Duke. Prov. What's he? His name is Barnardine. Duke. I would thou hadst done so by Claudio. Go fetch him hither; let me look upon him. [Exit Provost. Escal. I am sorry, one so learned and so wise As you, Lord Angelo, have still appear'd, Should slip so grossly, both in the heat of blood, And lack of temper'd judgment afterward. Ang. I am sorry that such sorrow I procure: And so deep sticks it in my penitent heart 480 That I crave death more willingly than mercy; 'Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it. Re-enter PROVOST, with BARNARDINE, This, my lord. Duke. There was a friar told me of this man. Sirrah, thou art said to have a stubborn soul, That apprehends no further than this world, And squarest thy life according. Thou'rt condemn'd: But, for those earthly faults, I quit them all; And pray thee take this mercy to provide 489 For better times to come. Friar, advise him; I leave him to your hand. What muffled fellow's that? I find an apt remission in myself; And yet here's one in place I cannot pardon. [To Lucio] You, sirrah, that knew me for a fool, a coward, One all of luxury, an ass, a madman; Lucio. 'Faith, my lord; I spoke it but according to the trick. If you will hang me for it, you may; but I had rather it would please you I might be whipt. Duke. Whipt first, sir, and hanged after. Proclaim it, provost, round about the city, Is any woman wrong'd by this lewd fellow, As I have heard him swear himself there's one Whom he begot with child, let her appear, And he shall marry her: the nuptial finish'd, Let him be whipt and hang'd. Lucio. I beseech your highness, do not marry me to a whore. Your highness said even now, I made you a duke: good my lord, do not recompense me in making me a cuckold. Duke. Upon mine honor, thou shalt marry her. Thy slanders I forgive; and therewithal Remit thy other forfeits. Take him to prison; And see our pleasure herein executed. Lucio. Marrying a punk, my lord, is pressing to death, whipping, and hanging. Duke. Slandering a prince deserves it. 530 [Exeunt Officers with Lucio. She, Claudio, that you wrong'd, look you re store. Joy to you, Mariana! Love her, Angelo : goodness: There's more behind that is more gratulate. So, bring us to our palace; where we'll show What's yet behind, that's meet you all should [Exeunt. know. TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. (WRITTEN ABOUT 1603?) INTRODUCTION. This play appeared in two quarto editions in the year 1609; on the title-page of the earlier of the two it is stated to have been acted at the Globe; the later contains a singular preface in which the play is spoken of as "never stal'd with the stage, never clapper-clawed with the palmes of the vulgar," and as having been published against the will of "the grand possessors." Perhaps the play was printed at first for the use of the theatre, with the intention of being published after having been represented, and the printers, against the known wishes of the proprietors of Shakespeare's manuscript, anticipated the first representation and issued the quarto with the attractive announcement that it was an absolute novelty. The editors of the folio, after having decided that Troilus and Cressida should follow Romeo and Juliet among the tragedies, changed their minds, apparently uncertain how the play should be classed, and placed it between the Histories and Tragedies; this led to the cancelling of a leaf, and the filling up of a blank space left by the alteration, with the Prologue to Troilus and Cressida a prologue which is believed by several critics not to have come from Shakespeare's hand. There is extreme uncertainty with respect to the date of the play. Dekker and Chettle were engaged in 1599 upon a play on this subject, and, from an entry in the Stationers' register, February 7, 1602-1603, it appears that a Troilus and Cressida had been acted by Shakespeare's company, the Lord Chamberlain's Servants. Was this Shakespeare's play? We are thrown back upon internal evidence to decide this question, and the internal evidence is itself of a conflicting kind, and has led to opposite conclusions. The massive worldly wisdom of Ulysses argues, it is it is supposed, in favor of a late date, and the general tone of the play has been compared with that of Timon of Athens. The fact that it does not contain a single weak ending, and only six light endings, is, however, almost decisive evidence against our placing it after either Timon or Macbeth; and the other metrical characteristics are considered, by the most careful student of this class of evidence in the case of the present play (Hertzberg), to point to a date about 1605. Other authorities place it as late as 1608 or 1609; while a third theory (that of Verplanck and Grant White) attempts to solve the difficulties by supposing that it was first written in 1603, and revised and enlarged shortly before the publication of the quarto. Parts of the play-notably the last battle of Hector-appear not to be by Shakespeare. The interpretation of the play itself is as difficult as the ascertainment of the external facts of its history. With what intention, and in what spirit did Shakespeare write this strange comedy? All the Greek heroes who fought against Troy are pitilessly exposed to ridicule; Helen and Cressida are light, sensual, and heartless, for whose sake it seems infatuated folly to strike a blow; Troilus is an enthusiastic young fool; and even Hector, though valiant and generous, spends his life in a cause which he knows to be unprofitable, if not evil. All this is seen and said by Thersites, whose mind is made up of the scum of the foulness of human life. But can Shakespeare's view of things have been the same as that of Thersites? The central theme, the young love and faith of Troilus given to one who was false and fickle, and his discovery of his error, lends its color to the whole play. It is the comedy of disillusion. And as Troilus passed through the illusion of his first love for woman, so by middle life the world itself often appears like one that has not kept her promises, and who is a poor deceiver. We come to see the seamy side of life; and from this mood of disillusion it is a deliverance to pass on even to a dark and tragic view of life, to which beauty and virtue reappear, even though human weakness or human vice may do them bitter wrong. Now such a mood of contemptuous depreciation of life may have come over Shakespeare, and spoilt him, at that time, for a writer of comedy. But for Isabella we should find the coming on of this mood in Measure for Measure; there is perhaps a touch of it in Hamlet. At this time Troilus and Cressida may have been written, and soon afterwards Shakespeare, rousing himself to a deeper inquest into things, may have passed on to his great series of tragedies. The materials for Troilus and Cressida were found by Shakespeare in Chaucer's Troilus and Creseide, Caxton's translation from the French, Remyles, or Destruction of Troy, and perhaps also Lydgate's Troye Boke. PRIAM, king of Troy. DEIPHOBUS, his sons. DRAMATIS PERSONE. PANDARUS, uncle to Cressida. Greece From isles of plains The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits, 20 To tell you, fair beholders, that our play ACT I. 29 SCENE I. Troy. Before Priam's palace. Why should I war without the walls of Troy, Pan. Will this gear ne'er be mended ? their strength, Fierce to their skill and to their fierceness valiant; But I am weaker than a woman's tear, Pan. Well, I have told you enough of this: for my part, I'll not meddle nor make no further. He that will have a cake out of the wheat must needs tarry the grinding. Tro. Have I not tarried? Pan. Ay, the grinding; but you must tarry the bolting. Tro. Have I not tarried? Pan. Ay, the bolting, but you must tarry the leavening. Tro. Still have I tarried. 20 The knife that made it. Pan. I speak no more than truth. Pan. Faith, I'll not meddle in't. Let her be as she is: if she be fair, 'tis the better for her; an she be not, she has the mends in her own hands. Tro. Good Pandarus, how now, Pandarus! Pan. I have had my labor for my travail; ill-thought on of her and ill-thought on of you; gone between and between, but small thanks for my labor. Tro. What, art thou angry, Pandarus? what, with me? Pan. Because she's kin to me, therefore she's not so fair as Helen: an she were not kin to me, she would be as fair on Friday as Helen is on Sunday. But what care I? I care not an she were a black-a-moor; 'tis all one to me. 80 Tro. Say I she is not fair? Pan. I do not care whether you do or no. She's a fool to stay behind her father; let her to the Greeks; and so I'll tell her the next time I see her: for my part, I'il meddle nor make no more i' the matter. 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. 91 Tro. Peace, you ungracious clamors! 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 starved a su ject for my sword. But Pandarus, 0 gods, ds, how do you plague mel I cannot come to Cressid but by Pandar; Ane. How now, Prince Troilus! where. fore not afield? Cres. And whither go they? Up to the eastern tower, Whose height commands as subject all the vale, To see the battle. Hector, whose patience Cres. 10 What was his cause of anger? Alex. The noise goes, this: there is among the Greeks A lord of Trojan blood, nephew to Hector; Alex. They say he is a very man per se, Cres. So do all men, unless they are drunk, sick, or have no legs. Alex. 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 crowded humors that his valor is 40 Cres. Hector's a gallant man. Alez. 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 up. Pan. Even so: Hector was stirring early. Cres. That were we talking of, and of his anger. Pan, Was he angry? Cres. So he says here. Pan. True, he was so I know the cause too: he'll lay about him to-day, I can tell them that and there's Troilus will not come far behind him; let them take heed of Troilus, I can tell them that too. 61 Paris. 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 th' 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 arithmetic 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? 129 Pan. But to prove to you that Helen loves him: she came and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin Cres. cloven? Juno have mercy! how came it 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, 141 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. |