Greece

The princes orgulous, their high blood chaf'd,
Have to the port of Athens sent their ships,
Fraught with the ministers and instruments
Of cruel war: Sixty and nine, that wore
Their crownets regal, from the Athenian bay
Put forth toward Phrygia: and their vow is made,
To ransack Troy; within whose strong immures
The ravish'd Helen, Menelaus' queen,
With wanton Paris sleeps; And that's the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come;

And the deep-drawing barks do there disgorge
Their warlike fraughtage: Now on Dardan plains
The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch
Their brave pavilions: Priam's six-gated city,

And Antenorides, with massy staples,
And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts,
Sperr up the sons of Troy.

Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits,
On one and other side, Trojan and Greek,
Sets all on hazard: And hither am I come
A prologue arm'd, -- but not in confidence
Of author's pen, or actor's voice; but suited
In like conditions as our argument, -
To tell you, fair beholders, that our play
Leaps o'er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils
'Ginning in the middle; starting thence away
To what may be digested in a play.
Like, or find fault; do as your pleasures are;
Now good, or bad, 'tis but the chance of war.

SCENE I. - Troy. Before Priam's Palace. Enter TROILUS armed, and PANDARUS. Tre. Call here my varlet, I'll unarm again: Why should I war without the walls of Troy, That find such cruel battle here within ?

Each Trojan, that is master of his heart,
Let him to field; Troilus, alas! hath none.
Pan. Will this geer ne'er be mended?
Tro. The Greeks are strong, and skilful to their

strength,

Fierce to their skill, and to their fierceness valiant;

Pan. Ay, to the leavening: but here's yet in the word-hereafter, the kneading, the making of the cake, the heating of the oven, and the baking; nay, you must stay the cooling too, or you may chance to burn your lips.

Tro. Patience herself, what goddess e'er she be, Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do.

At Priam's royal table do I sit;

And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts, So, traitor! when she comes! When is she thence?

Pan. Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw her look, or any woman else.

Tro. I was about to tell thee, - When my heart,

As wedged with a sigh, would rive in twain;
Lest Hector or my father should perceive me,
I have (as when the sun doth light a storm,)
Bury'd this sigh in wrinkle of a smile :
But sorrow, that is couch'd in seeming gladness,
Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness.

Pan. An her hair were not somewhat darker than Helen's, (well, go to,) there were no more comparison between the women. But, for my part, she is my kinswoman; I would not, as they term it, praise her, - But I would somebody had heard her talk yesterday, as I did. I will not dispraise your sister Cassandra's wit; but

Tro. O, Pandarus! I tell thee, Pandarus,
When I do tell thee, There my hopes lie drown'd,
Reply not in how many fathoms deep
They lie indrench'd. I tell thee, I am mad
In Cressid's love: Thou answer'st, She is fair;
Pour'st in the open ulcer of my heart

Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice;
Handlest in thy discourse, O, that her hand,
In whose comparison all whites are ink,
Writing their own reproach; To whose soft seizure
The cygnet's down is harsh, and spirit of sense

Hard as the palm of ploughman! This thou tell'st

Tro. Pandarus, Pan. Not I.

Tro. Sweet Pandarus,

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.

But Pandarus - O gods, how do you plague me
I cannot come to Cressid, but by Pandar;
And he's as tetchy to be woo'd to woo,
As she is stubborn-chaste against all suit.
Tell me, Apollo, for thy Daphne's love,
What Cressid is, what Pandar, and what we?
Her bed is India; there she lies, a pearl:
Between our Ilium, and where she resides,
Let it be call'd the wild and wandering flood;
Ourself, the merchant; and this sailing Pandar,
Our doubtful hope, our convoy, and our bark.

Alarum. Enter ÆNEAS.

Ene. How now, prince Troilus? wherefore not

Up to the eastern tower,

Whose height commands as subject all the vale,
To see the battle. Hector, whose patience
Is, as a virtue, fix'd, to-day was mov'd:
He chid Andromache, and struck his armourer;
And, like as there were husbandry in war,

Cres. So do all men; unless they are drunk, sick, or have no legs.

Aler. This man, lady, hath robbed many beasts of their particular additions; he is as valiant as the lion, churlish as the bear, slow as the elephant: a man into whom nature hath so crouded humos, that his valour is crushed into folly, his foily sauced with discretion: 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.

Aler. As may be in the world, lady.
Pan. What's that? what's that?

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

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 I ever 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. Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown.
Cres. To say the truth, true and not true.
Pan. She prais'd his complexion above Paris.
Cres. Why, Paris hath colour enough.
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 the 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? 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.

Cres. O, he smiles valiantly.
Pan. Does he not?

Cres. O yes, an 'twere a cloud in autumn.

Pan. Why, go to then; But to prove to you that Helen loves Troilus,

Cres. Troilus will stand to the proof, if you'll prove it so.

Pan. Troilus? why, he esteems her no more than I esteem an addle egg.

Cres. If you love an addle egg as well as you love an idle head, you would eat chickens i'the shell.

Pan. I cannot choose but laugh, to think how she tickled his chin! - Indeed, she has a marvellous white hand, I must needs confess.

Cres. Without the rack.

Pan. And she takes upon her to spy a white hair on his chin.

Cres. Alas, poor chin! many a wart is richer. Pan. But, there was such laughing; -- Queen Hecuba laughed, that her eyes ran o'er.

Cres. With mill-stones.

Pan. And Cassandra laughed.

Cres. But there was a more temperate fire under the pot of her eyes; - Did her eyes run o'er too? Pan. And Hector laughed.

Cres. At what was all this laughing? Pan. Marry, at the white hair that Helen spied on Troilus' chin.

Cres. An't had been a green hair, I should have laughed too.

Pan. They laughed not so much at the hair, as at his pretty answer.

Cres. What was his answer?

Pan. Quoth she, Here's but one and fifty hairs on your chin, and one of them is white.

Cres. This is her question.

Pan. That's true; make no question of that. One and fifty hairs, quoth he, and one white: That white hair is my father, and all the rest are his sons. Jupiter! quoth she, which of these hairs is Paris my husband? The forked one, quoth he, pluck it out, and give it him. But, there was such laughing! and Helen so blushed, and Paris so chafed, and all the rest so laughed, that it passed.

Cres. So let it now; for it has been a great while going by.

Pan. Well, cousin, I told you a thing yesterday;

think on't.

Cres. So I do.

HECTOR passes over.

Pan. That's Hector, that, that, look you, that; There's a fellow! - Go thy way, Hector! -There's a brave man, niece. - O brave Hector! - Look, how he looks! there's a countenance: Is't not a brave man?

Cres. O, a brave man !

Pan. Is 'a not? It does a man's heart good Look you what hacks are on his helmet? look you yonder, do you see? look you there! there's no jesting: there's laying on; take't off who will, as they say there be hacks!

Cres. Be those with swords?

Pan. Swords? any thing, he cares not: an the devil come to him, it's all one: By god's lid, it does one's heart good.

PARIS passes over.

Yonder comes Paris, yonder comes Paris: look ye yonder, niece; Is't not a gallant man too, is't not? Why, this is brave now. - Who said he came home hurt to-day? he's not hurt: why, this will do Helen's heart good now. Ha! 'would I could see Troilus now!

you shall see Troilus anon.

Cres. Who's that?

HELENUS passes over.

Pan. That's Helenus, - I marvel, where Troilus is: That's Helenus; - I think he went not forth to-day: - That's Helenus.

Cres. Can Helenus fight, uncle?

Pan. Helenus? no; - yes, he'll fight indifferent well: - I marvel, where Troilus is! - Hark; de you not hear the people cry, Troilus? - Helenus is a priest.

Cres. What sneaking fellow comes yonder?
TROILUS passes over.

Pan. Where? yonder? that's Deiphobus: 'Tis Troilus! there's a man, niece! - Hem! - Brave Troilus! the prince of chivalry.

Cres. Peace, for shame, peace!

Pan. Mark him; note him; - O brave Troilus. -look well upon him, niece; look you, how his sword is bloodied, and his helm more hack'd than Hector's; And how he looks, and how he goes! O admirable youth! he ne'er saw three and twenty. Go thy way, Troilus, go thy way; had I a sister were a grace, or a daughter a goddess, he should take his choice. O admirable man! Paris? Paris is dirt to him; and, I warrant, Helen, to change, would give an eye to boot.

Forces pass over the Stage.

Cres. Here come more.

Pan. Asses, fools, dolts! chaff and bran, chaff and bran! porridge after meat! I could live and die i'the eyes of Troilus. Ne'er look, ne'er look; the eagles are gone; crows and daws, crows and daws! I had rather be such a man as Troilus, than Agamemnon and all Greece.

Cres. There is among the Greeks, Achilles; a better man than Troilus.

Pan. Achilles? a drayman, a porter, a very camel. Cres. Well, well.

Pan. Well, well? - Why, have you any discretion? have you any eyes? Do you know what a man is? Is not birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood, learning, gentleness, virtue, youth, libe