PERSONS REPRESENTED.

PRIAM, King of Troy.

HECTOR,

TROILUS,

PARIS,

DEIPHOBUS,

HELENUS,

ÆNEAS,

ANTENOR,

his Sons.

Trojan Commanders.

CALCHAS, a Trojan Priest, taking part with the Greeks.

PANDARUS, Uncle to Cressida.

MARGARELON, a bastard Son of Priam.

DIOMEDES,

PATROCLUS,

THERSITES, a deformed and scurrilous Grecian.

ALEXANDER, Servant to Cressida.

Servants to Troilus, to Paris, and to Diomedes.

HELEN, Wife to Menelaus.

ANDROMACHE, Wife to Hector.

CASSANDRA, Daughter to Priam; a Prophetess.
CRESSIDA, Daughter to Calchas.

Trojan and Greek Soldiers, and Attendants.

SCENE, Troy, and the Grecian Camp before it.

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

PROLOGUE.'

IN Troy, there lies the scene. From isles of Greece
The princes orgulous, their high blood chaf'd,
Have to the port of Athens sent their ships,
Fraught with the ministers and instruments
Of cruel war: Sixty and nine, that wore
Their crownets regal, from the Athenian bay
Put forth toward Phrygia; and their vow is made,
To ransack Troy, within whose strong immures
The ravish'd Helen, Menelaus' queen,

With wanton Paris sleeps; and that's the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come;

And the deep-drawing barks do there disgorge
Their warlike fraughtage: Now on Dardan plains
The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch
Their brave pavilions: Priam's six-gated city,
Dardan, and Tymbria, Ilias, Chetas, Trojan,
And Antenorides, with massy staples,

And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts,'

1 This Prologue first appeared in the folio of 1623. Steevens took upon him, probably for this reason, to conjecture that the Prologue was not written by Shakespeare, and that perhaps the play itself was not entirely his work! Surely he was great at inferences.

2 Orgulous, proud, disdainful; orgueilleux, Fr.

H.

3 Corresponsive and fulfilling bolts" are bolts answering to and filling full their sockets. Fulfilling was often used in that sense, as appears from our translation of the Bible. — In Caxton's History of the Destruction of Troy, the gates of the city are

Sperr up the sons of Troy.^

Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits,
On one and other side, Trojan and Greek,
Sets all on hazard. And hither am I come

A prologue arm'd, — but not in confidence
Of author's pen or actor's voice, but suited
In like conditions as our argument,

To tell you, fair beholders, that our play

5

Leaps o'er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils,
'Ginuing in the middle; starting thence away
To what may be digested in a play.

Like, or find fault; do as your pleasures are ;
Now good, or bad, 'tis but the chance of war.

enumerated thus: "In this cittie were sixe principall gates; of which the one was named Dardane, the second Tymbria, the thyrd Helias, the fourth Chetas, the fifth Troyan, the sixt Antenorides." The folio gives the latter name Antenonidus.

H.

Stir can

4 The original has "Stirre up the sonnes of Troy." not be the right word, as its meaning will not cohere with the rest of the passage. Theobald made the change, which has been almost universally received. To sper, or spar, is to close, fasten, or bar up; from the Saxon Sparran. Thus in Spenser's Faerie Queene: "The other that was entred labour'd fast to sperre tha gate." Also, in Chaucer's Troilus and Creseide :

"For when he saw her doores sparred all, Well nigh for sorow adout he gan to fall: Therewith when he was ware, and gan behold How shet was every window of the place, As frost him thought his herte gan to cold." 5 That is, the avant, what went before. couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts." van of an army was formerly called the vaunt-guard.

H.

Thus in Lear: "Vunt What is now called the

ACT I

SCENE 1. Troy. Before PRIAM's Palace

Enter TROILUS armed, and PANDARUS. Tro. 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.

2

Pan. Will this gear ne'er be mended ??
Tro. The Greeks are strong, and skilful to their

strength,3

Fierce to their skill, and to their fierceness valiant;
But I am weaker than a woman's tear,

Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance;
Less valiant than the virgin in the night,
And skill-less as unpractis'd infancy.

Pan. 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 tarry the grinding.

Tro. Have I not tarried?

This word, from the old French varlet or vadlet, anciently sig. nified a groom, a servant of the meaner sort. Holinshed, speak ing of the battle of Agincourt, says, "Diverse were releeved by their varlets and conveied out of the field." Cotgrave says, "In old time it was a more honourable title; for all young gentlemen untill they came to be eighteen yeres of age were so tearmed." 2 We have repeatedly met with gear in the sense of matter, business, affair. See The Merchant of Venice, Act i. sc. 2, note 5

H.

2 l'o is here used for in addition to; a common phraseology the Poet's time

H.

Pan. Ay, the grinding; but you must tarry the bolting.

Tro. Have I not tarried?

Pan. Ay, the bolting; but you must tarry the leavening.

Tro. Still have I tarried.

Pan. Ay, to the leavening: but here's yet, in the word hereafter, the kneading, the making of the cake, the heating the oven,' and the baking; nay, you must stay the cooling too, or you may chance to burn your lips.

Tro. Patience herself, what goddess e'er she be, Doth lesser blench at sufferance than I do.

5

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?

Pan. Well, she look'd yesternight fairer than ever I saw her look, or any woman else.

Tro. 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, I have (as when the sun doth light a storm) Bury'd 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.

Pan. An her hair were not somewhat darker than Helen's, (well, go to,) there were no more comparison between the women, - But, for my

4 We here give the reading of the quarto. The folio has "the heating of the oven." And a few lines before, the folio has "must needs tarry the grinding."

H.

5 To blench is to start or fly off. The third line below reads thus in the original: "So (Traitor) then she comes, when she is thence." The happy emendation was made by Rowe. H.