Troilus and Cressida/Act II

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Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare Act II

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ACT II.

SCENE 1. The Grecian camp

[Enter Ajax and THERSITES.]

AJAX.

Thersites!

THERSITES.

Agamemnon—how if he had boils full, an over, generally?

AJAX.

Thersites!

THERSITES.

And those boils did run—say so. Did not the general run

then? Were not that a botchy core?

AJAX.

Dog!

THERSITES.

Then there would come some matter from him;

I see none now.

AJAX.

Thou bitch-wolf's son, canst thou not hear? Feel, then.

[Strikes him.]

THERSITES.

The plague of Greece upon thee, thou mongrel beef-witted

lord!

AJAX.

Speak, then, thou whinid'st leaven, speak. I will beat thee

into handsomeness.

THERSITES.

I shall sooner rail thee into wit and holiness; but I

think thy horse will sooner con an oration than thou learn a

prayer without book. Thou canst strike, canst thou? A red murrain

o' thy jade's tricks!

AJAX.

Toadstool, learn me the proclamation.

THERSITES.

Dost thou think I have no sense, thou strikest me thus?

AJAX.

The proclamation!

THERSITES.

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

AJAX.

Do not, porpentine, do not; my fingers itch.

THERSITES.

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.

AJAX.

I say, the proclamation.

THERSITES.

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 bark'st at him.

AJAX.

Mistress Thersites!

THERSITES.

Thou shouldst strike him.

AJAX.

Cobloaf!

THERSITES.

He would pun thee into shivers with his fist, as a

sailor breaks a biscuit.

AJAX.

You whoreson cur!

[Strikes him.]

THERSITES.

Do, do.

AJAX.

Thou stool for a witch!

THERSITES.

Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! Thou hast no more

brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinico may tutor thee. You

scurvy valiant ass! Thou art here but to thrash Troyans, 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!

THERSITES.

You scurvy lord!

AJAX.

You cur!

[Strikes him.]

THERSITES.

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

[Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS.]

ACHILLES.

Why, how now, Ajax! Wherefore do you thus?

How now, Thersites! What's the matter, man?

THERSITES.

You see him there, do you?

ACHILLES.

Ay; what's the matter?

THERSITES.

Nay, look upon him.

ACHILLES.

So I do. What's the matter?

THERSITES.

Nay, but regard him well.

ACHILLES.

Well! why, so I do.

THERSITES.

But yet you look not well upon him; for who some ever

you take him to be, he is Ajax.

ACHILLES.

I know that, fool.

THERSITES.

Ay, but that fool knows not himself.

AJAX.

Therefore I beat thee.

THERSITES.

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.

ACHILLES.

What?

THERSITES.

I say this Ajax—

[AJAX offers to strike him.]

ACHILLES.

Nay, good Ajax.

THERSITES.

Has not so much wit—

ACHILLES.

Nay, I must hold you.

THERSITES.

As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, for whom he

comes to fight.

ACHILLES.

Peace, fool.

THERSITES.

I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not—

he there; that he; look you there.

AJAX.

O thou damned cur! I shall—

ACHILLES.

Will you set your wit to a fool's?

THERSITES.

No, I warrant you, the fool's will shame it.

PATROCLUS.

Good words, Thersites.

ACHILLES.

What's the quarrel?

AJAX.

I bade the vile owl go learn me the tenour of the

proclamation, and he rails upon me.

THERSITES.

I serve thee not.

AJAX.

Well, go to, go to.

THERSITES.

I serve here voluntary.

ACHILLES.

Your last service was suff'rance; 'twas not voluntary. No

man is beaten voluntary. Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as

under an impress.

THERSITES.

E'en so; a great deal of your wit too lies in your

sinews, or else there be liars. Hector shall have a great catch

an he knock out either of your brains: 'a were as good crack a

fusty nut with no kernel.

ACHILLES.

What, with me too, Thersites?

THERSITES.

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.

ACHILLES.

What, what?

THERSITES.

Yes, good sooth. To Achilles, to Ajax, to—

AJAX.

I shall cut out your tongue.

THERSITES.

'Tis no matter; I shall speak as much as thou

afterwards.

PATROCLUS.

No more words, Thersites; peace!

THERSITES.

I will hold my peace when Achilles' brach bids me, shall I?

ACHILLES.

There's for you, Patroclus.

THERSITES.

I will see you hang'd like clotpoles ere I come any more

to your tents. I will keep where there is wit stirring, and leave

the faction of fools.

[Exit.]

PATROCLUS.

A good riddance.

ACHILLES.

Marry, this, sir, is proclaim'd through all our host,

That Hector, by the fifth 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?

ACHILLES.

I know not; 'tis put to lott'ry. Otherwise. He knew his man.

AJAX.

O, meaning you! I will go learn more of it.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 2. Troy. PRIAM'S palace

[Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, PARIS, and HELENUS.]

PRIAM.

After so many hours, lives, speeches, spent,

Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks:

'Deliver Helen, and all damage else—

As honour, loss of time, travail, expense,

Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consum'd

In hot digestion of this cormorant war—

Shall be struck off.' Hector, what say you to't?

HECTOR.

Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I,

As far as toucheth my particular,

Yet, dread Priam,

There is no lady of more softer bowels,

More spongy to suck in the sense of fear,

More ready to cry out 'Who knows what follows?'

Than Hector is. The wound of peace is surety,

Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd

The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches

To th' bottom of the worst. Let Helen go.

Since the first sword was drawn about this question,

Every tithe soul 'mongst many thousand dismes

Hath been as dear as Helen—I mean, of ours.

If we have lost so many tenths of ours

To guard a thing not ours, nor worth to us,

Had it our name, the value of one ten,

What merit's in that reason which denies

The yielding of her up?

TROILUS.

Fie, fie, my brother!

Weigh you the worth and honour of a king,

So great as our dread father's, in a scale

Of common ounces? Will you with counters sum

The past-proportion of his infinite,

And buckle in a waist most fathomless

With spans and inches so diminutive

As fears and reasons? Fie, for godly shame!

HELENUS.

No marvel though you bite so sharp at reasons,

You are so empty of them. Should not our father

Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons,

Because your speech hath none that tells him so?

TROILUS.

You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest;

You fur your gloves with reason. Here are your reasons:

You know an enemy intends you harm;

You know a sword employ'd is perilous,

And reason flies the object of all harm.

Who marvels, then, when Helenus beholds

A Grecian and his sword, if he do set

The very wings of reason to his heels

And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,

Or like a star disorb'd? Nay, if we talk of reason,

Let's shut our gates and sleep. Manhood and honour

Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their thoughts

With this cramm'd reason. Reason and respect

Make livers pale and lustihood deject.

HECTOR.

Brother, she is not worth what she doth, cost

The keeping.

TROILUS.

What's aught but as 'tis valued?

HECTOR.

But value dwells not in particular will:

It holds his estimate and dignity

As well wherein 'tis precious of itself

As in the prizer. 'Tis mad idolatry

To make the service greater than the god—I

And the will dotes that is attributive

To what infectiously itself affects,

Without some image of th' affected merit.

TROILUS.

I take to-day a wife, and my election

Is led on in the conduct of my will;

My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears,

Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores

Of will and judgment: how may I avoid,

Although my will distaste what it elected,

The wife I chose? There can be no evasion

To blench from this and to stand firm by honour.

We turn not back the silks upon the merchant

When we have soil'd them; nor the remainder viands

We do not throw in unrespective sieve,

Because we now are full. It was thought meet

Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks;

Your breath with full consent benied his sails;

The seas and winds, old wranglers, took a truce,

And did him service. He touch'd the ports desir'd;

And for an old aunt whom the Greeks held captive

He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness

Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes stale the morning.

Why keep we her? The Grecians keep our aunt.

Is she worth keeping? Why, she is a pearl

Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships,

And turn'd crown'd kings to merchants.

If you'll avouch 'twas wisdom Paris went—

As you must needs, for you all cried 'Go, go'—

If you'll confess he brought home worthy prize—

As you must needs, for you all clapp'd your hands,

And cried 'Inestimable!'—why do you now

The issue of your proper wisdoms rate,

And do a deed that never fortune did—

Beggar the estimation which you priz'd

Richer than sea and land? O theft most base,

That we have stol'n what we do fear to keep!

But thieves unworthy of a thing so stol'n

That in their country did them that disgrace

We fear to warrant in our native place!

CASSANDRA.

[Within.]

Cry, Troyans, cry.

PRIAM.

What noise, what shriek is this?

TROILUS.

'Tis our mad sister; I do know her voice.

CASSANDRA.

[Within.]

Cry, Troyans.

HECTOR.

It is Cassandra.

[Enter CASSANDRA, raving.]

CASSANDRA.

Cry, Troyans, cry. Lend me ten thousand eyes,

And I will fill them with prophetic tears.

HECTOR.

Peace, sister, peace.

CASSANDRA.

Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled eld,

Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry,

Add to my clamours. Let us pay betimes

A moiety of that mass of moan to come.

Cry, Troyans, cry. Practise your eyes with tears.

Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand;

Our firebrand brother, Paris, burns us all.

Cry, Troyans, cry, A Helen and a woe!

Cry, cry. Troy burns, or else let Helen go.

[Exit.]

HECTOR.

Now, youthful Troilus, do not these high strains

Of divination in our sister work

Some touches of remorse, or is your blood

So madly hot that no discourse of reason,

Nor fear of bad success in a bad cause,

Can qualify the same?

TROILUS.

Why, brother Hector,

We may not think the justness of each act

Such and no other than event doth form it;

Nor once deject the courage of our minds

Because Cassandra's mad. Her brain-sick raptures

Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel

Which hath our several honours all engag'd

To make it gracious. For my private part,

I am no more touch'd than all Priam's sons;

And Jove forbid there should be done amongst us

Such things as might offend the weakest spleen

To fight for and maintain.

PARIS.

Else might the world convince of levity

As well my undertakings as your counsels;

But I attest the gods, your full consent

Gave wings to my propension, and cut of

All fears attending on so dire a project.

For what, alas, can these my single arms?

What propugnation is in one man's valour

To stand the push and enmity of those

This quarrel would excite? Yet, I protest,

Were I alone to pass the difficulties,

And had as ample power as I have will,

Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done

Nor faint in the pursuit.

PRIAM.

Paris, you speak

Like one besotted on your sweet delights.

You have the honey still, but these the gall;

So to be valiant is no praise at all.

PARIS.

Sir, I propose not merely to myself

The pleasures such a beauty brings with it;

But I would have the soil of her fair rape

Wip'd off in honourable keeping her.

What treason were it to the ransack'd queen,

Disgrace to your great worths, and shame to me,

Now to deliver her possession up

On terms of base compulsion! Can it be

That so degenerate a strain as this

Should once set footing in your generous bosoms?

There's not the meanest spirit on our party

Without a heart to dare or sword to draw

When Helen is defended; nor none so noble

Whose life were ill bestow'd or death unfam'd

Where Helen is the subject. Then, I say,

Well may we fight for her whom we know well

The world's large spaces cannot parallel.

HECTOR.

Paris and Troilus, you have both said well;

And on the cause and question now in hand

Have gloz'd, but superficially; not much

Unlike young men, whom Aristode thought

Unfit to hear moral philosophy.

The reasons you allege do more conduce

To the hot passion of distemp'red blood

Than to make up a free determination

'Twixt right and wrong; for pleasure and revenge

Have ears more deaf than adders to the voice

Of any true decision. Nature craves

All dues be rend'red to their owners. Now,

What nearer debt in all humanity

Than wife is to the husband? If this law

Of nature be corrupted through affection;

And that great minds, of partial indulgence

To their benumbed wills, resist the same;

There is a law in each well-order'd nation

To curb those raging appetites that are

Most disobedient and refractory.

If Helen, then, be wife to Sparta's king—

As it is known she is-these moral laws

Of nature and of nations speak aloud

To have her back return'd. Thus to persist

In doing wrong extenuates not wrong,

But makes it much more heavy. Hector's opinion

Is this, in way of truth. Yet, ne'er the less,

My spritely brethren, I propend to you

In resolution to keep Helen still;

For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependence

Upon our joint and several dignities.

TROILUS.

Why, there you touch'd the life of our design.

Were it not glory that we more affected

Than the performance of our heaving spleens,

I would not wish a drop of Troyan blood

Spent more in her defence. But, worthy Hector,

She is a theme of honour and renown,

A spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds,

Whose present courage may beat down our foes,

And fame in time to come canonize us;

For I presume brave Hector would not lose

So rich advantage of a promis'd glory

As smiles upon the forehead of this action

For the wide world's revenue.

HECTOR.

I am yours,

You valiant offspring of great Priamus.

I have a roisting challenge sent amongst

The dull and factious nobles of the Greeks

Will strike amazement to their drowsy spirits.

I was advertis'd their great general slept,

Whilst emulation in the army crept.

This, I presume, will wake him.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE 3. The Grecian camp. Before the tent of ACHILLES

[Enter THERSITES, solus.]

THERSITES.

How now, Thersites! What, lost in the labyrinth of thy

fury? Shall the elephant Ajax carry it thus? He beats me, and I

rail at him. O worthy satisfaction! Would it were otherwise: that

I could beat him, whilst he rail'd at me! 'Sfoot, I'll learn to

conjure and raise devils, but I'll see some issue of my spiteful

execrations. Then there's Achilles, a rare engineer! If Troy be

not taken till these two undermine it, the walls will stand till

they fall of themselves. O thou great thunder-darter of Olympus,

forget that thou art Jove, the king of gods, and, Mercury, lose

all the serpentine craft of thy caduceus, if ye take not that

little little less-than-little wit from them that they have!

which short-arm'd ignorance itself knows is so abundant scarce,

it will not in circumvention deliver a fly from a spider without

drawing their massy irons and cutting the web. After this, the

vengeance on the whole camp! or, rather, the Neapolitan

bone-ache! for that, methinks, is the curse depending on those

that war for a placket. I have said my prayers; and devil Envy

say 'Amen.' What ho! my Lord Achilles!

[Enter PATROCLUS.]

PATROCLUS.

Who's there? Thersites! Good Thersites, come in and rail.

THERSITES.

If I could 'a rememb'red a gilt counterfeit, thou

wouldst not have slipp'd out of my contemplation; but it is no

matter; thyself upon thyself! The common curse of mankind, folly

and ignorance, be thine in great revenue! Heaven bless thee from

a tutor, and discipline come not near thee! Let thy blood be thy

direction till thy death. Then if she that lays thee out says

thou art a fair corse, I'll be sworn and sworn upon't she never

shrouded any but lazars. Amen. Where's Achilles?

PATROCLUS.

What, art thou devout? Wast thou in prayer?

THERSITES.

Ay, the heavens hear me!

PATROCLUS.

Amen.

[Enter ACHILLES.]

ACHILLES.

Who's there?

PATROCLUS.

Thersites, my lord.

ACHILLES.

Where, where? O, where? Art thou come? Why, my cheese, my

digestion, why hast thou not served thyself in to my table so

many meals? Come, what's Agamemnon?

THERSITES.

Thy commander, Achilles. Then tell me, Patroclus, what's

Achilles?

PATROCLUS.

Thy lord, Thersites. Then tell me, I pray thee, what's

Thersites?

THERSITES.

Thy knower, Patroclus. Then tell me, Patroclus, what art

thou?

PATROCLUS.

Thou must tell that knowest.

ACHILLES.

O, tell, tell,

THERSITES.

I'll decline the whole question. Agamemnon commands

Achilles; Achilles is my lord; I am Patroclus' knower; and

Patroclus is a fool.

PATROCLUS.

You rascal!

THERSITES.

Peace, fool! I have not done.

ACHILLES.

He is a privileg'd man. Proceed, Thersites.

THERSITES.

Agamemnon is a fool; Achilles is a fool; Thersites is a

fool; and, as aforesaid, Patroclus is a fool.

ACHILLES.

Derive this; come.

THERSITES.

Agamemnon is a fool to offer to command Achilles; Achilles is a

fool to be commanded of Agamemnon; Thersites is a fool to serve

such a fool; and this Patroclus is a fool positive.

PATROCLUS.

Why am I a fool?

THERSITES.

Make that demand of the Creator. It suffices me thou

art. Look you, who comes here?

ACHILLES.

Come, Patroclus, I'll speak with nobody. Come in with me,

Thersites.

[Exit.]

THERSITES.

Here is such patchery, such juggling, and such knavery.

All the argument is a whore and a cuckold-a good quarrel to draw

emulous factions and bleed to death upon. Now the dry serpigo on

the subject, and war and lechery confound all! Exit

[Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR, DIOMEDES, AJAX, and CALCHAS.]

AGAMEMNON.

Where is Achilles?

PATROCLUS.

Within his tent; but ill-dispos'd, my lord.

AGAMEMNON.

Let it be known to him that we are here.

He shent our messengers; and we lay by

Our appertainings, visiting of him.

Let him be told so; lest, perchance, he think

We dare not move the question of our place

Or know not what we are.

PATROCLUS.

I shall say so to him.

[Exit.]

ULYSSES.

We saw him at the opening of his tent.

He is not sick.

AJAX.

Yes, lion-sick, sick of proud heart. You may call it

melancholy, if you will favour the man; but, by my head, 'tis

pride. But why, why? Let him show us a cause. A word, my lord.

[Takes AGAMEMNON aside.]

NESTOR.

What moves Ajax thus to bay at him?

ULYSSES.

Achilles hath inveigled his fool from him.

NESTOR.

Who, Thersites?

ULYSSES.

He.

NESTOR.

Then will Ajax lack matter, if he have lost his argument

ULYSSES.

No; you see he is his argument that has his argument—

Achilles.

NESTOR.

All the better; their fraction is more our wish than their

faction. But it was a strong composure a fool could disunite!

ULYSSES.

The amity that wisdom knits not, folly may easily untie.

[Re-enter PATROCLUS.]

Here comes Patroclus.

NESTOR.

No Achilles with him.

ULYSSES.

The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy; his legs

are legs for necessity, not for flexure.

PATROCLUS.

Achilles bids me say he is much sorry

If any thing more than your sport and pleasure

Did move your greatness and this noble state

To call upon him; he hopes it is no other

But for your health and your digestion sake,

An after-dinner's breath.

AGAMEMNON.

Hear you, Patroclus.

We are too well acquainted with these answers;

But his evasion, wing'd thus swift with scorn,

Cannot outfly our apprehensions.

Much attribute he hath, and much the reason

Why we ascribe it to him. Yet all his virtues,

Not virtuously on his own part beheld,

Do in our eyes begin to lose their gloss;

Yea, like fair fruit in an unwholesome dish,

Are like to rot untasted. Go and tell him

We come to speak with him; and you shall not sin

If you do say we think him over-proud

And under-honest, in self-assumption greater

Than in the note of judgment; and worthier than himself

Here tend the savage strangeness he puts on,

Disguise the holy strength of their command,

And underwrite in an observing kind

His humorous predominance; yea, watch

His pettish lunes, his ebbs, his flows, as if

The passage and whole carriage of this action

Rode on his tide. Go tell him this, and ad

That if he overhold his price so much

We'll none of him, but let him, like an engine

Not portable, lie under this report:

Bring action hither; this cannot go to war.

A stirring dwarf we do allowance give

Before a sleeping giant. Tell him so.

PATROCLUS.

I shall, and bring his answer presently.

[Exit.]

AGAMEMNON.

In second voice we'll not be satisfied;

We come to speak with him. Ulysses, enter you.

[Exit ULYSSES.]

AJAX.

What is he more than another?

AGAMEMNON.

No more than what he thinks he is.

AJAX.

Is he so much? Do you not think he thinks himself a better

man than I am?

AGAMEMNON.

No question.

AJAX.

Will you subscribe his thought and say he is?

AGAMEMNON.

No, noble Ajax; you are as strong, as valiant, as wise,

no less noble, much more gentle, and altogether more tractable.

AJAX.

Why should a man be proud? How doth pride grow? I know not

what pride is.

AGAMEMNON.

Your mind is the clearer, Ajax, and your virtues the

fairer. He that is proud eats up himself. Pride is his own glass,

his own trumpet, his own chronicle; and whatever praises itself

but in the deed devours the deed in the praise.

[Re-enter ULYSSES.]

AJAX.

I do hate a proud man as I do hate the engend'ring of toads.

NESTOR.

[Aside]

And yet he loves himself: is't not strange?

ULYSSES.

Achilles will not to the field to-morrow.

AGAMEMNON.

What's his excuse?

ULYSSES.

He doth rely on none;

But carries on the stream of his dispose,

Without observance or respect of any,

In will peculiar and in self-admission.

AGAMEMNON.

Why will he not, upon our fair request,

Untent his person and share the air with us?

ULYSSES.

Things small as nothing, for request's sake only,

He makes important; possess'd he is with greatness,

And speaks not to himself but with a pride

That quarrels at self-breath. Imagin'd worth

Holds in his blood such swol'n and hot discourse

That 'twixt his mental and his active parts

Kingdom'd Achilles in commotion rages,

And batters down himself. What should I say?

He is so plaguy proud that the death tokens of it

Cry 'No recovery.'

AGAMEMNON.

Let Ajax go to him.

Dear lord, go you and greet him in his tent.

'Tis said he holds you well; and will be led

At your request a little from himself.

ULYSSES.

O Agamemnon, let it not be so!

We'll consecrate the steps that Ajax makes

When they go from Achilles. Shall the proud lord

That bastes his arrogance with his own seam

And never suffers matter of the world

Enter his thoughts, save such as doth revolve

And ruminate himself—shall he be worshipp'd

Of that we hold an idol more than he?

No, this thrice-worthy and right valiant lord

Shall not so stale his palm, nobly acquir'd,

Nor, by my will, assubjugate his merit,

As amply titled as Achilles is,

By going to Achilles.

That were to enlard his fat-already pride,

And add more coals to Cancer when he burns

With entertaining great Hyperion.

This lord go to him! Jupiter forbid,

And say in thunder 'Achilles go to him.'

NESTOR.

[Aside.] O, this is well! He rubs the vein of him.

DIOMEDES.

[Aside.] And how his silence drinks up this applause!

AJAX.

If I go to him, with my armed fist I'll pash him o'er the

face.

AGAMEMNON.

O, no, you shall not go.

AJAX.

An 'a be proud with me I'll pheeze his pride.

Let me go to him.

ULYSSES.

Not for the worth that hangs upon our quarrel.

AJAX.

A paltry, insolent fellow!

NESTOR.

[Aside.] How he describes himself!

AJAX.

Can he not be sociable?

ULYSSES.

[Aside.] The raven chides blackness.

AJAX.

I'll let his humours blood.

AGAMEMNON.

[Aside.] He will be the physician that should be the patient.

AJAX.

An all men were a my mind—

ULYSSES.

[Aside.] Wit would be out of fashion.

AJAX.

'A should not bear it so, 'a should eat's words first.

Shall pride carry it?

NESTOR.

[Aside.] An 'twould, you'd carry half.

ULYSSES.

[Aside.] 'A would have ten shares.

AJAX.

I will knead him, I'll make him supple.

NESTOR.

[Aside.] He's not yet through warm. Force him with praises;

pour in, pour in; his ambition is dry.

ULYSSES.

[To AGAMEMNON.] My lord, you feed too much on this dislike.

NESTOR.

Our noble general, do not do so.

DIOMEDES.

You must prepare to fight without Achilles.

ULYSSES.

Why 'tis this naming of him does him harm.

Here is a man-but 'tis before his face;

I will be silent.

NESTOR.

Wherefore should you so?

He is not emulous, as Achilles is.

ULYSSES.

Know the whole world, he is as valiant.

AJAX.

A whoreson dog, that shall palter with us thus!

Would he were a Troyan!

NESTOR.

What a vice were it in Ajax now—

ULYSSES.

If he were proud.

DIOMEDES.

Or covetous of praise.

ULYSSES.

Ay, or surly borne.

DIOMEDES.

Or strange, or self-affected.

ULYSSES.

Thank the heavens, lord, thou art of sweet composure

Praise him that gat thee, she that gave thee suck;

Fam'd be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature

Thrice-fam'd beyond, beyond all erudition;

But he that disciplin'd thine arms to fight—

Let Mars divide eternity in twain

And give him half; and, for thy vigour,

Bull-bearing Milo his addition yield

To sinewy Ajax. I will not praise thy wisdom,

Which, like a bourn, a pale, a shore, confines

Thy spacious and dilated parts. Here's Nestor,

Instructed by the antiquary times—

He must, he is, he cannot but be wise;

But pardon, father Nestor, were your days

As green as Ajax' and your brain so temper'd,

You should not have the eminence of him,

But be as Ajax.

AJAX.

Shall I call you father?

NESTOR.

Ay, my good son.

DIOMEDES.

Be rul'd by him, Lord Ajax.

ULYSSES.

There is no tarrying here; the hart Achilles

Keeps thicket. Please it our great general

To call together all his state of war;

Fresh kings are come to Troy. To-morrow

We must with all our main of power stand fast;

And here's a lord—come knights from east to west

And cull their flower, Ajax shall cope the best.

AGAMEMNON.

Go we to council. Let Achilles sleep.

Light boats sail swift, though greater hulks draw deep.

[Exeunt.]