CORIOLANUS ACT I SCENE I.-Rome. A Street. Enter a company of mutinous Citizens, with staves, clubs, and other weapons. First Cit. Before we proceed any further, hear me speak. First Cit. You are all resolved rather to die than to famish? All. Resolved, resolved. 5 First Cit. First, you know Caius Marcius is chief enemy to the people. All. We know 't, we know 't. First Cit. Let us kill him, and we'll have corn at our own ΙΟ All. No more talking on 't; let it be done. Away, away! Second Cit. One word, good citizens. Scene 1. Act I. Scene 1.] Scenes (save Act v. scenes v. and vi.) as in Capell; acts marked, but no scenes save here, in Ff, scenes first by Rowe; Pope made new scenes to introduce each new character. omitted Ff. Rome. A Street.] A street in Rome. Pope; 9-10. Let us ... price] Here Shakespeare departs from the account in North's Plutarch, in which the question of the corn does not arise, nor are there any corn riots, till after the war with the Volces. See Extracts, ante, p. xxxvi et seq. Io. Is 't a verdict ?] Are we unanimous on the point? Verity notes this 3 instance of Shakespeare's "partiality for legal figures." II. on 't] of it, about it. This confusion between on and of is very common. See Cymbeline, IV. ii. 198: "The bird is dead That we have made so much on," and also the Chronicle of Edward Halle, 1542, ed. 1809, p. 439: "John Lilie fell sick on the gowt." First Cit. We are accounted poor citizens, the patricians, good. What authority surfeits on would relieve us. If they would yield us but the superfluity, while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely; but they think we are too dear: the leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to particularize their abundance; our sufferance is a gain to them. Let us revenge this with our pikes, ere we become rakes: for the gods know I speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge. 15. on] F 3; one F. 15. good] The commercial sense, wealthy, is quibbled with. Compare The Merchant of Venice, 1. iii. 12-17 : 66 Shy. Antonio is a good man. Bass. Have you heard any imputation to the contrary? Shy. Ho, no, no, no, no: my meaning in saying he is a good man is to have you understand me that he is sufficient." See also The Woman's Prize, 1647, 1. i.; Weber's Beaumont and Fletcher, v. 260: "Moroso. I hold him a good man. Sophocles. Yes, sure, a wealthy." authority] Those in authority, the ruling classes. Compare Measure for Measure, I. ii. 124-125:— "Thus can the demi-god Authority Make us pay down for our offence by weight The word of heaven." 17. guess] think. Schmidt gives two other instances of guess in this sense from 1 Henry VI. II. i. 29, and Henry VIII. II. i. 47. The New Eng. Dict. gives several early English (no Elizabethan) examples: it quotes a 1400 Prymer (Early Eng. Text Soc.), 64: "Gessist thou not (Vulg. putasne) that a deed man shall live agen?" 18. they think dear] Johnson explains: "they think that the charge of maintaining us is more than we are worth." Others, however, explain "too precious," referring to what follows. 19. the object] the spectacle. Shakespeare uses object in this sense in Troilus and Cressida, II. ii. 41 "And reason flies the object of all harm." The New Eng. Dict. gives In glorious object." 19-20. is... abundance] ser a catalogue of wants emph their own plenty. Particula only found here in Shakespeare 21. sufferance] suffering, mis often in Shakespeare. Compare Cæsar, II. i. 115: "The suffer our souls." See also Thomas Complaint of Elstred, Hunteria ed., p. 77: "I faynting fell, en through my sufferance." 21-22. Let us rakes] Pi in early use in the sense of pit which suggests the comparison text. Among other references Eng. Dict. quotes Tusser, Fiv dreth Points of Good Husbandr ed. 1878, p. 37 [1812, chap. xv September]: "A rake for to hale up the that lie, A pike for to pike them u some to drie." The proverbial expression Chaucer 's Prologue, line 287 lene was his hors as is a ra common: see Skelton, The Phyllyp Sparowe [ed. Dyce, cited by New Eng. Dict.: “ Enui His bones crake le rake," and Spenser, The Faerie II. xi. 22: "His body leane and as a rake." In Stanyhurst's tra of Virgil, 1582 [ed. Arber, Sinon is called "A meigr rake." Second Cit. Would you proceed especially against Caius 25 Marcius? All. Against him first: he's a very dog to the com monalty. Second Cit. Consider you what services he has done for his country? First Cit. Very well; and could be content to give him good report for 't, but that he pays himself with being proud. Second Cit. Nay, but speak not maliciously. 30 First Cit. I say unto you, what he hath done famously, 35 he did it to that end: though soft-conscienced men can be content to say it was for his country, he did it to please his mother, and to be partly proud; which he is, even to the altitude of his virtue. Second Cit. What he cannot help in his nature, you 40 account a vice in him. You must in no way say he is covetous. First Cit. If I must not, I need not be barren of accusa- a very dog to, etc.] The dog is sometimes mentioned with indifference, and generally as the incarnation of bad qualities in Shakespeare's plays. In King Lear, III. iv. 96, the characteristic of the dog is madness: "hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness," the sense of madness here being probably rabies, wild fury. See also 2 Henry IV. IV. V. 131133: "For the fifth Harry from curb'd license plucks The muzzle of restraint, and the wild dog Shall flesh his tooth in every innocent"; and, among other writers, Halle, Chronicle, 1542, ed. 1809, p. 21: "The Gascons now abhorring the English people more than a dog or an Adder." 27. commonalty] the common people: 45 46. o' the] o' th' F 4; a'th F; a 'th' F 3. 34. Nay, but, etc.] Malone again would place these words in the First Citizen's mouth. 37-38. he proud] he did it partly to please his mother, and partly for the sake of his pride. It is unnecessary to change the text, as various editors have done. 39. to the altitude] Steevens quotes Henry VIII. 1. ii. 214: "He's traitor to the height." The speaker, of course, means to say: "brave man as he is, he is quite as proud as he is brave." 46. The . city] Probably Shakespeare had in his mind, the fact that the people went out, as Plutarch told him, to "the Holy Hill" (Mons Sacer) where the tribunes were granted them. All. Come, come. First Cit. Soft! who comes here? Enter MENENIUS AGRIPPA. Second Cit. Worthy Menenius Agrippa; one that hath always loved the people. First Cit. He's one honest enough: would all the res were so ! Men. What work's, my countrymen, in hand? where First Cit. Our business is not unknown to the senate they have had inkling this fortnight what we in tend to do, which now we 'll show 'em in deeds 54, 55. What . . . pray you.] As Theobald; three lines ending. matter the scene); 2 Cit. Ff. 49. Soft!] A common expression used to restrain, delay, or give pause: see The Tempest, 1. ii. 449: "Soft sir: one word more," and Mother Bombie, 1598, Fairholt's Lyly, II. 145, "Nay, soft, take us with you." Sometimes we find "soft, soft" (Twelfth Night, 1. v. 312), sometimes Soft you" (Hamlet, III. i. 88). See also Nash, Have with you to Saffron Walden, 1596, ed. McKerrow, III. 118, line 29, "But soft you now how is this, or any part of this to be proved?" 55. bats and clubs] As again 1. i. 160 post. Boswell-Stone (Shakespeare's Holinshed, 1896, p. 221), writes (re Henry VI. Part I.), quoting Fabyan's Chronicles, 1516, p. 596: "Fabyan says (596) that the Parliament which witnessed the reconciliation of Gloucester and Winchester 'was clepyd of the Comon people the Parlyament of Battes: the cause was, for Proclamacyons were made, that men shulde leue theyr Swerdes and other wepeyns in theyr Innys, the people toke great battes and stauys in theyr neckes, and so folowed theyr lordes and maisters vnto the Parlyament.'' Bat a stout staff: compare A Lover's Complaint, 64, "So slides he down upon his grained bat." We read in Wyclif's Bible, Mathew, XXVI. 47, "a great cumpanye with swerdis and battes" ("swords == 56. First Cit.] Capell's con adopted here and in the fo speeches, is thus advocated by This and all the subsequent p speeches in this scene are give old copy to the second Citizen. dialogue at the opening of t shows that it must have been as and that they ought to be attri the first Citizen. The second friendly to Coriolanus." 57. inkling] hint, slight int Only once again in Shak Henry VIII. 11. i. 140: "I can give you in Of an ensuing evil." See North's Plutarch, 1579, e p. 468: "But the keeper of th having an inckling of their c Lyly, Euphues and his Engla (ed. Arber, p. 420): "though Camilla should conce[i]ue a ling." They say poor suitors have strong breaths: they Men. Why, masters, my good friends, mine honest neigh bours, Will you undo yourselves? First Cit. We cannot, sir; we are undone already. Have the patricians of you. For your wants, Your knees to them, not arms, must help. Alack! Thither where more attends you; and you slander 75 For ... 65. you. 61, 62. Why. yourselves?] As Theobald; Ff divide after honest. wants,] Johnson; you for . . . wants, Rowe; you for . . . wants. F; you for . . . wants, F 3. 59-60. They say .. too] A quibble. Strong is defined by Johnson (Dict.), in this connection, as affecting the smell powerfully,' and he quotes Hudibras, [Part II. canto i, 753-755]:"The prince of Cambay's daily food Is asp, and basilisk, and toad, Which makes him have so strong a breath," etc. Compare Iv. vi. 99 post, "The breath of garlic-eaters," II. i. 232, beg their stinking breaths," III. iii. 120, "whose breath I hate As reek o' the rotten fens," and see also Measure for Measure, III. ii. 187-189 (in this edition): "he would mouth with a beggar, though she smelt brown bread and garlic," and Mr. Hart's note there. 66. dearth] famine; its primary meaning is dearness, scarcity of corn. It is often used by Shakespeare: see I. ii. 10 post, and Antony and Cleopatra, II. vii. 21-23: "they know By the height, the lowness, or the mean, if dearth Or foizon follow." |