Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

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!

Cres. Be those with swords?

PARIS passes over.

Pan. Swords! any thing, he cares not: an the devil come to him, it's all one: By god's lid, it does one's heart good:-Yonder comes Paris, yonder comes Paris : look ye yonder, niece; Is't not a gallant man too, is't not? Why, this is brave now.— -Who said, he came hurt home to-day? he's not hurt: why, this will do Helen's heart good now. Ha! 'would I could see Troilus now!-you shall see Troilus anon.

Cres. Who's that?

HELENUS passes over.

Pan. That's Helenus,-I marvel, where Troilus is :That's Helenus ;-I think he went not forth to-day :That's Helenus.

Cres. Can Helenus fight, uncle?

[ocr errors]

Pan. Helenus? no;-yes, he'll fight indifferent well:-I marvel, where Troilus is!-Hark; do you not hear the people cry, Troilus?—Helenus is a priest. Cres. What sneaking fellow comes yonder?

TROILUS passes over.

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

Cres. Peace, for shame, peace!

Pan. Mark him; note him;-O brave Troilus!-look well upon him, niece; look you, how his sword is bloodied, and his helm more hack'd than Hector's; And how he

looks, and how he goes!-O admirable youth! he ne'er saw three and twenty. Go thy way Troilus, go thy way; had I a sister were a grace, or a daughter a goddess, he should take his choice. O admirable man!

Paris Paris is dirt to him; and, I warrant, Helen, to change, would give an eye to boot.

Forces pass over the stage.

Cres. Here comes more.

Pan. Asses, fools, dolts! chaff and bran, chaff and bran! porridge after meat! I could live and die i' th' 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.

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

Pan. Achilles! a drayman, a porter, a very camel. Cres. Well, well.

Pan. Well, well?-Why, have you any discretion? have you any eyes? Do you know what a man is? Is not birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood, learning, gentleness, virtue, youth, liberality, and such like, the spice and salt that season a man?

Cres. Ay, a minced man: and then to be baked with no date in the pye,—for then the man's date is out. Pan. You are such a woman! one knows not at what ward you lie.

Cres. Upon my back, to defend my belly; upon my wit, to defend my wiles; upon my secrecy, to defend mine honesty; my mask, to defend my beauty; and you, to defend all these: and at all these wards I lie, at a thousand watches

Pan. Say one of your watches.

Cres. Nay, I'll watch you for that; and that's one of the chiefest of them too: if I cannot ward what I would not have hit, I can watch you for telling how I took the blow; unless it swell past hiding, and then it is past watching.

Pan. You are such another!

Enter TROILUS' Boy.

Boy. Sir, my lord would instantly speak with you.
Pan. Where?

Boy. At your own house; there he unarms him.
Pan. Good boy, tell him I come:

[Exit Boy

I doubt, he be hurt.-Fare ye well, good niece.
Cres. Adieu, uncle.

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

Cres. To bring, uncle,

Pan. Ay, a token from Troilus.

Cres. By the same token-you are a bawd.—

[Exit PANDARUS.

Words, vows, griefs, tears, and love's full sacrifice,
He offers in another's enterprize :

But more in Troilus thousand fold I see

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

Yet hold I off. Women are angels, wooing:

Things won are done, joy's soul lies in the doing: That she belov'd knows nought, that knows not

this,

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

That she was never yet, that ever knew
Love got so sweet, as when desire did sue:
Therefore this maxim out of love I teach,-
Achievement is command; ungain'd, beseech:

Then though my heart's content firm love doth bear, Nothing of that shall from mine eyes appear. [Exit.

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

tent.

Trumpets. Enter AGAMEMNON, NESTOR, ULYSSES, MENELAUS, and others.

Agam. Princes,

What grief hath set the jaundice on your cheeks?
The ample proposition, that hope makes

In all designs begun on earth below,

Fails in the promis'd largeness: checks and disasters
Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd;

As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap,
Infect the sound pine, and divert his grain
Tortive and errant from his course of growth.
Nor, princes, is it matter new to us,

That we come short of our suppose so far,
That, after seven years' siege, yet Troy walls stand;
Sith every action that hath gone before,
Whereof we have record, trial did draw
Bias and thwart, not answering the aim,
And that unbodied figure of the thought

That gav't surmised shape. Why then, you princes,
Do you with cheeks abash'd behold our works;
And think them shames, which are, indeed, nought else
But the protractive trials of great Jove,

To find persistive constancy in men?

The fineness of which metal is not found

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

The wise and fool, the artist and unread,

The hard and soft, seem all affin'd and kin:

But, in the wind and tempest of her frown,
Distinction, with a broad and powerful fan,
Puffing at all, winnows the light away;
And what hath mass, or matter, by itself
Lies, rich in virtue, and unmingled.

Nest. With due observance of thy godlike seat,
Great Agamemnon, Nestor shall apply

Thy latest words. In the reproof of chance
Lies the true proof of men: The sea being smooth,
How many shallow bauble boats dare sail

Upon her patient breast, making their way

With those of nobler bulk?

[ocr errors]

But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage

The gentle Thetis, and, anon, behold

The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut,
Bounding between the two moist elements,

Like Perseus' horse: Where's then the saucy boat,
Whose weak untimber'd sides but even now
Co-rival'd greatness? either to harbour fled,
Or made a toast for Neptune. Even so
Doth valour's show, and valour's worth, divide,
In storms of fortune: For, in her ray and brightness,
The herd hath more annoyance by the brize,

Than by the tiger: but when the splitting wind

Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks,

And flies fled under shade, Why, then, the thing of

courage,

As rous'd with rage, with rage doth sympathize,

And with an accent turn'd in self-same key,

Returns to chiding fortune.

Ulyss.

Agamemnon,

Thou great commander, nerve and bone of Greece,
Heart of our numbers, soul and only spirit,

« ПредишнаНапред »