Cres. Then you say as I say; for, I am sure, he is not Hector.

Pan. No, nor Hector is not Troilus, in some degrees.
Cres. 'Tis just to each of them; he is himself.
Pan. Himself? Alas, poor Troilus! I would, he

were,

Cres. So he is.

Pan.

'Condition, I had gone bare-foot to India. Cres. He is not Hector.

Pan. Himself? no, he's not himself.-'Would a' were himself! Well, the gods are above; Time must friend, or end: Well, Troilus, weil-I would, my heart were in her body—No, Hector is not a better man than Troilus.

Cres. Excuse me.

Pan. He is elder.

Cres. Pardon me, pardon me.

Pan. The other 's not come to 't; you shall tell me another tale, when the other's come to 't. Hector shall not have his wit1 this year.

Cres. He shall not need it, if he have his own.
Pan. Nor his qualities;

Cres. No matter.

Pan. Nor his beauty.

Cres. 'Twould not become him, his own 's better.

Pan. You have no judgment, niece: Helen herself swore the other day, that Troilus, for a brown favour, (for so 'tis, I must confess,)-Not brown neither.

Cres. No, but brown.

Pan. 'Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown.
Cres. To say the truth, true and not true.

Pan. She prais'd his complexion above Paris.
Cres. Why, Paris hath colour enough.

Pan. So he has.

Cres. Then, Troilus should have too much: if she praised him above, his complexion is higher than his; he having colour enough, and the other higher, is too flaming a praise for a good complexion. I had as lief,

Well, the gods are above;] So, in Othello: "Heaven's above all." Malone.

his wit-] Both the old copies have-will. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. Malone:

Helen's golden tongue had commended Troilus for a copper nose.

Pan. I swear to you, I think, Helen loves him better than Paris.

Cres. Then she's a merry Greek, indeed.

Pan. Nay, I am sure she does. She came to him the other day into the compassed window,—and, you know, he has not past three or four hairs on his chin.

Cres. Indeed, a tapster's arithmetick may soon bring his particulars therein to a total.

Pan. Why, he is very young: and yet will he, within three pound, lift as much as his brother Hector.

Cres. Is he so young a man, and so old a lifter ?4

Pan. But, to prove to you that Helen loves him ;— she came, and puts me her white hand to his cloven chin,

Cres. Juno have mercy!-How came it cloven?

Pan. Why, you know, 'tis dimpled: I think, his smiling becomes him better than any man in all Phrygia. Cres. O, he smiles valiantly.

Pan. Does he not?

2- a merry Greek,] Græcari, among the Romans, signified to play the reveller. Steevens.

The expression occurs in many old English books. See Act IV, sc. iv:

“A woeful Cressid 'mongst the merry Greeks.” Malone. compassed window,] The compassed window is the same as the bow-window. Johnson.

3

A compassed window is a circular bow window. In The Taming of the Shrew the same epithet is applied to the cape of a woman's gown: "a small compassed cape." Steevens.

A coved cieling is yet in some places called a compassed cieling.

Malone.

4 so old a lifter?] The word lifter is used for a thief, by Greene, in his Art of Coneycatcking, printed 1591: on this the humour of the passage may be supposed to turn. We still cali a person who plunders shops, a shop-lifter. Ben Jonson uses the expression in Cynthia's Revels:

"One other peculiar virtue you possess is, lifting.”

Again, in The Roaring Girl, 1611: "—cheaters, lifiers, nips, foists, puggards, courbers."

Again, in Holland's Leaguer, 1633: "Broker or pandar, cheater or lifter." Steevens.

Hliftus, in the Gothick language, signifies a thief. See Arche log. Vol. V, p. 311. Blackstone.

Cres. O yes, an 'twere a cloud in autumn.

Pan. Why, go to then :-But to prove to you that Helen loves Troilus,

Cres. Troilus will stand to the proof, if you'll prove it so.

Pan. Troilus? why, he esteems her no more than I esteem an addle egg.

Cres. If you love an addle egg as well as you love an idle head, you would eat chickens i' the shell.

Pan. I cannot choose but laugh, to think how she tickled his chin;-Indeed, she has a marvellous white hand, I must needs confess.

Cres. Without the rack.

Pan. And she takes upon her to spy a white hair on his chin.

Cres. Alas, poor chin! many a wart is richer.

Pan. But, there was such laughing;-Queen Hecuba laughed, that her eyes ran o'er.

Cres. With mill-stones.5

Pan. And Cassandra laughed.

Cres. But there was a more temperate fire under the pot of her eyes;-Did her eyes run o'er too?

Pan. And Hector laughed.

Cres. At what was all this laughing?

Pan. Marry, at the white hair that Helen spied on Troilus' chin.

Cres. An't had been a green hair, I should have laughed too.

Pan. They laughed not so much at the hair, as at his pretty answer.

Cres. What was his answer?

Pan. Quoth she, Here's but one and fifty hairs on your chin, and one of them is white.

Cres. This is her question.

Pan. That's true; make no question of that. One and fifty hairs, quoth he, and one white: That white

Cres. With mill-stones.] So, in King Richard III:

"Your eyes drop mill-stones, when fools' eyes drop tears."

Malone.

6 One and fifty hairs,] [Old copies-Two and fifty.] I have ven. tured to substitute-One and fifty, I think with some certainty. How else can the number make out Priam and his fifty sons?

Theobald

hair is my father, and all the rest are his sons. Jupiter! quoth she, which of these hairs is Paris, my husband? The forked one, quoth he; pluck it out, and give it him. But, there was such laughing! and Helen so blushed, and Paris so chafed, and all the rest so laughed, that it passed.7

Cres. So let it now; for it has been a great while going by.

Pan. Well, cousin, I told you a thing yesterday; think on 't.

Cres. So I do.

Pan. I'll be sworn, 'tis true; he will weep you, an 'twere a man born in April.8

Cres. And I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a nettle against May. [A Retreat sounded. Pan. Hark, they are coming from the field: Shall we stand up here, and see them, as they pass toward Ilium? good niece, do; sweet niece Cressida.

Cres. At your pleasure.

Pan. Here, here, here's an excellent place; here we may see most bravely: I'll tell you them all by their names, as they pass by; but mark Troilus above the rest. ENEAS passes over the Stage.

Cres. Speak not so loud.

Pan. That's Eneas; Is not that a brave man? he 's one of the flowers of Troy, I can tell you; But mark Troilus; you shall see anon.

Cres. Who's that?

ANTENOR passes over.

9

Pan. That's Antenor; he has a shrewd wit, I can

7 that it passed.] i. e. that it went beyond bounds. So, in The Merry Wives of Windsor: "Why this passes, master Ford." Cressida plays on the word, as used by Pandarus, by employing it herself in its common acceptation. Steevens.

8 — an 'twere a man born in April ] i. e. as if 'twere, &c. So, in A Midsummer Night's Dream: "I will roar you an 'twere any nightingale."

The foregoing thought occurs also in Antony and Cleopatra: "The April's in her eyes: it is love's spring, "And these the showers to bring it on."

9 That's Antenor; he has a shrewd wit,]

"Anthenor was

Steevens.

Copious in words, and one that much time spent

tell you; and he's a man good enough: he's one o' the soundest judgments in Troy, whosoever, and a proper man of person :- -When comes Troilus?—I'll show you Troilus anon; if he see me, you shall see him nod at me. Cres. Will he give you the nod?

Pan. You shall see.

Cres. If he do, the rich shall have more.1

HECTOR passes over.

Pan. That's Hector, that, that, look you, that; There's a fellow! Go thy way, Hector;-There's a brave man, niece. O brave Hector!-Look, how he looks! there's a countenance: Is 't not a brave man?

Cres. O, a brave man!

Pan. Is 'a not? It does a man's heart good-Look you what hacks are on his helmet? look you yonder, do you see? look you there! There's no jesting: there's laying on; take 't off who will, as they say: there be hacks!

Cres. Bc those with swords?

PARIS passes over.

Pan. Swords? any thing, he cares not: an the devil come to him, it's all one: By god's lid, it does one's heart good:-Yonder comes Paris, yonder comes Paris:

"To jest, when as he was in companie,
"So driely, that no man could it espie;

"And therewith held his countenaunce so well,

That every man received great content

"To heare him speake, and pretty jests to tell,
"When he was pleasant, and in merriment:

"For tho' that he most commonly was sad,
"Yet in his speech some jest he always had."

Lydgate, p. 105. Such, in the hands of a rude English poet, is the grave Antenor, to whose wisdom it was thought necessary that the art of Ulysses should be opposed:

1

"Et moveo Priamum, Priamoque Antenora junctum."

Steevens.

the rich shall have more.] The allusion is to the word noddy, which, as now, did, in our author's time, and long before, signify a silly fellow, and may, by its etymology, signify likewise full of nods Cressid means, that a noddy shall have more nods. Of such remarks as these is a comment to consist! Johnson.

To give the nod, was, I believe, a term in the game at cards called Noddy. This game is perpetually alluded to in the old comedies. See Vol. II, p. 148, n. 5. Steevens.