Tro. O, that I thought it could be in a woman,
(As, if it can, I will presume in you,)
To feed for aye her lamp and flames of love;
To keep her constancy in plight and youth,
Outliving beauty's outward, with a mind
That doth renew swifter than blood decays!
Or, that persuasion could but thus convince me,-
That my integrity and truth to you

O virtuous fight,

Might be affronted with the match and weight
Of such a winnowed purity in love;
How were I then uplifted! But, alas,
I am as true as truth's simplicity,
And simpler than the infancy of truth.
Cres. In that I'll war with you.
Tro.
When right with right wars who shall be most right!
True swains in love shall, in the world to come,
Approve their truths by Troilus; when their rhymes,
Full of protest, of oath, and big compare,
Want similes of truth, tired with iteration,2
As true as steel, as plantage to the moon,3
As sun to day, as turtle to her mate,

As iron to adamant, as earth to the centre,-
Yet, after all comparisons of truth,

As truth's authentic author to be cited,
As true as Troilus shall crown up the verse,
And sanctify the numbers.

Cres.

Prophet may you be!

If I be false, or swerve a hair from truth,

When time is old and hath forgot itself,

When water-drops have worn the stones of Troy,
And blind oblivion swallowed cities up,

And mighty states characterless are grated

1 Met with and equalled.

2 In the old copy this line stands,—

"Wants similes truth tired with iteration."

The emendation was proposed by Mr. Tyrwhitt.

3 Plantage is here put for any thing planted, which was thought to depend for its success upon the influence of the moon.

4 i. e. conclude it.

To dusty nothing; yet let memory,

From false to false, among false maids in love, Upbraid my falsehood! When they have said-as false

As air, as water, wind, or sandy earth,

As fox to lamb, as wolf to heifer's calf,
Pard to the hind, or stepdame to her son;

Yea, let them say, to stick the heart of falsehood,
As false as Cressid.

Pan. Go to, a bargain made; seal it, seal it; I'll be the witness.-Here I hold your hand; here, my cousin's. If ever you prove false one to another, since I have taken such pains to bring you together, let all pitiful goers-between be called to the world's end after my name; call them all-Pandars: let all constant1 men be Troiluses, all false women Cressids, and all brokers-between Pandars! say, amen.

Tro. Amen.

Cres. Amen

Pan. Amen. Whereupon I will show you a chamber and a bed; which bed, because it shall not speak of your pretty encounters, press it to death;

away.

And Cupid grant all tongue-tied maidens here,

Bed, chamber, Pandar, to provide this gear. [Exeunt.

SCENE III. The Grecian Camp.

Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, DIOMEDES, NESTOR, AJAX, MENELAUS, and CALCHAS.

Cal. Now, princes, for the service I have done you, The advantage of the time prompts me aloud To call for recompense. Appear it to your mind,

1 Hanmer altered this to "inconstant men;" but the Poet seems to have been less attentive to make Pandarus talk consequentially, than to account for the ideas actually annexed to the three names in his own time.

That, through the sight I bear in things, to Jove1
I have abandoned Troy, left my possession,
Incurred a traitor's name; exposed myself,
From certain and possessed conveniences,
To doubtful fortunes; sequestering from me all
That time, acquaintance, custom, and condition,
Made tame and most familiar to my nature;
And here, to do you service, am become

2

As new into the world, strange, unacquainted.
I do beseech you, as in way of taste,

To give me now a little benefit,

Out of those many registered in promise,
Which, you say, live to come in my behalf.

Agam. What wouldst thou of us, Trojan! make demand.

Cal. You have a Trojan prisoner, called Antenor,
Yesterday took; Troy holds him very dear.
Oft have you (often have you thanks therefore)
Desired my Cressid in right great exchange,
Whom Troy hath still denied. But this Antenor,
I know, is such a wrest3 in their affairs,
That their negotiations all must slack,
Wanting his manage; and they will almost
Give us a prince of blood, a son of Priam,

In change of him. Let him be sent, great princes,
And he shall buy my daughter; and her presence

1 The old copies all concur in reading

“That through the sight I bear in things to love."

The present reading of the text is supported by Johnson and Malone; to which Mason makes this objection:-"That it was Juno, and not Jove, that persecuted the Trojans. Some modern editions have the line thus :"That through the sight I bear in things to come."

As Mason observes, "the speech of Calchas would have been incomplete, if he had said he abandoned Troy, from the sight he bore of things, without explaining it by adding the words to come."

The merit of Calchas did not merely consist in having come over to the Greeks; he also revealed to them the fate of Troy, which depended on their conveying away the palladium, and the horses of Rhesus, before they should drink of the river Xanthus.

2 Into for unto; a common form of expression in old writers.

3 A wrest is an instrument for tuning harps, &c. by drawing up the strings.

Shall quite strike off all service I have done,
In most accepted pain.'

Agam.
Let Diomedes bear him,
And bring us Cressid hither; Calchas shall have
What he requests of us.-Good Diomed,
Furnish you fairly for this interchange;

Withal, bring word-if Hector will to-morrow
Be answered in his challenge. Ajax is ready.
Dio. This shall I undertake; and 'tis a burden
Which I am proud to bear.

[Exeunt DIOMEDES and CALCHAS.

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS, before their tent.
Ulyss. Achilles stands i'the entrance of his tent.—
Please it our general to pass strangely by him,
As if he were forgot; and, princes all,

Lay negligent and loose regard upon him.
I will come last. 'Tis like, he'll question me,
Why such unplausive eyes are bent, why turned on him.
If so, I have derision med'cinable,

To use between your strangeness and his pride,
Which his own will shall have desire to drink;
It may do good. Pride hath no other glass
To show itself, but pride; for supple knees
Feed arrogance, and are the proud man's fees.
Agam. We'll execute your purpose, and put on
A form of strangeness as we pass along;
So do each lord; and either greet him not,
Or else disdainfully, which shall shake him more
Than if not looked on. I will lead the way.

Achil. What, comes the general to speak with me? You know my mind; I'll fight no more 'gainst Troy. Agam. What says Achilles? would he aught with us? Nest. Would you, my lord, aught with the general? Achil.

1 Hanmer and Warburton read, "In most accepted pay." But the construction of the passage, as it stands, appears to be," Her presence shall strike off, or recompense the service I have done, even in those labors which were most accepted."

Nest. Nothing, my lord.

Agam.

The better.

Achil.

[Exeunt AGAMEMNON and NEStor. Good day, good day.

Men. How do you? how do you?

Achil.

[Exit MENELAUS.

What, does the cuckold scorn me?

Ajax. How now, Patroclus?

Achil.

Good morrow, Ajax.

Ajax.

Ha!

Achil. Good morrow.

Ajax.

Ay, and good next day too. [Exit AJAX.

Achil. What mean these fellows? Know they not

Achilles?

Patr. They pass by strangely; they were used to bend, To send their smiles before them to Achilles;

To come as humbly as they used to creep

To holy altars.

Achil.

What, am I poor of late?
'Tis certain, greatness, once fallen out with fortune,
Must fall out with men too. What the declined is,
He shall as soon read in the eyes of others,

As feel in his own fall; for men, like butterflies,
Show not their mealy wings, but to the summer;
And not a man, for being simply man,

Hath any honor; but honor for those honors
That are without him, as place, riches, favor,
Prizes of accident as oft as merit;

Which when they fall, as being slippery standers,
The love that leaned on them as slippery too,
Do one pluck down another, and together
Die in the fall. But 'tis not so with me.
Fortune and I are friends; I do enjoy

At ample point all that I did possess,

Save these men's looks; who do, methinks, find out
Something not worth in me such rich beholding
As they have often given. Here is Ulysses;
I'll interrupt his reading.-

How now, Ulysses!