Call here my varlet; I'll unarm again:

Why should I war without the walls of Troy,

That find such cruel battle here within?

Each Trojan that is master of his heart,

Let him to field; Troilus, alas! hath none.

Will this gear ne'er be mended?

The Greeks are strong and skilful to their strength,

Fierce to their skill and to their fierceness valiant;

But I am weaker than a woman's tear,

Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance,

Less valiant than the virgin in the night

And skilless as unpractised infancy.

Well, I have told you enough of this: for my part,

I'll not meddle nor make no further. He that will

have a cake out of the wheat must needs tarry the grinding.

Have I not tarried?

Ay, the grinding; but you must tarry

the bolting.

Have I not tarried?

Ay, the bolting, but you must tarry the leavening.

Still have I tarried.

Ay, to the leavening; but here's yet in the word

'hereafter' the kneading, the making of the cake, the

heating of the oven and the baking; nay, you must

stay the cooling too, or you may chance to burn your lips.

Patience herself, what goddess e'er she be,

Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do.

At Priam's royal table do I sit;

And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts,--

So, traitor! 'When she comes!' When is she thence?

Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw

her look, or any woman else.

I was about to tell thee:--when my heart,

As wedged with a sigh, would rive in twain,

Lest Hector or my father should perceive me,

I have, as when the sun doth light a storm,

Buried this sigh in wrinkle of a smile:

But sorrow, that is couch'd in seeming gladness,

Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness.

An her hair were not somewhat darker than Helen's--

well, go to--there were no more comparison between

the women: but, for my part, she is my kinswoman; I

would not, as they term it, praise her: but I would

somebody had heard her talk yesterday, as I did. I

will not dispraise your sister Cassandra's wit, but--

O Pandarus! I tell thee, Pandarus,--

When I do tell thee, there my hopes lie drown'd,

Reply not in how many fathoms deep

They lie indrench'd. I tell thee I am mad

In Cressid's love: thou answer'st 'she is fair;'

Pour'st in the open ulcer of my heart

Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice,

Handlest in thy discourse, O, that her hand,

In whose comparison all whites are ink,

Writing their own reproach, to whose soft seizure

The cygnet's down is harsh and spirit of sense

Hard as the palm of ploughman: this thou tell'st me,

As true thou tell'st me, when I say I love her;

But, saying thus, instead of oil and balm,

Thou lay'st in every gash that love hath given me

The knife that made it.

I speak no more than truth.

Thou dost not speak so much.

Faith, I'll not meddle in't. Let her be as she is:

if she be fair, 'tis the better for her; an she be

not, she has the mends in her own hands.

Good Pandarus, how now, Pandarus!

I have had my labour for my travail; ill-thought on of

her and ill-thought on of you; gone between and

between, but small thanks for my labour.

What, art thou angry, Pandarus? what, with me?

Because she's kin to me, therefore she's not so fair

as Helen: an she were not kin to me, she would be as

fair on Friday as Helen is on Sunday. But what care

I? I care not an she were a black-a-moor; 'tis all one to me.

Say I she is not fair?

I do not care whether you do or no. She's a fool to

stay behind her father; let her to the Greeks; and so

I'll tell her the next time I see her: for my part,

I'll meddle nor make no more i' the matter.

Pandarus,--

Not I.

Sweet Pandarus,--

Pray you, speak no more to me: I will leave all as I

found it, and there an end.

Exit PANDARUS. An alarum

Peace, you ungracious clamours! peace, rude sounds!

Fools on both sides! Helen must needs be fair,

When with your blood you daily paint her thus.

I cannot fight upon this argument;

It is too starved a subject for my sword.

But Pandarus,--O gods, how do you plague me!

I cannot come to Cressid but by Pandar;

And he's as tetchy to be woo'd to woo.

As she is stubborn-chaste against all suit.

Tell me, Apollo, for thy Daphne's love,

What Cressid is, what Pandar, and what we?

Her bed is India; there she lies, a pearl:

Between our Ilium and where she resides,

Let it be call'd the wild and wandering flood,

Ourself the merchant, and this sailing Pandar

Our doubtful hope, our convoy and our bark.

Alarum. Enter AENEAS

How now, Prince Troilus! wherefore not afield?

Because not there: this woman's answer sorts,

For womanish it is to be from thence.

What news, AEneas, from the field to-day?

That Paris is returned home and hurt.

By whom, AEneas?

Troilus, by Menelaus.

Let Paris bleed; 'tis but a scar to scorn;

Paris is gored with Menelaus' horn.

Alarum

Hark, what good sport is out of town to-day!

Better at home, if 'would I might' were 'may.'

But to the sport abroad: are you bound thither?

In all swift haste.

Come, go we then together.

Exeunt

Who were those went by?

Queen Hecuba and Helen.

And whither go they?

Up to the eastern tower,

Whose height commands as subject all the vale,

To see the battle. Hector, whose patience

Is, as a virtue, fix'd, to-day was moved:

He chid Andromache and struck his armourer,

And, like as there were husbandry in war,

Before the sun rose he was harness'd light,

And to the field goes he; where every flower

Did, as a prophet, weep what it foresaw

In Hector's wrath.

What was his cause of anger?

The noise goes, this: there is among the Greeks

A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector;

They call him Ajax.

Good; and what of him?

They say he is a very man per se,

And stands alone.

So do all men, unless they are drunk, sick, or have no legs.

This man, lady, hath robbed many beasts of their

particular additions; he is as valiant as the lion,

churlish as the bear, slow as the elephant: a man

into whom nature hath so crowded humours that his

valour is crushed into folly, his folly sauced with

discretion: there is no man hath a virtue that he

hath not a glimpse of, nor any man an attaint but he

carries some stain of it: he is melancholy without

cause, and merry against the hair: he hath the

joints of every thing, but everything so out of joint

that he is a gouty Briareus, many hands and no use,

or purblind Argus, all eyes and no sight.

But how should this man, that makes

me smile, make Hector angry?

They say he yesterday coped Hector in the battle and

struck him down, the disdain and shame whereof hath

ever since kept Hector fasting and waking.

Who comes here?

Madam, your uncle Pandarus.

Enter PANDARUS

Hector's a gallant man.

As may be in the world, lady.

What's that? what's that?

Good morrow, uncle Pandarus.

Good morrow, cousin Cressid: what do you talk of?

Good morrow, Alexander. How do you, cousin? When

were you at Ilium?

This morning, uncle.

What were you talking of when I came? Was Hector

armed and gone ere ye came to Ilium? Helen was not

up, was she?

Hector was gone, but Helen was not up.

Even so: Hector was stirring early.

That were we talking of, and of his anger.

Was he angry?

So he says here.

True, he was so: I know the cause too: he'll lay

about him to-day, I can tell them that: and there's

Troilus will not come far behind him: let them take

heed of Troilus, I can tell them that too.

What, is he angry too?

Who, Troilus? Troilus is the better man of the two.

O Jupiter! there's no comparison.

What, not between Troilus and Hector? Do you know a

man if you see him?

Ay, if I ever saw him before and knew him.

Well, I say Troilus is Troilus.

Then you say as I say; for, I am sure, he is not Hector.

No, nor Hector is not Troilus in some degrees.

'Tis just to each of them; he is himself.

Himself! Alas, poor Troilus! I would he were.

So he is.

Condition, I had gone barefoot to India.

He is not Hector.

Himself! no, he's not himself: would a' were

himself! Well, the gods are above; time must friend

or end: well, Troilus, well: I would my heart were

in her body. No, Hector is not a better man than Troilus.

Excuse me.

He is elder.

Pardon me, pardon me.

Th' other's not come to't; you shall tell me another

tale, when th' other's come to't. Hector shall not

have his wit this year.

He shall not need it, if he have his own.

Nor his qualities.

No matter.

Nor his beauty.

'Twould not become him; his own's better.

You have no judgment, niece: Helen

herself swore th' other day, that Troilus, for

a brown favour--for so 'tis, I must confess,--

not brown neither,--

No, but brown.

'Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown.

To say the truth, true and not true.

She praised his complexion above Paris.

Why, Paris hath colour enough.

So he has.

Then Troilus should have too much: if she praised

him above, his complexion is higher than his; he

having colour enough, and the other higher, is too

flaming a praise for a good complexion. I had as

lief Helen's golden tongue had commended Troilus for

a copper nose.

I swear to you. I think Helen loves him better than Paris.

Then she's a merry Greek indeed.

Nay, I am sure she does. She came to him th' other

day into the compassed window,--and, you know, he

has not past three or four hairs on his chin,--

Indeed, a tapster's arithmetic may soon bring his

particulars therein to a total.

Why, he is very young: and yet will he, within

three pound, lift as much as his brother Hector.

Is he so young a man and so old a lifter?

But to prove to you that Helen loves him: she came

and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin--

Juno have mercy! how came it cloven?

Why, you know 'tis dimpled: I think his smiling

becomes him better than any man in all Phrygia.

O, he smiles valiantly.

Does he not?

O yes, an 'twere a cloud in autumn.

Why, go to, then: but to prove to you that Helen

loves Troilus,--

Troilus will stand to the proof, if you'll

prove it so.

Troilus! why, he esteems her no more than I esteem

an addle egg.

If you love an addle egg as well as you love an idle

head, you would eat chickens i' the shell.

I cannot choose but laugh, to think how she tickled

his chin: indeed, she has a marvellous white hand, I

must needs confess,--

Without the rack.

And she takes upon her to spy a white hair on his chin.

Alas, poor chin! many a wart is richer.

But there was such laughing! Queen Hecuba laughed

that her eyes ran o'er.

With mill-stones.

And Cassandra laughed.

But there was more temperate fire under the pot of

her eyes: did her eyes run o'er too?

And Hector laughed.

At what was all this laughing?

Marry, at the white hair that Helen spied on Troilus' chin.

An't had been a green hair, I should have laughed

too.

They laughed not so much at the hair as at his pretty answer.

What was his answer?

Quoth she, 'Here's but two and fifty hairs on your

chin, and one of them is white.

This is her question.

That's true; make no question of that. 'Two and

fifty hairs' quoth he, 'and one white: that white

hair is my father, and all the rest are his sons.'

'Jupiter!' quoth she, 'which of these hairs is Paris,

my husband? 'The forked one,' quoth he, 'pluck't

out, and give it him.' But there was such laughing!

and Helen so blushed, an Paris so chafed, and all the

rest so laughed, that it passed.

So let it now; for it has been while going by.

Well, cousin. I told you a thing yesterday; think on't.

So I do.

I'll be sworn 'tis true; he will weep you, an 'twere

a man born in April.

And I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a nettle

against May.

A retreat sounded

Hark! they are coming from the field: shall we

stand up here, and see them as they pass toward

Ilium? good niece, do, sweet niece Cressida.

At your pleasure.

Here, here, here's an excellent place; here we may

see most bravely: I'll tell you them all by their

names as they pass by; but mark Troilus above the rest.

Speak not so loud.

AENEAS passes

That's AEneas: is not that a brave man? he's one of

the flowers of Troy, I can tell you: but mark

Troilus; you shall see anon.

ANTENOR passes

Who's that?

That's Antenor: he has a shrewd wit, I can tell you;

and he's a man good enough, he's one o' the soundest

judgments in whosoever, and a proper man of person.

When comes Troilus? I'll show you Troilus anon: if

he see me, you shall see him nod at me.

Will he give you the nod?

You shall see.

If he do, the rich shall have more.

HECTOR passes

That's Hector, that, that, look you, that; there's a

fellow! Go thy way, Hector! There's a brave man,

niece. O brave Hector! Look how he looks! there's

a countenance! is't not a brave man?

O, a brave man!

Is a' not? it does a man's heart good. Look you

what hacks are on his helmet! look you yonder, do

you see? look you there: there's no jesting;

there's laying on, take't off who will, as they say:

there be hacks!

Be those with swords?

Swords! any thing, he cares not; an the devil come

to him, it's all one: by God's lid, it does one's

heart good. Yonder comes Paris, yonder comes Paris.

PARIS passes

Look ye yonder, niece; is't not a gallant man too,

is't not? Why, this is brave now. Who said he came

hurt home to-day? he's not hurt: why, this will do

Helen's heart good now, ha! Would I could see

Troilus now! You shall see Troilus anon.

HELENUS passes

Who's that?

That's Helenus. I marvel where Troilus is. That's

Helenus. I think he went not forth to-day. That's Helenus.

Can Helenus fight, uncle?

Helenus? no. Yes, he'll fight indifferent well. I

marvel where Troilus is. Hark! do you not hear the

people cry 'Troilus'? Helenus is a priest.

What sneaking fellow comes yonder?

TROILUS passes

Where? yonder? that's Deiphobus. 'Tis Troilus!

there's a man, niece! Hem! Brave Troilus! the

prince of chivalry!

Peace, for shame, peace!

Mark him; note him. O brave Troilus! Look well upon

him, niece: look you how his sword is bloodied, and

his helm more hacked than Hector's, and how he looks,

and how he goes! O admirable youth! he ne'er saw

three and twenty. Go thy way, Troilus, go thy way!

Had I a sister were a grace, or a daughter a goddess,

he should take his choice. O admirable man! Paris?

Paris is dirt to him; and, I warrant, Helen, to

change, would give an eye to boot.

Here come more.

Forces pass

Asses, fools, dolts! chaff and bran, chaff and bran!

porridge after meat! I could live and die i' the

eyes of Troilus. Ne'er look, ne'er look: the eagles

are gone: crows and daws, crows and daws! I had

rather be such a man as Troilus than Agamemnon and

all Greece.

There is among the Greeks Achilles, a better man than Troilus.

Achilles! a drayman, a porter, a very camel.

Well, well.

'Well, well!' why, have you any discretion? have

you any eyes? Do you know what a man is? Is not

birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood,

learning, gentleness, virtue, youth, liberality,

and such like, the spice and salt that season a man?

Ay, a minced man: and then to be baked with no date

in the pie, for then the man's date's out.

You are such a woman! one knows not at what ward you

lie.

Upon my back, to defend my belly; upon my wit, to

defend my wiles; upon my secrecy, to defend mine

honesty; my mask, to defend my beauty; and you, to

defend all these: and at all these wards I lie, at a

thousand watches.

Say one of your watches.

Nay, I'll watch you for that; and that's one of the

chiefest of them too: if I cannot ward what I would

not have hit, I can watch you for telling how I took

the blow; unless it swell past hiding, and then it's

past watching.

You are such another!

Enter Troilus's Boy

Sir, my lord would instantly speak with you.

Where?

At your own house; there he unarms him.

Good boy, tell him I come.

Exit boy

I doubt he be hurt. Fare ye well, good niece.

Adieu, uncle.

I'll be with you, niece, by and by.

To bring, uncle?

Ay, a token from Troilus.

By the same token, you are a bawd.

Exit PANDARUS

Words, vows, gifts, tears, and love's full sacrifice,

He offers in another's enterprise;

But more in Troilus thousand fold I see

Than in the glass of Pandar's praise may be;

Yet hold I off. Women are angels, wooing:

Things won are done; joy's soul lies in the doing.

That she beloved knows nought that knows not this:

Men prize the thing ungain'd more than it is:

That she was never yet that ever knew

Love got so sweet as when desire did sue.

Therefore this maxim out of love I teach:

Achievement is command; ungain'd, beseech:

Then though my heart's content firm love doth bear,

Nothing of that shall from mine eyes appear.

Exeunt

Princes,

What grief hath set the jaundice on your cheeks?

The ample proposition that hope makes

In all designs begun on earth below

Fails in the promised largeness: cheques and disasters

Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd,

As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap,

Infect the sound pine and divert his grain

Tortive and errant from his course of growth.

Nor, princes, is it matter new to us

That we come short of our suppose so far

That after seven years' siege yet Troy walls stand;

Sith every action that hath gone before,

Whereof we have record, trial did draw

Bias and thwart, not answering the aim,

And that unbodied figure of the thought

That gave't surmised shape. Why then, you princes,

Do you with cheeks abash'd behold our works,

And call them shames? which are indeed nought else

But the protractive trials of great Jove

To find persistive constancy in men:

The fineness of which metal is not found

In fortune's love; for then the bold and coward,

The wise and fool, the artist and unread,

The hard and soft seem all affined and kin:

But, in the wind and tempest of her frown,

Distinction, with a broad and powerful fan,

Puffing at all, winnows the light away;

And what hath mass or matter, by itself

Lies rich in virtue and unmingled.

With due observance of thy godlike seat,

Great Agamemnon, Nestor shall apply

Thy latest words. In the reproof of chance

Lies the true proof of men: the sea being smooth,

How many shallow bauble boats dare sail

Upon her patient breast, making their way

With those of nobler bulk!

But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage

The gentle Thetis, and anon behold

The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut,

Bounding between the two moist elements,

Like Perseus' horse: where's then the saucy boat

Whose weak untimber'd sides but even now

Co-rivall'd greatness? Either to harbour fled,

Or made a toast for Neptune. Even so

Doth valour's show and valour's worth divide

In storms of fortune; for in her ray and brightness

The herd hath more annoyance by the breeze

Than by the tiger; but when the splitting wind

Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks,

And flies fled under shade, why, then the thing of courage

As roused with rage with rage doth sympathize,

And with an accent tuned in selfsame key

Retorts to chiding fortune.

Agamemnon,

Thou great commander, nerve and bone of Greece,

Heart of our numbers, soul and only spirit.

In whom the tempers and the minds of all

Should be shut up, hear what Ulysses speaks.

Besides the applause and approbation To which,

To AGAMEMNON

most mighty for thy place and sway,

To NESTOR

And thou most reverend for thy stretch'd-out life

I give to both your speeches, which were such

As Agamemnon and the hand of Greece

Should hold up high in brass, and such again

As venerable Nestor, hatch'd in silver,

Should with a bond of air, strong as the axle-tree

On which heaven rides, knit all the Greekish ears

To his experienced tongue, yet let it please both,

Thou great, and wise, to hear Ulysses speak.

Speak, prince of Ithaca; and be't of less expect

That matter needless, of importless burden,

Divide thy lips, than we are confident,

When rank Thersites opes his mastic jaws,

We shall hear music, wit and oracle.

Troy, yet upon his basis, had been down,

And the great Hector's sword had lack'd a master,

But for these instances.

The specialty of rule hath been neglected:

And, look, how many Grecian tents do stand

Hollow upon this plain, so many hollow factions.

When that the general is not like the hive

To whom the foragers shall all repair,

What honey is expected? Degree being vizarded,

The unworthiest shows as fairly in the mask.

The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre

Observe degree, priority and place,

Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,

Office and custom, in all line of order;

And therefore is the glorious planet Sol

In noble eminence enthroned and sphered

Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye

Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,

And posts, like the commandment of a king,

Sans cheque to good and bad: but when the planets

In evil mixture to disorder wander,

What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!

What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!

Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, horrors,

Divert and crack, rend and deracinate

The unity and married calm of states

Quite from their fixure! O, when degree is shaked,

Which is the ladder to all high designs,

Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,

Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,

Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,

The primogenitive and due of birth,

Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,

But by degree, stand in authentic place?

Take but degree away, untune that string,

And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets

In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters

Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores

And make a sop of all this solid globe:

Strength should be lord of imbecility,

And the rude son should strike his father dead:

Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,

Between whose endless jar justice resides,

Should lose their names, and so should justice too.

Then every thing includes itself in power,

Power into will, will into appetite;

And appetite, an universal wolf,

So doubly seconded with will and power,

Must make perforce an universal prey,

And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,

This chaos, when degree is suffocate,

Follows the choking.

And this neglection of degree it is

That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose

It hath to climb. The general's disdain'd

By him one step below, he by the next,

That next by him beneath; so every step,

Exampled by the first pace that is sick

Of his superior, grows to an envious fever

Of pale and bloodless emulation:

And 'tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,

Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,

Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.

Most wisely hath Ulysses here discover'd

The fever whereof all our power is sick.

The nature of the sickness found, Ulysses,

What is the remedy?

The great Achilles, whom opinion crowns

The sinew and the forehand of our host,

Having his ear full of his airy fame,

Grows dainty of his worth, and in his tent

Lies mocking our designs: with him Patroclus

Upon a lazy bed the livelong day

Breaks scurril jests;

And with ridiculous and awkward action,

Which, slanderer, he imitation calls,

He pageants us. Sometime, great Agamemnon,

Thy topless deputation he puts on,

And, like a strutting player, whose conceit

Lies in his hamstring, and doth think it rich

To hear the wooden dialogue and sound

'Twixt his stretch'd footing and the scaffoldage,--

Such to-be-pitied and o'er-wrested seeming

He acts thy greatness in: and when he speaks,

'Tis like a chime a-mending; with terms unsquared,

Which, from the tongue of roaring Typhon dropp'd

Would seem hyperboles. At this fusty stuff

The large Achilles, on his press'd bed lolling,

From his deep chest laughs out a loud applause;

Cries 'Excellent! 'tis Agamemnon just.

Now play me Nestor; hem, and stroke thy beard,

As he being drest to some oration.'

That's done, as near as the extremest ends

Of parallels, as like as Vulcan and his wife:

Yet god Achilles still cries 'Excellent!

'Tis Nestor right. Now play him me, Patroclus,

Arming to answer in a night alarm.'

And then, forsooth, the faint defects of age

Must be the scene of mirth; to cough and spit,

And, with a palsy-fumbling on his gorget,

Shake in and out the rivet: and at this sport

Sir Valour dies; cries 'O, enough, Patroclus;

Or give me ribs of steel! I shall split all

In pleasure of my spleen.' And in this fashion,

All our abilities, gifts, natures, shapes,

Severals and generals of grace exact,

Achievements, plots, orders, preventions,

Excitements to the field, or speech for truce,

Success or loss, what is or is not, serves

As stuff for these two to make paradoxes.

And in the imitation of these twain--

Who, as Ulysses says, opinion crowns

With an imperial voice--many are infect.

Ajax is grown self-will'd, and bears his head

In such a rein, in full as proud a place

As broad Achilles; keeps his tent like him;

Makes factious feasts; rails on our state of war,

Bold as an oracle, and sets Thersites,

A slave whose gall coins slanders like a mint,

To match us in comparisons with dirt,

To weaken and discredit our exposure,

How rank soever rounded in with danger.

They tax our policy, and call it cowardice,

Count wisdom as no member of the war,

Forestall prescience, and esteem no act

But that of hand: the still and mental parts,

That do contrive how many hands shall strike,

When fitness calls them on, and know by measure

Of their observant toil the enemies' weight,--

Why, this hath not a finger's dignity:

They call this bed-work, mappery, closet-war;

So that the ram that batters down the wall,

For the great swing and rudeness of his poise,

They place before his hand that made the engine,

Or those that with the fineness of their souls

By reason guide his execution.

Let this be granted, and Achilles' horse

Makes many Thetis' sons.

A tucket

What trumpet? look, Menelaus.

From Troy.

Enter AENEAS

What would you 'fore our tent?

Is this great Agamemnon's tent, I pray you?

Even this.

May one, that is a herald and a prince,

Do a fair message to his kingly ears?

With surety stronger than Achilles' arm

'Fore all the Greekish heads, which with one voice

Call Agamemnon head and general.

Fair leave and large security. How may

A stranger to those most imperial looks

Know them from eyes of other mortals?

How!

Ay;

I ask, that I might waken reverence,

And bid the cheek be ready with a blush

Modest as morning when she coldly eyes

The youthful Phoebus:

Which is that god in office, guiding men?

Which is the high and mighty Agamemnon?

This Trojan scorns us; or the men of Troy

Are ceremonious courtiers.

Courtiers as free, as debonair, unarm'd,

As bending angels; that's their fame in peace:

But when they would seem soldiers, they have galls,

Good arms, strong joints, true swords; and,

Jove's accord,

Nothing so full of heart. But peace, AEneas,

Peace, Trojan; lay thy finger on thy lips!

The worthiness of praise distains his worth,

If that the praised himself bring the praise forth:

But what the repining enemy commends,

That breath fame blows; that praise, sole sure,

transcends.

Sir, you of Troy, call you yourself AEneas?

Ay, Greek, that is my name.

What's your affair I pray you?

Sir, pardon; 'tis for Agamemnon's ears.

He hears naught privately that comes from Troy.

Nor I from Troy come not to whisper him:

I bring a trumpet to awake his ear,

To set his sense on the attentive bent,

And then to speak.

Speak frankly as the wind;

It is not Agamemnon's sleeping hour:

That thou shalt know. Trojan, he is awake,

He tells thee so himself.

Trumpet, blow loud,

Send thy brass voice through all these lazy tents;

And every Greek of mettle, let him know,

What Troy means fairly shall be spoke aloud.

Trumpet sounds

We have, great Agamemnon, here in Troy

A prince call'd Hector,--Priam is his father,--

Who in this dull and long-continued truce

Is rusty grown: he bade me take a trumpet,

And to this purpose speak. Kings, princes, lords!

If there be one among the fair'st of Greece

That holds his honour higher than his ease,

That seeks his praise more than he fears his peril,

That knows his valour, and knows not his fear,

That loves his mistress more than in confession,

With truant vows to her own lips he loves,

And dare avow her beauty and her worth

In other arms than hers,--to him this challenge.

Hector, in view of Trojans and of Greeks,

Shall make it good, or do his best to do it,

He hath a lady, wiser, fairer, truer,

Than ever Greek did compass in his arms,

And will to-morrow with his trumpet call

Midway between your tents and walls of Troy,

To rouse a Grecian that is true in love:

If any come, Hector shall honour him;

If none, he'll say in Troy when he retires,

The Grecian dames are sunburnt and not worth

The splinter of a lance. Even so much.

This shall be told our lovers, Lord AEneas;

If none of them have soul in such a kind,

We left them all at home: but we are soldiers;

And may that soldier a mere recreant prove,

That means not, hath not, or is not in love!

If then one is, or hath, or means to be,

That one meets Hector; if none else, I am he.

Tell him of Nestor, one that was a man

When Hector's grandsire suck'd: he is old now;

But if there be not in our Grecian host

One noble man that hath one spark of fire,

To answer for his love, tell him from me

I'll hide my silver beard in a gold beaver

And in my vantbrace put this wither'd brawn,

And meeting him will tell him that my lady

Was fairer than his grandam and as chaste

As may be in the world: his youth in flood,

I'll prove this truth with my three drops of blood.

Now heavens forbid such scarcity of youth!

Amen.

Fair Lord AEneas, let me touch your hand;

To our pavilion shall I lead you, sir.

Achilles shall have word of this intent;

So shall each lord of Greece, from tent to tent:

Yourself shall feast with us before you go

And find the welcome of a noble foe.

Exeunt all but ULYSSES and NESTOR

Nestor!

What says Ulysses?

I have a young conception in my brain;

Be you my time to bring it to some shape.

What is't?

This 'tis:

Blunt wedges rive hard knots: the seeded pride

That hath to this maturity blown up

In rank Achilles must or now be cropp'd,

Or, shedding, breed a nursery of like evil,

To overbulk us all.

Well, and how?

This challenge that the gallant Hector sends,

However it is spread in general name,

Relates in purpose only to Achilles.

The purpose is perspicuous even as substance,

Whose grossness little characters sum up:

And, in the publication, make no strain,

But that Achilles, were his brain as barren

As banks of Libya,--though, Apollo knows,

'Tis dry enough,--will, with great speed of judgment,

Ay, with celerity, find Hector's purpose

Pointing on him.

And wake him to the answer, think you?

Yes, 'tis most meet: whom may you else oppose,

That can from Hector bring his honour off,

If not Achilles? Though't be a sportful combat,

Yet in the trial much opinion dwells;

For here the Trojans taste our dear'st repute

With their finest palate: and trust to me, Ulysses,

Our imputation shall be oddly poised

In this wild action; for the success,

Although particular, shall give a scantling

Of good or bad unto the general;

And in such indexes, although small pricks

To their subsequent volumes, there is seen

The baby figure of the giant mass

Of things to come at large. It is supposed

He that meets Hector issues from our choice

And choice, being mutual act of all our souls,

Makes merit her election, and doth boil,

As 'twere from us all, a man distill'd

Out of our virtues; who miscarrying,

What heart receives from hence the conquering part,

To steel a strong opinion to themselves?

Which entertain'd, limbs are his instruments,

In no less working than are swords and bows

Directive by the limbs.

Give pardon to my speech:

Therefore 'tis meet Achilles meet not Hector.

Let us, like merchants, show our foulest wares,

And think, perchance, they'll sell; if not,

The lustre of the better yet to show,

Shall show the better. Do not consent

That ever Hector and Achilles meet;

For both our honour and our shame in this

Are dogg'd with two strange followers.

I see them not with my old eyes: what are they?

What glory our Achilles shares from Hector,

Were he not proud, we all should share with him:

But he already is too insolent;

A nd we were better parch in Afric sun

Than in the pride and salt scorn of his eyes,

Should he 'scape Hector fair: if he were foil'd,

Why then, we did our main opinion crush

In taint of our best man. No, make a lottery;

And, by device, let blockish Ajax draw

The sort to fight with Hector: among ourselves

Give him allowance for the better man;

For that will physic the great Myrmidon

Who broils in loud applause, and make him fall

His crest that prouder than blue Iris bends.

If the dull brainless Ajax come safe off,

We'll dress him up in voices: if he fail,

Yet go we under our opinion still

That we have better men. But, hit or miss,

Our project's life this shape of sense assumes:

Ajax employ'd plucks down Achilles' plumes.

Thersites!

Agamemnon, how if he had boils? full, all over,

generally?

Thersites!

And those boils did run? say so: did not the

general run then? were not that a botchy core?

Dog!

Then would come some matter from him; I see none now.

Thou bitch-wolf's son, canst thou not hear?

Beating him

Feel, then.

The plague of Greece upon thee, thou mongrel

beef-witted lord!

Speak then, thou vinewedst leaven, speak: I will

beat thee into handsomeness.

I shall sooner rail thee into wit and holiness: but,

I think, thy horse will sooner con an oration than

thou learn a prayer without book. Thou canst strike,

canst thou? a red murrain o' thy jade's tricks!

Toadstool, learn me the proclamation.

Dost thou think I have no sense, thou strikest me thus?

The proclamation!

Thou art proclaimed a fool, I think.

Do not, porpentine, do not: my fingers itch.

I would thou didst itch from head to foot and I had

the scratching of thee; I would make thee the

loathsomest scab in Greece. When thou art forth in

the incursions, thou strikest as slow as another.

I say, the proclamation!

Thou grumblest and railest every hour on Achilles,

and thou art as full of envy at his greatness as

Cerberus is at Proserpine's beauty, ay, that thou

barkest at him.

Mistress Thersites!

Thou shouldest strike him.

Cobloaf!

He would pun thee into shivers with his fist, as a

sailor breaks a biscuit.

[Beating him] You whoreson cur!

Do, do.

Thou stool for a witch!

Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! thou hast no

more brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinego

may tutor thee: thou scurvy-valiant ass! thou art

here but to thrash Trojans; and thou art bought and

sold among those of any wit, like a barbarian slave.

If thou use to beat me, I will begin at thy heel, and

tell what thou art by inches, thou thing of no

bowels, thou!

You dog!

You scurvy lord!

[Beating him] You cur!

Mars his idiot! do, rudeness; do, camel; do, do.

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS

Why, how now, Ajax! wherefore do you thus? How now,

Thersites! what's the matter, man?

You see him there, do you?

Ay; what's the matter?

Nay, look upon him.

So I do: what's the matter?

Nay, but regard him well.

'Well!' why, I do so.

But yet you look not well upon him; for whosoever you

take him to be, he is Ajax.

I know that, fool.

Ay, but that fool knows not himself.

Therefore I beat thee.

Lo, lo, lo, lo, what modicums of wit he utters! his

evasions have ears thus long. I have bobbed his

brain more than he has beat my bones: I will buy

nine sparrows for a penny, and his pia mater is not

worth the nineth part of a sparrow. This lord,

Achilles, Ajax, who wears his wit in his belly and

his guts in his head, I'll tell you what I say of

him.

What?

I say, this Ajax--

Ajax offers to beat him

Nay, good Ajax.

Has not so much wit--

Nay, I must hold you.

As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, for whom he

comes to fight.

Peace, fool!

I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will

not: he there: that he: look you there.

O thou damned cur! I shall--

Will you set your wit to a fool's?

No, I warrant you; for a fools will shame it.

Good words, Thersites.

What's the quarrel?

I bade the vile owl go learn me the tenor of the

proclamation, and he rails upon me.

I serve thee not.

Well, go to, go to.

I serve here voluntarily.

Your last service was sufferance, 'twas not

voluntary: no man is beaten voluntary: Ajax was

here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.

E'en so; a great deal of your wit, too, lies in your

sinews, or else there be liars. Hector have a great

catch, if he knock out either of your brains: a'

were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

What, with me too, Thersites?

There's Ulysses and old Nestor, whose wit was mouldy

ere your grandsires had nails on their toes, yoke you

like draught-oxen and make you plough up the wars.

What, what?

Yes, good sooth: to, Achilles! to, Ajax! to!

I shall cut out your tongue.

'Tis no matter! I shall speak as much as thou

afterwards.

No more words, Thersites; peace!

I will hold my peace when Achilles' brach bids me, shall I?

There's for you, Patroclus.

I will see you hanged, like clotpoles, ere I come

any more to your tents: I will keep where there is

wit stirring and leave the faction of fools.

Exit

A good riddance.

Marry, this, sir, is proclaim'd through all our host:

That Hector, by the fifth hour of the sun,

Will with a trumpet 'twixt our tents and Troy

To-morrow morning call some knight to arms

That hath a stomach; and such a one that dare

Maintain--I know not what: 'tis trash. Farewell.

Farewell. Who shall answer him?

I know not: 'tis put to lottery; otherwise

He knew his man.

O, meaning you. I will go learn more of it.

Exeunt

After so many hours, lives, speeches spent,

Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks:

'Deliver Helen, and all damage else--

As honour, loss of time, travail, expense,

Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consumed

In hot digestion of this cormorant war--

Shall be struck off.' Hector, what say you to't?

Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I

As far as toucheth my particular,

Yet, dread Priam,

There is no lady of more softer bowels,

More spongy to suck in the sense of fear,

More ready to cry out 'Who knows what follows?'

Than Hector is: the wound of peace is surety,

Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd

The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches

To the bottom of the worst. Let Helen go:

Since the first sword was drawn about this question,

Every tithe soul, 'mongst many thousand dismes,

Hath been as dear as Helen; I mean, of ours:

If we have lost so many tenths of ours,

To guard a thing not ours nor worth to us,

Had it our name, the value of one ten,

What merit's in that reason which denies

The yielding of her up?

Fie, fie, my brother!

Weigh you the worth and honour of a king

So great as our dread father in a scale

Of common ounces? will you with counters sum

The past proportion of his infinite?

And buckle in a waist most fathomless

With spans and inches so diminutive

As fears and reasons? fie, for godly shame!

No marvel, though you bite so sharp at reasons,

You are so empty of them. Should not our father

Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons,

Because your speech hath none that tells him so?

You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest;

You fur your gloves with reason. Here are

your reasons:

You know an enemy intends you harm;

You know a sword employ'd is perilous,

And reason flies the object of all harm:

Who marvels then, when Helenus beholds

A Grecian and his sword, if he do set

The very wings of reason to his heels

And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,

Or like a star disorb'd? Nay, if we talk of reason,

Let's shut our gates and sleep: manhood and honour

Should have hare-hearts, would they but fat

their thoughts

With this cramm'd reason: reason and respect

Make livers pale and lustihood deject.

Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost

The holding.

What is aught, but as 'tis valued?

But value dwells not in particular will;

It holds his estimate and dignity

As well wherein 'tis precious of itself

As in the prizer: 'tis mad idolatry

To make the service greater than the god

And the will dotes that is attributive

To what infectiously itself affects,

Without some image of the affected merit.

I take to-day a wife, and my election

Is led on in the conduct of my will;

My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears,

Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores

Of will and judgment: how may I avoid,

Although my will distaste what it elected,

The wife I chose? there can be no evasion

To blench from this and to stand firm by honour:

We turn not back the silks upon the merchant,

When we have soil'd them, nor the remainder viands

We do not throw in unrespective sieve,

Because we now are full. It was thought meet

Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks:

Your breath of full consent bellied his sails;

The seas and winds, old wranglers, took a truce

And did him service: he touch'd the ports desired,

And for an old aunt whom the Greeks held captive,

He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness

Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes stale the morning.

Why keep we her? the Grecians keep our aunt:

Is she worth keeping? why, she is a pearl,

Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships,

And turn'd crown'd kings to merchants.

If you'll avouch 'twas wisdom Paris went--

As you must needs, for you all cried 'Go, go,'--

If you'll confess he brought home noble prize--

As you must needs, for you all clapp'd your hands

And cried 'Inestimable!'--why do you now

The issue of your proper wisdoms rate,

And do a deed that fortune never did,

Beggar the estimation which you prized

Richer than sea and land? O, theft most base,

That we have stol'n what we do fear to keep!

But, thieves, unworthy of a thing so stol'n,

That in their country did them that disgrace,

We fear to warrant in our native place!

[Within] Cry, Trojans, cry!

What noise? what shriek is this?

'Tis our mad sister, I do know her voice.

[Within] Cry, Trojans!

It is Cassandra.

Enter CASSANDRA, raving

Cry, Trojans, cry! lend me ten thousand eyes,

And I will fill them with prophetic tears.

Peace, sister, peace!

Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled eld,

Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry,

Add to my clamours! let us pay betimes

A moiety of that mass of moan to come.

Cry, Trojans, cry! practise your eyes with tears!

Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand;

Our firebrand brother, Paris, burns us all.

Cry, Trojans, cry! a Helen and a woe:

Cry, cry! Troy burns, or else let Helen go.

Exit

Now, youthful Troilus, do not these high strains

Of divination in our sister work

Some touches of remorse? or is your blood

So madly hot that no discourse of reason,

Nor fear of bad success in a bad cause,

Can qualify the same?

Why, brother Hector,

We may not think the justness of each act

Such and no other than event doth form it,

Nor once deject the courage of our minds,

Because Cassandra's mad: her brain-sick raptures

Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel

Which hath our several honours all engaged

To make it gracious. For my private part,

I am no more touch'd than all Priam's sons:

And Jove forbid there should be done amongst us

Such things as might offend the weakest spleen

To fight for and maintain!

Else might the world convince of levity

As well my undertakings as your counsels:

But I attest the gods, your full consent

Gave wings to my propension and cut off

All fears attending on so dire a project.

For what, alas, can these my single arms?

What Propugnation is in one man's valour,

To stand the push and enmity of those

This quarrel would excite? Yet, I protest,

Were I alone to pass the difficulties

And had as ample power as I have will,

Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done,

Nor faint in the pursuit.

Paris, you speak

Like one besotted on your sweet delights:

You have the honey still, but these the gall;

So to be valiant is no praise at all.

Sir, I propose not merely to myself

The pleasures such a beauty brings with it;

But I would have the soil of her fair rape

Wiped off, in honourable keeping her.

What treason were it to the ransack'd queen,

Disgrace to your great worths and shame to me,

Now to deliver her possession up

On terms of base compulsion! Can it be

That so degenerate a strain as this

Should once set footing in your generous bosoms?

There's not the meanest spirit on our party

Without a heart to dare or sword to draw

When Helen is defended, nor none so noble

Whose life were ill bestow'd or death unfamed

Where Helen is the subject; then, I say,

Well may we fight for her whom, we know well,

The world's large spaces cannot parallel.

Paris and Troilus, you have both said well,

And on the cause and question now in hand

Have glozed, but superficially: not much

Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought

Unfit to hear moral philosophy:

The reasons you allege do more conduce

To the hot passion of distemper'd blood

Than to make up a free determination

'Twixt right and wrong, for pleasure and revenge

Have ears more deaf than adders to the voice

Of any true decision. Nature craves

All dues be render'd to their owners: now,

What nearer debt in all humanity

Than wife is to the husband? If this law

Of nature be corrupted through affection,

And that great minds, of partial indulgence

To their benumbed wills, resist the same,

There is a law in each well-order'd nation

To curb those raging appetites that are

Most disobedient and refractory.

If Helen then be wife to Sparta's king,

As it is known she is, these moral laws

Of nature and of nations speak aloud

To have her back return'd: thus to persist

In doing wrong extenuates not wrong,

But makes it much more heavy. Hector's opinion

Is this in way of truth; yet ne'ertheless,

My spritely brethren, I propend to you

In resolution to keep Helen still,

For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependance

Upon our joint and several dignities.

Why, there you touch'd the life of our design:

Were it not glory that we more affected

Than the performance of our heaving spleens,

I would not wish a drop of Trojan blood

Spent more in her defence. But, worthy Hector,

She is a theme of honour and renown,

A spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds,

Whose present courage may beat down our foes,

And fame in time to come canonize us;

For, I presume, brave Hector would not lose

So rich advantage of a promised glory

As smiles upon the forehead of this action

For the wide world's revenue.

I am yours,

You valiant offspring of great Priamus.

I have a roisting challenge sent amongst

The dun and factious nobles of the Greeks

Will strike amazement to their drowsy spirits:

I was advertised their great general slept,

Whilst emulation in the army crept:

This, I presume, will wake him.

Exeunt

How now, Thersites! what lost in the labyrinth of

thy fury! Shall the elephant Ajax carry it thus? He

beats me, and I rail at him: O, worthy satisfaction!

would it were otherwise; that I could beat him,

whilst he railed at me. 'Sfoot, I'll learn to

conjure and raise devils, but I'll see some issue of

my spiteful execrations. Then there's Achilles, a

rare enginer! If Troy be not taken till these two

undermine it, the walls will stand till they fall of

themselves. O thou great thunder-darter of Olympus,

forget that thou art Jove, the king of gods and,

Mercury, lose all the serpentine craft of thy

caduceus, if ye take not that little, little less

than little wit from them that they have! which

short-armed ignorance itself knows is so abundant

scarce, it will not in circumvention deliver a fly

from a spider, without drawing their massy irons and

cutting the web. After this, the vengeance on the

whole camp! or rather, the bone-ache! for that,

methinks, is the curse dependent on those that war

for a placket. I have said my prayers and devil Envy

say Amen. What ho! my Lord Achilles!

Enter PATROCLUS

Who's there? Thersites! Good Thersites, come in and rail.

If I could have remembered a gilt counterfeit, thou

wouldst not have slipped out of my contemplation: but

it is no matter; thyself upon thyself! The common

curse of mankind, folly and ignorance, be thine in

great revenue! heaven bless thee from a tutor, and

discipline come not near thee! Let thy blood be thy

direction till thy death! then if she that lays thee

out says thou art a fair corse, I'll be sworn and

sworn upon't she never shrouded any but lazars.

Amen. Where's Achilles?

What, art thou devout? wast thou in prayer?

Ay: the heavens hear me!

Enter ACHILLES

Who's there?

Thersites, my lord.

Where, where? Art thou come? why, my cheese, my

digestion, why hast thou not served thyself in to

my table so many meals? Come, what's Agamemnon?

Thy commander, Achilles. Then tell me, Patroclus,

what's Achilles?

Thy lord, Thersites: then tell me, I pray thee,

what's thyself?

Thy knower, Patroclus: then tell me, Patroclus,

what art thou?

Thou mayst tell that knowest.

O, tell, tell.

I'll decline the whole question. Agamemnon commands

Achilles; Achilles is my lord; I am Patroclus'

knower, and Patroclus is a fool.

You rascal!

Peace, fool! I have not done.

He is a privileged man. Proceed, Thersites.

Agamemnon is a fool; Achilles is a fool; Thersites

is a fool, and, as aforesaid, Patroclus is a fool.

Derive this; come.

Agamemnon is a fool to offer to command Achilles;

Achilles is a fool to be commanded of Agamemnon;

Thersites is a fool to serve such a fool, and

Patroclus is a fool positive.

Why am I a fool?

Make that demand of the prover. It suffices me thou

art. Look you, who comes here?

Patroclus, I'll speak with nobody.

Come in with me, Thersites.

Exit

Here is such patchery, such juggling and such

knavery! all the argument is a cuckold and a

whore; a good quarrel to draw emulous factions

and bleed to death upon. Now, the dry serpigo on

the subject! and war and lechery confound all!

Exit

Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR, DIOMEDES, and AJAX

Where is Achilles?

Within his tent; but ill disposed, my lord.

Let it be known to him that we are here.

He shent our messengers; and we lay by

Our appertainments, visiting of him:

Let him be told so; lest perchance he think

We dare not move the question of our place,

Or know not what we are.

I shall say so to him.

Exit

We saw him at the opening of his tent:

He is not sick.

Yes, lion-sick, sick of proud heart: you may call it

melancholy, if you will favour the man; but, by my

head, 'tis pride: but why, why? let him show us the

cause. A word, my lord.

Takes AGAMEMNON aside

What moves Ajax thus to bay at him?

Achilles hath inveigled his fool from him.

Who, Thersites?

He.

Then will Ajax lack matter, if he have lost his argument.

No, you see, he is his argument that has his

argument, Achilles.

All the better; their fraction is more our wish than

their faction: but it was a strong composure a fool

could disunite.

The amity that wisdom knits not, folly may easily

untie. Here comes Patroclus.

Re-enter PATROCLUS

No Achilles with him.

The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy:

his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.

Achilles bids me say, he is much sorry,

If any thing more than your sport and pleasure

Did move your greatness and this noble state

To call upon him; he hopes it is no other

But for your health and your digestion sake,

And after-dinner's breath.

Hear you, Patroclus:

We are too well acquainted with these answers:

But his evasion, wing'd thus swift with scorn,

Cannot outfly our apprehensions.

Much attribute he hath, and much the reason

Why we ascribe it to him; yet all his virtues,

Not virtuously on his own part beheld,

Do in our eyes begin to lose their gloss,

Yea, like fair fruit in an unwholesome dish,

Are like to rot untasted. Go and tell him,

We come to speak with him; and you shall not sin,

If you do say we think him over-proud

And under-honest, in self-assumption greater

Than in the note of judgment; and worthier

than himself

Here tend the savage strangeness he puts on,

Disguise the holy strength of their command,

And underwrite in an observing kind

His humorous predominance; yea, watch

His pettish lunes, his ebbs, his flows, as if

The passage and whole carriage of this action

Rode on his tide. Go tell him this, and add,

That if he overhold his price so much,

We'll none of him; but let him, like an engine

Not portable, lie under this report:

'Bring action hither, this cannot go to war:

A stirring dwarf we do allowance give

Before a sleeping giant.' Tell him so.

I shall; and bring his answer presently.

Exit

In second voice we'll not be satisfied;

We come to speak with him. Ulysses, enter you.

Exit ULYSSES

What is he more than another?

No more than what he thinks he is.

Is he so much? Do you not think he thinks himself a

better man than I am?

No question.

Will you subscribe his thought, and say he is?

No, noble Ajax; you are as strong, as valiant, as

wise, no less noble, much more gentle, and altogether

more tractable.

Why should a man be proud? How doth pride grow? I

know not what pride is.

Your mind is the clearer, Ajax, and your virtues the

fairer. He that is proud eats up himself: pride is

his own glass, his own trumpet, his own chronicle;

and whatever praises itself but in the deed, devours

the deed in the praise.

I do hate a proud man, as I hate the engendering of toads.

Yet he loves himself: is't not strange?

Aside

Re-enter ULYSSES

Achilles will not to the field to-morrow.

What's his excuse?

He doth rely on none,

But carries on the stream of his dispose

Without observance or respect of any,

In will peculiar and in self-admission.

Why will he not upon our fair request

Untent his person and share the air with us?

Things small as nothing, for request's sake only,

He makes important: possess'd he is with greatness,

And speaks not to himself but with a pride

That quarrels at self-breath: imagined worth

Holds in his blood such swoln and hot discourse

That 'twixt his mental and his active parts

Kingdom'd Achilles in commotion rages

And batters down himself: what should I say?

He is so plaguy proud that the death-tokens of it

Cry 'No recovery.'

Let Ajax go to him.

Dear lord, go you and greet him in his tent:

'Tis said he holds you well, and will be led

At your request a little from himself.

O Agamemnon, let it not be so!

We'll consecrate the steps that Ajax makes

When they go from Achilles: shall the proud lord

That bastes his arrogance with his own seam

And never suffers matter of the world

Enter his thoughts, save such as do revolve

And ruminate himself, shall he be worshipp'd

Of that we hold an idol more than he?

No, this thrice worthy and right valiant lord

Must not so stale his palm, nobly acquired;

Nor, by my will, assubjugate his merit,

As amply titled as Achilles is,

By going to Achilles:

That were to enlard his fat already pride

And add more coals to Cancer when he burns

With entertaining great Hyperion.

This lord go to him! Jupiter forbid,

And say in thunder 'Achilles go to him.'

[Aside to DIOMEDES] O, this is well; he rubs the

vein of him.

[Aside to NESTOR] And how his silence drinks up

this applause!

If I go to him, with my armed fist I'll pash him o'er the face.

O, no, you shall not go.

An a' be proud with me, I'll pheeze his pride:

Let me go to him.

Not for the worth that hangs upon our quarrel.

A paltry, insolent fellow!

How he describes himself!

Can he not be sociable?

The raven chides blackness.

I'll let his humours blood.

He will be the physician that should be the patient.

An all men were o' my mind,--

Wit would be out of fashion.

A' should not bear it so, a' should eat swords first:

shall pride carry it?

An 'twould, you'ld carry half.

A' would have ten shares.

I will knead him; I'll make him supple.

He's not yet through warm: force him with praises:

pour in, pour in; his ambition is dry.

[To AGAMEMNON] My lord, you feed too much on this dislike.

Our noble general, do not do so.

You must prepare to fight without Achilles.

Why, 'tis this naming of him does him harm.

Here is a man--but 'tis before his face;

I will be silent.

Wherefore should you so?

He is not emulous, as Achilles is.

Know the whole world, he is as valiant.

A whoreson dog, that shall pelter thus with us!

Would he were a Trojan!

What a vice were it in Ajax now,--

If he were proud,--

Or covetous of praise,--

Ay, or surly borne,--

Or strange, or self-affected!

Thank the heavens, lord, thou art of sweet composure;

Praise him that got thee, she that gave thee suck:

Famed be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature

Thrice famed, beyond all erudition:

But he that disciplined thy arms to fight,

Let Mars divide eternity in twain,

And give him half: and, for thy vigour,

Bull-bearing Milo his addition yield

To sinewy Ajax. I will not praise thy wisdom,

Which, like a bourn, a pale, a shore, confines

Thy spacious and dilated parts: here's Nestor;

Instructed by the antiquary times,

He must, he is, he cannot but be wise:

Put pardon, father Nestor, were your days

As green as Ajax' and your brain so temper'd,

You should not have the eminence of him,

But be as Ajax.

Shall I call you father?

Ay, my good son.

Be ruled by him, Lord Ajax.

There is no tarrying here; the hart Achilles

Keeps thicket. Please it our great general

To call together all his state of war;

Fresh kings are come to Troy: to-morrow

We must with all our main of power stand fast:

And here's a lord,--come knights from east to west,

And cull their flower, Ajax shall cope the best.

Friend, you! pray you, a word: do not you follow

the young Lord Paris?

Ay, sir, when he goes before me.

You depend upon him, I mean?

Sir, I do depend upon the lord.

You depend upon a noble gentleman; I must needs

praise him.

The lord be praised!

You know me, do you not?

Faith, sir, superficially.

Friend, know me better; I am the Lord Pandarus.

I hope I shall know your honour better.

I do desire it.

You are in the state of grace.

Grace! not so, friend: honour and lordship are my titles.

Music within

What music is this?

I do but partly know, sir: it is music in parts.

Know you the musicians?

Wholly, sir.

Who play they to?

To the hearers, sir.

At whose pleasure, friend

At mine, sir, and theirs that love music.

Command, I mean, friend.

Who shall I command, sir?

Friend, we understand not one another: I am too

courtly and thou art too cunning. At whose request

do these men play?

That's to 't indeed, sir: marry, sir, at the request

of Paris my lord, who's there in person; with him,

the mortal Venus, the heart-blood of beauty, love's

invisible soul,--

Who, my cousin Cressida?

No, sir, Helen: could you not find out that by her

attributes?

It should seem, fellow, that thou hast not seen the

Lady Cressida. I come to speak with Paris from the

Prince Troilus: I will make a complimental assault

upon him, for my business seethes.

Sodden business! there's a stewed phrase indeed!

Enter PARIS and HELEN, attended

Fair be to you, my lord, and to all this fair

company! fair desires, in all fair measure,

fairly guide them! especially to you, fair queen!

fair thoughts be your fair pillow!

Dear lord, you are full of fair words.

You speak your fair pleasure, sweet queen. Fair

prince, here is good broken music.

You have broke it, cousin: and, by my life, you

shall make it whole again; you shall piece it out

with a piece of your performance. Nell, he is full

of harmony.

Truly, lady, no.

O, sir,--

Rude, in sooth; in good sooth, very rude.

Well said, my lord! well, you say so in fits.

I have business to my lord, dear queen. My lord,

will you vouchsafe me a word?

Nay, this shall not hedge us out: we'll hear you

sing, certainly.

Well, sweet queen. you are pleasant with me. But,

marry, thus, my lord: my dear lord and most esteemed

friend, your brother Troilus,--

My Lord Pandarus; honey-sweet lord,--

Go to, sweet queen, to go:--commends himself most

affectionately to you,--

You shall not bob us out of our melody: if you do,

our melancholy upon your head!

Sweet queen, sweet queen! that's a sweet queen, i' faith.

And to make a sweet lady sad is a sour offence.

Nay, that shall not serve your turn; that shall not,

in truth, la. Nay, I care not for such words; no,

no. And, my lord, he desires you, that if the king

call for him at supper, you will make his excuse.

My Lord Pandarus,--

What says my sweet queen, my very very sweet queen?

What exploit's in hand? where sups he to-night?

Nay, but, my lord,--

What says my sweet queen? My cousin will fall out

with you. You must not know where he sups.

I'll lay my life, with my disposer Cressida.

No, no, no such matter; you are wide: come, your

disposer is sick.

Well, I'll make excuse.

Ay, good my lord. Why should you say Cressida? no,

your poor disposer's sick.

I spy.

You spy! what do you spy? Come, give me an

instrument. Now, sweet queen.

Why, this is kindly done.

My niece is horribly in love with a thing you have,

sweet queen.

She shall have it, my lord, if it be not my lord Paris.

He! no, she'll none of him; they two are twain.

Falling in, after falling out, may make them three.

Come, come, I'll hear no more of this; I'll sing

you a song now.

Ay, ay, prithee now. By my troth, sweet lord, thou

hast a fine forehead.

Ay, you may, you may.

Let thy song be love: this love will undo us all.

O Cupid, Cupid, Cupid!

Love! ay, that it shall, i' faith.

Ay, good now, love, love, nothing but love.

In good troth, it begins so.

Sings

Love, love, nothing but love, still more!

For, O, love's bow

Shoots buck and doe:

The shaft confounds,

Not that it wounds,

But tickles still the sore.

These lovers cry Oh! oh! they die!

Yet that which seems the wound to kill,

Doth turn oh! oh! to ha! ha! he!

So dying love lives still:

Oh! oh! a while, but ha! ha! ha!

Oh! oh! groans out for ha! ha! ha!

Heigh-ho!

In love, i' faith, to the very tip of the nose.

He eats nothing but doves, love, and that breeds hot

blood, and hot blood begets hot thoughts, and hot

thoughts beget hot deeds, and hot deeds is love.

Is this the generation of love? hot blood, hot

thoughts, and hot deeds? Why, they are vipers:

is love a generation of vipers? Sweet lord, who's

a-field to-day?

Hector, Deiphobus, Helenus, Antenor, and all the

gallantry of Troy: I would fain have armed to-day,

but my Nell would not have it so. How chance my

brother Troilus went not?

He hangs the lip at something: you know all, Lord Pandarus.

Not I, honey-sweet queen. I long to hear how they

sped to-day. You'll remember your brother's excuse?

To a hair.

Farewell, sweet queen.

Commend me to your niece.

I will, sweet queen.

Exit

A retreat sounded

They're come from field: let us to Priam's hall,

To greet the warriors. Sweet Helen, I must woo you

To help unarm our Hector: his stubborn buckles,

With these your white enchanting fingers touch'd,

Shall more obey than to the edge of steel

Or force of Greekish sinews; you shall do more

Than all the island kings,--disarm great Hector.

'Twill make us proud to be his servant, Paris;

Yea, what he shall receive of us in duty

Gives us more palm in beauty than we have,

Yea, overshines ourself.

Sweet, above thought I love thee.

Exeunt

How now! where's thy master? at my cousin

Cressida's?

No, sir; he stays for you to conduct him thither.

O, here he comes.

Enter TROILUS

How now, how now!

Sirrah, walk off.

Exit Boy

Have you seen my cousin?

No, Pandarus: I stalk about her door,

Like a strange soul upon the Stygian banks

Staying for waftage. O, be thou my Charon,

And give me swift transportance to those fields

Where I may wallow in the lily-beds

Proposed for the deserver! O gentle Pandarus,

From Cupid's shoulder pluck his painted wings

And fly with me to Cressid!

Walk here i' the orchard, I'll bring her straight.

Exit

I am giddy; expectation whirls me round.

The imaginary relish is so sweet

That it enchants my sense: what will it be,

When that the watery palate tastes indeed

Love's thrice repured nectar? death, I fear me,

Swooning destruction, or some joy too fine,

Too subtle-potent, tuned too sharp in sweetness,

For the capacity of my ruder powers:

I fear it much; and I do fear besides,

That I shall lose distinction in my joys;

As doth a battle, when they charge on heaps

The enemy flying.

Re-enter PANDARUS

She's making her ready, she'll come straight: you

must be witty now. She does so blush, and fetches

her wind so short, as if she were frayed with a

sprite: I'll fetch her. It is the prettiest

villain: she fetches her breath as short as a

new-ta'en sparrow.

Exit

Even such a passion doth embrace my bosom:

My heart beats thicker than a feverous pulse;

And all my powers do their bestowing lose,

Like vassalage at unawares encountering

The eye of majesty.

Re-enter PANDARUS with CRESSIDA

Come, come, what need you blush? shame's a baby.

Here she is now: swear the oaths now to her that

you have sworn to me. What, are you gone again?

you must be watched ere you be made tame, must you?

Come your ways, come your ways; an you draw backward,

we'll put you i' the fills. Why do you not speak to

her? Come, draw this curtain, and let's see your

picture. Alas the day, how loath you are to offend

daylight! an 'twere dark, you'ld close sooner.

So, so; rub on, and kiss the mistress. How now!

a kiss in fee-farm! build there, carpenter; the air

is sweet. Nay, you shall fight your hearts out ere

I part you. The falcon as the tercel, for all the

ducks i' the river: go to, go to.

You have bereft me of all words, lady.

Words pay no debts, give her deeds: but she'll

bereave you o' the deeds too, if she call your

activity in question. What, billing again? Here's

'In witness whereof the parties interchangeably'--

Come in, come in: I'll go get a fire.

Exit

Will you walk in, my lord?

O Cressida, how often have I wished me thus!

Wished, my lord! The gods grant,--O my lord!

What should they grant? what makes this pretty

abruption? What too curious dreg espies my sweet

lady in the fountain of our love?

More dregs than water, if my fears have eyes.

Fears make devils of cherubims; they never see truly.

Blind fear, that seeing reason leads, finds safer

footing than blind reason stumbling without fear: to

fear the worst oft cures the worse.

O, let my lady apprehend no fear: in all Cupid's

pageant there is presented no monster.

Nor nothing monstrous neither?

Nothing, but our undertakings; when we vow to weep

seas, live in fire, eat rocks, tame tigers; thinking

it harder for our mistress to devise imposition

enough than for us to undergo any difficulty imposed.

This is the monstruosity in love, lady, that the will

is infinite and the execution confined, that the

desire is boundless and the act a slave to limit.

They say all lovers swear more performance than they

are able and yet reserve an ability that they never

perform, vowing more than the perfection of ten and

discharging less than the tenth part of one. They

that have the voice of lions and the act of hares,

are they not monsters?

Are there such? such are not we: praise us as we

are tasted, allow us as we prove; our head shall go

bare till merit crown it: no perfection in reversion

shall have a praise in present: we will not name

desert before his birth, and, being born, his addition

shall be humble. Few words to fair faith: Troilus

shall be such to Cressid as what envy can say worst

shall be a mock for his truth, and what truth can

speak truest not truer than Troilus.

Will you walk in, my lord?

Re-enter PANDARUS

What, blushing still? have you not done talking yet?

Well, uncle, what folly I commit, I dedicate to you.

I thank you for that: if my lord get a boy of you,

you'll give him me. Be true to my lord: if he

flinch, chide me for it.

You know now your hostages; your uncle's word and my

firm faith.

Nay, I'll give my word for her too: our kindred,

though they be long ere they are wooed, they are

constant being won: they are burs, I can tell you;

they'll stick where they are thrown.

Boldness comes to me now, and brings me heart.

Prince Troilus, I have loved you night and day

For many weary months.

Why was my Cressid then so hard to win?

Hard to seem won: but I was won, my lord,

With the first glance that ever--pardon me--

If I confess much, you will play the tyrant.

I love you now; but not, till now, so much

But I might master it: in faith, I lie;

My thoughts were like unbridled children, grown

Too headstrong for their mother. See, we fools!

Why have I blabb'd? who shall be true to us,

When we are so unsecret to ourselves?

But, though I loved you well, I woo'd you not;

And yet, good faith, I wish'd myself a man,

Or that we women had men's privilege

Of speaking first. Sweet, bid me hold my tongue,

For in this rapture I shall surely speak

The thing I shall repent. See, see, your silence,

Cunning in dumbness, from my weakness draws

My very soul of counsel! stop my mouth.

And shall, albeit sweet music issues thence.

Pretty, i' faith.

My lord, I do beseech you, pardon me;

'Twas not my purpose, thus to beg a kiss:

I am ashamed. O heavens! what have I done?

For this time will I take my leave, my lord.

Your leave, sweet Cressid!

Leave! an you take leave till to-morrow morning,--

Pray you, content you.

What offends you, lady?

Sir, mine own company.

You cannot shun Yourself.

Let me go and try:

I have a kind of self resides with you;

But an unkind self, that itself will leave,

To be another's fool. I would be gone:

Where is my wit? I know not what I speak.

Well know they what they speak that speak so wisely.

Perchance, my lord, I show more craft than love;

And fell so roundly to a large confession,

To angle for your thoughts: but you are wise,

Or else you love not, for to be wise and love

Exceeds man's might; that dwells with gods above.

O that I thought it could be in a woman--

As, if it can, I will presume in you--

To feed for aye her ramp and flames of love;

To keep her constancy in plight and youth,

Outliving beauty's outward, with a mind

That doth renew swifter than blood decays!

Or that persuasion could but thus convince me,

That my integrity and truth to you

Might be affronted with the match and weight

Of such a winnow'd purity in love;

How were I then uplifted! but, alas!

I am as true as truth's simplicity

And simpler than the infancy of truth.

In that I'll war with you.

O virtuous fight,

When right with right wars who shall be most right!

True swains in love shall in the world to come

Approve their truths by Troilus: when their rhymes,

Full of protest, of oath and big compare,

Want similes, truth tired with iteration,

As true as steel, as plantage to the moon,

As sun to day, as turtle to her mate,

As iron to adamant, as earth to the centre,

Yet, after all comparisons of truth,

As truth's authentic author to be cited,

'As true as Troilus' shall crown up the verse,

And sanctify the numbers.

Prophet may you be!

If I be false, or swerve a hair from truth,

When time is old and hath forgot itself,

When waterdrops have worn the stones of Troy,

And blind oblivion swallow'd cities up,

And mighty states characterless are grated

To dusty nothing, yet let memory,

From false to false, among false maids in love,

Upbraid my falsehood! when they've said 'as false

As air, as water, wind, or sandy earth,

As fox to lamb, as wolf to heifer's calf,

Pard to the hind, or stepdame to her son,'

'Yea,' let them say, to stick the heart of falsehood,

'As false as Cressid.'

Go to, a bargain made: seal it, seal it; I'll be the

witness. Here I hold your hand, here my cousin's.

If ever you prove false one to another, since I have

taken such pains to bring you together, let all

pitiful goers-between be called to the world's end

after my name; call them all Pandars; let all

constant men be Troiluses, all false women Cressids,

and all brokers-between Pandars! say, amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen. Whereupon I will show you a chamber with a

bed; which bed, because it shall not speak of your

pretty encounters, press it to death: away!

And Cupid grant all tongue-tied maidens here

Bed, chamber, Pandar to provide this gear!

Exeunt

Now, princes, for the service I have done you,

The advantage of the time prompts me aloud

To call for recompense. Appear it to your mind

That, through the sight I bear in things to love,

I have abandon'd Troy, left my possession,

Incurr'd a traitor's name; exposed myself,

From certain and possess'd conveniences,

To doubtful fortunes; sequestering from me all

That time, acquaintance, custom and condition

Made tame and most familiar to my nature,

And here, to do you service, am become

As new into the world, strange, unacquainted:

I do beseech you, as in way of taste,

To give me now a little benefit,

Out of those many register'd in promise,

Which, you say, live to come in my behalf.

What wouldst thou of us, Trojan? make demand.

You have a Trojan prisoner, call'd Antenor,

Yesterday took: Troy holds him very dear.

Oft have you--often have you thanks therefore--

Desired my Cressid in right great exchange,

Whom Troy hath still denied: but this Antenor,

I know, is such a wrest in their affairs

That their negotiations all must slack,

Wanting his manage; and they will almost

Give us a prince of blood, a son of Priam,

In change of him: let him be sent, great princes,

And he shall buy my daughter; and her presence

Shall quite strike off all service I have done,

In most accepted pain.

Let Diomedes bear him,

And bring us Cressid hither: Calchas shall have

What he requests of us. Good Diomed,

Furnish you fairly for this interchange:

Withal bring word if Hector will to-morrow

Be answer'd in his challenge: Ajax is ready.

This shall I undertake; and 'tis a burden

Which I am proud to bear.

Exeunt DIOMEDES and CALCHAS

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS, before their tent

Achilles stands i' the entrance of his tent:

Please it our general to pass strangely by him,

As if he were forgot; and, princes all,

Lay negligent and loose regard upon him:

I will come last. 'Tis like he'll question me

Why such unplausive eyes are bent on him:

If so, I have derision medicinable,

To use between your strangeness and his pride,

Which his own will shall have desire to drink:

It may be good: pride hath no other glass

To show itself but pride, for supple knees

Feed arrogance and are the proud man's fees.

We'll execute your purpose, and put on

A form of strangeness as we pass along:

So do each lord, and either greet him not,

Or else disdainfully, which shall shake him more

Than if not look'd on. I will lead the way.

What, comes the general to speak with me?

You know my mind, I'll fight no more 'gainst Troy.

What says Achilles? would he aught with us?

Would you, my lord, aught with the general?

No.

Nothing, my lord.

The better.

Exeunt AGAMEMNON and NESTOR

Good day, good day.

How do you? how do you?

Exit

What, does the cuckold scorn me?

How now, Patroclus!

Good morrow, Ajax.

Ha?

Good morrow.

Ay, and good next day too.

Exit

What mean these fellows? Know they not Achilles?

They pass by strangely: they were used to bend

To send their smiles before them to Achilles;

To come as humbly as they used to creep

To holy altars.

What, am I poor of late?

'Tis certain, greatness, once fall'n out with fortune,

Must fall out with men too: what the declined is

He shall as soon read in the eyes of others

As feel in his own fall; for men, like butterflies,

Show not their mealy wings but to the summer,

And not a man, for being simply man,

Hath any honour, but honour for those honours

That are without him, as place, riches, favour,

Prizes of accident as oft as merit:

Which when they fall, as being slippery standers,

The love that lean'd on them as slippery too,

Do one pluck down another and together

Die in the fall. But 'tis not so with me:

Fortune and I are friends: I do enjoy

At ample point all that I did possess,

Save these men's looks; who do, methinks, find out

Something not worth in me such rich beholding

As they have often given. Here is Ulysses;

I'll interrupt his reading.

How now Ulysses!

Now, great Thetis' son!

What are you reading?

A strange fellow here

Writes me: 'That man, how dearly ever parted,

How much in having, or without or in,

Cannot make boast to have that which he hath,

Nor feels not what he owes, but by reflection;

As when his virtues shining upon others

Heat them and they retort that heat again

To the first giver.'

This is not strange, Ulysses.

The beauty that is borne here in the face

The bearer knows not, but commends itself

To others' eyes; nor doth the eye itself,

That most pure spirit of sense, behold itself,

Not going from itself; but eye to eye opposed

Salutes each other with each other's form;

For speculation turns not to itself,

Till it hath travell'd and is mirror'd there

Where it may see itself. This is not strange at all.

I do not strain at the position,--

It is familiar,--but at the author's drift;

Who, in his circumstance, expressly proves

That no man is the lord of any thing,

Though in and of him there be much consisting,

Till he communicate his parts to others:

Nor doth he of himself know them for aught

Till he behold them form'd in the applause

Where they're extended; who, like an arch,

reverberates

The voice again, or, like a gate of steel

Fronting the sun, receives and renders back

His figure and his heat. I was much wrapt in this;

And apprehended here immediately

The unknown Ajax.

Heavens, what a man is there! a very horse,

That has he knows not what. Nature, what things there are

Most abject in regard and dear in use!

What things again most dear in the esteem

And poor in worth! Now shall we see to-morrow--

An act that very chance doth throw upon him--

Ajax renown'd. O heavens, what some men do,

While some men leave to do!

How some men creep in skittish fortune's hall,

Whiles others play the idiots in her eyes!

How one man eats into another's pride,

While pride is fasting in his wantonness!

To see these Grecian lords!--why, even already

They clap the lubber Ajax on the shoulder,

As if his foot were on brave Hector's breast

And great Troy shrieking.

I do believe it; for they pass'd by me

As misers do by beggars, neither gave to me

Good word nor look: what, are my deeds forgot?

Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,

Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,

A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:

Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd

As fast as they are made, forgot as soon

As done: perseverance, dear my lord,

Keeps honour bright: to have done is to hang

Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail

In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;

For honour travels in a strait so narrow,

Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;

For emulation hath a thousand sons

That one by one pursue: if you give way,

Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,

Like to an enter'd tide, they all rush by

And leave you hindmost;

Or like a gallant horse fall'n in first rank,

Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,

O'er-run and trampled on: then what they do in present,

Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours;

For time is like a fashionable host

That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand,

And with his arms outstretch'd, as he would fly,

Grasps in the comer: welcome ever smiles,

And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not

virtue seek

Remuneration for the thing it was;

For beauty, wit,

High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,

Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all

To envious and calumniating time.

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,

That all with one consent praise new-born gawds,

Though they are made and moulded of things past,

And give to dust that is a little gilt

More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.

The present eye praises the present object.

Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,

That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;

Since things in motion sooner catch the eye

Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,

And still it might, and yet it may again,

If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive

And case thy reputation in thy tent;

Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,

Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves

And drave great Mars to faction.

Of this my privacy

I have strong reasons.

But 'gainst your privacy

The reasons are more potent and heroical:

'Tis known, Achilles, that you are in love

With one of Priam's daughters.

Ha! known!

Is that a wonder?

The providence that's in a watchful state

Knows almost every grain of Plutus' gold,

Finds bottom in the uncomprehensive deeps,

Keeps place with thought and almost, like the gods,

Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.

There is a mystery--with whom relation

Durst never meddle--in the soul of state;

Which hath an operation more divine

Than breath or pen can give expressure to:

All the commerce that you have had with Troy

As perfectly is ours as yours, my lord;

And better would it fit Achilles much

To throw down Hector than Polyxena:

But it must grieve young Pyrrhus now at home,

When fame shall in our islands sound her trump,

And all the Greekish girls shall tripping sing,

'Great Hector's sister did Achilles win,

But our great Ajax bravely beat down him.'

Farewell, my lord: I as your lover speak;

The fool slides o'er the ice that you should break.

Exit

To this effect, Achilles, have I moved you:

A woman impudent and mannish grown

Is not more loathed than an effeminate man

In time of action. I stand condemn'd for this;

They think my little stomach to the war

And your great love to me restrains you thus:

Sweet, rouse yourself; and the weak wanton Cupid

Shall from your neck unloose his amorous fold,

And, like a dew-drop from the lion's mane,

Be shook to air.

Shall Ajax fight with Hector?

Ay, and perhaps receive much honour by him.

I see my reputation is at stake

My fame is shrewdly gored.

O, then, beware;

Those wounds heal ill that men do give themselves:

Omission to do what is necessary

Seals a commission to a blank of danger;

And danger, like an ague, subtly taints

Even then when we sit idly in the sun.

Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus:

I'll send the fool to Ajax and desire him

To invite the Trojan lords after the combat

To see us here unarm'd: I have a woman's longing,

An appetite that I am sick withal,

To see great Hector in his weeds of peace,

To talk with him and to behold his visage,

Even to my full of view.

Enter THERSITES

A labour saved!

A wonder!

What?

Ajax goes up and down the field, asking for himself.

How so?

He must fight singly to-morrow with Hector, and is so

prophetically proud of an heroical cudgelling that he

raves in saying nothing.

How can that be?

Why, he stalks up and down like a peacock,--a stride

and a stand: ruminates like an hostess that hath no

arithmetic but her brain to set down her reckoning:

bites his lip with a politic regard, as who should

say 'There were wit in this head, an 'twould out;'

and so there is, but it lies as coldly in him as fire

in a flint, which will not show without knocking.

The man's undone forever; for if Hector break not his

neck i' the combat, he'll break 't himself in

vain-glory. He knows not me: I said 'Good morrow,

Ajax;' and he replies 'Thanks, Agamemnon.' What think

you of this man that takes me for the general? He's

grown a very land-fish, language-less, a monster.

A plague of opinion! a man may wear it on both

sides, like a leather jerkin.

Thou must be my ambassador to him, Thersites.

Who, I? why, he'll answer nobody; he professes not

answering: speaking is for beggars; he wears his

tongue in's arms. I will put on his presence: let

Patroclus make demands to me, you shall see the

pageant of Ajax.

To him, Patroclus; tell him I humbly desire the

valiant Ajax to invite the most valorous Hector

to come unarmed to my tent, and to procure

safe-conduct for his person of the magnanimous

and most illustrious six-or-seven-times-honoured

captain-general of the Grecian army, Agamemnon,

et cetera. Do this.

Jove bless great Ajax!

Hum!

I come from the worthy Achilles,--

Ha!

Who most humbly desires you to invite Hector to his tent,--

Hum!

And to procure safe-conduct from Agamemnon.

Agamemnon!

Ay, my lord.

Ha!

What say you to't?

God b' wi' you, with all my heart.

Your answer, sir.

If to-morrow be a fair day, by eleven o'clock it will

go one way or other: howsoever, he shall pay for me

ere he has me.

Your answer, sir.

Fare you well, with all my heart.

Why, but he is not in this tune, is he?

No, but he's out o' tune thus. What music will be in

him when Hector has knocked out his brains, I know

not; but, I am sure, none, unless the fiddler Apollo

get his sinews to make catlings on.

Come, thou shalt bear a letter to him straight.

Let me bear another to his horse; for that's the more

capable creature.

My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirr'd;

And I myself see not the bottom of it.

Exeunt ACHILLES and PATROCLUS

See, ho! who is that there?

It is the Lord AEneas.

Is the prince there in person?

Had I so good occasion to lie long

As you, prince Paris, nothing but heavenly business

Should rob my bed-mate of my company.

That's my mind too. Good morrow, Lord AEneas.

A valiant Greek, AEneas,--take his hand,--

Witness the process of your speech, wherein

You told how Diomed, a whole week by days,

Did haunt you in the field.

Health to you, valiant sir,

During all question of the gentle truce;

But when I meet you arm'd, as black defiance

As heart can think or courage execute.

The one and other Diomed embraces.

Our bloods are now in calm; and, so long, health!

But when contention and occasion meet,

By Jove, I'll play the hunter for thy life

With all my force, pursuit and policy.

And thou shalt hunt a lion, that will fly

With his face backward. In humane gentleness,

Welcome to Troy! now, by Anchises' life,

Welcome, indeed! By Venus' hand I swear,

No man alive can love in such a sort

The thing he means to kill more excellently.

We sympathize: Jove, let AEneas live,

If to my sword his fate be not the glory,

A thousand complete courses of the sun!

But, in mine emulous honour, let him die,

With every joint a wound, and that to-morrow!

We know each other well.

We do; and long to know each other worse.

This is the most despiteful gentle greeting,

The noblest hateful love, that e'er I heard of.

What business, lord, so early?

I was sent for to the king; but why, I know not.

His purpose meets you: 'twas to bring this Greek

To Calchas' house, and there to render him,

For the enfreed Antenor, the fair Cressid:

Let's have your company, or, if you please,

Haste there before us: I constantly do think--

Or rather, call my thought a certain knowledge--

My brother Troilus lodges there to-night:

Rouse him and give him note of our approach.

With the whole quality wherefore: I fear

We shall be much unwelcome.

That I assure you:

Troilus had rather Troy were borne to Greece

Than Cressid borne from Troy.

There is no help;

The bitter disposition of the time

Will have it so. On, lord; we'll follow you.

Good morrow, all.

Exit with Servant

And tell me, noble Diomed, faith, tell me true,

Even in the soul of sound good-fellowship,

Who, in your thoughts, merits fair Helen best,

Myself or Menelaus?

Both alike:

He merits well to have her, that doth seek her,

Not making any scruple of her soilure,

With such a hell of pain and world of charge,

And you as well to keep her, that defend her,

Not palating the taste of her dishonour,

With such a costly loss of wealth and friends:

He, like a puling cuckold, would drink up

The lees and dregs of a flat tamed piece;

You, like a lecher, out of whorish loins

Are pleased to breed out your inheritors:

Both merits poised, each weighs nor less nor more;

But he as he, the heavier for a whore.

You are too bitter to your countrywoman.

She's bitter to her country: hear me, Paris:

For every false drop in her bawdy veins

A Grecian's life hath sunk; for every scruple

Of her contaminated carrion weight,

A Trojan hath been slain: since she could speak,

She hath not given so many good words breath

As for her Greeks and Trojans suffer'd death.

Fair Diomed, you do as chapmen do,

Dispraise the thing that you desire to buy:

But we in silence hold this virtue well,

We'll but commend what we intend to sell.

Here lies our way.

Exeunt

Dear, trouble not yourself: the morn is cold.

Then, sweet my lord, I'll call mine uncle down;

He shall unbolt the gates.

Trouble him not;

To bed, to bed: sleep kill those pretty eyes,

And give as soft attachment to thy senses

As infants' empty of all thought!

Good morrow, then.

I prithee now, to bed.

Are you a-weary of me?

O Cressida! but that the busy day,

Waked by the lark, hath roused the ribald crows,

And dreaming night will hide our joys no longer,

I would not from thee.

Night hath been too brief.

Beshrew the witch! with venomous wights she stays

As tediously as hell, but flies the grasps of love

With wings more momentary-swift than thought.

You will catch cold, and curse me.

Prithee, tarry:

You men will never tarry.

O foolish Cressid! I might have still held off,

And then you would have tarried. Hark!

there's one up.

[Within] What, 's all the doors open here?

It is your uncle.

A pestilence on him! now will he be mocking:

I shall have such a life!

Enter PANDARUS

How now, how now! how go maidenheads? Here, you

maid! where's my cousin Cressid?

Go hang yourself, you naughty mocking uncle!

You bring me to do, and then you flout me too.

To do what? to do what? let her say

what: what have I brought you to do?

Come, come, beshrew your heart! you'll ne'er be good,

Nor suffer others.

Ha! ha! Alas, poor wretch! ah, poor capocchia!

hast not slept to-night? would he not, a naughty

man, let it sleep? a bugbear take him!

Did not I tell you? Would he were knock'd i' the head!

Knocking within

Who's that at door? good uncle, go and see.

My lord, come you again into my chamber:

You smile and mock me, as if I meant naughtily.

Ha, ha!

Come, you are deceived, I think of no such thing.

Knocking within

How earnestly they knock! Pray you, come in:

I would not for half Troy have you seen here.

Exeunt TROILUS and CRESSIDA

Who's there? what's the matter? will you beat

down the door? How now! what's the matter?

Enter AENEAS

Good morrow, lord, good morrow.

Who's there? my Lord AEneas! By my troth,

I knew you not: what news with you so early?

Is not Prince Troilus here?

Here! what should he do here?

Come, he is here, my lord; do not deny him:

It doth import him much to speak with me.

Is he here, say you? 'tis more than I know, I'll

be sworn: for my own part, I came in late. What

should he do here?

Who!--nay, then: come, come, you'll do him wrong

ere you're ware: you'll be so true to him, to be

false to him: do not you know of him, but yet go

fetch him hither; go.

Re-enter TROILUS

How now! what's the matter?

My lord, I scarce have leisure to salute you,

My matter is so rash: there is at hand

Paris your brother, and Deiphobus,

The Grecian Diomed, and our Antenor

Deliver'd to us; and for him forthwith,

Ere the first sacrifice, within this hour,

We must give up to Diomedes' hand

The Lady Cressida.

Is it so concluded?

By Priam and the general state of Troy:

They are at hand and ready to effect it.

How my achievements mock me!

I will go meet them: and, my Lord AEneas,

We met by chance; you did not find me here.

Good, good, my lord; the secrets of nature

Have not more gift in taciturnity.

Exeunt TROILUS and AENEAS

Is't possible? no sooner got but lost? The devil

take Antenor! the young prince will go mad: a

plague upon Antenor! I would they had broke 's neck!

Re-enter CRESSIDA

How now! what's the matter? who was here?

Ah, ah!

Why sigh you so profoundly? where's my lord? gone!

Tell me, sweet uncle, what's the matter?

Would I were as deep under the earth as I am above!

O the gods! what's the matter?

Prithee, get thee in: would thou hadst ne'er been

born! I knew thou wouldst be his death. O, poor

gentleman! A plague upon Antenor!

Good uncle, I beseech you, on my knees! beseech you,

what's the matter?

Thou must be gone, wench, thou must be gone; thou

art changed for Antenor: thou must to thy father,

and be gone from Troilus: 'twill be his death;

'twill be his bane; he cannot bear it.

O you immortal gods! I will not go.

Thou must.

I will not, uncle: I have forgot my father;

I know no touch of consanguinity;

No kin no love, no blood, no soul so near me

As the sweet Troilus. O you gods divine!

Make Cressid's name the very crown of falsehood,

If ever she leave Troilus! Time, force, and death,

Do to this body what extremes you can;

But the strong base and building of my love

Is as the very centre of the earth,

Drawing all things to it. I'll go in and weep,--

Do, do.

Tear my bright hair and scratch my praised cheeks,

Crack my clear voice with sobs and break my heart

With sounding Troilus. I will not go from Troy.

Exeunt

It is great morning, and the hour prefix'd

Of her delivery to this valiant Greek

Comes fast upon. Good my brother Troilus,

Tell you the lady what she is to do,

And haste her to the purpose.

Walk into her house;

I'll bring her to the Grecian presently:

And to his hand when I deliver her,

Think it an altar, and thy brother Troilus

A priest there offering to it his own heart.

Exit

I know what 'tis to love;

And would, as I shall pity, I could help!

Please you walk in, my lords.

Exeunt

Be moderate, be moderate.

Why tell you me of moderation?

The grief is fine, full, perfect, that I taste,

And violenteth in a sense as strong

As that which causeth it: how can I moderate it?

If I could temporize with my affection,

Or brew it to a weak and colder palate,

The like allayment could I give my grief.

My love admits no qualifying dross;

No more my grief, in such a precious loss.

Here, here, here he comes.

Enter TROILUS

Ah, sweet ducks!

O Troilus! Troilus!

Embracing him

What a pair of spectacles is here!

Let me embrace too. 'O heart,' as the goodly saying is,

'--O heart, heavy heart,

Why sigh'st thou without breaking?

where he answers again,

'Because thou canst not ease thy smart

By friendship nor by speaking.'

There was never a truer rhyme. Let us cast away

nothing, for we may live to have need of such a

verse: we see it, we see it. How now, lambs?

Cressid, I love thee in so strain'd a purity,

That the bless'd gods, as angry with my fancy,

More bright in zeal than the devotion which

Cold lips blow to their deities, take thee from me.

Have the gods envy?

Ay, ay, ay, ay; 'tis too plain a case.

And is it true that I must go from Troy?

A hateful truth.

What, and from Troilus too?

From Troy and Troilus.

Is it possible?

And suddenly; where injury of chance

Puts back leave-taking, justles roughly by

All time of pause, rudely beguiles our lips

Of all rejoindure, forcibly prevents

Our lock'd embrasures, strangles our dear vows

Even in the birth of our own labouring breath:

We two, that with so many thousand sighs

Did buy each other, must poorly sell ourselves

With the rude brevity and discharge of one.

Injurious time now with a robber's haste

Crams his rich thievery up, he knows not how:

As many farewells as be stars in heaven,

With distinct breath and consign'd kisses to them,

He fumbles up into a lose adieu,

And scants us with a single famish'd kiss,

Distasted with the salt of broken tears.

[Within] My lord, is the lady ready?

Hark! you are call'd: some say the Genius so

Cries 'come' to him that instantly must die.

Bid them have patience; she shall come anon.

Where are my tears? rain, to lay this wind, or

my heart will be blown up by the root.

Exit

I must then to the Grecians?

No remedy.

A woful Cressid 'mongst the merry Greeks!

When shall we see again?

Hear me, my love: be thou but true of heart,--

I true! how now! what wicked deem is this?

Nay, we must use expostulation kindly,

For it is parting from us:

I speak not 'be thou true,' as fearing thee,

For I will throw my glove to Death himself,

That there's no maculation in thy heart:

But 'be thou true,' say I, to fashion in

My sequent protestation; be thou true,

And I will see thee.

O, you shall be exposed, my lord, to dangers

As infinite as imminent! but I'll be true.

And I'll grow friend with danger. Wear this sleeve.

And you this glove. When shall I see you?

I will corrupt the Grecian sentinels,

To give thee nightly visitation.

But yet be true.

O heavens! 'be true' again!

Hear while I speak it, love:

The Grecian youths are full of quality;

They're loving, well composed with gifts of nature,

Flowing and swelling o'er with arts and exercise:

How novelty may move, and parts with person,

Alas, a kind of godly jealousy--

Which, I beseech you, call a virtuous sin--

Makes me afeard.

O heavens! you love me not.

Die I a villain, then!

In this I do not call your faith in question

So mainly as my merit: I cannot sing,

Nor heel the high lavolt, nor sweeten talk,

Nor play at subtle games; fair virtues all,

To which the Grecians are most prompt and pregnant:

But I can tell that in each grace of these

There lurks a still and dumb-discoursive devil

That tempts most cunningly: but be not tempted.

Do you think I will?

No.

But something may be done that we will not:

And sometimes we are devils to ourselves,

When we will tempt the frailty of our powers,

Presuming on their changeful potency.

[Within] Nay, good my lord,--

Come, kiss; and let us part.

[Within] Brother Troilus!

Good brother, come you hither;

And bring AEneas and the Grecian with you.

My lord, will you be true?

Who, I? alas, it is my vice, my fault:

Whiles others fish with craft for great opinion,

I with great truth catch mere simplicity;

Whilst some with cunning gild their copper crowns,

With truth and plainness I do wear mine bare.

Fear not my truth: the moral of my wit

Is 'plain and true;' there's all the reach of it.

Enter AENEAS, PARIS, ANTENOR, DEIPHOBUS, and DIOMEDES

Welcome, Sir Diomed! here is the lady

Which for Antenor we deliver you:

At the port, lord, I'll give her to thy hand,

And by the way possess thee what she is.

Entreat her fair; and, by my soul, fair Greek,

If e'er thou stand at mercy of my sword,

Name Cressida and thy life shall be as safe

As Priam is in Ilion.

Fair Lady Cressid,

So please you, save the thanks this prince expects:

The lustre in your eye, heaven in your cheek,

Pleads your fair usage; and to Diomed

You shall be mistress, and command him wholly.

Grecian, thou dost not use me courteously,

To shame the zeal of my petition to thee

In praising her: I tell thee, lord of Greece,

She is as far high-soaring o'er thy praises

As thou unworthy to be call'd her servant.

I charge thee use her well, even for my charge;

For, by the dreadful Pluto, if thou dost not,

Though the great bulk Achilles be thy guard,

I'll cut thy throat.

O, be not moved, Prince Troilus:

Let me be privileged by my place and message,

To be a speaker free; when I am hence

I'll answer to my lust: and know you, lord,

I'll nothing do on charge: to her own worth

She shall be prized; but that you say 'be't so,'

I'll speak it in my spirit and honour, 'no.'

Come, to the port. I'll tell thee, Diomed,

This brave shall oft make thee to hide thy head.

Lady, give me your hand, and, as we walk,

To our own selves bend we our needful talk.

Exeunt TROILUS, CRESSIDA, and DIOMEDES

Trumpet within

Hark! Hector's trumpet.

How have we spent this morning!

The prince must think me tardy and remiss,

That sore to ride before him to the field.

'Tis Troilus' fault: come, come, to field with him.

Let us make ready straight.

Yea, with a bridegroom's fresh alacrity,

Let us address to tend on Hector's heels:

The glory of our Troy doth this day lie

On his fair worth and single chivalry.

Exeunt

Here art thou in appointment fresh and fair,

Anticipating time with starting courage.

Give with thy trumpet a loud note to Troy,

Thou dreadful Ajax; that the appalled air

May pierce the head of the great combatant

And hale him hither.

Thou, trumpet, there's my purse.

Now crack thy lungs, and split thy brazen pipe:

Blow, villain, till thy sphered bias cheek

Outswell the colic of puff'd Aquilon:

Come, stretch thy chest and let thy eyes spout blood;

Thou blow'st for Hector.

Trumpet sounds

No trumpet answers.

'Tis but early days.

Is not yond Diomed, with Calchas' daughter?

'Tis he, I ken the manner of his gait;

He rises on the toe: that spirit of his

In aspiration lifts him from the earth.

Enter DIOMEDES, with CRESSIDA

Is this the Lady Cressid?

Even she.

Most dearly welcome to the Greeks, sweet lady.

Our general doth salute you with a kiss.

Yet is the kindness but particular;

'Twere better she were kiss'd in general.

And very courtly counsel: I'll begin.

So much for Nestor.

I'll take what winter from your lips, fair lady:

Achilles bids you welcome.

I had good argument for kissing once.

But that's no argument for kissing now;

For this popp'd Paris in his hardiment,

And parted thus you and your argument.

O deadly gall, and theme of all our scorns!

For which we lose our heads to gild his horns.

The first was Menelaus' kiss; this, mine:

Patroclus kisses you.

O, this is trim!

Paris and I kiss evermore for him.

I'll have my kiss, sir. Lady, by your leave.

In kissing, do you render or receive?

Both take and give.

I'll make my match to live,

The kiss you take is better than you give;

Therefore no kiss.

I'll give you boot, I'll give you three for one.

You're an odd man; give even or give none.

An odd man, lady! every man is odd.

No, Paris is not; for you know 'tis true,

That you are odd, and he is even with you.

You fillip me o' the head.

No, I'll be sworn.

It were no match, your nail against his horn.

May I, sweet lady, beg a kiss of you?

You may.

I do desire it.

Why, beg, then.

Why then for Venus' sake, give me a kiss,

When Helen is a maid again, and his.

I am your debtor, claim it when 'tis due.

Never's my day, and then a kiss of you.

Lady, a word: I'll bring you to your father.

Exit with CRESSIDA

A woman of quick sense.

Fie, fie upon her!

There's language in her eye, her cheek, her lip,

Nay, her foot speaks; her wanton spirits look out

At every joint and motive of her body.

O, these encounterers, so glib of tongue,

That give accosting welcome ere it comes,

And wide unclasp the tables of their thoughts

To every ticklish reader! set them down

For sluttish spoils of opportunity

And daughters of the game.

Trumpet within

The Trojans' trumpet.

Yonder comes the troop.

Enter HECTOR, armed; AENEAS, TROILUS, and other Trojans, with Attendants

Hail, all you state of Greece! what shall be done

To him that victory commands? or do you purpose

A victor shall be known? will you the knights

Shall to the edge of all extremity

Pursue each other, or shall be divided

By any voice or order of the field?

Hector bade ask.

Which way would Hector have it?

He cares not; he'll obey conditions.

'Tis done like Hector; but securely done,

A little proudly, and great deal misprizing

The knight opposed.

If not Achilles, sir,

What is your name?

If not Achilles, nothing.

Therefore Achilles: but, whate'er, know this:

In the extremity of great and little,

Valour and pride excel themselves in Hector;

The one almost as infinite as all,

The other blank as nothing. Weigh him well,

And that which looks like pride is courtesy.

This Ajax is half made of Hector's blood:

In love whereof, half Hector stays at home;

Half heart, half hand, half Hector comes to seek

This blended knight, half Trojan and half Greek.

A maiden battle, then? O, I perceive you.

Re-enter DIOMEDES

Here is Sir Diomed. Go, gentle knight,

Stand by our Ajax: as you and Lord AEneas

Consent upon the order of their fight,

So be it; either to the uttermost,

Or else a breath: the combatants being kin

Half stints their strife before their strokes begin.

AJAX and HECTOR enter the lists

They are opposed already.

What Trojan is that same that looks so heavy?

The youngest son of Priam, a true knight,

Not yet mature, yet matchless, firm of word,

Speaking in deeds and deedless in his tongue;

Not soon provoked nor being provoked soon calm'd:

His heart and hand both open and both free;

For what he has he gives, what thinks he shows;

Yet gives he not till judgment guide his bounty,

Nor dignifies an impure thought with breath;

Manly as Hector, but more dangerous;

For Hector in his blaze of wrath subscribes

To tender objects, but he in heat of action

Is more vindicative than jealous love:

They call him Troilus, and on him erect

A second hope, as fairly built as Hector.

Thus says AEneas; one that knows the youth

Even to his inches, and with private soul

Did in great Ilion thus translate him to me.

Alarum. Hector and Ajax fight

They are in action.

Now, Ajax, hold thine own!

Hector, thou sleep'st;

Awake thee!

His blows are well disposed: there, Ajax!

You must no more.

Trumpets cease

Princes, enough, so please you.

I am not warm yet; let us fight again.

As Hector pleases.

Why, then will I no more:

Thou art, great lord, my father's sister's son,

A cousin-german to great Priam's seed;

The obligation of our blood forbids

A gory emulation 'twixt us twain:

Were thy commixtion Greek and Trojan so

That thou couldst say 'This hand is Grecian all,

And this is Trojan; the sinews of this leg

All Greek, and this all Troy; my mother's blood

Runs on the dexter cheek, and this sinister

Bounds in my father's;' by Jove multipotent,

Thou shouldst not bear from me a Greekish member

Wherein my sword had not impressure made

Of our rank feud: but the just gods gainsay

That any drop thou borrow'dst from thy mother,

My sacred aunt, should by my mortal sword

Be drain'd! Let me embrace thee, Ajax:

By him that thunders, thou hast lusty arms;

Hector would have them fall upon him thus:

Cousin, all honour to thee!

I thank thee, Hector

Thou art too gentle and too free a man:

I came to kill thee, cousin, and bear hence

A great addition earned in thy death.

Not Neoptolemus so mirable,

On whose bright crest Fame with her loud'st Oyes

Cries 'This is he,' could promise to himself

A thought of added honour torn from Hector.

There is expectance here from both the sides,

What further you will do.

We'll answer it;

The issue is embracement: Ajax, farewell.

If I might in entreaties find success--

As seld I have the chance--I would desire

My famous cousin to our Grecian tents.

'Tis Agamemnon's wish, and great Achilles

Doth long to see unarm'd the valiant Hector.

AEneas, call my brother Troilus to me,

And signify this loving interview

To the expecters of our Trojan part;

Desire them home. Give me thy hand, my cousin;

I will go eat with thee and see your knights.

Great Agamemnon comes to meet us here.

The worthiest of them tell me name by name;

But for Achilles, mine own searching eyes

Shall find him by his large and portly size.

Worthy of arms! as welcome as to one

That would be rid of such an enemy;

But that's no welcome: understand more clear,

What's past and what's to come is strew'd with husks

And formless ruin of oblivion;

But in this extant moment, faith and troth,

Strain'd purely from all hollow bias-drawing,

Bids thee, with most divine integrity,

From heart of very heart, great Hector, welcome.

I thank thee, most imperious Agamemnon.

[To TROILUS] My well-famed lord of Troy, no

less to you.

Let me confirm my princely brother's greeting:

You brace of warlike brothers, welcome hither.

Who must we answer?

The noble Menelaus.

O, you, my lord? by Mars his gauntlet, thanks!

Mock not, that I affect the untraded oath;

Your quondam wife swears still by Venus' glove:

She's well, but bade me not commend her to you.

Name her not now, sir; she's a deadly theme.

O, pardon; I offend.

I have, thou gallant Trojan, seen thee oft

Labouring for destiny make cruel way

Through ranks of Greekish youth, and I have seen thee,

As hot as Perseus, spur thy Phrygian steed,

Despising many forfeits and subduements,

When thou hast hung thy advanced sword i' the air,

Not letting it decline on the declined,

That I have said to some my standers by

'Lo, Jupiter is yonder, dealing life!'

And I have seen thee pause and take thy breath,

When that a ring of Greeks have hemm'd thee in,

Like an Olympian wrestling: this have I seen;

But this thy countenance, still lock'd in steel,

I never saw till now. I knew thy grandsire,

And once fought with him: he was a soldier good;

But, by great Mars, the captain of us all,

Never saw like thee. Let an old man embrace thee;

And, worthy warrior, welcome to our tents.

'Tis the old Nestor.

Let me embrace thee, good old chronicle,

That hast so long walk'd hand in hand with time:

Most reverend Nestor, I am glad to clasp thee.

I would my arms could match thee in contention,

As they contend with thee in courtesy.

I would they could.

Ha!

By this white beard, I'ld fight with thee to-morrow.

Well, welcome, welcome! I have seen the time.

I wonder now how yonder city stands

When we have here her base and pillar by us.

I know your favour, Lord Ulysses, well.

Ah, sir, there's many a Greek and Trojan dead,

Since first I saw yourself and Diomed

In Ilion, on your Greekish embassy.

Sir, I foretold you then what would ensue:

My prophecy is but half his journey yet;

For yonder walls, that pertly front your town,

Yond towers, whose wanton tops do buss the clouds,

Must kiss their own feet.

I must not believe you:

There they stand yet, and modestly I think,

The fall of every Phrygian stone will cost

A drop of Grecian blood: the end crowns all,

And that old common arbitrator, Time,

Will one day end it.

So to him we leave it.

Most gentle and most valiant Hector, welcome:

After the general, I beseech you next

To feast with me and see me at my tent.

I shall forestall thee, Lord Ulysses, thou!

Now, Hector, I have fed mine eyes on thee;

I have with exact view perused thee, Hector,

And quoted joint by joint.

Is this Achilles?

I am Achilles.

Stand fair, I pray thee: let me look on thee.

Behold thy fill.

Nay, I have done already.

Thou art too brief: I will the second time,

As I would buy thee, view thee limb by limb.

O, like a book of sport thou'lt read me o'er;

But there's more in me than thou understand'st.

Why dost thou so oppress me with thine eye?

Tell me, you heavens, in which part of his body

Shall I destroy him? whether there, or there, or there?

That I may give the local wound a name

And make distinct the very breach whereout

Hector's great spirit flew: answer me, heavens!

It would discredit the blest gods, proud man,

To answer such a question: stand again:

Think'st thou to catch my life so pleasantly

As to prenominate in nice conjecture

Where thou wilt hit me dead?

I tell thee, yea.

Wert thou an oracle to tell me so,

I'd not believe thee. Henceforth guard thee well;

For I'll not kill thee there, nor there, nor there;

But, by the forge that stithied Mars his helm,

I'll kill thee every where, yea, o'er and o'er.

You wisest Grecians, pardon me this brag;

His insolence draws folly from my lips;

But I'll endeavour deeds to match these words,

Or may I never--

Do not chafe thee, cousin:

And you, Achilles, let these threats alone,

Till accident or purpose bring you to't:

You may have every day enough of Hector

If you have stomach; the general state, I fear,

Can scarce entreat you to be odd with him.

I pray you, let us see you in the field:

We have had pelting wars, since you refused

The Grecians' cause.

Dost thou entreat me, Hector?

To-morrow do I meet thee, fell as death;

To-night all friends.

Thy hand upon that match.

First, all you peers of Greece, go to my tent;

There in the full convive we: afterwards,

As Hector's leisure and your bounties shall

Concur together, severally entreat him.

Beat loud the tabourines, let the trumpets blow,

That this great soldier may his welcome know.

Exeunt all except TROILUS and ULYSSES

My Lord Ulysses, tell me, I beseech you,

In what place of the field doth Calchas keep?

At Menelaus' tent, most princely Troilus:

There Diomed doth feast with him to-night;

Who neither looks upon the heaven nor earth,

But gives all gaze and bent of amorous view

On the fair Cressid.

Shall sweet lord, be bound to you so much,

After we part from Agamemnon's tent,

To bring me thither?

You shall command me, sir.

As gentle tell me, of what honour was

This Cressida in Troy? Had she no lover there

That wails her absence?

I'll heat his blood with Greekish wine to-night,

Which with my scimitar I'll cool to-morrow.

Patroclus, let us feast him to the height.

Here comes Thersites.

Enter THERSITES

How now, thou core of envy!

Thou crusty batch of nature, what's the news?

Why, thou picture of what thou seemest, and idol

of idiot worshippers, here's a letter for thee.

From whence, fragment?

Why, thou full dish of fool, from Troy.

Who keeps the tent now?

The surgeon's box, or the patient's wound.

Well said, adversity! and what need these tricks?

Prithee, be silent, boy; I profit not by thy talk:

thou art thought to be Achilles' male varlet.

Male varlet, you rogue! what's that?

Why, his masculine whore. Now, the rotten diseases

of the south, the guts-griping, ruptures, catarrhs,

loads o' gravel i' the back, lethargies, cold

palsies, raw eyes, dirt-rotten livers, wheezing

lungs, bladders full of imposthume, sciaticas,

limekilns i' the palm, incurable bone-ache, and the

rivelled fee-simple of the tetter, take and take

again such preposterous discoveries!

Why thou damnable box of envy, thou, what meanest

thou to curse thus?

Do I curse thee?

Why no, you ruinous butt, you whoreson

indistinguishable cur, no.

No! why art thou then exasperate, thou idle

immaterial skein of sleave-silk, thou green sarcenet

flap for a sore eye, thou tassel of a prodigal's

purse, thou? Ah, how the poor world is pestered

with such waterflies, diminutives of nature!

Out, gall!

Finch-egg!

My sweet Patroclus, I am thwarted quite

From my great purpose in to-morrow's battle.

Here is a letter from Queen Hecuba,

A token from her daughter, my fair love,

Both taxing me and gaging me to keep

An oath that I have sworn. I will not break it:

Fall Greeks; fail fame; honour or go or stay;

My major vow lies here, this I'll obey.

Come, come, Thersites, help to trim my tent:

This night in banqueting must all be spent.

Away, Patroclus!

Exeunt ACHILLES and PATROCLUS

With too much blood and too little brain, these two

may run mad; but, if with too much brain and too

little blood they do, I'll be a curer of madmen.

Here's Agamemnon, an honest fellow enough and one

that loves quails; but he has not so much brain as

earwax: and the goodly transformation of Jupiter

there, his brother, the bull,--the primitive statue,

and oblique memorial of cuckolds; a thrifty

shoeing-horn in a chain, hanging at his brother's

leg,--to what form but that he is, should wit larded

with malice and malice forced with wit turn him to?

To an ass, were nothing; he is both ass and ox: to

an ox, were nothing; he is both ox and ass. To be a

dog, a mule, a cat, a fitchew, a toad, a lizard, an

owl, a puttock, or a herring without a roe, I would

not care; but to be Menelaus, I would conspire

against destiny. Ask me not, what I would be, if I

were not Thersites; for I care not to be the louse

of a lazar, so I were not Menelaus! Hey-day!

spirits and fires!

Enter HECTOR, TROILUS, AJAX, AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR, MENELAUS, and DIOMEDES, with lights

We go wrong, we go wrong.

No, yonder 'tis;

There, where we see the lights.

I trouble you.

No, not a whit.

Here comes himself to guide you.

Re-enter ACHILLES

Welcome, brave Hector; welcome, princes all.

So now, fair prince of Troy, I bid good night.

Ajax commands the guard to tend on you.

Thanks and good night to the Greeks' general.

Good night, my lord.

Good night, sweet lord Menelaus.

Sweet draught: 'sweet' quoth 'a! sweet sink,

sweet sewer.

Good night and welcome, both at once, to those

That go or tarry.

Good night.

Exeunt AGAMEMNON and MENELAUS

Old Nestor tarries; and you too, Diomed,

Keep Hector company an hour or two.

I cannot, lord; I have important business,

The tide whereof is now. Good night, great Hector.

Give me your hand.

[Aside to TROILUS] Follow his torch; he goes to

Calchas' tent:

I'll keep you company.

Sweet sir, you honour me.

And so, good night.

Exit DIOMEDES; ULYSSES and TROILUS following

Come, come, enter my tent.

Exeunt ACHILLES, HECTOR, AJAX, and NESTOR

That same Diomed's a false-hearted rogue, a most

unjust knave; I will no more trust him when he leers

than I will a serpent when he hisses: he will spend

his mouth, and promise, like Brabbler the hound:

but when he performs, astronomers foretell it; it

is prodigious, there will come some change; the sun

borrows of the moon, when Diomed keeps his

word. I will rather leave to see Hector, than

not to dog him: they say he keeps a Trojan

drab, and uses the traitor Calchas' tent: I'll

after. Nothing but lechery! all incontinent varlets!

Exit

What, are you up here, ho? speak.

[Within] Who calls?

Calchas, I think. Where's your daughter?

[Within] She comes to you.

Enter TROILUS and ULYSSES, at a distance; after them, THERSITES

Stand where the torch may not discover us.

Enter CRESSIDA

Cressid comes forth to him.

How now, my charge!

Now, my sweet guardian! Hark, a word with you.

Whispers

Yea, so familiar!

She will sing any man at first sight.

And any man may sing her, if he can take her cliff;

she's noted.

Will you remember?

Remember! yes.

Nay, but do, then;

And let your mind be coupled with your words.

What should she remember?

List.

Sweet honey Greek, tempt me no more to folly.

Roguery!

Nay, then,--

I'll tell you what,--

Foh, foh! come, tell a pin: you are forsworn.

In faith, I cannot: what would you have me do?

A juggling trick,--to be secretly open.

What did you swear you would bestow on me?

I prithee, do not hold me to mine oath;

Bid me do any thing but that, sweet Greek.

Good night.

Hold, patience!

How now, Trojan!

Diomed,--

No, no, good night: I'll be your fool no more.

Thy better must.

Hark, one word in your ear.

O plague and madness!

You are moved, prince; let us depart, I pray you,

Lest your displeasure should enlarge itself

To wrathful terms: this place is dangerous;

The time right deadly; I beseech you, go.

Behold, I pray you!

Nay, good my lord, go off:

You flow to great distraction; come, my lord.

I pray thee, stay.

You have not patience; come.

I pray you, stay; by hell and all hell's torments

I will not speak a word!

And so, good night.

Nay, but you part in anger.

Doth that grieve thee?

O wither'd truth!

Why, how now, lord!

By Jove,

I will be patient.

Guardian!--why, Greek!

Foh, foh! adieu; you palter.

In faith, I do not: come hither once again.

You shake, my lord, at something: will you go?

You will break out.

She strokes his cheek!

Come, come.

Nay, stay; by Jove, I will not speak a word:

There is between my will and all offences

A guard of patience: stay a little while.

How the devil Luxury, with his fat rump and

potato-finger, tickles these together! Fry, lechery, fry!

But will you, then?

In faith, I will, la; never trust me else.

Give me some token for the surety of it.

I'll fetch you one.

Exit

You have sworn patience.

Fear me not, sweet lord;

I will not be myself, nor have cognition

Of what I feel: I am all patience.

Re-enter CRESSIDA

Now the pledge; now, now, now!

Here, Diomed, keep this sleeve.

O beauty! where is thy faith?

My lord,--

I will be patient; outwardly I will.

You look upon that sleeve; behold it well.

He loved me--O false wench!--Give't me again.

Whose was't?

It is no matter, now I have't again.

I will not meet with you to-morrow night:

I prithee, Diomed, visit me no more.

Now she sharpens: well said, whetstone!

I shall have it.

What, this?

Ay, that.

O, all you gods! O pretty, pretty pledge!

Thy master now lies thinking in his bed

Of thee and me, and sighs, and takes my glove,

And gives memorial dainty kisses to it,

As I kiss thee. Nay, do not snatch it from me;

He that takes that doth take my heart withal.

I had your heart before, this follows it.

I did swear patience.

You shall not have it, Diomed; faith, you shall not;

I'll give you something else.

I will have this: whose was it?

It is no matter.

Come, tell me whose it was.

'Twas one's that loved me better than you will.

But, now you have it, take it.

Whose was it?

By all Diana's waiting-women yond,

And by herself, I will not tell you whose.

To-morrow will I wear it on my helm,

And grieve his spirit that dares not challenge it.

Wert thou the devil, and worest it on thy horn,

It should be challenged.

Well, well, 'tis done, 'tis past: and yet it is not;

I will not keep my word.

Why, then, farewell;

Thou never shalt mock Diomed again.

You shall not go: one cannot speak a word,

But it straight starts you.

I do not like this fooling.

Nor I, by Pluto: but that that likes not you pleases me best.

What, shall I come? the hour?

Ay, come:--O Jove!--do come:--I shall be plagued.

Farewell till then.

Good night: I prithee, come.

Exit DIOMEDES

Troilus, farewell! one eye yet looks on thee

But with my heart the other eye doth see.

Ah, poor our sex! this fault in us I find,

The error of our eye directs our mind:

What error leads must err; O, then conclude

Minds sway'd by eyes are full of turpitude.

Exit

A proof of strength she could not publish more,

Unless she said ' My mind is now turn'd whore.'

All's done, my lord.

It is.

Why stay we, then?

To make a recordation to my soul

Of every syllable that here was spoke.

But if I tell how these two did co-act,

Shall I not lie in publishing a truth?

Sith yet there is a credence in my heart,

An esperance so obstinately strong,

That doth invert the attest of eyes and ears,

As if those organs had deceptious functions,

Created only to calumniate.

Was Cressid here?

I cannot conjure, Trojan.

She was not, sure.

Most sure she was.

Why, my negation hath no taste of madness.

Nor mine, my lord: Cressid was here but now.

Let it not be believed for womanhood!

Think, we had mothers; do not give advantage

To stubborn critics, apt, without a theme,

For depravation, to square the general sex

By Cressid's rule: rather think this not Cressid.

What hath she done, prince, that can soil our mothers?

Nothing at all, unless that this were she.

Will he swagger himself out on's own eyes?

This she? no, this is Diomed's Cressida:

If beauty have a soul, this is not she;

If souls guide vows, if vows be sanctimonies,

If sanctimony be the gods' delight,

If there be rule in unity itself,

This is not she. O madness of discourse,

That cause sets up with and against itself!

Bi-fold authority! where reason can revolt

Without perdition, and loss assume all reason

Without revolt: this is, and is not, Cressid.

Within my soul there doth conduce a fight

Of this strange nature that a thing inseparate

Divides more wider than the sky and earth,

And yet the spacious breadth of this division

Admits no orifex for a point as subtle

As Ariachne's broken woof to enter.

Instance, O instance! strong as Pluto's gates;

Cressid is mine, tied with the bonds of heaven:

Instance, O instance! strong as heaven itself;

The bonds of heaven are slipp'd, dissolved, and loosed;

And with another knot, five-finger-tied,

The fractions of her faith, orts of her love,

The fragments, scraps, the bits and greasy relics

Of her o'er-eaten faith, are bound to Diomed.

May worthy Troilus be half attach'd

With that which here his passion doth express?

Ay, Greek; and that shall be divulged well

In characters as red as Mars his heart

Inflamed with Venus: never did young man fancy

With so eternal and so fix'd a soul.

Hark, Greek: as much as I do Cressid love,

So much by weight hate I her Diomed:

That sleeve is mine that he'll bear on his helm;

Were it a casque composed by Vulcan's skill,

My sword should bite it: not the dreadful spout

Which shipmen do the hurricano call,

Constringed in mass by the almighty sun,

Shall dizzy with more clamour Neptune's ear

In his descent than shall my prompted sword

Falling on Diomed.

He'll tickle it for his concupy.

O Cressid! O false Cressid! false, false, false!

Let all untruths stand by thy stained name,

And they'll seem glorious.

O, contain yourself

Your passion draws ears hither.

Enter AENEAS

I have been seeking you this hour, my lord:

Hector, by this, is arming him in Troy;

Ajax, your guard, stays to conduct you home.

Have with you, prince. My courteous lord, adieu.

Farewell, revolted fair! and, Diomed,

Stand fast, and wear a castle on thy head!

I'll bring you to the gates.

Accept distracted thanks.

Exeunt TROILUS, AENEAS, and ULYSSES

Would I could meet that rogue Diomed! I would

croak like a raven; I would bode, I would bode.

Patroclus will give me any thing for the

intelligence of this whore: the parrot will not

do more for an almond than he for a commodious drab.

Lechery, lechery; still, wars and lechery; nothing

else holds fashion: a burning devil take them!

Exit

When was my lord so much ungently temper'd,

To stop his ears against admonishment?

Unarm, unarm, and do not fight to-day.

You train me to offend you; get you in:

By all the everlasting gods, I'll go!

My dreams will, sure, prove ominous to the day.

No more, I say.

Enter CASSANDRA

Where is my brother Hector?

Here, sister; arm'd, and bloody in intent.

Consort with me in loud and dear petition,

Pursue we him on knees; for I have dream'd

Of bloody turbulence, and this whole night

Hath nothing been but shapes and forms of slaughter.

O, 'tis true.

Ho! bid my trumpet sound!

No notes of sally, for the heavens, sweet brother.

Be gone, I say: the gods have heard me swear.

The gods are deaf to hot and peevish vows:

They are polluted offerings, more abhorr'd

Than spotted livers in the sacrifice.

O, be persuaded! do not count it holy

To hurt by being just: it is as lawful,

For we would give much, to use violent thefts,

And rob in the behalf of charity.

It is the purpose that makes strong the vow;

But vows to every purpose must not hold:

Unarm, sweet Hector.

Hold you still, I say;

Mine honour keeps the weather of my fate:

Lie every man holds dear; but the brave man

Holds honour far more precious-dear than life.

Enter TROILUS

How now, young man! mean'st thou to fight to-day?

Cassandra, call my father to persuade.

Exit CASSANDRA

No, faith, young Troilus; doff thy harness, youth;

I am to-day i' the vein of chivalry:

Let grow thy sinews till their knots be strong,

And tempt not yet the brushes of the war.

Unarm thee, go, and doubt thou not, brave boy,

I'll stand to-day for thee and me and Troy.

Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you,

Which better fits a lion than a man.

What vice is that, good Troilus? chide me for it.

When many times the captive Grecian falls,

Even in the fan and wind of your fair sword,

You bid them rise, and live.

O,'tis fair play.

Fool's play, by heaven, Hector.

How now! how now!

For the love of all the gods,

Let's leave the hermit pity with our mothers,

And when we have our armours buckled on,

The venom'd vengeance ride upon our swords,

Spur them to ruthful work, rein them from ruth.

Fie, savage, fie!

Hector, then 'tis wars.

Troilus, I would not have you fight to-day.

Who should withhold me?

Not fate, obedience, nor the hand of Mars

Beckoning with fiery truncheon my retire;

Not Priamus and Hecuba on knees,

Their eyes o'ergalled with recourse of tears;

Not you, my brother, with your true sword drawn,

Opposed to hinder me, should stop my way,

But by my ruin.

Re-enter CASSANDRA, with PRIAM

Lay hold upon him, Priam, hold him fast:

He is thy crutch; now if thou lose thy stay,

Thou on him leaning, and all Troy on thee,

Fall all together.

Come, Hector, come, go back:

Thy wife hath dream'd; thy mother hath had visions;

Cassandra doth foresee; and I myself

Am like a prophet suddenly enrapt

To tell thee that this day is ominous:

Therefore, come back.

AEneas is a-field;

And I do stand engaged to many Greeks,

Even in the faith of valour, to appear

This morning to them.

Ay, but thou shalt not go.

I must not break my faith.

You know me dutiful; therefore, dear sir,

Let me not shame respect; but give me leave

To take that course by your consent and voice,

Which you do here forbid me, royal Priam.

O Priam, yield not to him!

Do not, dear father.

Andromache, I am offended with you:

Upon the love you bear me, get you in.

Exit ANDROMACHE

This foolish, dreaming, superstitious girl

Makes all these bodements.

O, farewell, dear Hector!

Look, how thou diest! look, how thy eye turns pale!

Look, how thy wounds do bleed at many vents!

Hark, how Troy roars! how Hecuba cries out!

How poor Andromache shrills her dolours forth!

Behold, distraction, frenzy and amazement,

Like witless antics, one another meet,

And all cry, Hector! Hector's dead! O Hector!

Away! away!

Farewell: yet, soft! Hector! take my leave:

Thou dost thyself and all our Troy deceive.

Exit

You are amazed, my liege, at her exclaim:

Go in and cheer the town: we'll forth and fight,

Do deeds worth praise and tell you them at night.

Farewell: the gods with safety stand about thee!

Exeunt severally PRIAM and HECTOR. Alarums

They are at it, hark! Proud Diomed, believe,

I come to lose my arm, or win my sleeve.

Enter PANDARUS

Do you hear, my lord? do you hear?

What now?

Here's a letter come from yond poor girl.

Let me read.

A whoreson tisick, a whoreson rascally tisick so

troubles me, and the foolish fortune of this girl;

and what one thing, what another, that I shall

leave you one o' these days: and I have a rheum

in mine eyes too, and such an ache in my bones

that, unless a man were cursed, I cannot tell what

to think on't. What says she there?

Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart:

The effect doth operate another way.

Tearing the letter

Go, wind, to wind, there turn and change together.

My love with words and errors still she feeds;

But edifies another with her deeds.

Exeunt severally

Now they are clapper-clawing one another; I'll go

look on. That dissembling abominable varlets Diomed,

has got that same scurvy doting foolish young knave's

sleeve of Troy there in his helm: I would fain see

them meet; that that same young Trojan ass, that

loves the whore there, might send that Greekish

whore-masterly villain, with the sleeve, back to the

dissembling luxurious drab, of a sleeveless errand.

O' the t'other side, the policy of those crafty

swearing rascals, that stale old mouse-eaten dry

cheese, Nestor, and that same dog-fox, Ulysses, is

not proved worthy a blackberry: they set me up, in

policy, that mongrel cur, Ajax, against that dog of

as bad a kind, Achilles: and now is the cur Ajax

prouder than the cur Achilles, and will not arm

to-day; whereupon the Grecians begin to proclaim

barbarism, and policy grows into an ill opinion.

Soft! here comes sleeve, and t'other.

Enter DIOMEDES, TROILUS following

Fly not; for shouldst thou take the river Styx,

I would swim after.

Thou dost miscall retire:

I do not fly, but advantageous care

Withdrew me from the odds of multitude:

Have at thee!

Hold thy whore, Grecian!--now for thy whore,

Trojan!--now the sleeve, now the sleeve!

Exeunt TROILUS and DIOMEDES, fighting

Enter HECTOR