PROLOGUE.

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 the Athenian bay
Put forward toward Phrygia: and their vow is made,
To ransack Troy; within those strong immures
The ravish'd Helen, Menelaus' queen,
With wanton Paris sleeps; and that's the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come;

Servant to Troilus.

Servant to Paris.

Servant to Diomedes.

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
'Ginning in the middle; starting thence away
To what may be digested in a play.

Act V. Scene 3.

HELEN, Wife to Menelaus.

ANDROMACHE, Wife to Hector.

CASSANDRA, Daughter to Priam, a Prophetess. CRESSIDA, Daughter to Calchas.

Trojan and Greek Soldiers, and Attendants.

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

ACT I.

SCENE I.-Troy. Before Priam's Palace.
Enter TROILUS armed, and PANDARUS.
Tro. Call here my varlet, I'll unarm again :>
Why should I war without the walls of Troy,
That find such cruel battle here within?
Each Trojan, that is master of his heart,
Let him to field; Troilus, alas! hath none.
Pan. Will this geer ne'er be mended?

Tro. The Greeks are strong, and skilful to their

strength,

Fierce to their skill, and to their fierceness valiant;
But I am weaker than a woman's tear,
Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance;
Less valiant than the virgin in the night,
And skill-less as unpractis'd infancy.

Pan. Well, I have told you enough of this: for my part, I'll not meddle nor make no further. He, that will have a cake out of the wheat, must tarry the grinding.

Tro. Have I not tarried?

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

Tro. Have I not tarried?
[leavening.
Pan. Ay, the bolting; but you must tarry the
Tro. Still have I tarried.

Pan. Ay, to the leavening: but here's yet in the word-hereafter, the kneading, the making of the

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 is Troilus will not come far behind him; let them take heed of Troilus; I can tell them that Cres. What, is he angry too?

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

were,

Cres. So he is.

[India.

Pan. 'Condition, I had gone bare-foot to Cres. He is not Hector.

Pan. Himself? no, he's not himself.-'Would 'a were himself! Well, the gods are above; Time must friend, or end: Well, Troilus, well,-I would, my heart were in her body!-No, Hector is not a better man than Troilus.

Cres. Juno have mercy!-How came it cloven? Pan. Why, you know, 'tis dimpled: I think, bis smiling becomes him better than any man in all Phrygia.

Cres. O, he smiles valiantly.

Pan. Does he not?

Cres. Is he so young a man, and so old a lifter? Pan. But, to prove to you, that Heleu loves him; -she came, and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin,

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. Quoth she, Here's but one 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. One 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 be; pluck it out, and give it him. But, there was such laughing! and Helen so blushed, and Paris so chafed, and all the rest so laugh'd, that it pass'd.

Cres. So let it now; for it has been a great while going by. [think on't. Pan. Well, cousin, I told you a thing yesterday; Cres. So I do.

Pan. I'll be sworn, 'tis true; he will weep you, an 'twere a man born in April.

Cres. And I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a nettle against May. (A retreat sounded.) Pan. Hark, they are coming from the field: Shall we stand up here, and see them, as they pass towards Ilium? good niece, do; sweet niece Cressida.

Cres. At your pleasure.

Pan. Here, here, here's an excellent place; here we may see most bravely: I'll tell you them all by their names, as they pass by; but mark Troilus above the rest.

ENEAS passes over the Stage.

Cres. Speak not so loud.

Pan. That's Eneas; Is not that a brave man? he's one of the flowers of Troy, I can tell you; But mark Troilus; you shall see anon. Cres. Who's that?

ANTENOR passes over.

Pan. That's Antenor; he has a shrewd wit, I can tell you; and he's a man good enough: he's one o'the soundest judgments in Troy, whosoever, and a proper man of person:-When comes Troilus? I'll shew you Troilus anon; if he see me, you

shall see him nod at me.

Cres. Will he give you the nod?

Pan. You shall see.

Cres. If he do, the rich shall have more.

HECTOR passes over.

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!

PARIS passes over.

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 youder, 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.

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

Cres. Peace, for shame, peace!

Pan. Mark him; note him;-O brave Troilus! -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.

Forces pass over the Stage. 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.

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

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?

Cres. Ay, a minced man; and then to be baked with no date in the pie,-for then the man's date is 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; and upon my secrecy, to defend mine honesty; my mask, to defend my beauty; and 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 hidand then it is past watching.

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. I 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, griefs, tears, and love's full sacrifice, He offers in another's enterprise: 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,-
Achievement is command; ungain'd, beseech:
Then, though my heart's content firm love doth bear,
Nothing of that shall from mine eyes appear. [Exit.
SCENE III.-The Grecian Camp. Before Agamem-

non's Tent.
Trumpets. 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
Nor, princes, is it matter new to us,
Tortive and errant from his course of growth.
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 gave't surmised shape. Why then, you princes,
Do you with cheeks abash'd behold our works;
And think 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?

[cut,

But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage
The gentle Thetis, and, anon, behold
The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains
Bounding between the two moist elements,
Like Perseus' horse: Where's then the sancy 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 shew, 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,
And flies fled under shade, Why, then, the thing of

courage,

As rous'd with rage, with rage doth sympathize, And with an accent tun'd in self-same key, Returns to chiding fortune.

Ulyss.

Agamemnon,

Thou great commander, nerve and bone of Greece,
Heart of our numbers, soul and only spirit,
In whom the tempers and the minds of all
Should be shut up,-hear what Ulysses speaks.
Besides the applause and approbation
The which,—most mighty for thy place and sway,-
(To Agamemnon.)
And thou most reverend for thy stretch'd-out life,-
(To Nestor.)
I give to both your speeches,-which were such,
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 axle-tree
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.

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:
Force should be right; or, rather, right and wrong,
(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.

The specialty of rule bath 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,
The unworthiest shews 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 aud married calm of states
Quite from their fixture? O, when degree is shak'd,
Which is the ladder of all high designs,
The enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools, and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful comptérce 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 this neglection of degree it is,
That by a pace goes back ward, 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?

Ulyss. 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
'Twixt his stretch'd footing and the scaffoldage,-
Such to-be-pitied and o'er-wrested seeming
He acts thy greatness in: and when he speaks,
'Tis like a chime a-mending; with terms unsquar'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 folling,
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 ories, 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,
Sir Valour dies; cries, O! enough, Patroclus ;-
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.

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