صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

not clap him, and hiss him, according as he pleased, and displeased them, as they use to do the players in the theatre, I am no true man.

Bru. What said he, when he came unto himself?

Casca. Marry, before he fell down, when he perceiv'd the common herd was glad he refused the crown, he plucked me ope his doublet, and offered them his throat to cut.-An I had been a man of any occupation, if I would not have taken him at a word, I would I might go to hell among the rogues:-and so he fell. When he came to himself again, he said, if he had done or said any thing amiss, he desired their worships to think it was his infirmity. Three or four wenches, where I stood, cried, "Alas, good soul!"-and forgave him with all their hearts. But there's no heed to be taken of them: if Cæsar had stabbed their mothers, they would have done no less.

Bru. And after that, he came thus sad away?
Casca. Ay.

Cas. Did Cicero say any thing?

Casca. Ay, he spoke Greek.

Cas. To what effect?

Casca. Nay, an I tell you that, I'll ne'er look you i' the face again: but those, that understood him, smiled at one another, and shook their heads; but, for

mine own part, it was Greek to me. I could tell you more news, too: Marullus and Flavius, for pulling scarfs off Cæsar's images, are put to silence. Fare you well there was more foolery yet, if I could remember it.

Cas. Will you sup with me to-night, Casca?

Casca. No, I am promised forth.

Cas. Will you dine with me to-morrow?

Casca. Ay, if I be alive, and your mind hold, and your dinner worth the eating.

Cas. Good; I will expect you.
Casca. Do so. Farewell, both.

5

[Exit CASCA.

Bru. What a blunt fellow is this grown to be. He was quick mettle when he went to school.

Cas. So is he now, in execution

Of any bold or noble enterprize,

However he puts on this tardy form.
This rudeness is a sauce to his good wit,

Which gives men stomach to digest his words

With better appetite.

Bru. And so it is. For this time I will leave you : To-morrow, if you please to speak with me,

I will come home to you; or, if you will,

Come home to me, and I will wait for you.

Cas. I will do so:-till then, think of the world.
[Exit BRUTUS.
Well, Brutus, thou art noble; yet, I see,
Thy honourable metal' may be wrought
From that it is dispos'd: therefore, 'tis meet
That noble minds keep ever with their likes;
For who so firm that cannot be seduc'd?

Cæsar doth bear me hard, but he loves Brutus:
If I were Brutus now, and he were Cassius,
He should not humour me. I will this night,
In several hands, in at his windows throw,
As if they came from several citizens,
Writings, all tending to the great opinion
That Rome holds of his name; wherein obscurely
Cæsar's ambition shall be glanced at:

And, after this, let Cæsar seat him sure,

For we will shake him, or worse days endure.

[Exit.

Thy honourable METAL-] It may be doubted whether "mettle," a few lines above, ought not also to be printed metal. Butler says of Hudibras,

"Both kinds of metal he prepar'd,

Either to give blows or to ward:
Courage and steel both of great force,
Prepar'd for better or for worse."

SCENE III.

The Same. A Street.

Thunder and Lightning. Enter, from opposite sides, CASCA, with his Sword drawn, and CICERO.

Cic. Good even, Casca. Brought you Cæsar home? Why are you breathless, and why stare you so?

Casca. Are not you mov'd, when all the sway of earth

Shakes like a thing unfirm? O, Cicero!

I have seen tempests, when the scolding winds
Have riv'd the knotty oaks; and I have seen
The ambitious ocean swell, and rage, and foam,
To be exalted with the threatening clouds;
But never till to-night, never till now,
Did I go through a tempest dropping fire.
Either there is a civil strife in heaven,
Or else the world, too saucy with the gods,
Incenses them to send destruction.

Cic. Why, saw you any thing more wonderful?
Casca. A common slave (you know him well by

sight)

Held up his left hand, which did flame, and burn

Like twenty torches join'd; and yet his hand,

Not sensible of fire, remain'd unscorch'd.
Besides, (I have not since put up my sword)

Against the Capitol I met a lion,

Who glar'd upon me1o, and went surly by,
Without annoying me: and there were drawn
Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women,
Transformed with their fear, who swore they saw

10 Who GLAR'D upon me,] The old folios all read glaz'd; which Southern, in his copy of the folio, 1685, altered to "glar'd:" and there can be little doubt that it is the correct reading, and glaz'd a misprint.

Men, all in fire, walk up and down the streets.
And yesterday the bird of night did sit,
Even at noon-day, upon the market-place,
Hooting, and shrieking. When these prodigies
Do so conjointly meet, let not men say,
"These are their reasons,-they are natural;"
For, I believe, they are portentous things
Unto the climate that they point upon.

Cic. Indeed, it is a strange-disposed time:
But men may construe things after their fashion,
Clean from the purpose of the things themselves.
Comes Cæsar to the Capitol to-morrow?

Casca. He doth; for he did bid Antonius
Send word to you, he would be there to-morrow.
Cic. Good night then, Casca: this disturbed sky
Is not to walk in.

[blocks in formation]

Casca. Your ear is good. Cassius, what night is

this?

Cas. A very pleasing night to honest men.

Casca. Who ever knew the heavens menace so?

Cas. Those that have known the earth so full of faults.

For my part, I have walk'd about the streets,

Submitting me unto the perilous night;

And, thus unbraced, Casca, as you see,

Have bar'd my bosom to the thunder-stone:

And, when the cross blue lightning seem'd to open
The breast of heaven, I did present myself

Even in the aim and very flash of it.

Casca. But wherefore did you so much tempt the heavens?

It is the part of men to fear and tremble,

When the most mighty gods by tokens send
Such dreadful heralds to astonish us.

Cas. You are dull, Casca; and those sparks of life, That should be in a Roman, you do want,

You look pale, and gaze,

Or else you use not.
And put on fear, and cast yourself in wonder,
To see the strange impatience of the heavens;
But if you would consider the true cause,
Why all these fires, why all these gliding ghosts,
Why birds, and beasts, from quality and kind;
Why old men, fools, and children calculate;
Why all these things change from their ordinance,
Their natures, and pre-formed faculties,

To monstrous quality; why, you shall find,
That heaven hath infus'd them with these spirits,
To make them instruments of fear, and warning,
Unto some monstrous state.

Now could I, Casca, name to thee a man

Most like this dreadful night;

That thunders, lightens, opens graves, and roars
As doth the lion in the Capitol :

A man no mightier than thyself, or me,

In personal action; yet prodigious grown,

And fearful, as these strange eruptions are.

Casca. Tis Cæsar that you mean; is it not, Cassius? Cas. Let it be who it is: for Romans now Have thewes and limbs" like to their ancestors; But, woe the while! our fathers' minds are dead, And we are govern'd with our mothers' spirits;

11 Have THEWES and limbs-] "Thewe" seems to be from the Saxon word signifying the thigh, and it means muscular power: by a comparison of the old copies, we may ascertain about the time it became obsolete. It is found in the folios, 1623 and 1632, but is altered to sinews in the folios, 1664 and 1685. It was rather a favourite word with Shakespeare, and he uses it in "Hamlet," and in "Henry IV." part ii. It occurs in Chaucer and Spenser, in the sense of manners or qualities, but then it has a different etymology. Ben Jonson employs "thewes" in the same way as Shakespeare, and not Chaucer, as indeed Gifford suspected. (Works, vol. viii. p. 127.)

« السابقةمتابعة »