4

It was a bare petition of a state

To one whom they had punish'd.

Men.

Could he say less?

Very well:

Com. I offer'd to awaken his regard

For his 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.

Men.

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.

Sic. Nay, pray, be patient: If you refuse your aid
In this so never-heeded help, yet do not
Upbraid us 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.

Men.

Sic. Pray you, go to him.
Men.

Bru. Only make trial what
For Rome, towards Marcius.

Men.

No; I'll not meddle.

What should I do?

your love can do

Return me, as Cominius is return'd,

Unheard; what then?

But as a discontented friend, grief-shot

With his unkindness? Say't be so?

Sic.

Yet your good will

A Bare may mean palpable, evident; but I think we should

read base.

Must have that thanks from Rome, after the measure

And hum at good Cominius, much unhearts me.
He was not taken well; he had not din'd 5:
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.

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

Men.

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

[Exit.

Com.

He'll never hear him.

Sic.

Not?

Com. I tell you, he does sit in gold7, 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; dismiss'd me

5 This observation is not only from nature, and finely expressed, but admirably befits the mouth of one who, in the beginning of the play, had told us that he loved convivial doings.'-Warburton.

6 The poet had the discipline of modern Rome in his thoughts; by the discipline of whose church priests are forbid to break their fast before the celebration of mass, which must take place after sun-rise, and before mid-day.

7 So in North's Plutarch:-' He was set in his chaire of state, with a marvellous and unspeakable majesty.' The idea expressed by Cominius occurs in the eighth Iliad. Pope was perhaps indebted to Shakspeare in the translation of the passage:Th' eternal Thunderer sat throned in gold.'

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 8:
So, that all hope is vain,

Unless his noble mother, and his wife9;
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 Volcian Camp before Rome. The Guard at their Stations.

Enter to them, MENENIUS.

1 G. Stay: Whence are you?

2 G.

Stand, and go back.

Men. You guard like men; 'tis well: But, by

your leave,

I am an officer of state, and come

To speak with Coriolanus.

1 G.

Men.

From whence?

From Rome.

8

'Bound with an oath, to yield to his conditions.' None of the explanations or proposed emendations of this passage satisfy me. Perhaps we might read, 'to yield to no conditions.' The sense of the passage would then be, 'What he would do he sent in writing after me; the things he would not do, he bound himself with an oath to yield to no conditions that might be proposed.' It afterwards appears what these were:The things I have foresworn to grant may never Be held by you denials. Do not bid me

Dismiss my soldiers, or capitulate

Again with Rome's mechanicks.'

9 To satisfy modern notions of construction, this line must be

read as if written

Unless in his noble mother and his wife.'

1 G. You may not pass, you must return: our

general

Will no more hear from thence.

2 G. You'll see your Rome embrac'd with fire,

before

You'll speak with Coriolanus.

Men. Good my friends, If you have heard your general talk of Rome, And of his friends there, it is lots to blanks1, My name hath touch'd your ears: it is Menenius. 1 G. Be it so; go back: the virtue of Is not here passable.

Men.

I tell thee, fellow, Thy general is my lover: I have been

your name

The book of his good acts, whence men have read His fame unparallel'd, haply, amplified;

For I have ever verified3 my friends

(Of whom he's chief), with all the size that verity Would without lapsing suffer: nay, sometimes, Like to a bowl upon a subtle ground,

4

I have tumbled past the throw; and in his praise Have, almost, stamp'd the leasing5: Therefore,fellow, I must have leave to pass.

1 Lots to blanks is chances to nothing. Equivalent to another phrase in King Richard III.:

All the world to nothing.'

2 i. e. friend. See vol. iii. p. 66, note 2.

3 Verified must here be used for displayed or testified, if it be not a corruption of the text for notified, or some other word. Mr. Edwards proposed to read varnished, which, as it was anciently written vernished, might easily be mistaken for verified. Shakspeare, however, seems to have made Dogberry use verified for testified; but as he is never orthodox in his meaning, it may be no evidence: They have verified unjust things.' Much Ado about Nothing, Act v. Sc. 1.

4 Subtle here means smooth, level. Tityus's breast is counted the subtlest bowling ground in all Tartary.

Ben Jonson's Chlorida, vol. viii. p. 105. 5 i.e. have almost given the lie such a sanction as to render it

current.

1 G. 'Faith, sir, if you had told as many lies in his behalf, as you have uttered words in your own, you should not pass here: no, though it were as virtuous to lie, as to live chastly. Therefore, go back.

6

Men. Pr'ythee, fellow, remember my name is Menenius, always factionary on the party of your general.

2 G. Howsoever you have been his liar (as you say, you have), I am one that, telling true under him, must say, you cannot pass. Therefore, go back.

Men. Has he dined, canst thou tell? for I would not speak with him till after dinner.

1 G. You are a Roman, are you? Men. I am as thy general is.

1 G. Then you should hate Rome, as he does. Can you, when you have pushed out your gates the very defender of them, and, in a violent popular ignorance, given your enemy your shield, think to front his revenges with the easy groans of old women, the virginal palms of your daughters, or with the palsied intercession of such a decayed dotant as you seem to be? Can you think to blow out the intended fire your city is ready to flame in, with such weak breath as this? No, you are deceived; therefore, back to Rome, and prepare for your execution: you are condemned, our general has sworn you out of reprieve and pardon.

Men. Sirrah, If thy captain knew I were here, he would use me with estimation.

6 Factionary is adherent, partisan. See Sherwood in v. faction. Thus in King Henry VI. Part II. :

'Her faction will be full as strong as ours.'

7 i. e. slight, inconsiderable. So in King Henry VI. Part II. Act v. Sc. 2:~