Ajax.

Thersites,—

Ther.

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

Ajax.

Thersites,—

Ther.

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

Ajax.

Dog,—

Ther.

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

Ajax.

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

Ther.

The plague of Greece upon thee^{7 note}

Ajax.

Speak then, thou unsalted leaven, speak^{9 note}

Ther.

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^{1 note}!

Ajax.

Toads-stool, learn me the proclamation.

Ther.

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

Ajax.

The proclamation,—

Ther.

Thou art proclaimed 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^{2 note}. When

thou art forth in the incursions, thou strikest as slow as another.

Ajax.

I say, the proclamation,—

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^{3 note}

Ajax.

Mistress Thersites!

Ther.

Thou shouldest strike him.

Ajax.

Cobloaf^{4 note}

Ther.

He would pun thee into shivers^{5 note}

Ajax.

You whoreson cur!

Ther.

Do, do.

Ajax.

Thou stool for a witch^{6 note}!

Ther.

Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinego^{7 note}

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.

Achil.
Marry, this, sir, is proclaimed through all our host:
That Hector, by the first^{6 note} 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. [Exeunt.

SCENE II. Troy. A Room in Priam's Palace. Enter Priam, Hector, Troilus, Paris, and Helenus.

Pri.
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, travel, expence,
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?

Hect.
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 spungy^{7 note}
to suck in the sense of fear,
More ready to cry out—Who knows what follows^{8 note}?
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 the bottom of the worst. Let Helen go:
Since the first sword was drawn about this question,
Every tithe soul, 'mongst many thousand dismes^{9 note}

If we have lost so many tenths of ours,
To guard a thing not ours; not 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?

Tro.
Fye, fye, my brother
Weigh you the worth and honour of a king,
So great as our dread father, in a scale
Of common ounces? will you with counters sum
The past-proportion of his infinite^{1 note}
?
And buckle-in a waist most fathomless,
With spans and inches so diminutive
As fears and reasons? fye, for godly shame!

Hel.
No marvel, though you bite so sharp at reasons^{2 note}

Tro.
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 dis-orb'd^{3 note}
?—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^{4 note}

Hect.
Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost
The holding.

Tro.
What is aught, but as 'tis valued?

Hect.
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;
And the will dotes, that is attributive^{5 note}

Without some image of the affected merit^{6 note}

Tro.
I take to-day a wife, and my election
Is led on in the conduct of my will^{7 note};
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^{8 note} from this, and to stand firm by honour:
We turn not back the silks upon the merchant,
When we have soil'd them^{9 note}
; nor the remainder viands
We do not throw in unrespective sieve^{1 note}

Because we now are full. It was thought meet,
Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks:
Your breath with full consent^{2 note} bellied 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^{3 note}

Beggar the estimation which you priz'd
Richer than sea and land? O theft most base;
That we have stolen what we do fear to keep!
But, thieves^{6 note}

Cas. [Within.]
Cry, Trojans, cry!

Pri.
What noise? what shriek is this?

Tro.
'Tis our mad sister, I do know her voice.

Cas. [Within.]
Cry, Trojans!

Hect.
It is Cassandra. Enter Cassandra, raving^{7 note}



.

Cas.
Cry, Trojans, cry! lend me ten thousand eyes,
And I will fill them with prophetick tears.

Hect.
Peace, sister, peace.

Cas.
Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled elders^{8 note}

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, Trojans, cry! practise your eyes with tears!
Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand^{9 note}
;
Our fire-brand brother^{1 note}

, Paris, burns us all.
Cry, Trojans, cry! a Helen, and a woe:
Cry, cry! Troy burns, or else let Helen go. [Exit.

Hect.
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?

Tro.
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^{2 note} the goodness of a quarrel,

Which hath our several honours all engag'd
To make it gracious^{3 note}. 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!

Par.
Else might the world convince of levity^{4 note}
As well my undertakings, as your counsels:
But I attest the gods, your full consent^{5 note}
Gave wings to my propension, and cut off
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.

Pri.
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.

Par.
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^{6 note}

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.

Hect.
Paris, and Troilus, you have both said well;
And on the cause and question now in hand
Have gloz'd^{7 note}

Unfit to hear moral philosophy:
The reasons, you allege, do more conduce
To the hot passion of distemper'd blood,
Than to make up a free determination
'Twixt right and wrong; For pleasure, and revenge,
Have ears more deaf than adders^{9 note} to the voice
Of any true decision. Nature craves,
All dues be render'd 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^{1 note}
To their benumbed wills^{2 note}, resist the same;
There is a law^{3 note} 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^{4 note}: yet, ne'ertheless,

My spritely brethren, I propend to you
In resolution to keep Helen still;
For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependance
Upon our joint and several dignities.

Tro.
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^{5 note},
I would not wish a drop of Trojan 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^{6 note}:
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.

Hect.
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 advértis'd, their great general slept,
Whilst emulation^{7 note}

SCENE III. The Grecian Camp. Before Achilles' Tent. Enter Thersites.

Ther.

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 railed 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^{8 note}. 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^{9 note}

; if ye take not that little little less-than-little wit from them that they have! which short-armed ignorance itself knows is so abundant scarce, it will not in circumvention deliver a fly from a spider, without drawing their massy irons^{1 note}

on the whole camp! or, rather, the bone-ache^{2 note}

Patr.

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

Ther.

If I could have remembered a gilt counterfeit, thou wouldest not have slipped out of my contemplation^{4 note}: 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^{5 note}

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?

Patr.

What, art thou devout? wast thou in prayer?

Ther.

Ay; The heavens hear me!

Achil.

Who's there?

Patr.

Thersites, my lord.

Achil.

Where, 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?

Ther.

Thy commander, Achilles;—Then tell me, Patroclus, what's Achilles?

Patr.

Thy lord, Thersites; Then tell me, I pray thee, what's thyself?

Ther.

Thy knower, Patroclus; Then tell me, Patroclus, what art thou?

Patr.

Thou mayest tell, that knowest.

Achil.

O tell, tell.

Ther.

I'll decline the whole question^{6 note}. Agamemnon commands Achilles; Achilles is my lord; I am Patroclus' knower; and Patroclus is a fool^{7 note}.

Patr.

You rascal!

Ther.

Peace, fool; I have not done.

Achil.

He is a privileged man.—Proceed, Thersites.

Ther.

Agamemnon is a fool; Achilles is a fool;

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

Achil.

Derive this: come.

Ther.

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 Patroclus is a fool positive^{8 note}.

Patr.

Why am I a fool?

Ther.

Make that demand of the prover^{9 note}