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Complete Plays, The

Page 76

by William Shakespeare


  Speak loudly for him.

  Take up the bodies: such a sight as this

  Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss.

  Go, bid the soldiers shoot.

  A dead march. Exeunt, bearing off the dead bodies; after which a peal of ordnance is shot off

  Troilus and Cressida

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY

  PROLOGUE

  ACT I

  SCENE I. TROY. BEFORE PRIAM’S PALACE.

  SCENE II. THE SAME. A STREET.

  SCENE III. THE GRECIAN CAMP. BEFORE AGAMEMNON’S TENT.

  ACT II

  SCENE I. A PART OF THE GRECIAN CAMP.

  SCENE II. TROY. A ROOM IN PRIAM’S PALACE.

  SCENE III. THE GRECIAN CAMP. BEFORE ACHILLES’ TENT.

  ACT III

  SCENE I. TROY. PRIAM’S PALACE.

  SCENE II. THE SAME. PANDARUS’ ORCHARD.

  SCENE III. THE GRECIAN CAMP. BEFORE ACHILLES’ TENT.

  ACT IV

  SCENE I. TROY. A STREET.

  SCENE II. THE SAME. COURT OF PANDARUS’ HOUSE.

  SCENE III. THE SAME. STREET BEFORE PANDARUS’ HOUSE.

  SCENE IV. THE SAME. PANDARUS’ HOUSE.

  SCENE V. THE GRECIAN CAMP. LISTS SET OUT.

  ACT V

  SCENE I. THE GRECIAN CAMP. BEFORE ACHILLES’ TENT.

  SCENE II. THE SAME. BEFORE CALCHAS’ TENT.

  SCENE III. TROY. BEFORE PRIAM’S PALACE.

  SCENE IV. PLAINS BETWEEN TROY AND THE GRECIAN CAMP.

  SCENE V. ANOTHER PART OF THE PLAINS.

  SCENE VI. ANOTHER PART OF THE PLAINS.

  SCENE VII. ANOTHER PART OF THE PLAINS.

  SCENE VIII. ANOTHER PART OF THE PLAINS.

  SCENE IX. ANOTHER PART OF THE PLAINS.

  SCENE X. ANOTHER PART OF THE PLAINS.

  CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY

  Priam, King of Troy.

  His sons: Hector, Troilus, Paris, Deiphobus and Helenus.

  Margarelon, a bastard son of Priam.

  Trojan commanders: Aeneas and Antenor.

  Calchas, a Trojan priest, taking part with the Greeks.

  Pandarus, uncle to Cressida.

  Agamemnon, the Greek general.

  Menelaus, his brother.

  Greek commanders: Achilles, Ajax, Ulysses, Nestor, Diomedes and Patroclus.

  Thersites, a deformed and scurrilous Greek.

  Alexander, servant to Cressida.

  Servant to Troilus.

  Servant to Paris.

  Servant to Diomedes.

  Helen, wife to Menelaus.

  Andromache, wife to Hector.

  Cassandra, daughter to Priam, a prophetess.

  Cressida, daughter to Calchas.

  Trojan and Greek Soldiers, and Attendants.

  Scene: Troy and the Greek camp before it.

  PROLOGUE

  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

  Of cruel war: sixty and nine, that wore

  Their crownets regal, from the Athenian bay

  Put forth toward Phrygia; and their vow is made

  To ransack Troy, within whose strong immures

  The ravish’d Helen, Menelaus’ queen,

  With wanton Paris sleeps; and that’s the quarrel.

  To Tenedos they come;

  And the deep-drawing barks do there disgorge

  Their warlike fraughtage: now on Dardan plains

  The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch

  Their brave pavilions: Priam’s six-gated city,

  Dardan, and Tymbria, Helias, Chetas, Troien,

  And Antenorides, with massy staples

  And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts,

  Sperr up the sons of Troy.

  Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits,

  On one and other side, Trojan and Greek,

  Sets all on hazard: and hither am I come

  A prologue arm’d, but not in confidence

  Of author’s pen or actor’s voice, but suited

  In like conditions as our argument,

  To tell you, fair beholders, that our play

  Leaps o’er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils,

  Beginning in the middle, starting thence away

  To what may be digested in a play.

  Like or find fault; do as your pleasures are:

  Now good or bad, ’tis but the chance of war.

  ACT I

  SCENE I. TROY. BEFORE PRIAM’S PALACE.

  Enter Troilus armed, and Pandarus

  Troilus

  Call here my varlet; I’ll unarm again:

  Why should I war without the walls of Troy,

  That find such cruel battle here within?

  Each Trojan that is master of his heart,

  Let him to field; Troilus, alas! hath none.

  Pandarus

  Will this gear ne’er be mended?

  Troilus

  The Greeks are strong and skilful to their strength,

  Fierce to their skill and to their fierceness valiant;

  But I am weaker than a woman’s tear,

  Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance,

  Less valiant than the virgin in the night

  And skilless as unpractised infancy.

  Pandarus

  Well, I have told you enough of this: for my part, I’ll not meddle nor make no further. He that will have a cake out of the wheat must needs tarry the grinding.

  Troilus

  Have I not tarried?

  Pandarus

  Ay, the grinding; but you must tarry the bolting.

  Troilus

  Have I not tarried?

  Pandarus

  Ay, the bolting, but you must tarry the leavening.

  Troilus

  Still have I tarried.

  Pandarus

  Ay, to the leavening; but here’s yet in the word ‘hereafter’ the kneading, the making of the cake, the heating of the oven and the baking; nay, you must stay the cooling too, or you may chance to burn your lips.

  Troilus

  Patience herself, what goddess e’er she be,

  Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do.

  At Priam’s royal table do I sit;

  And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts,—

  So, traitor! ‘When she comes!’ When is she thence?

  Pandarus

  Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw her look, or any woman else.

  Troilus

  I was about to tell thee:— when my heart,

  As wedged with a sigh, would rive in twain,

  Lest Hector or my father should perceive me,

  I have, as when the sun doth light a storm,

  Buried this sigh in wrinkle of a smile:

  But sorrow, that is couch’d in seeming gladness,

  Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness.

  Pandarus

  An her hair were not somewhat darker than Helen’s — well, go to — there were no more comparison between the women: but, for my part, she is my kinswoman; I would not, as they term it, praise her: but I would somebody had heard her talk yesterday, as I did. I will not dispraise your sister Cassandra’s wit, but —

  Troilus

  O Pandarus! I tell thee, Pandarus,—

  When I do tell thee, there my hopes lie drown’d,

  Reply not in how many fathoms deep

  They lie indrench’d. I tell thee I am mad

  In Cressid’s love: thou answer’st ‘she is fair;’

  Pour’st in the open ulcer of my heart

  Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice,

  Handlest in thy discourse, O, that her hand,

  In whose comparison all whites are ink,

  Writing their own reproach, to whose soft seizure


  The cygnet’s down is harsh and spirit of sense

  Hard as the palm of ploughman: this thou tell’st me,

  As true thou tell’st me, when I say I love her;

  But, saying thus, instead of oil and balm,

  Thou lay’st in every gash that love hath given me

  The knife that made it.

  Pandarus

  I speak no more than truth.

  Troilus

  Thou dost not speak so much.

  Pandarus

  Faith, I’ll not meddle in’t. Let her be as she is: if she be fair, ’tis the better for her; an she be not, she has the mends in her own hands.

  Troilus

  Good Pandarus, how now, Pandarus!

  Pandarus

  I have had my labour for my travail; ill-thought on of her and ill-thought on of you; gone between and between, but small thanks for my labour.

  Troilus

  What, art thou angry, Pandarus? what, with me?

  Pandarus

  Because she’s kin to me, therefore she’s not so fair as Helen: an she were not kin to me, she would be as fair on Friday as Helen is on Sunday. But what care I? I care not an she were a black-a-moor; ’tis all one to me.

  Troilus

  Say I she is not fair?

  Pandarus

  I do not care whether you do or no. She’s a fool to stay behind her father; let her to the Greeks; and so I’ll tell her the next time I see her: for my part, I’ll meddle nor make no more i’ the matter.

  Troilus

  Pandarus,—

  Pandarus

  Not I.

  Troilus

  Sweet Pandarus,—

  Pandarus

  Pray you, speak no more to me: I will leave all as I found it, and there an end.

  Exit Pandarus. An alarum

  Troilus

  Peace, you ungracious clamours! peace, rude sounds!

  Fools on both sides! Helen must needs be fair,

  When with your blood you daily paint her thus.

  I cannot fight upon this argument;

  It is too 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 woo’d to woo.

  As she is stubborn-chaste against all suit.

  Tell me, Apollo, for thy Daphne’s love,

  What Cressid is, what Pandar, and what we?

  Her bed is India; there she lies, a pearl:

  Between our Ilium and where she resides,

  Let it be call’d the wild and wandering flood,

  Ourself the merchant, and this sailing Pandar

  Our doubtful hope, our convoy and our bark.

  Alarum. Enter Aeneas

  Aeneas

  How now, Prince Troilus! wherefore not afield?

  Troilus

  Because not there: this woman’s answer sorts,

  For womanish it is to be from thence.

  What news, Aeneas, from the field to-day?

  Aeneas

  That Paris is returned home and hurt.

  Troilus

  By whom, Aeneas?

  Aeneas

  Troilus, by Menelaus.

  Troilus

  Let Paris bleed; ’tis but a scar to scorn;

  Paris is gored with Menelaus’ horn.

  Alarum

  Aeneas

  Hark, what good sport is out of town to-day!

  Troilus

  Better at home, if ‘would I might’ were ‘may.’

  But to the sport abroad: are you bound thither?

  Aeneas

  In all swift haste.

  Troilus

  Come, go we then together.

  Exeunt

  SCENE II. THE SAME. A STREET.

  Enter Cressida and Alexander

  Cressida

  Who were those went by?

  Alexander

  Queen Hecuba and Helen.

  Cressida

  And whither go they?

  Alexander

  Up to the eastern tower,

  Whose height commands as subject all the vale,

  To see the battle. Hector, whose patience

  Is, as a virtue, fix’d, to-day was moved:

  He chid Andromache and struck his armourer,

  And, like as there were husbandry in war,

  Before the sun rose he was harness’d light,

  And to the field goes he; where every flower

  Did, as a prophet, weep what it foresaw

  In Hector’s wrath.

  Cressida

  What was his cause of anger?

  Alexander

  The noise goes, this: there is among the Greeks

  A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector;

  They call him Ajax.

  Cressida

  Good; and what of him?

  Alexander

  They say he is a very man per se,

  And stands alone.

  Cressida

  So do all men, unless they are drunk, sick, or have no legs.

  Alexander

  This man, lady, hath robbed many beasts of their particular additions; he is as valiant as the lion, churlish as the bear, slow as the elephant: a man into whom nature hath so crowded humours that his valour 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 attaint but he carries some stain of it: he is melancholy without cause, and merry against the hair: he hath the joints of every thing, but everything so out of joint that he is a gouty Briareus, many hands and no use, or purblind Argus, all eyes and no sight.

  Cressida

  But how should this man, that makes me smile, make Hector angry?

  Alexander

  They say he yesterday coped Hector in the battle and struck him down, the disdain and shame whereof hath ever since kept Hector fasting and waking.

  Cressida

  Who comes here?

  Alexander

  Madam, your uncle Pandarus.

  Enter Pandarus

  Cressida

  Hector’s a gallant man.

  Alexander

  As may be in the world, lady.

  Pandarus

  What’s that? what’s that?

  Cressida

  Good morrow, uncle Pandarus.

  Pandarus

  Good morrow, cousin Cressid: what do you talk of? Good morrow, Alexander. How do you, cousin? When were you at Ilium?

  Cressida

  This morning, uncle.

  Pandarus

  What were you talking of when I came? Was Hector armed and gone ere ye came to Ilium? Helen was not up, was she?

  Cressida

  Hector was gone, but Helen was not up.

  Pandarus

  Even so: Hector was stirring early.

  Cressida

  That were we talking of, and of his anger.

  Pandarus

  Was he angry?

  Cressida

  So he says here.

  Pandarus

  True, he was so: I know the cause too: he’ll lay about him to-day, I can tell them that: and there’s Troilus will not come far behind him: let them take heed of Troilus, I can tell them that too.

  Cressida

  What, is he angry too?

  Pandarus

  Who, Troilus? Troilus is the better man of the two.

  Cressida

  O Jupiter! there’s no comparison.

  Pandarus

  What, not between Troilus and Hector? Do you know a man if you see him?

  Cressida

  Ay, if I ever saw him before and knew him.

  Pandarus

  Well, I say Troilus is Troilus.

  Cressida

  Then you say as I say; for, I am sure, he is not Hector.

  Pandarus

  No, nor Hector is not Troilus in some degrees.

  Cressida

  ’Tis just to each of them; he is himsel
f.

  Pandarus

  Himself! Alas, poor Troilus! I would he were.

  Cressida

  So he is.

  Pandarus

  Condition, I had gone barefoot to India.

  Cressida

  He is not Hector.

  Pandarus

  Himself! no, he’s not himself: would a’ were himself! Well, the gods are above; time must friend or end: well, Troilus, well: I would my heart were in her body. No, Hector is not a better man than Troilus.

  Cressida

  Excuse me.

  Pandarus

  He is elder.

  Cressida

  Pardon me, pardon me.

  Pandarus

  Th’ other’s not come to’t; you shall tell me another tale, when th’ other’s come to’t. Hector shall not have his wit this year.

  Cressida

  He shall not need it, if he have his own.

  Pandarus

  Nor his qualities.

  Cressida

  No matter.

  Pandarus

  Nor his beauty.

  Cressida

  ’Twould not become him; his own’s better.

  Pandarus

  You have no judgment, niece: Helen herself swore th’ other day, that Troilus, for a brown favour — for so ’tis, I must confess,— not brown neither,—

  Cressida

  No, but brown.

  Pandarus

  ’Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown.

  Cressida

  To say the truth, true and not true.

  Pandarus

  She praised his complexion above Paris.

  Cressida

  Why, Paris hath colour enough.

  Pandarus

  So he has.

  Cressida

  Then Troilus should have too much: if she praised him above, his complexion is higher than his; he having colour 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

  I swear to you. I think Helen loves him better than Paris.

  Cressida

  Then she’s a merry Greek indeed.

  Pandarus

  Nay, I am sure she does. She came to him th’ other day into the compassed window,— and, you know, he has not past three or four hairs on his chin,—

  Cressida

  Indeed, a tapster’s arithmetic may soon bring his particulars therein to a total.

  Pandarus

  Why, he is very young: and yet will he, within three pound, lift as much as his brother Hector.

  Cressida

  Is he so young a man and so old a lifter?

  Pandarus

  But to prove to you that Helen loves him: she came and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin —

 

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