Pan. Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw her look, or any woman else. Tro. I was about to tell thee :-when my heart, As wedged with a sigh, would rive in twain, Lest Hector or my father should perceive me, I have, as when the sun doth light a storm, Buried this sigh in wrinkle of a smile: But sorrow, that is couch'd in seeming gladness, Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness. 40 Pan. An her hair were not somewhat darker than Helen's-well, go to-there were no more comparison between the women: but, for my part, she is my kinswoman; I would not, as they term it, praise her: but I would somebody had heard her talk yesterday, as I did. I will not dispraise your sister Cassandra's wit, but

Tro. O Pandarus! I tell thee, Pandarus,When I do tell thee, there my hopes lie drown'd, Reply not in how many fathoms deep They lie indrench'd. I tell thee I am mad

50

In Cressid's love: thou answer'st 'she is fair;'
Pour'st in the open ulcer of my heart
Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice,
Handlest in thy discourse, O, that her hand,
In whose comparison all whites are ink,
Writing their own reproach, to whose soft seizure
The cygnet's down is harsh and spirit of sense
Hard as the palm of ploughman: this thou tell'st
me,

As true thou tell'st me, when I say I love her; 60
But, saying thus, instead of oil and balm,

Thou lay'st in every gash that love hath given me The knife that made it.

Pan. I speak no more than truth. Tro. Thou dost not speak so much. Pan. Faith, I'll not meddle in't. Let her be as she is: if she be fair, 'tis the better for her; an she be not, she has the mends in her own hands. Tro. Good Pandarus, how now, Pandarus! Pan. I have had my labour for my travail; illthought on of her and ill-thought on of you; gone between and between, but small thanks for my labour.

Tro. What, art thou angry, Pandarus? what, with me?

Pan. Because she's kin to me, therefore she's not so fair as Helen: an she were not kin to me, she would be as fair on Friday as Helen is on Sunday. But what care I? I care not an she were a black-a-moor; 'tis all one to me.

Tro. Say I she is not fair?

80

When with your blood you daily paint her thus. I cannot fight upon this argument;

100

It is too starved a subject for my sword.
But Pandarus,-O gods, how do you plague me!
I cannot come to Cressid but by Pandar;
And he's as tetchy to be woo'd to woo,
As she is stubborn-chaste against all suit.
Tell me, Apollo, for thy Daphne's love,
What Cressid is, what Pandar, and what we?
Her bed is India; there she lies, a pearl:
Between our Ilium and where she resides,
Let it be call'd the wild and wandering flood,
Ourself the merchant, and this sailing Pandar
Our doubtful hope, our convoy and our bark.
Alarum. Enter ENEAS.

Ene. How now, Prince Troilus! wherefore not afield?

Tro. Because not there: this woman's answer sorts,

ΙΙΟ

For womanish it is to be from thence.
What news, Æneas, from the field to-day?
Ene. That Paris is returned home and hurt.
Tro. By whom, Æneas?
Ene.
Troilus, by Menelaus.
Tro. Let Paris bleed: 'tis but a scar to scorn;
Paris is gored with Menelaus' horn. [Alarum.
Ene. Hark, what good sport is out of town
to-day!

Tro. Better at home, if 'would I might' were 'may.'

But to the sport abroad: are you bound thither?
Ene. In all swift haste.
Tro.

Come, go we then together.
[Exeunt.

SCENE II. The same. A street. Enter CRESSIDA and ALEXANDER. Cres. Who were those went by? Alex. Queen Hecuba and Helen. Cres. And whither go they? Alex.

Up to the eastern tower,
Whose height commands as subject all the vale,
To see the battle. Hector, whose patience
Is, as a virtue, fix'd, to-day was moved:
He chid Andromache and struck his armorer,
And, like as there were husbandry in war,
Before the sun rose he was harness'd light,
And to the field goes he; where every flower
Did, as a prophet, weep what it foresaw
In Hector's wrath.
Cres.
What was his cause of anger?
Alex. The noise goes, this: there is among
the Greeks

A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector;
They call him Ajax.

Cres.
Good; and what of him?
Alex. They say he is a very man per se,
And stands alone.

TO

Cres. So do all men, unless they are drunk, sick, or have no legs.

Alex. This man, lady, hath robbed many beasts of their particular additions; he is as valiant as the lion, churlish as the bear, slow as the elephant: a man into whom nature hath so crowded humours that his valour is crushed into folly, his folly sauced with discretion: there is no man hath a virtue that he hath not a glimpse of,

nor any man an attaint but he carries some stain of it: he is melancholy without cause, and merry against the hair: he hath the joints of every thing, but every thing so out of joint that he is a gouty Briareus, many hands and no use, or purblind Argus, all eyes and no sight. 31 Cres. But how should this man, that makes me smile, make Hector angry?

Alex. They say he yesterday coped Hector in the battle and struck him down, the disdain and shame whereof hath ever since kept Hector fasting and waking.

Cres.

Who comes here?

Alex. Madam, your uncle Pandarus.

Enter PANDARUS.

40

How

Cres. Hector's a gallant man. Alex. As may be in the world, lady. Pan. What's that? what's that? Cres. Good morrow, uncle Paudarus. Pan. Good morrow, cousin Cressid: what do you talk of? Good morrow, Alexander. do you, cousin? When were you at Ilium? Cres. This morning, uncle. Pan. What were you talking of when I came? Was Hector armed and gone ere ye came to Ilium? Helen was not up, was she?

50 Cres. Hector was gone, but Helen was not up. Pan. Even so: Hector was stirring early. Cres. That were we talking of, and of his anger.

Pan. Was he angry?

Cres. So he says here.

Pan. True, he was so: I know the cause too: he'll lay about him to-day, I can tell them that and there's Troilus will not come far behind him; let them take heed of Troilus, I can tell them that too.

Cres. What, is he angry too?

61

Pan. Who, Troilus? Troilus is the better man of the two. Cres.

O Jupiter! there's no comparison. Pan. What, not between Troilus and Hector? you know a man if you see him?

Do

Cres. Ay, if I ever saw him before and knew

109

Cres. Then Troilus should have too much: if she praised him above, his complexion is higher than his; he having colour enough, and the other higher, is too flaming a praise for a good complexion. I had as lief Helen's golden tongue had commended Troilus for a copper nose.

Pan. I swear to you, I think Helen loves him better than Paris.

Cres. Then she's a merry Greek indeed. Pan. Nay, I am sure she does. She came to him th' other day into the compassed window, -and, you know, he has not past three or four hairs on his chin,

Cres. Indeed, a tapster's arithmetic may soon bring his particulars therein to a total.

Pan. Why, he is very young: and yet will he, within three pound, lift as much as his brother Hector.

Cres. Is he so young a man and so old a

Cres. O yes, an 'twere a cloud in autumn. 139 Pan. Why, go to, then: but to prove to you that Helen loves Troilus,

Cres. Troilus will stand to the proof, if you prove it so.

Pan. Troilus! why, he esteems her no more than I esteem an addle egg.

Cres. If you love an addle egg as well as you love an idle head, you would eat chickens i'the shell.

Pan. I cannot choose but laugh, to think how she tickled his chin: indeed, she has a marvellous white hand, I must needs confess,151 Cres. Without the rack.

Pan. And she takes upon her to spy a white hair on his chin.

Cres. Alas, poor chin! many a wart is richer. Pan. But there was such laughing! Queen Hecuba laughed that her eyes ran o'er.

Cres. With mill-stones.

Pan. And Cassandra laughed.

Cres. But there was more temperate fire under the pot of her eyes: did her eyes run o'er too? 161

Pan. And Hector laughed. Cres. At what was all this laughing? Pan. Marry, at the white hair that Helen spied on Troilus' chin.

Cres. An't had been a green hair, I should have laughed too.

Pan. They laughed not so much at the hair as at his pretty answer.

170

Cres. What was his answer? Pan. Quoth she, 'Here's but two and fifty hairs on your chin, and one of them is white.' Cres. This is her question.

Pan. That's true; make no question of that. "Two and fifty hairs,' quoth he, and one white: that white hair is my father, and all the rest are his sons.''Jupiter!' quoth she, which of these hairs is Paris my husband?' "The forked one,' quoth he, 'pluck't out, and give it him.' But there was such laughing! and Helen so blushed, and Paris so chafed, and all the rest so laughed, that it passed.

Cres. So let it now; for it has been a great while going by.

Pan. Well, cousin, I told you a thing yesterday; think on't.

Cres. So I do.

Pan. I'll be sworn 'tis true; he will weep you, an 'twere a man born in April.

189 Cres. And I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a nettle against May. [A retreat sounded. Pan. Hark! they are coming from the field: shall we stand up here, and see them as they pass toward Ilium? good niece, do, sweet niece Cressida.

Cres. At your pleasure.

Pan. Here, here, here's an excellent place; here we may see most bravely: I'll tell you them all by their names as they pass by; but mark Troilus above the rest.

Cres. Speak not so loud.

ENEAS passes.

200

Cres. Can Helenus fight, uncle? Pan. Helenus? no. Yes, he'll fight indifferent well. I marvel where Troilus is. Hark! do you not hear the people cry 'Troilus'? Helenus is a priest.

Cres. What sneaking fellow comes yonder? TROILUS passes.

Pan. Where? yonder? that's Deiphobus. 'Tis Troilus! there's a man, niece! Hem! Brave Troilus! the prince of chivalry!

250

Cres. Peace, for shame, peace! Pan. Mark him; note him. O brave Troilus! Look well upon him, niece: look you how his sword is bloodied, and his helm more hacked than Hector's, and how he looks, and how he goes! O admirable youth! he ne'er saw three and twenty. Go thy way, Troilus, go thy way! Had I a sister were a grace, or a daughter a goddess, he should take his choice. O admirable man! Paris? Paris is dirt to him; and, I warrant, Helen, to change, would give an eye to boot. 260 Cres. Here come more.

Forces pass.

Pan. Asses, fools, dolts! chaff and bran, chaff and bran! porridge after meat! I could live and die i' the eyes of Troilus. Ne'er look, ne'er look: the eagles are gone: crows and daws, crows and daws! I had rather be such a man as Troilus than Agamemnon and all Greece.

Cres. There is among the Greeks Achilles, a better man than Troilus. 269 Pan. Achilles! a drayman, a porter, a very camel.

Cres. Well, well.

Pan. 'Well, well!' Why, have you any discretion? have you any eyes? do you know what a man is? Is not birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood, learning, gentleness, virtue, youth, liberality, and such like, the spice and salt that season a man?

Cres. Ay, a minced man: and then to be baked with no date in the pie, for then the man's date's out.

281 Pan. You are such a woman! one knows not at what ward you lie.

Cres. Upon my back, to defend my belly;

upon my wit, to defend my wiles; upon my secrecy, to defend mine honesty; my mask, to defend my beauty; and you, to defend all these: and at all these wards I lie, at a thousand watches.

Pan. Say one of your watches. 290 Cres. Nay, I'll watch you for that; and that's one of the chiefest of them too: if I cannot ward what I would not have hit, I can watch you for telling how I took the blow; unless it swell past hiding, and then it's past watching. Pan. You are such another!

Enter TROILUS'S Boy.

Boy. Sir, my lord would instantly speak with

you.

Pan. Where?

299 Boy. At your own house; there he unarms him. Pan. Good boy, tell him I come. [Exit Boy.] I doubt he be hurt. Fare ye well, good niece. Cres. Adieu, uncle.

Pan. I'll be with you, niece, by and by.
Cres. To bring, uncle?

Pan. Ay, a token from Troilus.
Cres. By the same token, you are a bawd.
[Exit Pandarus.
Words, vows, gifts, tears, and love's full sacrifice,
He offers in another's enterprise:
But more in Troilus thousand fold I see
Than in the glass of Pandar's praise may be;
Yet hold I off. Women are angels, wooing:
Things won are done; joy's soul lies in the doing.
That she beloved knows nought that knows not
this:

310

ΤΟ

Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd,
As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap,
Infect the sound pine and divert his grain
Tortive and errant from his course of growth.
Nor, princes, is it matter new to us
That we come short of our suppose so far
That after seven years' siege yet Troy walls stand;
Sith every action that hath gone before,
Whereof we have record, trial did draw
Bias and thwart, not answering the aim,
And that unbodied figure of the thought

That gave't surmised shape. Why then, you princes,

Do you with cheeks abash'd behold our works,

And call them shames? which are indeed nought else

20

But the protractive trials of great Jove
To find persistive constancy in men:
The fineness of which metal is not found.
In fortune's love; for then the bold and coward,
The wise and fool, the artist and unread,
The hard and soft, seem all affined and kin:
But, in the wind and tempest of her frown,
Distinction, with a broad and powerful fan,
Puffing at all, winnows the light away;
And what hath mass or matter, by itself
Lies rich in virtue and unmingled.

30

Nest. With due observance of thy godlike seat,
Great Agamemnon, Nestor shall apply
Thy latest words. In the reproof of chance.
Lies the true proof of men: the sea being smooth,
How many shallow bauble boats dare sail
Upon her patient breast, making their way
With those of nobler bulk!

But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage
The gentle Thetis, and anon behold

The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut,

40

Bounding between the two moist elements,
Like Perseus' horse: where's then the saucy boat
Whose weak untimber'd sides but even now
Co-rivall❜d greatness? Either to harbour fled,
Or made a toast for Neptune. Even so
Doth valour's show and valour's worth divide
In storms of fortune; for in her ray and bright-

ness

The herd hath more annoyance by the breese
Than by the tiger; but when the splitting wind
Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks,
And flies fled under shade, why, then the thing
of courage

50

As roused with rage with rage doth sympathize,
And with an accent tuned in selfsame key
Retorts to chiding fortune.
Ulyss.
Agamemnon,
Thou great commander, nerve and bone of Greece,
Heart of our numbers, soul and only spirit,
In whom the tempers and the minds of all
Should be shut up, hear what Ulysses speaks.
Besides the applause and approbation
The which, [To Agamemnon] most mighty for
thy place and sway,
60
[To Nestor] And thou most reverend for thy
stretch'd-out life

I give to both your speeches, which were such
As Agamemnon and the hand of Greece
Should hold up high in brass, and such again
As venerable Nestor, hatch'd in silver,
Should with a bond of air, strong as the axletree
On which heaven rides, knit all the Greekish ears
To his experienced tongue, yet let it please both,
Thou great, and wise, to hear Ulysses speak.
Agam. Speak, Prince of Ithaca; and be't of
less expect

That matter needless, of importless burden,
Divide thy lips, than we are confident,
When rank Thersites opes his mastic jaws,
We shall hear music, wit and oracle.

70

Ulyss. Troy, yet upon his basis, had been down, And the great Hector's sword had lack'd a master, But for these instances.

The specialty of rule hath been neglected:
And, look, how many Grecian tents do stand

81

Ulyss. The great Achilles, whom opinion

centre

crowns

The sinew and the forehand of our host,
Having his ear full of his airy fame,
Grows dainty of his worth and in his tent
Lies mocking our designs: with him Patroclus
Upon a lazy bed the livelong day
Breaks scurril jests,

And with ridiculous and awkward action,
Which, slanderer, he imitation calls,

150

Observe degree, priority and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order;
And therefore is the glorious planet Sol
In noble eminence enthroned and sphered
Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
And posts, like the commandment of a king,
Sans check to good and bad: but when the
planets

In evil mixture to disorder wander,
What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!
What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!
Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, hor-

rors,

86

Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states 10
Quite from their fixure! O, when degree is
shaked,

Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing
110

meets

In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,

And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,

So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal

prey,

And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.

And this neglection of degree it is

120

And, like a strutting player, whose conceit Lies in his hamstring, and doth think it rich To hear the wooden dialogue and sound 'Twixt his stretch'd footing and the scaffoldage,— Such to-be-pitied and o'er-wrested seeming He acts thy greatness in: and when he speaks, 'Tis like a chime a-mending; with terms unsquared,

Which, from the tongue of roaring Typhon dropp'd,

me,

160

Patroclus,

171

Would seem hyperboles. At this fusty stuff
The large Achilles, on his press'd bed lolling,
From his deep chest laughs out a loud applause;
Cries 'Excellent! 'tis Agamemnon just.
Now play me Nestor; hem, and stroke thy beard,
As he being drest to some oration.'
That's done, as near as the extremest ends
Of parallels, as like as Vulcan and his wife:
Yet god Achilles still cries 'Excellent!
'Tis Nestor right. Now play him
Arming to answer in a night alarm.'
And then, forsooth, the faint defects of age
Must be the scene of mirth; to cough and spit,
And, with a palsy-fumbling on his gorget,
Shake in and out the rivet: and at this sport
Sir Valour dies; crics 'O, enough, Patroclus;
Or give me ribs of steel! I shall split all
In pleasure of my spleen.' And in this fashion,
All our abilities, gifts, natures, shapes,
Severals and generals of grace exact,
Achievements, plots, orders, preventions,
Excitements to the field, or speech for truce,
Success or loss, what is or is not, serves
As stuff for these two to make paradoxes.

Nest. And in the imitation of these twain-
Who, as Ulysses says, opinion crowns
With an imperial voice-many are infect.
Ajax is grown self-will'd, and bears his head
In such a rein, in full as proud a place

180

As broad Achilles; keeps his tent like him; 190 Makes factious feasts; rails on our state of war, Bold as an oracle, and sets Thersites,

130

A slave whose gall coins slanders like a mint,
To match us in comparisons with dirt,
To weaken and discredit our exposure,

That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose
It hath to climb. The general's disdain'd
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation:
And 'tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.
Nest. Most wisely hath Ulysses here dis-
cover'd

The fever whereof all our power is sick.
Agam. The nature of the sickness found,
Ulysses,

140

How rank soever rounded in with danger.
Ulyss. They tax our policy, and call it cow-
ardice,

Count wisdom as no member of the war,
Forestall prescience and esteem no act
But that of hand: the still and mental parts, 200
That do contrive how many hands shall strike,
When fitness calls them on, and know by measure
Of their observant toil the enemies' weight,-
Why, this hath not a finger's dignity:
They call this bed-work, mappery, closet-war;