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His heart and hand both open, and both free;
For what he has, he gives, what thinks, he shows;
Yet gives he not till judgment guide his bounty,
Nor dignifies an impair thought with breath:
Manly as Hector, but more dangerous;

For Hector, in his blaze of wrath, subscribes
To tender objects; but he, in heat of action,
Is more vindicative than jealous love:
They call him Troilus; and on him erect
A second hope, as fairly built as Hector.
Thus says Eneas; one that knows the youth
Even to his inches, and, with private soul,
Did in great Ilion thus translate him to me.1

[Alarum. HECT. and AJAX fight.

Agam. They are in action.
Nest. Now, Ajax, hold thine own!

Tro.

Awake thee!

Agam. His blows are well dispos'd:-there, Ajax!

Dio. You must no more.

Hector, thou sleep'st;

[Trumpets cease.

Princes, enough, so please you.

Why then, will I no more:

Ene.
Ajax. I am not warm yet, let us fight again.
Dio. As Hector pleases.

Hect.

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:

8 an impair thought--] A thought unsuitable to the digaity of his character. This word I should have changed to impure, were I not overpowered by the unanimity of the editors, and concurrence of the old copies. Johnson.

So, in Chapman's preface to his translation of the Shield of Homer, 1598: "-nor is it more impaire to an honest and absolute man" &c. Steevens.

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To tender objects;] That is, yields, gives way. Johnson. So, in King Lear: "— - subscrib'd his power;" i. e. submitted.

Steevens.

1- thus translate him to me.] Thus explain his character.

So, in Hamlet:

Johnson

"There's matter in these sighs, these profound heaves; "You must translate." Steevens.

Were thy commixtion Greek and Trojan so,
That thou could'st say―This hand is Grecian all,
And this is Trojan; the sinews of this leg
All Greek, and this all Troy; my mother's blood
Runs on the dexter cheek, and this sinister
Bounds-in my father's; by Jove multipotent,
Thou should'st not bear from me a Greekish member
Wein my sword had not impressure made
If Jur rank feud: But the just gods gainsay,
"That any drop thou borrow'st from thy mother,
My sacred aunt,2 should by my mortal sword
Be drain'd! Let me embrace thee, Ajax:
By him that thunders, thou hast lusty arms;
Hector would have them fall upon him thus:
Cousin, all honour to thee!

Ajax.
I thank thee, Hector.
Thou art too gentle, and too free a man:
I came to kill thee, cousin, and bear hence
A great addition3 earned in thy death.

Hect. Not Neoptolemus so mirable

(On whose bright crest Fame with her loud'st O yes Cries, This is he,) could promise to himself

2 My sacred aunt,] It is remarkable that the Greeks give to the uncle the title of Sacred, Jelos. Patruus avunculus ὁ πδὸς παλεος los, Gaz. de Senec. patruus "gos μnlgóc bus, avunculus, Budæi Lexic.—Juos is also used absolutely for ‘o ægòs walgos Juos, Euri. pid. Iphigen. Taurid. 1.930

66

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“ Ιφι. Η που νοσούντας θεῖος υβρισεν δόμους.” And Xenoph. Kugu waid. Lib. I. passim.

Vaillant.

This circumstance may tend to establish an opinion I have else. where expressed, that this play was not the entire composition of Shakspeare, to whom the Grecism before us was probably un known. Steevens.

3 A A great addition -] i. e. denomination. Steevens.

4 Not Neoptolemus so mirable

(On whose bright crest Fame with her loud'st O yes,

Cries, This is he,) coull promise to himself &c.] Dr. Warburton observes, that "the sense and spirit of Hector's speech requires that the most celebrated of his adversaries should be picked out to be defied, and this was Achilles himself, not his son Neoptolemus, who was yet but an apprentice in warfare." In the rage of correction therefore he reads:

Not Neoptolemus's sire irascible.

Such a licentious conjecture deserves no attention.

Malone.

My opinion is, that by Neoptolemus the author meant Achilles

A thought of added honour torn from Hector.

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

Hect.
We'll answer it;5
The issue is embracement:-Ajax, farewel.
Ajax. If I might in entreaties find success,
(As seld I have the chance) I would desire
My famous cousin to our Grecian tents.

Dio. 'Tis Agamemnon's wish: and great Achilles
Doth long to see unarm'd the valiant Hector.
Hect. Æneas, call my brother Troilus to me:
And signify this loving interview

himself; and remembering that the son was Pyrrhus Neoptolemus, considered Neoptolemus as the nomen gentilitium, and thought the father was likewise Achilles Neoptolemus. Johnson.

Shakspeare might have used Neoptolemus for Achilles. Wilfride Holme, the author of a poem called The Fall and evil Sucesse of Rebellion, &c. 1537, had made the same mistake before him, as the following stanza will show:

"Also the triumphant Troyans victorious,

"By Anthenor and Eneas false confederacie,

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Sending Polidamus to Neoptolemus,

"Who was vanquished and subdued by their conspiracie.
"O dolorous fortune, and fatal miserie!

"For multitude of people was there mortificate
"With condigne Priamus and all his progenie,
"And flagrant Polixene, that lady delicate."

In Lydgate, however, Achilles, Neoptolemus, and Pyrrhus, are distinct characters. Neoptolemus is enumerated among the Grecian princes who first embarked to revenge the rape of Helen: "The valiant Grecian called Neoptolemus,

"That had his haire as blacke as any jet," &c. p. 102. and Pyrrhus, very properly, is not heard of till after the death of his father:

"Sith that Achilles in such traiterous wise

"Is slaine, that we a messenger should send
"To fetch his son yong Pyrrhus, to the end

"He may revenge his father's death," &c. p. 237. Steevens. I agree with Dr. Johnson and Mr Steevens, in thinking that Shakspeare supposed Neoptolemus was the nomen gentilitium: an error into which he might have been led by some book of the time That by Neoptolemus he meant Achilles, and not Pyrrhus, may be inferred from a former passage in p. 121, by which it appears that he knew Pyrrhus had not yet engaged in the siege of Troy:

"But it must grieve young Pyrrhus, now at home," &c. Malone.

5 We'll answer it;] That is, answer the expectance. Johnson.

To the expecters of our Trojan part;

Desire them home. Give me thy hand, my cousin; I will go eat with thee, and see your knights."

Ajax. Great Agamemnon comes to meet us here. Hect. The worthiest of them tell me name by name; But for Achilles, my own searching eyes

Shall find him by his large and portly size.

Agam. Worthy of arms!7 as welcome as to one

That would be rid of such an enemy;

But that's no welcome: Understand more clear,
What's past, and what 's to come, is strew'd with husks
And formless ruin of oblivion ;

But in this extant moment, faith and troth,
Strain'd purely from all hollow bias-drawing,
Bids thee, with most divine integrity,8

From heart of very heart, great Hector, welcome.
Hect. I thank thee, most imperious Agamemnon.$
Agam. My well-fam'd lord of Troy, no less to you.

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[To TRO. Men. Let me confirm my princely brother's greeting;

You brace of warlike brothers, welcome hither.
Hect. Whom must we answer?

6

- your knights.] The word knight, as often as it occurs, is sure to bring with it the idea of chivalry, and revives the memory of Amadis and his fantastick followers, rather than that of the mighty confederates who fought on either side of the Trojan war. I wish that eques and armiger could have been rendered by any other words than knight and 'squire. Mr. Pope, in his translation of the Iliad, is very liberal of the latter. Steevens.

These knights, to the amount of about two hundred thousand, (for there were not less in both armies) Shakspeare found, with all the appendages of chivalry, in The Three Destructions of Troy.

Malone.

7 Worthy of arms!] Folio Worthy all arms! Quarto. The quarto has only the first, second, and the last line of this salutation; the intermediate verses seem added on a revision. Johnson. divine integrity,] i. e. integrity like that of heaven.

8

Steevens.

9 most imperious Agamemnon] Imperious and imperial had formerly the same signification. So, in our author's Venus and Adonis:

"Imperious supreme of all mortal things." Malone. Again, in Titus and Andronicus:

65

King, be thy thoughts imperious, like thy name." Steevens.

Men:

The noble Menelaus. Hect. O you, my lord? by Mars his gauntlet, thanks! Mock not, that I affect the untraded oath;

Your quondam wife swears still by Venus' glove:2
She's well, but bade me not commend her to you.
Men. Name her not now, sir; she's a deadly theme.
Hect. O, pardon; I offend.

Nest. I have, thou gallant Trojan, seen thee oft,
Labouring for destiny, make cruel way

Through ranks of Greekish youth:3 and I have seen thee,

As hot as Perseus, spur thy Phrygian steed,

1 Men. The noble Menelaus.] Mr. Ritson supposes this speech to belong to Æneas.

Reed.

As I cannot suppose that Menelaus would style himself " the noble Menelaus," I think Ritson right in giving this speech to Eneas.

M Mason.

2 Mock not, &c.] The quarto bas here a strange corruption: Mock not thy affect, the untreaded earth Johnson

the untraded oath;] A singular oath, not in common use. So, in King Richard II:

-some way of common trade."

Under the lady's oath perhaps more is meant than meets the ear; unless the poet caught his idea from Grange's Golden Aphroditis, 4to. 1577, sign. Mij: "At this upper borde next unto Jupiter on the right hande sat Juno, that honourable and gracious goddesse his wyfe: Nexte unto hyr satte Venus, the goddesse of love, with a GLOVE made of floures sticking in hyr bosome." Malone.

Glove, in the preceding extract, must be a corruption of some other word, perhaps of-Globe. A flowery globe might have been worn by Venus as an emblem of the influence of Love, which, by adding graces and pleasures to the world, may, poetically, be said to cover it with flowers.

Our ancient nosegays also (as may be known from several old engravings) were nearly globular. But what idea can be communicated by a glove made of flowers? or how could any form resembling a glove, be produced out of such materials? Steevens.

3 Labouring for destiny, &c.] The vicegerent of Fate. So, in Coriolanus:

66 His sword, death's stamp,

"Where it did mark, it took; from face to foot
"He was a thing of blood, whose every motion
"Was tim'd with dying cries: alone he enter'd
"The mortal gate of the city, which he painted
"With shunless destiny." Malone.

4 As hot as Perseus, spur-] As the equestrian fame of Perseus, on the present occasion, must be alluded to, this simile will serve

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