APDL Eductation Resources/APDL Eductation Resources.iso/text/shakespear/troilus/TROILUS

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        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


        DRAMATIS PERSONAE


PRIAM   king of Troy.


HECTOR  |
        |
TROILUS |
        |
PARIS   |  his sons.
        |
DEIPHOBUS       |
        |
HELENUS |


MARGARELON      a bastard son of Priam.


AENEAS  |
        |  Trojan commanders.
ANTENOR |


CALCHAS a Trojan priest, taking part with the Greeks.

PANDARUS        uncle to Cressida.

AGAMEMNON       the Grecian general.

MENELAUS        his brother.


ACHILLES        |
        |
AJAX    |
        |
ULYSSES |
        |  Grecian princes.
NESTOR  |
        |
DIOMEDES        |
        |
PATROCLUS       |


THERSITES       a deformed and scurrilous Grecian.

ALEXANDER       servant to Cressida.

        Servant to Troilus. (Boy:)

        Servant to Paris.

        Servant to Diomedes. (Servant:)

HELEN   wife to Menelaus.

ANDROMACHE      wife to Hector.

CASSANDRA       daughter to Priam, a prophetess.

CRESSIDA        daughter to Calchas.

        Trojan and Greek Soldiers, and Attendants.


SCENE   Troy, and the Grecian camp before it.




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA

        PROLOGUE


        In Troy, there lies the scene. From isles of Greece
        The princes orgulous, their high blood chafed,
        Have to the port of Athens sent their ships,
        Fraught with the ministers and instruments
        Of cruel war: sixty and nine, that wore
        Their crownets regal, from the Athenian bay
        Put forth toward Phrygia; and their vow is made
        To ransack Troy, within whose strong immures
        The ravish'd Helen, Menelaus' queen,
        With wanton Paris sleeps; and that's the quarrel.
        To Tenedos they come;
        And the deep-drawing barks do there disgorge
        Their warlike fraughtage: now on Dardan plains
        The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch
        Their brave pavilions: Priam's six-gated city,
        Dardan, and Tymbria, Helias, Chetas, Troien,
        And Antenorides, with massy staples
        And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts,
        Sperr up the sons of Troy.
        Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits,
        On one and other side, Trojan and Greek,
        Sets all on hazard: and hither am I come
        A prologue arm'd, but not in confidence
        Of author's pen or actor's voice, but suited
        In like conditions as our argument,
        To tell you, fair beholders, that our play
        Leaps o'er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils,
        Beginning in the middle, starting thence away
        To what may be digested in a play.
        Like or find fault; do as your pleasures are:
        Now good or bad, 'tis but the chance of war.




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT I



SCENE I Troy. Before Priam's palace.


        [Enter TROILUS armed, and PANDARUS]

TROILUS 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.

PANDARUS        Will this gear ne'er be mended?

TROILUS 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.

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS Have I not tarried?

PANDARUS        Ay, the grinding; but you must tarry
        the bolting.

TROILUS Have I not tarried?

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

TROILUS Still have I tarried.

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS 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?

PANDARUS        Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw
        her look, or any woman else.

TROILUS 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.

PANDARUS        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--

TROILUS 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.

PANDARUS        I speak no more than truth.

TROILUS Thou dost not speak so much.

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS Good Pandarus, how now, Pandarus!

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.

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

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS Say I she is not fair?

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS Pandarus,--

PANDARUS        Not I.

TROILUS Sweet Pandarus,--

PANDARUS        Pray you, speak no more to me: I will leave all as I
        found it, and there an end.

        [Exit PANDARUS. An alarum]

TROILUS 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]

AENEAS  How now, Prince Troilus! wherefore not afield?

TROILUS Because not there: this woman's answer sorts,
        For womanish it is to be from thence.
        What news, AEneas, from the field to-day?

AENEAS  That Paris is returned home and hurt.

TROILUS By whom, AEneas?

AENEAS                    Troilus, by Menelaus.

TROILUS Let Paris bleed; 'tis but a scar to scorn;
        Paris is gored with Menelaus' horn.

        [Alarum]

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

TROILUS Better at home, if 'would I might' were 'may.'
        But to the sport abroad: are you bound thither?

AENEAS  In all swift haste.

TROILUS Come, go we then together.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT I



SCENE II        The Same. A street.


        [Enter CRESSIDA and ALEXANDER]

CRESSIDA        Who were those went by?

ALEXANDER       Queen Hecuba and Helen.

CRESSIDA        And whither go they?

ALEXANDER       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.

CRESSIDA                          What was his cause of anger?

ALEXANDER       The noise goes, this: there is among the Greeks
        A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector;
        They call him Ajax.

CRESSIDA        Good; and what of him?

ALEXANDER       They say he is a very man per se,
        And stands alone.

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

ALEXANDER       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.

CRESSIDA        But how should this man, that makes
        me smile, make Hector angry?

ALEXANDER       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.

CRESSIDA        Who comes here?

ALEXANDER       Madam, your uncle Pandarus.

        [Enter PANDARUS]

CRESSIDA        Hector's a gallant man.

ALEXANDER       As may be in the world, lady.

PANDARUS        What's that? what's that?

CRESSIDA        Good morrow, uncle Pandarus.

PANDARUS        Good morrow, cousin Cressid: what do you talk of?
        Good morrow, Alexander. How do you, cousin? When
        were you at Ilium?

CRESSIDA        This morning, uncle.

PANDARUS        What were you talking of when I came? Was Hector
        armed and gone ere ye came to Ilium? Helen was not
        up, was she?

CRESSIDA        Hector was gone, but Helen was not up.

PANDARUS        Even so: Hector was stirring early.

CRESSIDA        That were we talking of, and of his anger.

PANDARUS        Was he angry?

CRESSIDA        So he says here.

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        What, is he angry too?

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

CRESSIDA        O Jupiter! there's no comparison.

PANDARUS        What, not between Troilus and Hector? Do you know a
        man if you see him?

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

PANDARUS        Well, I say Troilus is Troilus.

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

PANDARUS        No, nor Hector is not Troilus in some degrees.

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

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

CRESSIDA        So he is.

PANDARUS        Condition, I had gone barefoot to India.

CRESSIDA        He is not Hector.

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        Excuse me.

PANDARUS        He is elder.

CRESSIDA        Pardon me, pardon me.

PANDARUS        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.

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

PANDARUS        Nor his qualities.

CRESSIDA        No matter.

PANDARUS        Nor his beauty.

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

PANDARUS        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,--

CRESSIDA        No, but brown.

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

CRESSIDA        To say the truth, true and not true.

PANDARUS        She praised his complexion above Paris.

CRESSIDA        Why, Paris hath colour enough.

PANDARUS        So he has.

CRESSIDA        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.

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

CRESSIDA        Then she's a merry Greek indeed.

PANDARUS        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,--

CRESSIDA        Indeed, a tapster's arithmetic may soon bring his
        particulars therein to a total.

PANDARUS        Why, he is very young: and yet will he, within
        three pound, lift as much as his brother Hector.

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

PANDARUS        But to prove to you that Helen loves him: she came
        and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin--

CRESSIDA        Juno have mercy! how came it cloven?

PANDARUS        Why, you know 'tis dimpled: I think his smiling
        becomes him better than any man in all Phrygia.

CRESSIDA        O, he smiles valiantly.

PANDARUS        Does he not?

CRESSIDA        O yes, an 'twere a cloud in autumn.

PANDARUS        Why, go to, then: but to prove to you that Helen
        loves Troilus,--

CRESSIDA        Troilus will stand to the proof, if you'll
        prove it so.

PANDARUS        Troilus! why, he esteems her no more than I esteem
        an addle egg.

CRESSIDA        If you love an addle egg as well as you love an idle
        head, you would eat chickens i' the shell.

PANDARUS        I cannot choose but laugh, to think how she tickled
        his chin: indeed, she has a marvellous white hand, I
        must needs confess,--

CRESSIDA        Without the rack.

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

CRESSIDA        Alas, poor chin! many a wart is richer.

PANDARUS        But there was such laughing! Queen Hecuba laughed
        that her eyes ran o'er.

CRESSIDA        With mill-stones.

PANDARUS        And Cassandra laughed.

CRESSIDA        But there was more temperate fire under the pot of
        her eyes: did her eyes run o'er too?

PANDARUS        And Hector laughed.

CRESSIDA        At what was all this laughing?

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

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

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

CRESSIDA        What was his answer?

PANDARUS        Quoth she, 'Here's but two and fifty hairs on your
        chin, and one of them is white.

CRESSIDA        This is her question.

PANDARUS        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.

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

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

CRESSIDA        So I do.

PANDARUS        I'll be sworn 'tis true; he will weep you, an 'twere
        a man born in April.

CRESSIDA        And I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a nettle
        against May.

        [A retreat sounded]

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        At your pleasure.

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        Speak not so loud.

        [AENEAS passes]

PANDARUS        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]

CRESSIDA        Who's that?

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        Will he give you the nod?

PANDARUS        You shall see.

CRESSIDA        If he do, the rich shall have more.

        [HECTOR passes]

PANDARUS        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?

CRESSIDA        O, a brave man!

PANDARUS        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!

CRESSIDA        Be those with swords?

PANDARUS        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]

CRESSIDA        Who's that?

PANDARUS        That's Helenus. I marvel where Troilus is. That's
        Helenus. I think he went not forth to-day. That's Helenus.

CRESSIDA        Can Helenus fight, uncle?

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        What sneaking fellow comes yonder?

        [TROILUS passes]

PANDARUS        Where? yonder? that's Deiphobus. 'Tis Troilus!
        there's a man, niece! Hem! Brave Troilus! the
        prince of chivalry!

CRESSIDA        Peace, for shame, peace!

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        Here come more.

        [Forces pass]

PANDARUS        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.

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

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

CRESSIDA        Well, well.

PANDARUS        '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?

CRESSIDA        Ay, a minced man: and then to be baked with no date
        in the pie, for then the man's date's out.

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

CRESSIDA        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.

PANDARUS        Say one of your watches.

CRESSIDA        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.

PANDARUS        You are such another!

        [Enter Troilus's Boy]

Boy     Sir, my lord would instantly speak with you.

PANDARUS        Where?

Boy     At your own house; there he unarms him.

PANDARUS        Good boy, tell him I come.

        [Exit boy]

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

CRESSIDA        Adieu, uncle.

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

CRESSIDA        To bring, uncle?

PANDARUS        Ay, a token from Troilus.

CRESSIDA        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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT I



SCENE III       The Grecian camp. Before Agamemnon's tent.


        [Sennet. Enter AGAMEMNON, NESTOR, ULYSSES,
        MENELAUS, and others]

AGAMEMNON       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.

NESTOR  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.

ULYSSES 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.

AGAMEMNON       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.

ULYSSES 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.

NESTOR  Most wisely hath Ulysses here discover'd
        The fever whereof all our power is sick.

AGAMEMNON       The nature of the sickness found, Ulysses,
        What is the remedy?

ULYSSES 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.

NESTOR  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.

ULYSSES 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.

NESTOR  Let this be granted, and Achilles' horse
        Makes many Thetis' sons.

        [A tucket]

AGAMEMNON       What trumpet? look, Menelaus.

MENELAUS        From Troy.

        [Enter AENEAS]

AGAMEMNON       What would you 'fore our tent?

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

AGAMEMNON       Even this.

AENEAS  May one, that is a herald and a prince,
        Do a fair message to his kingly ears?

AGAMEMNON       With surety stronger than Achilles' arm
        'Fore all the Greekish heads, which with one voice
        Call Agamemnon head and general.

AENEAS  Fair leave and large security. How may
        A stranger to those most imperial looks
        Know them from eyes of other mortals?

AGAMEMNON       How!

AENEAS  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?

AGAMEMNON       This Trojan scorns us; or the men of Troy
        Are ceremonious courtiers.

AENEAS  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.

AGAMEMNON       Sir, you of Troy, call you yourself AEneas?

AENEAS  Ay, Greek, that is my name.

AGAMEMNON       What's your affair I pray you?

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

AGAMEMNON       He hears naught privately that comes from Troy.

AENEAS  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.

AGAMEMNON                         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.

AENEAS  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.

AGAMEMNON       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.

NESTOR  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.

AENEAS  Now heavens forbid such scarcity of youth!

ULYSSES Amen.

AGAMEMNON       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]

ULYSSES Nestor!

NESTOR  What says Ulysses?

ULYSSES I have a young conception in my brain;
        Be you my time to bring it to some shape.

NESTOR  What is't?

ULYSSES 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.

NESTOR  Well, and how?

ULYSSES This challenge that the gallant Hector sends,
        However it is spread in general name,
        Relates in purpose only to Achilles.

NESTOR  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.

ULYSSES And wake him to the answer, think you?

NESTOR  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.

ULYSSES 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.

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

ULYSSES What glory our Achilles shares from Hector,
        Were he not proud, we all should share with him:
        But he already is too insolent;
        And 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.

NESTOR  Ulysses,
        Now I begin to relish thy advice;
        And I will give a taste of it forthwith
        To Agamemnon: go we to him straight.
        Two curs shall tame each other: pride alone
        Must tarre the mastiffs on, as 'twere their bone.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT II



SCENE I A part of the Grecian camp.


        [Enter AJAX and THERSITES]

AJAX    Thersites!

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

AJAX    Thersites!

THERSITES       And those boils did run? say so: did not the
        general run then? were not that a botchy core?

AJAX    Dog!

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

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

        [Beating him]

        Feel, then.

THERSITES       The plague of Greece upon thee, thou mongrel
        beef-witted lord!

AJAX    Speak then, thou vinewedst leaven, speak: I will
        beat thee into handsomeness.

THERSITES       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!

AJAX    Toadstool, learn me the proclamation.

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

AJAX    The proclamation!

THERSITES       Thou art proclaimed a fool, I think.

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

THERSITES       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.

AJAX    I say, the proclamation!

THERSITES       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.

AJAX    Mistress Thersites!

THERSITES       Thou shouldest strike him.

AJAX    Cobloaf!

THERSITES       He would pun thee into shivers with his fist, as a
        sailor breaks a biscuit.

AJAX    [Beating him]  You whoreson cur!

THERSITES       Do, do.

AJAX    Thou stool for a witch!

THERSITES       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!

AJAX    You dog!

THERSITES       You scurvy lord!

AJAX    [Beating him]  You cur!

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

        [Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS]

ACHILLES        Why, how now, Ajax! wherefore do you thus? How now,
        Thersites! what's the matter, man?

THERSITES       You see him there, do you?

ACHILLES        Ay; what's the matter?

THERSITES       Nay, look upon him.

ACHILLES        So I do: what's the matter?

THERSITES       Nay, but regard him well.

ACHILLES        'Well!' why, I do so.

THERSITES       But yet you look not well upon him; for whosoever you
        take him to be, he is Ajax.

ACHILLES        I know that, fool.

THERSITES       Ay, but that fool knows not himself.

AJAX    Therefore I beat thee.

THERSITES       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.

ACHILLES        What?

THERSITES       I say, this Ajax--

        [Ajax offers to beat him]

ACHILLES        Nay, good Ajax.

THERSITES       Has not so much wit--

ACHILLES        Nay, I must hold you.

THERSITES       As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, for whom he
        comes to fight.

ACHILLES        Peace, fool!

THERSITES       I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will
        not: he there: that he: look you there.

AJAX    O thou damned cur! I shall--

ACHILLES        Will you set your wit to a fool's?

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

PATROCLUS       Good words, Thersites.

ACHILLES        What's the quarrel?

AJAX    I bade the vile owl go learn me the tenor of the
        proclamation, and he rails upon me.

THERSITES       I serve thee not.

AJAX    Well, go to, go to.

THERSITES       I serve here voluntarily.

ACHILLES        Your last service was sufferance, 'twas not
        voluntary: no man is beaten voluntary: Ajax was
        here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.

THERSITES       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.

ACHILLES        What, with me too, Thersites?

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.

ACHILLES        What, what?

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

AJAX    I shall cut out your tongue.

THERSITES       'Tis no matter! I shall speak as much as thou
        afterwards.

PATROCLUS       No more words, Thersites; peace!

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

ACHILLES        There's for you, Patroclus.

THERSITES       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]

PATROCLUS       A good riddance.

ACHILLES        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.

AJAX    Farewell. Who shall answer him?

ACHILLES        I know not: 'tis put to lottery; otherwise
        He knew his man.

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

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT II



SCENE II        Troy. A room in Priam's palace.


        [Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, PARIS, and HELENUS]

PRIAM   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?

HECTOR  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?

TROILUS 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!

HELENUS 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?

TROILUS 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.

HECTOR  Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost
        The holding.

TROILUS                   What is aught, but as 'tis valued?

HECTOR  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.

TROILUS 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!

CASSANDRA       [Within]  Cry, Trojans, cry!

PRIAM   What noise? what shriek is this?

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

CASSANDRA       [Within]  Cry, Trojans!

HECTOR  It is Cassandra.

        [Enter CASSANDRA, raving]

CASSANDRA       Cry, Trojans, cry! lend me ten thousand eyes,
        And I will fill them with prophetic tears.

HECTOR  Peace, sister, peace!

CASSANDRA       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]

HECTOR  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?

TROILUS 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!

PARIS   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.

PRIAM   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.

PARIS   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.

HECTOR  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.

TROILUS 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.

HECTOR  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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT II



SCENE III       The Grecian camp. Before Achilles' tent.


        [Enter THERSITES, solus]

THERSITES       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]

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

THERSITES       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?

PATROCLUS       What, art thou devout? wast thou in prayer?

THERSITES       Ay: the heavens hear me!

        [Enter ACHILLES]

ACHILLES        Who's there?

PATROCLUS       Thersites, my lord.

ACHILLES        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?

THERSITES       Thy commander, Achilles. Then tell me, Patroclus,
        what's Achilles?

PATROCLUS       Thy lord, Thersites: then tell me, I pray thee,
        what's thyself?

THERSITES       Thy knower, Patroclus: then tell me, Patroclus,
        what art thou?

PATROCLUS       Thou mayst tell that knowest.

ACHILLES        O, tell, tell.

THERSITES       I'll decline the whole question. Agamemnon commands
        Achilles; Achilles is my lord; I am Patroclus'
        knower, and Patroclus is a fool.

PATROCLUS       You rascal!

THERSITES       Peace, fool! I have not done.

ACHILLES        He is a privileged man. Proceed, Thersites.

THERSITES       Agamemnon is a fool; Achilles is a fool; Thersites
        is a fool, and, as aforesaid, Patroclus is a fool.

ACHILLES        Derive this; come.

THERSITES       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.

PATROCLUS       Why am I a fool?

THERSITES       Make that demand of the prover. It suffices me thou
        art. Look you, who comes here?

ACHILLES        Patroclus, I'll speak with nobody.
        Come in with me, Thersites.

        [Exit]

THERSITES       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]

AGAMEMNON       Where is Achilles?

PATROCLUS       Within his tent; but ill disposed, my lord.

AGAMEMNON       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.

PATROCLUS       I shall say so to him.

        [Exit]

ULYSSES We saw him at the opening of his tent:
        He is not sick.

AJAX    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]

NESTOR  What moves Ajax thus to bay at him?

ULYSSES Achilles hath inveigled his fool from him.

NESTOR  Who, Thersites?

ULYSSES He.

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

ULYSSES No, you see, he is his argument that has his
        argument, Achilles.

NESTOR  All the better; their fraction is more our wish than
        their faction: but it was a strong composure a fool
        could disunite.

ULYSSES The amity that wisdom knits not, folly may easily
        untie. Here comes Patroclus.

        [Re-enter PATROCLUS]

NESTOR  No Achilles with him.

ULYSSES The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy:
        his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.

PATROCLUS       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.

AGAMEMNON       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.

PATROCLUS       I shall; and bring his answer presently.

        [Exit]

AGAMEMNON       In second voice we'll not be satisfied;
        We come to speak with him. Ulysses, enter you.

        [Exit ULYSSES]

AJAX    What is he more than another?

AGAMEMNON       No more than what he thinks he is.

AJAX    Is he so much? Do you not think he thinks himself a
        better man than I am?

AGAMEMNON       No question.

AJAX    Will you subscribe his thought, and say he is?

AGAMEMNON       No, noble Ajax; you are as strong, as valiant, as
        wise, no less noble, much more gentle, and altogether
        more tractable.

AJAX    Why should a man be proud? How doth pride grow? I
        know not what pride is.

AGAMEMNON       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.

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

NESTOR  Yet he loves himself: is't not strange?

        [Aside]

        [Re-enter ULYSSES]

ULYSSES Achilles will not to the field to-morrow.

AGAMEMNON       What's his excuse?

ULYSSES                   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.

AGAMEMNON       Why will he not upon our fair request
        Untent his person and share the air with us?

ULYSSES 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.'

AGAMEMNON                         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.

ULYSSES 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.'

NESTOR  [Aside to DIOMEDES]  O, this is well; he rubs the
        vein of him.

DIOMEDES        [Aside to NESTOR]  And how his silence drinks up
        this applause!

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

AGAMEMNON       O, no, you shall not go.

AJAX    An a' be proud with me, I'll pheeze his pride:
        Let me go to him.

ULYSSES Not for the worth that hangs upon our quarrel.

AJAX    A paltry, insolent fellow!

NESTOR  How he describes himself!

AJAX    Can he not be sociable?

ULYSSES The raven chides blackness.

AJAX    I'll let his humours blood.

AGAMEMNON       He will be the physician that should be the patient.

AJAX    An all men were o' my mind,--

ULYSSES Wit would be out of fashion.

AJAX    A' should not bear it so, a' should eat swords first:
        shall pride carry it?

NESTOR  An 'twould, you'ld carry half.

ULYSSES A' would have ten shares.

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

NESTOR  He's not yet through warm: force him with praises:
        pour in, pour in; his ambition is dry.

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

NESTOR  Our noble general, do not do so.

DIOMEDES        You must prepare to fight without Achilles.

ULYSSES Why, 'tis this naming of him does him harm.
        Here is a man--but 'tis before his face;
        I will be silent.

NESTOR                    Wherefore should you so?
        He is not emulous, as Achilles is.

ULYSSES Know the whole world, he is as valiant.

AJAX    A whoreson dog, that shall pelter thus with us!
        Would he were a Trojan!

NESTOR  What a vice were it in Ajax now,--

ULYSSES If he were proud,--

DIOMEDES        Or covetous of praise,--

ULYSSES Ay, or surly borne,--

DIOMEDES        Or strange, or self-affected!

ULYSSES 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.

AJAX                      Shall I call you father?

NESTOR  Ay, my good son.

DIOMEDES                          Be ruled by him, Lord Ajax.

ULYSSES 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.

AGAMEMNON       Go we to council. Let Achilles sleep:
        Light boats sail swift, though greater hulks draw deep.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT III



SCENE I Troy. Priam's palace.


        [Enter a Servant and PANDARUS]

PANDARUS        Friend, you! pray you, a word: do not you follow
        the young Lord Paris?

Servant Ay, sir, when he goes before me.

PANDARUS        You depend upon him, I mean?

Servant Sir, I do depend upon the lord.

PANDARUS        You depend upon a noble gentleman; I must needs
        praise him.

Servant The lord be praised!

PANDARUS        You know me, do you not?

Servant Faith, sir, superficially.

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

Servant I hope I shall know your honour better.

PANDARUS        I do desire it.

Servant You are in the state of grace.

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

        [Music within]

        What music is this?

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

PANDARUS        Know you the musicians?

Servant Wholly, sir.

PANDARUS        Who play they to?

Servant To the hearers, sir.

PANDARUS        At whose pleasure, friend

Servant At mine, sir, and theirs that love music.

PANDARUS        Command, I mean, friend.

Servant Who shall I command, sir?

PANDARUS        Friend, we understand not one another: I am too
        courtly and thou art too cunning. At whose request
        do these men play?

Servant 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,--

PANDARUS        Who, my cousin Cressida?

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

PANDARUS        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.

Servant Sodden business! there's a stewed phrase indeed!

        [Enter PARIS and HELEN, attended]

PANDARUS        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!

HELEN   Dear lord, you are full of fair words.

PANDARUS        You speak your fair pleasure, sweet queen. Fair
        prince, here is good broken music.

PARIS   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.

PANDARUS        Truly, lady, no.

HELEN   O, sir,--

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

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

PANDARUS        I have business to my lord, dear queen. My lord,
        will you vouchsafe me a word?

HELEN   Nay, this shall not hedge us out: we'll hear you
        sing, certainly.

PANDARUS        Well, sweet queen. you are pleasant with me. But,
        marry, thus, my lord: my dear lord and most esteemed
        friend, your brother Troilus,--

HELEN   My Lord Pandarus; honey-sweet lord,--

PANDARUS        Go to, sweet queen, to go:--commends himself most
        affectionately to you,--

HELEN   You shall not bob us out of our melody: if you do,
        our melancholy upon your head!

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

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

PANDARUS        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.

HELEN   My Lord Pandarus,--

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

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

HELEN   Nay, but, my lord,--

PANDARUS        What says my sweet queen? My cousin will fall out
        with you. You must not know where he sups.

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

PANDARUS        No, no, no such matter; you are wide: come, your
        disposer is sick.

PARIS   Well, I'll make excuse.

PANDARUS        Ay, good my lord. Why should you say Cressida? no,
        your poor disposer's sick.

PARIS   I spy.

PANDARUS        You spy! what do you spy? Come, give me an
        instrument. Now, sweet queen.

HELEN   Why, this is kindly done.

PANDARUS        My niece is horribly in love with a thing you have,
        sweet queen.

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

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

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

PANDARUS        Come, come, I'll hear no more of this; I'll sing
        you a song now.

HELEN   Ay, ay, prithee now. By my troth, sweet lord, thou
        hast a fine forehead.

PANDARUS        Ay, you may, you may.

HELEN   Let thy song be love: this love will undo us all.
        O Cupid, Cupid, Cupid!

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

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

PANDARUS        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!

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

PARIS   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.

PANDARUS        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?

PARIS   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?

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

PANDARUS        Not I, honey-sweet queen. I long to hear how they
        sped to-day. You'll remember your brother's excuse?

PARIS   To a hair.

PANDARUS        Farewell, sweet queen.

HELEN   Commend me to your niece.

PANDARUS        I will, sweet queen.

        [Exit]

        [A retreat sounded]

PARIS   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.

HELEN   '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.

PARIS   Sweet, above thought I love thee.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT III



SCENE II        The same. Pandarus' orchard.


        [Enter PANDARUS and Troilus's Boy, meeting]

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

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

PANDARUS        O, here he comes.

        [Enter TROILUS]

        How now, how now!

TROILUS Sirrah, walk off.

        [Exit Boy]

PANDARUS        Have you seen my cousin?

TROILUS 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!

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

        [Exit]

TROILUS 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]

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]

TROILUS 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]

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS You have bereft me of all words, lady.

PANDARUS        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]

CRESSIDA        Will you walk in, my lord?

TROILUS O Cressida, how often have I wished me thus!

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

TROILUS What should they grant? what makes this pretty
        abruption? What too curious dreg espies my sweet
        lady in the fountain of our love?

CRESSIDA        More dregs than water, if my fears have eyes.

TROILUS Fears make devils of cherubims; they never see truly.

CRESSIDA        Blind fear, that seeing reason leads, finds safer
        footing than blind reason stumbling without fear: to
        fear the worst oft cures the worse.

TROILUS O, let my lady apprehend no fear: in all Cupid's
        pageant there is presented no monster.

CRESSIDA        Nor nothing monstrous neither?

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        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?

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        Will you walk in, my lord?

        [Re-enter PANDARUS]

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

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

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS You know now your hostages; your uncle's word and my
        firm faith.

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        Boldness comes to me now, and brings me heart.
        Prince Troilus, I have loved you night and day
        For many weary months.

TROILUS Why was my Cressid then so hard to win?

CRESSIDA        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.

TROILUS And shall, albeit sweet music issues thence.

PANDARUS        Pretty, i' faith.

CRESSIDA        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.

TROILUS Your leave, sweet Cressid!

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

CRESSIDA        Pray you, content you.

TROILUS What offends you, lady?

CRESSIDA        Sir, mine own company.

TROILUS You cannot shun Yourself.

CRESSIDA                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.

TROILUS Well know they what they speak that speak so wisely.

CRESSIDA        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.

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        In that I'll war with you.

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        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.'

PANDARUS        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.

TROILUS Amen.

CRESSIDA        Amen.

PANDARUS        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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT III



SCENE III       The Grecian camp. Before Achilles' tent.


        [Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, DIOMEDES, NESTOR, AJAX,
        MENELAUS, and CALCHAS]

CALCHAS 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.

AGAMEMNON       What wouldst thou of us, Trojan? make demand.

CALCHAS 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.

AGAMEMNON       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.

DIOMEDES        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]

ULYSSES 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.

AGAMEMNON       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.

ACHILLES        What, comes the general to speak with me?
        You know my mind, I'll fight no more 'gainst Troy.

AGAMEMNON       What says Achilles? would he aught with us?

NESTOR  Would you, my lord, aught with the general?

ACHILLES        No.

NESTOR  Nothing, my lord.

AGAMEMNON       The better.

        [Exeunt AGAMEMNON and NESTOR]

ACHILLES        Good day, good day.

MENELAUS        How do you? how do you?

        [Exit]

ACHILLES        What, does the cuckold scorn me?

AJAX    How now, Patroclus!

ACHILLES        Good morrow, Ajax.

AJAX    Ha?

ACHILLES        Good morrow.

AJAX    Ay, and good next day too.

        [Exit]

ACHILLES        What mean these fellows? Know they not Achilles?

PATROCLUS       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.

ACHILLES                          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!

ULYSSES                   Now, great Thetis' son!

ACHILLES        What are you reading?

ULYSSES 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.'

ACHILLES        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.

ULYSSES 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.

ACHILLES        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?

ULYSSES 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.

ACHILLES        Of this my privacy
        I have strong reasons.

ULYSSES 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.

ACHILLES        Ha! known!

ULYSSES 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]

PATROCLUS       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.

ACHILLES                          Shall Ajax fight with Hector?

PATROCLUS       Ay, and perhaps receive much honour by him.

ACHILLES        I see my reputation is at stake
        My fame is shrewdly gored.

PATROCLUS       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.

ACHILLES        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!

THERSITES       A wonder!

ACHILLES        What?

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

ACHILLES        How so?

THERSITES       He must fight singly to-morrow with Hector, and is so
        prophetically proud of an heroical cudgelling that he
        raves in saying nothing.

ACHILLES        How can that be?

THERSITES       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.

ACHILLES        Thou must be my ambassador to him, Thersites.

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.

ACHILLES        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.

PATROCLUS       Jove bless great Ajax!

THERSITES       Hum!

PATROCLUS       I come from the worthy Achilles,--

THERSITES       Ha!

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

THERSITES       Hum!

PATROCLUS       And to procure safe-conduct from Agamemnon.

THERSITES       Agamemnon!

PATROCLUS       Ay, my lord.

THERSITES       Ha!

PATROCLUS       What say you to't?

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

PATROCLUS       Your answer, sir.

THERSITES       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.

PATROCLUS       Your answer, sir.

THERSITES       Fare you well, with all my heart.

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

THERSITES       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.

ACHILLES        Come, thou shalt bear a letter to him straight.

THERSITES       Let me bear another to his horse; for that's the more
        capable creature.

ACHILLES        My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirr'd;
        And I myself see not the bottom of it.

        [Exeunt ACHILLES and PATROCLUS]

THERSITES       Would the fountain of your mind were clear again,
        that I might water an ass at it! I had rather be a
        tick in a sheep than such a valiant ignorance.

        [Exit]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT IV



SCENE I Troy. A street.


        [Enter, from one side, AENEAS, and Servant with a
        torch; from the other, PARIS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR,
        DIOMEDES, and others, with torches]

PARIS   See, ho! who is that there?

DEIPHOBUS       It is the Lord AEneas.

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.

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

PARIS   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.

AENEAS  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.

DIOMEDES        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.

AENEAS  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.

DIOMEDES        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!

AENEAS  We know each other well.

DIOMEDES        We do; and long to know each other worse.

PARIS   This is the most despiteful gentle greeting,
        The noblest hateful love, that e'er I heard of.
        What business, lord, so early?

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

PARIS   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.

AENEAS  That I assure you:
        Troilus had rather Troy were borne to Greece
        Than Cressid borne from Troy.

PARIS   There is no help;
        The bitter disposition of the time
        Will have it so. On, lord; we'll follow you.

AENEAS  Good morrow, all.

        [Exit with Servant]

PARIS   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?

DIOMEDES        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.

PARIS   You are too bitter to your countrywoman.

DIOMEDES        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.

PARIS   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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT IV



SCENE II        The same. Court of Pandarus' house.


        [Enter TROILUS and CRESSIDA]

TROILUS Dear, trouble not yourself: the morn is cold.

CRESSIDA        Then, sweet my lord, I'll call mine uncle down;
        He shall unbolt the gates.

TROILUS 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!

CRESSIDA        Good morrow, then.

TROILUS I prithee now, to bed.

CRESSIDA        Are you a-weary of me?

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        Night hath been too brief.

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        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.

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

TROILUS It is your uncle.

CRESSIDA        A pestilence on him! now will he be mocking:
        I shall have such a life!

        [Enter PANDARUS]

PANDARUS        How now, how now! how go maidenheads? Here, you
        maid! where's my cousin Cressid?

CRESSIDA        Go hang yourself, you naughty mocking uncle!
        You bring me to do, and then you flout me too.

PANDARUS        To do what? to do what? let her say
        what: what have I brought you to do?

CRESSIDA        Come, come, beshrew your heart! you'll ne'er be good,
        Nor suffer others.

PANDARUS        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!

CRESSIDA        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.

TROILUS Ha, ha!

CRESSIDA        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]

PANDARUS        Who's there? what's the matter? will you beat
        down the door? How now! what's the matter?

        [Enter AENEAS]

AENEAS  Good morrow, lord, good morrow.

PANDARUS        Who's there? my Lord AEneas! By my troth,
        I knew you not: what news with you so early?

AENEAS  Is not Prince Troilus here?

PANDARUS        Here! what should he do here?

AENEAS  Come, he is here, my lord; do not deny him:
        It doth import him much to speak with me.

PANDARUS        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?

AENEAS  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]

TROILUS How now! what's the matter?

AENEAS  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.

TROILUS                   Is it so concluded?

AENEAS  By Priam and the general state of Troy:
        They are at hand and ready to effect it.

TROILUS How my achievements mock me!
        I will go meet them: and, my Lord AEneas,
        We met by chance; you did not find me here.

AENEAS  Good, good, my lord; the secrets of nature
        Have not more gift in taciturnity.

        [Exeunt TROILUS and AENEAS]

PANDARUS        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]

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

PANDARUS        Ah, ah!

CRESSIDA        Why sigh you so profoundly? where's my lord? gone!
        Tell me, sweet uncle, what's the matter?

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

CRESSIDA        O the gods! what's the matter?

PANDARUS        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!

CRESSIDA        Good uncle, I beseech you, on my knees! beseech you,
        what's the matter?

PANDARUS        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.

CRESSIDA        O you immortal gods! I will not go.

PANDARUS        Thou must.

CRESSIDA        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,--

PANDARUS        Do, do.

CRESSIDA        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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT IV



SCENE III       The same. Street before Pandarus' house.


        [Enter PARIS, TROILUS, AENEAS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR,
        and DIOMEDES]

PARIS   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.

TROILUS 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]

PARIS   I know what 'tis to love;
        And would, as I shall pity, I could help!
        Please you walk in, my lords.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT IV



SCENE IV        The same. Pandarus' house.


        [Enter PANDARUS and CRESSIDA]

PANDARUS        Be moderate, be moderate.

CRESSIDA        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.

PANDARUS        Here, here, here he comes.

        [Enter TROILUS]

        Ah, sweet ducks!

CRESSIDA        O Troilus! Troilus!

        [Embracing him]

PANDARUS        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?

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        Have the gods envy?

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

CRESSIDA        And is it true that I must go from Troy?

TROILUS A hateful truth.

CRESSIDA                          What, and from Troilus too?

TROILUS From Troy and Troilus.

CRESSIDA        Is it possible?

TROILUS 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.

AENEAS  [Within]  My lord, is the lady ready?

TROILUS 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.

PANDARUS        Where are my tears? rain, to lay this wind, or
        my heart will be blown up by the root.

        [Exit]

CRESSIDA        I must then to the Grecians?

TROILUS No remedy.

CRESSIDA        A woful Cressid 'mongst the merry Greeks!
        When shall we see again?

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

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

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        O, you shall be exposed, my lord, to dangers
        As infinite as imminent! but I'll be true.

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

CRESSIDA        And you this glove. When shall I see you?

TROILUS I will corrupt the Grecian sentinels,
        To give thee nightly visitation.
        But yet be true.

CRESSIDA                          O heavens! 'be true' again!

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA                          O heavens! you love me not.

TROILUS 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.

CRESSIDA        Do you think I will?

TROILUS 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.

AENEAS  [Within]  Nay, good my lord,--

TROILUS Come, kiss; and let us part.

PARIS   [Within]  Brother Troilus!

TROILUS Good brother, come you hither;
        And bring AEneas and the Grecian with you.

CRESSIDA        My lord, will you be true?

TROILUS 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.

DIOMEDES        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.

TROILUS 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.

DIOMEDES        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.'

TROILUS 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]

PARIS   Hark! Hector's trumpet.

AENEAS  How have we spent this morning!
        The prince must think me tardy and remiss,
        That sore to ride before him to the field.

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

DEIPHOBUS       Let us make ready straight.

AENEAS  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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT IV



SCENE V The Grecian camp. Lists set out.


        [Enter AJAX, armed; AGAMEMNON, ACHILLES, PATROCLUS,
        MENELAUS, ULYSSES, NESTOR, and others]

AGAMEMNON       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.

AJAX    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]

ULYSSES No trumpet answers.

ACHILLES        'Tis but early days.

AGAMEMNON       Is not yond Diomed, with Calchas' daughter?

ULYSSES '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]

AGAMEMNON       Is this the Lady Cressid?

DIOMEDES        Even she.

AGAMEMNON       Most dearly welcome to the Greeks, sweet lady.

NESTOR  Our general doth salute you with a kiss.

ULYSSES Yet is the kindness but particular;
        'Twere better she were kiss'd in general.

NESTOR  And very courtly counsel: I'll begin.
        So much for Nestor.

ACHILLES        I'll take what winter from your lips, fair lady:
        Achilles bids you welcome.

MENELAUS        I had good argument for kissing once.

PATROCLUS       But that's no argument for kissing now;
        For this popp'd Paris in his hardiment,
        And parted thus you and your argument.

ULYSSES O deadly gall, and theme of all our scorns!
        For which we lose our heads to gild his horns.

PATROCLUS       The first was Menelaus' kiss; this, mine:
        Patroclus kisses you.

MENELAUS        O, this is trim!

PATROCLUS       Paris and I kiss evermore for him.

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

CRESSIDA        In kissing, do you render or receive?

PATROCLUS       Both take and give.

CRESSIDA        I'll make my match to live,
        The kiss you take is better than you give;
        Therefore no kiss.

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

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

MENELAUS        An odd man, lady! every man is odd.

CRESSIDA        No, Paris is not; for you know 'tis true,
        That you are odd, and he is even with you.

MENELAUS        You fillip me o' the head.

CRESSIDA        No, I'll be sworn.

ULYSSES It were no match, your nail against his horn.
        May I, sweet lady, beg a kiss of you?

CRESSIDA        You may.

ULYSSES        I do desire it.

CRESSIDA        Why, beg, then.

ULYSSES Why then for Venus' sake, give me a kiss,
        When Helen is a maid again, and his.

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

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

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

        [Exit with CRESSIDA]

NESTOR  A woman of quick sense.

ULYSSES 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]

ALL     The Trojans' trumpet.

AGAMEMNON       Yonder comes the troop.

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

AENEAS  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.

AGAMEMNON       Which way would Hector have it?

AENEAS  He cares not; he'll obey conditions.

ACHILLES        'Tis done like Hector; but securely done,
        A little proudly, and great deal misprizing
        The knight opposed.

AENEAS  If not Achilles, sir,
        What is your name?

ACHILLES                          If not Achilles, nothing.

AENEAS  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.

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

        [Re-enter DIOMEDES]

AGAMEMNON       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]

ULYSSES They are opposed already.

AGAMEMNON       What Trojan is that same that looks so heavy?

ULYSSES 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]

AGAMEMNON       They are in action.

NESTOR  Now, Ajax, hold thine own!

TROILUS Hector, thou sleep'st;
        Awake thee!

AGAMEMNON       His blows are well disposed: there, Ajax!

DIOMEDES        You must no more.

        [Trumpets cease]

AENEAS                    Princes, enough, so please you.

AJAX    I am not warm yet; let us fight again.

DIOMEDES        As Hector pleases.

HECTOR                    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!

AJAX    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.

HECTOR  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.

AENEAS  There is expectance here from both the sides,
        What further you will do.

HECTOR  We'll answer it;
        The issue is embracement: Ajax, farewell.

AJAX    If I might in entreaties find success--
        As seld I have the chance--I would desire
        My famous cousin to our Grecian tents.

DIOMEDES        'Tis Agamemnon's wish, and great Achilles
        Doth long to see unarm'd the valiant Hector.

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.

AJAX    Great Agamemnon comes to meet us here.

HECTOR  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.

AGAMEMNON       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.

HECTOR  I thank thee, most imperious Agamemnon.

AGAMEMNON       [To TROILUS]  My well-famed lord of Troy, no
        less to you.

MENELAUS        Let me confirm my princely brother's greeting:
        You brace of warlike brothers, welcome hither.

HECTOR  Who must we answer?

AENEAS  The noble Menelaus.

HECTOR  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.

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

HECTOR  O, pardon; I offend.

NESTOR  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.

AENEAS  'Tis the old Nestor.

HECTOR  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.

NESTOR  I would my arms could match thee in contention,
        As they contend with thee in courtesy.

HECTOR  I would they could.

NESTOR  Ha!
        By this white beard, I'ld fight with thee to-morrow.
        Well, welcome, welcome! I have seen the time.

ULYSSES I wonder now how yonder city stands
        When we have here her base and pillar by us.

HECTOR  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.

ULYSSES 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.

HECTOR  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.

ULYSSES 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.

ACHILLES        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.

HECTOR  Is this Achilles?

ACHILLES        I am Achilles.

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

ACHILLES        Behold thy fill.

HECTOR                    Nay, I have done already.

ACHILLES        Thou art too brief: I will the second time,
        As I would buy thee, view thee limb by limb.

HECTOR  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?

ACHILLES        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!

HECTOR  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?

ACHILLES        I tell thee, yea.

HECTOR  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--

AJAX                      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.

HECTOR  I pray you, let us see you in the field:
        We have had pelting wars, since you refused
        The Grecians' cause.

ACHILLES        Dost thou entreat me, Hector?
        To-morrow do I meet thee, fell as death;
        To-night all friends.

HECTOR  Thy hand upon that match.

AGAMEMNON       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]

TROILUS My Lord Ulysses, tell me, I beseech you,
        In what place of the field doth Calchas keep?

ULYSSES 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.

TROILUS Shall sweet lord, be bound to you so much,
        After we part from Agamemnon's tent,
        To bring me thither?

ULYSSES 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?


TROILUS O, sir, to such as boasting show their scars
        A mock is due. Will you walk on, my lord?
        She was beloved, she loved; she is, and doth:
        But still sweet love is food for fortune's tooth.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE I The Grecian camp. Before Achilles' tent.


        [Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS]

ACHILLES        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.

PATROCLUS       Here comes Thersites.

        [Enter THERSITES]

ACHILLES        How now, thou core of envy!
        Thou crusty batch of nature, what's the news?

THERSITES       Why, thou picture of what thou seemest, and idol
        of idiot worshippers, here's a letter for thee.

ACHILLES        From whence, fragment?

THERSITES       Why, thou full dish of fool, from Troy.

PATROCLUS       Who keeps the tent now?

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

PATROCLUS       Well said, adversity! and what need these tricks?

THERSITES       Prithee, be silent, boy; I profit not by thy talk:
        thou art thought to be Achilles' male varlet.

PATROCLUS       Male varlet, you rogue! what's that?

THERSITES       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!

PATROCLUS       Why thou damnable box of envy, thou, what meanest
        thou to curse thus?

THERSITES       Do I curse thee?

PATROCLUS       Why no, you ruinous butt, you whoreson
        indistinguishable cur, no.

THERSITES       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!

PATROCLUS       Out, gall!

THERSITES       Finch-egg!

ACHILLES        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]

THERSITES       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]

AGAMEMNON       We go wrong, we go wrong.

AJAX    No, yonder 'tis;
        There, where we see the lights.

HECTOR  I trouble you.

AJAX    No, not a whit.

ULYSSES                   Here comes himself to guide you.

        [Re-enter ACHILLES]

ACHILLES        Welcome, brave Hector; welcome, princes all.

AGAMEMNON       So now, fair prince of Troy, I bid good night.
        Ajax commands the guard to tend on you.

HECTOR  Thanks and good night to the Greeks' general.

MENELAUS        Good night, my lord.

HECTOR  Good night, sweet lord Menelaus.

THERSITES       Sweet draught: 'sweet' quoth 'a! sweet sink,
        sweet sewer.

ACHILLES        Good night and welcome, both at once, to those
        That go or tarry.

AGAMEMNON       Good night.

        [Exeunt AGAMEMNON and MENELAUS]

ACHILLES        Old Nestor tarries; and you too, Diomed,
        Keep Hector company an hour or two.

DIOMEDES        I cannot, lord; I have important business,
        The tide whereof is now. Good night, great Hector.

HECTOR  Give me your hand.

ULYSSES [Aside to TROILUS]  Follow his torch; he goes to
        Calchas' tent:
        I'll keep you company.

TROILUS Sweet sir, you honour me.

HECTOR  And so, good night.

        [Exit DIOMEDES; ULYSSES and TROILUS following]

ACHILLES        Come, come, enter my tent.

        [Exeunt ACHILLES, HECTOR, AJAX, and NESTOR]

THERSITES       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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE II        The same. Before Calchas' tent.


        [Enter DIOMEDES]

DIOMEDES        What, are you up here, ho? speak.

CALCHAS [Within]  Who calls?

DIOMEDES        Calchas, I think. Where's your daughter?

CALCHAS [Within]  She comes to you.

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

ULYSSES Stand where the torch may not discover us.

        [Enter CRESSIDA]

TROILUS Cressid comes forth to him.

DIOMEDES        How now, my charge!

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

        [Whispers]

TROILUS Yea, so familiar!

ULYSSES She will sing any man at first sight.

THERSITES       And any man may sing her, if he can take her cliff;
        she's noted.

DIOMEDES        Will you remember?

CRESSIDA        Remember! yes.

DIOMEDES        Nay, but do, then;
        And let your mind be coupled with your words.

TROILUS What should she remember?

ULYSSES List.

CRESSIDA        Sweet honey Greek, tempt me no more to folly.

THERSITES       Roguery!

DIOMEDES        Nay, then,--

CRESSIDA        I'll tell you what,--

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

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

THERSITES       A juggling trick,--to be secretly open.

DIOMEDES        What did you swear you would bestow on me?

CRESSIDA        I prithee, do not hold me to mine oath;
        Bid me do any thing but that, sweet Greek.

DIOMEDES        Good night.

TROILUS Hold, patience!

ULYSSES How now, Trojan!

CRESSIDA        Diomed,--

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

TROILUS Thy better must.

CRESSIDA        Hark, one word in your ear.

TROILUS O plague and madness!

ULYSSES 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.

TROILUS Behold, I pray you!

ULYSSES Nay, good my lord, go off:
        You flow to great distraction; come, my lord.

TROILUS I pray thee, stay.

ULYSSES                   You have not patience; come.

TROILUS I pray you, stay; by hell and all hell's torments
        I will not speak a word!

DIOMEDES        And so, good night.

CRESSIDA        Nay, but you part in anger.

TROILUS Doth that grieve thee?
        O wither'd truth!

ULYSSES                   Why, how now, lord!

TROILUS By Jove,
        I will be patient.

CRESSIDA                          Guardian!--why, Greek!

DIOMEDES        Foh, foh! adieu; you palter.

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

ULYSSES You shake, my lord, at something: will you go?
        You will break out.

TROILUS She strokes his cheek!

ULYSSES Come, come.

TROILUS 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.

THERSITES       How the devil Luxury, with his fat rump and
        potato-finger, tickles these together! Fry, lechery, fry!

DIOMEDES        But will you, then?

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

DIOMEDES        Give me some token for the surety of it.

CRESSIDA        I'll fetch you one.

        [Exit]

ULYSSES You have sworn patience.

TROILUS Fear me not, sweet lord;
        I will not be myself, nor have cognition
        Of what I feel: I am all patience.

        [Re-enter CRESSIDA]

THERSITES       Now the pledge; now, now, now!

CRESSIDA        Here, Diomed, keep this sleeve.

TROILUS O beauty! where is thy faith?

ULYSSES My lord,--

TROILUS I will be patient; outwardly I will.

CRESSIDA        You look upon that sleeve; behold it well.
        He loved me--O false wench!--Give't me again.

DIOMEDES        Whose was't?

CRESSIDA        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.

THERSITES       Now she sharpens: well said, whetstone!

DIOMEDES        I shall have it.

CRESSIDA                          What, this?

DIOMEDES        Ay, that.

CRESSIDA        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.

DIOMEDES        I had your heart before, this follows it.

TROILUS I did swear patience.

CRESSIDA        You shall not have it, Diomed; faith, you shall not;
        I'll give you something else.

DIOMEDES        I will have this: whose was it?

CRESSIDA        It is no matter.

DIOMEDES        Come, tell me whose it was.

CRESSIDA        'Twas one's that loved me better than you will.
        But, now you have it, take it.

DIOMEDES        Whose was it?

CRESSIDA        By all Diana's waiting-women yond,
        And by herself, I will not tell you whose.

DIOMEDES        To-morrow will I wear it on my helm,
        And grieve his spirit that dares not challenge it.

TROILUS Wert thou the devil, and worest it on thy horn,
        It should be challenged.

CRESSIDA        Well, well, 'tis done, 'tis past: and yet it is not;
        I will not keep my word.

DIOMEDES        Why, then, farewell;
        Thou never shalt mock Diomed again.

CRESSIDA        You shall not go: one cannot speak a word,
        But it straight starts you.

DIOMEDES        I do not like this fooling.

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

DIOMEDES        What, shall I come? the hour?

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

DIOMEDES        Farewell till then.

CRESSIDA        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]

THERSITES       A proof of strength she could not publish more,
        Unless she said ' My mind is now turn'd whore.'

ULYSSES All's done, my lord.

TROILUS It is.

ULYSSES Why stay we, then?

TROILUS 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?

ULYSSES                   I cannot conjure, Trojan.

TROILUS She was not, sure.

ULYSSES                   Most sure she was.

TROILUS Why, my negation hath no taste of madness.

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

TROILUS 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.

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

TROILUS Nothing at all, unless that this were she.

THERSITES       Will he swagger himself out on's own eyes?

TROILUS 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.

ULYSSES May worthy Troilus be half attach'd
        With that which here his passion doth express?

TROILUS 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.

THERSITES       He'll tickle it for his concupy.

TROILUS O Cressid! O false Cressid! false, false, false!
        Let all untruths stand by thy stained name,
        And they'll seem glorious.

ULYSSES O, contain yourself
        Your passion draws ears hither.

        [Enter AENEAS]

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.


TROILUS Have with you, prince. My courteous lord, adieu.
        Farewell, revolted fair! and, Diomed,
        Stand fast, and wear a castle on thy head!

ULYSSES I'll bring you to the gates.

TROILUS Accept distracted thanks.

        [Exeunt TROILUS, AENEAS, and ULYSSES]

THERSITES       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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE III       Troy. Before Priam's palace.


        [Enter HECTOR and ANDROMACHE]

ANDROMACHE      When was my lord so much ungently temper'd,
        To stop his ears against admonishment?
        Unarm, unarm, and do not fight to-day.

HECTOR  You train me to offend you; get you in:
        By all the everlasting gods, I'll go!

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

HECTOR  No more, I say.

        [Enter CASSANDRA]

CASSANDRA                         Where is my brother Hector?

ANDROMACHE      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.

CASSANDRA       O, 'tis true.

HECTOR                    Ho! bid my trumpet sound!

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

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

CASSANDRA       The gods are deaf to hot and peevish vows:
        They are polluted offerings, more abhorr'd
        Than spotted livers in the sacrifice.

ANDROMACHE      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.

CASSANDRA       It is the purpose that makes strong the vow;
        But vows to every purpose must not hold:
        Unarm, sweet Hector.

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?

ANDROMACHE      Cassandra, call my father to persuade.

        [Exit CASSANDRA]

HECTOR  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.

TROILUS Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you,
        Which better fits a lion than a man.

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

TROILUS When many times the captive Grecian falls,
        Even in the fan and wind of your fair sword,
        You bid them rise, and live.

HECTOR  O,'tis fair play.

TROILUS                   Fool's play, by heaven, Hector.

HECTOR  How now! how now!

TROILUS                   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.

HECTOR  Fie, savage, fie!

TROILUS                   Hector, then 'tis wars.

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

TROILUS 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]

CASSANDRA       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.

PRIAM                     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.

HECTOR  AEneas is a-field;
        And I do stand engaged to many Greeks,
        Even in the faith of valour, to appear
        This morning to them.

PRIAM   Ay, but thou shalt not go.

HECTOR  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.

CASSANDRA       O Priam, yield not to him!

ANDROMACHE      Do not, dear father.

HECTOR  Andromache, I am offended with you:
        Upon the love you bear me, get you in.

        [Exit ANDROMACHE]

TROILUS This foolish, dreaming, superstitious girl
        Makes all these bodements.

CASSANDRA       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!

TROILUS Away! away!

CASSANDRA       Farewell: yet, soft! Hector! take my leave:
        Thou dost thyself and all our Troy deceive.

        [Exit]

HECTOR  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.

PRIAM   Farewell: the gods with safety stand about thee!

        [Exeunt severally PRIAM and HECTOR. Alarums]

TROILUS They are at it, hark! Proud Diomed, believe,
        I come to lose my arm, or win my sleeve.

        [Enter PANDARUS]

PANDARUS        Do you hear, my lord? do you hear?

TROILUS What now?

PANDARUS        Here's a letter come from yond poor girl.

TROILUS Let me read.

PANDARUS        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?

TROILUS 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]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE IV        Plains between Troy and the Grecian camp.


        [Alarums: excursions. Enter THERSITES]

THERSITES       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]

TROILUS Fly not; for shouldst thou take the river Styx,
        I would swim after.

DIOMEDES        Thou dost miscall retire:
        I do not fly, but advantageous care
        Withdrew me from the odds of multitude:
        Have at thee!

THERSITES       Hold thy whore, Grecian!--now for thy whore,
        Trojan!--now the sleeve, now the sleeve!

        [Exeunt TROILUS and DIOMEDES, fighting]

        [Enter HECTOR]

HECTOR  What art thou, Greek? art thou for Hector's match?
        Art thou of blood and honour?

THERSITES       No, no, I am a rascal; a scurvy railing knave:
        a very filthy rogue.

HECTOR  I do believe thee: live.

        [Exit]

THERSITES       God-a-mercy, that thou wilt believe me; but a
        plague break thy neck for frightening me! What's
        become of the wenching rogues? I think they have
        swallowed one another: I would laugh at that
        miracle: yet, in a sort, lechery eats itself.
        I'll seek them.

        [Exit]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE V Another part of the plains.


        [Enter DIOMEDES and a Servant]

DIOMEDES        Go, go, my servant, take thou Troilus' horse;
        Present the fair steed to my lady Cressid:
        Fellow, commend my service to her beauty;
        Tell her I have chastised the amorous Trojan,
        And am her knight by proof.

Servant I go, my lord.

        [Exit]

        [Enter AGAMEMNON]

AGAMEMNON       Renew, renew! The fierce Polydamas
        Hath beat down Menon: bastard Margarelon
        Hath Doreus prisoner,
        And stands colossus-wise, waving his beam,
        Upon the pashed corses of the kings
        Epistrophus and Cedius: Polyxenes is slain,
        Amphimachus and Thoas deadly hurt,
        Patroclus ta'en or slain, and Palamedes
        Sore hurt and bruised: the dreadful Sagittary
        Appals our numbers: haste we, Diomed,
        To reinforcement, or we perish all.

        [Enter NESTOR]

NESTOR  Go, bear Patroclus' body to Achilles;
        And bid the snail-paced Ajax arm for shame.
        There is a thousand Hectors in the field:
        Now here he fights on Galathe his horse,
        And there lacks work; anon he's there afoot,
        And there they fly or die, like scaled sculls
        Before the belching whale; then is he yonder,
        And there the strawy Greeks, ripe for his edge,
        Fall down before him, like the mower's swath:
        Here, there, and every where, he leaves and takes,
        Dexterity so obeying appetite
        That what he will he does, and does so much
        That proof is call'd impossibility.

        [Enter ULYSSES]

ULYSSES O, courage, courage, princes! great Achilles
        Is arming, weeping, cursing, vowing vengeance:
        Patroclus' wounds have roused his drowsy blood,
        Together with his mangled Myrmidons,
        That noseless, handless, hack'd and chipp'd, come to him,
        Crying on Hector. Ajax hath lost a friend
        And foams at mouth, and he is arm'd and at it,
        Roaring for Troilus, who hath done to-day
        Mad and fantastic execution,
        Engaging and redeeming of himself
        With such a careless force and forceless care
        As if that luck, in very spite of cunning,
        Bade him win all.

        [Enter AJAX]

AJAX    Troilus! thou coward Troilus!

        [Exit]

DIOMEDES        Ay, there, there.

NESTOR  So, so, we draw together.

        [Enter ACHILLES]

ACHILLES        Where is this Hector?
        Come, come, thou boy-queller, show thy face;
        Know what it is to meet Achilles angry:
        Hector? where's Hector? I will none but Hector.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE VI        Another part of the plains.


        [Enter AJAX]

AJAX    Troilus, thou coward Troilus, show thy head!

        [Enter DIOMEDES]

DIOMEDES        Troilus, I say! where's Troilus?

AJAX    What wouldst thou?

DIOMEDES        I would correct him.

AJAX    Were I the general, thou shouldst have my office
        Ere that correction. Troilus, I say! what, Troilus!

        [Enter TROILUS]

TROILUS O traitor Diomed! turn thy false face, thou traitor,
        And pay thy life thou owest me for my horse!

DIOMEDES        Ha, art thou there?

AJAX    I'll fight with him alone: stand, Diomed.

DIOMEDES        He is my prize; I will not look upon.

TROILUS Come, both you cogging Greeks; have at you both!

        [Exeunt, fighting]

        [Enter HECTOR]

HECTOR  Yea, Troilus? O, well fought, my youngest brother!

        [Enter ACHILLES]

ACHILLES        Now do I see thee, ha! have at thee, Hector!

HECTOR  Pause, if thou wilt.

ACHILLES        I do disdain thy courtesy, proud Trojan:
        Be happy that my arms are out of use:
        My rest and negligence befriends thee now,
        But thou anon shalt hear of me again;
        Till when, go seek thy fortune.

        [Exit]

HECTOR  Fare thee well:
        I would have been much more a fresher man,
        Had I expected thee. How now, my brother!

        [Re-enter TROILUS]

TROILUS Ajax hath ta'en AEneas: shall it be?
        No, by the flame of yonder glorious heaven,
        He shall not carry him: I'll be ta'en too,
        Or bring him off: fate, hear me what I say!
        I reck not though I end my life to-day.

        [Exit]

        [Enter one in sumptuous armour]

HECTOR  Stand, stand, thou Greek; thou art a goodly mark:
        No? wilt thou not? I like thy armour well;
        I'll frush it and unlock the rivets all,
        But I'll be master of it: wilt thou not,
        beast, abide?
        Why, then fly on, I'll hunt thee for thy hide.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE VII       Another part of the plains.


        [Enter ACHILLES, with Myrmidons]

ACHILLES        Come here about me, you my Myrmidons;
        Mark what I say. Attend me where I wheel:
        Strike not a stroke, but keep yourselves in breath:
        And when I have the bloody Hector found,
        Empale him with your weapons round about;
        In fellest manner execute your aims.
        Follow me, sirs, and my proceedings eye:
        It is decreed Hector the great must die.

        [Exeunt]

        [Enter MENELAUS and PARIS, fighting:
        then THERSITES]

THERSITES       The cuckold and the cuckold-maker are at it. Now,
        bull! now, dog! 'Loo, Paris, 'loo! now my double-
        henned sparrow! 'loo, Paris, 'loo! The bull has the
        game: ware horns, ho!

        [Exeunt PARIS and MENELAUS]

        [Enter MARGARELON]

MARGARELON      Turn, slave, and fight.

THERSITES       What art thou?

MARGARELON      A bastard son of Priam's.

THERSITES       I am a bastard too; I love bastards: I am a bastard
        begot, bastard instructed, bastard in mind, bastard
        in valour, in every thing illegitimate. One bear will
        not bite another, and wherefore should one bastard?
        Take heed, the quarrel's most ominous to us: if the
        son of a whore fight for a whore, he tempts judgment:
        farewell, bastard.

        [Exit]

MARGARELON      The devil take thee, coward!

        [Exit]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE VIII      Another part of the plains.


        [Enter HECTOR]

HECTOR  Most putrefied core, so fair without,
        Thy goodly armour thus hath cost thy life.
        Now is my day's work done; I'll take good breath:
        Rest, sword; thou hast thy fill of blood and death.

        [Puts off his helmet and hangs his shield
        behind him]

        [Enter ACHILLES and Myrmidons]

ACHILLES        Look, Hector, how the sun begins to set;
        How ugly night comes breathing at his heels:
        Even with the vail and darking of the sun,
        To close the day up, Hector's life is done.

HECTOR  I am unarm'd; forego this vantage, Greek.

ACHILLES        Strike, fellows, strike; this is the man I seek.

        [HECTOR falls]

        So, Ilion, fall thou next! now, Troy, sink down!
        Here lies thy heart, thy sinews, and thy bone.
        On, Myrmidons, and cry you all amain,
        'Achilles hath the mighty Hector slain.'

        [A retreat sounded]

        Hark! a retire upon our Grecian part.

MYRMIDONS       The Trojan trumpets sound the like, my lord.

ACHILLES        The dragon wing of night o'erspreads the earth,
        And, stickler-like, the armies separates.
        My half-supp'd sword, that frankly would have fed,
        Pleased with this dainty bait, thus goes to bed.

        [Sheathes his sword]

        Come, tie his body to my horse's tail;
        Along the field I will the Trojan trail.

        [Exeunt]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE IX        Another part of the plains.


        [Enter AGAMEMNON, AJAX, MENELAUS, NESTOR, DIOMEDES,
        and others, marching. Shouts within]

AGAMEMNON       Hark! hark! what shout is that?

NESTOR  Peace, drums!

        [Within]

        Achilles! Achilles! Hector's slain! Achilles.

DIOMEDES        The bruit is, Hector's slain, and by Achilles.

AJAX    If it be so, yet bragless let it be;
        Great Hector was a man as good as he.

AGAMEMNON       March patiently along: let one be sent
        To pray Achilles see us at our tent.
        If in his death the gods have us befriended,
        Great Troy is ours, and our sharp wars are ended.

        [Exeunt, marching]




        TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT V



SCENE X Another part of the plains.


        [Enter AENEAS and Trojans]

AENEAS  Stand, ho! yet are we masters of the field:
        Never go home; here starve we out the night.

        [Enter TROILUS]

TROILUS Hector is slain.

ALL                       Hector! the gods forbid!

TROILUS He's dead; and at the murderer's horse's tail,
        In beastly sort, dragg'd through the shameful field.
        Frown on, you heavens, effect your rage with speed!
        Sit, gods, upon your thrones, and smile at Troy!
        I say, at once let your brief plagues be mercy,
        And linger not our sure destructions on!

AENEAS  My lord, you do discomfort all the host!

TROILUS You understand me not that tell me so:
        I do not speak of flight, of fear, of death,
        But dare all imminence that gods and men
        Address their dangers in. Hector is gone:
        Who shall tell Priam so, or Hecuba?
        Let him that will a screech-owl aye be call'd,
        Go in to Troy, and say there, Hector's dead:
        There is a word will Priam turn to stone;
        Make wells and Niobes of the maids and wives,
        Cold statues of the youth, and, in a word,
        Scare Troy out of itself. But, march away:
        Hector is dead; there is no more to say.
        Stay yet. You vile abominable tents,
        Thus proudly pight upon our Phrygian plains,
        Let Titan rise as early as he dare,
        I'll through and through you! and, thou great-sized coward,
        No space of earth shall sunder our two hates:
        I'll haunt thee like a wicked conscience still,
        That mouldeth goblins swift as frenzy's thoughts.
        Strike a free march to Troy! with comfort go:
        Hope of revenge shall hide our inward woe.

        [Exeunt AENEAS and Trojans]

        [As TROILUS is going out, enter, from the other
        side, PANDARUS]

PANDARUS        But hear you, hear you!

TROILUS Hence, broker-lackey! ignomy and shame
        Pursue thy life, and live aye with thy name!

        [Exit]

PANDARUS        A goodly medicine for my aching bones! O world!
        world! world! thus is the poor agent despised!
        O traitors and bawds, how earnestly are you set
        a-work, and how ill requited! why should our
        endeavour be so loved and the performance so loathed?
        what verse for it? what instance for it? Let me see:
        Full merrily the humble-bee doth sing,
        Till he hath lost his honey and his sting;
        And being once subdued in armed tail,
        Sweet honey and sweet notes together fail.
        Good traders in the flesh, set this in your
        painted cloths.
        As many as be here of pander's hall,
        Your eyes, half out, weep out at Pandar's fall;
        Or if you cannot weep, yet give some groans,
        Though not for me, yet for your aching bones.
        Brethren and sisters of the hold-door trade,
        Some two months hence my will shall here be made:
        It should be now, but that my fear is this,
        Some galled goose of Winchester would hiss:
        Till then I'll sweat and seek about for eases,
        And at that time bequeathe you my diseases.

        [Exit]