1 When I did him at this advantage take, An ass's nole I fixed on his head.
2 Methinks I see these things with parted eye, When everything seems double.
3 When in that moment, so it came to pass, Titania wak'd, and straightway lov'd an ass.
4 He goes before me, and still dares me on; When I come where he calls, then he is gone.
5 When his love he doth espy, Let her shine as gloriously As the Venus of the sky.
6 I will hear that play; For never anything can be amiss When simpleness and duty tender it.
7 I was with Hercules and Cadmus once, When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear With hounds of Sparta.
8 When thou wak'st, Thou tak'st True delight In the sight Of thy former lady's eye.
9 Be it ounce, or cat, or bear, Pard, or boar with bristled hair, In thy eye that shall appear When thou wak'st, it is thy dear.
10 Churl, upon thy eyes I throw All the power this charm doth owe; When thou wak'st let love forbid Sleep his seat on thy eyelid.
11 When they next wake, all this derision Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision; And back to Athens shall the lovers wend, With league whose date till death shall never end.
12 Then I must be thy lady; but I know When thou hast stol'n away from fairyland, And in the shape of Corin sat all day Playing on pipes of corn, and versing love To amorous Phillida.
13 You, ladies, you, whose gentle hearts do fear The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor, May now, perchance, both quake and tremble here, When lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.
14 When I had at my pleasure taunted her, And she in mild terms begg'd my patience, I then did ask of her her changeling child; Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent To bear him to my bower in fairyland.
15 I jest to Oberon, and make him smile, When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile, Neighing in likeness of a filly foal; And sometime lurk I in a gossip's bowl In very likeness of a roasted crab, And, when she drinks, against her lips I bob, And on her withered dewlap pour the ale.
16 When they him spy, As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye, Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort, Rising and cawing at the gun's report, Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky, So at his sight away his fellows fly, And at our stamp, here o'er and o'er one falls; He murder cries, and help from Athens calls.