Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours; That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand, To envious and calumniating time. One touch of nature makes the whole world kin, More laud than gilt o'er-dusted. The present eye praises the present object: If thou would'st not entomb thyself alive, Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late, Achil. I have strong reasons. Ulyss. Of this my privacy But 'gainst your privacy The reasons are more potent and heroical. 'Tis known, Achilles, that you are in love With one of Priam's daughters. Achil. Ulyss. Is that a wonder? Ha! known? The providence that's in a watchful state Keeps place with thought, and almost, like the gods, To throw down Hector, than Polyxena: But it must grieve young Pyrrhus, now at home, The fool slides o'er the ice that you should break. Patr. To this effect, Achilles, have I mov'd you. A woman impudent and mannish grown Is not more loath'd, than an effeminate man [Exit. Patr. Ay; and, perhaps, receive much honour by him. My fame is shrewdly gor'd. Patr. O! then beware: Those wounds heal ill that men do give themselves. Seals a commission to a blank of danger; Achil. Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus. I'll send the fool to Ajax, and desire him T'invite the Trojan lords, after the combat, To see us here unarm'd. I have a woman's longing, To see great Hector in his weeds of peace; Ther. Ajax goes up and down the field asking for himself. Ther. He must fight singly to-morrow with Hector; and is so prophetically proud of an heroical cudgelling, that he raves in saying nothing. Achil. How can that be? Ther. Why, he stalks up and down like a peacock; a stride, and a stand: ruminates, like an hostess, that hath no arithmetic but her brain to set down her reckoning: bites his lip with a politic regard, as who should say there were wit in this head, an 't would out: and so there is; but it lies as coldly in him as fire in a flint, which will not show without knocking. The man 's undone for ever; for if Hector break not his neck i' the combat, he 'll break 't himself in vain-glory. He knows not me: I said, "Good-morrow, Ajax;" and he replies, "Thanks, Agamemnon." What think you of this man, that takes me for the general? He's grown a very land-fish, languageless, a monster. A plague of opinion! a man may wear it on both sides, like a leather jerkin. Achil. Thou must be my ambassador to him, Thersites. Ther. Who, I? why, he 'll answer nobody; he professes not answering: speaking is for beggars; he wears his tongue in his arms. I will put on his presence: let Patroclus make his demands to me, you shall see the pageant of Ajax. Achil. To him, Patroclus: tell him, - I humbly desire the valiant Ajax to invite the most valorous Hector to come unarmed to my tent; and to procure safe conduct for his person of the magnanimous, and most illustrious, six-or-seven-times-honoured, captain-general of the Grecian army, Agamemnon. Do this. Patr. Jove bless great Ajax. tent. Patr. Who most humbly desires you to invite Hector to his Ther. Humph! Patr. And to procure safe conduct from Agamemnon. Ther. Agamemnon? Patr. Ay, my lord. Ther. Ha! Patr. What say you to 't? Ther. God be wi' you, with all my heart. Patr. Your answer, Sir. Ther. If to-morrow be a fair day, by eleven o'clock it will go one way or other: howsoever, he shall pay for me ere he has me. Patr. Your answer, Sir. Ther. Fare you well, with all my heart. Achil. Why, but he is not in this tune, is he? Ther. No, but he 's out o' tune thus. What music will be in him when Hector has knocked out his brains, I know not; but, I am sure, none, unless the fiddler Apollo get his sinews to make catlings on. Achil. Come, thou shalt bear a letter to him straight. Ther. Let me bear another to his horse, for that 's the more capable creature. Achil. My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirr'd; And I myself see not the bottom of it. [Exeunt ACHILLES and PATROCIUS. that Ther. Would the fountain of your mind were clear again, I might water an ass at it. I had rather be a tick in a sheep, than such a valiant ignorance. [Exit. Enter, at one side, ÆNEAS, and Servant, with a Torch; at the other, PARIS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR, DIOMEDES, and Others, with Torches. Par. See, ho! who is that there? Dei. Ene. Is the prince there in person? Had I so good occasion to lie long, It is the lord Æneas. As you, prince Paris, nothing but heavenly business Dio. That's my mind too. - Good morrow, lord Æneas. Witness the process of your speech, wherein You told how Diomed, a whole week by days, Ene. Health to you, valiant Sir, Dio. The one and other Diomed embraces. By Jove, I'll play the hunter for thy life, Ene. And thou shalt hunt a lion, that will fly The thing he means to kill, more excellently. Dio. We sympathize. — Jove, let Æneas live, A thousand complete courses of the sun! |