NIC. The same, sir.

ADR. You had more beard when I last saw you; but your favour is well appeared 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.

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

ADR. 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.

Nic. 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 to pluck from them their tribunes for ever. This lies glowing, I can tell you, and is almost mature for the violent breaking out.

ADR. Coriolanus banished?

NIC. Banished, sir.

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

Nic. 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.

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

NIC. I shall, between this and supper, tell you

a - your favour is well appeared by your tongue.] This may import, your favour is well manifested, or rendered apparent; but Johnson would read,-affeared, and Steevens and Mr. Collier's

most strange things from Rome, all tending to the good of their adversaries. Have you an army ready, say you?

ADR. 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.

Nic. 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.

ADR. You take my part from me, sir; I have the most cause to be glad of yours. NIC. Well, let us go together.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV.-Antium. Before Aufidius' House.

COR. Prepare thy brow to frown: know'st thou me yet?

AUF. I know thee not:-thy name?

COR. My name is Caius Marcius, who hath done
To thee particularly, and to all the Volsces,
Great hurt and mischief; thereto witness may
My surname, Coriolanus: the painful service,
The extreme dangers, and the drops of blood
Shed for my thankless country, are requited
But with that surname; a good memory,*
And witness of the malice and displeasure [mains;
Which thou should'st bear me: only that name re-
The cruelty and envy of the people,
Permitted by our dastard nobles, who
Have all forsook me, hath devour'd the rest;
And suffer'd me by the voice of slaves to be
Whoop'd out of Rome. Now, this extremity
Hath brought me to thy hearth; not out of hope,
Mistake me not, to save my life; for if

I had fear'd death, of all the men i' the world
I would have 'voided thee; but in mere spite,
To be full quit of those my banishers,
Stand I before thee here. Then if thou hast
A heart of wreak in thee, that will revenge
Thine own particular wrongs, and stop those maims
Of shame seen through thy country, speed thee
straight,

b

And make my misery serve thy turn; so use it, That my revengeful services may prove

As benefits to thee; for I will fight

Against my canker'd country with the spleen
Of all the under fiends. But if so be
Thou dar'st not this, and that to prove more fortunes
Thou'rt tir'd, then, in a word, I also am
Longer to live most weary, and present
My throat to thee and to thy ancient malice;
Which not to cut would show thee but a fool,
Since I have ever follow'd thee with hate,
Drawn tuns of blood out of thy country's breast,
And cannot live but to thy shame, unless
It be to do thee service.

AUF.
O, Marcius, Marcius,
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'd not believe them more
Than thee, all-noble Marcius.(1)-Let me twine
Mine arms about that body, where against
My grained ash an hundred times hath broke,
And scar'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,

the opening scene of this act, where Volumnia calls Coriolanus, my first son."

64

I lov'd 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 for 't: 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 wak'd half dead with nothing.

Marcius,

Worthy

Had we no other 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 prepar'd against your territories,
Though not for Rome itself.

COR.
You bless me, gods!
AUF. 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 experienc'd, 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. 1 SERV. [Advancing.] Here's a strange alte

ration!

2 SERV. 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.

1 SERV. What an arm he has! He turned me about with his finger and his thumb, as one would set up a top.

2 SERV. 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.

1 SERV. He had so; looking, as it were,Would I were hanged, but I thought there was more in him than I could think.

asowle-] The etymology of this word is uncertain, but it is still employed in many English counties for lugging and dragging. Steevens quotes a line from Heywood's comedy, called "Love's

2 SERV. So did I, I'll be sworn: he is simply the rarest man i̇' the world.

1 SERV. I think he is; but a greater soldier than he, you wot one.

2 SERV. Who? my master?

1 SERV. Nay, it's no matter for that.
2 SERV. Worth six on him.

1 SERV. Nay, not so neither; but I take him to be the greater soldier.

2 SERV. Faith, look you, one cannot tell how to say that for the defence of a town, our general is excellent.

1 SERV. Ay, and for an assault too.

Re-enter third Servant.

3 SERV. O, slaves, I can tell you news! news, you rascals!

1 and 2 SERV. What, what, what? let's partake. 3 SERV. I would not be a Roman, of all nations; I had as lieve be a condemned man.

1 and 2 SERV. Wherefore? wherefore? 3 SERV. Why, here's he that was wont to thwack our general, Caius Marcius.

1 SERV. Why do you say, thwack our general? 3 SERV. I do not say, thwack our general; but he was always good enough for him.

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

1 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.

:

2 SERV. An he had been cannibally given, he might have broiled and eaten him too.

1 SERV. But more of thy news.

3 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 sowle the porter of Rome gates by the ears: he will mow down all before him, and leave his passage polled."

a

2 SERV. And he's as like to do't as any man I can imagine.

3 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 them

Mistress," 1636, where it occurs,

"Venus will sowle me by the ears for this." b-polled.] Cleared.

selves, as we term it, his friends, whilst he's in directitude."

1 SERV. Directitude! What's that?

3 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.

1 SERV. But when goes this forward?

3 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.

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

1 SERV. Let me have war, say I; it exceeds peace, as far as day does night; it's spritely walking, audible, and full of vent.d Peace is a very apoplexy, lethargy; mulled, deaf, sleepy, insensible; a getter of more bastard children than wars a destroyer of men.

2 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.

1 SERV. Ay, and it makes men hate one another. 3 SERV. 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.

SCENE VI.-Rome. A Public Place.

Enter SICINIUS and BRUTUS.

SIC. We hear not of him, neither need we fear him;

His remedies are tame i' the present peace
And quietness o' the people, which before
Were in wild hurry. Here do we make his friends
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. Is this
Menenius?

SIC. 'Tis he, 'tis he: O he is grown most kind Of late.-Hail, sir!

Enter MENENIUS.

MEN. Hail to you both!

SIC. Your Coriolanus is not much missed but with his friends: the commonwealth doth stand; and so would do, were he more angry at it.

MEN. All's well; and might have been much better, if he could have temporized.

SIC. Where is he, hear you?

MEN. Nay, I hear nothing; his mother and his wife hear nothing from him.

e His remedies are tame i' the present peace-] A correction by Theobald, the old copies having,-"His remedies are tame, the present peace." Omission, however, is not, perhaps, the only defect in the line; the word "remedies" is very equivocal.