Troilus and Cressida/Source

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:


 * PRIAM, King of Troy

His sons:
 * HECTOR
 * TROILUS
 * PARIS
 * DEIPHOBUS
 * HELENUS
 * MARGARELON, a bastard son of Priam

Trojan commanders:
 * AENEAS
 * ANTENOR


 * CALCHAS, a Trojan priest, taking part with the Greeks
 * PANDARUS, uncle to Cressida
 * AGAMEMNON, the Greek general
 * MENELAUS, his brother

Greek commanders:
 * ACHILLES
 * AJAX
 * ULYSSES
 * NESTOR
 * DIOMEDES
 * PATROCLUS


 * THERSITES, a deformed and scurrilous Greek
 * ALEXANDER, servant to Cressida
 * SERVANT to Troilus
 * SERVANT to Paris
 * SERVANT to Diomedes
 * 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 Greek camp before it

PROLOGUE
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


 * In Troy, there lies the scene. From isles of Greece
 * The princes orgulous, their high blood chaf'd,
 * 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 war-like fraughtage. Now on Dardan plains
 * The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch
 * Their brave pavilions: Priam's six-gated city,
 * Dardan, and Tymbria, Ilias, 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, Troyan 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.

SCENE 1. 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 unpractis'd 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 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 suff'rance 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 she is thence?

PANDARUS.
 * Well, she look'd 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
 * blackamoor; '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 starv'd 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 gor'd 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.]

SCENE 2. Troy. A street
[Enter CRESSIDA and her man 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 mov'd.
 * 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 Troyan 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 robb'd many beasts of their particular
 * additions: he is as valiant as a lion, churlish as the bear, slow
 * as the elephant—a man into whom nature hath so crowded
 * humours that his valour is crush'd 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 cop'd Hector in the battle and
 * struck him down, the disdain and shame whereof hath ever since
 * kept Hector fasting and waking.

[Enter PANDARUS.]

CRESSIDA.
 * Who comes here?

ALEXANDER.
 * Madam, your uncle 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 arm'd
 * and gone ere you came to Ilium? Helen was not up, was she?

CRESSIDA.
 * Hector was gone; but Helen was not up.

PANDARUS.
 * E'en 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 today, 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.

ANDARUS.
 * 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 prais'd his complexion above Paris.

CRESSIDA.
 * Why, Paris hath colour enough.

PANDARUS.
 * So he has.

CRESSIDA.
 * Then Troilus should have too much. If she prais'd him
 * above, his complexion is higher than his; he having colour
 * enough, and the other higher, is too flaming 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 compass'd 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' th' shell.

PANDARUS.
 * I cannot choose but laugh to think how she tickled his
 * chin. Indeed, she has a marvell's 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 laugh'd that
 * her eyes ran o'er.

CRESSIDA.
 * With millstones.

PANDARUS.
 * And Cassandra laugh'd.

CRESSIDA.
 * But there was a more temperate fire under the pot of her
 * eyes. Did her eyes run o'er too?

PANDARUS.
 * And Hector laugh'd.

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 laugh'd too.

PANDARUS.
 * They laugh'd 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 blush'd, and Paris so chaf'd; and all the rest so
 * laugh'd that it pass'd.

CRESSIDA.
 * So let it now; for it has been a great 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, and 'twere a
 * man born in April.

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

[Sound a retreat.]

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.

[AENEAS passes.]

CRESSIDA.
 * Speak not so loud.

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' th' soundest judgments in
 * Troy, 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! anything, 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
 * hack'd than Hector's; and how he looks, and how he goes! O
 * admirable youth! he never 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 comes more.

[Common soldiers pass.]

PANDARUS.
 * Asses, fools, dolts! chaff and bran, chaff and bran!
 * porridge after meat! I could live and die in 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 amongst 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 minc'd man; and then to be bak'd with no date in
 * the pie, for then the man's date is out.

PANDARUS.
 * You are such a woman! A man 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, 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' 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 will 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 belov'd 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.

[Exit.]

SCENE 3. The Grecian camp. Before AGAMEMNON'S tent
[Sennet. Enter AGAMEMNON, NESTOR, ULYSSES, DIOMEDES, MENELAUS, and others.]

AGAMEMNON.
 * Princes,
 * What grief hath set these jaundies o'er your cheeks?
 * The ample proposition that hope makes
 * In all designs begun on earth below
 * Fails in the promis'd largeness; checks and disasters
 * Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd,
 * As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap,
 * Infects the sound pine, and diverts 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 affin'd 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 rous'd with rage, with rage doth sympathise,
 * And with an accent tun'd in self-same 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
 * The 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 experienc'd 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,
 * Th' 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 enthron'd and spher'd
 * Amidst the other, whose med'cinable eye
 * Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
 * And posts, like the commandment of a king,
 * Sans check, 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 fixture! O, when degree is shak'd,
 * Which is the ladder of all high designs,
 * The enterprise is sick! How could communities,
 * Degrees in schools, and brotherhoods in cities,
 * Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
 * The primogenity 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 melts
 * 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 everything 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 ever step,
 * Exampl'd 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 unsquar'd,
 * 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 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, mapp'ry, closet-war;
 * So that the ram that batters down the wall,
 * For the great swinge 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.

[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 eyes?

AGAMEMNON.
 * With surety stronger than Achilles' an
 * 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 Troyan 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, Troyan; lay thy finger on thy lips.
 * The worthiness of praise distains his worth,
 * If that the prais'd himself bring the praise forth;
 * But what the repining enemy commends,
 * That breath fame blows; that praise, sole pure, 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.

AGAME
 * He hears nought privately that comes from Troy.

AENEAS.
 * Nor I from Troy come not to whisper with 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, Troyan, 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.

[Sound trumpet.]


 * We have, great Agamemnon, here in Troy
 * A prince called Hector-Priam is his father—
 * Who in this dull and long-continued truce
 * Is resty 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 Troyans 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 couple in his arms;
 * And will to-morrow with his trumpet call
 * Mid-way 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 mould
 * 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 grandame, 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 forfend such scarcity of youth!

ULYSSES.
 * Amen.

AGAMEMNON.
 * Fair Lord Aeneas, let me touch your hand;
 * To our pavilion shall I lead you, first.
 * 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.
 * True. 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.
 * Why, 'tis most meet. Who may you else oppose
 * That can from Hector bring those honours off,
 * If not Achilles? Though 't be a sportful combat,
 * Yet in this trial much opinion dwells
 * For here the Troyans taste our dear'st repute
 * With their fin'st palate; and trust to me, Ulysses,
 * Our imputation shall be oddly pois'd
 * In this vile 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 mas
 * Of things to come at large. It is suppos'd
 * 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 forth us all, a man distill'd
 * Out of our virtues; who miscarrying,
 * What heart receives from hence a 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,
 * By showing the worst first. 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 wear with him;
 * But he already is too insolent;
 * And it 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 do our main opinion crush
 * In taint of our best man. No, make a lott'ry;
 * 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.
 * Now, Ulysses, I begin to relish thy advice;
 * And I will give a taste thereof 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.]

SCENE 1. The Grecian camp
[Enter Ajax and THERSITES.]

AJAX.
 * Thersites!

THERSITES.
 * Agamemnon—how if he had boils full, an 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 there would come some matter from him;
 * I see none now.

AJAX.
 * Thou bitch-wolf's son, canst thou not hear? Feel, then.

[Strikes him.]

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

AJAX.
 * Speak, then, thou whinid'st 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 proclaim'd, 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
 * Proserpina's beauty—ay, that thou bark'st at him.

AJAX.
 * Mistress Thersites!

THERSITES.
 * Thou shouldst strike him.

AJAX.
 * Cobloaf!

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

AJAX.
 * You whoreson cur!

[Strikes him.]

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 assinico may tutor thee. You
 * scurvy valiant ass! Thou art here but to thrash Troyans, 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.
 * You cur!

[Strikes him.]

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, so I do.

THERSITES.
 * But yet you look not well upon him; for who some ever
 * 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 bobb'd 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 ninth 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 strike 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, the fool's will shame it.

PATROCLUS.
 * Good words, Thersites.

ACHILLES.
 * What's the quarrel?

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

THERSITES.
 * I serve thee not.

AJAX.
 * Well, go to, go to.

THERSITES.
 * I serve here voluntary.

ACHILLES.
 * Your last service was suff'rance; '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 shall have a great catch
 * an 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 hang'd 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 lott'ry. Otherwise. He knew his man.

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

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 2. Troy. 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 consum'd
 * 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 th' 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's, 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 keeping.

TROILUS.
 * What's 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—I
 * And the will dotes that is attributive
 * To what infectiously itself affects,
 * Without some image of th' 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 with full consent benied his sails;
 * The seas and winds, old wranglers, took a truce,
 * And did him service. He touch'd the ports desir'd;
 * 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 worthy 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 never fortune did—
 * Beggar the estimation which you priz'd
 * 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, Troyans, cry.

PRIAM.
 * What noise, what shriek is this?

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

CASSANDRA.
 * [Within.]
 * Cry, Troyans.

HECTOR.
 * It is Cassandra.

[Enter CASSANDRA, raving.]

CASSANDRA.
 * Cry, Troyans, 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, Troyans, cry. Practise your eyes with tears.
 * Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand;
 * Our firebrand brother, Paris, burns us all.
 * Cry, Troyans, 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 engag'd
 * 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 of
 * 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
 * Wip'd 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 unfam'd
 * 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 gloz'd, but superficially; not much
 * Unlike young men, whom Aristode thought
 * Unfit to hear moral philosophy.
 * The reasons you allege do more conduce
 * To the hot passion of distemp'red 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 rend'red 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'er the less,
 * My spritely brethren, I propend to you
 * In resolution to keep Helen still;
 * For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependence
 * 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 Troyan 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 promis'd 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 dull and factious nobles of the Greeks
 * Will strike amazement to their drowsy spirits.
 * I was advertis'd their great general slept,
 * Whilst emulation in the army crept.
 * This, I presume, will wake him.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 3. The Grecian camp. Before the tent of ACHILLES
[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 rail'd 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 engineer! 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-arm'd 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 Neapolitan
 * bone-ache! for that, methinks, is the curse depending 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 'a rememb'red a gilt counterfeit, thou
 * wouldst not have slipp'd 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!

PATROCLUS.
 * Amen.

[Enter ACHILLES.]

ACHILLES.
 * Who's there?

PATROCLUS.
 * Thersites, my lord.

ACHILLES.
 * Where, where? O, 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
 * Thersites?

THERSITES.
 * Thy knower, Patroclus. Then tell me, Patroclus, what art
 * thou?

PATROCLUS.
 * Thou must 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 privileg'd 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 this Patroclus is a fool positive.

PATROCLUS.
 * Why am I a fool?

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

ACHILLES.
 * Come, 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 whore and a cuckold-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, AJAX, and CALCHAS.]

AGAMEMNON.
 * Where is Achilles?

PATROCLUS.
 * Within his tent; but ill-dispos'd, my lord.

AGAMEMNON.
 * Let it be known to him that we are here.
 * He shent our messengers; and we lay by
 * Our appertainings, 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 a 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.

[Re-enter PATROCLUS.]


 * Here comes 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,
 * An 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 ad
 * 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.

[Re-enter ULYSSES.]

AJAX.
 * I do hate a proud man as I do hate the engend'ring of toads.

NESTOR.

[Aside]


 * And yet he loves himself: is't not strange?

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. Imagin'd worth
 * Holds in his blood such swol'n 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 doth 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
 * Shall not so stale his palm, nobly acquir'd,
 * 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.] O, this is well! He rubs the vein of him.

DIOMEDES.
 * [Aside.] 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.
 * [Aside.] How he describes himself!

AJAX.
 * Can he not be sociable?

ULYSSES.
 * [Aside.] The raven chides blackness.

AJAX.
 * I'll let his humours blood.

AGAMEMNON.
 * [Aside.] He will be the physician that should be the patient.

AJAX.
 * An all men were a my mind—

ULYSSES.
 * [Aside.] Wit would be out of fashion.

AJAX.
 * 'A should not bear it so, 'a should eat's words first.
 * Shall pride carry it?

NESTOR.
 * [Aside.] An 'twould, you'd carry half.

ULYSSES.
 * [Aside.] 'A would have ten shares.

AJAX.
 * I will knead him, I'll make him supple.

NESTOR.
 * [Aside.] 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 palter with us thus!
 * Would he were a Troyan!

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 gat thee, she that gave thee suck;
 * Fam'd be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature
 * Thrice-fam'd beyond, beyond all erudition;
 * But he that disciplin'd thine 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;
 * But 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 rul'd 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.]

SCENE 1. Troy. PRIAM'S palace
[Music sounds within. Enter PANDARUS and a SERVANT.]

PANDARUS.
 * Friend, you—pray you, a word. Do you not 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 notable 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.
 * 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 is 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 not you 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 stew'd 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.

HELEN.
 * 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, go to—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 it 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.

HELEN.
 * 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's 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 love, still more!
 * For, oh, love's bow
 * Shoots buck and doe;
 * The shaft confounds
 * Not that it wounds,
 * But tickles still the sore.
 * These lovers cry, O ho, they die!
 * Yet that which seems the wound to kill
 * Doth turn O ho! to ha! ha! he!
 * So dying love lives still.
 * O ho! a while, but ha! ha! ha!
 * O ho! groans out for ha! ha! ha!-hey 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 today?

PARIS.
 * Hector, Deiphobus, Helenus, Antenor, and all the gallantry
 * of Troy. I would fain have arm'd to-day, but my Nell would not
 * have it so. How chance my brothe

HELEN.
 * He hangs the lip at something. You know all, Lord Pandarus.

PANDARUS.
 * Not I, honey-sweet queen. I long to hear how they spend
 * 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. Sound a retreat.]

PARIS.
 * They're come from the 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

SCENE 2. Troy. PANDARUS' orchard
[Enter PANDARUS and TROILUS' 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.

[Enter TROILUS.]

PANDARUS.
 * O, here he comes. 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 these fields
 * Where I may wallow in the lily beds
 * Propos'd for the deserver! O gentle Pandar,
 * from Cupid's shoulder pluck his painted wings,
 * and fly with me to Cressid!

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

[Exit.]

TROILUS.
 * I am giddy; expectation whirls me round.
 * Th' imaginary relish is so sweet
 * That it enchants my sense; what will it be
 * When that the wat'ry palate tastes indeed
 * Love's thrice-repured nectar? Death, I fear me;
 * Swooning destruction; or some joy too fine,
 * Too subtle-potent, tun'd 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 fray'd 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 encount'ring
 * 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 watch'd ere you be made
 * tame, must you? Come your ways, come your ways; an you draw
 * backward, we'll put you i' th' 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'd 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' th' 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' th' 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 Cressid, how often have I wish'd me thus!

CRESSIDA.
 * Wish'd, 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 confin'd; 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 lov'd 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 till now not 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 lov'd 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 asham'd. 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 lamp 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 winnowed 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 truth by Troilus, when their rhymes,
 * Full of protest, of oath, and big compare,
 * Want similes, truth tir'd 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 th' 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 th' have said 'As false
 * As air, as water, wind, or sandy earth,
 * As fox to lamb, or 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 call'd 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 and 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, pander, to provide this gear!

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 3. The Greek camp
[Flourish. Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, DIOMEDES, NESTOR, AJAX, MENELAUS, and CALCHAS.]

CALCHAS.
 * Now, Princes, for the service I have done,
 * Th' 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 come,
 * I have abandon'd Troy, left my possession,
 * Incurr'd a traitor's name, expos'd myself
 * From certain and possess'd conveniences
 * To doubtful fortunes, sequest'ring 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 regist'red in promise,
 * Which you say live to come in my behalf.

AGAMEMNON.
 * What wouldst thou of us, Troyan? Make demand.

CALCHAS.
 * You have a Troyan prisoner call'd Antenor,
 * Yesterday took; Troy holds him very dear.
 * Oft have you—often have you thanks therefore—
 * Desir'd 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.]

[ACHILLES and PATROCLUS stand in their tent.]

ULYSSES.
 * Achilles stands i' th' entrance of his tent.
 * Please it our general 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, why turn'd on him?
 * If so, I have derision med'cinable
 * To use between your strangeness and his pride,
 * Which his own will shall have desire to drink.
 * It may do 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 us'd to bend,
 * To send their smiles before them to Achilles,
 * To come as humbly as they us'd 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 declin'd 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, and 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,
 * Doth 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 anything,
 * 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 formed in th' applause
 * Where th' are extended; who, like an arch, reverb'rate
 * The voice again; or, like a gate of steel
 * Fronting the sun, receives and renders back
 * His figure and his heat. I was much rapt in this;
 * And apprehended here immediately
 * Th' 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 shrinking.

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-siz'd 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 mock'ry. 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 ent'red 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 th' hand;
 * And with his arms out-stretch'd, as he would fly,
 * Grasps in the corner. The 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 stirs not. 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 th' uncomprehensive deeps;
 * Keeps place with thought, and almost, like the gods,
 * Do 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 island 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 mov'd you.
 * A woman impudent and mannish grown
 * Is not more loath'd 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 airy 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 gor'd.

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 they sit idly in the sun.

ACHILLES.
 * Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus.
 * I'll send the fool to Ajax, and desire him
 * T' invite the Troyan 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 sav'd!

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, 'a stalks up and down like a peacock—a stride and a
 * stand; ruminaies 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 for ever; for if Hector break not his neck i' th' combat,
 * he'll break't himself in vainglory. 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, languageless, a monster. A plague of opinion! A man may
 * wear it on both sides, like 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 his 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 unarm'd to my
 * tent; and to procure safe conduct for his person of the
 * magnanimous and most illustrious six-or-seven-times-honour'd
 * Captain General of the Grecian army, et cetera, Agamemnon. 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 you say to't?

THERSITES.
 * God buy you, with all my heart.

PATROCLUS.
 * Your answer, sir.

THERSITES.
 * If to-morrow be a fair day, by eleven of the clock it will go one
 * way or other. Howsoever, he shall pay for me ere he has me.

PATROCLUS.
 * Your answer, sir.

THERSITES.
 * Fare ye well, with all my heart.

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

THERSITES.
 * No, but he's out a tune thus. What music will be in him when
 * Hector has knock'd 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 carry 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.]

SCENE 1. Troy. A street
[Enter, at one side, AENEAS, and servant with a torch; at another, PARIS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR, DIOMEDES the Grecian, 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 sympathise. 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'st 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 believe—
 * 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 deserves 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 d
 * 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 pleas'd to breed out your inheritors.
 * Both merits pois'd, each weighs nor less nor more;
 * But he as he, the heavier for a whore.

PARIS.
 * You are too bitter to your country-woman.

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 Troyan hath been slain; since she could speak,
 * She hath not given so many good words breath
 * As for her Greeks and Troyans suff'red 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 not commend what we intend to sell.
 * Here lies our way.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 2. Troy. The 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 aweary of me?

TROILUS.
 * O Cressida! but that the busy day,
 * Wak'd by the lark, hath rous'd 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.

[Enter PANDARUS.]

CRESSIDA.
 * A pestilence on him! Now will he be mocking.
 * I shall have such a life!

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! a 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' th' head!

[One knocks.]


 * 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 deceiv'd, I think of no such thing.

[Knock.]


 * 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? It's 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 are
 * 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 neighbour Pandar
 * 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.
 * Pray thee, 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 I beseech you,
 * what's the matter?

PANDARUS.
 * Thou must be gone, wench, thou must be gone; thou art chang'd 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.]

SCENE 3. Troy. A street before PANDARUS' house
[Enter PARIS, TROILUS, AENEAS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR, and DIOMEDES.]

PARIS.
 * It is great morning; and the hour prefix'd
 * For 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 off'ring 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.]

SCENE 4. Troy. 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 affections
 * 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.

[Enter TROILUS.]

PANDARUS.
 * Here, here, here he comes. Ah, sweet ducks!

CRESSIDA.
 * [Embracing him.]
 * O Troilus! Troilus!

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?
 * Why sigh'st thou without breaking?

when 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; '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 loose 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 woeful 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 expos'd, 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 why I speak it, love.
 * The Grecian youths are full of quality;
 * They're loving, well compos'd, 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 afear'd.

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 Cressid, 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 mov'd, Prince Troilus.
 * Let me be privileg'd 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 priz'd. But that you say 'Be't so,'
 * I 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.]

[Sound trumpet.]

PARIS.
 * Hark! Hector's trumpet.

AENEAS.
 * How have we spent this morning!
 * The Prince must think me tardy and remiss,
 * That swore 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.]

SCENE 5. 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 blowest for Hector.

[Trumpet sounds.]

ULYSSES.
 * No trumpet answers.

ACHILLES.
 * 'Tis but early days.

[Enter DIOMEDES, with CRESSIDA.]

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 that 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 thus 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 are 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 a coasting welcome ere it comes,
 * And wide unclasp the tables of their thoughts
 * To every tickling 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, PARIS, HELENUS, 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 misprising
 * The knight oppos'd.

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 oppos'd 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 provok'd, nor being provok'd 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 dispos'd. 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 could'st 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 drained! 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.

[AGAMEMNON and the rest of the Greeks come forward.]

AJAX.
 * Great Agamemnon comes to meet us here.

HECTOR.
 * The worthiest of them tell me name by name;
 * But for Achilles, my 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-fam'd 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' th' 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 like thee. O, 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'd 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 perus'd 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 everywhere, 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 refus'd
 * 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 tambourines, let the trumpets blow,
 * That this great soldier may his welcome know.

[Exeunt all but 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 I, 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 belov'd, she lov'd; she is, and doth;
 * But still sweet love is food for fortune's tooth.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 1. The Grecian camp. Before the tent of ACHILLES
[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 needs these tricks?

THERSITES.
 * Prithee, be silent, boy; I profit not by thy talk; thou
 * art said 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
 * in the back, lethargies, cold palsies, raw eyes, dirt-rotten
 * livers, wheezing lungs, bladders full of imposthume, sciaticas,
 * limekilns i' th' 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 water-flies, 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!

[Exit with PATROCLUS.]

THERSITES.
 * With too much blood and too little brain these two may
 * run mad; but, if with too much brain and to 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 ear-wax; 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 put-tock, 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! sprites 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 all but THERSITES.]

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.]

SCENE 2. The Grecian camp. Before CALCHAS' tent
[Enter DIOMEDES.]

DIOMEDES.
 * What, are you up here, ho! Speak.

CALCHAS.
 * [Within.] Who calls?

DIOMEDES.
 * Diomed. 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.
 * Fo, fo! come, tell a pin; you are a 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 anything 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 withered truth!

ULYSSES.
 * How now, my lord?

TROILUS.
 * By Jove, I will be patient.

CRESSIDA.
 * Guardian! Why, Greek!

DIOMEDES.
 * Fo, fo! 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, my 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 lov'd 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 on 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 lov'd 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 wor'st it on thy horn,
 * It should be challeng'd.

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 plagu'd.

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 th' 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 believ'd 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 sanctimony,
 * If sanctimony be the god's delight,
 * If there be rule in unity itself,
 * This was 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 orifice 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, dissolv'd, and loos'd;
 * 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
 * Inflam'd 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 compos'd by Vulcan's skill
 * My sword should bite it. Not the dreadful spout
 * Which shipmen do the hurricano call,
 * Constring'd 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.
 * Fairwell, 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
 * anything 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.]

SCENE 3. 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 dreamt
 * 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 off'rings, 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.
 * Life every man holds dear; but the dear 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 th' 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;
 * Nor you, my brother, with your true sword drawn,
 * Oppos'd 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 dreamt; 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 engag'd 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, I take my leave.
 * Thou dost thyself and all our Troy deceive.

[Exit.]

HECTOR.
 * You are amaz'd, 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 curs'd I cannot tell what to think on't. What
 * says she there?

TROILUS.
 * Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart;
 * Th' 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.]

SCENE 4. The plain 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 varlet, 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 whoremasterly
 * villain with the sleeve back to the dissembling luxurious drab of
 * a sleeve-less errand. O' the 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 prov'd worth 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.

[Enter DIOMEDES, TROILUS following.]

Soft! here comes sleeve, and t'other.

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 frighting 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.]

SCENE 5. Another part of the plain
[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 chastis'd the amorous Trojan,
 * And am her knight by proof.

SERVANT.
 * I go, my lord.

[Exit.]

[Enter AGAMEMNON.]

AGAMEMNON.
 * Renew, renew! The fierce Polydamus
 * 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. Polixenes is slain;
 * Amphimacus and Thoas deadly hurt;
 * Patroclus ta'en, or slain; and Palamedes
 * Sore hurt and bruis'd. 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-pac'd 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 everywhere, 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, courage, Princes! Great
 * Achilles is arming, weeping, cursing, vowing vengeance.
 * Patroclus' wounds have rous'd 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.

[Exit.]

[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.]

SCENE 6. Another part of the plain
[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—

[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 befriend 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.

[Re-enter TROILUS.]

How now, my brother!

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 thou end my life to-day.

[Exit.]

[Enter one in 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.]

SCENE 7. Another part of the plain
[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
 * everything 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.]

SCENE 8. Another part of the plain
[Enter HECTOR.]

HECTOR.
 * Most putrified 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!

[Disarms.]

[Enter ACHILLES and his Myrmidons.]

ACHILLES.
 * Look, Hector, how the sun begins to set;
 * How ugly night comes breathing at his heels;
 * Even with the vail and dark'ning 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 an amain
 * 'Achilles hath the mighty Hector slain.'

[A retreat sounded.]


 * Hark! a retreat upon our Grecian part.

MYRMIDON.
 * 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,
 * Pleas'd 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.]

SCENE 9. Another part of the plain
[Sound retreat. Shout. Enter AGAMEMNON, AJAX, MENELAUS, NESTOR, DIOMEDES, and the rest, marching.]

AGAMEMNON.
 * Hark! hark! what shout is this?

NESTOR.
 * Peace, drums!

SOLDIERS.
 * [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 as good a man 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.]

SCENE 10. Another part of the plain
[Enter AENEAS, PARIS, ANTENOR, and DEIPHOBUS.]

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-siz'd 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.

[Enter PANDARUS.]

PANDARUS.
 * But hear you, hear you!

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

[Exeunt all but PANDARUS.]

PANDARUS.
 * A goodly medicine for my aching bones! world! world! thus
 * is the poor agent despis'd! traitors and bawds, how earnestly are
 * you set a-work, and how ill requited! Why should our endeavour be
 * so lov'd, 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 subdu'd in armed trail,
 * 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 bequeath you my diseases.

[Exit.]