A Sennet. Enter, with Lictors before them, COMINIUS, the Consul, MENENIUS, CORIOLANUS, many other Senators, SICINIUS and BRUTUS. The Senators take their places; the Tribunes take theirs also by themselves.

Men. Having determin'd of the Volces, and
To send for Titus Lartius, it remains,

As the main point of this our after-meeting,
To gratify his noble service, that

Hath thus stood for his country: Therefore, please

you,

Most reverend and grave elders, to desire

The present consul, and last general
In our well found successes, to report
A little of that worthy work perform'd-
By Caius Marcius Coriolanus; whom

We meet here, both to thank, and to remember
With honours like himself.

1 Sen.

Speak, good Cominius: Leave nothing out for length, and make us think, Rather our state's defective for requital,

Then we to stretch it out 5. Masters o'the people,
We do request your kindest ears; and, after,
Your loving motion toward the common body 6,
To yield what passes here.

Sic.

We are convented Upon a pleasing treaty; and have hearts

Inclinable to honour and advance

The theme of our assembly7.

5 Rather say that our means are too defective to afford an adequate reward, than our inclinations defective to extend it toward him.'

6 i. e. your kind interposition with the common people.

7 Shakspeare was probably not aware that until the promulgation of the Lex Attinia, which is supposed to have been in the time of Quintus Metellus Macedonicus, the tribunes had not the

Bru.

Which the rather

We shall be bless'd to do, if he remember
A kinder value of the people, than
He hath hereto priz'd them at.

Men.

That's off, that's off3,

I would you rather had been silent: Please you
To hear Cominius speak?

Bru.

Most willingly:

But yet my caution was more pertinent,
Than the rebuke you give it.

Men.

He loves your people:

But tie him not to be their bedfellow.—

Worthy Cominius, speak.-Nay, keep your place. [CORIOLANUS rises, and offers to go away.

1 Sen. Sit, Coriolanus: never shame to hear What you have nobly done.

Cor.

Your honours' pardon;

I had rather have my wounds to heal again,
Than hear say how I got them.

Bru.

My words disbench'd you not.

Sir, I hope,

No, sir: yet oft,

Cor. When blows have made me stay, I fled from words. You sooth'd not, therefore hurt not: But, your

people,

I love them as they weigh.

Men. Pray now, sit down. Cor. I had rather have one scratch my head i'the sun, When the alarum were struck, than idly sit To hear my nothings monster'd. [Exit CORIOLANUS. privilege of entering the senate, but had seats placed for them near the door, on the outside of the house. But in our ancient theatres the imagination of the spectators was frequently called upon to lend its aid to illusions much more improbable than that of supposing they saw the inside and outside of the same building at once.

8 i. e. that is nothing to the purpose.'

Men.

Masters o'the people,

Your multiplying spawn how can he flatter (That's thousand to one good one), when

you now see, He had rather venture all his limbs for honour, Than one of his ears to hear it?-Proceed, Cominius,

Com. I shall lack voice: the deeds of Coriolanus Should not be utter'd 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 counterpois'd. At sixteen years,
When Tarquin made a head for Rome, he fought
Beyond the mark of others: our then dictator,
Whom with all praise I point at, saw him fight,
When with his Amazonian chin he drove
The bristled lips before him: he bestrid

An o'er press'd Roman, and i' the consul's view
Slew three opposers: Tarquin's self he met,
And struck him on his knee 10: in that day's feats,
When he might act the woman in the scene11,
He prov'd best man i'the field, and for his meed
Was brow-bound with the oak. His pupil age
Man-entered thus, he waxed like a sea;

And, in the brunt of seventeen battles since 12,

9 When Tarquin, who had been expelled, raised a power to recover Rome.

10 This does not mean that he gave Tarquin a blow on the knee, but gave him such a blow as occasioned him to fall on his knee: ad terram duplicato poplite Turnus.'

11 It has been before mentioned that the parts of women were, in Shakspeare's time, represented by the most smooth-faced young men to be found among the players. This is a palpable anachronism; there were no theatres at Rome for the exhibition of plays until about two hundred and fifty years after the death of Coriolanus.

12 Plutarch says, ' seventeen years of service in the wars, and many and sundry battles:' but from Coriolanus's first campaign to his death was only a period of eight years.

He lurch'd 13 all swords o'the garland. For this last, Before and in Corioli, let me say,

I cannot speak him home: He stopp'd the fliers; And, by his rare example, made the coward

Turn terror into sport: as waves

14 before

A vessel under sail, so men obey'd,

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 15 with dying cries: alone he enter'd
The mortal gate 16 o'the city, which he painted
With shunless destiny, aidless came off,
And with a sudden reenforcement struck
Corioli, 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
Requicken'd what in flesh was fatigate 17,
And to the battle came he; where he did
Run reeking o'er the lives of men, as if
"Twere a perpetual spoil: and, till we call'd
Both field and city ours, he never stood
To ease his breast with panting.

Men.

Worthy man!

13 To lurch is to win or carry off easily the prize or stake at any game. It originally signified to devour greedily, from lurco, Lat. then to purloin, subtract, or withdraw any thing from another. Thus in Ben Jonson's Silent Woman:- You have lurch'd your friends of the better half of the garland.' Cole, in his Latin Dictionary, 1679, has ' A lurch, duplex palma facilis victoria.'

14 Thus the second folio. The first folio' as weeds,' &c. which Malone pertinaciously adheres to. I think with Steevens, that a vessel stemming the waves is an image much more suitable to the prowess of Coriolanus, than that which Malone would substitute.

15 The cries of the slaughtered regularly followed his motion, as music and a dancer accompany each other.

16 The gate which was made the scene of death.

17 Wearied.

1 Sen. He cannot but with measure fit the ho

nours

Which we devise him 18

Com.

•

Our spoils he kick'd at; And look'd upon things precious, as they were The common muck o'the world; he covets less Than misery 19 itself would give; rewards His deeds with doing them; and is content To spend the time, to end it.

Re-enter CORIOLANUS.

Men. The senate, Coriolanus, are well pleas'd

To make thee consul.

I do beseech you,

Let me o'erleap that custom; for I cannot
Put on the gown, stand naked, and entreat them,

18 No honour will be too great for him; he will show a mind equal to any elevation.

19 Misery for avarice, because a miser signifies avaricious.

Shak

20 Coriolanus (as Warburton observes) was banished A. U. C.. 262. But till the time of Manlius Torquatus, A. U. C. 393, the senate chose both consuls; and then the people, assisted by the seditious temper of the tribunes, got the choice of one. speare follows Plutarch, who expressly says in the Life of Coriolanus, that it was the custome of Rome at that time, that such as dyd sue for any office, should for certen dayes before be in the market place, only with a poor gowne on their backes, and without any coate underneath, to praye the people to remember them at the day of election.' North's Translation, p. 244,