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. 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. Alarum. Enter ENEAS. Ene. How now, prince Troilus? wherefore not a-field? 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. Ene. Tro. By Menelaus. Let him bleed. [Alarum. Ene. Hark! what good sport is out of town to-day! 1 Suits. Tro. Better at home, if would I might, were Queen Hecuba, and Helen. Cres. And whither go they? Alex. He chid Andromache, and struck his armourer; he; In Hector's wrath. Cres. What was his cause of anger? Alex. The noise goes, this: There is among the Greeks A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector; Cres. 2 Good; and what of him? 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 2 By himself. Characters. lion, churlish as the bear, slow as the elephant: a man into whom nature hath so crowded humours, that his valour is crushed into 4 folly, his folly sauced with descretion: 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 gouty Briareus, many hands and no use; or purblind Argus, all eyes and no sight. Cres. But how should this man, that makes me smile, make Hector angry? Alex. They say, he yesterday coped Hector in the battle and struck him down; the disdain and shame whereof hath ever since kept Hector fasting and waking. Enter PANDARUS. Cres. Who comes here? Alex. Madam, your uncle Pandarus. Cres. Hector's a gallant man. Alex. As may be in the world, lady. Cres. Good morrow, uncle Pandarus. Pan. Good morrow, cousin Cressid: what do you talk of? - Good morrow, Alexander.- How do you, cousin? When were you at Ilium? Cres. This morning, uncle. Pan. What were you talking of when I came? Was Hector armed, and gone, ere ye came to Ilium? Helen was not up, was she? Cres. Hector was gone; but Helen was not up. Cres. That were we talking of, and of his anger. Cres. So he says, here. + Mingled with, ¿ Grain 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 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 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. 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 were, Cres. So he is. Pan. 'Condition I had gone barefoot to India. 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. Excuse me. Pan. He is elder. Cres. Pardon me, pardon me. Pan. The other's not come to't; you shall tell me another tale, when the other's come to't. tor shall not have his wit this year. Hec Cres. He shall not need it, if he have his own. Pan. Nor his qualities; Cres. No matter. Pan. Nor his beauty. Cres. 'Twould not become him, his own's better. Pan. You have no judgment, niece: Helen herself swore the other day, that Troilus, for a brown favour, (for so 'tis, I must confess,) — Not brown neither. Cres. No, but brown. Pan. 'Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown. 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 the other day into a 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? 7 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. Čres. O, he smiles valiantly. |