Complete Plays, The (101 page)

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

A
CT
III

S
CENE
I. T
ROY
. P
RIAM
’
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.