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Tro. O beauty! where's thy faith?

Ulyss.

My lord,

Tro. I will be patient; outwardly I will.
Cres. You look upon that sleeve; Behold it well.
He lov'd me-O false wench!Give 't me again.
Dio. Whose was 't?

Cres.

No matter, now I have 't again.

ware on his head-piece his lady's sleeve, and another bare on his helme the glove of his deareling."

Again, in the second canto of The Barons' Wars, by Drayton: "A lady's sleeve high-spirited Hastings wore.'

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Again, in the Morte Arthur, p. 3, ch. 119: "When Queen Genever wist that Sir Launcelot beare the red sleeve of the faire maide of Astolat, she was nigh out of her minde for anger." Holinshed, p. 844, says, King Henry VIII "had on his head a ladies sleeve full of diamonds." The circumstance, however, was adopted by Shakspeare from Chaucer. T. and C. 1. 5. 1040: "She made him were a pencell of her sleeve." A pencell is a small pennon or streamer. Steevens.

In an old play, (in six acts) called Histriomastix, 1610, this incident seems to be burlesqued. Troilus and Cressida are introduced by way of interlude; and Cressida breaks out:

"O knight, with valour in thy face,
"Here take my skreene, wear it for grace;
"Within thy helmet put the same,

"Therewith to make thine enemies lame."

A little old book, The Hundred Hystoryes of Troye, tells us, "Bryseyde whom master Chaucer calleth Cresseyde, was a damosell of great beaute; and yet was more quaynte, mutable, and full of vagaunt condysions." Farmer.

This sleeve was given by Troilus to Cressida at their parting, and she gave him a glove in return. M. Mason.

What Mr. Steevens has observed on the subject of ladies' sleeves is certainly true; but the sleeve given in the present instance was the sleeve of Troilus. It may be supposed to be an ornamented cuff, such perhaps, as was worn by some of our young nobility at a tilt, in Shakspeare's age.

On second consideration, I believe, the sleeve of Troilus, which is here given to Diomed, was such a one as was formerly worn at tournaments. See Spenser's View of Ireland, p. 43, edit. 1633: "Also the deepe smocke sleive, which the Irish women use, they say, was old Spanish, and is used yet in Barbary; and yet that should seeme rather to be an old English fashion, for in armory the fashion of the manche which is given in armes by many, being indeed nothing else but a sleive, is fashioned much like to that sleive." Malone.

6 No matter, now &c.] Old copies, redundantly, --It is no matter, &c. Steevens.

I will not meet with you to-morrow night:

I pr'ythee, Diomed, visit me no more.

Ther. Now she sharpens;-Well said, whetstone.
Dio. I shall have it."

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Ay, that.

Cres. O, all you gods!-O pretty pretty pledge!
Thy master now lies thinking in his bed

Of thee, and me; and sighs, and takes my glove,
And gives memorial dainty kisses to it,

As I kiss thee.—Nay, do not snatch it from me;
He, that takes that, must take my heart withal.
Dio. I had your heart before, this follows it.
Tro. I did swear patience.

Cres. You shall not have it, Diomed; 'faith you shall

not;

I'll give you something else.

Dio. I will have this; Whose was it?

Cres.

Dio. Come, tell me whose it was.

'Tis no matter.

you will.

Whose was it?

Cres. 'Twas one's that loved me better than But, now you have it, take it.

Dio.

Cres. By all Diana's waiting-women yonder,

And by herself, I will not tell you whose.

7 I shall have it.] Some word or words, necessary to the metre, are here apparently omitted. Steevens.

8 As I kiss thee. &c.] In old editions:

As I kiss thee.

Dio. Nay do not snatch it from me.

Cres. He, that takes that, must take my heart withal.

Dr. Thirlby thinks this should be all placed to Cressida. She had the sleeve, and was kissing it rapturously; and Diomedes snatches it back from her. Theobald.

9 By all Diana's waiting-women yonder,] i. e. the stars which she points to. Warburton.

So, in our author's Rape of Lucrece:

"The silver-shining queen he would distain;

"Her twinkling hand-maids too, by him defil'd,

Through night's black bosom should not peep again."

Milton, in his Elegy I, v. 77, has imitated Shakspeare: - cœlo scintillant astra sereno

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Malone

Dio. To-morrow will I wear it on my helm;

And grieve his spirit, that dares not challenge it.

Tro. Wert thou the devil, and wor'st it on thy horn, It should be challeng'd.

Cres. Well, well, 'tis done, 'tis past ;-And yet it is not; I will not keep my word.

Dio.
Why then, farewel;
Thou never shalt mock Diomed again.

Cres. You shall not go:-One cannot speak a word, But it straight starts you.

Dio.

I do not like this fooling. Ther. Nor I, by Pluto:1 but that that likes not you, pleases me best.

Dio. What, shall I come? the hour?

Cres.

Do come :-I shall be plagu’d.

Dio.

Ay, come:-O Jove!

Farewel till then.

Cres. Good night. I pr'ythee, come.[Exit Dio. Troilus, farewel!2 one eye yet looks on thee; But with my heart the other eye doth see.3.

1 Ther. Nor I, by Pluto: &c.] Sir Thomas Hanmer gives this speech to Troilus. It does not very much resemble the language of Thersites. If indeed it belongs to the former character, it should assume a metrical form, though it is here given as it stands in the folio, and the quarto 1609, "imprinted by G. Eld, for R. Bonian and H. Whalley." Steevens.

2 Troilus, farewel!] The characters of Cressida and Pandarus are more immediately formed from Chaucer than from Lydgate; for though the latter mentions them both characteristically, he does not sufficiently dwell on either to have furnished Shakspeare with many circumstances to be found in this tragedy. Lydgate, speaking of Cressida, says only:

"She gave her heart and love to Diomede,

"To shew what trust there is in woman kind';
"For she of her new love no sooner sped,

"But Troilus was cleane out of her mind,

"As if she never had him known or seen,

"Wherein I cannot guess what she did mean." Steevens. 3 But with my heart &c.] I think it should be read thus: But my heart with the other eye doth see. Johnson. Perhaps, rather:

But with the other eye my heart doth see.

Tyrwhitt.

The present reading is right. She means to say-" one eye yet looks on thee, Troilus, but the other corresponds with my heart, and looks after Diomedes."

M. Mason.

Ah! poor our sex! this fault in us I find,
The error of our eye directs our mind:

What error leads, must err; O then conclude,

Minds, sway'd by eyes, are full of turpitude. [Exit CRES. Ther. A proof of strength she could not publish

more,4

Unless she said, My mind is now turn'd whore.

Ulyss. All's done, my lord.

Tro.
Ulyss.

It is.

Why stay we then?

Tro. To make a recordation to my soul
Of every syllable that here was spoke.
But, if I tell how these two did co-act,
Shall I not lie in publishing a truth?
Sith yet there is a credence in my heart,
An esperance so obstinately strong,

That doth invert the attest of eyes and ears;5
As if those organs had deceptious functions,
Created only to calumniate.

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Tro. Why, my negation hath no taste of madness.
Ulyss. Nor mine, my lord: Cressid was here but now.
Tro. Let it not be believ'd for womanhood! 8

Think, we had mothers; do not give advantage
To stubborn criticks-apt, without a theme,

For depravation,9-to square the general sex

4

A proof of strength she could not publish more,] She could not publish a stronger proof. Johnson.

5 That doth invert the attest of eyes and ears;] i. e. that turns the very testimony of seeing and hearing against themselves.

Theobald.

6 I cannot conjure, Trojan !] That is, I cannot raise spirits in the form of Cressida. Johnson.

7 Most sure she was.] The present deficiency in the measure induces me to suppose our author wrote:

It is most sure she was. Steevens.

8 for womanhood!] i. e. for the sake of womanhood.

9

do not give advantage

To stubborn criticks-apt, without a theme,

Steevens.

By Cressid's rule: rather think this not Cressid.

Ulyss. What hath she done, prince, that can soil our mothers?

Tro. Nothing at all, unless that this were she.
Ther. Will he swagger himself out on 's own eyes?
Tro. This she? no, this is Diomed's Cressida :

If beauty have a soul, this is not she;

If souls guide vows, if vows be sanctimony,
If sanctimony be the gods' delight,

If there be rule in unity itself,1

This was not she. O madness of discourse,
That cause sets up with and against itself!2
Bi-fold authority!3 where reason can revolt
Without perdition, and loss assume all reason
Without revolt; this is, and is not, Cressid!
Within my soul there doth commence a fight5
Of this strange nature, that a thing inseparate

For depravation, Critick has bere, I think, the signification of Cynick. So, in Love's Labour's Lost:

“And critick Timon laugh at idle toys."

Malone.

1 If there be rule in unity itself,] may mean-If there be cer tainty in unity, if there be a rule that one is one. Johnson.

If it be true that one individual cannot be two distinct persons. M. Mason.

The rule alluded to is a very simple one; that one cannot be two. This woman therefore, says Troilus, this false one, cannot be that Cressida that formerly plighted her faith to me. Malone.

2 against itself!] Thus the quarto. The folio readsagainst thyself. In the preceding line also I have followed the quarto. The folio reads-This is not she. Malone.

3 Bi-fold authority!] This is the reading of the quarto. The folio gives us:

By foul authority!

There is madness in that disquisition in which a man reasons at once for and against himself upon authority which he knows not to be valid. The quarto is right. Johnson.

This is one of the passages in which the editor of the folio changed words that he found in the quartos, merely because he did not understand them. Malone.

4 Where reason can revolt

Without perdition, and loss assume all reason

Without revolt;] The words loss and perdition are used in their common sense, but they mean the loss or perdition of reason.

Johnson.

5 Within my soul there doth commence a fight -] So, in Hamlet : "Sir, in my heart, there was a kind of fighting." Malone.

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