Complete Plays, The (108 page)

This she? no, this is Diomed’s Cressida:
If beauty have a soul, this is not she;
If souls guide vows, if vows be sanctimonies,
If sanctimony be the gods’ delight,
If there be rule in unity itself,
This is not she. O madness of discourse,
That cause sets up with and against itself!
Bi-fold authority! where reason can revolt
Without perdition, and loss assume all reason
Without revolt: this is, and is not, Cressid.
Within my soul there doth conduce a fight
Of this strange nature that a thing inseparate
Divides more wider than the sky and earth,
And yet the spacious breadth of this division
Admits no orifex for a point as subtle
As Ariachne’s broken woof to enter.
Instance, O instance! strong as Pluto’s gates;
Cressid is mine, tied with the bonds of heaven:
Instance, O instance! strong as heaven itself;
The bonds of heaven are slipp’d, dissolved, and loosed;
And with another knot, five-finger-tied,
The fractions of her faith, orts of her love,
The fragments, scraps, the bits and greasy relics
Of her o’er-eaten faith, are bound to Diomed.

Ulysses

May worthy Troilus be half attach’d
With that which here his passion doth express?

Troilus

Ay, Greek; and that shall be divulged well
In characters as red as Mars his heart
Inflamed with Venus: never did young man fancy
With so eternal and so fix’d a soul.
Hark, Greek: as much as I do Cressid love,
So much by weight hate I her Diomed:
That sleeve is mine that he’ll bear on his helm;
Were it a casque composed by Vulcan’s skill,
My sword should bite it: not the dreadful spout
Which shipmen do the hurricano call,
Constringed in mass by the almighty sun,
Shall dizzy with more clamour Neptune’s ear
In his descent than shall my prompted sword
Falling on Diomed.

Thersites

He’ll tickle it for his concupy.

Troilus

O Cressid! O false Cressid! false, false, false!
Let all untruths stand by thy stained name,
And they’ll seem glorious.

Ulysses

O, contain yourself
Your passion draws ears hither.

Enter Aeneas

Aeneas

I have been seeking you this hour, my lord:
Hector, by this, is arming him in Troy;
Ajax, your guard, stays to conduct you home.

Troilus

Have with you, prince. My courteous lord, adieu.
Farewell, revolted fair! and, Diomed,
Stand fast, and wear a castle on thy head!

Ulysses

I’ll bring you to the gates.

Troilus

Accept distracted thanks.

Exeunt Troilus, Aeneas, and Ulysses

Thersites

Would I could meet that rogue Diomed! I would croak like a raven; I would bode, I would bode. Patroclus will give me any thing for the intelligence of this whore: the parrot will not do more for an almond than he for a commodious drab. Lechery, lechery; still, wars and lechery; nothing else holds fashion: a burning devil take them!

Exit

S
CENE
III. T
ROY
. B
EFORE
P
RIAM
’
S
PALACE
.

Enter Hector and Andromache

Andromache

When was my lord so much ungently temper’d,
To stop his ears against admonishment?
Unarm, unarm, and do not fight to-day.

Hector

You train me to offend you; get you in:
By all the everlasting gods, I’ll go!

Andromache

My dreams will, sure, prove ominous to the day.

Hector

No more, I say.

Enter Cassandra

Cassandra

 
Where is my brother Hector?

Andromache

Here, sister; arm’d, and bloody in intent.
Consort with me in loud and dear petition,
Pursue we him on knees; for I have dream’d
Of bloody turbulence, and this whole night
Hath nothing been but shapes and forms of slaughter.

Cassandra

O, ’tis true.

Hector

 
Ho! bid my trumpet sound!

Cassandra

No notes of sally, for the heavens, sweet brother.

Hector

Be gone, I say: the gods have heard me swear.

Cassandra

The gods are deaf to hot and peevish vows:
They are polluted offerings, more abhorr’d
Than spotted livers in the sacrifice.

Andromache

O, be persuaded! do not count it holy
To hurt by being just: it is as lawful,
For we would give much, to use violent thefts,
And rob in the behalf of charity.

Cassandra

It is the purpose that makes strong the vow;
But vows to every purpose must not hold:
Unarm, sweet Hector.

Hector

Hold you still, I say;
Mine honour keeps the weather of my fate:
Lie every man holds dear; but the brave man
Holds honour far more precious-dear than life.

Enter Troilus

How now, young man! mean’st thou to fight to-day?

Andromache

Cassandra, call my father to persuade.

Exit Cassandra

Hector

No, faith, young Troilus; doff thy harness, youth;
I am to-day i’ the vein of chivalry:
Let grow thy sinews till their knots be strong,
And tempt not yet the brushes of the war.
Unarm thee, go, and doubt thou not, brave boy,
I’ll stand to-day for thee and me and Troy.

Troilus

Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you,
Which better fits a lion than a man.

Hector

What vice is that, good Troilus? chide me for it.

Troilus

When many times the captive Grecian falls,
Even in the fan and wind of your fair sword,
You bid them rise, and live.

Hector

O,’tis fair play.

Troilus

 
Fool’s play, by heaven, Hector.

Hector

How now! how now!

Troilus

 
For the love of all the gods,
Let’s leave the hermit pity with our mothers,
And when we have our armours buckled on,
The venom’d vengeance ride upon our swords,
Spur them to ruthful work, rein them from ruth.

Hector

Fie, savage, fie!

Troilus

 
Hector, then ’tis wars.

Hector

Troilus, I would not have you fight to-day.

Troilus

Who should withhold me?
Not fate, obedience, nor the hand of Mars
Beckoning with fiery truncheon my retire;
Not Priamus and Hecuba on knees,
Their eyes o’ergalled with recourse of tears;
Not you, my brother, with your true sword drawn,
Opposed to hinder me, should stop my way,
But by my ruin.

Re-enter Cassandra, with Priam

Cassandra

Lay hold upon him, Priam, hold him fast:
He is thy crutch; now if thou lose thy stay,
Thou on him leaning, and all Troy on thee,
Fall all together.

Priam

 
Come, Hector, come, go back:
Thy wife hath dream’d; thy mother hath had visions;
Cassandra doth foresee; and I myself
Am like a prophet suddenly enrapt
To tell thee that this day is ominous:
Therefore, come back.

Hector

Aeneas is a-field;
And I do stand engaged to many Greeks,
Even in the faith of valour, to appear
This morning to them.

Priam

Ay, but thou shalt not go.

Hector

I must not break my faith.
You know me dutiful; therefore, dear sir,
Let me not shame respect; but give me leave
To take that course by your consent and voice,
Which you do here forbid me, royal Priam.

Cassandra

O Priam, yield not to him!

Andromache

Do not, dear father.

Hector

Andromache, I am offended with you:
Upon the love you bear me, get you in.

Exit Andromache

Troilus

This foolish, dreaming, superstitious girl
Makes all these bodements.

Cassandra

O, farewell, dear Hector!
Look, how thou diest! look, how thy eye turns pale!
Look, how thy wounds do bleed at many vents!
Hark, how Troy roars! how Hecuba cries out!
How poor Andromache shrills her dolours forth!
Behold, distraction, frenzy and amazement,
Like witless antics, one another meet,
And all cry, Hector! Hector’s dead! O Hector!

Troilus

Away! away!

Cassandra

Farewell: yet, soft! Hector! take my leave:
Thou dost thyself and all our Troy deceive.

Exit

Hector

You are amazed, my liege, at her exclaim:
Go in and cheer the town: we’ll forth and fight,
Do deeds worth praise and tell you them at night.

Priam

Farewell: the gods with safety stand about thee!

Exeunt severally Priam and Hector. Alarums

Troilus

They are at it, hark! Proud Diomed, believe,
I come to lose my arm, or win my sleeve.

Enter Pandarus

Pandarus

Do you hear, my lord? do you hear?

Troilus

What now?

Pandarus

Here’s a letter come from yond poor girl.

Troilus

Let me read.

Pandarus

A whoreson tisick, a whoreson rascally tisick so troubles me, and the foolish fortune of this girl; and what one thing, what another, that I shall leave you one o’ these days: and I have a rheum in mine eyes too, and such an ache in my bones that, unless a man were cursed, I cannot tell what to think on’t. What says she there?

Troilus

Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart:
The effect doth operate another way.

Tearing the letter

Go, wind, to wind, there turn and change together.
My love with words and errors still she feeds;
But edifies another with her deeds.

Exeunt severally

S
CENE
IV. P
LAINS
BETWEEN
T
ROY
AND
THE
G
RECIAN
CAMP
.

Alarums: excursions. Enter Thersites

Thersites

Now they are clapper-clawing one another; I’ll go look on. That dissembling abominable varlets Diomed, has got that same scurvy doting foolish young knave’s sleeve of Troy there in his helm: I would fain see them meet; that that same young Trojan ass, that loves the whore there, might send that Greekish whore-masterly villain, with the sleeve, back to the dissembling luxurious drab, of a sleeveless errand. O’ the t’other side, the policy of those crafty swearing rascals, that stale old mouse-eaten dry cheese, Nestor, and that same dog-fox, Ulysses, is not proved worthy a blackberry: they set me up, in policy, that mongrel cur, Ajax, against that dog of as bad a kind, Achilles: and now is the cur Ajax prouder than the cur Achilles, and will not arm to-day; whereupon the Grecians begin to proclaim barbarism, and policy grows into an ill opinion. Soft! here comes sleeve, and t’other.

Enter Diomedes, Troilus following

Troilus

Fly not; for shouldst thou take the river Styx,
I would swim after.

Diomedes

Thou dost miscall retire:
I do not fly, but advantageous care
Withdrew me from the odds of multitude:
Have at thee!

Thersites

Hold thy whore, Grecian!— now for thy whore,
Trojan!— now the sleeve, now the sleeve!

Exeunt Troilus and Diomedes, fighting

Enter Hector

Hector

What art thou, Greek? art thou for Hector’s match?
Art thou of blood and honour?

Thersites

No, no, I am a rascal; a scurvy railing knave: a very filthy rogue.

Hector

I do believe thee: live.

Exit

Thersites

God-a-mercy, that thou wilt believe me; but a plague break thy neck for frightening me! What’s become of the wenching rogues? I think they have swallowed one another: I would laugh at that miracle: yet, in a sort, lechery eats itself. I’ll seek them.

Exit

S
CENE
V. A
NOTHER
PART
OF
THE
PLAINS
.

Enter Diomedes and a Servant

Diomedes

Go, go, my servant, take thou Troilus’ horse;
Present the fair steed to my lady Cressid:
Fellow, commend my service to her beauty;
Tell her I have chastised the amorous Trojan,
And am her knight by proof.

Servant

I go, my lord.

Exit

Enter Agamemnon

Agamemnon

Renew, renew! The fierce Polydamas
Hath beat down Menon: bastard Margarelon
Hath Doreus prisoner,
And stands colossus-wise, waving his beam,
Upon the pashed corses of the kings
Epistrophus and Cedius: Polyxenes is slain,
Amphimachus and Thoas deadly hurt,
Patroclus ta’en or slain, and Palamedes
Sore hurt and bruised: the dreadful Sagittary
Appals our numbers: haste we, Diomed,
To reinforcement, or we perish all.

Enter Nestor

Nestor

Go, bear Patroclus’ body to Achilles;
And bid the snail-paced Ajax arm for shame.
There is a thousand Hectors in the field:
Now here he fights on Galathe his horse,
And there lacks work; anon he’s there afoot,
And there they fly or die, like scaled sculls
Before the belching whale; then is he yonder,
And there the strawy Greeks, ripe for his edge,
Fall down before him, like the mower’s swath:
Here, there, and every where, he leaves and takes,
Dexterity so obeying appetite
That what he will he does, and does so much
That proof is call’d impossibility.