Music. Enter the Countrymen, Countrywomen and Jailer’s Daughter; they perform a morris dance.
Ladies, if we have been merry
And have pleased ye with a derry,
And a derry, and a down,
Say the schoolmaster’s no clown.
Duke, if we have pleased thee too
And have done as good boys should do,
Give us but a tree or twain
For a Maypole, and again,
Ere another year run out,
We’ll make thee laugh, and all this rout.
THESEUS.
Take twenty, Domine.—How does my sweetheart?
HIPPOLYTA.
Never so pleased, sir.
EMILIA.
’Twas an excellent dance,
And, for a preface, I never heard a better.
THESEUS.
Schoolmaster, I thank you.—One see’em all rewarded.
PIRITHOUS.
And here’s something to paint your pole withal.
[He gives money.]
THESEUS.
Now to our sports again.
SCHOOLMASTER.
May the stag thou hunt’st stand long,
And thy dogs be swift and strong;
May they kill him without lets,
And the ladies eat his dowsets.