COMINIUS

You have fought together? It is your former promise. Noble Martius. Breath you my friends, well fought, we are come off, Like Roman, neither foolish in our stands, Nor Cowardly in retire: Believe me Sirs, We shall be charged again. While we have struck By Interims and conveying gusts, we have herd The Charges of our Friends. The Roman Gods, Lead their successes, as we wish our own, That both our powers, with smiling Fronts encountering, May give you thankful Sacrifice. Thy News? Though thou speakest truth, Me thinks thou speakest not well. How long is't since? It's not a mile: briefly we herd their drums. How couldst thou in a mile confound and hour, And bring thy News so late? Whose yonder, That doe's appear as he were Flayed? Oh Gods, He has the stamp of Martius, and I have Before time seen him thus. The Shepherd knows not Thunder from ̄ a Taber, More then I know the found of Martius Tongue From every meaner man. I, if you come not in the blood of others, But mantled in your own. Flower of Warriors, how is't with Titus Lartius ? Where is that Slave Which told me they had beat you to your Trenches? Where is he? Call him hither. But how prevailed you? Martius, we have at disadvantage fought, And did retire to win our purpose. As I guess Martius, Their Bans in that Vanward are the Ancients Of their best trust: Over them Auffidious, Their very heart of Hope. Though I could wish, You were conducted to a gentle Both, And Balms applied to you, yet dare I never Deny your asking, take your choice of those That best can aid your Actium. March on my Fellows: Make good this ostentation, and you shall Divide in all, with us. If I should tell thee over this thy days Work, Thou'lt not believe thy deeds: but I'll report it, Where Senators shall mingle tears with smiles, Where great Patricians shall attend, and shrug, In the end admire: where Ladies shall be frighted, And gladly quaked, hear more: where the dull Tribunes, That with the fusty Plebeans, hate thine Honours, Shall say against their hearts, We thank the Gods Our Room hath such a Soldier. Yet camest thou to a Morsel of this Feast, Having fully dined before. You shall not be the Grave of your deserving, Room must know the valve of her own: 'Twere a Concealment worse then a Theft, No less then a Traducement, To hide your doings, and to silence that, Which to the spire, and top of praises vouched, Would seem but modest: therefore I beseech you, In sign of what you are, not to reward What you have done, before our Army hear me. Should they not: Well might they fester against Ingratitude, And tent themselves with death: of all the Horses, Whereof we have taken good, and good store of all, The Treasure in this field achieved, and City, We render you the Tenth, to be taken forth, Before the common distribution, At your only choice. Too modest are you: More cruel to your good report, then grateful To us, that give you truly: by your patience, If against your self you be incensed, we'll put you (Like one that means his proper harm) in Manacles, Then reason safely with you: Therefore be it known, As to us, to all the World, That Caius Martius Wears this Wars Garland: in token of the which, My Noble Steed, known to the Camp, I give him, With all his trim belonging; and from this time, For what he did before Corioles, call him, With all the applause and Clamor of the Host, So, to our Tent: Where ere we do repose us, we will write To Room of our success: you Titus Lartius Must to Corioles back, send us to Room The best, with whom we may articulate, For their own good, and ours. Tak't, it's yours: what is't? O well begged: Were he the Butcher of my Son, he should Be free, as is the Wind: deliver him, Titus. Go we to our Tent: The blood upon your Visage dries, it's time It should be looked too: come. Look, Sir, your Mother. And live you yet? O my sweet Lady, pardon. Ever right. On, to the Capital. I shall lack voice: the deeds of Coriolanus Should not be uttered feebly: it is held, That Valour is the chiefest Virtue, And most dignifies the haver: if it be, The man I speak of, cannot in the World Be singly counter-poys'd. At sixteen years, When Tarquin made a Head for Room, he fought Beyond the mark of others: our then Dictator, Whom with all praise I point at, saw him fight, When with his Amazonian Shin he drove The brizled Lips before him: he bestrid And overpressed Roman, and in the Consuls view Slew three Opposers: Tarquin's self he met, And struck him on his Knee: in that days feats, When he might act the Woman in the Scene, He proved best man in the field, and for his meed Was Brow-bound with the Oak. His Pupil age Man-entred thus, he waxed Like a Sea, And in the brunt of seventeen Battles since, He lurched all Swords of the Garland: for this last, Before, and in Corioles, let me say I cannot speak him home: he stopped the flyers, And by his rare example made the Coward Turn terror into sport: as Weeds before A Vessel under sail, so men obeyed, And fell below his Stem: his Sword, Death's stamp, Where it did mark, it took from face to foot: He was a thing of Blood, whose every motion Was timed with dying Cries: alone he entered The mortal Gate of the City, which he painted With shunless destiny: aydelesse came off, And with a sudden reinforcement struck Carioles Like a Planet: now all's his, When by and by the din of War gan pierce His ready sense: then straight his doubled spirit Requickned what in flesh was fatigate, And to the Battle came he, where he did Run reeking over the lives of men, as if 'twere A perpetual spoil: and till we called Both Field and City ours, he never stood To ease his Breast with panting. Our spoils he kicked at, And looked upon things precious, as they were The common Muck of the World: he covets less Then Misery it self would give, rewards his deeds With doing them, and is content To spend the time to end it. They are worn (Lord Consul) so, That we shall hardly in our ages see Their Banners wave again. Hath he not passed the Noble, and the Common? You are Like to do such business. The People are abused: set on, this paltering Becomes not Room: nor ha Coriolanus Deserved this so dishonoured Rub, laid falsely In the plain Way of his Merit. 'Twas from the Cannon. Well, on to the Market place. Aged sir, hands-off. That is the way to lay the City flat, To bring the Roof to the Foundation, And bury all, which yet distinctly ranges In heaps, and piles of Ruin. Stand fast, we have as many friends as enemies. But now it's odds beyond Arithmetic, And Manhood is called Foolery, when it stands Against a falling Fabric. Will you hence, Before the Tag return? whose Rage does rend Like interrupted Waters, and o're-beare What they are used to bear. Nay, come away. I have been in the Market place: and Sir it's fit You make strong party, or defend your self By calmness, or by absence: all's in anger. I think it'll serve, if he can thereto frame his spirit. Come, come, we'll prompt you. Away, the Tribunes do attend you: arm your self To answer mildly: for they are prepared With Accusations, as I hear more strong Then are upon you yet. Well, well, no more. Know, I pray you. Hear me my Master's, and my common friends. Let me speak: I have be Consul, and can show from Room Her Enemies marks upon me. I do love My Countries good, with a respect more tender, More holy, and profound, then mine own life, My deer Wives estimate, her wombs increase, And treasure of my Loins: then if I would Speak that. I'll follow thee a Month, devise with thee Where thou shalt rest, that thou mayest hear of us, And we of thee. So if the time thrust forth A cause for thy Repeal, we shall not send Over the vast world, to seek a single man, And lose advantage, which does ever cool I the absence of the needer. O you have made good work. You have help to ravish your own daughters, & To melt the City Leads upon your pates, To see your Wives dishonoured to your Noses. Your Temples burned in their Ciment, and Your Franchises, whereon you stood, confined Into and Augors boar. If? He is their God, he leads them Like a thing Made by some other Deity then Nature, That shapes man Better: and they follow him Against us Brats, with no less Confidence, Then Boys pursuing Summer Butterflies, Or Butchers killing Flies. He I shake your Room about your ears. Who shall ask it? The Tribunes cannot doo't for shame; the people Deserve such pity of him, as the Wolf Doe's of the Shepherds: For his best Friends, if they Should say be good to Room, they charged him, even As those should do that had deserved his hate, And therein showed Like Enemies. You have brought A Trembling upon Room, such as was never S'incapeable of help. But I fear They'll roar him in again. Tullus Auffidius, The second name of men, obeys his points As if he were his Officer: Desperation, Is all the Policy, Strength, and Defence That Room can make against them. you are goodly things, you Voices. O I, what else? He would not seem to know me. Yet one time he did call me by my name: I urged our old acquaintance, and the drops That we have bled together. Coriolanus He would not answer too: Forbade all Names, He was a kind of Nothing, Titlelesse, Till he had forged himself a name of the fire Of burning Room. I minded him, how Royal 'twas to pardon When it was less expected. He replied It was a bore petition of a State To one whom they had punished. I offered to awaken his regard For's private Friends. His answer to me was He could not stay to pick them, in a pile Of noisome musty Chaff. He said, 'twas folly For one poor grain or two, to leave unburnt And still to nose the offence. He'll never hear him. I tell you, he doe's fit in Gold, his eye Read as 'twould burn Room: and his Injury The Gaoler to his pity. I kneeled before him, 'Twas very faintly he said Rise: dismissed me Thus with his speechless hand. What he would do He sent in writing after me: what he would not, Bound with and Oath to yield to his conditions: So that all hope is vain, unless his Noble Mother, And his Wife, who (as I hear) mean to solicit him For mercy to his Country: therefore let's hence, And with our fair entreaties hast them on. I, and you'll look pale Before you find it other. All the Regions Do smilingly Revolt, and who resists Are mocked for valiant Ignorance, And perish constant Fools: who is't can blame him? Your Enemies and his, find something in him.