Each word thou hast spoke hath weeded from my heart A root of ancient envy. If Jupiter Should from yond cloud speak divine things, And say 'Tis true,' I'ld not believe them more Than thee, all noble Marcius. Let me twine Mine arms about that body, where against My grained ash an hundred times hath broke And scarr'd the moon with splinters: here I clip The anvil of my sword, and do contest As hotly and as nobly with thy love As ever in ambitious strength I did Contend against thy valour. Know thou first, I loved the maid I married; never man Sigh'd truer breath; but that I see thee here, Thou noble thing! more dances my rapt heart Than when I first my wedded mistress saw Bestride my threshold. Why, thou Mars! I tell thee, We have a power on foot; and I had purpose Once more to hew thy target from thy brawn, Or lose mine arm fort: thou hast beat me out Twelve several times, and I have nightly since Dreamt of encounters 'twixt thyself and me;
We have been down together in my sleep, Unbuckling helms, fisting each other's throat, And waked half dead with nothing. Worthy Marcius, Had we no quarrel else to Rome, but that Thou art thence banish'd, we would muster all From twelve to seventy, and pouring war Into the bowels of ungrateful Rome, Like a bold flood o'er-bear. O, come, go in, And take our friendly senators by the hands;
Who now are here, taking their leaves of me, Who am prepared against your territories, Though not for Rome itself. CORIOLANUS You bless me, gods! AUFIDIUS Therefore, most absolute sir, if thou wilt have The leading of thine own revenges, take The one half of my commission; and set down--As best thou art experienced, since thou know'st Thy country's strength and weakness,--thine own ways;
Whether to knock against the gates of Rome, Or rudely visit them in parts remote, To fright them, ere destroy. But come in:
Let me commend thee first to those that shall Say yea to thy desires. A thousand welcomes!
And more a friend than e'er an enemy;
Yet, Marcius, that was much. Your hand: most welcome!
Exeunt CORIOLANUS and AUFIDIUS. The two Servingmen come forward First Servingman Here's a strange alteration! Second Servingman By my hand, I had thought to have strucken him with a cudgel; and yet my mind gave me his clothes made a false report of him. First Servingman What an arm he has! he turned me about with his finger and his thumb, as one would set up a top. Second Servingman Nay, I knew by his face that there was something in him: he had, sir, a kind of face, methought,--I cannot tell how to term it. First Servingman He had so; looking as it were--would I were hanged, but I thought there was more in him than I could think. Second Servingman So did I, I'll be sworn: he is simply the rarest man i' the world. First Servingman I think he is: but a greater soldier than he you wot on. Second Servingman Who, my master? First Servingman Nay, it's no matter for that. Second Servingman Worth six on him. First Servingman Nay, not so neither: but I take him to be the greater soldier. Second Servingman Faith, look you, one cannot tell how to say that: for the defence of a town, our general is excellent. First Servingman Ay, and for an assault too.
Re-enter third Servingman Third Servingman O slaves, I can tell you news,-- news, you rascals! First Servingman Second Servingman What, what, what? let's partake. Third Servingman I would not be a Roman, of all nations;
I had as lieve be a condemned man. First Servingman Second Servingman Wherefore? wherefore? Third Servingman Why, here's he that was wont to thwack our general, Caius Marcius. First Servingman Why do you say 'thwack our general '? Third Servingman I do not say 'thwack our general;' but he was always good enough for him. Second Servingman Come, we are fellows and friends: he was ever too hard for him; I have heard him say so himself. First Servingman He was too hard for him directly, to say the troth on't: before Corioli he scotched him and notched him like a carbon ado. Second Servingman An he had been cannibally given, he might have broiled and eaten him too. First Servingman But, more of thy news? Third Servingman Why, he is so made on here within, as if he were son and heir to Mars; set at upper end o' the table; no question asked him by any of the senators, but they stand bald before him: our general himself makes a mistress of him: sanctifies himself with's hand and turns up the white o' the eye to his discourse.
But the bottom of the news is that our general is cut i' the middle and but one half of what he was yesterday; for the other has half, by the entreaty and grant of the whole table. He'll go, he says, and sowl the porter of Rome gates by the ears: he will mow all down before him, and leave his passage polled. Second Servingman And he's as like to do't as any man I can imagine. Third Servingman Do't! he will do't; for, look you, sir, he has as many friends as enemies; which friends, sir, as it were, durst not, look you, sir, show themselves, as we term it, his friends whilst he's in directitude. First Servingman Directitude! what's that? Third Servingman But when they shall see, sir, his crest up again, and the man in blood, they will out of their burrows, like conies after rain, and revel all with him. First Servingman But when goes this forward? Third Servingman To-morrow; to-day; presently; you shall have the drum struck up this afternoon: 'tis, as it were, a parcel of their feast, and to be executed ere they wipe their lips. Second Servingman Why, then we shall have a stirring world again.
This peace is nothing, but to rust iron, increase tailors, and breed ballad-makers. First Servingman Let me have war, say I; it exceeds peace as far as day does night; it's spritely, waking, audible, and full of vent. Peace is a very apoplexy, lethargy; mulled, deaf, sleepy, insensible; a getter of more bastard children than war's a destroyer of men. Second Servingman 'Tis so: and as war, in some sort, may be said to be a ravisher, so it cannot be denied but peace is a great maker of cuckolds. First Servingman Ay, and it makes men hate one another. Third Servingman Reason; because they then less need one another.
The wars for my money. I hope to see Romans as cheap as Volscians. They are rising, they are rising. All In, in, in, in!
