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In praising her: I tell thee, lord of Greece,
She is as far high-soaring o'er thy praises,1
As thou unworthy to be call'd her servant.
I charge thee, use her well, even for my charge;
For, by the dreadful Pluto, if thou dost not,
Though the great bulk Achilles be thy guard,
I'll cut thy throat.

DIO.
O, be not mov'd, prince Troilus:
Let me be privileg'd by my place, and message,
To be a speaker free; when I am hence,
I'll answer to my lust: And know you, lord,

• To shame the zeal of my petition to thee,

In praising her :] [Old copies-the seal.] To shame the seal of a petition is nonsense. Shakspeare wrote:

To shame the zeal

and the sense is this: Grecian, you use me discourteously: you see I am a passionate lover by my petition to you; and therefore you should not shame the zeal of it, by promising to do what I require of you, for the sake of her beauty: when, if you had good manners, or a sense of a lover's delicacy, you would have promised to do it in compassion to his pangs and sufferings. WARBURTON.

Troilus, I suppose, means to say, that Diomede does not use him courteously by addressing himself to Cressida, and assuring her that she shall be well treated for her own sake, and on account of her singular beauty, instead of making a direct answer to that warm request which Troilus had just made to him to "entreat her fair." "The subsequent words fully support this interpretation:

"I charge thee, use her well, even for my charge."

MALONE. She is as far high-soaring o'er thy praises,] So, in The Tempest:

"she will outstrip all praise." STEEVENS.

my lust:] List, I think, is right, though both the old copies read lust. JOHNSON.

Lust is inclination, will. HENLEY.

So, in Exodus, xv. 9: "I will divide the spoil; my lust shall be satisfied upon them."

I'll nothing do on charge: To her own worth
She shall be priz'd; but that you say-be't so,
I'll speak it in my spirit and honour,-no.

TRO. Come, to the port.-I'll tell thee, Diomed, This brave shall oft make thee to hide thy head. Lady, give me your hand; and, as we walk, To our own selves bend we our needful talk. [Exeunt TROILUS, CRESSIDA, and DIOMED. [Trumpet heard.

PAR. Hark! Hector's trumpet.

ENE.

How have we spent this morning! The prince must think me tardy and remiss, That swore to ride before him to the field. PAR. 'Tis Troilus' fault: Come, come, to field with him.

In many of our ancient writers, lust and list are synonymously employed. So, in Chapman's version of the seventeenth Iliad: Sarpedon, guest and friend

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"To thee, (and most deservedly) thou flew'st from in his end,

"And left'st to all the lust of Greece."

I'll answer to my lust, means—I'll follow my inclination.

STEEVENS. Lust was used formerly as synonymous to pleasure. So, in The Rape of Lucrece :

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the eyes of men through loopholes thrust, "Gazing upon the Greeks with little lust." MALONE.

I'll tell thee,] This phraseology (instead of" I tell thee") occurs almost too frequently in our author to need exemplification. One instance of it, however, shall be given from King John, Act V. sc. vi:

"I'll tell thee, Hubert, half my power this night
"Passing these flats are taken by the tide."

Again, in the first line of King Henry V:

"My lord, I'll tell you, that self bill is urg'd-."

Mr. Malone, conceiving this mode of speech to be merely a printer's error, reads, in the former instance-" I tell thee," though, in the two passages just cited, he retains the ancient, and perhaps the true reading. STEEVENS.

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DEI. Let us make ready straight.*

ENE. Yea, with a bridegroom's fresh alacrity, Let us address to tend on Hector's heels: The glory of our Troy doth this day lie

On his fair worth, and single chivalry. [Exeunt.

* Dei. Let us make ready straight. &c.] These five lines are not in the quarto, being probably added at the revision.

JOHNSON.

But why should Diomed say-Let us make ready straight? Was HE to tend with them on Hector's heels? Certainly not. Dio. has therefore crept in by mistake; the line either is part of Paris's speech, or belongs to Deiphobus, who is in company. As to Diomed, he neither goes along with them, nor has any thing to get ready:- he is now walking with Troilus and Cressida, towards the gate, on his way to the Grecian camp.

RITSON.

This last speech cannot possibly belong to Diomede, who was a Grecian, and could not have addressed Paris and Æneas, as if they were going on the same party. This is, in truth, a continuation of the speech of Paris, and the preceding stage direction should run thus: "Exeunt Troilus, Cressida, and Diomed who had the charge of Cressida." M. MASON.

To the first of these lines, "Let us make ready straight," is prefixed in the folio, where alone the passage is found, Dio.

I suspect these five lines were an injudicious addition by the actors, for the sake of concluding the scene with a couplet; to which (if there be no corruption) they were more attentive than to the country of Diomed, or the particular commission he was entrusted with by the Greeks. The line in question, however, as has been suggested, may belong to Deiphobus. From Æneas's second speech, in p. 387, and the stage-direction in the quarto and folio prefixed to the third scene of this Act, Deipho bus appears to be now on the stage; and Dio. and Dei. might have been easily confounded. As this slight change removes the absurdity, I have adopted it. It was undoubtedly intended by Shakspeare that Diomed should make his exit with Troilus and Cressida. MALONE.

SCENE V.

The Grecian Camp. Lists set out.

Enter AJAX, armed; AGAMEMNON, ACHILLEs, PATROCLUS, MENELAUS, ULYSSES, NESTOR, and Others.

AGAM. Here art thou in appointment fresh and
fair,5

Anticipating time with starting courage.
Give with thy trumpet a loud note to Troy,
Thou dreadful Ajax; that the appalled air
May pierce the head of the great combatant,
And hale him hither.

AJAX.
Thou, trumpet, there's my purse.
Now crack thy lungs, and split thy brazen pipe:
Blow, villain, till thy sphered bias cheek
Out-swell the colick of puff'd Aquilon:

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5 in appointment fresh and fair,] Appointment is preparation. So, in Measure for Measure:

"Therefore your best appointment make with speed.” Again, in King Henry V. Part I:

"What well-appointed leader fronts us here?"

i. e. what leader well prepared with arms and accoutrements?

On the other hand, in Hamlet :

STEEVENS.

"Unhousell'd, disappointed, unanneal'd." MALone.
bias cheek-] Swelling out like the bias of a bowl.
JOHNSON.

So, in Vittoria Corombona, or the White Devil, 1612:

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"Has a most excellent bias-."

The idea is taken from the puffy cheeks of the winds, as represented in ancient prints, maps, &c. STEEVENS.

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Come, stretch thy chest, and let thy eyes spout

blood;

Thou blow'st for Hector.

ULYSS. No trumpet answers.

ACHIL.

[Trumpet sounds.

'Tis but early days.

AGAM. Is not yon Diomed, with Calchas' daugh

ter?

ULYSS. 'Tis he, I ken the manner of his gait; He rises on the toe: that spirit of his In aspiration lifts him from the earth.

Enter DIOMED, with CRESSIDA.

AGAM. Is this the lady Cressid?

DIO.

Even she.

AGAM. Most dearly welcome to the Greeks, sweet

lady.

NEST. Our general doth salute you with a kiss. ULYSS. Yet is the kindness but particular; 'Twere better, she were kiss'd in general.

NEST. And very courtly counsel: I'll begin.— So much for Nestor.

ACHIL. I'll take that winter from your lips, fair lady:

Achilles bids you

welcome.

MEN. I had good argument for kissing once. PATR. But that's no argument for kissing now: For thus popp'd Paris in his hardiment :; And parted thus you and your argument.

ULYSS. O deadly gall, and theme of all our scorns! For which we lose our heads, to gild his horns.

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