Let me commend thee first to those that shall [Exeunt CORIOLANUS and AUFIDIUS. 1st Serv. [advancing]. Here's a strange alteration! 2nd Serv. By my hand, I had thought to have strucken him with a cudgel; and yet my mind gave me his clothes made a false report of him. 1st Serv. What an arm he has! He turned me about with his finger and his thumb as one would set up a top. 2nd Serv. Nay, I knew by his face that there was something in him: he had, sir, a kind of face, methought,-I cannot tell how to term it. he was ever too hard for him: I have heard him say so himself. 1st Serv. He was too hard for him directly, to say the truth on 't: before Corioli he scotched him and notched him like a carbonado. 2nd Serv. An he had been cannibally given, he might have broiled and eaten him too. 1st Serv. But more of thy news? 3rd Serv. Why, he is so made on here within as if he were son and heir to Mars: set at upper end o'the table: no question asked him by any of the senators but they stand bald before him. Our general himself makes a mistress of him; sanctifies himself with 's hand, and turns up the white o' the eye to his discourse. But the bottom of the news is, our general is cut i' the middle, and but one half of what he was yesterday for the other has half, by the entreaty and grant of the whole table. He'll go, he says, and sowle the porter of Rome gates by the ears: he will mow down all before him, and leave his passage polled. 2nd Serv. And he 's as like to do't as any man I can imagine. 3rd Serv. Do't? he will do 't. For look you, sir, he has as many friends as enemies: which friends, sir (as it were), durst not (look you, sir) shew themselves (as we term it) his friends whilst he's in directitude. 1st Serv. Directitude! what's that? 3rd Serv. But when they shall see, sir, his crest up again, and the man in blood, they will out of their burrows like conies after rain, and revel all with him. 1st Serv. But when goes this forward? 3rd Serv. To-morrow: to-day: presently. You shall have the drum struck up this afternoon : 't is, as it were, a parcel of their feast, and to be executed ere they wipe their lips. 2nd Serv. Why, then we shall have a stirring world again. This peace is nothing but to rust iron, increase tailors, and breed ballad-makers. 1st Serv. Let me have war, say I: it exceeds peace as far as day does night: it's sprightly, waking, audible, and full of vent. Peace is a very apoplexy, lethargy; mulled, deaf, sleepy, insensible; a getter of more bastard children than wars a destroyer of men. 2nd Serv. "Tis so: and as wars, in some sort, may be said to be a ravisher, so it cannot be denied but peace is a great maker of cuckolds. 1st Serv. Ay, and it makes men hate one another. 3rd Serv. Reason; because they then less need one another. The wars for my money: I hope to see Romans as cheap as Volcians. They are rising, they are rising. All. In, in, in, in! [Exeunt. SCENE VI.-Rome. A public Place. Enter SICINIUS and BRUTUS. Sic. We hear not of him, neither need we fear him: His remedies are tame i' the present peace Bru. We stood to 't in good time.-Is this Menenius? Com. O, you have made good work! What news? what news? Com. You have holp to ravish your own daughters, and To melt the city leads upon your pates: Men. Pray now, your news?— Cit. 'Faith, we hear fearful news. 1st Cit. For mine own part, When I said "Banish him," I said 't was pity. 2nd Cit. And so did I. 3rd Cit. And so did I: and, to say the truth, so did very many of us. That we did, we did for the best and though we willingly consented to his banishment, yet it was against our will. Com. You are goodly things, you voices! Men. You have made : (I mean for your particular), you had not Auf. I understand thee well: and be thou sure, Lieu. Sir, I beseech you, think you he 'll carry Rome? Auf. All places yield to him ere he sits down; To expel him thence. I think he'll be to Rome A noble servant to them; but he could not The happy man: whether defect of judgment, Even with the same austerity and garb As he controlled the war:-but one of these For I dare so far free him) made him feared; To choke it in the utterance. So our virtues One fire drives out one fire; one nail, one nail: Rights by rights fouler, strength by strengths, do fail. Come, let's away.-When, Caius, Rome is thine, Thou art poor'st of all: then shortly art thou [Exeunt. mine. |