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pledge!

Thy master now lies thinking in his bed
Of thee and me; and sighs, and takes my glove,
And gives memorial dainty kisses to it,

As I kiss thee.-Nay, do not snatch it from me;
He that takes that, must take my heart withal.

Dio. I had your heart before; this follows it. Tro. I did swear patience.

Cres. You shall not have it, Diomed; 'faith you shall not;

I'll give you something else.

Dio. I will have this; whose was it?

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Cres. By all Diana's waiting-women yonder, And by herself, I will not tell you whose.

Dio. To-morrow will I wear it on my helm; And grieve his spirit that dares not challenge it. Tro. Wert thou the devil, and wor'st it on thy horn,

It should be challenged.

Cres. Well, well, 't is done, 'tis past: and yet it is not;

I will not keep my word.

Dio. Why then, farewell;

Thou never shalt mock Diomed again.

Cres. You shall not go:-one cannot speak a word,

But it straight starts you.

Dio.

I do not like this fooling. Ther. Nor I, by Pluto: but that that likes not you, pleases me best.

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Tro. Let it not be believed for womanhood! Think we had mothers; do not give advantage To stubborn critics-apt, without a theme, For depravation-to square the general sex By Cressid's rule: rather think this not Cressid. Ulys. What hath she done, prince, that can soil our mothers?

Tro. Nothing at all, unless that this were she. Ther. Will he swagger himself out on's own eyes?

Tro. This she? no, this is Diomed's Cressida : If beauty have a soul, this is not she; If souls guide vows, if vows be sanctimony, If sanctimony be the gods' delight, If there be rule in unity itself,

This was not she. O, madness of discourse, That cause sets up with and against itself! Bifold authority! where reason can revolt Without perdition, and loss assume all reason Without revolt; this is, and is not, Cressid! Within my soul there doth commence a fight

Of this strange nature, that a thing inseparate
Divides more wider than the sky and earth;
And yet the spacious breadth of this division
Admits no orifice for a point, as subtile
As is Arachne's broken woof, to enter.
Instance, O instance! strong as Pluto's gates;
Cressid is mine, tied with the bonds of heaven:
Instance, O instance! strong as heaven itself;
The bonds of heaven are slipped, dissolved, and
loosed;

And with another knot, five-finger tied,
The fractions of her faith, orts of her love,
The fragments, scraps, the bits, and greasy reliques.
Of her o'er eaten faith, are bound to Diomed.

Ulys. May worthy Troilus be half attached With that which here his passion doth express?

Tro. Ay, Greek; and that shall be divulged well In characters as red as Mars his heart Inflamed with Venus: never did young man fancy With so eternal and so fixed a soul. Hark, Greek ;-as much as I do Cressid love, So much by weight hate I her Diomed: That sleeve is mine that he'll bear on his helm; Were it a casque composed by Vulcan's skill, My sword should bite it: not the dreadful spout Which shipmen do the hurricano call, Constringed in mass by the almighty sun, Shall dizzy with more clamour Neptune's ear In his descent, than shall my prompted sword Falling on Diomed.

Ther. He'll tickle it for his concupy.

Tro. O, Cressid! O, false Cressid! false, false, false !

Let all untruths stand by thy stained name,
And they'll seem glorious.

Ulys. O, contain yourself;
Your passion draws ears hither.

Enter ENEAS.

Ene. I have been seeking you this hour, mylord : Hector, by this, is arming him in Troy; Ajax, your guard, stays to conduct you home. Tro. Have with you, prince :-My courteous

lord, adieu ::

Farewell, revolted fair! and, Diomed,
Stand fast, and wear a castle on thy head!
Ulys. I'll bring you to the gates.
Tro. Accept distracted thanks.

[Exeunt TROILUS, ENEAS, and ULYSSES. Ther. 'Would I could meet that rogue Diomed!

I would croak like a raven; I would bode, I would bode. Patroclus will give me anything for the intelligence of this whore: the parrot will not do more for an almond, than he for a commodious drab. Lechery, lechery; still wars and lechery; nothing else holds fashion: a burning devil take them. [Exit.

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Cas. It is the purpose that makes strong the To tell thee that this day is ominous :

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How now, young man? mean'st thou to fight to-day? And. Cassandra, call my father to persuade. [Exit CasSANDRA.

Hect. No, 'faith, young Troilus; doff thy harness, youth;

I am to-day i' the vein of chivalry:

Let grow thy sinews till their knots be strong, And tempt not yet the brushes of the war. Unarm thee, go; and doubt thou not, brave boy, I'll stand, to-day, for thee, and me, and Troy.

Tro. Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you, Which better fits a lion than a man.

Hect. What vice is that, good Troilus? chide me for it.

Tro. When many times the captive Grecians fall, Even in the fan and wind of your fair sword, You bid them rise and live.

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But thou shalt not go.

Hect. I must not break my faith.

You know me dutiful; therefore, dear sir,
Let me not shame respect; but give me leave
To take that course by your consent and voice,
Which you do here forbid me, royal Priam.
Cas. O Priam, yield not to him!
And. Do not, dear father.

Hect. Andromache, I am offended with
Upon the love you bear me, get you in.

you:

[Exit ANDROMACHE. Tro. This foolish, dreaming, superstitious girl Makes all these bodements.

Cas. O, farewell, dear Hector! Look, how thou diest! look, how thy eye turns pale! Look, how thy wounds do bleed at many vents! Hark, how Troy roars! how Hecuba cries out! How poor Andromache shrills her dolours forth! Behold, distraction, frenzy, and amazement, Like witless anticks, one another meet, And all cry" Hector! Hector's dead!" O Hector! Tro. Away! away!

Cas. Farewell.-Yet, soft: Hector, I take my leave:

Thou dost thyself and all our Troy deceive. [Exit.

Hect. You are amazed, my liege, at her exclaim! Go in, and cheer the town: we'll forth and fight: Do deeds worth praise, and tell you them at night. Pri. Farewell: the gods with safety stand about thee!

[Exeunt, severally, PRIAM and HECTOR. Alarums.

Tro. They are at it; hark! Proud Diomed, believe

I come to lose my arm, or win my sleeve.

AS TROILUS is going out, enter, from the other side,
PANDARUS.

Pan. Do you hear, my lord? do you hear?
Tro. What now?

Pan. Here's a letter from yon' poor girl.
Tro. Let me read.

Pan. A whoreson ptisick, a whoreson rascally ptisick so troubles me, and the foolish fortune of this girl; and what one thing, what another, that I shall leave you one o' these days: and I have a rheum in mine eyes too; and such an ache in my bones, that, unless a man were cursed, I cannot tell what to think on 't.-What says she there? Tro. Words, words, mere words; no matter from [Tearing the letter.

the heart;

The effect doth operate another way.— Go, wind to wind, there turn and change together.

My love with words and errors still she feeds; But edifies another with her deeds.

[Exeunt severally.

SCENE IV.-Between Troy and the Grecian Camp. Alarums: Excursions. Enter THERSITES. Ther. Now they are clapper-clawing one another: I'll go look on. That dissembling abominable varlet, Diomed, has got that same scurvy doting foolish young knave's sleeve of Troy there, in his helm: I would fain see them meet; that that same Trojan ass, that loves the whore there, might send that Greekish whoremasterly villain, with the sleeve, back to the dissembling luxurious drab, on a sleeveless errand. O' the other side, the policy of those crafty swearing rascals—that stale old mouse-eaten dry cheese, Nestor, and that same dog-fox, Ulysses-is not proved worth a blackberry:-they set me up, in policy, that mongrel cur, Ajax, against that dog of as bad a kind, Achilles: and now is the cur Ajax prouder than the cur Achilles, and will not arm to-day; whereupon the Grecians begin to proclaim barbarism, and policy grows into an ill opinion. Soft! here come sleeve, and t'other.

Enter DIOMEDES: TROILUS following.

Tro. Fly not; for shouldst thou take the river Styx,

I would swim after.

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Nes. Go, bear Patroclus' body to Achilles; And bid the snail-paced Ajax arm for shame.— There is a thousand Hectors in the field: Now here he fights on Galathé his horse, And there lacks work; anon, he's there afoot, And there they fly or die, like scaléd sculls Before the belching whale; then is he yonder, And there the strawy Greeks, ripe for his edge, Fall down before him, like the mower's swath : Here, there, and everywhere, he leaves and takes; Dexterity so obeying appetite,

That what he will, he does; and does so much, That proof is called impossibility.

Enter ULYSSES.

Ulys. O, courage, courage, 'princes! great
Achilles

Is arming, weeping, cursing, vowing vengeance.
Patroclus' wounds have roused his drowsy blood,
Together with his mangled Myrmidons,
That noseless, handless, hacked, and chipped,
come to him,

Crying on Hector. Ajax hath lost a friend, And foams at mouth, and he is armed, and at it,

Roaring for Troilus; who hath done to-day
Mad and fantastic execution;

Engaging and redeeming of himself,

With such a careless force and forceless care,
As if that luck, in very spite of cunning,
Bade him win all.

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