| ACT I SCENE I | Troy. Before Priam's palace. | |
| [Enter TROILUS armed, and PANDARUS] |
| TROILUS | Call here my varlet; I'll unarm again: |
| Why should I war without the walls of Troy, |
| That find such cruel battle here within? |
| Each Trojan that is master of his heart, |
| Let him to field; Troilus, alas! hath none. | 5 |
| PANDARUS | Will this gear ne'er be mended? |
| TROILUS | The Greeks are strong and skilful to their strength, |
| Fierce to their skill and to their fierceness valiant; |
| But I am weaker than a woman's tear, |
| Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance, | 10 |
| Less valiant than the virgin in the night |
| And skilless as unpractised infancy. |
| PANDARUS | Well, I have told you enough of this: for my part, |
| I'll not meddle nor make no further. He that will |
| have a cake out of the wheat must needs tarry the grinding. | 15 |
| TROILUS | Have I not tarried? |
| PANDARUS | Ay, the grinding; but you must tarry |
| the bolting. |
| TROILUS | Have I not tarried? |
| PANDARUS | Ay, the bolting, but you must tarry the leavening. | 20 |
| TROILUS | Still have I tarried. |
| PANDARUS | Ay, to the leavening; but here's yet in the word |
| 'hereafter' the kneading, the making of the cake, the |
| heating of the oven and the baking; nay, you must |
| stay the cooling too, or you may chance to burn your lips. | 25 |
| TROILUS | Patience herself, what goddess e'er she be, |
| Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do. |
| At Priam's royal table do I sit; |
| And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts,-- |
| So, traitor! 'When she comes!' When is she thence? | 30 |
| PANDARUS | Well, she looked yesternight fairer than ever I saw |
| her look, or any woman else. |
| TROILUS | I was about to tell thee:--when my heart, |
| As wedged with a sigh, would rive in twain, |
| Lest Hector or my father should perceive me, | 35 |
| I have, as when the sun doth light a storm, |
| Buried this sigh in wrinkle of a smile: |
| But sorrow, that is couch'd in seeming gladness, |
| Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness. |
| PANDARUS | An her hair were not somewhat darker than Helen's-- | 40 |
| well, go to--there were no more comparison between |
| the women: but, for my part, she is my kinswoman; I |
| would not, as they term it, praise her: but I would |
| somebody had heard her talk yesterday, as I did. I |
| will not dispraise your sister Cassandra's wit, but-- | 45 |
| TROILUS | O Pandarus! I tell thee, Pandarus,-- |
| When I do tell thee, there my hopes lie drown'd, |
| Reply not in how many fathoms deep |
| They lie indrench'd. I tell thee I am mad |
| In Cressid's love: thou answer'st 'she is fair;' | 50 |
| Pour'st in the open ulcer of my heart |
| Her eyes, her hair, her cheek, her gait, her voice, |
| Handlest in thy discourse, O, that her hand, |
| In whose comparison all whites are ink, |
| Writing their own reproach, to whose soft seizure | 55 |
| The cygnet's down is harsh and spirit of sense |
| Hard as the palm of ploughman: this thou tell'st me, |
| As true thou tell'st me, when I say I love her; |
| But, saying thus, instead of oil and balm, |
| Thou lay'st in every gash that love hath given me | 60 |
| The knife that made it. |
| PANDARUS | I speak no more than truth. |
| TROILUS | Thou dost not speak so much. |
| PANDARUS | Faith, I'll not meddle in't. Let her be as she is: |
| if she be fair, 'tis the better for her; an she be | 65 |
| not, she has the mends in her own hands. |
| TROILUS | Good Pandarus, how now, Pandarus! |
| PANDARUS | I have had my labour for my travail; ill-thought on of |
| her and ill-thought on of you; gone between and |
| between, but small thanks for my labour. | 70 |
| TROILUS | What, art thou angry, Pandarus? what, with me? |
| PANDARUS | Because she's kin to me, therefore she's not so fair |
| as Helen: an she were not kin to me, she would be as |
| fair on Friday as Helen is on Sunday. But what care |
| I? I care not an she were a black-a-moor; 'tis all one to me. | 75 |
| TROILUS | Say I she is not fair? |
| PANDARUS | I do not care whether you do or no. She's a fool to |
| stay behind her father; let her to the Greeks; and so |
| I'll tell her the next time I see her: for my part, |
| I'll meddle nor make no more i' the matter. | 80 |
| TROILUS | Pandarus,-- |
| PANDARUS | Not I. |
| TROILUS | Sweet Pandarus,-- |
| PANDARUS | Pray you, speak no more to me: I will leave all as I |
| found it, and there an end. | 85 |
| [Exit PANDARUS. An alarum] |
| TROILUS | Peace, you ungracious clamours! peace, rude sounds! |
| Fools on both sides! Helen must needs be fair, |
| When with your blood you daily paint her thus. |
| I cannot fight upon this argument; |
| It is too starved a subject for my sword. | 90 |
| But Pandarus,--O gods, how do you plague me! |
| I cannot come to Cressid but by Pandar; |
| And he's as tetchy to be woo'd to woo. |
| As she is stubborn-chaste against all suit. |
| Tell me, Apollo, for thy Daphne's love, | 95 |
| What Cressid is, what Pandar, and what we? |
| Her bed is India; there she lies, a pearl: |
| Between our Ilium and where she resides, |
| Let it be call'd the wild and wandering flood, |
| Ourself the merchant, and this sailing Pandar | 100 |
| Our doubtful hope, our convoy and our bark. |
| [Alarum. Enter AENEAS] |
| AENEAS | How now, Prince Troilus! wherefore not afield? |
| TROILUS | Because not there: this woman's answer sorts, |
| For womanish it is to be from thence. |
| What news, AEneas, from the field to-day? | 105 |
| AENEAS | That Paris is returned home and hurt. |
| TROILUS | By whom, AEneas? |
| AENEAS | Troilus, by Menelaus. |
| TROILUS | Let Paris bleed; 'tis but a scar to scorn; |
| Paris is gored with Menelaus' horn. | 110 |
| [Alarum] |
| AENEAS | Hark, what good sport is out of town to-day! |
| TROILUS | Better at home, if 'would I might' were 'may.' |
| But to the sport abroad: are you bound thither? |
| AENEAS | In all swift haste. |
| TROILUS | Come, go we then together. | 115 |
| [Exeunt] |
Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida: Scenes and Commentary