Then, though my heart's content firm love doth | The herd hath more annoyance by the brize,

That we come short of our suppose so far,
That, after seven years' siege, yet Troy walls Should with a bond of air (strong as the axle-tree

1

Quite from their fixture? O, when degree is 'Tis like a chime a-mending; with terms un

shak'd,

Which is the ladder of all high designs,
The enterprize 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 thingmeets
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,

squar'd,

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

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 good Achilles still cries, Excellent!
'Tis Nestor right! Now play him me, Patroclus,
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,

Should lose their names, and so should justice too. Sir Valour dies; cries, O! enough, Patroclus ;

And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or, rather, right and

wrong,

(Between whose endless jar justice resides,)

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.

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.

And this neglection of degree it is,
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 discover'd
The fever, whereof all our power is sick.

Agam. The nature of the sickness found,

Ulysses,

What is the remedy?

Ulys. The great Achilles, whom opinion

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 live-long day

Breaks scurril jests;

And with ridiculous and aukward action

(Which, slanderer, he imitation calls,)

He pageants us. Sometime, great Agamemnon,
Thy topless deputation he puts on;

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

Nest. And in the imitation of these twain

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

(A slave whose gall coins slanders like a mint,)
To match us in comparisons with dirt;
To weaken and discredit our exposure,
How rank soever rounded in with danger.

Ulys. They tax our policy, and call it cowardice;
Count wisdom as no member of the war;
Forestall prescíence, and esteem no act
But that of hand: the still and mental parts,-
That do contrive how many hands shall strike,
When fitness calls them on; and know, by

Agam. What would you 'fore our tent?
Æne. Is this

Great Agamemnon's tent, I pray?
Agam. Even this.

Æne. May one, that is a herald, and a prince,
Do a fair message to his kingly ears?

Agam. With surety stronger than Achilles'

arm

voice

'Fore all the Greekish heads, which with one Call Agamemnon head and general.

Who in this dull and long-continued truce
Is rusty grown; he bade me take a trumpet,
And to this purpose speak. Kings, princes, lords!
If there be one, among the fair'st of Greece,
That holds his honour higher than his ease;
That seeks his praise more than he fears his peril;
That knows his valour, and knows not his fear;
That loves his mistress more than in confession,
(With truant vows to her own lips he loves,)
And dare avow her beauty and her worth,
In other arms than hers, -to him this challenge.

Æne. Fair leave, and large security. How Hector, in view of Trojans and of Greeks,

may
A stranger to those most imperial looks
Know them from eyes of other mortals ?
Agam. How?

Æne. Ay;

I ask, that I might waken reverence,

And bid the cheek be ready with a blush,
Modest as morning, when she coldly eyes
The youthful Phœbus:

Which is that god in office, guiding men ?
Which is the high and mighty Agamemnon ?

Agam. This Trojan scorns us; or the men of
Troy

Are ceremonious courtiers.

Æne. Courtiers as free, as debonair, unarm'd,
As bending angels; that's their fame in peace:
But when they would seem soldiers, they have
galls,

Good arms, strong joints, true swords; and,
Jove's accord,

Nothing so full of heart. But peace, Æneas,
Peace, Trojan; lay thy finger on thy lips!
The worthiness of praise distains his worth,
If that the prais'd himself bring the praise forth:
But what the repining enemy commends,

That breath fame follows; that praise, sole pure,
transcends.

Agam. Sir, you of Troy, call you yourself

Æneas?

Æne. Nor I from Troy come not to whisper him:

I bring a trumpet to awake his ear;

To set his sense on the attentive bent,
And then to speak.

Agam. Speak frankly as the wind;
It is not Agamemnon's sleeping hour :
That thou shalt know, Trojan, he is awake,
He teils thee so himself.

Æne. Trumpet, blow loud,

Shall make it good, or do his best to do it,
He hath a lady, wiser, fairer, truer,
Than ever Greek did compass in his arms;
And will to-morrow with his trumpet call,
Mid-way between your tents and walls of Troy,
To rouse a Grecian that is true in love:
If any come, Hector shall honour him;
If none, he'll say in Troy, when he retires,
The Grecian dames are sun-burn'd, and not

worth

The splinter of a lance. Even so much.
Agam. This shall be told our lovers, lord
Æneas;

If none of them have soul in such a kind,
We left them all at home: But we are soldiers;
And may that soldier a mere recreant prove,
That means not, hath not, or is not in love!
If then one is, or hath, or means to be,
That one meets Hector; if none else, I am he.

Nest. Tell him of Nestor, one that was a man
When Hector's grandsire suck'd: he is old now;
But, if there be not in our Grecian host
One noble man, that hath one spark of fire
To answer for his love, Tell him from me,-
I'll hide my silver beard in a gold beaver,
And in my vantbrace put this wither'd brawn;
And, meeting him, will tell him, that my lady
Was fairer than his grandame, and as chaste
As may be in the world: His youth in flood,
I'll prove this truth with my three drops of blood.
Æne. Now heavens forbid such scarcity of

youth! Ulyss. Amen.

Agam. Fair lord Æneas, let me touch your

hand;

To our pavilion shall I lead you, sir.
Achilles shall have word of this intent;
So shall each lord of Greece, from tent to tent:

Yourself shall feast with us before you go,

And find the welcome of a noble foe.

[Exeunt all but Ulysses and Nestor.

Ulyss. Nestor,-
Nest. What says Ulysses?

Ulyss. I have a young conception in my brain,

Send thy brass voice through all these lazy Be you my time to bring it to some shape.

tents ;

And every Greek of mettle let him know,

What Troy means fairly, shall be spoke aloud. [Trumpet sounds.

We have, great Agamemnon, here in Troy

A prince call'd Hector, (Priam is his father,)

Blunt wedges rive hard knots: The seeded

Nest. What is't?

Ulyss. This 'tis :

pride,

That hath to this maturity blown up

In rank Achilles, must or now be cropp'd,

Nest. The purpose is perspicuous even as sub- The lustre of the better shall exceed,

ACT II.

Ther. Agamemnon-how if he had boils? speak: I'll beat thee into handsomeness.

Ther. And those boils did run?-Say so,did not the general run then? were not that a botchy core?

Ther. Then would come some matter from him; I see none now.

Ajax. The proclamation,

Ther. Thou art proclaim'd a fool, I think.

Ajax. Do not, porcupine, do not; my fingers itch.

Ther. I would thou didst itch from head to foot, and I had the scratching of thee; I would make thee the loathsomest scab in Greece. When thou art forth in the incursions, thou strikest as slow as another.

Ajar. I say, the proelamation,

Ther. Thou grumblest and railest every hour on Achilles; and thou art as full of envy at his greatness, as Cerberus is at Proserpina's beauty, ay, that thou barkest at him.

Ajax. Mistress Thersites!

Ther. Thou should'st strike him.

Ajax. Cobloaf!

Ther. He would pun thee into shivers with

his fist, as a sailor breaks a biscuit.

Ajar. You whoreson cur!
Ther. Do, do.

Ajas. Thou stool for a witch!

[Beating him.

Patr. Good words, Thersites.

Achil. What's the quarrel?

Ajax. I bade the vile owl, go learn me the tenour of the proclamation, and he rails upon me. Ther. I serve thee not.

Ajax. Well, go to, go to,
Ther. I serve here voluntary.

Achil. Your last service was sufferance, 'twas

Ther. Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! | not voluntary; no man is beaten voluntary:

thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinego may tutor thee: Thou scurvy valiant ass! thou art here put to thrash Trojans; and thou art bought and sold among those of any wit, like a barbarian slave. If thou use to beat me, I will begin at thy heel, and tell what thou art by inches, thou thing of no bowels, thou !

Ajax. You dog!

Ther. You scurvy lord!
Ajax. You cur!

[Beating him.

Ther. Mars his idiot! do, rudeness; do, camel; do, do.

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS.

Achil. Why, how now, Ajax? wherefore do

you thus?

How now, Thersites? what's the matter, man?

Ther. You see him there, do you?
Achil. Ay; what's the matter?

Ther. Nay, look upon him.

Achil. So I do; What's the matter?

Ther. Nay, but regard him well.

Achil. Well, why I do so.

Ther. But yet you look not well upon him:

or, whosoever you take him to be, he is Ajax.

Achil. I know that, fool.

Ther. Ay, but that fool knows not himself.
Ajax. Therefore I beat thee.

The

Ther. Lo, lo, lo, lo, what modicums of wit he utters! his evasions have ears thus long. I have bobb'd his brain, more than he has beat my bones: I will buy nine sparrows for a penny, and his pia mater is not worth the ninth part of a sparrow. This lord, Achilles, Ajax,who wears his wit in his belly, and his guts in his head, I'll tell you what I say of him. Achil. What?

Ther, I say, this Ajax

Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.

Ther. Even so?-a great deal of your wit too lies in your sinews, or else there be liars. Несtor shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains; 'a were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

Achil. What, with me too, Thersites?

Ther. 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.

Achil. What, what?

Ther. Yes, good sooth; To, Achilles! to,

Ajax! to!

Ajax. I shall cut out your tongue.

Ther. "Tis no matter; I shall speak as much as thou, afterwards.

Patr. No more words, Thersites; peace.

Ther. I will hold my peace, when Achilles'

brach bids me, shall I ?

Achil. There's for you, Patroclus.

Ther. I will see you hanged, like clotpoles, ere I come any more to your tents; I will keep where there is wit stirring, and leave the faction of fools.

Patr. A good riddance.

[Exit.

Achil. Marry, this, sir, is proclaim'd through

all our host,

That Hector, by the first 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?
Achil. I know not, it is put to lottery; otherwise,
He knew his man.

Ajax. O, meaning you :-I'll go learn more of
it.
[Excunt.