| [Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS] | |
| ACHILLES | I'll heat his blood with Greekish wine to-night, Which with my scimitar I'll cool to-morrow. Patroclus, let us feast him to the height. |
| PATROCLUS | Here comes Thersites. |
| [Enter THERSITES] | |
| ACHILLES | How now, thou core of envy! Thou crusty batch of nature, what's the news? |
| THERSITES | Why, thou picture of what thou seemest, and idol of idiot worshippers, here's a letter for thee. |
| ACHILLES | From whence, fragment? |
| THERSITES | Why, thou full dish of fool, from Troy. |
| PATROCLUS | Who keeps the tent now? |
| THERSITES | The surgeon's box, or the patient's wound. |
| PATROCLUS | Well said, adversity! and what need these tricks? |
| THERSITES | Prithee, be silent, boy; I profit not by thy talk: thou art thought to be Achilles' male varlet. |
| PATROCLUS | Male varlet, you rogue! what's that? |
| THERSITES | 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-ache, and the rivelled fee-simple of the tetter, take and take again such preposterous discoveries! |
| PATROCLUS | Why thou damnable box of envy, thou, what meanest thou to curse thus? |
| THERSITES | Do I curse thee? |
| PATROCLUS | Why no, you ruinous butt, you whoreson indistinguishable cur, no. |
| THERSITES | No! why art thou then exasperate, thou idle immaterial skein of sleave-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 waterflies, diminutives of nature! |
| PATROCLUS | Out, gall! |
| THERSITES | Finch-egg! |
| ACHILLES | 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 love, 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] | |
| THERSITES | 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; but he has not so much brain as earwax: 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 with wit turn him to? To an ass, were nothing; he is both ass and ox: to an ox, were nothing; he is both ox and ass. To be a dog, a mule, a cat, a fitchew, 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! |
| [Enter HECTOR, TROILUS, AJAX, AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR, MENELAUS, and DIOMEDES, with lights] |
|
| AGAMEMNON | We go wrong, we go wrong. |
| AJAX | No, yonder 'tis; There, where we see the lights. |
| HECTOR | I trouble you. |
| AJAX | No, not a whit. |
| ULYSSES | Here comes himself to guide you. |
| [Re-enter ACHILLES] | |
| ACHILLES | Welcome, brave Hector; welcome, princes all. |
| AGAMEMNON | So now, fair prince of Troy, I bid good night. Ajax commands the guard to tend on you. |
| HECTOR | Thanks and good night to the Greeks' general. |
| MENELAUS | Good night, my lord. |
| HECTOR | Good night, sweet lord Menelaus. |
| THERSITES | Sweet draught: 'sweet' quoth 'a! sweet sink, sweet sewer. |
| ACHILLES | Good night and welcome, both at once, to those That go or tarry. |
| AGAMEMNON | Good night. |
| [Exeunt AGAMEMNON and MENELAUS] | |
| ACHILLES | Old Nestor tarries; and you too, Diomed, Keep Hector company an hour or two. |
| DIOMEDES | I cannot, lord; I have important business, The tide whereof is now. Good night, great Hector. |
| HECTOR | Give me your hand. |
| ULYSSES | [Aside to TROILUS] Follow his torch; he goes to Calchas' tent: I'll keep you company. |
| TROILUS | Sweet sir, you honour me. |
| HECTOR | And so, good night. |
| [Exit DIOMEDES; ULYSSES and TROILUS following] | |
| ACHILLES | Come, come, enter my tent. |
| [Exeunt ACHILLES, HECTOR, AJAX, and NESTOR] | |
| THERSITES | 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 Brabbler the hound: but when he performs, astronomers foretell it; it is prodigious, 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] |