Ther. Do, do.

Ajax Thou stool for a witch

Ther. Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! Thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinego may tutor thee: thou'scurvy valiant ass! Thou art here put to thrash Trojans; and thou art bought and sold among those of any wit, like a Barbarian slave. If thou use to beat me, I will begin at thy heel, and tell what thou art by inches, thon thing of no bowels, thou!

Ajax. You dog!

Ther. You scurvy lord,!

Ajax. You cur!

[Beating him. Ther. Mars his idiot! Do, rudeness; do, camel;

do, do.

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS.

Achil. Why, how now, Ajax? Wherefore do you thus ?

How now, Thersites? What's the matter, man?
Ther. You see him there, do you?

Achil. Ay; what's the matter?

Ther. Nay, look upon him.

Achil. So I do; what's the matter?

Ther. Nay, but regard him well.

Achil. Well, why I do so.

Ther. But yet you look not well upon him for, whosoever you take him to be, he is Ajax.

Achil. I know that, fool.

Ther. Ay, but that fool knows not himself.
Ajax. Therefore I beat thee.

Ther. Lo, lo, lo, lo, what modicums of wit he utters His evasions have ears thus long. I have bobb'd his brain, more than he has beat my bones: I will buy nine sparrows for a penny, and his pia matert is not worth the ninth part of a sparrow. This lord, Achilles, Ajax,-who wears his wit in his belly, and his guts in his head,-I'll tell you what I say of him.

Achil. What?

Ther. I say, this Ajax-
Achil. Nay, good Ajax.

[Ajax offers to strike him, Achilles interposes. Ther. Has not so much wit

Ass, a cant term for a foolish fellow.

+ Continue.

1 The membrane that protects the brain.

Achil. Nay, I must hold you.

Ther. As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, for whom he comes to fight.

Achil. Peace, fool!

Ther. I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not: he there; that he; look you there. Ajax. O thou damn'd cur! 1 shall

Achil. Will you set your wit to a fool's?

Ther. No, I warrant you; for a fool's will shame it.
Patr, Good words, Thersites.

Achil. What's the quarrel?

Ajax. Well, go to, go to.

Ther. I serve here voluntary*.

Ajax. I bade the vile owl, go learn me the tenor of the proclamation, and he rails upon me. Ther. I serve thee not.

Achil. Your last service was sufferance, 'twas not voluntary; no man is beaten voluntary: Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.`

Ther. Even so?-A great deal of your wit too lies in you sinews, or else there be liars.-Hector shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains; 'a were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

Achil. What, with me too, Thersites ?

Ther. There's Ulysses, and old Nestor,-whose wit was mouldly ere your grandsires had nails on their toes, yoke you like draught oxen, and make you plough up the wars.

Achil. What, what?

Ther. Yes, good sooth; to, Achilles! to, Ajax! to!
Ajar. I shall cut out your tongue.

Ther. 'Tis no matter; I shall speak as much as thou, afterwards.

Patr. No more words, Thersites; peace.

Ther. I will hold my peace when Achilles' brach bids me, shall I?

Achil. There's for you, Patroclus.

Ther. I will see you hang'd, like clotpoles, ere I come any more to your tents; I will keep where there is wit stirring, and leave the faction of fools.

[Exit,

• Voluntarily. VOL. IV.

Patr: A good riddance.

Achil. Marry, this, Sir, is proclaim'd through all our host':

2

That Hector, by the first hour of the sun,

Q 9

Will, with a trumpet, 'twixt our tents and Troy, To morrow morning call some knight to arms, That hath a stomach; and such a one, that dare Maintain-I know not what; 'tis trash farewell. Ajax. Farewell. Who shall answer him?

Achil. I know not, it is put to lottery; otherwise, He knew his man

Ajax. O, meaning you :—I'll go learn more of it. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.-Troy.-A Room in Priam's Palace. Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, PARIS, and

HELENUS.

Pri. After so many hours, lives, speeches spent, Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks; Deliver Helen, and all damage else―

As honour, loss of time, travel, expence,

Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consumed,

In hot digestion of this cormorant war,—

Shall be struck off: Hector, what say you to't? Hect. Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than 1,

As far as toucheth my particular, yet,

Dread Priam,

There is no lady of more softer bowels,

More spongy to suck in the sense of fear,"

More ready to cry out-Who knows what follows
Than Hector is: the wound of peace is surety,
Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd
The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches
To the bottom of the worst. Let Helen go :
Since the first sword was drawn about this question,
Every tithe soul, 'mongst many thousand dismes
Hath been as dear as Helen ; I mean, of ours:
if we have lost so many tenths of ours,
To guard a thing not ours; not worth to us,
Had it our name, the value of one ten';

What merit's in that reason, which denies
her up?

The yielding of

Tro. Fie, fie, my brother!

So great as our

Weigh you the worth and honour of a king,

Of common ounces? Will you with counters sum

638 our dread father, in a scale

The past-proportion of his infinite?

• Tenths.

7 P9

And buckle-in a waist most fathomless, IT With spans and inches so diminutive

As fears and reasons? Fie, for godly shame!

T

Hel. No marvel, though you bite so sharp at

reasons,

You are so empty of them. Should not our father, Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons, Because your speech hath none, that tells him so? Tro. You are for dreams and slumbers, brother. priest, LSBE bio,

You fur your gloves with reason.

Here are your

reasons: de la
You know, an enemy intends you harm;
You know, a sword employ'd is perilous,
And reason flies the object of all harm:
Who marvels then, when Helenus beholds
A Grecian and his sword, if he do set
The very wings of reason to his heels;
And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,

Or like a star dis-orb'd :-Nay, if we talk of reason, Let's shut our gates, and sleep: Manhood and ho

nour

Should have hard hearts, would they but fat their thoughts

With this cramm'd reason: reason and respect +
Make livers pale, and lustihood deject.

Hect. Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost

The holding.

Tro. What is aught, but as 'tis valued?

Hect. But value dwells not in particular will'; It holds his estimate and dignity

As well wherein 'tis precious of itself

As in the prizer: 'tis mad idolatry,

To make the service greater than the god;
And the will dotes, that is attributive
To what infectiously itself affects,
Without some image of the affected merit.
Tro. I take to-day a wife, and my election
Is led, on in the conduct of my will;
My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears,
Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores
Of will and judgment: how may I avoid,
Although my will distaste what it elected,

The wife I chose? There can be no evasion
To blench from this, and to stand firm by honour:
We turn not back the silks upon the merchant,
When we have soil'd them; nor the remainder

viands

We do not throw in unrespective sieve t,
Because we now are full. It was thought meet,
Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks:
Your breath with full consent bellied his sails;
The seas and winds (old wranglers) took a truce,
And did him service; he touch'd the ports desired;
And, for an old aunt, whom the Greeks held captive,
He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and

freshness

Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes pale the morning.
Why keep we her? The Grecians keep our aunt:
Is she worth keeping? Why, she is a pearl,
Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships,
And turn'd crown'd kings to merchants.
If you'll avouch, 'twas wisdom Paris went,
(As you must needs, for you all cried-Go, go,)
If you'll confess, he brought home noble prize,
(As you must needs, for you all clapp'd your hands,
And cried-Inestimable!) Why do you now
The issue of your proper wisdoms rate;
And do a deed that fortune never did,
Beggar the estimation which yon prized,
Richer than sea and land? O theft most base;
That we have stolen what we do fear to keep!
But, thieves, unworthy of a thing so stolen,
That in their country did them that disgrace,
We fear to warrant in our native place!

Cas. [Within.] Cry, Trojans, cry!
Pri. What noise? What shriek is this?
Tro. 'Tis our mad sister, I do know her voice.
Cas. [Within.] Cry, Trojans !
Hect. It is Cassandra.

Enter CASSANDRA, raring、,

Cas. Cry,Trojans, cry! Lend me ten thousand eyes, Add I will fill them with prophetic tears.

Hect. Peace, sister, peace.

Cas. Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled

'

elders,

J

Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry,
Add to my clamours! Let us pay betimes

• Shrink, or fly off.

+ Basket.