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Dio. Nay, then,

Cres.

I'll tell you what:

Dio. Pho! pho! come, tell a pin: You are for

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Cres. In faith, I cannot: What would you have me.

do?

Ther. A juggling trick, to be-secretly open.

Dio. What did you swear you would bestow on me? Cres. I pr'ythee, do not hold me to mine oath ; Bid me do any thing but that, sweet Greek.

Dio. Good night.

Tro.

Hold, patience!

Ulyss.

Cres.

How now, Trojan?
Diomed,

Dio. No, no, good night: I'll be your fool no more.

Tro. Thy better must.

Cres.

Hark! one word in your ear.

Tro. O plague and madness!

Ulyss. You are mov'd, prince; let us depart, I pray

you,

Lest your displeasure should enlarge itself
To wrathful terms; this place is dangerous;
The time right deadly; I beseech you, go.
Tro. Behold, I pray you!

Ulyss.

You flow to great destruction; come, my lord.

Tro. I pr'ythee, stay.

Ulyss.

Now, good my lord, go off:

You have not patience; come.

Tro. I pray you, stay; by hell, and all hell's tor

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Cres.

Guardian!-why, Greek!

Dio. Pho, pho! adieu; you palter 7.

Cres. In faith, I do not; come hither once again. Ulyss. You shake, my lord, at something; will you go? You will break out.

Tro.

Ulyss.

She strokes his cheek!

Come, come.

Tro. Nay, stay; by Jove, I will not speak a word : There is between my will and all offences

A guard of patience :-stay a little while.

Ther. How the devil luxury, with his fat rump, and potatoe finger, tickles these together! Fry, lechery, fry!

Dio. But will you then?

Cres. In faith, I will, la; never trust me else.

Dio. Give me some token for the surety of it.
Cres. I'll fetch you one.

[Exit.

Fear me not, my lord;

Ulyss. You have sworn patience.

Tro.

I will not be myself, nor have cognition
Of what I feel; I am all patience.

Re-enter CRESSIDA.

Ther. Now the pledge; now, now, now!
Cres. Here, Diomed, keep this sleeve.

Tro. O beauty! where's thy faith?

Ulyss.

My lord,

Tro. I will be patient; outwardly I will.

Cres. You look upon that sleeve; Behold it well.He loved me-O false wench !-Giv't me again. Dio. Whose was't?

7

8

palter.] i. e. shuffle, behave with duplicity.

· keep this sleeve.] The custom of wearing a lady's sleeve for a favour, is of ancient date, but the sleeve given in the present instance was the sleeve of Troilus. It may be supposed to be an ornamented cuff, such, perhaps, as was worn by some of our young nobility at a tilt, in Shakspeare's age.

Cres.

No matter †, now I have't again.

I will not meet with you to-morrow night:

I pr'ythee, Diomed, visit me no more.

Ther. Now she sharpens;-Well said, whetstone.
Dio. I shall have it.

Cres.

Dio.

What, this?

Ay, that.

Cres. O, all you gods !-O pretty pretty pledge!
Thy master now lies thinking in his bed
Of thee, and me; and sighs, and takes my glove,
And gives memorial dainty kisses to it,
As I kiss thee.-Nay, do not snatch it from me;
He, that takes that, must take my heart withal.
Dio. I had your heart before, this follows it.
Tro. I did swear patience.

Cres. You shall not have it, Diomed; 'faith you shall

not;

I'll give you something else.

Dio. I will have this; Whose was it?

Cres.

Dio. Come, tell me whose it was.

'Tis no matter.

Cres. 'Twas one's that loved me better than you will, But, now you have it, take it.

Dio.

Whose was it?

Cres. By all Diana's waiting-women yonder, And by herself, I will not tell you whose.

Dio. To-morrow will I wear it on my helm; And grieve his spirit, that dares not challenge it. Tro. Wert thou the devil, and wor'st it on thy horn, It should be challeng'd.

Cres. Well, well, 'tis done, 'tis past;-And yet it is not; I will not keep my word.

Dio.

Why then, farewell;

Thou never shalt mock Diomed again.

+ "It is no matter,"-MALONE.

9 By all Diana's waiting-women yonder,] i. e. the stars which she points to.

Cres. You shall not go:-One cannot speak a word, But it straight starts you.

Dio.

I do not like this fooling.

Ther. Nor I, by Pluto: but that that likes not you,

pleases me best.

Dio. What, shall I come? the hour?
Cres.

Do come :-I shall be plagu'd.

Dio.

Ay, come:-O Jove!

Farewell till then.

[Exit DIOMEDES.

Cres. Good night. I pr'ythee, come.

Troilus, farewell! one eye yet looks on thee;
But with my heart the other eye doth see.
Ah! poor our sex! this fault in us I find,
The error of our eye directs our mind:
What error leads, must err; O then conclude,
Minds, sway'd by eyes, are full of turpitude.

[Exit CRESSIDA.

Ther. A proof of strength she could not publish

more,

Unless she said, My mind is now turn'd whore.

Ulyss. All's done, my lord.

Tro.

Ulyss.

It is.

Why stay we then?

Tro. To make a recordation to my soul
Of every syllable that here was spoke.
But, if I tell how these two did co-act,
Shall I not lie in publishing a truth?
Sith yet there is a credence in my heart,
An esperance so obstinately strong,

That doth invert the attest of eyes and ears;
As if those organs had deceptious functions,
Created only to calumniate.

Was Cressid here?

Ulyss.

I cannot conjure, Trojan '.

1 I cannot conjure, Trojan.] That is, I cannot raise spirits in the form of Cressida.

Tro. She was not, sure.

Ulyss.

Most sure she was.

Tro. Why, my negation hath no taste of madness. Ulyss. Nor mine, my lord: Cressid was here but

now.

Tro. Let it not be believ'd for womanhood"!
Think, we had mothers; do not give advantage
To stubborn criticks 3-apt, without a theme,
For depravation,-to square the general sex
By Cressid's rule: rather think this not Cressid.
Ulyss. What hath she done, prince, that can soil our
mothers?

Tro. Nothing at all, unless that this were she.
Ther. Will he swagger himself out on's own eyes?
Tro. This she? no, this is Diomed's Cressida :

If beauty have a soul, this is not she;

If souls guide vows, if vows be sanctimony,
If sanctimony be the gods' delight,
If there be rule in unity itself',

This was 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 commence a fight
Of this strange nature, that a thing inseparate"
Divides more wider than the sky and earth;

2

for womanhood!] i. e. for the sake of womanhood. 3 To stubborn criticks-] Critick has here, probably, the signification of cynick.

If there be rule in unity itself,] If it be true that one individual cannot be two distinct persons.

5

where reason can revolt

Without perdition, and loss assume all reason

Without revolt ;] The words loss and perdition are used in their

common sense, but they mean the loss or perdition of reason.

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- a thing inseparate —] i. e. the plighted troth of lovers. Troilus considers it inseparable, or at least that it ought never to he broken.

VOL, VI.

B b

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