Ther. Pr'ythee be silent, boy; I profit not by thy talk: thou art thought to be Achilles' male varlet.

Patr. Male varlet 5, you rogue! what's that?

Ther. Why, his masculine whore. Now the rotten diseases of the south, the guts-griping, ruptures, catarrhs, loads o'gravel i'the back, lethargies, cold palsies, raw eyes, dirt-rotten livers, wheezing lungs, bladders full of imposthume, sciaticas, limekilns i'the palm, incurable bone-ach, and the rivelled fee-simple of the tetter, take and take again such preposterous discoveries!

Patr. Why thou damnable box of envy, thou, what meanest thou to curse thus?

Ther. Do I curse thee?

Patr. Why, no, you ruinous butt; you whoreson indistinguishable cur, no.

Ther. No? why art thou then exasperate, thou idle immaterial skein of sleive silk, thou green sarcenet flap for a sore eye, thou tassel of a prodigal's purse, thou? Ah, how the poor world is pestered with such water-flies: diminutives of nature!

sites having been studiously adverse to the drift of the question urged by Patroclus. So in Love's Labour's Lost, the Princess addressing Boyet (who had been capriciously employing himself to perplex the dialogue), says, ' Avaunt, Perplexity!'

5 This expression is met with in Decker's Honest Whore:'Tis a male varlet, sure, my lord!' The person spoken of is Bellafronte, a harlot, who is introduced in boy's clothes. Manmistress is a term of reproach thrown out by Dorax, in Dryden's Don Sebastian. See Professor Heyne's Seventeenth Excursus on the first book of the Æneid.

6 Patroclus reproaches Thersites with deformity, with having one part crowded into another. The same idea occurs in the Second Part of King Henry IV.:—

'Crowd us and crush us to this monstrous form.'

7 See Macbeth, Act ii. Sc. 2, note 3, p. 246.

So Hamlet, speaking of Osrick :

Dost know this water-fly?'

Patr. Out, gall!

Ther. Finch egg!

Achil. My sweet Patroclus, I am thwarted quite
From my great purpose in to-morrow's battle.
Here is a letter from queen Hecuba;

A token from her daughter, my fair love9;
Both taxing me, and gaging me to keep

An oath that I have sworn. I will not break it:
Fall, Greeks; fail, fame; honour, or go, or stay,
My major vow lies here, this I'll obey.

Come, come, Thersites, help to trim my tent;
This night in banqueting must all be spent.
Away, Patroclus.

[Exeunt ACHILLES and PATRoclus. Ther. With too much blood, and too little brain, these two may run mad; but if with too much brain, and too little blood, they do, I'll be a curer of madmen. Here's Agamemnon, -an honest fellow enough, and one that loves quails 10; but he has not so much brain as ear-wax. And the goodly transformation of Jupiter there, his brother, the bull, -the primitive statue, and oblique memorial of cuckolds; a thrifty shoeing-horn in a chain, hanging at his brother's leg,-to what form, but that he is, should wit larded with malice, and malice forced 12 with wit, turn him to? To an ass, were nothing he is both ass and ox: to an ox were no

9 This is a circumstance taken from the old story book of The Destruction of Troy.

10 By quails are meant women, and probably those of a looser description. 'Caille coeffée' is a sobriquet for a harlot. Chaud comme un caille is a French proverb. The quail being remarkably salacious.

1 He calls Menelaus the transformation of Jupiter, that is, the bull, on account of his horns, which are the oblique memorial of cuckolds.

12 i. e. farced or stuffed.

VOL. VII.

PP

To be a dog, a

thing he is both ox and ass. mule, a cat, a fitchew 13, a toad, a lizard, an owl, a puttock, or a herring without a roe, I would not care: but to be Menelaus,-I would conspire against destiny. Ask me not what I would be, if I were not Thersites; for I care not to be the louse of a lazar, so I were not Menelaus.-Hey-day! spirits and fires 14!

Enter HECTOR, TROILUS, AJAX, AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR, MENELAUS, and DIOMED, with Lights.

Agam. We go wrong, we go wrong.

Ajax.

There, where we see the lights.

Hect.

Ajax. No, not a whit.

Ülyss.

No, yonder 'tis;

I trouble you.

Here comes himself to guide you.

Enter ACHIlles.

Achil. Welcome, brave Hector; welcome, princes

all.

Agam. So now, fair prince of Troy, I bid good night.

Ajax commands the guard to tend on you.

Hect. Thanks, and good night, to the Greeks'

general.

Men. Good night, my lord.

Hect.

Good night, sweet lord Menelaus. Ther Sweet draught 15: Sweet, quoth 'a! sweet sink, sweet sewer.

13 A polecat. So in Othello:- 'Tis such another fitchew, marry a perfumed one.'

14 This Thersites speaks upon the first sight of the distant lights.

15 Draught is the old word for forica. It is used in the translation of the Bible, in Holinshed, and by all old writers.

Achil. Good night.

And welcome, both to those that go, or tarry.
Agam. Good night.

[Exeunt AGAMEMNON and Menelaus. Achil. Old Nestor tarries; and you too, Diomed, Keep Hector company an hour or two.

Dio. I cannot, lord; I have important business, The tide whereof is now.-Good night, great Hector. Hect. Give me your hand.

Ulyss.

To Calchas' tent; I'll keep you company.

Follow his torch, he

goes

[Aside to TROILUS.

And so good night.

Tro. Sweet sir, you honour me.

Hect.

[Exit DIOMED; ULYSSES and TROILUS

following.

Achil. Come, come, enter my tent.

[Exeunt ACHILLES, HECTOR, AJAX, and NESTOR.

Ther. That same Diomed's a false-hearted rogue, a most unjust knave; I will no more trust him when he leers, than I will a serpent when he hisses: he will spend his mouth, and promise, like Brabler the hound 16; but when he performs, astronomers foretell it; it is prodigious 17, there will come some change; the sun borrows of the moon, when Diomed keeps his word. I will rather leave to see Hector, than not to dog him: they say, he keeps a Trojan drab, and uses the traitor Calchas' tent: I'll after.-Nothing but lechery! all incontinent varlets! [Exit.

16 If a hound gives mouth, and is not upon the scent of the game, he is called a babler or brabler. The proverb says, Brabling curs never want sore ears.'

17 Portentous, ominous.

SCENE II.

The same. Before Calchas' Tent.

Enter DIOMEdes.

Dio. What are you up here, ho? speak.

Cal. [Within.] Who calls?

Dio. Diomed.-Calchas, I think,-Where's your daughter?

Cal. [Within.] She comes to you.

Enter TROILUS and ULYSSES, at a distance; after them THERSITES.

Ulyss. Stand where the torch may not discover us.

Enter CRESSIDA.

Tro. Cressid comes forth to him!

Dio.

How now, my charge?

Cres. Now, my sweet guardian!-Hark! a word

with you.

Tro. Yea, so familiar!

[Whispers.

Ulyss. She will sing any man at first sight.

Ther. And any man may sing her, if he can take

her cliff1; she's noted.

Dio. Will you remember?

Cres.

Dio.

Remember? yes.

Nay, but do then;

And let your mind be coupled with your words.
Tro. What should she remember?

Ulyss. List!

Cres. Sweet honey Greek, tempt me no more to folly. Ther. Roguery!

Dio. Nay, then,

1 That is, her key. Clef, Fr. A mark in music at the beginning of the lines of a song, &c. which indicates the pitch, and whether it is suited for a base, treble, or tenor voice.