Where he should find you lions, finds you hares; Deserves your hate; and your affections are And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye! With every minute you do change a mind; matter, What's the You cry against the noble senate, who, seeking? MEN. For corn at their own rates; whereof, they say, The city is well stor❜d. MAR. Hang 'em! They say! They'll sit by the fire, and presume to know What's done i' the Capitol; who's like to rise, Who thrives, and who declines; side factions, and give out Conjectural marriages; making parties strong, And feebling such as stand not in their liking Below their cobbled shoes. They say there's grain enough! Would the nobility lay aside their ruth, And let me use my sword, I'd make a quarry' A quarry." in the language of the forest, meant a pile of slaughtered game. MAR. They have a leader, Tullus Aufidius, that will put you to't. COM. Upon my party, I'd revolt, to make 1 SEN. Sir, it is; And I am constant.-Titus Lartius,* thou TIT. O, true bred! 1 SEN. Your company to the Capitol; where, I know, Our greatest friends attend us. TIT. Сом. Lead you on: Noble Marcius! 1 SEN. Hence! To your homes, be gone! MAR. The Volsces have much thither, [To the Citizens. Nay, let them follow: corn; take these rats (*) Old text, Lucius The present wars devour him! he is grown The beginning of this speech, which has been explained.-his pride of military prowess in these wars devours him, we prefer to read, with Warburton, as an imprecation. The latter words appear to import,-He is grown too proud of being so valiant. Tickled with good success, disdains the shadow Which he treads on at noon: but I do wonder, His insolence can brook to be commanded Under Cominius. BRU. Fame, at the which he aims, In whom already he's well grac'd,—cannot Better be held, nor more attain'd, than by A place below the first: for what miscarries Shall be the general's fault, though he perform To the utmost of a man; and giddy censure Will then cry out of Marcius, O, if he Had borne the business! Let's along. [Exeunt. 1 SEN. 2 SEN. ALL. Farewell. The gods assist you! Farewell. Farewell. [Exeunt. SCENE II.-Corioli. The Senate-House. Enter TULLUS AUFIDIUS, and certain Senators. 1 SEN. So, your opinion is, Aufidius, That they of Rome are enter'd in our counsels, And know how we proceed. C AUF. I have the letter here:-yes, here it is:- [Reads. 1 SEN. Our army's in the field: a Of his demerits rob Cominius.] "Demerits" and merits had, of old, the same meaning, that of deserts. b More than his singularity,-] As "singularity" formerly implied pre-eminence, Sicinius may mean, sarcastically,-after what fashion beside his usual assumption of superiority. Enter VOLUMNIA and VIRGILIA: they sit down on two low stools, and sew. VOL. I pray you, daughter, sing; or express yourself in a more comfortable sort: if my son were my husband, I should freelier rejoice in that absence wherein he won honour, than in the embracements of his bed where he would show most love. When yet he was but tender-bodied, and the only son of my womb; when youth with comeliness plucked all gaze his way; when, for a day of kings' entreaties, a mother should not sell him an hour from her beholding; I,- considering how honour would become such a person; that it was no better than picture-like to hang by the wall, if renown made it not stir,-was pleased to let him seek danger where he was like to find fame. Το a cruel war I sent him; from whence he returned, his brows bound with oak.(3) I tell thee, daughter, -I sprang not more in joy at first hearing he was Methinks I hear hither your husband's drum; VIR. His bloody brow! O, Jupiter, no blood! VOL. Away, you fool! it more becomes a man Than gilt his trophy: the breasts of Hecuba, When she did suckle Hector, look'd not lovelier Than Hector's forehead when it spit forth blood At Grecian swords' contending."-Tell Valeria, We are fit to bid her welcome. [Exit Gent. VIR. Heavens bless my lord from fell Aufidius! VOL. He'll beat Aufidius' head below his knee, And tread upon his neck. "At Grecian swords contemning," &c.; and Mr. W. N. Lettsom, "As Grecian swords contemning." Enter VALERIA, attended by an Usher, and a Gentlewoman. VAL. My ladies both, good day to you. VIR. I am glad to see your ladyship. VAL. How do you both? you are manifest house-keepers. What are you sewing here? A fine spot, in good faith.-How does your little son? VIR. I thank your ladyship; well, good madam. VOL. He had rather see the swords, and hear a drum, than look upon his school-master. VAL. O' my word, the father's son: I'll swear, 'tis a very pretty boy. O' my troth, I looked upon him o' Wednesday half an hour together: h'as such a confirmed countenance. I saw him run after a gilded butterfly; and when he caught it, he let it go again; and after it again; and over and over he comes, and up again; catched it again or whether his fall enraged him, or how 'twas, he did so set his teeth, and tear it; O, I warrant, how he mammocked it. VOL. One of his father's moods. VAL. Indeed la, 'tis a noble child. VAL. In earnest, it's true; I heard a senator speak it. Thus it is:-The Volsces have an army forth; against whom Cominius the general is gone, with one part of our Roman power: your lord and Titus Lartius are set down before their city Corioli; they nothing doubt prevailing, and to make it brief wars. This is true, on mine honour; and So, I pray, go with us. VIR. Give me excuse, good madam; I will obey you in every thing hereafter. VOL. Let her alone, lady; as she is now, she will but disease our better mirth. VAL. In troth, I think, she would.-Fare you well then.-Come, good sweet lady.—Pr'ythee, Virgilia, turn thy solemness out o'door, and go along with us. VIR. No, at a word, madam; indeed, I must not. I wish you much mirth. VAL. Well then, farewell. SCENE IV. Before Corioli. [Exeunt. VIR. No, good madam; I will not out of Enter, with Drum and Colours, MARCIUS, TITUS doors. VAL. Not out of doors! VOL. She shall, she shall. VIR. Indeed, no, by your patience; I'll not over the threshold till my lord return from the wars. VAL. Fie, you confine yourself most unreasonably come, you must go visit the good lady that lies in. VIR. I will wish her speedy strength, and visit her with my prayers; but I cannot go thither. VOL. Why, I pray you? VIR. "Tis not to save labour, nor that I want love. VAL. You would be another Penelope: yet, they say, all the yarn she spun in Ulysses' absence, did but fill Ithaca full of moths. Come; I would your cambric were sensible as your finger, that you might leave pricking it for pity. Come, you shall go with us. VIR. No, good madam, pardon me; indeed, I will not forth. VAL. In truth la, go with me; and I'll tell you excellent news of your husband. (*) Old text, Athica. a or whether his fall enraged him,-] Or, here, is probably a misprint for and. LARTIUS, Officers and Soldiers. MAR. Yonder comes news:-a wager they have met. LART. My horse to yours, no. MAR. LART. 'Tis done. Agreed. Enter a Messenger. MAR. Say, has our general met the enemy? For half a hundred years.--Summon the town. Now, Mars, I pr'ythee, make us quick in work, b A crack, madam.] A "crack" is a bold, sharp boy; a manikin. The term occurs again in the "Second Part of Henry IV." Act III. Sc. 2:-"I saw him break Skogan's 1. vd at the courtgate, when he was a crack, not thus high." |