THERSITES. Has not so much wit- ACHILLES. Nay, I must hold you.

THERSITES. As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, for whom he comes to fight.

ACHILLES. Peace, fool.

THERSITES. I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not- he there; that he; look you there.

AJAX. O thou d.a.m.ned cur! I shall- ACHILLES. Will you set your wit to a fool's?

THERSITES. No, I warrant you, the fool's will shame it.

PATROCLUS. Good words, Thersites.

ACHILLES. What's the quarrel?

AJAX. I bade the vile owl go learn me the tenour of the proclamation, and he rails upon me.

THERSITES. I serve thee not.

AJAX. Well, go to, go to.

THERSITES. I serve here voluntary.

ACHILLES. Your last service was suff'rance; 'twas not voluntary. No man is beaten voluntary. Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.

THERSITES. E'en so; a great deal of your wit too lies in your sinews, or else there be liars. Hector shall have a great catch an he knock out either of your brains: 'a were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

ACHILLES. What, with me too, Thersites?

THERSITES. There's Ulysses and old Nestor-whose wit was mouldy ere your grandsires had nails on their toes-yoke you like draught oxen, and make you plough up the wars.

ACHILLES. What, what?

THERSITES. Yes, good sooth. To Achilles, to Ajax, to- AJAX. I shall cut out your tongue.

THERSITES. 'Tis no matter; I shall speak as much as thou afterwards.

PATROCLUS. No more words, Thersites; peace!

THERSITES. I will hold my peace when Achilles' brach bids me, shall I?

ACHILLES. There's for you, Patroclus.

THERSITES. I will see you hang'd like clotpoles ere I come any more to your tents. I will keep where there is wit stirring, and leave the faction of fools. Exit PATROCLUS. A good riddance.

ACHILLES. Marry, this, sir, is proclaim'd through all our host, That Hector, by the fifth hour of the sun, Will with a trumpet 'twixt our tents and Troy, To-morrow morning, call some knight to arms That hath a stomach; and such a one that dare Maintain I know not what; 'tis trash. Farewell.

AJAX. Farewell. Who shall answer him?

ACHILLES. I know not; 'tis put to lott'ry. Otherwise. He knew his man.

AJAX. O, meaning you! I will go learn more of it. Exeunt

ACT II. SCENE 2.

Troy. PRIAM'S palace

Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, PARIS, and HELENUS

PRIAM. After so many hours, lives, speeches, spent, Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks: 'Deliver Helen, and all damage else- As honour, loss of time, travail, expense, Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consum'd In hot digestion of this cormorant war- Shall be struck off.' Hector, what say you to't?

HECTOR. Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I, As far as toucheth my particular, Yet, dread Priam, There is no lady of more softer bowels, More spongy to suck in the sense of fear, More ready to cry out 'Who knows what follows?'

Than Hector is. The wound of peace is surety, Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches To th' bottom of the worst. Let Helen go.

Since the first sword was drawn about this question, Every t.i.the soul 'mongst many thousand dismes Hath been as dear as Helen-I mean, of ours.

If we have lost so many tenths of ours To guard a thing not ours, nor worth to us, Had it our name, the value of one ten, What merit's in that reason which denies The yielding of her up?

TROILUS. Fie, fie, my brother!

Weigh you the worth and honour of a king, So great as our dread father's, in a scale Of common ounces? Will you with counters sum The past-proportion of his infinite, And buckle in a waist most fathomless With spans and inches so diminutive As fears and reasons? Fie, for G.o.dly shame!

HELENUS. No marvel though you bite so sharp at reasons, You are so empty of them. Should not our father Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons, Because your speech hath none that tells him so?

TROILUS. You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest; You fur your gloves with reason. Here are your reasons: You know an enemy intends you harm; You know a sword employ'd is perilous, And reason flies the object of all harm.

Who marvels, then, when Helenus beholds A Grecian and his sword, if he do set The very wings of reason to his heels And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove, Or like a star disorb'd? Nay, if we talk of reason, Let's shut our gates and sleep. Manhood and honour Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their thoughts With this cramm'd reason. Reason and respect Make livers pale and l.u.s.tihood deject.

HECTOR. Brother, she is not worth what she doth, cost The keeping.

TROILUS. What's aught but as 'tis valued?

HECTOR. But value dwells not in particular will: It holds his estimate and dignity As well wherein 'tis precious of itself As in the prizer. 'Tis mad idolatry To make the service greater than the G.o.d-I And the will dotes that is attributive To what infectiously itself affects, Without some image of th' affected merit.

TROILUS. I take to-day a wife, and my election Is led on in the conduct of my will; My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears, Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous sh.o.r.es Of will and judgment: how may I avoid, Although my will distaste what it elected, The wife I chose? There can be no evasion To blench from this and to stand firm by honour.

We turn not back the silks upon the merchant When we have soil'd them; nor the remainder viands We do not throw in unrespective sieve, Because we now are full. It was thought meet Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks; Your breath with full consent benied his sails; The seas and winds, old wranglers, took a truce, And did him service. He touch'd the ports desir'd; And for an old aunt whom the Greeks held captive He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes stale the morning.

Why keep we her? The Grecians keep our aunt.

Is she worth keeping? Why, she is a pearl Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand s.h.i.+ps, And turn'd crown'd kings to merchants.

If you'll avouch 'twas wisdom Paris went- As you must needs, for you all cried 'Go, go'- If you'll confess he brought home worthy prize- As you must needs, for you all clapp'd your hands, And cried 'Inestimable!' -why do you now The issue of your proper wisdoms rate, And do a deed that never fortune did- Beggar the estimation which you priz'd Richer than sea and land? O theft most base, That we have stol'n what we do fear to keep!

But thieves unworthy of a thing so stol'n That in their country did them that disgrace We fear to warrant in our native place!

Ca.s.sANDRA. [Within] Cry, Troyans, cry.

PRIAM. What noise, what shriek is this?

TROILUS. 'Tis our mad sister; I do know her voice.

Ca.s.sANDRA. [Within] Cry, Troyans.

HECTOR. It is Ca.s.sandra.

Enter Ca.s.sANDRA, raving

Ca.s.sANDRA. Cry, Troyans, cry. Lend me ten thousand eyes, And I will fill them with prophetic tears.

HECTOR. Peace, sister, peace.

Ca.s.sANDRA. Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled eld, Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry, Add to my clamours. Let us pay betimes A moiety of that ma.s.s of moan to come.

Cry, Troyans, cry. Practise your eyes with tears.

Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand; Our firebrand brother, Paris, burns us all.

Cry, Troyans, cry, A Helen and a woe!

Cry, cry. Troy burns, or else let Helen go. Exit HECTOR. Now, youthful Troilus, do not these high strains Of divination in our sister work Some touches of remorse, or is your blood So madly hot that no discourse of reason, Nor fear of bad success in a bad cause, Can qualify the same?

TROILUS. Why, brother Hector, We may not think the justness of each act Such and no other than event doth form it; Nor once deject the courage of our minds Because Ca.s.sandra's mad. Her brain-sick raptures Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel Which hath our several honours all engag'd To make it gracious. For my private part, I am no more touch'd than all Priam's sons; And Jove forbid there should be done amongst us Such things as might offend the weakest spleen To fight for and maintain.

PARIS. Else might the world convince of levity As well my undertakings as your counsels; But I attest the G.o.ds, your full consent Gave wings to my propension, and cut of All fears attending on so dire a project.

For what, alas, can these my single arms?

What propugnation is in one man's valour To stand the push and enmity of those This quarrel would excite? Yet, I protest, Were I alone to pa.s.s the difficulties, And had as ample power as I have will, Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done Nor faint in the pursuit.

PRIAM. Paris, you speak Like one besotted on your sweet delights.

You have the honey still, but these the gall; So to be valiant is no praise at all.

PARIS. Sir, I propose not merely to myself The pleasures such a beauty brings with it; But I would have the soil of her fair rape Wip'd off in honourable keeping her.

What treason were it to the ransack'd queen, Disgrace to your great worths, and shame to me, Now to deliver her possession up On terms of base compulsion! Can it be That so degenerate a strain as this Should once set footing in your generous bosoms?

There's not the meanest spirit on our party Without a heart to dare or sword to draw When Helen is defended; nor none so n.o.ble Whose life were ill bestow'd or death unfam'd Where Helen is the subject. Then, I say, Well may we fight for her whom we know well The world's large s.p.a.ces cannot parallel.

HECTOR. Paris and Troilus, you have both said well; And on the cause and question now in hand Have gloz'd, but superficially; not much Unlike young men, whom Aristode thought Unfit to hear moral philosophy.

The reasons you allege do more conduce To the hot pa.s.sion of distemp'red blood Than to make up a free determination 'Twixt right and wrong; for pleasure and revenge Have ears more deaf than adders to the voice Of any true decision. Nature craves All dues be rend'red to their owners. Now, What nearer debt in all humanity Than wife is to the husband? If this law Of nature be corrupted through affection; And that great minds, of partial indulgence To their benumbed wills, resist the same; There is a law in each well-order'd nation To curb those raging appet.i.tes that are Most disobedient and refractory.

If Helen, then, be wife to Sparta's king- As it is known she is-these moral laws Of nature and of nations speak aloud To have her back return'd. Thus to persist In doing wrong extenuates not wrong, But makes it much more heavy. Hector's opinion Is this, in way of truth. Yet, ne'er the less, My spritely brethren, I propend to you In resolution to keep Helen still; For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependence Upon our joint and several dignities.

TROILUS. Why, there you touch'd the life of our design.

Were it not glory that we more affected Than the performance of our heaving spleens, I would not wish a drop of Troyan blood Spent more in her defence. But, worthy Hector, She is a theme of honour and renown, A spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds, Whose present courage may beat down our foes, And fame in time to come canonize us; For I presume brave Hector would not lose So rich advantage of a promis'd glory As smiles upon the forehead of this action For the wide world's revenue.

HECTOR. I am yours, You valiant offspring of great Priamus.

I have a roisting challenge sent amongst The dull and factious n.o.bles of the Greeks Will strike amazement to their drowsy spirits.

I was advertis'd their great general slept, Whilst emulation in the army crept.

This, I presume, will wake him. Exeunt

ACT II. SCENE 3.

The Grecian camp. Before the tent of ACHILLES

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 rail'd 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 engineer! 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, forget that thou art Jove, the king of G.o.ds, 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-arm'd ignorance itself knows is so abundant scarce, it will not in circ.u.mvention deliver a fly from a spider without drawing their ma.s.sy irons and cutting the web. After this, the vengeance on the whole camp! or, rather, the Neapolitan bone-ache! for that, methinks, is the curse depending on those that war for a placket. I have said my prayers; and devil Envy say 'Amen.' What ho! my Lord Achilles!