Complete Plays, The

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Complete Plays, The Page 80

by William Shakespeare


  Agamemnon

  Let it be known to him that we are here.

  He shent our messengers; and we lay by

  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.

  Exit

  Ulysses

  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 favour the man; but, by my head, ’tis pride: but why, why? let him show us the cause. A word, my lord.

  Takes Agamemnon aside

  Nestor

  What moves Ajax thus to bay at him?

  Ulysses

  Achilles hath inveigled his fool from him.

  Nestor

  Who, Thersites?

  Ulysses

  He.

  Nestor

  Then 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 wish than their faction: but it was a strong composure a fool could disunite.

  Ulysses

  The amity that wisdom knits not, folly may easily untie. Here comes Patroclus.

  Re-enter Patroclus

  Nestor

  No Achilles with him.

  Ulysses

  The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy: his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.

  Patroclus

  Achilles bids me say, he is much sorry,

  If any thing more than your sport and pleasure

  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,

  And after-dinner’s breath.

  Agamemnon

  Hear you, Patroclus:

  We are too well acquainted with these answers:

  But his evasion, wing’d 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,

  Not virtuously on his own part beheld,

  Do in our eyes begin to lose their gloss,

  Yea, 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 sin,

  If you do say we think him over-proud

  And under-honest, in self-assumption greater

  Than in the note of judgment; and worthier than himself

  Here tend the savage strangeness he puts on,

  Disguise the holy strength of their command,

  And underwrite in an observing kind

  His humorous predominance; yea, watch

  His pettish lunes, his ebbs, his flows, as if

  The passage and whole carriage of this action

  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:

  A stirring dwarf we do allowance give

  Before a sleeping giant.’ Tell him so.

  Patroclus

  I shall; and bring his answer presently.

  Exit

  Agamemnon

  In second voice we’ll not be satisfied;

  We come to speak with him. Ulysses, enter you.

  Exit Ulysses

  Ajax

  What 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

  Will 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.

  Ajax

  Why should a man be proud? How doth pride 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 the deed, devours the deed in the praise.

  Ajax

  I do hate a proud man, as I hate the engendering of toads.

  Nestor

  Yet he loves himself: is’t not strange?

  Aside

  Re-enter Ulysses

  Ulysses

  Achilles will not to the field to-morrow.

  Agamemnon

  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

  Why will he not upon our fair request

  Untent his person and share the air with us?

  Ulysses

  Things small as nothing, for request’s sake only,

  He makes important: possess’d he is with greatness,

  And speaks not to himself but with a pride

  That quarrels at self-breath: imagined worth

  Holds in his blood such swoln and hot discourse

  That ’twixt his mental and his active parts

  Kingdom’d Achilles in commotion rages

  And batters down himself: what should I say?

  He is so plaguy proud that the death-tokens of it

  Cry ‘No recovery.’

  Agamemnon

  Let Ajax go to him.

  Dear lord, go you and greet him in his tent:

  ’Tis said he holds you well, and will be led

  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 seam

  And never suffers matter of the world

  Enter his thoughts, save such as do revolve

  And ruminate himself, shall he be worshipp’d

  Of that we hold an idol more than he?

  No, this thrice worthy and right valiant lord

  Must 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 pride

  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] And how his silence drinks up this applause!

  Ajax

  If I go to him, with my armed fist I’ll pash him o’er the face.

  Agamemnon

  O, no, you shall not go.

  Ajax

  An a’ be proud with me, I’ll pheeze his pride:

  Let me go to him.

  Ulysses

  Not for the worth that hangs upon our quarrel.

  Ajax

  A paltry, insolent fellow!

  Nestor

  How he describes himself!

  Ajax

  Can he not be sociable?

  Ulysses

  The raven chides blackness.

 
Ajax

  I’ll let his humours blood.

  Agamemnon

  He will be the physician that should be the patient.

  Ajax

  An all men were o’ my mind,—

  Ulysses

  Wit would be out of fashion.

  Ajax

  A’ should not bear it so, a’ should eat swords first: shall pride carry it?

  Nestor

  An ’twould, you’ld carry half.

  Ulysses

  A’ would have ten shares.

  Ajax

  I will knead him; I’ll make him supple.

  Nestor

  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

  Our noble general, do not do so.

  Diomedes

  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?

  He is not emulous, as Achilles is.

  Ulysses

  Know the whole world, he is as valiant.

  Ajax

  A whoreson dog, that shall pelter thus with us!

  Would he were a Trojan!

  Nestor

  What a vice were it in Ajax now,—

  Ulysses

  If he were proud,—

  Diomedes

  Or covetous of praise,—

  Ulysses

  Ay, or surly borne,—

  Diomedes

  Or strange, or self-affected!

  Ulysses

  Thank the heavens, lord, thou art of sweet composure;

  Praise him that got thee, she that gave thee suck:

  Famed be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature

  Thrice famed, beyond all erudition:

  But he that disciplined thy arms to fight,

  Let Mars divide eternity in twain,

  And give him half: and, for thy vigour,

  Bull-bearing Milo his addition yield

  To sinewy Ajax. I will not praise thy wisdom,

  Which, like a bourn, a pale, a shore, confines

  Thy spacious and dilated parts: here’s Nestor;

  Instructed by the antiquary times,

  He must, he is, he cannot but be wise:

  Put pardon, father Nestor, were your days

  As green as Ajax’ and your brain so temper’d,

  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

  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: to-morrow

  We must with all our main of power stand fast:

  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.

  Exeunt

  ACT III

  SCENE I. TROY. PRIAM’S PALACE.

  Enter a Servant and Pandarus

  Pandarus

  Friend, you! pray you, a word: do not you follow the young Lord Paris?

  Servant

  Ay, sir, when he goes before me.

  Pandarus

  You depend upon him, I mean?

  Servant

  Sir, I do depend upon the lord.

  Pandarus

  You depend upon a noble gentleman; I must needs praise him.

  Servant

  The lord be praised!

  Pandarus

  You know me, do you not?

  Servant

  Faith, sir, superficially.

  Pandarus

  Friend, know me better; I am the Lord Pandarus.

  Servant

  I hope I shall know your honour better.

  Pandarus

  I do desire it.

  Servant

  You are in the state of grace.

  Pandarus

  Grace! not so, friend: honour and lordship are my titles.

  Music within

  What music is this?

  Servant

  I do but partly know, sir: it is music in parts.

  Pandarus

  Know you the musicians?

  Servant

  Wholly, sir.

  Pandarus

  Who play they to?

  Servant

  To the hearers, sir.

  Pandarus

  At whose pleasure, friend

  Servant

  At mine, sir, and theirs that love music.

  Pandarus

  Command, I mean, friend.

  Servant

  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?

  Servant

  That’s to ’t indeed, sir: marry, sir, at the request of Paris my lord, who’s there in person; with him, the mortal Venus, the heart-blood of beauty, love’s invisible soul,—

  Pandarus

  Who, my cousin Cressida?

  Servant

  No, sir, Helen: could you not find out that by her attributes?

  Pandarus

  It should seem, fellow, that thou hast not seen the Lady Cressida. I come to speak with Paris from the Prince Troilus: I will make a complimental assault upon him, for my business seethes.

  Servant

  Sodden business! there’s a stewed phrase indeed!

  Enter Paris and Helen, attended

  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! fair 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, you shall make it whole again; you shall piece it out with a piece of your performance. Nell, he is full of harmony.

  Pandarus

  Truly, lady, no.

  Helen

  O, sir,—

  Pandarus

  Rude, in sooth; in good sooth, very rude.

  Paris

  Well said, my lord! well, you say so in fits.

  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 you 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

  Go to, sweet queen, to go:— 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 sweet 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 not, in truth, la. Nay, I care not for such words; no, no. And, my lord, he desires you, that 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

  What exploit’s in hand? where sups he to-night?

  Helen

  Nay, but, my lord,—

  Pandarus

  What says my sweet queen? My cousin will fall out with you. You must not know where he sups.

  Paris

  I’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 excuse.

  Pandarus

  Ay, good my lord. Why should you say Cressida? no, your poor disposer’s sick.

  Paris

  I spy.

  Pandarus

  You spy! what do you spy? Come, give me an instrument. Now, sweet queen.

  Helen

  Why, 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

  He! 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’ll 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.

  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.

  Sings

  Love, love, nothing but love, still more!

  For, O, love’s bow

  Shoots buck and doe:

  The shaft confounds,

  Not that it wounds,

  But tickles still the sore.

  These lovers cry Oh! oh! they die!

  Yet that which seems the wound to kill,

  Doth turn oh! oh! to ha! ha! he!

  So dying love lives still:

  Oh! oh! a while, but ha! ha! ha!

  Oh! oh! groans out for ha! ha! ha!

  Heigh-ho!

  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

  Is 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 a-field to-day?

  Paris

  Hector, Deiphobus, Helenus, Antenor, and all the gallantry of Troy: I would fain have armed to-day, but my Nell would not have it so. How chance my brother Troilus went not?

  Helen

 

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