LUCILIUS, TITINIUS, MESSALA, young CATO, and VOLUMNIUS, Friends to Brutus and Cassius.

VARRO, CLITUS, CLAUDIUS, STRATO, LUCIUS, DARDANIUS, Servants to Brutus.

PINDARUS, Servant to Cassius.

CALPHURNIA, Wife to Cæsar.

PORTIA, Wife to Brutus.

Senators, Citizens, Guards, Attendants, &c. 1

SCENE, during a great part of the play, at Rome: afterwards at Sardis, and near Philippi.

1) Das Personenverzeichniss fügte zuerst Rowe in seiner Ausgabe (1709.) hinzu.

АСТ 1.

SCENE I.

Rome. A Street.

Enter FLAVIUS, MARULLUS, and a body of Citizens, 2

Flav. Hence! home, you idle creatures, get you home.
Is this a holiday? What! know you not,
Being mechanical, 3 you ought not walk,
Upon a labouring day, without the sign

Of your profession?

Speak, what trade art thou?

1 Cit. Why, Sir, a carpenter.

Mar. Where is thy leather apron, and thy rule?

What dost thou with thy best apparel on?

You, Sir; what trade are you?

2 Cit. Truly, Sir, in respect of a fine workman, I am but, as you would say, a cobbler. 4

Mar. But what trade art thou? Answer me directly.

2 Cit. A trade, Sir, that, I hope, I may use with a safe conscience; which is, indeed, Sir, a mender of bad soles. 5

Flav. What trade, thou knave? thou naughty knave, what trade?

2 Cit. Nay, I beseech you, Sir, be not out with me: yet, if you be

6

out, Sir, I can mend you.

Mar. What mean'st thou by that?

2 Cit.

Why, Sir, cobble you.

Flav.

Thou art a cobbler, art thou?

Mend me, thou saucy fellow?

2) Die Fol. hat: Enter Flavius, Murellus and certain Commoners over the Stage. Murellus änderte Theobald, auf Plutarch gestützt, in Marullus um.

3) mechanical = dem Handwerkerstande angehörig, zunftpflichtig. In diesem Sinne, oft mit verächtlicher Nebenbedeutung, gebraucht Sh. dieses Adjectiv auch sonst.

4) cobbler fasst der zweite Bürger" hier allgemein Einer, der Flickarbeit macht, ein Stümper, im Gegensatz zu einem geschickten, künstlerischen Arbeiter (fine workman). 5) Das Wortspiel zwischen sole und soul hat Sh. auch in Romeo and Juliet (A. 1, Sc. 4.) und Merchant of Venice (A. 4, Sc. 1.). Die folgende Rede ertheilen die meisten Hgg. mit Capell und ohne Noth abweichend von der Fol. dem Marullus zu. 6) to be out uneins mit Jemandem sein, und = zerrissen in Kleidern oder Schuhen sein, so dass die Haut sichtbar wird. Eben so doppelsinnig stehet to mend = bessern, in moralischer Beziehung, und = ausbessern, flicken.

2 Cit. Truly, Sir, all that I live by is with the awl: I meddle with no tradesman's matters, nor women's matters, but with all. 8 I am, indeed, Sir, a surgeon to old shoes; when they are in great danger, I recover them. 10 have As proper men as ever trod upon neat's-leather, gone upon my handywork.

Flav. But wherefore art not in thy shop to-day?

Why dost thou lead these men about the streets?

9

2 Cit. Truly, Sir, to wear out their shoes, to get myself into more work. But, indeed, Sir, we make holiday, to see Cæsar, and to rejoice in his triumph. 11 Mar. Wherefore rejoice? What conquest brings he home?

What tributaries follow him to Rome,

To grace in captive bonds his chariot wheels?

You blocks, you stones, you worse than senseless things!

cruel men of Rome,

O! you hard hearts, you
Knew you not Pompey? Many a time and oft
Have you climb'd up to walls and battlements,
To towers and windows, yea, to chimney-tops,
Your infants in your arms, and there have sat
The live-long day, with patient expectation,
To see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome:
And when you saw his chariot but appear,
Have you not made an universal shout,
That Tiber trembled underneath her banks,
To hear the replication 13 of your sounds
Made in her concave shores?

And do you now put on your best attire?
And do you now cull out a holiday?

12

7) women's ist, da es im Gegensatz zu tradesman's steht, wie tradeswomen's zu verstehen. —Dieselbe Zweideutigkeit kehrt in Coriolanus (A. 4, Sc. 5.) wieder, wo Coriolan auf die Frage des Dieners: How, sir, do you meddle with my master? erwidert: Ay, 't is an honester service than to meddle with thy mistress.

8) Das Wortspiel zwischen awl und all, das Sh. beabsichtigt, veranlasst Malone and andre Hgg. hier with awl zu setzen. Die Fol. schreibt und interpungirt: but withal I am indeed, Sir, a Surgeon to old shoes. Sh. fand das Wortspiel in einer alten Ballade: The three Merry Cobblers, in der es heisst: We have awl at our command | And still we are on the mending hand.

-

9) Die meisten Hgg. schreiben re-cover, um den Doppelsinn wiederüberziehen, deutlicher hervorzuheben.

wiederherstellen, und

10) Dieselbe sprüchwörtliche Redensart, die der Schuster hier auf sein Gewerbe bezieht, hat Sh. in allgemeinerer Anwendung in Tempest (A. 2, Sc. 2.) he's a present for any emperor that ever trode on neat's leather.

11) triumph ist bei Sh. jeder Festaufzug, jede öffentliche Lustbarkeit und Feier. Marullus fasst das Wort jedoch specieller Triumph. In dem vorhergehenden Satze unterscheidet der zweite Bürger mit der scherzhaften Spitzfindigkeit der Clowns zwischen truly und indeed, als ob das zweierlei wäre.

12) Sh. fasst Tiber als Femininum, wie die Flüsse in England poetisch meistens weiblich personificirt werden. Er denkt dabei an eine Flussgöttin.

13) replication gebraucht Sh. nur an dieser Stelle,

=

Widerhall.

And do you now strew flowers in his way,
That comes in triumph over Pompey's blood?
Be gone!

Run to your houses, fall upon your knees,
Pray to the gods to intermit the plague
That needs must light on this ingratitude.

Flav. Go, go, good countrymen, and for this fault
Assemble all the poor men of your sort: 14

Draw them to Tiber banks, and weep your tears

Into the channel, till the lowest stream

Do kiss the most exalted shores of all.

See, whe'r 15 their basest metal be not mov'd;
They vanish tongue-tied in their guiltiness.
Go you down that way towards the Capitol:

This way will I. Disrobe the images,

If you do find them deck'd with ceremonies. 16
Mar. May we do so?

You know, it is the feast of Lupercal.

Flav. It is no matter; let no images
Be hung with Cæsar's trophies. I'll about,
And drive away the vulgar from the streets:
So do you too, where you perceive them thick.

These growing feathers 17 pluck'd from Cæsar's wing
Will make him fly an ordinary pitch,

Who else would soar above the view of men,
And keep us all in servile fearfulness.

SCENE II.

The Same. A public Place.

[Exeunt Citizens.

[Exeunt.

1

Enter, in procession, with music, CAESAR; ANTONY, for the course; CALPHURNIA, PORTIA, DECIUS, CICERO, BRUTUS, CASSIUS, and CASCA; a great crowd following, among them a Soothsayer.

Caes. Calphurnia,

Casca.

11) sort

=

Stand. Sie sollen die armen Leute ihres Standes versammeln, weil diese in ihrer Noth am ersten zum Weinen geneigt sein werden.

15) whe'r ist aus whether abgekürzt. Die Fol. schreibt bald where, bald whe'r. 16) Die images sind die öffentlich aufgestellten Bildsäulen und Büsten Cäsar's, welche zur Feier des Tages und zu Ehren Cäsars mit besondern feierlichen Auszeichnungen (ceremonies) geschmückt waren. Als solche erwähnt Plutarch diadems, und Sh. selbst in der folgenden Scene scarfs.

17) Das Gefieder, mit dem Cäsar zu hoch fliegen würde, ist der ihm in den Strassen zujauchzende Pöbel (the vulgar).

1) Vgl. Einleitung pag. III. — In den Bühnenweisungen der Fol. bleibt die Musik unerwähnt, in deren Begleitung sie auftreten; dagegen fügt sie hinzu: after them Murellus and Flavius. Die Tribunen können jedoch nur als stumme Zuschauer im Hintergrunde gestanden haben.

Cæs. Who is it in the press that calls on me?

I hear a tongue, shriller than all the music,

Cry, Cæsar!
Sooth.

Cœs.

Speak: Cæsar is turn'd to hear.

Beware the ides of March.

What man is that?

Bru. A soothsayer, bids you beware the ides of March.

Cæs. Set him before me; let me see his face.

Cas. Fellow, come from the throng: look upon Cæsar.

Beware the ides of March.

Speak once again.

Caes. What say'st thou to me now?
Sooth.
Caes. He is a dreamer; let us leave him:

pass.

[Sennet. Exeunt all but BRUTUS and CASSIUS.

Cas. Will you go see the order of the course?
Bru. Not I.

Cas. I pray you, do.

Bru. I am not gamesome: I do lack some part

Of that quick spirit that is in Antony.

Let me not hinder, Cassius, your desires;

I'll leave you.

Cas. Brutus, I do observe you now of late:

I have not from your eyes that gentleness,

2) Die Fol. hat Antoniu's, und in den folgenden Zeilen Antonio, mit einer Verwechslang

der Endungen, die bei ihr öfter vorkommt.

3) So hat Plutarch an der entsprechenden Stelle: Antonius was one of them that run

this holy course.

*) their steril curse ist der Fluch ihrer Unfruchtbarkeit.