The Tragedy of Coriolanus by William Shakespeare (scary books to read txt) 📖

MESSENGER.]

SECOND MESSENGER. You are sent for to the senate: A fearful army, led by Caius Marcius Associated with Aufidius, rages Upon our territories; and have already O'erborne their way, consum'd with fire and took What lay before them.

[Enter COMINIUS.]

COMINIUS. O, you have made good work!

MENENIUS. What news? what news?

COMINIUS. You have holp to ravish your own daughters, and To melt the city leads upon your pates; To see your wives dishonour'd to your noses, -

MENENIUS. What's the news? what's the news?

COMINIUS. Your temples burned in their cement; and Your franchises, whereon you stood, confin'd Into an auger's bore.

MENENIUS. Pray now, your news? - You have made fair work, I fear me. - Pray, your news. If Marcius should be join'd wi' the Volscians, -

COMINIUS. If! He is their god: he leads them like a thing Made by some other deity than nature, That shapes man better; and they follow him, Against us brats, with no less confidence Than boys pursuing summer butterflies, Or butchers killing flies.

MENENIUS. You have made good work, You and your apron men; you that stood so much Upon the voice of occupation and The breath of garlic-eaters!

COMINIUS. He'll shake Your Rome about your ears.

MENENIUS. As Hercules Did shake down mellow fruit. - You have made fair work!

BRUTUS. But is this true, sir?

COMINIUS. Ay; and you'll look pale Before you find it other. All the regions Do smilingly revolt; and who resists Are mock'd for valiant ignorance, And perish constant fools. Who is't can blame him? Your enemies and his find something in him.

MENENIUS. We are all undone unless The noble man have mercy.

COMINIUS. Who shall ask it? The tribunes cannot do't for shame; the people Deserve such pity of him as the wolf Does of the shepherds: for his best friends, if they Should say 'Be good to Rome,' they charg'd him even As those should do that had deserv'd his hate, And therein show'd like enemies.

MENENIUS. 'Tis true: If he were putting to my house the brand That should consume it, I have not the face To say 'Beseech you, cease.' - You have made fair hands, You and your crafts! You have crafted fair!

COMINIUS. You have brought A trembling upon Rome, such as was never So incapable of help.

BOTH TRIBUNES. Say not, we brought it.

MENENIUS. How! Was it we? we lov'd him, but, like beasts, And cowardly nobles, gave way unto your clusters, Who did hoot him out o' the city.

COMINIUS. But I fear They'll roar him in again. Tullus Aufidius, The second name of men, obeys his points As if he were his officer: - desperation Is all the policy, strength, and defence, That Rome can make against them.

[Enter a troop of citizens.]

MENENIUS. Here comes the clusters. - And is Aufidius with him? - You are they That made the air unwholesome, when you cast Your stinking greasy caps in hooting at Coriolanus' exile. Now he's coming; And not a hair upon a soldier's head Which will not prove a whip: as many coxcombs As you threw caps up will he tumble down, And pay you for your voices. 'Tis no matter; If he could burn us all into one coal We have deserv'd it.

CITIZENS. Faith, we hear fearful news.

FIRST CITIZEN. For mine own part, When I said banish him, I said 'twas pity.

SECOND CITIZEN. And so did I.

THIRD CITIZEN. And so did I; and, to say the truth, so did very many of us. That we did, we did for the best; and though we willingly consented to his banishment, yet it was against our will.

COMINIUS. You are goodly things, you voices!

MENENIUS. You have made Good work, you and your cry! - Shall's to the Capitol?

COMINIUS. O, ay; what else? [Exeunt COMINIUS and MENENIUS.]

SICINIUS. Go, masters, get you home; be not dismay'd; These are a side that would be glad to have This true which they so seem to fear. Go home, And show no sign of fear.

FIRST CITIZEN. The gods be good to us! - Come, masters, let's home. I ever said we were i' the wrong when we banished him.

SECOND CITIZEN. So did we all. But come, let's home.

[Exeunt Citizens.]

BRUTUS. I do not like this news.

SICINIUS. Nor I.

BRUTUS. Let's to the Capitol: - would half my wealth Would buy this for a lie!

SICINIUS. Pray let's go.

[Exeunt.]


SCENE VII. A camp at a short distance from Rome.

[Enter AUFIDIUS and his LIEUTENANT.]

AUFIDIUS. Do they still fly to the Roman?

LIEUTENANT. I do not know what witchcraft's in him, but Your soldiers use him as the grace 'fore meat, Their talk at table, and their thanks at end; And you are darken'd in this action, sir, Even by your own.

AUFIDIUS. I cannot help it now, Unless by using means, I lame the foot Of our design. He bears himself more proudlier, Even to my person, than I thought he would When first I did embrace him: yet his nature In that's no changeling; and I must excuse What cannot be amended.

LIEUTENANT. Yet I wish, sir, - I mean, for your particular, - you had not Join'd in commission with him; but either Had borne the action of yourself, or else To him had left it solely.

AUFIDIUS. I understand thee well; and be thou sure, When he shall come to his account, he knows not What I can urge against him. Although it seems, And so he thinks, and is no less apparent To the vulgar eye, that he bears all things fairly, And shows good husbandry for the Volscian state, Fights dragon-like, and does achieve as soon As draw his sword: yet he hath left undone That which shall break his neck or hazard mine Whene'er we come to our account.

LIEUTENANT. Sir, I beseech you, think you he'll carry Rome?

AUFIDIUS. All places yield to him ere he sits down; And the nobility of Rome are his; The senators and patricians love him too: The tribunes are no soldiers; and their people Will be as rash in the repeal as hasty To expel him thence. I think he'll be to Rome As is the osprey to the fish, who takes it By sovereignty of nature. First he was A noble servant to them; but he could not Carry his honours even: whether 'twas pride, Which out of daily fortune ever taints The happy man; whether defect of judgment, To fail in the disposing of those chances Which he was lord of; or whether nature, Not to be other than one thing, not moving From the casque to the cushion, but commanding peace Even with the same austerity and garb As he controll'd the war; but one of these, - As he hath spices of them all, not all, For I dare so far free him, - made him fear'd, So hated, and so banish'd: but he has a merit To choke it in the utterance. So our virtues Lie in the interpretation of the time: And power, unto itself most commendable, Hath not a tomb so evident as a cheer To extol what it hath done. One fire drives out one fire; one nail, one nail; Rights by rights falter, strengths by strengths do fail. Come, let's away. When, Caius, Rome is thine, Thou art poor'st of all; then shortly art thou mine.

[Exeunt.]


ACT V.

SCENE I. Rome. A public place

[Enter MENENIUS, COMINIUS, SICINIUS and BRUTUS, and others.]

MENENIUS. No, I'll not go: you hear what he hath said Which was sometime his general; who lov'd him In a most dear particular. He call'd me father: But what o' that? Go, you that banish'd him; A mile before his tent fall down, and knee The way into his mercy: nay, if he coy'd To hear Cominius speak, I'll keep at home.

COMINIUS. He would not seem to know me.

MENENIUS. Do you hear?

COMINIUS. 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 to: forbad all names; He was a kind of nothing, titleless, Till he had forg'd himself a name i' the fire Of burning Rome.

MENENIUS. Why, so! - you have made good work! A pair of tribunes that have rack'd for Rome, To make coals cheap, - a noble memory!

COMINIUS. I minded him how royal 'twas to pardon When it was less expected: he replied, It was a bare petition of a state To one whom they had punish'd.

MENENIUS. Very well: Could he say less?

COMINIUS. I offer'd 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.

MENENIUS. For one poor grain Or two! I am one of those; his mother, wife, His child, and this brave fellow too- we are the grains: You are the musty chaff; and you are smelt Above the moon: we must be burnt for you.

SICINIUS. Nay, pray be patient: if you refuse your aid In this so never-needed help, yet do not Upbraid's with our distress. But, sure, if you Would be your country's pleader, your good tongue, More than the instant army we can make, Might stop our countryman.

MENENIUS. No; I'll not meddle.

SICINIUS. Pray you, go to him.

MENENIUS. What should I do?

BRUTUS. Only make trial what your love can do For Rome, towards Marcius.

MENENIUS. Well, and say that Marcius Return me, as Cominius is return'd, Unheard; what then? But as a discontented friend, grief-shot With his unkindness? Say't be so?

SICINIUS. Yet your good-will Must have that thanks from Rome, after the measure As you intended well.

MENENIUS. I'll undertake't; I think he'll hear me. Yet to bite his lip And hum at good Cominius much unhearts me. He was not taken well: he had not din'd; The veins unfill'd, our blood is cold, and then We pout upon the morning, are unapt To give or to forgive; but when we have stuff'd These pipes and these conveyances of our blood With wine and feeding, we have suppler souls Than in our priest-like fasts. Therefore I'll watch him Till he be dieted to my request, And then I'll set upon him.

BRUTUS. You know the very road into his kindness And cannot lose your way.

MENENIUS. Good faith, I'll prove him, Speed how it will. I shall ere long have knowledge Of my success.

[Exit.]

COMINIUS. He'll never hear him.

SICINIUS. Not?

COMINIUS. I tell you he does sit in gold, his eye Red as 'twould burn Rome: and his injury The gaoler to his pity. I kneel'd 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 an 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 haste them on.

[Exeunt.]


SCENE II. An Advanced post of the Volscian camp