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Troilus and Cressida

Act V, Scene 4

Plains between Troy and the Grecian camp.
 
[Alarums: excursions. Enter THERSITES]
 
THERSITES
Now they are clapper-clawing one another, I'll go look on: that dissembling abominable varlets Diomed, has got that same scurvy, doting, foolish young knave's sleeve of Troy, there in his helm: I would fain see them meet; that, that same young Troyan ass, that loves the whore there, might send that Greekish whore-masterly villain, with the sleeve, back to the dissembling luxurious drab, of a sleeveless errand. On the other side, the policy of those crafty swearing rascals; that stale old mouse-eaten dry cheese, Nestor: and that same dog-fox Ulysses is not proved worthy a blackberry. They set me up in policy, that mongrel cur Ajax, against that dog of as bad a kind, Achilles. And now is the cur Ajax prouder than the cur Achilles, and will not arm today. Whereupon, the Grecians begin to proclaim barbarism; and policy grows into an ill opinion. Soft, here comes sleeve, and the other.
 
[Enter DIOMEDES, TROILUS following]
 
TROILUS
       ,   ,                         ,         ,       ,
      Fly not;/ for shouldst^|thou take | the riv|er Styx,
      ,               ,
      I would | swim^aft|er.
 
DIOMEDES
                                   ,         ,        ,
                            Thou dost | miscall | retire:
         ,        ,         ,     ,         ,
      I do | not fly;| but ad|vanta|geous care
            ,     ,              ,        ,      ,
      Withdrew | me from | the odds | of mul|titude:
            ,
      Have at | thee?  \\
 
THERSITES
Hold thy whore Grecian: now for thy whore Troyan: now the sleeve, now the sleeve.
 
[Exeunt TROILUS and DIOMEDES, fighting. Enter HECTOR]
 
HECTOR
What art thou Greek? Art thou for Hector's match? Art thou of blood, and honor?
 
THERSITES
No, no: I am a rascal: a scurvy railing knave: a very filthy rogue.
 
HECTOR
I do believe thee, live.
 
[Exit]
 
THERSITES
God-a-mercy, that thou wilt believe me; but a plague break thy neck-- for frighting me; what's become of the wenching rogues? I think they have swallowed one another. I would laugh at that miracle-- yet in a sort, lechery eats itself. I'll seek them.
 
[Exit]

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