I have no will to wander forth of doors, Enter Citizens. I Cit. What is your name? 3 Cit. Where do you dwell? 4 Cit. Are you a married man or a bachelor? 2 Cit. Answer every man directly. 1 Cit. Ay, and briefly. 4 Cit. Ay, and wisely. 3 Cit. Ay, and truly; you were best. Cin. What is my name? Whither am I going? Where do I dwell? Am I a married man or a bachelor? Then, to answer every man directly and briefly, wisely and truly. Wisely I say I am a bachelor. 2 Cit. That's as much as to say, they are fools that marry : you'll bear me a bang for that, I fear. Proceed; directly. Cin. Directly, I am going to Cæsar's funeral. I Cit. As a friend, or an enemy? Cin. As a friend. 2 Cit. That matter is answered directly. 4 Cit. For your dwelling, — briefly. Cin. Briefly, I dwell by the Capitol. I Cit. Tear him to pieces! he's a conspirator. Cin. I am Cinna the poet, I am Cinna the poet. 4 Cit. Tear him for his bad verses, tear him for his bad verses. Cin. I am not Cinna the conspirator. 2 "You'll get a banging of me for that." 4 Cit. It is no matter; his name's Cinna: pluck but his name out of his heart, and turn him going.3 3 Cit. Tear him, tear him! Come; brands, ho! firebrands! To Brutus', to Cassius'; burn all. Some to Decius' house, and some to Casca's; some to Ligarius': away, go! [Exeunt. ACT IV. 商 SCENE I. Rome. A Room in ANTONY'S House.1 ANTONY, OCTAVIUS, and LEPIDUS, seated at a table. Ant. These many, then, shall die; their names are prick'd. Oct. Your brother too must die: consent you, Lepidus? 3 There was a poet called Cinna, who had been no partaker of the conspiracy, but was always one of Cæsar's chiefest friends: he dreamed, the night before, that Cæsar bad him to supper with him, and that, he refusing to go, Cæsar was very importunate with him, and compelled him; so that at length he led him by the hand into a great dark place, where, being marvellously afraid, he was driven to follow him in spite of his heart. This dream put him all night into a fever; and yet, notwithstanding, the next ́ morning, when he heard that they carried Cæsar's body to burial, being ashamed not to accompany his funerals, he went out of his house, and thrust himself into the press of the common people that were in a great uproar. And because some one called him by his name Cinna, the people, thinking he had been that Cinna who in an oration he made had spoken very evil of Cæsar, they, falling upon him in their rage slew him outright in the market-place.— PLUTARCH. 1 The time of this scene was, historically, in November, B.C. 43; some nineteen months after the preceding. The place of the scene is shown to be at Rome, by Lepidus's being sent to Cæsar's house, and told that he will find his confederates "or here, or at the Capitol." In fact, however, the triumvirs, Octavius, Antonius, and Lepidus, did not meet at Rome to settle the proscription, but on a small island near Bologna. Plutarch relates the matter as follows: "All three met together in an island environed round Lep. I do consent, Oct. Lep. Prick him down, Antony. - Upon condition Publius shall not live, Who is your sister's son, Mark Antony.2 3 Ant. He shall not live; look, with a spot I damn 3 him. But, Lepidus, go you to Cæsar's house; Fetch the will hither, and we shall determine How to cut off some charge in legacies. Lep. What, shall I find you here? [Exit LEPIDUS. man, Ant. This is a slight unmeritable 4 Oct. So you thought him; And took his voice who should be prick'd to die, about with a little river, and there remained three days together. Now, as touching all other matters they were easily agreed, and did divide all the empire of Rome between them, as if it had been their own inheritance. But yet they could hardly agree whom they would put to death: for every one of them would kill their enemies, and save their kinsmen and friends. Yet, at length, giving place to their greedy desire to be revenged of their enemies, they spurned all reverence of blood and holiness of friendship at their feet. For Cæsar left Cicero to Antonius's will; Antonius also forsook Lucius Cæsar, who was his uncle by his mother; and both of them together suffered Lepidus to kill his own brother Paulus. Yet some writers affirm that Cæsar and Antonius requested Paulus might be slain, and that Lepidus was contented with it." 2 According to Plutarch, as quoted in the preceding note, this was Lucius Cæsar, not Publius; nor was he Antony's nephew, but his uncle by the mother's side. A mistake by the Poet, probably. 3 Both the verb to damn and the noun damnation were often used in the sense of to condemn simply. So it is, properly, in the English Bible. 4 Unmeritable for unmeriting or undeserving. This indiscriminate use of active and passive forms, both in adjectives and participles, is very frequent in Shakespeare. The usage was common. In our black sentence and proscription. Ant. Octavius, I have seen more days than you : Oct. You may do your will; But he's a tried and valiant soldier. Ant. So is my horse, Octavius; and for that I do appoint him store of provender : It is a creature that I teach to fight, To wind, to stop, to run directly on, He must be taught, and train'd, and bid go forth : On objects, arts, and imitations, Which, out of use and staled by other men, 5 Commons, here, is such pasture-lands as in England were not owned or appropriated by individuals, but occupied by a given neighbourhood in common. 6 To wind is to turn or bend to the right or the left; the opposite of running "directly on," that is, straight ahead. 7 That is, one who is always interested in, and talking about, such things — books, works of art, &c.- - as everybody else has got tired of and thrown aside. So Falstaff's account of Shallow, in 2 Henry the Fourth, iii. 2: “He came ever in the rearward of the fashion; and sung those tunes to the overscutch'd huswives which he heard the carmen whistle, and sware they were But as a property. And now, Octavius, Are levying powers: we must straight make head: Our best friends made, our means stretch'd out; And open perils surest answered. Oct. Let us do so: for we are at the stake, And some that smile have in their hearts, I fear, 8 [Exeunt. SCENE II. - Before BRUTUS' Tent, in the Camp near Sardis.1 Drum. Enter BRUTUS, LUCILIUS, TITINIUS, and Soldiers; PINDARUS meeting them; LUCIUS at some distance. Bru. Stand, ho! Lucil. Give the word, ho! and stand. Bru. What now, Lucilius is Cassius near? To do you salutation from his master. [PINDARUS gives a letter to BRUTUS. his Fancies or his Good-nights." In the text, staled is outworn or grown stale; and the reference is not to objects, &c., generally, but only to those which have lost the interest of freshness. 8 To make head is to raise an army, or to lead one forth. Often so. 9 An allusion to bear-baiting. One of the old English sports was, to tie a bear to a stake, and then set a pack of dogs to barking at him and worrying him. So in Macbeth, v. 7: "They've tied me to a stake; I cannot fly, but, bear-like, I must fight the course." See, also, page 112, note 34. 1 This scene, again, is separated from the foregoing, historically, by about a year; the remaining events of the drama having taken place in the Fall, B.C. 42. |