your way.

Vol. O! ye're well met. The hoarded plague o' the gods

Requite your love!

Men.

Peace, peace! be not so loud. Vol. If that I could for weeping, you should

hear

Nay, and you shall hear some. To BRUTUS.
Will you be gone?

Vir. To SICINIUS. You shall stay too. I
would I had the power
To say so to my husband.

Sic.

Are you mankind? Vol. Ay, fool; is that a shame? Note but this fool.

Was not a man my father? Hadst thou foxship
To banish him that struck more blows for Rome
Than thou hast spoken words?
O blessed heavens! 20
Vol. More noble blows than ever thou wise
words;

Sic.

And for Rome's good. I'll tell thee what; yet

go:

Nay, but thou shalt stay too: I would my son
Were in Arabia, and thy tribe before him,
His good sword in his hand.

What then?

Sic.

Vir.
He'd make an end of thy posterity.

Vol. Bastards and all.

Good man, the wounds that he does bear for

Rome!

Rom. The same, sir.

Vols. 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 to find you out there you have well saved me a day's journey.

Rom. There hath been in Rome strange insurrections: the people against the senators, patricians, and nobles.

15

Vols. Hath been! Is it ended then? Our state thinks not so; they are in a most warlike preparation, and hope to come upon them in the heat of their division.

Rom. 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 Coriolanus, that they are in a ripe aptness to take all power from the people and What then! to pluck from them their tribunes for ever. This lies glowing, I can tell you, and is almost mature for the violent breaking out.

Vols. Coriolanus banished!

Men. Come, come: peace!

Sic. I would he had continu'd to his country As he began, and not unknit himself

The noble knot he made.

Bru.

Vol. I would he had!'
the rabble:

Cats, that can judge as fitly of his worth
As I can of those mysteries which heaven
Will not have earth to know.

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Rom. Banished, sir.

Vols. You will be welcome with this intelligence, Nicanor.

$1

Rom. The day serves well for them now. I have heard it said, the fittest time to corrupt a man's wife is 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.

Vols. He cannot choose. I am most fortunate thus accidentally to encounter you: you have ended my business, and I will merrily accompany you home.

41

Rom. 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

Vols. 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.

Rom. I am joyful to hear of their readiness, and am the man, I think, that shall set them in present action. So, sir, heartily well met, and most glad of your company.

I would he had.
'Twas you incens'd

Men.
You have told them home,
And, by my troth, you have cause.
You'll sup
with me?

Vol. Anger's my meat; I sup upon myself, 59
And so shall starve with feeding. Come, let's go.
Leave this faint puling and lament as I do,
In anger, Juno-like. Come, come, come.
Men. Fie, fie, fie!

Exeunt.

Bru.

Pray, let us go.
Vol. Now, pray, sir. get you gone:
You have done a brave deed. Ere you
hear this:

go,

As far as doth the Capitol exceed
The meanest house in Rome, so far my son,
This lady's husband here, this, do you see?
Whom you have banish'd, does exceed you all.
Bru. Well, well; we'll leave you.
Sic.
Why stay we to be baited
With one that wants her wits?

Vol.

SCENE III.-A Highway between Rome and
Antium.

Take my prayers with you.
Exeunt Tribunes.
I would the gods had nothing else to do
But to confirm my curses! Could I meet 'em
But once a day, it would unclog my heart
Of what lies heavy to't.

Enter a Roman and a Volsce, meeting.

Rom. I know you well, sir, and you know me: your name I think is Adrian.

Vols. It is so, sir: truly, I have forgot you. Rom. I am a Roman; and my services are, as you are, against 'em. Know you me yet? Vols. Nicanor? No.

Vols. You take my part from me, sir; I have the most cause to be glad of yours.

Rom. Well, let us go together.

Exeunt.

Music within.

Enter a Servingman.

Exit. First Serv. Wine, wine, wine! What service is here! I think our fellows are asleep.

First Serv. And I shall.

Third Serv. Where dwellest thou?

Enter a Second Servingman.
Exit.
Second Serv. Where 's Cotus? my master calls
Cotus!
for him.

Cor. Under the canopy.

Third Serv. Under the canopy!
Cor. Ay.

Third Serv. Where's that?

Cor. I' the city of kites and crows.

Third Serv. I' the city of kites and crows! What an ass it is! Then thou dwellest with daws too?

Cor. No; I serve not thy master.
Third Serv. How, sir!

Exit.

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11

my master?

51

Cor. Ay; 'tis an honester service than to
meddle with thy mistress.
Thou prat'st, and prat'st: serve with thy trencher.
Beats him away.

Hence!

Do you meddle with

Enter AUFIDIUS and the First Servingman.
Auf. Where is this fellow?

First Serv. Here, sir: I'd have beaten him Auf. Whence comest thou? what would'st like a dog, but for disturbing the lords within. thou? thy name?

Why speak'st not? speak, man: what's thy

name?

60

Second Serv. Whence are you, sir? Has the porter his eyes in his head, that he gives entrance to such companions? Pray, get you out.

Cor. Unmuffling. If. Tullus,

Enter CORIOLANUS.

not

Not yet thou know'st me, and, seeing me, dost Cor. A goodly house: the feast smells well; Think me for the man I am, necessity Commands me name myself. Appear not like a guest.

but I

Auf.

Re-enter the First Servingman.

First Serv. What would you have, friend? Exit. Whence are you? Here's no place for you: pray, go to the door.

Cor. I have deserv'd no better entertainment, In being Coriolanus.

Re-enter Second Servingman.

What is thy name? Servants retire. Cor. A name unmusical to the Volscians' ears, And harsh in sound to thine.

Auf.

Say, what's thy name?
Bears a command in 't; though thy tackle 's
Thou hast a grim appearance, and thy face
torn,

Thou show'st a noble vessel. What's thy name?
Know'st
Cor. Prepare thy brow to frown.

thou me yet?

Auf. I know thee not. Thy name?

2 T

70

own ways;

90

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:

Third Serv. I do not say thwack our general'; | Were in wild hurry. Here do we make his but he was always good enough for him.

friends

Second Serv. Come, we are fellows and friends: he was ever too hard for him; I have heard him say so himself.

First Serv. He was too hard for him directly, to say the truth on 't: before Corioli he scotched him and notched him like a carbonado.

201

Second Serv. An he had been cannibally given, he might have broiled and eaten him too.

First Serv. But, more of thy news?

Third Serv. 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, 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 down all before him, and leave his passage polled.

Second Serv. And he's as like to do 't as any man I can imagine.

220

Third Serv. 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 Serv. 'Directitude'! what's that? Third Serv. 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.

230

First Serv. But when goes this forward?

Third Serv. 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 Serv. Why, then we shall have a stirring world again. This peace is nothing but to rust iron, increase tailors, and breed ballad-makers.

First Serv. 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 Serv. '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 Serv. Ay, and it makes men hate one

another.

249

Third Serv. Reason: because they then less need one another. The wars for my money. hope to see Romans as cheap as Volscians. They are rising, they are rising.

All. In, in, in, in!

Blush that the world goes well, who rather had,
Though they themselves did suffer by 't, behold
Dissentious numbers pestering streets than see
Our tradesmen singing in their shops and going
About their functions friendly.
Bru. We stood to 't in good time.

Enter MENENIUS.

Is this Menenius? 10 Sic. 'Tis he, 'tis he. O! he is grown most kind Of late. Hail, sir!

him;

His remedies are tame i' the present peace
And quietness o' the people, which before

Ed.
Worthy tribunes,
There is a slave, whom we have put in prison,
Reports, the Volsces with two several powers
Exeunt. Are enter'd in the Roman territories,
And with the deepest malice of the war
Destroy what lies before 'em.

SCENE VI.-Rome. A public Place.

Men.
'Tis Aufidius,
Who, hearing of our Marcius' banishment,
Thrusts forth his horns again into the world:

Enter SICINIUS aad BRUTUS.

Sic. We hear not of him, neither need we fear Which were inshell'd when Marcius stood for

Rome,

And durst not once peep out.

Sic. Come, what talk you of Marcius?

40

Enter a Messenger.

Mess. The nobles in great earnestness are going Are mock'd for valiant ignorance,
And perish constant fools.

All to the senate-house: some news is come
That turns their countenances.

him?