Cit. We know 't; we know 't.

1st Cit. Let us kill him, and we'll have corn at our own price. Is 't a verdict?

Cit. No more talking on 't: let it be done.
Away, away!

2nd Cit. One word, good citizens.

1st Cit. We are accounted poor citizens: the patricians, good. What authority surfeits on, would relieve us: if they would yield us but the superfluity while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely but they think we are too dear. The leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to particularise their abundance: our sufference is a gain to them.-Let us revenge this with our pikes, ere we become rakes: for the gods know I speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge.

2nd Cit. Would you proceed especially against Caius Marcius?

Cit. Against him first: he's a very dog to the commonalty.

2nd Cit. Consider you what services he has done for his country?

1st Cit. Very well: and could be content to give him good report for 't, but that he pays himself with being proud.

2nd Cit. Nay, but speak not maliciously.

1st Cit. I say unto you, what he hath done famously, he did it to that end: though softconscienced men can be content to say it was for his country, he did it to please his mother, and to be partly proud: which he is, even to the altitude of his virtue.

2nd Cit. What he cannot help in his nature, you account a vice in him. You must in no way say he is covetous.

1st Cit. If I must not, I need not be barren of accusations: he hath faults, with surplus, to tire in repetition. [Shouts within.] What shouts are these? The other side o' the city is risen! Why stay we prating here?-to the Capitol !

we intend to do, which now we'll shew 'em in deeds. They say, poor suitors have strong breaths: they shall know we have strong arms too.

Men. Why, masters! my good friends, mine honest neighbours,

Will you undo yourselves?

1st Cit. We cannot, sir; we are undone already. Men. I tell you, friends, most charitable care Have the patricians of you. For your wants, Your suffering in this dearth, you may as well Strike at the heaven with your staves, as lift them Against the Roman state; whose course will on The way it takes, cracking ten thousand curbs Of more strong link asunder, than can ever Appear in your impediment. For the dearth, The gods, not the patricians, make it; and Your knees to them, not arms, must help. Alack! You are transported by calamity

Thither where more attends you; and you slander The helms o' the state, who care for you like fathers, When you curse them as enemies.

1st Cit. Care for us!-True, indeed!—They ne'er cared for us yet. Suffer us to famish, and their storehouses crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to support usurers: repeal daily any wholesome act established against the rich; and provide more piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain the poor! If the wars eat us not up, they will: and there's all the love they bear us.

Men. Either you must

Confess yourselves wondrous malicious,
Or be accused of folly.--I shall tell you
A pretty tale: it may be, you have heard it;
But, since it serves my purpose, I will venture
To scale't a little more.

1st Cit. Well, I'll hear it, sir: yet you must not think to fob off our disgrace with a tale : but, an 't please you, deliver.

Men. There was a time when all the body's

members

Rebelled against the belly; thus accused it :
That only like a gulf it did remain

I' the midst o' the body, idle and inactive,
Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing
Like labour with the rest: where the other in-
struments

Did
see, and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel,
And, mutually participate, did minister
Unto the appetite and affection common
Of the whole body. The belly answered,-
1st Cit. Well, sir, what answer made the belly?
Men. I shall tell you. With a kind of smile
Which ne'er came from the lungs, but even thus
(For, look you, I may make the belly smile
As well as speak), it tauntingly replied

To the discontented members, the mutinous parts

:

If you'll bestow a small (of what you have little)
Patience awhile, you'll hear the belly's answer.
1st Cit. You are long about it.
Men. Note me this, good friend:
Your most grave belly was deliberate,
Not rash like his accusers, and thus answered :-
"True is it, my incorporate friends," quoth he,
"That I receive the general food at first,
Which you do live upon: and fit it is;
Because I am the storehouse and the shop
Of the whole body. But if you do remember,
I send it through the rivers of your blood,
Even to the court, the heart; to the seat o' the brain;
And, through the cranks and offices of man,
The strongest nerves, and small inferior veins,
From me receive that natural competency
Whereby they live. And though that all at once,
You, my good friends," (this says the belly,
mark me,)—

66

1st Cit. Ay, sir: well, well. Men. Though all at once cannot See what I do deliver out to each; Yet I can make my audit up that all From me do back receive the flour of all, And leave me but the bran."-What say you to 't? 1st Cit. It was an answer.-How apply you this? Men. The senators of Rome are this good belly, And you the mutinous members. For, examine Their counsels and their cares; digest things rightly,

Touching the weal o' the common; you shall find, No public benefit which you receive

But it proceeds or comes from them to you, And no way from yourselves.-What do you think: You, the great toe of this assembly?—

1st Cit. I the great toe!-Why the great toe? Men. For that, being one o' the lowest, basest, poorest,

Of this most wise rebellion, thou goest foremost: Thou rascal, that art worst in blood to run, Lead'st first to win some vantage!

But make you ready your stiff bats and clubs: Rome and her rats are at the point of battle; The one side must have bale.-Hail, noble Marcius!

Enter CAIUS MARCIUS.

Mar. Thanks.-What's the matter, you dissentious rogues,

That rubbing the poor itch of your opinion,
Make yourselves scabs?

1st Cit. We have ever your good word. Mar. He that will give good words to thee, will flatter

Beneath abhorring.-What would you have, you

curs,

That like nor peace nor war? the one affrights you,
The other makes you proud. He that trusts you,
Where he should find you lions, finds you hares;
Where foxes, geese: you are no surer, no,
Than is the coal of fire upon the ice,

Or hailstone in the sun. Your virtue is
To make him worthy whose offence subdues him,
And curse that justice did it. Who deserves

greatness,

Deserves your hate and your affections are
A sick man's appetite, who desires most that
Which would increase his evil. He that depends
Upon your favours, swims with fins of lead,
And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye!
Trust ye?

With every minute you do change a mind;
And call him noble that was now your hate;
Him vile that was your garland. What's the

matter,

That in these several places of the city
You cry against the noble senate, who,
Under the gods, keep you in awe, which else
Which feed on one another?-What's their

seeking?

Men. For corn at their own rates: whereof, they say, The city is well stored. Mar. Hang 'em! they say? They'll sit by the fire, and presume to know What's done i' the Capitol: who's like to rise, Who thrives, and who declines: side factions, and give out

Conjectural marriages: making parties strong,
And feebling such as stand not in their liking,
Below their cobbled shoes. They say there's
grain enough!

Would the nobility lay aside their ruth,
And let me use my sword, I'd make a quarry
With thousands of these quartered slaves, as high
As I could pick my lance.

SCENE III.-Rome. An Apartment in MARCIUS' House.

Enter VOLUMNIA and VIRGILIA: they sit down on two low stools, and sew.

Vol. I pray you, daughter, sing; or express yourself in a more comfortable sort. If my son were my husband, I should freelier rejoice in that absence wherein he won honour, than in the embracements of his bed, where he would shew most love. When he was but tender-bodied, and the only son of my womb; when youth with comeliness plucked all gaze his way; when, for a day of kings' entreaties, a mother should not sell him an hour from her beholding; I,-considering how honour would become such a person; that it was no better than picture-like to hang by the wall, if renown made it not stir,— was pleased to let him seek danger where he was like to find fame. To a cruel war I sent him; from whence he returned, his brows bound with oak. I tell thee, daughter, I sprang not more in joy at first hearing he was a man-child, than now in first seeing he had proved himself a man.

Vir. But had he died in the business, madam; how then?

Enter a Gentlewoman.

Gent. Madam, the lady Valeria is come to visit you.

Vir. 'Beseech you, give me leave to retire myself.

Vol. Indeed you shall not.

Methinks I hear hither your husband's drum;
See him pluck Aufidius down by the hair;
As children from a bear, the Volces shunning him:
Methinks I see him stamp thus, and call thus:
"Come on, you cowards, you were got in fear,
Though you were born in Rome." His bloody brow
With his mailed hand then wiping, forth he goes,
Like to a harvest-man that 's tasked to mow
Or all or lose his hire.

Vir. His bloody brow! O, Jupiter, no blood! Vol. Away, you fool! it more becomes a man Than gilt his trophy. The breasts of Hecuba, When she did suckle Hector, looked not lovelier Than Hector's forehead, when it spit forth blood At Grecian swords contending.-Tell Valeria We are fit to bid her welcome.

[Exit Gentlewoman.