| ACT IV SCENE III. A highway between Rome and Antium. |
| [Enter a Roman and a Volsce, meeting] |
| Roman | I know you well, sir, and you know |
| me: your name, I think, is Adrian. |
| Volsce | It is so, sir: truly, I have forgot you. |
| Roman | I am a Roman; and my services are, |
| as you are, against 'em: know you me yet? | 5 |
| Volsce | Nicanor? no. |
| Roman | The same, sir. |
| Volsce | You had more beard when I last saw you; but your |
| favour is well approved by your tongue. What's the |
| news in Rome? I have a note from the Volscian state, | 10 |
| to find you out there: you have well saved me a |
| day's journey. |
| Roman | There hath been in Rome strange insurrections; the |
| people against the senators, patricians, and nobles. |
| Volsce | Hath been! is it ended, then? Our state thinks not | 15 |
| so: they are in a most warlike preparation, and |
| hope to come upon them in the heat of their division. |
| Roman | The main blaze of it is past, but a small thing |
| would make it flame again: for the nobles receive |
| so to heart the banishment of that worthy | 20 |
| Coriolanus, that they are in a ripe aptness to take |
| all power from the people and to pluck from them |
| their tribunes for ever. This lies glowing, I can |
| tell you, and is almost mature for the violent |
| breaking out. | 25 |
| Volsce | Coriolanus banished! |
| Roman | Banished, sir. |
| Volsce | You will be welcome with this intelligence, Nicanor. |
| Roman | The day serves well for them now. I have heard it |
| said, the fittest time to corrupt a man's wife is | 30 |
| when she's fallen out with her husband. Your noble |
| Tullus Aufidius will appear well in these wars, his |
| great opposer, Coriolanus, being now in no request |
| of his country. |
| Volsce | He cannot choose. I am most fortunate, thus | 35 |
| accidentally to encounter you: you have ended my |
| business, and I will merrily accompany you home. |
| Roman | I shall, between this and supper, tell you most |
| strange things from Rome; all tending to the good of |
| their adversaries. Have you an army ready, say you? | 40 |
| Volsce | A most royal one; the centurions and their charges, |
| distinctly billeted, already in the entertainment, |
| and to be on foot at an hour's warning. |
| Roman | I am joyful to hear of their readiness, and am the |
| man, I think, that shall set them in present action. | 45 |
| So, sir, heartily well met, and most glad of your company. |
| Volsce | You take my part from me, sir; I have the most cause |
| to be glad of yours. |
| Roman | Well, let us go together. |
| [Exeunt] |
Shakespeare's Sources for Coriolanus