“Sleep thou, and I will stay here beside thee,” said the Queen. “Fairies, begone! Oh, how I love thee! how I doat on thee!”
Hermia had gone in search of Lysander, but instead of finding him she came across Demetrius. The latter immediately began, as usual, to declare his affection for her, and Hermia, as before, repulsed him angrily. Lysander was the only person in the world for whom she would ever care, though she could not imagine why he had deserted her so cruelly while she lay asleep.
“This is the Athenian whose eyes I told you to anoint,” said King Oberon to Puck, as they watched from the thicket all that was happening.
“This is the woman, but this is not the man,” said Puck.
“What have you done?” exclaimed the King. “You have made a great mistake. You have placed the love-juice on some true-love’s eyes, and now, because of your error, some true love has turned false, instead of some false love turning true! Go swifter than the wind through the wood, and look you find Helena of Athens. She is pale and ill with sighing for love. See that you bring her here by some device. I will charm the eyes of Demetrius before she appears.”
Puck flew off, eager to repair the mischief he had done, and King Oberon squeezed some of the magic juice on the eyes of Demetrius.
A few minutes later Helena arrived, but Lysander was with her. Now there were fresh troubles and perplexities. Demetrius woke up, and, as the first object on which his eyes fell was Helena, he immediately fell in love with her again, and forgot Hermia.
But Helena could not understand what all this meant. She thought both men were mocking and insulting her. She knew that only the day before Lysander had wanted to marry Hermia, and that Demetrius also wanted to marry Hermia, although he had originally paid court to herself. Why, then, did they both now pretend that it was herself that they wanted? She did not know it was all the fault of that mischievous little flower.
Hermia was as much distressed as Helena. It was perplexing enough when Demetrius suddenly turned round and would have nothing more to say to her; but what cut Hermia to the heart was that her own faithful Lysander should not only forsake her for Helena, but shower insults on her whenever she came near.