John Dryden - Delphi Poets Series

by John Dryden

  Some frantic augur has observed the skies;

  Some victim wants a heart, or crow flies wrong.

  By heaven, ’twas never well, since saucy priests

  Grew to be masters of the listening herd,

  And into mitres cleft the regal crown;

  Then, as the earth were scanty for their power,

  They drew the pomp of heaven to wait on them.

  Shall I go publish, Hector dares not fight,

  Because a madman dreamt he talked with Jove?

  What could the god see in a brain-sick priest,

  That he should sooner talk to him than me?

  Hect. You know my name’s not liable to fear.

  Troil. Yes, to the worst of fear, — to superstition.

  But whether that, or fondness of a wife,

  (The more unpardonable ill) has seized you,

  Know this, the Grecians think you fear Achilles,

  And that Polyxena has begged your life.

  Hect. How! that my life is begged, and by my sister?

  Troil. Ulysses so informed me at our parting,

  With a malicious and disdainful smile:

  ’Tis true, he said not, in broad words, you feared;

  But in well-mannered terms ’twas so agreed,

  Achilles should avoid to meet with Hector.

  Hect. He thinks my sister’s treason my petition;

  That, largely vaunting, in my heat of blood,

  More than I could, it seems, or durst perform,

  I sought evasion.

  Troil. And in private prayed —

  Hect. O yes, Polyxena to beg my life.

  Andr. He cannot think so; — do not urge him thus.

  Hect. Not urge me! then thou think’st I need his urging.

  By all the gods, should Jove himself descend,

  And tell me, — Hector, thou deservest not life,

  But take it as a boon, — I would not live.

  But that a mortal man, and he, of all men,

  Should think my life were in his power to give,

  I will not rest, till, prostrate on the ground,

  I make him, atheist-like, implore his breath

  Of me, and not of heaven.

  Troil. Then you’ll refuse no more to fight?

  Hect. Refuse! I’ll not be hindered, brother.

  I’ll through and through them, even their hindmost ranks,

  Till I have found that large-sized boasting fool,

  Who dares presume my life is in his gift.

  Andr. Farewell, farewell; ’tis vain to strive with fate!

  Cassandra’s raging god inspires my breast

  With truths that must be told, and not believed.

  Look how he dies! look how his eyes turn pale!

  Look how his blood bursts out at many vents!

  Hark how Troy roars, how Hecuba cries out,

  And widowed I fill all the streets with screams!

  Behold distraction, frenzy, and amazement,

  Like antiques meet, and tumble upon heaps!

  And all cry, Hector, Hector’s dead! Oh Hector![Exit.

  Hect. What sport will be, when we return at evening,

  To laugh her out of countenance for her dreams!

  Troil. I have not quenched my eyes with dewy sleep this night;

  But fiery fumes mount upward to my brains,

  And, when I breathe, methinks my nostrils hiss!

  I shall turn basilisk, and with my sight

  Do my hands’ work on Diomede this day.

  Hect. To arms, to arms! the vanguards are engaged

  Let us not leave one man to guard the walls;

  Both old and young, the coward and the brave,

  Be summoned all, our utmost fate to try,

  And as one body move, whose soul am I.[Exeunt.

  SCENE II — The Camp.

  Alarm within. Enter Agamemnon, Ulysses, Menelaus, Soldiers.

  Agam. Thus far the promise of the day is fair.

  Æneas rather loses ground than gains.

  I saw him over-laboured, taking breath,

  And leaning on his spear, behold our trenches,

  Like a fierce lion looking up to toils,

  Which yet he durst not leap.

  Ulys. And therefore distant death does all the work;

  The flights of whistling darts make brown the sky,

  Whose clashing points strike fire, and gild the dusk;

  Those, that reach home, from neither host are vain,

  So thick the prease; so lusty are their arms,

  That death seemed never sent with better will.

  Nor was with less concernment entertained.

  Enter Nestor.

  Agam. Now, Nestor, what’s the news?

  Nest. I have descried

  A cloud of dust, that mounts in pillars upwards,

  Expanding as it travels to our camp;

  And from the midst I heard a bursting shout,

  That rent the heaven; as if all Troy were swarmed.

  And on the wing this way.

  Menel. Let them come, let them come.

  Agam. Where’s great Achilles?

  Ulys. Think not on Achilles,

  Till Hector drag him from his tent to fight;

  Which sure he will, for I have laid the train.

  Nest. But young Patroclus leads his Myrmidons,

  And in their front, even in the face of Hector,

  Resolves to dare the Trojans.

  Agam. Haste, Ulysses, bid Ajax issue forth and second him.

  Ulys. Oh noble general, let it not be so.

  Oppose not rage, while rage is in its force,

  But give it way awhile, and let it waste.

  The rising deluge is not stopt with dams;

  Those it o’erbears, and drowns the hopes of harvest;

  But, wisely managed, its divided strength

  Is sluiced in channels, and securely drained.

  First, let small parties dally with their fury;

  But when their force is spent and unsupplied,

  The residue with mounds may be restrained,

  And dry-shod we may pass the naked ford.

  Enter Thersites.

  Thers. Ho, ho, ho!

  Menel. Why dost thou laugh, unseasonable fool?

  Thers. Why, thou fool in season, cannot a man laugh, but thou thinkest he makes horns at thee? Thou prince of the herd, what hast thou to do with laughing? ’Tis the prerogative of a man, to laugh. Thou risibility without reason, thou subject of laughter, thou fool royal!

  Ulys. But tell us the occasion of thy mirth?

  Thers. Now a man asks me, I care not if I answer to my own kind. — Why, the enemies are broken into our trenches; fools like Menelaus fall by thousands yet not a human soul departs on either side. Troilus and Ajax have almost beaten one another’s heads off, but are both immortal for want of brains. Patroclus has killed Sarpedon, and Hector Patroclus, so there is a towardly springing fop gone off; he might have made a prince one day, but now he’s nipt in the very bud and promise of a most prodigious coxcomb.

  Agam. Bear off Patroclus’ body to Achilles;

  Revenge will arm him now, and bring us aid.

  The alarm sounds near, and shouts are driven upon us,

  As of a crowd confused in their retreat.

  Ulys. Open your ranks, and make these madmen way,

  Then close again to charge upon their backs,

  And quite consume the relics of the war. [Exeunt all but Thersites.

  Thers. What shoals of fools one battle sweeps away! How it purges families of younger brothers, highways of robbers, and cities of cuckold-makers! There is nothing like a pitched battle for these brisk addle-heads! Your physician is a pretty fellow, but his fees make him tedious, he rides not fast enough; the fools grow upon him, and their horse bodies are poison proof. Your pestilence is a quicker remedy, but it has not the grace to make distinction; it huddles up honest men and rogues together. But your battle has discretion; it pi
cks out all the forward fools, and sowses them together into immortality. [Shouts and alarms within] Plague upon these drums and trumpets! these sharp sauces of the war, to get fools an appetite to fighting! What do I among them? I shall be mistaken for some valiant ass, and die a martyr in a wrong religion.

  [Here Grecians fly over the stage pursued by Trojans; one Trojan turns back upon Thersites who is flying too.

  Troj. Turn, slave, and fight.

  Thers. [turning.] What art thou?

  Troj. A bastard son of Priam’s.

  Thers. I am a bastard too, I love bastards, I am bastard in body, bastard in mind, bastard in valour, in every thing illegitimate. A bear will not fasten upon a bear; why should one bastard offend another! Let us part fair, like true sons of whores, and have the fear of our mothers before our eyes.

  Troj. The devil take thee, coward.[Exit Troj.

  Thers. Now, would I were either invisible or invulnerable! These gods have a fine time on it; they can see and make mischief, and never feel it.

  [Clattering of swords at both doors; he runs each way, and meets the noise.

  A pox clatter you! I am compassed in. Now would I were that blockhead Ajax for a minute. Some sturdy Trojan will poach me up with a long pole! and then the rogues may kill one another at free cost, and have nobody left to laugh at them. Now destruction! now destruction!

  Enter Hector and Troilus driving in the Greeks.

  Hect. to Thers. Speak what part thou fightest on!

  Thers. I fight not at all; I am for neither side.

  Hect. Thou art a Greek; art thou a match for Hector?

  Art thou of blood and honour?

  Thers. No, I am a rascal, a scurvy railing knave, a very filthy rogue.

  Hect. I do believe thee; live.

  Thers. God-a-mercy, that thou wilt believe me; but the devil break thy neck for frighting me. [Aside.

  Troil. (returning.) What prisoner have you there?

  Hect. A gleaning of the war; a rogue, he says.

  Troil. Dispatch him, and away.[Going to kill him.

  Thers. Hold, hold! — what, is it no more but dispatch a man and away! I am in no such haste: I will not die for Greece; I hate Greece, and by my good will would never have been born there; I was mistaken into that country, and betrayed by my parents to be born there. And besides, I have a mortal enemy among the Grecians, one Diomede, a 355 damned villain, and cannot die with a safe conscience till I have first murdered him.

  Troil. Shew me that Diomede, and thou shalt live.

  Thers. Come along with me, and I will conduct thee to Calchas’s tent, where I believe he is now, making war with the priest’s daughter.

  Hect. Here we must part, our destinies divide us;

  Brother and friend, farewell.

  Troil. When shall we meet?

  Hect. When the gods please; if not, we once must part.

  Look; on yon hill their squandered troops unite.

  Troil. If I mistake not, ’tis their last reserve:

  The storm’s blown o’er, and those but after-drops.

  Hect. I wish our men be not too far engaged;

  For few we are and spent, as having born

  The burthen of the day: But, hap what can,

  They shall be charged; Achilles must be there,

  And him I seek, or death.

  Divide our troops, and take the fresher half.

  Troil. O brother!

  Hect. No dispute of ceremony:

  These are enow for me, in faith enow.

  Their bodies shall not flag while I can lead;

  Nor wearied limbs confess mortality,

  Before those ants, that blacken all yon hill,

  Are crept into the earth. Farewell.[Exit Hect.

  Troil. Farewell. — Come, Greek.

  Thers. Now these rival rogues will clapperclaw one another, and I shall have the sport of it.

  [Exit Troil. with Thers.

  Enter Achilles and Myrmidons.

  Achill. Which way went Hector?

  Myrmid. Up yon sandy hill;

  You may discern them by their smoking track:

  A wavering body working with bent hams

  Against the rising, spent with painful march,

  And by loose footing cast on heaps together.

  Achil. O thou art gone, thou sweetest, best of friends!

  Why did I let thee tempt the shock of war,

  Ere yet the tender nerves had strung thy limbs,

  And knotted into strength! Yet, though too late,

  I will, I will revenge thee, my Patroclus!

  Nor shall thy ghost thy murderers long attend,

  But thou shalt hear him calling Charon back,

  Ere thou art wafted to the farther shore. —

  Make haste, my soldiers; give me this day’s pains

  For my dead friend: strike every hand with mine,

  Till Hector breathless on the ground we lay!

  Revenge is honour, the securest way.[Exit with Myrm.

  Enter Thersites, Troilus, Trojans.

  Thers. That’s Calchas’s tent.

  Troil. Then, that one spot of earth contains more falsehood,

  Than all the sun sees in his race beside.

  That I should trust the daughter of a priest!

  Priesthood, that makes a merchandise of heaven!

  Priesthood, that sells even to their prayers and blessings

  And forces us to pay for our own cozenage!

  Thers. Nay, cheats heaven too with entrails and with offals;

  Gives it the garbage of a sacrifice,

  And keeps the best for private luxury.

  Troil. Thou hast deserved thy life for cursing priests.

  Let me embrace thee; thou art beautiful:

  . That back, that nose, those eyes are beautiful:

  Live; thou art honest, for thou hat’st a priest.

  Thers. [Aside.] Farewell, Trojan; if I escape with life, as I hope, and thou art knocked on the head, as I hope too, I shall be the first that ever escaped 357 the revenge of a priest after cursing him; and thou wilt not be the last, I prophesy, that a priest will bring to ruin.

  [Exit Ther.

  Troil. Methinks, my soul is roused to her last work;

  Has much to do, and little time to spare.

  She starts within me, like a traveller,

  Who sluggishly outslept his morning hour,

  And mends his pace to reach his inn betimes. [Noise within, Follow, follow!

  A noise of arms! the traitor may be there;

  Or else, perhaps, that conscious scene of love,

  The tent, may hold him; yet I dare not search,

  For oh, I fear to find him in that place.[Exit Troilus.

  Enter Calchas and Cressida.

  Cres. Where is he? I’ll be justified, or die.

  Calch. So quickly vanished! he was here but now.

  He must be gone to search for Diomede;

  For Diomede told me, here they were to fight.

  Cres. Alas!

  Calch. You must prevent, and not complain.

  Cres. If Troilus die, I have no share in life.

  Calch. If Diomede sink beneath the sword of Troilus

  We lose not only a protector here,

  But are debarred all future means of flight.

  Cres. What then remains?

  Calch. To interpose betimes

  Betwixt their swords; or, if that cannot be,

  To intercede for him, who shall be vanquished.

  Fate leaves no middle course.[Exit Calchas.

  Clashing within.

  Cres. Ah me! I hear them,

  And fear ’tis past prevention.

  Enter Diomede, retiring before Troilus, and falling as he enters.

  Troil. Now beg thy life, or die.

  Diom. No; use thy fortune:

  I loath the life, which thou canst give, or take.

  Troil. Scorn’st thou my mercy, villain! — Take thy wish. —

  Cres. Hold, hold your hand,
my lord, and hear me speak.

  [Troilus turns back; in which time Diomede rises, Trojans and Greeks enter, and rank themselves on both sides of their Captains.

  Troil. Did I not hear the voice of perjured Cressida?

  Com’st thou to give the last stab to my heart?

  As if the proofs of all thy former falsehood

  Were not enough convincing, com’st thou now

  To beg my rival’s life?

  Whom, oh, if any spark of truth remained,

  Thou couldst not thus, even to my face, prefer.

  Cres. What shall I say! — that you suspect me false,

  Has struck me dumb! but let him live, my Troilus;

  By all our loves, by all our past endearments,

  I do adjure thee, spare him.

  Troil. Hell and death!

  Cres. If ever I had power to bend your mind,

  Believe me still your faithful Cressida;

  And though my innocence appear like guilt,

  Because I make his forfeit life my suit,

  ’Tis but for this, that my return to you

  Would be cut off for ever by his death;

  My father, treated like a slave, and scorned;

  Myself in hated bonds a captive held.

  Troil. Could I believe thee, could I think thee true,

  In triumph would I bear thee back to Troy,

  Though Greece could rally all her shattered troops,

  And stand embattled to oppose my way.

  But, oh, thou syren, I will stop my ears

  To thy enchanting notes; the winds shall bear

  Upon their wings thy words, more light than they.

  Cres. Alas! I but dissembled love to him.

  If ever he had any proof, beyond

  What modesty might give —

  Diom. No! witness this. — [The Ring shewn.

  There, take her, Trojan, thou deserv’st her best;

  You good, kind-natured, well-believing fools,

  Are treasures to a woman.

  I was a jealous, hard, vexatious lover,

  And doubted even this pledge, — till full possession;

  But she was honourable to her word,

  And I have no just reason to complain.

  Cres. O unexampled, frontless impudence!

  Troil. Hell, show me such another tortured wretch as Troilus!

  Diom. Nay, grieve not; I resign her freely up;

  I’m satisfied; and dare engage for Cressida,

  That, if you have a promise of her person,

  She shall be willing to come out of debt.

  Cres. [Kneeling.] My only lord, by all those holy vows,

  Which, if there be a Power above, are binding,

  Or, if there be a hell below, are fearful,