on would relieve us: if they would yield us
but the superfluity while it were wholesome,
we might guess they relieved us humanely;
but they think we are too dear: the leanness 20
that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is
as an inventory to particularize their abun-
dance; our sufferance is a gain to them.
Let us revenge this with our pikes, ere we
become rakes: for the gods know I speak
this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for re-
venge.

Sec. Cit. Would you proceed especially against
Caius Marcius?

All. Against him first: he's a very dog to the 30 commonalty.

Sec. Cit. Consider you what services he has done for his country?

First Cit. Very well; and could be content to give him good report for 't, but that he pays himself with being proud.

Sec. Cit. Nay, but speak not maliciously. First Cit. I say unto you, what he hath done famously, he did it to that end: though softconscienced men can be content to say it was 40 for his country, he did it to please his mother and to be partly proud; which he is, even to the altitude of his virtue.

Sec. Cit. What he cannot help in his nature,

21. "object of our misery"; that is, apparently, the sight or spectacle of their misery: their "leanness" was the "object" that served, by comparison, to remind the Patricians of their own abundance; and so the sufferings of the Plebs were a gain to them Mr. Collier's second folio turns "object" into abjectness.-H. N. H.

you account a vice in him. You must in no
way say he is covetous.

First Cit. If I must not, I need not be barren
of accusations; he hath faults, with surplus,
to tire in repetition. [Shouts within.]
What shouts are these? The other side o' 50
the city is risen: why stay we prating here?
to the Capitol!

All. Come, come.

First Cit. Soft! who comes here?

Enter Menenius Agrippa.

Sec. Cit. Worthy Menenius Agrippa; one that hath always loved the people.

First Cit. He's one honest enough: would all the rest were so!

Men. What work's, my countrymen, in hand?

where go you

60

With bats and clubs? the matter? speak, I pray

you.

First Cit. Our business is not unknown to the

senate; they have had inkling, this fortnight,
what we intend to do, which now we 'll show
'em in deeds. They say poor suitors have
strong breaths: they shall know we have
strong arms too.

Men. Why, masters, my good friends, mine honest neighbors,

Will

you undo yourselves?

First Cit. We cannot, sir, we are undone al

ready.

Men. I tell you, friends, most charitable care

70

Have the patricians of you. For your wants,
Your suffering in this dearth, you may as well
Strike at the heaven with your staves as lift

them

Against the Roman state; whose course will on
The way it takes, cracking ten thousand curbs
Of more strong link asunder than can ever
Appear in your impediment. For the dearth,
The gods, not the patricians, make it, and
Your knees to them, not arms, must help.
Alack,

You are transported by calamity

81

Thither where more attends you, and you slander

The helms o' the state, who care for you like fathers,

When you curse them as enemies.

First Cit. Care for us! True, indeed! They

ne'er cared for us yet: suffer us to famish,

87. In North's Plutarch the account of this insurrection runs as follows: "It fortuned there grew sedition in the city, because the Senate did favour the rich against the people, who did complaine of the sore oppression of usurers, of whom they borrowed mony. For those that had litle were yet spoiled of that litle by their creditors, for lack of ability to pay the usury; who offered their goods to be sold to them that would give most. And such as had nothing left, their bodies were laid hold on, and they were made bondmen, notwithstanding all the wounds and cuts which they had received in many battels, fighting for defence of their countrey; of the which the last warre they had made was against the Sabynes, wherein they fought upon the promise the rich men had made, that from thenceforth they would intreate them more gently. But after that they had faithfully served in this last battel, seeing they were never a whit the better, and that the Senate would give no care to them, but suffered them to be made slaves to their creditours; they fel then even to flat rebellion and mutiny, and to stirre up dangerous tumults within the city. Whereupon their

and their store-houses crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to support usurers; 90 repeal daily any wholesome act established against the rich, and provide more piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and there's all the love they bear us. Men. Either you must

Confess yourselves wondrous malicious,
Or be accused of folly. I shall tell you
A pretty tale: it may be you have heard it;
But, since it serves my purpose, I will venture
To stale 't a little more.

First Cit. Well, I'll hear it, sir: yet you must
not think to fob off our disgrace with a tale:
but, an 't please you, deliver.

101

chiefe magistrates, and many of the Senate, began to be of divers opinions among themselves. For some thought it was reason they shold somewhat yeeld to the poore peoples request, and a litle qualifie the severity of the law. Other held hard against that opinion, and Martius for one. For he alleged that the creditours losing their money was not the worst thing that was herein; but that the lenity was a beginning of disobedience, and that the proud attempt of the communalty was to abolish law, and to bring all to confusion. Therefore, he said, if the Senate were wise, they should betimes prevent and quench this ill favoured and worse meant beginning. The Senate met many daies in consultation about it; but in the end they concluded nothing. The poore common people, seeing no redresse, gathered themselves one day together, and all forsook the city, and encamped upon a hil, called at that day the holy hill, along the river of Tyber, offering no creature any hurt, nor making any shew of actuall rebellion, saving that they cried, as they went up and down, that the rich men had driven them out of the city. Moreover, they said, to dwell at Rome was nothing els but to be slain or hurt with continuall wars, and fighting for defence of the rich mens goods."-H. N. H.

Men. There was a time when all the body's mem

bers

Rebell'd against the belly; thus accused it:
That only like a gulf it did remain

I' the midst o' the body, idle and unactive, Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing Like labor with the rest; where the other instruments 110 Did see and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel, And, mutually participate, did minister Unto the appetite and affection common Of the whole body. The belly answer'd— First Cit. Well sir, what answer made the belly?

Men. Sir, I shall tell you. With a kind of smile, Which ne'er came from the lungs, but even

thus

For, look you, I may make the belly smile
As well as speak-it tauntingly replied

120

To the discontented members, the mutinous

parts

That envied his receipt; even so most fitly
As you malign our senators for that

They are not such as you.

First Cit.

Your belly's answer? What!

105, etc. The fable of the Belly and the Members has been traced far back in antiquity. It is found in several ancient collections of Esopian fables; so that there is as much reason for making Æsop the author of this as of many others that go in his name. Shakespeare was acquainted with a very spirited version of it in Camden's Remains; but he was chiefly indebted for the matter to North's Plutarch.-H. N. H.

118. "Which ne'er came from the lungs"; the lungs were regarded as the seat of joyous laughter.-C. H. H.

122. "most fitly"; exactly.-H. N. H.