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- $Unique_ID{SSP01257}
- $Title{Troilus and Cressida: Act II, Scene III}
- $Author{Shakespeare, William}
- $Subject{}
- $Log{Dramatis Personae*01250.txt}
-
- Portions copyright (c) CMC ReSearch, Inc., 1989
-
- The Complete Works of William Shakespeare
-
- TROILUS AND CRESSIDA
-
-
- ACT II
- ................................................................................
-
-
- SCENE III: The Grecian camp. Before Achilles' tent.
- . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
-
- {Enter THERSITES, solus.}
-
- THERSITES: How now, Thersites! what lost in the labyrinth of
- thy fury! Shall the elephant Ajax carry it thus? He
- beats me, and I rail at him: O, worthy satisfaction!
- would it were otherwise; that I could beat him,
- whilst he railed at me. 'Sfoot, I'll learn to
- conjure and raise devils, but I'll see some issue of
- my spiteful execrations. Then there's Achilles, a
- rare enginer! If Troy be not taken till these two
- undermine it, the walls will stand till they fall of
- themselves. O thou great thunder-darter of Olympus, 10
- forget that thou art Jove, the king of gods and,
- Mercury, lose all the serpentine craft of thy
- caduceus, if ye take not that little, little less
- than little wit from them that they have! which
- short-armed ignorance itself knows is so abundant
- scarce, it will not in circumvention deliver a fly
- from a spider, without drawing their massy irons and
- cutting the web. After this, the vengeance on the
- whole camp! or rather, the bone-ache! for that,
- methinks, is the curse dependent on those that war 20
- for a placket. I have said my prayers and devil Envy
- say Amen. What ho! my Lord Achilles!
-
- {Enter PATROCLUS.}
-
- PATROCLUS: Who's there? Thersites! Good Thersites, come in
- and rail.
-
- THERSITES: If I could have remembered a gilt counterfeit, thou
- wouldst not have slipped out of my contemplation: but
- it is no matter; thyself upon thyself! The common
- curse of mankind, folly and ignorance, be thine in
- great revenue! heaven bless thee from a tutor, and
- discipline come not near thee! Let thy blood be thy 30
- direction till thy death! then if she that lays thee
- out says thou art a fair corse, I'll be sworn and
- sworn upon't she never shrouded any but lazars.
- Amen. Where's Achilles?
-
- PATROCLUS: What, art thou devout? wast thou in prayer?
-
- THERSITES: Ay: the heavens hear me!
-
- {Enter ACHILLES.}
-
- ACHILLES: Who's there?
-
- PATROCLUS: Thersites, my lord.
-
- ACHILLES: Where, where? Art thou come? why, my cheese, my
- digestion, why hast thou not served thyself in to 40
- my table so many meals? Come, what's Agamemnon?
-
- THERSITES: Thy commander, Achilles. Then tell me, Patroclus,
- what's Achilles?
-
- PATROCLUS: Thy lord, Thersites: then tell me, I pray thee,
- what's thyself?
-
- THERSITES: Thy knower, Patroclus: then tell me, Patroclus,
- what art thou?
-
- PATROCLUS: Thou mayst tell that knowest.
-
- ACHILLES: O, tell, tell.
-
- THERSITES: I'll decline the whole question. Agamemnon commands 50
- Achilles; Achilles is my lord; I am Patroclus'
- knower, and Patroclus is a fool.
-
- PATROCLUS: You rascal!
-
- THERSITES: Peace, fool! I have not done.
-
- ACHILLES: He is a privileged man. Proceed, Thersites.
-
- THERSITES: Agamemnon is a fool; Achilles is a fool; Thersites
- is a fool, and, as aforesaid, Patroclus is a fool.
-
- ACHILLES: Derive this; come.
-
- THERSITES: Agamemnon is a fool to offer to command Achilles;
- Achilles is a fool to be commanded of Agamemnon; 60
- Thersites is a fool to serve such a fool, and
- Patroclus is a fool positive.
-
- PATROCLUS: Why am I a fool?
-
- THERSITES: Make that demand of the prover. It suffices me thou
- art. Look you, who comes here?
-
- ACHILLES: Patroclus, I'll speak with nobody.
- Come in with me, Thersites.
-
- [Exit.]
-
- THERSITES: Here is such patchery, such juggling and such
- knavery! all the argument is a cuckold and a
- whore; a good quarrel to draw emulous factions 70
- and bleed to death upon. Now, the dry serpigo on
- the subject! and war and lechery confound all!
-
- [Exit.]
-
- {Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR, DIOMEDES,
- and AJAX.}
-
- AGAMEMNON: Where is Achilles?
-
- PATROCLUS: Within his tent; but ill disposed, my lord.
-
- 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. 80
-
- [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 favor 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. 90
-
- 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. 100
-
- 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, 110
- 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 120
- 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 130
- 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 140
- 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 150
- 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, 160
- 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 170
- 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 180
- 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 190
- 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: 200
- 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 humors 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. 210
-
- 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. 220
-
- 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,-- 230
-
- 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 vigor, 240
- 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? 250
-
- 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. 260
-
- [Exeunt.]
-