Troy. A Street. | |
| |
Enter, on one side, ÆNEAS, and Servant with a torch; on the other, PARIS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR, DIOMEDES, and Others, with torches. | |
| Par. See, ho! who is that there? | |
| Dei. It is the Lord Æneas. | 4 |
| Æne. Is the prince there in person? | |
| Had I so good occasion to lie long | |
| As you, Prince Paris, nothing but heavenly business | |
| Should rob my bed-mate of my company. | 8 |
| Dio. That’s my mind too. Good morrow, Lord Æneas. | |
| Par. A valiant Greek, Æneas; take his hand: | |
| Witness the process of your speech, wherein | |
| You told how Diomed, a whole week by days, | 12 |
| Did haunt you in the field. | |
| Æne. Health to you, valiant sir, | |
| During all question of the gentle truce; | |
| But when I meet you arm’d, as black defiance | 16 |
| As heart can think or courage execute. | |
| Dio. The one and other Diomed embraces. | |
| Our bloods are now in calm, and, so long, health! | |
| But when contention and occasion meet, | 20 |
| By Jove, I’ll play the hunter for thy life | |
| With all my force, pursuit, and policy. | |
| Æne. And thou shalt hunt a lion, that will fly | |
| With his face backward. In humane gentleness, | 24 |
| Welcome to Troy! now, by Anchises’ life, | |
| Welcome, indeed! By Venus’ hand I swear, | |
| No man alive can love in such a sort | |
| The thing he means to kill more excellently. | 28 |
| Dio. We sympathize. Jove, let Æneas live, | |
| If to my sword his fate be not the glory, | |
| A thousand complete courses of the sun! | |
| But, in mine emulous honour, let him die, | 32 |
| With every joint a wound, and that to-morrow! | |
| Æne. We know each other well. | |
| Dio. We do; and long to know each other worse. | |
| Par. This is the most despiteful gentle greeting, | 36 |
| The noblest hateful love, that e’er I heard of. | |
| What business, lord, so early? | |
| Æne. I was sent for to the king; but why, I know not. | |
| Par. His purpose meets you: ’twas to bring this Greek | 40 |
| To Calchas’ house, and there to render him, | |
| For the enfreed Antenor, the fair Cressid. | |
| Let’s have your company; or, if you please, | |
| Haste there before us. I constantly do think— | 44 |
| Or rather, call my thought a certain knowledge— | |
| My brother Troilus lodges there to-night: | |
| Rouse him and give him note of our approach, | |
| With the whole quality wherefore: I fear | 48 |
| We shall be much unwelcome. | |
| Æne. That I assure you: | |
| Troilus had rather Troy were borne to Greece | |
| Than Cressid borne from Troy. | 52 |
| Par. There is no help; | |
| The bitter disposition of the time | |
| Will have it so. On, lord; we’ll follow you. | |
| Æne. Good morrow, all. [Exit. | 56 |
| Par. And tell me, noble Diomed; faith, tell me true, | |
| Even in the soul of sound good-fellowship, | |
| Who, in your thoughts, merits fair Helen best— | |
| Myself or Menelaus? | 60 |
| Dio. Both alike: | |
| He merits well to have her that doth seek her— | |
| Not making any scruple of her soilure— | |
| With such a hell of pain and world of charge, | 64 |
| And you as well to keep her that defend her— | |
| Not palating the taste of her dishonour— | |
| With such a costly loss of wealth and friends: | |
| He, like a puling cuckold, would drink up | 68 |
| The lees and dregs of a fiat tamed piece; | |
| You, like a lecher, out of whorish loins | |
| Are pleas’d to breed out your inheritors: | |
| Both merits pois’d, each weighs nor less nor more; | 72 |
| But he as he, the heavier for a whore. | |
| Par. You are too bitter to your country-woman. | |
| Dio. She’s bitter to her country. Hear me, Paris: | |
| For every false drop in her bawdy veins | 76 |
| A Grecian’s life hath sunk; for every scruple | |
| Of her contaminated carrion weight | |
| A Trojan hath been slain. Since she could speak, | |
| She hath not given so many good words breath | 80 |
| As for her Greeks and Trojans suffer’d death. | |
| Par. Fair Diomed, you do as chapmen do, | |
| Dispraise the thing that you desire to buy; | |
| But we in silence hold this virtue well, | 84 |
| We’ll not commend what we intend to sell. | |
| Here lies our way. [Exeunt. | |
