Pan. Marry, at the white hair that Helen spied | devil come to him, it's all one: by God's lid, it on Troilus' chin.

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

Cres. Ay, a minced man: and then to be baked with no date in the pie, for then the man's date's out.

Pan. You are such a woman! one knows not at what ward you lie.

Cres. Upon my back, to defend my belly; upon my wit, to defend my wiles; upon my secrecy, to defend mine honesty: my mask, to

Pan. Swords! any thing, he cares not; an the | defend my beauty; and you, to defend all these:

and at all these wards I lie, at a thousand | To find persistive constancy in men: watches.

Nest. With due observance of thygod-likeseat,

Boy. Sir, my lord would instantly speak with Great Agamemnon, Nestor shall apply you.

What grief hath set the jaundice on your cheeks? Should hold up high in brass; and such again

100

Would seem hyperboles. At this fusty stuff
The large Achilles, on his press'd bed lolling,

The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixure! O! when degree is From his deep chest laughs out a loud applause;
shak'd,

Which is the ladder to all high designs,
The enterprise is sick. How could communities,
Degrees in schools, and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark! what discord follows; each thing

wrong,

Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;

And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.

And this neglection of degree it is
That by a pace goes backward, in a purpose
It hath to climb. The general's disdain'd
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation :

120

130

And 'tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness lives, not in her strength.
Nest. Most wisely hath Ulysses here discover'd
The fever whereof all our power is sick.

Cries 'Excellent! 'tis Agamemnon just.
Now play me Nestor; hem, and stroke thy
beard,

171

180

As he being dress'd to some oration.'
That's done; as near as the extremest ends
Of parallels, as like as Vulcan and his wife:
Yet god Achilles still cries 'Excellent!
'Tis Nestor right. Now play him me, Patroclus,
Arming to answer in a night alarm.'
And then, forsooth, the faint defects of age
Must be the scene of mirth; to cough and spit,
And with a palsy-fumbling on his gorget,
Shake in and out the rivet: and at this sport
Sir Valour dies; cries 'O! enough, Patroclus,
Or give me ribs of steel; I shall split all
In pleasure of my spleen.' And in this fashion,
All our abilities, gifts, natures, shapes,
Severals and generals of grace exact,
Achievements, plots, orders, preventions,
Excitements to the field, or speech for truce,
Success or loss, what is or is not, serves
As stuff for these two to make paradoxes.
Nest. And in the imitation of these twain,
Who, as Ulysses says, opinion crowns
With an imperial voice, many are infect.
Ajax is grown self-will'd, and bears his head
In such a rein, in full as proud a place
As broad Achilles; keeps his tent like him; 190
Makes factious feasts; rails on our state of war,
Bold as an oracle, and sets Thersites,
A slave whose gall coins slanders like a mint,
To match us in comparisons with dirt;
To weaken and discredit our exposure,
How rank soever rounded in with danger.
Ulyss. They tax our policy, and call it
cowardice;

Count wisdom as no member of the war;
Forestall prescience, and esteem no act
But that of hand: the still and mental parts,
That do contrive how many hands shall strike.
When fitness calls them on, and know by

199

Ajam. The nature of the sickness found,
Ulysses,

measure

What is the remedy?

140

Ulyss. The great Achilles, whom opinion

Of their observant toil the enemies' weight,-
Why, this hath not a finger's dignity.
They call this bed-work, mappery, closet-war;
So that the ram that batters down the wall,
For the great swing and rudeness of his poise,
They place before his hand that made the
engine,

210

Or those that with the fineness of their souls
By reason guide his execution.
Nest. Let this be granted, and Achilles' horse
Makes many Thetis' sons.
A tucket.
Agam.

What trumpet? look, Menelaus.

Men. From Troy.

Enter ÆNEAS.

Agam. What would you 'fore our tent?

If there be one among the fair'st of Greece
That holds his honour higher than his ease,
That seeks his praise more than he fears his

peril,

That knows his valour, and knows not his fear,
That loves his mistress more than in confession,
With truant vows to her own lips he loves,
And dare avow her beauty and her worth
In other arms than hers, to him this challenge.

Ane. Is this great Agamemnon's tent, I pray Hector, in view of Trojans and of Greeks,
you?

I ask, that I might waken reverence,
And bid the cheek be ready with a blush
Modest as morning when she coldly eyes
The youthful Phœbus.

How!

230

Which is that god in office, guiding men ?
Which is the high and mighty Agamemnon ?
Agam. This Trojan scorns us; or the men of
Troy

Are ceremonious courtiers.

Ane. Courtiers as free, as debonair, unarm'd,
As bending angels; that's their fame in peace:
But when they would seem soldiers, they have
galls,

Good arms, strong joints, true swords; and,
Jove's accord,

Nothing so full of heart. But peace, Æneas !
Peace, Trojan! lay thy finger on thy lips.
The worthiness of praise distains his worth, 240
If that the prais'd himself bring the praise forth;
But what the repining enemy commends,

That breath fame blows; that praise, sole pure,

transcends.

Shall make it good, or do his best to do it,
He hath a lady, wiser, fairer, truer,

270

Than ever Greek did compass in his arms ;
And will to morrow with his trumpet call,
Midway between your tents and walls of Troy,
To rouse a Grecian that is true in love:
If any come, Hector shall honour him;
If none, he'll say in Troy when he retires,
The Grecian dames are sunburnt, and not worth
The splinter of a lance. Even so much.
Agam. This shall be told our lovers, Lord
Æneas;

280

If none of them have soul in such a kind,
We left them all at home: but we are soldiers;
And may that soldier a mere recreant prove,
That means not, hath not, or is not in love!
If then one is, or hath, or means to be,
That one meets Hector; if none else, I am he.

292

Nest. Tell him of Nestor, one that was a man
When Hector's grandsire suck'd: he is old now;
But if there be not in our Grecian host
One noble man that hath one spark of fire
To answer for his love, tell him from me
I'll hide my silver beard in a gold beaver,
And in my vantbrace put this wither'd brawn;
And, meeting him, will tell him that my lady
Was fairer than his grandam, and as chaste
As may be in the world his youth in flood,
I'll pawn this truth with my three drops of blood.
Ene. Now heavens forbid such scarcity of
youth!

Blunt wedges rive hard knots: the seeded pride

That hath to this maturity blown up

In rank Achilles must or now be cropp'd,

Or, shedding, breed a nursery of like evil,
To overbulk us all.

Nest.

Well, and how?

Ulyss. This challenge that the gallant Hector
sends,

However it is spread in general name,
Relates in purpose only to Achilles.

320

Nest. The purpose is perspicuous even as sub-
stance,

Whose grossness little characters sum up:
And, in the publication, make no strain,

340 botchy core?

Who broils in loud applause; and make him fall elbows; an assinego may tutor thee, thou scurvy