A never writer to an ever reader: news.
Eternal reader, you have here a new play, never staled
with the stage, never clapperclawed with the palms of
the vulgar, and yet passing full of the palm comical, for
it is a birth of your brain that never undertook anything
comical vainly. And were but the vain names of comedies
changed for the titles of commodities, or of plays
for pleas, you should see all those grand censors, that
now style them such vanities, flock to them for the
main grace of their gravities, especially this author’s
comedies, that are so framed to the life that they serve
for the most common commentaries of all the actions
of our lives, showing such a dexterity and power of wit
that the most displeased with plays are pleased with
his comedies. And all such dull and heavy-witted
worldlings as were never capable of the wit of a comedy,
coming by report of them to his representations,
have found that wit there that they never found in
themselves and have parted better witted than they
came, feeling an edge of wit set upon them more than
ever they dreamed they had brain to grind it on. So
much and such savored salt of wit is in his comedies
that they seem, for their height of pleasure, to be born
in that sea that brought forth Venus. Amongst all there
is none more witty than this; and had I time, I would
comment upon it, though I know it needs not, for so
much as will make you think your testern well
bestowed, but for so much worth as even poor I know
to be stuffed in it. It deserves such a labor as well as the
best comedy in Terence or Plautus. And believe this,
that when he is gone and his comedies out of sale, you
will scramble for them and set up a new English
Inquisition. Take this for a warning, and at the peril of
your pleasure’s loss, and judgment’s, refuse not nor like
this the less for not being sullied with the smoky breath
of the multitude, but thank fortune for the scape it
hath made amongst you, since by the grand possessors’
wills I believe you should have prayed for them rather
than been prayed. And so I leave all such to be prayed
for, for the states of their wits’ healths, that will not
praise it.
Vale.
⌜Enter the Prologue in armor.⌝
⟨PROLOGUE
In Troy there lies the scene. From isles of Greece
The princes orgulous, their high blood chafed,
Have to the port of Athens sent their ships
Fraught with the ministers and instruments
5 Of cruel war. Sixty and nine, that wore
Their crownets regal, from th’ Athenian bay
Put forth toward Phrygia, and their vow is made
To ransack Troy, within whose strong immures
The ravished Helen, Menelaus’ queen,
10 With wanton Paris sleeps; and that’s the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come,
And the deep-drawing ⌜barks⌝ do there disgorge
Their warlike fraughtage. Now on Dardan plains
The fresh and yet unbruisèd Greeks do pitch
15 Their brave pavilions. Priam’s six-gated city—
Dardan and Timbria, Helias, Chetas, Troien,
And Antenorides—with massy staples
And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts,
⌜Spar⌝ up the sons of Troy.
20 Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits
On one and other side, Trojan and Greek,
Sets all on hazard. And hither am I come,
A prologue armed, but not in confidence
Of author’s pen or actor’s voice, but suited
25 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.
30 Like, or find fault; do as your pleasures are.
Now, good or bad, ’tis but the chance of war.⟩
⌜Prologue exits.⌝
Enter Pandarus and Troilus.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,5 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,10 Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance, Less valiant than the virgin in the night, And skilless as unpracticed infancy.PANDARUS Well, I have told you enough of this. For my part, I’ll not meddle nor make no farther. He that will15 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 20Ay, the bolting; but you must tarry the leavening.
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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, the25 heating the oven, and the baking. Nay, you must stay the cooling too, or you may chance 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 sit30 And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts— So, traitor! “⌜When⌝ she comes”? When ⌜is she⌝ thence?PANDARUS Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw her look, or any woman else.TROILUS 35 I was about to tell thee: when my heart, As wedgèd with a sigh, would rive in twain, Lest Hector or my father should perceive me, I have, as when the sun doth light a-scorn, Buried this sigh in wrinkle of a smile;40 But sorrow that is couched 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 is45 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:50 When I do tell thee there my hopes lie drowned, Reply not in how many fathoms deep They lie indrenched. I tell thee I am mad In Cressid’s love. Thou answer’st she is fair; Pourest in the open ulcer of my heart
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55 Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice; Handiest 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 sense60 Hard as the palm of plowman. 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 65I speak no more than truth.TROILUS Thou dost not speak so much.PANDARUS Faith, I’ll not meddle in it. 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 70Good Pandarus—how now, Pandarus?PANDARUS I have had my labor for my travail, ill thought on of her, and ill thought ⟨on⟩ of you; gone between and between, but small thanks for my labor.TROILUS What, art thou angry, Pandarus? What, with75 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 o’ Friday as Helen is on Sunday. But what ⟨care⟩ I? I care not an she were a blackamoor;80 ’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 my85 part, I’ll meddle nor make no more i’ th’ matter.TROILUS Pandarus—PANDARUS Not I.TROILUS Sweet Pandarus—PANDARUS Pray you speak no more to me. I will leave90 all as I found it, and there an end.He exits.
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Sound alarum.TROILUS Peace, you ungracious clamors! 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;95 It is too starved a subject for my sword. But Pandarus—O gods, how do you plague me! I cannot come to Cressid but by Pandar, And he’s as tetchy to be wooed to woo As she is stubborn-chaste against all suit.100 Tell me, Apollo, for thy Daphnes 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 called the wild and wand’ring flood,105 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.110 What news, Aeneas, from the field today?AENEAS That Paris is returnèd home, and hurt.TROILUS By whom, Aeneas?AENEAS Troilus, by Menelaus.TROILUS Let Paris bleed. ’Tis but a scar to scorn;115 Paris is gored with Menelaus’ horn.Alarum.
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AENEAS Hark what good sport is out of town today!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 120 Come, go we then together.They exit.
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,5 Whose height commands as subject all the vale, To see the battle. Hector, whose patience Is as a virtue fixed, today was moved. He chid Andromache and struck his armorer; And, like as there were husbandry in war,10 Before the sun rose he was harnessed 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 15 The noise goes, this: there is among the Greeks A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector. They call him Ajax.CRESSIDA Good; and what of him?
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ALEXANDER They say he is a very man per se20 And stands alone.CRESSIDA So do all men unless ⟨they⟩ are drunk, sick, or have no legs.ALEXANDER This man, lady, hath robbed many beasts of their particular additions. He is as valiant as the25 lion, churlish as the bear, slow as the elephant, a man into whom nature hath so crowded humors that his valor is crushed into folly, his folly sauced with discretion. There is no man hath a virtue that he hath not a glimpse of, nor any man an attaint30 but he carries some stain of it. He is melancholy without cause and merry against the hair. He hath the joints of everything, 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 35But how should this man that makes me smile make Hector angry?ALEXANDER They say he yesterday coped Hector in the battle and struck him down, the disdain and shame whereof hath ever since kept Hector fasting40 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 45What’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 50This morning, uncle.
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PANDARUS What were you talking of when I came? Was Hector armed and gone ere you came to Ilium? Helen was not up, was she?CRESSIDA Hector was gone, but Helen was not up.PANDARUS 55E’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’ll60 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 of65 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 70Well, 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 75Himself? 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 he80 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 85He is elder.CRESSIDA Pardon me, pardon me.
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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 90He shall not need it, if he have his own.PANDARUS Nor his qualities.CRESSIDA No matter.PANDARUS Nor his beauty.CRESSIDA ’Twould not become him. His own ’s better.PANDARUS 95You have no judgment, niece. Helen herself swore th’ other day that Troilus, for a brown favor— for so ’tis, I must confess—not brown neither—CRESSIDA No, but brown.PANDARUS Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown.CRESSIDA 100To say the truth, true and not true.PANDARUS She praised his complexion above Paris’.CRESSIDA Why, Paris hath color enough.PANDARUS So he has.CRESSIDA Then Troilus should have too much. If she105 praised him above, his complexion is higher than his. He having color enough, and the other higher, is too flaming a praise for a good complexion. I had as lief Helen’s golden tongue had commended Troilus for a copper nose.PANDARUS 110I swear to you, I think Helen loves him better than Paris.CRESSIDA Then she’s a merry Greek indeed.PANDARUS Nay, I am sure she does. She came to him th’ other day into the compassed window—and115 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 within120 three pound ⟨lift⟩ as much as his brother Hector.CRESSIDA Is he so young a man and so old a lifter?
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PANDARUS But to prove to you that Helen loves him: she came and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin—CRESSIDA 125Juno 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 130Does 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’ll135 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 140I cannot choose but laugh to think how she tickled his chin. Indeed, she has a marvellous white hand, I must needs confess—CRESSIDA Without the rack.PANDARUS And she takes upon her to spy a white hair145 on his chin.CRESSIDA Alas, poor chin! Many a wart is richer.PANDARUS But there was such laughing! Queen Hecuba laughed that her eyes ran o’er—CRESSIDA With millstones.PANDARUS 150And Cassandra laughed—CRESSIDA But there was a more temperate fire under the pot of her eyes. Did her eyes run o’er too?PANDARUS And Hector laughed.CRESSIDA At what was all this laughing?PANDARUS 155Marry, at the white hair that Helen spied on Troilus’ chin.
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CRESSIDA An ’t had been a green hair, I should have laughed too.PANDARUS They laughed not so much at the hair as at160 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 165That’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.170 “Pluck ’t out, and give it him.” But there was such laughing, and Helen so blushed, and Paris so chafed, and all the rest so laughed that it passed.CRESSIDA So let it now, for it has been a great while going by.PANDARUS 175Well, cousin, I told you a thing yesterday. Think on ’t.CRESSIDA So I do.PANDARUS I’ll be sworn ’tis true. He will weep you an ’twere a man born in April.CRESSIDA 180And 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 185At 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.⌜They cross the stage; Alexander exits.⌝CRESSIDA 190Speak not so loud.
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Enter Aeneas ⌜and crosses the stage.⌝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.Enter Antenor ⌜and crosses the stage.⌝CRESSIDA Who’s that?PANDARUS 195That’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 see200 him nod at me.CRESSIDA Will he give you the nod?PANDARUS You shall see.CRESSIDA If he do, the rich shall have more.Enter Hector ⌜and crosses the stage.⌝PANDARUS That’s Hector, that, that, look you, that.205 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 he not? It does a ⟨man’s⟩ heart good. Look210 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 215Swords, anything, he cares not. An the devil come to him, it’s all one. By God’s lid, it does one’s heart good.Enter Paris ⌜and crosses the stage.⌝ Yonder comes Paris, yonder comes Paris! Look you yonder, niece. Is ’t not a gallant man too? Is ’t not?
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220 Why, this is brave now. Who said he came hurt home today? 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.Enter Helenus ⌜and crosses the stage.⌝CRESSIDA Who’s that?PANDARUS 225That’s Helenus. I marvel where Troilus is. That’s Helenus. I think he went not forth today. That’s Helenus.CRESSIDA Can Helenus fight, uncle?PANDARUS Helenus? No. Yes, he’ll fight indifferent230 well. I marvel where Troilus is. Hark, do you not hear the people cry “Troilus”? Helenus is a priest.Enter Troilus ⌜and crosses the stage.⌝CRESSIDA What sneaking fellow comes yonder?PANDARUS Where? Yonder? That’s Deiphobus. ’Tis Troilus! There’s a man, niece. Hem! Brave Troilus,235 the prince of chivalry!CRESSIDA Peace, for shame, peace.PANDARUS Mark him. Note him. O brave Troilus! Look well upon him, niece. Look you how his sword is bloodied and his helm more hacked than Hector’s,240 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 to245 him; and I warrant Helen, to change, would give an eye to boot.⟨Enter Common Soldiers ⌜and cross the stage.⌝⟩CRESSIDA Here comes more.PANDARUS Asses, fools, dolts, chaff and bran, chaff and bran, porridge after meat. I could live and die in
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250 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 better255 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? Is260 not birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood, learning, gentleness, virtue, youth, liberality and such-like the spice and salt that season a man?CRESSIDA Ay, a minced man; and then to be baked with no date in the pie, for then the man’s date is out.PANDARUS 265You 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, and270 you to defend all these; and at all these wards I lie, at a thousand watches.PANDARUS Say one of your watches.CRESSIDA Nay, I’ll watch you for that, and that’s one of the chiefest of them too. If I cannot ward what I275 would not have hit, I can watch you for telling how I took the blow—unless it swell past hiding, and then it’s past watching.PANDARUS You are such another!Enter ⌜Troilus’s⌝ Boy.BOY Sir, my lord would instantly speak with you.PANDARUS 280Where?BOY At your own house. There he unarms him.PANDARUS Good boy, tell him I come.⌜Boy exits.⌝ I doubt he be hurt.—Fare you well, good niece.
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CRESSIDA Adieu, uncle.PANDARUS 285I 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.⟨Pandarus exits.⟩ Words, vows, gifts, tears, and love’s full sacrifice290 He offers in another’s enterprise; But more in Troilus thousandfold 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.295 That she beloved knows naught that knows not this: Men prize the thing ungained 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:300 Achievement is command; ungained, beseech. Then though my heart’s content firm love doth bear, Nothing of that shall from mine eyes appear.She exits.
⟨Sennet.⟩ Enter Agamemnon, Nestor, Ulysses, Diomedes,
Menelaus, with others.AGAMEMNON Princes, what grief hath set ⟨the⟩ jaundice o’er your cheeks? The ample proposition that hope makes In all designs begun on Earth below5 Fails in the promised largeness. Checks and disasters Grow in the veins of actions highest reared, As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap, Infects the sound pine and diverts his grain
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Tortive and errant from his course of growth.10 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 draw15 Bias and thwart, not answering the aim And that unbodied figure of the thought That gave ’t surmisèd shape. Why then, you princes, Do you with cheeks abashed behold our works And call them shames, which are indeed naught else20 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,25 The hard and soft seem all affined and kin. But in the wind and tempest of her frown, Distinction, with a broad and powerful fan, Puffing at all, winnows the light away, And what hath mass or matter by itself30 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,35 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 behold40 The strong-ribbed bark through liquid mountains cut, Bounding between the two moist elements, Like Perseus’ horse. Where’s then the saucy boat Whose weak untimbered sides but even now
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Corrivaled greatness? Either to harbor fled45 Or made a toast for Neptune. Even so Doth valor’s show and valor’s worth divide In storms of Fortune. For in her ray and brightness The herd hath more annoyance by the breese Than by the tiger, but when the splitting wind50 Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks, And flies ⌜flee⌝ under shade, why, then the thing of courage, As roused with rage, with rage doth sympathize, And with an accent tuned in selfsame key55 ⌜Retorts⌝ to chiding Fortune.ULYSSES Agamemnon, Thou great commander, nerves and bone of Greece, Heart of our numbers, soul and only sprite, In whom the tempers and the minds of all60 Should be shut up, hear what Ulysses speaks. Besides th’ applause and approbation, The which, (⌜to Agamemnon⌝) most mighty for thy place and sway, (⌜To Nestor⌝) And thou most reverend for ⟨thy⟩65 stretched-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, hatched in silver,70 Should with a bond of air, strong as the axletree On which heaven rides, knit all the Greekish ears To his experienced tongue, yet let it please both, Thou great, and wise, to hear Ulysses speak.⟨AGAMEMNON Speak, Prince of Ithaca, and be ’t of less expect75 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.⟩
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ULYSSES Troy, yet upon his ⟨basis,⟩ had been down,80 And the great Hector’s sword had lacked 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.85 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 center90 Observe degree, priority, and place, Insisture, course, proportion, season, form, Office, and custom, in all line of order. And therefore is the glorious planet Sol In noble eminence enthroned and sphered95 Amidst the other, whose med’cinable eye Corrects the influence of evil planets, And posts, like the commandment of a king, Sans check, to good and bad. But when the planets In evil mixture to disorder wander,100 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 states105 Quite from their fixture! O, when degree is shaked, 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,110 The primogeneity and due of birth, Prerogative of age, crowns, scepters, laurels, But by degree stand in authentic place? Take but degree away, untune that string,
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And hark what discord follows. Each thing ⟨meets⟩115 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;120 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,125 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,130 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 disdained By him one step below, he by the next,135 That next by him beneath; so every step, Exampled by the first pace that is sick Of his superior, grows to an envious fever Of pale and bloodless emulation. And ’tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,140 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 discovered The fever whereof all our power is sick.AGAMEMNON The nature of the sickness found, Ulysses,145 What is the remedy?ULYSSES The great Achilles, whom opinion crowns
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The sinew and the forehand of our host, Having his ear full of his airy fame, Grows dainty of his worth and in his tent150 Lies mocking our designs. With him Patroclus, Upon a lazy bed, the live-long day Breaks scurril jests, And with ridiculous and silly action, Which, slanderer, he imitation calls,155 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 sound160 ’Twixt his stretched footing and the scaffollage, Such to-be-pitied and o’erwrested seeming He acts thy greatness in; and when he speaks, ’Tis like a chime a-mending, with terms ⟨unsquared⟩ Which from the tongue of roaring Typhon dropped165 Would seem hyperboles. At this fusty stuff, The large Achilles, on his pressed bed lolling, From his deep chest laughs out a loud applause, Cries “Excellent! ’Tis Agamemnon right. Now play me Nestor; hem and stroke thy beard,170 As he being dressed to some oration.” That’s done, as near as the extremest ends Of parallels, as like as Vulcan and his wife; Yet god Achilles still cries “Excellent! ’Tis Nestor right. Now play him me, Patroclus,175 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 sport180 Sir Valor 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,
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Severals and generals of grace exact,185 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,190 Who, as Ulysses says, opinion crowns With an imperial voice, many are infect: Ajax is grown self-willed and bears his head In such a rein, in full as proud a place As broad Achilles; keeps his tent like him,195 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,200 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 parts205 That do contrive how many hands shall strike When fitness calls them on and know by measure Of their observant toil the enemy’s weight— Why, this hath not a fingers dignity. They call this bed-work, mapp’ry, closet war;210 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 215 Let this be granted, and Achilles’ horse Makes many Thetis’ sons.⟨Tucket.⟩
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AGAMEMNON What trumpet? Look, Menelaus.MENELAUS From Troy.⟨Enter Aeneas, ⌜with a Trumpeter.⌝⟩AGAMEMNON What would you ’fore our tent?AENEAS 220 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’ arm225 ’Fore all the Greekish ⌜host,⌝ 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 230 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.235 Which is that god in office, guiding men? Which is the high and mighty Agamemnon?AGAMEMNON This Trojan scorns us, or the men of Troy Are ceremonious courtiers.AENEAS Courtiers as free, as debonair, unarmed,240 As bending angels—that’s their fame in peace. But when they would seem soldiers, they have galls,
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Good arms, strong joints, true swords, and—great Jove’s accord— Nothing so full of heart. But peace, Aeneas.245 Peace, Trojan. Lay thy finger on thy lips. The worthiness of praise distains his worth If that the praised himself bring the praise forth. But what the repining enemy commends, That breath fame blows; that praise, sole pure,250 transcends.AGAMEMNON Sir, you of Troy, call you yourself Aeneas?AENEAS Ay, Greek, that is my name.AGAMEMNON What’s your ⟨affair,⟩ I pray you?AENEAS Sir, pardon. ’Tis for Agamemnon’s ears.AGAMEMNON 255 He hears naught 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 260 Speak frankly as the wind; It is not Agamemnon’s sleeping hour. That thou shalt know, Trojan, he is awake, He tells thee so himself.AENEAS Trumpet, blow ⟨loud⟩!265 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—270 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,
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If there be one among the fair’st of Greece That holds his honor higher than his ease,275 ⟨That seeks⟩ his praise more than he fears his peril, That knows his valor 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 worth280 In other arms than hers—to him this challenge. Hector, in view of Trojans and of Greeks, Shall make it good, or do his best to do it, He hath a lady wiser, fairer, truer Than ever Greek did couple in his arms285 And will tomorrow with his trumpet call, Midway between your tents and walls of Troy, To rouse a Grecian that is true in love. If any come, Hector shall honor him; If none, he’ll say in Troy when he retires290 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,295 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, ⌜to Aeneas⌝ Tell him of Nestor, one that was a man300 When Hector’s grandsire sucked. He is old now, But if there be not in our Grecian host A 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 beaver305 And in my vambrace put my withered brawns And, meeting him, ⟨will⟩ tell him that my lady
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Was fairer than his grandam and as chaste As may be in the world. His youth in flood, I’ll prove this troth with my three drops of blood.AENEAS 310 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, sir. Achilles shall have word of this intent;315 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.⟨All but Ulysses and Nestor exit.⟩ULYSSES Nestor.NESTOR What says Ulysses?ULYSSES 320 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 pride325 That hath to this maturity blown up In rank Achilles must or now be cropped Or, shedding, breed a nursery of like evil To overbulk us all.NESTOR Well, and how?ULYSSES 330 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 as substance Whose grossness little characters sum up;335 And, in the publication, make no strain But that Achilles, were his brain as barren
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As banks of Libya—though, Apollo knows, ’Tis dry enough—will, with great speed of judgment, Ay, with celerity, find Hector’s purpose340 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 ⟨his honor⟩ off If not Achilles? Though ’t be a sportful combat,345 Yet in the trial much opinion dwells, For here the Trojans taste our dear’st repute With their fin’st palate. And, trust to me, Ulysses, Our imputation shall be oddly poised In this vile action. For the success,350 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 mass355 Of things to come at large. It is supposed He that meets Hector issues from our choice; And choice, being mutual act of all our souls, Makes merit her election and doth boil, As ’twere from forth us all, a man distilled360 Out of our virtues, who, miscarrying, What heart receives from hence a conquering part To steel a strong opinion to themselves?— ⟨Which entertained, limbs are his instruments, In no less working than are swords and bows365 Directive by the limbs.⟩ULYSSES Give pardon to my speech: therefore ’tis meet Achilles meet not Hector. Let us like merchants First show foul wares and think perchance they’ll sell; If not, the luster of the better shall exceed370 By showing the worse first. Do not consent
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That ever Hector and Achilles meet, For both our honor and our shame in this Are dogged with two strange followers.NESTOR I see them not with my old eyes. What are they?ULYSSES 375 What glory our Achilles shares from Hector, Were he not proud, we all should share 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 eyes380 Should he scape Hector fair. If he were foiled, 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 ourselves385 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,390 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 employed plucks down Achilles’ plumes.NESTOR 395 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 ⟨tar⟩ the mastiffs on, as ’twere a bone.They exit.
Enter Ajax and Thersites.AJAX Thersites!THERSITES Agamemnon—how if he had boils, full, all over, generally?AJAX Thersites!THERSITES 5And 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 10Thou bitchwolf’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 unsalted leaven, speak. I will15 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 20Toadstool, learn me the proclamation.THERSITES Dost thou think I have no sense, thou strikest me thus?AJAX The proclamation!THERSITES Thou art proclaimed ⟨a⟩ fool, I think.
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AJAX 25Do 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 as30 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, that35 thou bark’st at him.AJAX Mistress Thersites!THERSITES Thou shouldst strike him—AJAX Cobloaf!⟨THERSITES⟩ He would pound thee into shivers with his40 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. Thou45 hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows; an asinego may tutor thee, ⟨thou⟩ scurvy-valiant ass. Thou art here but to thrash Trojans, and thou art bought and sold among those of any wit, like a barbarian slave. If thou use to beat me, I will begin50 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 55Mars 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?
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THERSITES 60You 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 65Well, why, so I do.THERSITES But yet you look not well upon him, for whosomever you take him to be, he is Ajax.ACHILLES I know that, fool.THERSITES Ay, but that fool knows not himself.AJAX 70Therefore I beat thee.THERSITES Lo, lo, lo, lo, what modicums of wit he utters! His evasions have ears thus long. I have bobbed his brain more than he has beat my bones. ⟨I⟩ will buy nine sparrows for a penny, and his pia75 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 80I say, this Ajax—⌜Ajax menaces him.⌝ACHILLES Nay, good Ajax.THERSITES Has not so much wit—ACHILLES, ⌜to Ajax⌝ Nay, I must hold you.THERSITES As will stop the eye of Helen’s needle, for85 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 90Will you set your wit to a fool’s?THERSITES No, I warrant you. The fool’s will shame it.PATROCLUS Good words, Thersites.ACHILLES, ⌜to Ajax⌝ What’s the quarrel?AJAX I bade the vile owl go learn me the tenor of the95 proclamation, and he rails upon me.
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THERSITES I serve thee not.AJAX Well, go to, go to.THERSITES I serve here voluntary.ACHILLES Your last service was suff’rance; ’twas not100 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 of105 your brains; he 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 moldy ere ⌜your⌝ grandsires had nails ⟨on110 their toes⟩—yoke you like draft-oxen and make you plow up the wars.ACHILLES What? What?THERSITES Yes, good sooth. To, Achilles! To, Ajax! To—AJAX I shall cut out your tongue.THERSITES 115’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 120There’s for you, Patroclus.THERSITES I will see you hanged like clodpolls ere I come any more to your tents. I will keep where there is wit stirring and leave the faction of fools.He exits.PATROCLUS A good riddance.ACHILLES, ⌜to Ajax⌝ 125 Marry, this, sir, is proclaimed through all our host: That Hector, by the ⟨fifth⟩ hour of the sun, Will with a trumpet ’twixt our tents and Troy Tomorrow morning call some knight to arms That hath a stomach, and such a one that dare130 Maintain—I know not what; ’tis trash. Farewell.
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AJAX Farewell. Who shall answer him?ACHILLES I know not. ’Tis put to lott’ry. Otherwise, He knew his man.⌜Achilles and Patroclus exit.⌝AJAX O, meaning you? I will go learn more of it.⟨He exits.⟩
Enter Priam, Hector, Troilus, Paris and Helenas.PRIAM After so many hours, lives, speeches spent, Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks: “Deliver Helen, and all damage else— As honor, loss of time, travel, expense,5 Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consumed In hot digestion of this cormorant war— Shall be struck off.”—Hector, what say you to ’t?HECTOR Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I As far as toucheth my particular,10 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,15 Surety⟩ secure; but modest doubt is called 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,20 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—
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What merit’s in that reason which denies25 The yielding of her up?TROILUS Fie, fie, my brother, Weigh you the worth and honor of a king So great as our dread father’s in a scale Of common ounces? Will you with counters sum30 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,35 You are so empty of them. Should not our father Bear the great sway of his affairs with reason, Because your speech hath none that tell him so?TROILUS You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest. You fur your gloves with reason. Here are your40 reasons: You know an enemy intends you harm; You know a sword employed is perilous, And reason flies the object of all harm. Who marvels, then, when Helenus beholds45 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 disorbed? Nay, if we talk of reason, ⟨Let’s⟩ shut our gates and sleep. Manhood and honor50 Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their thoughts With this crammed reason. Reason and respect Make livers pale and lustihood deject.HECTOR Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost55 The keeping.TROILUS What’s aught but as ’tis valued?
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HECTOR But value dwells not in particular will; It holds his estimate and dignity As well wherein ’tis precious of itself60 As in the prizer. ’Tis mad idolatry To make the service greater than the god; And the will dotes that is attributive To what infectiously itself affects Without some image of th’ affected merit.TROILUS 65 I take today 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,70 Although my will distaste what it elected, The wife I choose? There can be no evasion To blench from this and to stand firm by honor. We turn not back the silks upon the merchant When we have soiled them, nor the remainder75 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 bellied his sails;80 The seas and winds, old wranglers, took a truce And did him service. He touched the ports desired, And for an old aunt whom the Greeks held captive, He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness85 Wrinkles Apollo’s and makes pale the morning. Why keep we her? The Grecians keep our aunt. Is she worth keeping? Why, she is a pearl Whose price hath launched above a thousand ships And turned crowned kings to merchants.90 If you’ll avouch ’twas wisdom Paris went—
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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 clapped your hands And cried “Inestimable”—why do you now95 The issue of your proper wisdoms rate And do a deed that never Fortune did, Beggar the estimation which you prized Richer than sea and land? O, theft most base, That we have stol’n what we do fear to keep!100 But thieves unworthy of a thing so stol’n, That in their country did them that disgrace We fear to warrant in our native place.CASSANDRA, ⌜within⌝ Cry, Trojans, cry!PRIAM What noise? What shriek is this?TROILUS 105 ’Tis our mad sister. I do know her voice.CASSANDRA, ⌜within⌝ Cry, Trojans!HECTOR It is Cassandra.Enter Cassandra raving.CASSANDRA Cry, Trojans, cry! Lend me ten thousand eyes, And I will fill them with prophetic tears.HECTOR 110Peace, sister, peace!CASSANDRA Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled elders, Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry, Add to my clamors. Let us pay betimes A moiety of that mass of moan to come.115 Cry, Trojans, cry! Practice your eyes with tears. Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilium stand. Our firebrand brother Paris burns us all. Cry, Trojans, cry! A Helen and a woe! Cry, cry! Troy burns, or else let Helen go.She exits.
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HECTOR 120 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 cause125 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 minds130 Because Cassandra’s mad. Her brainsick raptures Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel Which hath our several honors all engaged To make it gracious. For my private part, I am no more touched than all Priam’s sons;135 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.140 But I attest the gods, your full consent Gave wings to my propension and cut off All fears attending on so dire a project. For what, alas, can these my single arms? What propugnation is in one man’s valor145 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 done150 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.
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PARIS 155 Sir, I propose not merely to myself The pleasures such a beauty brings with it, But I would have the soil of her fair rape Wiped off in honorable keeping her. What treason were it to the ransacked queen,160 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?165 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 bestowed or death unfamed Where Helen is the subject. Then I say,170 Well may we fight for her whom, we know well, The world’s large spaces cannot parallel.HECTOR Paris and Troilus, you have both said well, And on the cause and question now in hand Have glozed—but superficially, not much175 Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought Unfit to hear moral philosophy. The reasons you allege do more conduce To the hot passion of distempered blood Than to make up a free determination180 ’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 rendered to their owners. Now, What nearer debt in all humanity185 Than wife is to the husband? If this law Of nature be corrupted through affection, And that great minds, of partial indulgence To their benumbèd wills, resist the same,
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There is a law in each well-ordered nation190 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 aloud195 To have her back returned. Thus to persist In doing wrong extenuates not wrong, But makes it much more heavy. Hector’s opinion Is this in way of truth; yet, ne’ertheless, My sprightly brethren, I propend to you200 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 touched the life of our design! Were it not glory that we more affected205 Than the performance of our heaving spleens, I would not wish a drop of Trojan blood Spent more in her defense. But, worthy Hector, She is a theme of honor and renown, A spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds,210 Whose present courage may beat down our foes, And fame in time to come canonize us; For I presume brave Hector would not lose So rich advantage of a promised glory As smiles upon the forehead of this action215 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 Greeks220 Will ⟨strike⟩ amazement to their drowsy spirits. I was advertised their great general slept, Whilst emulation in the army crept. This, I presume, will wake him.They exit.
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Enter Thersites, alone.⌜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 could5 beat him whilst he railed at me. ’Sfoot, I’ll learn to conjure and raise devils but I’ll see some issue of my spiteful execrations. Then there’s Achilles, a rare enginer! If Troy be not taken till these two undermine it, the walls will stand till they fall of10 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 you take not that little, little, less than little wit from them that they have, which short-armed15 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!20 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!PATROCLUS, ⌜within⌝ Who’s there? Thersites? Good25 Thersites, come in and rail.THERSITES If I could ’a remembered a gilt counterfeit, thou couldst not have slipped out of my contemplation. But it is no matter. Thyself upon thyself! The common curse of mankind, folly and ignorance,30 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
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sworn and sworn upon ’t she never shrouded any35 but lazars. Amen.⟨Enter Patroclus.⟩ Where’s Achilles?PATROCLUS What, art thou devout? Wast thou in prayer?THERSITES Ay. The heavens hear me![PATROCLUS 40Amen.]ACHILLES, ⌜within⌝ Who’s there?PATROCLUS Thersites, my lord.ACHILLES, ⌜within⌝ Where? Where? O, where?Enter Achilles. ⌜To Thersites.⌝ Art thou come? Why, my cheese, my45 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 pray50 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 55I’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, ⌜to Patroclus⌝ 60He is a privileged man.—Proceed, Thersites.THERSITES Agamemnon is a fool, Achilles is a fool, Thersites is a fool, and, as aforesaid, Patroclus is a fool.⟩ACHILLES 65Derive this. Come.
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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 70Why am I a fool?THERSITES Make that demand of the ⟨creator.⟩ It suffices me thou art.Enter ⌜at a distance⌝ Agamemnon, Ulysses, Nestor,
Diomedes, Ajax, and Calchas. Look you, who comes here?ACHILLES Patroclus, I’ll speak with nobody.—Come in75 with me, Thersites.⟨He exits.⟩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 on80 the subject, and war and lechery confound all!⟩⌜He exits.⌝AGAMEMNON, ⌜to Patroclus⌝ Where is Achilles?PATROCLUS Within his tent, but ill-disposed, my lord.AGAMEMNON Let it be known to him that we are here. He ⌜shent⌝ our messengers, and we lay by85 Our ⟨appertainments,⟩ visiting of him. Let him be told so, lest perchance he think We dare not move the question of our place Or know not what we are.PATROCLUS I shall say so to him.⌜He exits.⌝ULYSSES 90 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 favor the man, but, by my
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head, ’tis pride. But, why, why? Let him show us a95 cause.—⟨A word, my lord.⟩⌜He and Agamemnon walk aside.⌝NESTOR What moves Ajax thus to bay at him?ULYSSES Achilles hath inveigled his fool from him.NESTOR Who, Thersites?ULYSSES He.NESTOR 100Then 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 wish105 than their faction. But it was a strong composure a fool could disunite.ULYSSES The amity that wisdom knits not, folly may easily untie.⟨Enter Patroclus.⟩ Here comes Patroclus.NESTOR 110No Achilles with him.ULYSSES The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy; his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.PATROCLUS, ⌜to Agamemnon⌝ Achilles bids me say he is much sorry If anything more than your sport and pleasure115 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:120 We are too well acquainted with these answers, But his evasion, winged 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,125 Not virtuously on his own part beheld,
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Do in our eyes begin to lose their gloss, Yea, ⟨and⟩ 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 sin130 If you do say we think him overproud And underhonest, in self-assumption greater Than in the note of judgment; and worthier than himself Here tend the savage strangeness he puts on,135 Disguise the holy strength of their command, And underwrite in an observing kind His humorous predominance—yea, watch His course and time, his ebbs and flows, ⟨as⟩ if The passage and whole ⟨carriage of this action⟩140 Rode on his tide. Go tell him this, and add That, if he overhold his price so much, We’ll none of him. But let him, like an engine Not portable, lie under this report: “Bring action hither; this cannot go to war.”145 A stirring dwarf we do allowance give Before a sleeping giant. Tell him so.PATROCLUS I shall, and bring his answer presently.AGAMEMNON In second voice we’ll not be satisfied; We come to speak with him.—Ulysses, ⟨enter you.⟩⟨Ulysses exits, ⌜with Patroclus.⌝⟩AJAX 150What 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 155Will 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.
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AJAX Why should a man be proud? How doth pride160 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 the165 deed devours the deed in the praise.AJAX I do hate a proud man as I hate the engendering of toads.NESTOR, ⌜aside⌝ And yet he loves himself. Is ’t not strange?Enter Ulysses.ULYSSES Achilles will not to the field tomorrow.AGAMEMNON 170 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 175 Why, will he not, upon our fair request, Untent his person and share th’ air with us?ULYSSES Things small as nothing, for request’s sake only, He makes important. Possessed he is with greatness And speaks not to himself but with a pride180 That quarrels at self-breath. Imagined worth Holds in his blood such swoll’n and hot discourse That ’twixt his mental and his active parts Kingdomed Achilles in commotion rages And batters down himself. What should I say?185 He is so plaguy proud that the death-tokens of it Cry “No recovery.”AGAMEMNON Let Ajax go to him.—
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Dear lord, go you and greet him in his tent. ’Tis said he holds you well and will be led190 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 seam195 And never suffers matter of the world Enter his thoughts, save such as doth revolve And ruminate himself—shall he be worshipped Of that we hold an idol more than he? No. This thrice-worthy and right valiant lord200 Shall not so stale his palm, nobly acquired, Nor, by my will, assubjugate his merit, As amply ⟨titled⟩ as Achilles is, By going to Achilles. That were to enlard his fat-already pride205 And add more coals to Cancer when he burns With entertaining great Hyperion. This lord go to him? Jupiter forbid And say in thunder “Achilles, go to him.”NESTOR, ⌜aside to Diomedes⌝ O, this is well; he rubs the vein of him.DIOMEDES, ⌜aside to Nestor⌝ 210 And how his silence drinks up ⟨this⟩ applause!AJAX If I go to him, with my armèd fist I’ll ⟨pash⟩ him o’er the face.AGAMEMNON O, no, you shall not go.AJAX An he be proud with me, I’ll feeze his pride.215 Let me go to him.ULYSSES Not for the worth that hangs upon our quarrel.AJAX A paltry, insolent fellow.
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NESTOR, ⌜aside⌝ How he describes himself!AJAX Can he not be sociable?ULYSSES, ⌜aside⌝ 220The raven chides blackness.AJAX I’ll ⟨let⟩ his humorous blood.AGAMEMNON, ⌜aside⌝ He will be the physician that should be the patient.AJAX An all men were of my mind—ULYSSES, ⌜aside⌝ 225Wit would be out of fashion.AJAX —he should not bear it so; he should eat swords first. Shall pride carry it?NESTOR, ⌜aside⌝ An ’twould, you’d carry half.⟨ULYSSES,⟩ ⌜aside⌝ He would have ten shares.AJAX 230I 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, ⌜to Agamemnon⌝ Our noble general, do not do so.DIOMEDES, ⌜to Agamemnon⌝ 235 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?240 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 Trojan!NESTOR What a vice were it in Ajax now—ULYSSES 245If he were proud—DIOMEDES Or covetous of praise—ULYSSES Ay, or surly borne—DIOMEDES Or strange, or self-affected—
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ULYSSES, ⌜to Ajax⌝ Thank the heavens, lord, thou art of sweet250 composure. Praise him that gat thee, she that gave thee suck; Famed be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature Thrice famed beyond, ⟨beyond⟩ thy erudition; But he that disciplined thine arms to fight,255 Let Mars divide eternity in twain And give him half; and for thy vigor, Bull-bearing Milo his addition yield To sinewy Ajax. I will not praise thy wisdom, Which like a ⟨bourn,⟩ a pale, a shore confines260 ⟨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 tempered,265 You should not have the eminence of him, But be as Ajax.AJAX Shall I call you father?NESTOR Ay, my good son.DIOMEDES Be ruled by him, Lord Ajax.ULYSSES 270 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. Tomorrow We must with all our main of power stand fast.275 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.They exit.
⟨Music sounds within.⟩ Enter Pandarus ⌜and Paris’s
Servingman.⌝PANDARUS Friend, you, pray you, a word. Do you not follow the young Lord Paris?MAN Ay, sir, when he goes before me.PANDARUS You depend upon him, I mean.MAN 5Sir, I do depend upon the Lord.PANDARUS You depend upon a notable gentleman. I must needs praise him.MAN The Lord be praised!PANDARUS You know me, do you not?MAN 10Faith, sir, superficially.PANDARUS Friend, know me better. I am the Lord Pandarus.MAN I hope I shall know your Honor better.PANDARUS I do desire it.MAN 15You are in the state of grace?PANDARUS Grace? Not so, friend. “Honor” and “Lordship” are my titles. What music is this?MAN I do but partly know, sir. It is music in parts.PANDARUS Know you the musicians?MAN 20Wholly, sir.PANDARUS Who play they to?MAN To the hearers, sir.PANDARUS At whose pleasure, friend?
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MAN At mine, sir, and theirs that love music.PANDARUS 25Command, I mean, ⟨friend.⟩MAN 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?MAN 30That’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 ⌜visible⌝ soul.PANDARUS Who, my cousin Cressida?MAN 35No, sir, Helen. Could not you find out that by her attributes?PANDARUS It should seem, fellow, ⟨that⟩ thou hast not seen the Lady Cressid. I come to speak with Paris from the Prince Troilus. I will make a complimental40 assault upon him, for my business seethes.MAN Sodden business! There’s a stewed phrase indeed.Enter Paris and Helen ⌜with Attendants.⌝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, fair45 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, you50 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 55Rude, in sooth; in good sooth, very rude.PARIS Well said, my lord; well, you say so in fits.
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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 you60 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 65Go 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 sweet70 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 that75 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 80What exploit’s in hand? Where sups he tonight?HELEN Nay, but, my lord—PANDARUS What says my sweet queen? My cousin will fall out with you.HELEN, ⌜to Paris⌝ You must not know where he sups.PARIS 85I’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?90 No, your ⟨poor⟩ disposer’s sick.PARIS I spy.
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PANDARUS You spy? What do you spy?—Come, give me an instrument. ⌜An Attendant gives him an instrument.⌝ Now, sweet queen.HELEN 95Why, 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 100He? 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’ll105 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.”110 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.⟩ Love, love, nothing but love, still love, still more!
115 For, O, love’s bow
Shoots buck and doe.
The ⟨shaft confounds⟩
Not that it wounds
But tickles still the sore.
120 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!” awhile, but “Ha ha ha!”
125 “O ho!”groans out for “ha ha ha!”—Hey ho!
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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 130Is 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 afield today?PARIS Hector, Deiphobus, Helenus, Antenor, and all the135 gallantry of Troy. I would fain have armed today, but my Nell would not have it so. How chance my brother Troilus went not?HELEN He hangs the lip at something.—You know all, Lord Pandarus.PANDARUS 140Not I, honey sweet queen. I long to hear how they sped today.—You’ll remember your brother’s excuse?PARIS To a hair.PANDARUS Farewell, sweet queen.HELEN 145Commend me to your niece.PANDARUS I will, sweet queen.⌜He exits.⌝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,150 With ⟨these⟩ your white enchanting fingers touched, 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.155 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.⟩They exit.
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Enter Pandarus ⟨and⟩ Troilus’s Man, ⌜meeting.⌝PANDARUS How now? Where’s thy master? At my cousin Cressida’s?MAN No, sir, ⟨he⟩ stays for you to conduct him thither.⟨Enter Troilus.⟩PANDARUS O, here he comes.—How now, how now?TROILUS, ⌜to his Man⌝ 5Sirrah, walk off.⌜Man exits.⌝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,10 And give me swift transportance to ⟨those⟩ fields Where I may wallow in the lily beds Proposed for the deserver! O, gentle Pandar, From Cupid’s shoulder pluck his painted wings And fly with me to Cressid!PANDARUS 15Walk here i’ th’ orchard. I’ll bring her straight.⟨Pandarus exits.⟩TROILUS I am giddy; expectation whirls me round. Th’ imaginary relish is so sweet That it enchants my sense. What will it be20 When that the wat’ry ⌜palate⌝ taste indeed Love’s thrice-repurèd nectar? Death, I fear me, Swooning destruction, or some joy too fine, Too subtle-potent, tuned too sharp in sweetness For the capacity of my ruder powers.25 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.
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⟨Enter Pandarus.⟩PANDARUS She’s making her ready; she’ll come straight.30 You must be witty now. She does so blush and fetches her wind so short as if she were frayed with a spirit. I’ll fetch her. It is the prettiest villain. She fetches her breath as short as a new-ta’en sparrow.⟨Pandarus exits.⟩TROILUS Even such a passion doth embrace my bosom.35 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.Enter Pandarus, and Cressida ⌜veiled.⌝PANDARUS, ⌜to Cressida⌝ Come, come, what need you40 blush? Shame’s a baby.—Here she is now. Swear the oaths now to her that you have sworn to me. ⌜Cressida offers to leave.⌝ What, are you gone again? You must be watched ere you be made tame, must you? Come your ways; come your ways. An you45 draw backward, we’ll put you i’ th’ ⌜thills.⌝—Why do you not speak to her?—Come, draw this curtain and let’s see your picture. ⌜He draws back her veil.⌝ Alas the day, how loath you are to offend daylight! An ’twere dark, you’d close sooner.—So, so, rub on,50 and kiss the mistress. (⌜They kiss.⌝) 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 55You 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. (⌜They kiss.⌝) What, billing
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again? Here’s “In witness whereof the parties60 interchangeably—.” Come in, come in. I’ll go get a fire.⌜Pandarus exits.⌝CRESSIDA Will you walk in, my lord?TROILUS O Cressid, how often have I wished me thus!CRESSIDA “Wished,” my lord? The gods grant—O, my lord!TROILUS 65What 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 cherubins; they never70 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 all75 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 imposition80 enough than for us to undergo any difficulty imposed. This ⟨is⟩ the monstruosity in love, lady, that the will is infinite and the execution confined, that the desire is boundless and the act a slave to limit.CRESSIDA They say all lovers swear more performance85 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 90Are 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
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name desert before his birth, and, being born, his95 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?⟨Enter Pandarus.⟩PANDARUS 100What, 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 of105 you, you’ll give him me. Be true to my lord. If he flinch, chide me for it.TROILUS, ⌜to Cressida⌝ 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,110 though they be long ere they be wooed, they are constant being won. They are burrs, I can tell you; they’ll stick where they are thrown.CRESSIDA Boldness comes to me now and brings me heart. Prince Troilus, I have loved you night and day115 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.120 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 blabbed? Who shall be true to us
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125 When we are so unsecret to ourselves? But though I loved you well, I wooed you not; And yet, good faith, I wished myself a man; Or that we women had men’s privilege Of speaking first. Sweet, bid me hold my tongue,130 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.⌜They kiss.⌝PANDARUS 135Pretty, i’ faith!CRESSIDA, ⌜to Troilus⌝ My lord, I do beseech you pardon me. ’Twas not my purpose thus to beg a kiss. I am ashamed. O heavens, what have I done! For this time will I take my leave, my lord.TROILUS 140Your leave, sweet Cressid?PANDARUS Leave? An you take leave till tomorrow morning—CRESSIDA Pray you, content you.TROILUS What offends you, lady?CRESSIDA 145Sir, 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 leave150 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 confession155 To angle for your thoughts. But you are wise,
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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—160 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 me165 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 simplicity170 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 come175 Approve their truth by Troilus. When their rhymes, Full of protest, of oath and big compare, Wants similes, truth tired with iteration— “As true as steel, as plantage to the moon, As sun to day, as turtle to her mate,180 As iron to adamant, as Earth to th’ center”— ⟨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 185 Prophet may you be! If I be false or swerve a hair from truth, When time is old ⟨and⟩ hath forgot itself, When water drops have worn the stones of Troy And blind oblivion swallowed cities up,
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190 And mighty states characterless are grated To dusty nothing, yet let memory, From false to false, among false maids in love, Upbraid my falsehood! When they’ve said “as false As air, as water, wind or sandy earth,195 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 be200 the witness. Here I hold your hand, here my cousin’s. If ever you prove false one to another, since I have taken such ⟨pains⟩ to bring you together, let all pitiful goers-between be called to the world’s end after my name: call them all panders. Let all205 constant men be Troiluses, all false women Cressids, and all brokers-between panders. Say “Amen.”TROILUS Amen.CRESSIDA Amen.PANDARUS Amen. Whereupon I will show you a chamber210 ⌜with a bed,⌝ which bed, because it shall not speak of your pretty encounters, press it to death. Away.⌜Troilus and Cressida⌝ exit. And Cupid grant all tongue-tied maidens here Bed, chamber, pander to provide this gear.He exits.
⟨Flourish.⟩ Enter Ulysses, Diomedes, Nestor,
Agamemnon, Calchas, ⟨Menelaus,⟩ ⌜and Ajax.⌝CALCHAS Now, princes, for the service I have done ⟨you,⟩ Th’ advantage of the time prompts me aloud To call for recompense. Appear it to ⟨your⟩ mind
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That, through the sight I bear in things to ⌜come,⌝5 I have abandoned Troy, left my ⌜possessions,⌝ Incurred a traitor’s name, exposed myself, From certain and possessed conveniences, To doubtful fortunes, sequest’ring from me all That time, acquaintance, custom, and condition10 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 benefit15 Out of those many regist’red in promise, Which you say live to come in my behalf.AGAMEMNON What wouldst thou of us, Trojan, make demand?CALCHAS You have a Trojan prisoner called Antenor Yesterday took. Troy holds him very dear.20 Oft have you—often have you thanks therefor— Desired my Cressid in right great exchange, Whom Troy hath still denied; but this Antenor, I know, is such a wrest in their affairs That their negotiations all must slack,25 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 done30 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.35 Withal, bring word if Hector will tomorrow Be answered in his challenge. Ajax is ready.
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DIOMEDES This shall I undertake, and ’tis a burden Which I am proud to bear.He exits ⌜with Calchas.⌝Achilles and Patroclus stand in their tent.ULYSSES Achilles stands i’ th’ entrance of his tent.40 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 turned on45 him. If so, I have derision medicinable To use between your strangeness and his pride, Which his own will shall have desire to drink. It may do good; pride hath no other glass50 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 not55 Or else disdainfully, which shall shake him more Than if not looked on. I will lead the way.⌜They pass before Achilles and Patroclus. Ulysses
remains in place, reading.⌝ACHILLES What, comes the General to speak with me? You know my mind: I’ll fight no more ’gainst Troy.AGAMEMNON, ⌜to Nestor⌝ What says Achilles? Would he aught with us?NESTOR, ⌜to Achilles⌝ 60 Would you, my lord, aught with the General?ACHILLES No.
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NESTOR Nothing, my lord.AGAMEMNON The better.⌜Agamemnon and Nestor exit.⌝ACHILLES, ⌜to Menelaus⌝ Good day, good day.MENELAUS 65How do you? How do you?⌜He exits.⌝ACHILLES What, does the cuckold scorn me?AJAX How now, Patroclus?ACHILLES Good morrow, Ajax.AJAX Ha?ACHILLES 70Good morrow.AJAX Ay, and good next day too.⌜He exits.⌝ACHILLES What mean these fellows? Know they not Achilles?PATROCLUS They pass by strangely. They were used to bend, To send their smiles before them to Achilles,75 To come as humbly as they ⌜use⌝ to creep To holy altars.ACHILLES What, am I poor of late? ’Tis certain, greatness, once fall’n out with Fortune, Must fall out with men too. What the declined is80 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 honor, but honor for those honors85 That are without him—as place, riches, and favor, Prizes of accident as oft as merit, Which, when they fall, as being slippery slanders, The love that leaned on them, as slippery too, Doth one pluck down another and together90 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
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95 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 here100 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,105 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 itself110 [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 itself115 Till it hath traveled and is ⌜mirrored⌝ 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 proves120 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 the applause125 Where they’re 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
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130 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 esteem135 And poor in worth! Now shall we see tomorrow— An act that very chance doth throw upon him— Ajax renowned. O, heavens, what some men do While some men leave to do! How some men creep in skittish Fortune’s hall,140 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 shoulder145 As if his foot were on brave Hector’s breast And great Troy shrieking.ACHILLES I do believe it, for they passed by me As misers do by beggars, neither gave to me Good word nor look. What, are my deeds forgot?ULYSSES 150 Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, A great-sized monster of ingratitudes. Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devoured As fast as they are made, forgot as soon155 As done. Perseverance, dear my lord, Keeps honor bright. To have done is to hang Quite out of fashion like a rusty ⌜mail⌝ In monumental mock’ry. Take the instant way, For honor travels in a strait so narrow160 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 turn aside from the direct forthright,
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Like to an entered tide they all rush by165 And leave you ⟨hindmost; Or, like a gallant horse fall’n in first rank, Lie there for pavement to the abject ⌜rear,⌝ O’errun and trampled on.⟩ Then what they do in present,170 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 outstretched as he would fly, Grasps in the comer. Welcome ever smiles,175 And Farewell goes out sighing. Let not virtue seek Remuneration for the thing it was, For beauty, wit, High birth, vigor of bone, desert in service, Love, friendship, charity are subjects all180 To envious and calumniating Time. One touch of nature makes the whole world kin, That all, with one consent, praise newborn gauds, Though they are made and molded of things past, And ⌜give⌝ to dust that is a little gilt185 More laud than gilt o’erdusted. 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 eye190 ⟨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 late195 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
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200 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?205 The providence that’s in a watchful state Knows almost every ⟨grain of Pluto’s gold,⟩ Finds bottom in the uncomprehensive ⌜deep,⌝ Keeps place with thought and almost, like the gods, Do thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.210 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 Troy215 As perfectly is ours as yours, my lord; And better would it fit Achilles much To throw down Hector than Polyxena. But it must grieve young Pyrrhus now at home When Fame shall in our islands sound her trump,220 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.⌜He exits.⌝PATROCLUS 225 To this effect, Achilles, have I moved you. A woman impudent and mannish grown Is not more loathed than an effeminate man In time of action. I stand condemned for this. They think my little stomach to the war,230 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
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And, like ⟨a⟩ dewdrop from the lion’s mane, Be shook to air.ACHILLES 235 Shall Ajax fight with Hector?PATROCLUS Ay, and perhaps receive much honor by him.ACHILLES I see my reputation is at stake; My fame is shrewdly gored.PATROCLUS O, then, beware!240 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 245 Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus. I’ll send the fool to Ajax and desire him T’ invite the Trojan lords after the combat To see us here unarmed. I have a woman’s longing, An appetite that I am sick withal,250 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 labor saved.THERSITES A wonder!ACHILLES 255What?THERSITES Ajax goes up and down the field, asking for himself.ACHILLES How so?THERSITES He must fight singly tomorrow with Hector260 and is so prophetically proud of an heroical cudgeling that he raves in saying nothing.ACHILLES How can that be?
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THERSITES Why, he stalks up and down like a peacock— a stride and a stand; ruminates like an hostess265 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 not270 show without knocking. The man’s undone forever, 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 this275 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 a leather jerkin.ACHILLES Thou must be my ambassador ⟨to him,⟩280 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. You285 shall see the pageant of Ajax.ACHILLES To him, Patroclus. Tell him I humbly desire the valiant Ajax to invite the ⟨most⟩ valorous Hector to come unarmed to my tent, and to procure safe-conduct for his person of the magnanimous and290 most illustrious, six-or-seven-times-honored captain general of the ⟨Grecian⟩ army, Agamemnon, ⟨et cetera.⟩ Do this.PATROCLUS, ⌜to Thersites, who is playing Ajax⌝ Jove bless great Ajax.THERSITES 295Hum!PATROCLUS I come from the worthy Achilles—THERSITES Ha?
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PATROCLUS Who most humbly desires you to invite Hector to his tent—THERSITES 300Hum!PATROCLUS And to procure safe-conduct from Agamemnon.THERSITES Agamemnon?PATROCLUS Ay, my lord.THERSITES 305Ha!PATROCLUS What say you to ’t?THERSITES God b’ wi’ you, with all my heart.PATROCLUS Your answer, sir.THERSITES If tomorrow be a fair day, by eleven of the310 clock it will go one way or other. Howsoever, he shall pay for me ere he has me.PATROCLUS Your answer, sir.THERSITES Fare you well with all my heart.⌜He pretends to exit.⌝ACHILLES Why, but he is not in this tune, is he?THERSITES 315No, but ⟨he’s⟩ out of tune thus. What music will be in him when Hector has knocked out his brains I know not. But I am sure none, unless the fiddler Apollo get his sinews to make catlings on.ACHILLES Come, thou shalt bear a letter to him320 straight.THERSITES Let me bear another to his horse, for that’s the more capable creature.ACHILLES My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirred, And I myself see not the bottom of it.⌜Achilles and Patroclus exit.⌝THERSITES 325Would 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.⌜He exits.⌝
Enter at one door Aeneas ⌜with a Torchbearer,⌝ at
another Paris, Deiphobus, Antenor, Diomedes ⌜and
Grecians⌝ 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 long5 As ⟨you,⟩ Prince Paris, nothing but heavenly business Should rob my bedmate 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, wherein10 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 armed, as black defiance15 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,
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By Jove, I’ll play the hunter for thy life20 With all my force, pursuit, and policy.AENEAS And thou shalt hunt a lion that will fly With his face backward. In human gentleness, Welcome to Troy. Now, by Anchises’ life, Welcome indeed. By Venus’ hand I swear25 No man alive can love in such a sort The thing he means to kill more excellently.DIOMEDES We sympathize. Jove, let Aeneas live, If to my sword his fate be not the glory, A thousand complete courses of the sun!30 But in mine emulous honor let him die With every joint a wound and that tomorrow.AENEAS We know each other well.DIOMEDES We do, and long to know each other worse.PARIS This is the most despiteful gentle greeting,35 The noblest hateful love, that e’er I heard of. ⌜To Aeneas.⌝ 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,40 For the enfreed Antenor, the fair Cressid. Let’s have your company, or, if you please, Haste there before us. (⌜Aside to Aeneas.⌝) I constantly believe— Or, rather, call my thought a certain knowledge—45 My brother Troilus lodges there tonight. Rouse him, and give him note of our approach, With the whole quality ⟨whereof.⟩ I fear We shall be much unwelcome.
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AENEAS, ⌜aside to Paris⌝ That I assure you.50 Troilus had rather Troy were borne to Greece Than Cressid borne from Troy.PARIS, ⌜aside to Aeneas⌝ There is no help. The bitter disposition of the time Will have it so.—On, lord, we’ll follow you.AENEAS 55Good morrow, all.⟨Aeneas exits ⌜with the Torchbearer.⌝⟩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 60 Both alike. He merits well to have her that doth seek her, Not making any scruple of her ⟨soilure,⟩ With such a hell of pain and world of charge; And you as well to keep her that defend her,65 Not palating the taste of her dishonor, With such a costly loss of wealth and friends. He, like a puling cuckold, would drink up The lees and dregs of a flat tamèd piece; You, like a lecher, out of whorish loins70 Are pleased to breed out your inheritors. Both merits poised, each weighs nor less nor more; But he as he, the heavier for a whore.PARIS You are too bitter to your countrywoman.DIOMEDES She’s bitter to her country. Hear me, Paris:75 For every false drop in her bawdy veins A Grecian’s life hath sunk; for every scruple Of her contaminated carrion weight A Trojan hath been slain. Since she could speak, She hath not given so many good words breath80 As for her Greeks and Trojans suffered death.
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PARIS Fair Diomed, you do as chapmen do, Dispraise the thing that they desire to buy. But we in silence hold this virtue well: We’ll not commend ⌜that not⌝ intend to sell.85 Here lies our way.They exit.
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.5 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 10Are you aweary of me?TROILUS O Cressida! But that the busy day, Waked by the lark, hath roused the ribald crows, And dreaming night will hide our joys no longer, I would not from thee.CRESSIDA 15 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.
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CRESSIDA 20 Prithee, tarry. You men will never tarry. O foolish Cressid! I might have still held off, And then you would have tarried. Hark, there’s one up.PANDARUS, ⟨within⟩ What’s all the doors open here?TROILUS It is your uncle.CRESSIDA 25 A pestilence on him! Now will he be mocking. I shall have such a life!⟨Enter Pandarus.⟩PANDARUS How now, how now? How go maidenheads? Here, you maid! Where’s my Cousin Cressid?CRESSIDA Go hang yourself, you naughty mocking uncle.30 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 35Ha, ha! Alas, poor wretch! Ah, poor capocchia! Has ’t not slept tonight? Would he not—a naughty man—let it sleep? A bugbear take him!CRESSIDA, ⌜to Troilus⌝ Did not I tell you? Would he were knocked i’ th’ head!One knocks. Who’s that at door?—Good uncle, go and see.—40 My lord, come you again into my chamber. You smile and mock me, as if I meant naughtily.TROILUS Ha, ha!CRESSIDA Come, you are deceived. I think of no such thing.Knock. How earnestly they knock! Pray you, come in.45 I would not for half Troy have you seen here.⌜Troilus and Cressida⌝ exit.
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PANDARUS Who’s there? What’s the matter? Will you beat down the door?⌜Enter Aeneas.⌝ How now? What’s the matter?AENEAS Good morrow, lord, good morrow.PANDARUS 50Who’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.55 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 ⌜Ho,⌝ nay, then! Come, come, you’ll do him60 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.⟨Enter Troilus.⟩TROILUS How now? What’s the matter?AENEAS My lord, I scarce have leisure to salute you,65 My matter is so rash. There is at hand Paris your brother and Deiphobus, The Grecian Diomed, and our Antenor Delivered to ⟨us;⟩ and ⟨for him⟩ forthwith, Ere the first sacrifice, within this hour,70 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.
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TROILUS 75How my achievements mock me! I will go meet them. And, my Lord Aeneas, We met by chance; you did not find me here.AENEAS Good, good, my lord; the secrets of ⟨nature⟩ Have not more gift in taciturnity.⌜Troilus and Aeneas⌝ exit.PANDARUS 80Is ’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!Enter Cressida.⟨CRESSIDA⟩ How now? What’s the matter? Who was here?PANDARUS 85Ah, 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 90O 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 ⟨I95 beseech you,⟩ what’s the matter?PANDARUS Thou must be gone, wench; thou must be gone. Thou art changed for Antenor. Thou must to thy father and be gone from Troilus. ’Twill be his death; ’twill be his bane. He cannot bear it.CRESSIDA 100 O you immortal gods! I will not go.PANDARUS Thou must.CRESSIDA I will not, uncle. I have forgot my father.
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I know no touch of consanguinity, No kin, no love, no blood, no soul so near me105 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 love110 Is as the very center 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 praisèd cheeks, Crack my clear voice with sobs, and break my heart115 With sounding “Troilus.” I will not go from Troy.⟨They exit.⟩
Enter Paris, Troilus, Aeneas, Deiphobus, Antenor,
⟨and⟩ Diomedes.
PARIS
It is great morning, and the hour prefixed
For her delivery to this valiant Greek
Comes fast upon. Good my brother Troilus,
Tell you the lady what she is to do
5 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
10 A priest there off’ring to it his own heart.⌜He exits.⌝
PARIS I know what ’tis to love,
And would, as I shall pity, I could help.—
Please you walk in, my lords?
They exit.
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Enter Pandarus and Cressida, ⌜weeping.⌝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 strong5 As that which causeth it. How can I moderate it? If I could temporize with my ⟨affection⟩ Or brew it to a weak and colder palate, The like allayment could I give my grief. My love admits no qualifying dross;10 No more my grief in such a precious loss.Enter Troilus.PANDARUS Here, here, here he comes. ⌜Ah,⌝ sweet ducks!CRESSIDA, ⌜embracing Troilus⌝ O Troilus, Troilus!PANDARUS What a pair of spectacles is here! Let me15 embrace too. “O heart,” as the goodly saying is, O heart, heavy heart,
Why sigh’st thou without breaking? where he answers again, Because thou canst not ease thy smart
20 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 strained a purity25 That the blest gods, as angry with my fancy— More bright in zeal than the devotion which Cold lips blow to their deities—take thee from me.CRESSIDA Have the gods envy?PANDARUS Ay, ay, ay, ay, ’tis too plain a case.
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CRESSIDA 30 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 ’t possible?TROILUS 35 And suddenly, where injury of chance Puts back leave-taking, jostles roughly by All time of pause, rudely beguiles our lips Of all rejoindure, forcibly prevents Our locked embrasures, strangles our dear vows40 Even in the birth of our own laboring 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 haste45 Crams his rich thiev’ry up, he knows not how. As many farewells as be stars in heaven, With distinct breath and consigned kisses to them, He fumbles up into a loose adieu And scants us with a single famished kiss,50 Distasted with the salt of broken tears.AENEAS, within My lord, is the lady ready?TROILUS Hark, you are called. Some say the genius Cries so to him that instantly must die.— Bid them have patience. She shall come anon.PANDARUS 55Where are my tears? Rain, to lay this wind, or my heart will be blown up by ⟨the root.⟩⌜He exits.⌝CRESSIDA I must, then, to the Grecians?TROILUS No remedy.
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CRESSIDA A woeful Cressid ’mongst the merry Greeks.60 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.65 I speak not “Be thou true” as fearing thee, For I will throw my glove to Death himself That there is no maculation in thy heart; But “Be thou true,” say I, to fashion in My sequent protestation: “Be thou true,70 And I will see thee.”CRESSIDA O, you shall be exposed, my lord, to dangers As infinite as imminent! But I’ll be true.TROILUS And I’ll grow friend with danger. Wear this sleeve.CRESSIDA And you this glove. When shall I see you?⌜They exchange love-tokens.⌝TROILUS 75 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.80 The Grecian youths are full of quality, ⟨Their loving well composed, with gift of nature ⌜flowing,⌝⟩ And swelling o’er with arts and exercise. How novelty may move, and parts with ⟨person,⟩85 Alas, a kind of godly jealousy— Which I beseech you call a virtuous sin— Makes me afeard.
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CRESSIDA O heavens, you love me not!TROILUS Die I a villain then!90 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.95 But I can tell that in each grace of these There lurks a still and dumb-discursive devil That tempts most cunningly. But be not tempted.CRESSIDA Do you think I will?TROILUS No.100 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 105 Come, kiss, and let us part.⌜They kiss.⌝PARIS, within Brother Troilus!TROILUS, ⌜calling⌝ Good brother, come you hither, And bring Aeneas and the Grecian with you.CRESSIDA My lord, will you be true?TROILUS 110 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.115 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.⌝⟩
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Welcome, Sir Diomed. Here is the lady Which for Antenor we deliver you. At the port, lord, I’ll give her to thy hand120 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 Ilium.DIOMEDES 125 Fair Lady Cressid, So please you, save the thanks this prince expects. The luster in your eye, heaven in your cheek, Pleads your fair usage, and to Diomed You shall be mistress and command him wholly.TROILUS 130 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 called her servant.135 I charge thee use her well, even for my charge, For, by the dreadful Pluto, if thou dost not, Though the great bulk Achilles be thy guard, I’ll cut thy throat.DIOMEDES O, be not moved, Prince Troilus.140 Let me be privileged by my place and message To be a speaker free. When I am hence, I’ll answer to my lust, and know you, lord, I’ll nothing do on charge. To her own worth She shall be prized; but that you say “Be ’t so,”145 I speak it in my spirit and honor: “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.⌜Cressida, Diomedes, and Troilus exit.⌝
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⟨Sound trumpet ⌜within.⌝⟩PARIS 150 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 155 ’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 lie160 On his fair worth and single chivalry.⟩They exit.
Enter Ajax, armed, Achilles, Patroclus, Agamemnon,
Menelaus, Ulysses, Nestor, etc. ⌜and Trumpeter.⌝AGAMEMNON, ⌜to Ajax⌝ 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 appallèd air5 May pierce the head of the great combatant And hale him hither.AJAX Thou, trumpet, there’s my purse.⌜He gives money to Trumpeter.⌝ Now crack thy lungs and split thy brazen pipe. Blow, villain, till thy spherèd bias cheek10 Outswell the colic of puffed Aquilon. Come, stretch thy chest, and let thy eyes spout blood. Thou blowest for Hector.⌜Sound trumpet.⌝
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ULYSSES No trumpet answers.ACHILLES ’Tis but early days.⌜Enter Cressida and Diomedes.⌝AGAMEMNON 15 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.AGAMEMNON Is this the Lady Cressid?DIOMEDES 20 Even she.AGAMEMNON Most dearly welcome to the Greeks, sweet lady.⌜He kisses her.⌝NESTOR Our general doth salute you with a kiss.ULYSSES Yet is the kindness but particular. ’Twere better she were kissed in general.NESTOR 25 And very courtly counsel. I’ll begin.⌜He kisses her.⌝ So much for Nestor.ACHILLES I’ll take that winter from your lips, fair lady. Achilles bids you welcome.⌜He kisses her.⌝MENELAUS I had good argument for kissing once.PATROCLUS, ⌜stepping between Menelaus and Cressida⌝ 30 But that’s no argument for kissing now, For thus popped Paris in his hardiment [And parted thus you and your argument.]⌜He kisses her.⌝
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ULYSSES O deadly gall and theme of all our scorns, For which we lose our heads to gild his horns!PATROCLUS 35 The first was Menelaus’ kiss; this mine. Patroclus kisses you.⌜He kisses her again.⌝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 40 In kissing, do you render or receive?⌜MENELAUS⌝ 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 45 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 50 You fillip me o’ th’ 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 55 I do desire it.
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CRESSIDA Why, beg ⌜two.⌝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 60 Never’s my day, and then a kiss of you.DIOMEDES Lady, a word. I’ll bring you to your father.⌜Diomedes and Cressida talk aside.⌝NESTOR A woman of quick sense.ULYSSES Fie, fie upon her! There’s language in her eye, her cheek, her lip;65 Nay, her foot speaks. Her wanton spirits look out At every joint and motive of her body. O, these encounterers, so glib of tongue, That give ⌜accosting⌝ welcome ere it comes And wide unclasp the tables of their thoughts70 To every ⟨tickling⟩ reader! Set them down For sluttish spoils of opportunity And daughters of the game.⟨⌜Diomedes and Cressida⌝ exit.⟩Flourish.ALL The Trojan’s trumpet.Enter all of Troy: ⟨Hector, ⌜armed,⌝ Paris, Aeneas,
Helenus, ⌜Troilus,⌝ and Attendants.⟩AGAMEMNON Yonder comes the troop.AENEAS 75 Hail, all the 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
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Pursue each other, or shall they be divided80 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.AGAMEMNON ’Tis done like Hector.⌜ACHILLES⌝ 85 But securely done, A little proudly, and great deal misprizing The knight opposed.AENEAS If not Achilles, sir, What is your name?ACHILLES 90 If not Achilles, nothing.AENEAS Therefore Achilles. But whate’er, know this: In the extremity of great and little, Valor and pride excel themselves in Hector, The one almost as infinite as all,95 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 seek100 This blended knight, half Trojan and half Greek.ACHILLES A maiden battle, then? O, I perceive you.⌜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,105 So be it, either to the uttermost Or else a breath. The combatants being kin Half stints their strife before their strokes begin.
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⌜Hector and Ajax enter the lists.⌝⟨ULYSSES They are opposed already.⟩AGAMEMNON What Trojan is that same that looks so heavy?ULYSSES 110 The youngest son of Priam, a true knight, Not yet mature, yet matchless firm of word, Speaking ⟨in⟩ deeds, and deedless in his tongue, Not soon provoked, nor being provoked soon calmed, His heart and hand both open and both free.115 For what he has, he gives; what thinks, he shows; Yet gives he not till judgment guide his bounty, Nor dignifies an impair thought with breath; Manly as Hector, but more dangerous, For Hector in his blaze of wrath subscribes120 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 youth125 Even to his inches, and with private soul Did in great Ilium thus translate him to me.Alarum. ⌜The fight begins.⌝AGAMEMNON They are in action.NESTOR Now, Ajax, hold thine own!TROILUS Hector, thou sleep’st. Awake thee!AGAMEMNON 130 His blows are well disposed.—There, Ajax!Trumpets cease.DIOMEDES You must no more.AENEAS Princes, enough, so please you.AJAX I am not warm yet. Let us fight again.DIOMEDES As Hector pleases.
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HECTOR 135 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.140 Were thy commixtion Greek and Trojan so That thou couldst say “This hand is Grecian all, And this is Trojan; the sinews of this leg All Greek, and this all Troy; my mother’s blood Runs on the dexter cheek, and this sinister145 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 borrowd’st from thy mother,150 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 honor to thee!⌜They embrace.⌝AJAX 155 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 earnèd in thy death.HECTOR Not Neoptolemus so mirable—160 On whose bright crest Fame with her loud’st “Oyez” Cries “This is he”—could promise to himself A thought of added honor torn from Hector.AENEAS There is expectance here from both the sides What further you will do.HECTOR 165 We’ll answer it; The issue is embracement.—Ajax, farewell.⌜They embrace again.⌝
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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 170 ’Tis Agamemnon’s wish; and great Achilles Doth long to see unarmed the valiant Hector.HECTOR Aeneas, call my brother Troilus to me, And signify this loving interview To the expecters of our Trojan part;175 Desire them home.⌜Aeneas speaks to Trojans, who exit; he then
returns with Troilus.⌝ ⌜To Ajax.⌝ Give me thy hand, my cousin. I will go eat with thee and see your knights.⟨Agamemnon and the rest ⌜come forward.⌝⟩AJAX Great Agamemnon comes to meet us here.HECTOR, ⌜to Aeneas⌝ The worthiest of them tell me name by name;180 But for Achilles, my own searching eyes Shall find him by his large and portly size.AGAMEMNON Worthy all arms! As welcome as to one That would be rid of such an enemy— ⟨But that’s no welcome. Understand more clear:185 What’s past and what’s to come is strewed with husks And formless ruin of oblivion; But in this extant moment, faith and troth, Strained purely from all hollow bias-drawing, Bids thee, with most divine integrity,⟩190 From heart of very heart, great Hector, welcome.HECTOR I thank thee, most imperious Agamemnon.
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AGAMEMNON, ⌜to Troilus⌝ My well-famed lord of Troy, no less to you.MENELAUS Let me confirm my princely brother’s greeting: You brace of warlike brothers, welcome hither.HECTOR, ⌜to Aeneas⌝ 195 Who must we answer?AENEAS The noble Menelaus.HECTOR O, you, my lord? By Mars his gauntlet, thanks! Mock not ⟨that I⟩ affect th’ untraded ⟨oath;⟩ Your quondam wife swears still by Venus’ glove.200 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, Laboring for destiny, make cruel way205 Through ranks of Greekish youth; and I have seen thee, As hot as Perseus, spur thy Phrygian steed, Despising many forfeits and subduments, When thou hast hung ⟨thy⟩ advanced sword i’ th’ air,210 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 ⟨hemmed⟩ thee in,215 Like an Olympian wrestling. This have I seen. But this thy countenance, still locked 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,220 Never like thee! O, let an old man embrace thee; And, worthy warrior, welcome to our tents.
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AENEAS, ⌜to Hector⌝ ’Tis the old Nestor.HECTOR Let me embrace thee, good old chronicle That hast so long walked hand in hand with time.225 Most reverend Nestor, I am glad to clasp thee.⌜They embrace.⌝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 tomorrow.230 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 favor, Lord Ulysses, well. Ah, sir, there’s many a Greek and Trojan dead235 Since first I saw yourself and Diomed In Ilium, 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,240 Yon 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 cost245 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.250 After the General, I beseech you next To feast with me and see me at my tent.
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ACHILLES I shall forestall thee, Lord Ulysses, thou!— Now, Hector, I have fed mine eyes on thee; I have with exact view perused thee, Hector,255 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 260 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.265 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 name270 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 pleasantly275 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,
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280 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.285 But I’ll endeavor 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.290 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, ⌜to Achilles⌝ I pray you, let us see you in the field. We have had pelting wars since you refused295 The Grecians’ cause.ACHILLES Dost thou entreat me, Hector? Tomorrow do I meet thee, fell as death; Tonight all friends.HECTOR Thy hand upon that match.AGAMEMNON 300 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 taborins;⟩ let the trumpets blow,305 That this great soldier may his welcome know.⌜Flourish.⌝⌜All but Troilus and Ulysses⌝ exit.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 tonight,
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310 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,315 To bring me thither?ULYSSES You shall command me, sir. ⟨As⟩ gentle tell me, of what honor was This Cressida in Troy? Had she no lover there That wails her absence?TROILUS 320 O sir, to such as boasting show their scars A mock is due. Will you walk on, my lord? She was beloved, ⟨she loved;⟩ she is, and doth; But still sweet love is food for Fortune’s tooth.They exit.
Enter Achilles and Patroclus.ACHILLES I’ll heat his blood with Greekish wine tonight, Which with my scimitar I’ll cool tomorrow. Patroclus, let us feast him to the height.PATROCLUS Here comes Thersites.Enter Thersites.ACHILLES 5 How now, thou ⟨core⟩ of envy? Thou crusty ⌜botch⌝ 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 10Why, thou full dish of fool, from Troy.⌜Achilles takes the letter and moves aside to read it.⌝PATROCLUS Who keeps the tent now?THERSITES The surgeon’s box or the patient’s wound.PATROCLUS Well said, adversity. And what ⟨need these⟩ tricks?THERSITES 15Prithee, 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,
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20 ⟨catarrhs,⟩ loads o’ gravel in the back, lethargies, cold palsies, [raw eyes, dirt-rotten livers, whissing lungs, bladders full of impostume, sciaticas, limekilns i’ th’ palm, incurable bone-ache, and the rivelled fee-simple of the tetter,] take and take25 again such preposterous discoveries.PATROCLUS Why, thou damnable box of envy, thou, what means thou to curse thus?THERSITES Do I curse thee?PATROCLUS Why, no, you ruinous butt, you whoreson30 indistinguishable cur, no.THERSITES No? Why art thou then exasperate, thou idle immaterial skein of sleave-silk, thou green sarsenet flap for a sore eye, thou tassel of a prodigal’s purse, thou? Ah, how the poor world is pestered with such35 waterflies, diminutives of nature!PATROCLUS Out, gall!THERSITES Finch egg!ACHILLES, ⌜coming forward⌝ My sweet Patroclus, I am thwarted quite From my great purpose in tomorrow’s battle.40 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; honor, or go or stay;45 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.⟨He exits ⌜with Patroclus.⌝⟩THERSITES With too much blood and too little brain,50 these two may run mad; but if with too much brain and too little blood they do, I’ll be a curer of madmen. Here’s Agamemnon, an honest fellow enough and one that loves quails, but he has not so much brain as earwax. And the goodly transformation
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55 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⟩ with60 wit turn him to? To an ass were nothing; he is both ass and ox. To an ox were nothing; ⟨he is⟩ both ox and ass. To be a ⟨dog,⟩ a ⟨mule,⟩ a cat, a fitchew, a toad, a lizard, an owl, a puttock, or a herring without a roe, I would not care; but to be Menelaus! I65 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.Enter ⟨Hector,⟩ ⌜Troilus,⌝ ⟨Ajax,⟩ Agamemnon, Ulysses,
Nestor, ⌜Menelaus,⌝ and Diomedes, with lights. Heyday! Sprites and fires!AGAMEMNON We go wrong, we go wrong.AJAX 70 No, yonder—’tis there, where we see the lights.HECTOR I trouble you.AJAX No, not a whit.⟨Enter Achilles.⟩ULYSSES, ⌜to Hector⌝ Here comes himself to guide you.ACHILLES Welcome, brave Hector. Welcome, princes all.AGAMEMNON, ⌜to Hector⌝ 75 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 lord80 Menelaus.
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THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ Sweet draught. “Sweet,” quoth he? Sweet sink, sweet sewer.ACHILLES Good night and welcome, both ⟨at once⟩, to those That go or tarry.AGAMEMNON 85Good night.Agamemnon ⌜and⌝ Menelaus exit.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 90Give me your hand.ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ Follow his torch; he goes to Calchas’ tent. I’ll keep you company.TROILUS Sweet sir, you honor me.HECTOR And so, good night.⌜Diomedes exits, followed by Troilus and Ulysses.⌝ACHILLES 95 Come, come, enter my tent.⌜Achilles, Ajax, Nestor, and Hector⌝ exit.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 Brabbler100 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 a105 Trojan drab and uses the traitor Calchas ⟨his⟩ tent. I’ll after. Nothing but lechery! All incontinent varlets!⌜He exits.⌝
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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⌝ 5She comes to you.⟨Enter Troilus and Ulysses,⟩ ⌜at a distance, and then,
apart from them, Thersites.⌝ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ Stand where the torch may not discover us.Enter Cressida.TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ Cressid comes forth to him.DIOMEDES How now, my charge?CRESSIDA Now, my sweet guardian. Hark, a word with you.⌜She whispers to him.⌝TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ 10Yea, so familiar?ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ She will sing any man at first sight.THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ And any man may sing her, if he can take her clef. She’s noted.DIOMEDES 15Will you remember?⌜CRESSIDA⌝ Remember? Yes.DIOMEDES Nay, but do, then, and let your mind be coupled with your words.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ What ⟨should⟩ she remember?ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ 20List!CRESSIDA Sweet honey Greek, tempt me no more to folly.THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ Roguery!DIOMEDES Nay, then—
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CRESSIDA I’ll tell you what—DIOMEDES 25 Foh, foh, come, tell a pin! You are forsworn.CRESSIDA In faith, I cannot. What would you have me do?THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ 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.30 Bid me do anything but that, sweet Greek.DIOMEDES Good night.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ Hold, patience!ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ How now, Trojan?CRESSIDA Diomed—DIOMEDES 35 No, no, good night. I’ll be your fool no more.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ Thy better must.CRESSIDA Hark, a word in your ear.⌜She whispers to him.⌝TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ O plague and madness!ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ You are moved, prince. Let us depart, I pray ⟨you,⟩40 Lest your displeasure should enlarge itself To wrathful terms. This place is dangerous; The time right deadly. I beseech you, go.TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ Behold, I pray you.ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ ⟨Nay,⟩ good my lord, go off.45 You flow to great ⟨distraction.⟩ Come, my lord.TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ I prithee, stay.ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ You have not patience. Come.TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ I pray you, stay. By hell and all hell’s torments, I will not speak a word.
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DIOMEDES 50 And so good night.⌜He starts to leave.⌝CRESSIDA Nay, but you part in anger.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ Doth that grieve thee? O withered truth!ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ How now, my lord?TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ 55 By Jove, I will be patient.CRESSIDA Guardian! Why, Greek!DIOMEDES Foh foh! ⟨Adieu.⟩ You palter.CRESSIDA In faith, I do not. Come hither once again.ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ You shake, my lord, at something. Will you go?60 You will break out.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ She strokes his cheek!ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ Come, come.TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ Nay, stay. By Jove, I will not speak a word. There is between my will and all offenses65 A guard of patience. Stay a little while.THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ How the devil Luxury, with his fat rump and potato finger, tickles ⟨these⟩ together. Fry, lechery, fry!DIOMEDES ⟨But⟩ will you, then?CRESSIDA 70 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.She exits.ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ You have sworn patience.TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ Fear me not, my lord.75 I will not be myself nor have cognition Of what I feel. I am all patience.
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Enter Cressida ⌜with Troilus’s sleeve.⌝THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ Now the pledge, now, now, now!CRESSIDA, ⌜giving the sleeve⌝ Here, Diomed. Keep this sleeve.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ 80O beauty, where is thy faith?ULYSSES, ⌜aside to Troilus⌝ My lord—TROILUS, ⌜aside to Ulysses⌝ ⟨I will be patient; outwardly I will.CRESSIDA⟩ You look upon that sleeve? Behold it well. He loved me—O false wench!—Give ’t me again.⌜She snatches the sleeve from Diomedes.⌝DIOMEDES 85Whose was ’t?CRESSIDA It is no matter, now I ha ’t again. I will not meet with you tomorrow night. I prithee, Diomed, visit me no more.THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ Now she sharpens. Well said,90 whetstone.DIOMEDES I shall have it.CRESSIDA What, this?DIOMEDES Ay, that.CRESSIDA O all you gods!—O pretty, pretty pledge!95 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.⌜He grabs the sleeve, and she tries to retrieve it.⌝DIOMEDES Nay, do not snatch it from me.CRESSIDA 100 He that takes that doth take my heart withal.DIOMEDES I had your heart before. This follows it.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ I did swear patience.
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⟨CRESSIDA⟩ You shall not have it, Diomed, faith, you shall not. I’ll give you something else.DIOMEDES 105I will have this. Whose was it?CRESSIDA It is no matter.DIOMEDES Come, tell me whose it was.CRESSIDA ’Twas one’s that loved me better than you will. But now you have it, take it.DIOMEDES 110 Whose was it?CRESSIDA By all Diana’s waiting-women yond, And by herself, I will not tell you whose.DIOMEDES Tomorrow will I wear it on my helm And grieve his spirit that dares not challenge it.TROILUS, ⌜aside⌝ 115 Wert thou the devil and wor’st it on thy horn, It should be challenged.CRESSIDA Well, well, ’tis done, ’tis past. And yet it is not. I will not keep my word.DIOMEDES Why, then, farewell.120 Thou never shalt mock Diomed again.⌜He starts to leave.⌝CRESSIDA You shall not go. One cannot speak a word But it straight starts you.DIOMEDES I do not like this fooling.⌜TROILUS, aside⌝ Nor I, by Pluto! But that that likes not you125 Pleases me best.DIOMEDES What, shall I come? The hour?CRESSIDA Ay, come.—O Jove!—Do, come.—I shall be plagued.
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DIOMEDES Farewell, till then.CRESSIDA Good night. I prithee, come.—⟨He exits.⟩130 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:135 Minds swayed by eyes are full of turpitude.She exits.THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ A proof of strength she could not publish more, Unless she said “My mind is now turned whore.”ULYSSES All’s done, my lord.TROILUS It is.ULYSSES 140 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?145 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.150 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 155 Nor mine, my lord. Cressid was here but now.
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TROILUS Let it not be believed for womanhood! Think, we had mothers. Do not give advantage To stubborn critics, apt, without a theme For depravation, to square the general sex160 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, ⌜aside⌝ Will he swagger himself out on ’s165 own eyes?TROILUS This she? No, this is Diomed’s Cressida. If beauty have a soul, this is not she; If souls guide vows, if vows be sanctimonies, If sanctimony be the gods’ delight,170 If there be rule in unity itself, This ⟨is⟩ not she. O madness of discourse, That cause sets up with and against itself! Bifold authority, where reason can revolt Without perdition, and loss assume all reason175 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 division180 Admits no orifex for a point as subtle As Ariachne’s broken woof to enter. Instance, O instance, strong as Pluto’s gates, Cressid is mine, tied with the bonds of heaven; Instance, O instance, strong as heaven itself,185 The bonds of heaven are slipped, dissolved, and loosed, And with another knot, ⟨five-finger-tied,⟩
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The fractions of her faith, orts of her love, The fragments, scraps, the bits and greasy relics190 Of her o’er-eaten faith are given to Diomed.ULYSSES May worthy Troilus be half attached With that which here his passion doth express?TROILUS Ay, Greek, and that shall be divulgèd well In characters as red as Mars his heart195 Inflamed with Venus. Never did young man fancy With so eternal and so fixed 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.200 Were it a casque composed by Vulcan’s skill, My sword should bite it. Not the dreadful spout Which shipmen do the hurricano call, Constringed in mass by the almighty sun, Shall dizzy with more clamor Neptune’s ear205 In his descent than shall my prompted sword Falling on Diomed.THERSITES, ⌜aside⌝ He’ll tickle it for his concupy.TROILUS O Cressid! O false Cressid! False, false, false! Let all untruths stand by thy stainèd name,210 And they’ll seem glorious.ULYSSES O, contain yourself. Your passion draws ears hither.Enter Aeneas.AENEAS, ⌜to Troilus⌝ I have been seeking you this hour, my lord. Hector, by this, is arming him in Troy.215 Ajax, your guard, stays to conduct you home.TROILUS Have with you, prince.—My courteous lord, adieu.—
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Farewell, revolted fair!—And, Diomed, Stand fast, and wear a castle on thy head!ULYSSES I’ll bring you to the gates.TROILUS 220Accept distracted thanks.Troilus, Aeneas, and Ulysses exit.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 more225 for an almond than he for a commodious drab. Lechery, lechery, still wars and lechery! Nothing else holds fashion. A burning devil take them!He exits.
Enter Hector, ⌜armed,⌝ and Andromache.ANDROMACHE When was my lord so much ungently tempered To stop his ears against admonishment? Unarm, unarm, and do not fight today.HECTOR You train me to offend you. Get you in.5 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, armed and bloody in intent.10 Consort with me in loud and dear petition; Pursue we him on knees. For I have dreamt
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Of bloody turbulence, and this whole night Hath nothing been but shapes and forms of slaughter.CASSANDRA O, ’tis true!HECTOR, ⌜calling out⌝ 15 Ho! Bid my trumpet sound!⟨CASSANDRA⟩ No notes of sally, for the heavens, sweet brother!HECTOR Begone, I say. The gods have heard me swear.CASSANDRA The gods are deaf to hot and peevish vows. They are polluted off’rings more abhorred20 Than spotted livers in the sacrifice.ANDROMACHE, ⌜to Hector⌝ 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⟩ 25 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 honor keeps the weather of my fate.30 Life every man holds dear, but the dear man Holds honor far more precious-dear than life.Enter Troilus, ⌜armed.⌝ How now, young man? Meanest thou to fight today?ANDROMACHE Cassandra, call my father to persuade.Cassandra exits.HECTOR No, faith, young Troilus, doff thy harness, youth.35 I am today i’ th’ vein of chivalry. Let grow thy sinews till their knots be strong,
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And tempt not yet the brushes of the war. Unarm thee, go, and doubt thou not, brave boy, I’ll stand today for thee and me and Troy.TROILUS 40 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,45 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,50 Let’s leave the hermit Pity with our mother, And when we have our armors buckled on, The venomed Vengeance ride upon our swords, Spur them to ruthful work, rein them from ruth.HECTOR Fie, savage, fie!TROILUS 55 Hector, then ’tis wars.HECTOR Troilus, I would not have you fight today.TROILUS Who should withhold me? Not fate, obedience, nor the hand of Mars, Beck’ning with fiery truncheon my retire;60 Not Priamus and Hecuba on knees, Their eyes o’er-gallèd with recourse of tears; Nor you, my brother, with your true sword drawn Opposed to hinder me, should stop my way, ⟨But by my ruin.⟩
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Enter Priam and Cassandra.CASSANDRA, ⌜indicating Hector⌝ 65 Lay hold upon him, Priam; hold him fast. He is thy crutch. Now if thou loose thy stay, Thou on him leaning, and all Troy on thee, Fall all together.PRIAM Come, Hector, come. Go back.70 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 75 Aeneas is afield, And I do stand engaged to many Greeks, Even in the faith of valor, to appear This morning to them.PRIAM Ay, but thou shalt not go.HECTOR 80I 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 85 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.Andromache exits.TROILUS This foolish, dreaming, superstitious girl90 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!
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Hark, how Troy roars, how Hecuba cries out,95 How poor Andromache shrills her ⟨dolor⟩ 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 100 Farewell.—Yet soft! Hector, I take my leave. Thou dost thyself and all our Troy deceive.⟨She exits.⟩HECTOR You are amazed, my liege, at her exclaim. Go in and cheer the town. We’ll forth and fight, Do deeds worth praise, and tell you them at night.PRIAM 105 Farewell. The gods with safety stand about thee!⌜Hector and Priam exit at separate doors.⌝Alarum.TROILUS They are at it, hark! Proud Diomed, believe, I come to lose my arm or win my sleeve.Enter Pandarus, ⌜with a paper.⌝PANDARUS Do you hear, my lord? Do you hear?TROILUS What now?PANDARUS 110Here’s a letter come from yond poor girl.TROILUS Let me read.⌜He reads.⌝PANDARUS A whoreson phthisic, a whoreson rascally phthisic so troubles me, and the foolish fortune of this girl, and what one thing, what another, that I115 shall leave you one o’ ⌜these⌝ days. And I have a rheum in mine eyes too, and such an ache in my bones that, unless a man were cursed, I cannot tell what to think on ’t.—What says she there?TROILUS Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart.120 Th’ effect doth operate another way.
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Go, wind, to wind! There turn and change together.⌜He tears up the paper and throws the pieces in the air.⌝ My love with words and errors still she feeds, But edifies another with her deeds.They exit.
⟨Alarum.⟩ 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.5 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 sleeveless errand. O’ th’ t’other side, the policy of those10 crafty swearing rascals—that stale old mouse-eaten dry cheese, Nestor, and that same dog-fox, Ulysses—is ⌜proved not⌝ 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 the15 cur Ajax prouder than the cur Achilles, and will not arm today, whereupon the Grecians ⌜begin⌝ to proclaim barbarism, and policy grows into an ill opinion.⟨Enter Diomedes, and Troilus ⌜pursuing him.⌝⟩ Soft! Here comes sleeve and t’ other.⌜Thersites moves aside.⌝TROILUS, ⌜to Diomedes⌝ 20 Fly not, for shouldst thou take the river Styx I would swim after.DIOMEDES Thou dost miscall retire.
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I do not fly, but advantageous care Withdrew me from the odds of multitude.25 Have at thee!⌜They fight.⌝THERSITES Hold thy whore, Grecian! Now for thy whore, Trojan! Now the sleeve, now the sleeve!⌜Diomedes and Troilus exit fighting.⌝Enter Hector.HECTOR What art ⟨thou,⟩ Greek? Art thou for Hector’s match? Art thou of blood and honor?THERSITES 30No, no, I am a rascal, a scurvy railing knave, a very filthy rogue.HECTOR I do believe thee. Live.⌜He exits.⌝THERSITES God-a-mercy, that thou wilt believe me! But a plague break thy neck for frighting me!35 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.He exits.
Enter Diomedes and ⌜Servingman.⌝DIOMEDES Go, go, my servant, take thou Troilus’ horse; Present the fair steed to my Lady Cressid. Fellow, commend my service to her beauty. Tell her I have chastised the amorous Trojan5 And am her knight by proof.MAN I go, my lord.⌜He exits.⌝Enter Agamemnon.
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AGAMEMNON Renew, renew! The fierce Polydamas Hath beat down Menon; bastard Margareton Hath Doreus prisoner,10 And stands colossus-wise, waving his beam Upon the pashèd corses of the kings Epistrophus and Cedius. Polyxenes is slain, Amphimachus and Thoas deadly hurt, Patroclus ta’en or slain, and Palamedes15 Sore hurt and bruised. The dreadful Sagittary Appals our numbers. Haste we, Diomed, To reinforcement, or we perish all.Enter Nestor, ⌜with Soldiers bearing the body of
Patroclus.⌝NESTOR Go, bear Patroclus’ body to Achilles, And bid the snail-paced Ajax arm for shame.⌜Soldiers exit with Patroclus’s body.⌝20 There is a thousand Hectors in the field. Now here he fights on Galathe his horse, And ⌜here⌝ lacks work; anon he’s there afoot And there they fly or die, like ⟨scalèd⟩ schools Before the belching whale; then is he yonder,25 And there the strawy Greeks, ripe for his edge, Fall down before him like a mower’s swath. Here, there, and everywhere he leaves and takes, Dexterity so obeying appetite That what he will he does, and does so much30 That proof is called impossibility.Enter Ulysses.ULYSSES O, courage, courage, princes! Great Achilles Is arming, weeping, cursing, vowing vengeance. Patroclus’ wounds have roused his drowsy blood, Together with his mangled Myrmidons,
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35 That noseless, handless, hacked and chipped, come to him, Crying on Hector. Ajax hath lost a friend And foams at mouth, and he is armed and at it, Roaring for Troilus, who hath done today40 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⟩ 45Troilus, thou coward Troilus!He exits.DIOMEDES Ay, there, there!He exits.NESTOR So, so, we draw together.Enter Achilles.ACHILLES Where is this Hector?— Come, come, thou boy-queller, show thy face!50 Know what it is to meet Achilles angry. Hector! Where’s Hector? I will none but Hector.He exits, ⌜with the others.⌝
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 5 Were I the General, thou shouldst have my office Ere that correction.—Troilus, I say! What, Troilus!
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Enter Troilus.TROILUS O traitor Diomed! Turn thy false face, thou traitor, And pay ⌜the⌝ life thou owest me for my horse!DIOMEDES Ha! Art thou there?AJAX 10 I’ll fight with him alone. Stand, Diomed.DIOMEDES He is my prize. I will not look upon.TROILUS Come, both you cogging Greeks. Have at you both!⟨Enter Hector.⟩⟨Troilus exits, ⌜fighting Diomedes and Ajax.⌝⟩HECTOR Yea, Troilus? O, well fought, my youngest brother!Enter Achilles.⟨ACHILLES⟩ Now do I see thee. Ha! Have at thee, Hector!⌜They fight.⌝HECTOR 15Pause if thou wilt.ACHILLES I do disdain thy courtesy, proud Trojan. Be happy that my arms are out of use. My rest and negligence befriends thee now, But thou anon shalt hear of me again;20 Till when, go seek thy fortune.He exits.HECTOR Fare thee well. I would have been much more a fresher man Had I expected thee.Enter Troilus. How now, my brother?
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TROILUS 25 Ajax hath ta’en Aeneas. Shall it be? No, by the flame of yonder glorious heaven, He shall not carry him. I’ll be ta’en too Or bring him off. Fate, hear me what I say! I reck not though I end my life today.He exits.Enter one in ⌜Greek⌝ armor.HECTOR 30 Stand, stand, thou Greek! Thou art a goodly mark. No? Wilt thou not? I like thy armor well. I’ll frush it and unlock the rivets all, But I’ll be master of it.⌜The Greek exits.⌝ Wilt thou not, beast, abide?35 Why then, fly on. I’ll hunt thee for thy hide.He exits.
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,
5 Empale him with your weapons round about.
In fellest manner execute your arms.
Follow me, sirs, and my proceedings eye.
It is decreed Hector the great must die.
⌜They⌝ exit.
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Enter Thersites; ⌜then⌝ Menelaus ⌜fighting⌝ Paris.
THERSITES The cuckold and the cuckold-maker are at
it. Now, bull! Now, dog! Loo, Paris, loo! Now, my
⌜double-horned⌝ Spartan! Loo, Paris, loo! The bull
has the game. Ware horns, ho!
Paris and Menelaus exit, ⌜fighting.⌝
Enter Bastard.
BASTARD 5Turn, slave, and fight.
THERSITES What art thou?
BASTARD A bastard son of Priam’s.
THERSITES I am a bastard too. I love bastards. I am
bastard begot, bastard instructed, bastard in mind,
10 bastard in valor, 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.⌜He exits.⌝
BASTARD 15The devil take thee, coward!
He exits.
Enter Hector, ⌜with the body of the Greek in armor.⌝HECTOR Most putrefied core, so fair without, Thy goodly armor thus hath cost thy life. Now is my day’s work done. I’ll take my breath. Rest, sword; thou hast thy fill of blood and death.⌜He begins to disarm.⌝Enter Achilles and ⟨his⟩ Myrmidons.
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ACHILLES 5 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 unarmed. Forgo this vantage, Greek.ACHILLES 10 Strike, fellows, strike! This is the man I seek.⌜The Myrmidons kill Hector.⌝ So, Ilium, fall thou next! Come, Troy, sink down! Here lies thy heart, thy sinews, and thy bone. On, Myrmidons, and cry you all amain “Achilles hath the mighty Hector slain.”Retreat ⌜sounded from both armies.⌝15 Hark! A retire upon our Grecian part.⌜A 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-supped sword, that frankly would have fed,20 Pleased with this dainty bait, thus goes to bed.⌜He sheathes his sword.⌝ Come, tie his body to my horse’s tail; Along the field I will the Trojan trail.They exit ⌜with the bodies.⌝
⟨Sound retreat.⟩ Enter Agamemnon, Ajax, Menelaus,
Nestor, Diomedes, and the rest, marching ⌜to the beat of
drums.⌝ ⟨Shout ⌜within.⌝⟩AGAMEMNON Hark, hark, what ⟨shout⟩ is this?NESTOR Peace, drums!⌜The drums cease.⌝
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SOLDIERS, within Achilles! Achilles! Hector’s slain! Achilles!DIOMEDES The bruit is Hector’s slain, and by Achilles.AJAX 5 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,10 Great Troy is ours, and our sharp wars are ended.They exit, ⌜marching.⌝
Enter Aeneas, Paris, Antenor, Deiphobus, ⌜and Trojan
soldiers.⌝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 5 He’s dead, and at the murderer’s horse’s tail, In beastly sort, dragged through the shameful field. Frown on, you heavens; effect your rage with speed. Sit, gods, upon your thrones, and ⌜smite⌝ at Troy! I say at once: let your brief plagues be mercy,10 And linger not our sure destructions on!AENEAS My lord, you do discomfort all the host.
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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 men15 Address their dangers in. Hector is gone. Who shall tell Priam so, or Hecuba? Let him that will a screech-owl aye be called Go into Troy and say their Hector’s dead. There is a word will Priam turn to stone,20 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,25 Thus proudly pitched upon our Phrygian plains, Let Titan rise as early as he dare, I’ll through and through you! And, thou great-sized coward, No space of earth shall sunder our two hates.30 I’ll haunt thee like a wicked conscience still, That moldeth 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 35 Hence, broker, lackey! ⟨Ignomy and⟩ shame Pursue thy life, and live aye with thy name!All but Pandarus exit.PANDARUS A goodly medicine for my aching bones! O world, world, ⟨world⟩! Thus is the poor agent despised. O traitors and bawds, how earnestly are40 you set a-work, and how ill requited! Why should our endeavor be so loved and the performance so loathed? What verse for it? What instance for it?
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Let me see: Full merrily the humble-bee doth sing,
45 Till he hath lost his honey and his sting;
And being once subdued in armèd tail,
Sweet honey and sweet notes together fail. Good traders in the flesh, set this in your painted cloths:50 As many as be here of panders’ 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,55 Some two months hence my will shall here be made. It should be now, but that my fear is this: Some gallèd goose of Winchester would hiss. Till then I’ll sweat and seek about for eases, And at that time bequeath you my diseases.⌜He exits.⌝
