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IN Troy, there lies the scene. From isles of Greece
The princes orgulous, their high blood chaf'd,
Have to the port of Athens sent their ships,
Fraught with the ministers and instruments
Of cruel war sixty and nine, that wore
Their crownets regal, from th' Athenian bay
Put forth toward Phrygia; and their vow is made,
To ransack Troy, within whose strong immures
The ravish'd Helen, Menelaus' queen,
With wanton Paris sleeps; and that's the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come,

And the deep-drawing barks do there disgorge
Their warlike fraughtage: now on Dardan plains
The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch
Their brave pavilions: Priam's six-gated city,
Dardan, and Tymbria, Ilias, Chetas, Trojan,

And Antenorides, with massy staples
And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts,
Sperr up the sons of Troy.

Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits
On one and other side, Trojan and Greek,
Sets all on hazard.-And hither am I come
A Prologue arm'd,-but not in confidence
Of author's pen, or actor's voice, but suited
In like conditions as our argument,-
To tell you, fair beholders, that our play
Leaps o'er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils,
Beginning in the middle; starting thence away
To what may be digested in a play.

Like, or find fault; do as your pleasures are;
Now, good or bad, 'tis but the chance of war.

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Pan. Ay, the bolting; but you must tarry the leavening.

Tro. Still have I tarried.

Pan. Ay, to the leavening: but here's yet, in the word hereafter, the kneading, the making of the cake, the heating the oven, and the baking: nay, you must stay the cooling too, or you may chance burn your lips. Tro. Patience herself, what goddess e'er she be,

Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do.
At Priam's royal table do I sit;

And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts,-
So, traitor!-when she comes!-When is she thence?
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)
Bury'd 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.

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
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;
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; ill-thought 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-amoor; 'tis all one to me.

She's a
Greeks;
For my

Tro. Say I, she is not fair? Pan. I do not care whether you do or no. fool to stay behind her father: let her to the and so I'll tell her the next time I see her. part, I'll meddle nor make no more i' the matter. Tro. Pandarus.

Pan. Not I.

Tro. Sweet Pandarus,

Tro. Peace, you ungracious clamours! peace, rude

sounds!

Fools on both sides! Helen must needs be fair,
When with your blood you daily paint her thus.
I cannot fight upon this argument;
It is too starv'd 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?

Pan. Pray you, speak no more to me: I will leave all as I found it, and there an end.

[Exit PANDARUS. An Alarum.

Tro. Because not there: this woman's answer sorts, 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 gor'd with Menelaus' horn. [Alarum. Ene. Hark, what good sport is out of town to-day! Tro. Better at home, if "would I might," were

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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 mov'd:
He chid Andromache, and struck his armourer;
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, thus: 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.

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

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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?

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? Do you know a man if you see him?

Cres. Ay; if I ever saw him before, and knew him.
Pan. Well, I say, Troilus is Troilus.

Cres. Then you say as I say; for, I am sure, he is not Hector.

Pan. No, nor Hector is not Troilus, in some degrees.
Cres. 'Tis just to each of them; he is himself.
Pan. Himself? Alas, poor Troilus! I would, he

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Pan. She prais'd his complexion above Paris.
Cres. Why, Paris hath colour enough.

Pan. So he has.

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 arithmetick 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 lifter? Pan. But, to prove to you that Helen loves him :-she came, and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin,

Cres. Juno have mercy! How came it cloven?

Pan. Why, you know, 'tis dimpled. I think his smiling becomes him better than any man in all Phrygia.

Cres. O! he smiles valiantly.
Pan. Does he not?

Cres. O! yes, an 'twere a cloud in autumn.
Pan. Why, go to then.-But to prove to you that
Helen loves Troilus,-

Cres. Troilus will stand to the proof, if you'll 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.

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? 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.

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.

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Pan. That's Hector; that, that, look you, that; there's a fellow !-Go thy way, Hector.-There's a brave man, niece. O brave Hector!-Look how he looks; there's a countenance. Is't not a brave man?

Cres. O! a brave man.

Pan. Is 'a not? It does a man's heart good-Look you what hacks are on his helmet! look you yonder, do you see? look you there. There's no jesting: there's laying on, tak't off who will, as they say; there be hacks?

Cres. Be those with swords?

PARIS passes over.

look well upon him, niece: look you how his sword is
bloodied, and his helm more hack'd 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.
Soldiers pass over the Stage.

Pan. Swords? any thing, he cares not; an the devil come to him, it's all one: by god's lid, it does one's heart good.-Yonder comes Paris; yonder comes Paris: look ye yonder, niece: is't not a gallant man too, is't not?-Why, this is brave now.-Who said he came hurt home to-day? he's not hurt: why, this will do Helen's heart good now. Ha! would I could see Troilus now.-You shall see Troilus anon.

Cres. Who's that?

HELENUS passes over.

Cres. Here come more.

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.

Pan. That's Helenus. I marvel, where Troilus is. That's Helenus.-I think he went not forth to-day. That's Helenus.

Cres. Can Helenus fight, uncle?

Cres. There is among the Greeks Achilles, a better man than Troilus.

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 over.

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?

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

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

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; upon my mask, to defend my beauty; and upon you, to defend all these and at all these wards I lie, at a thousand watches.

Pan. Say one of your watches.

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.

I

Pan. You are such another!
Enter TROILUS' Boy.

Boy. Sir, my lord would instantly speak with you.
Pan. Where?

Boy. At your own house; there he unarms him.
Pan. Good boy, tell him I come.
[Exit Boy.

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 enterprize;
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 belov'd knows nought, that knows not
this,-

Men prize the thing ungain'd more than it is:
That she was never yet, that ever knew
Love got so sweet as when desire did sue.
Therefore, this maxim out of love I teach,-
Achieved men still command; ungain'd, beseech:
Then, though my heart's content firm love doth bear,
Pan. Mark him; note him.-O brave Troilus! Nothing of that shall from mine eyes appear. [Exit.

Cres. Peace! for shame; peace!

SCENE III.

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

SCENE III.-The Grecian Camp. Before AGAMEM-I give to both your speeches, which were such,

NON'S Tent.

Sennet. Enter AGAMEMNON, NESTOR, ULYSSES,
MENELAUS, and others.

Agam. Princes,

What grief hath set the jaundice on your cheeks?
The ample proposition, that hope makes

In all designs begun on earth below,

Fails in the promis'd largeness: checks and disasters
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 gav't surmised shape. Why then, you princes,
Do with cheeks abash'd behold our wrecks,

you

And call them shames, which are, indeed, nought else
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 affin'd 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.

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,
Bounding between the two moist elements,

Like Perseus' horse: where's then the saucy boat,
Whose weak untimber'd sides but even now
Co-rival'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 brightness,
The herd hath more annoyance by the brize,
Than by the tiger; but when the splitting wind
Makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks,

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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 experienc'd 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 mastiff jaws,
We shall hear music, wit, and oracle.

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
Hollow upon
this plain, so many hollow factions.
When that the general is not like the hive,
To whom the foragers shall all repair,
What honey is expected? Degree being vizarded,
Th' unworthiest shows as fairly in the mask.

The heavens themselves, the planets, and this centre,
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 enthron'd and spher'd
Amidst the other; whose med 'cinable 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, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixure!

O! when degree is shak'd,
Which is the ladder to 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 thing 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:

And flies fled under shade, why then, the thing of Force should be right; or, rather, right and wrong,

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(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,

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;

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