University of Virginia Library

Actus Secundus:

Scœna prima.

Enter Priam in his night-gowne and slippers, after him Hecuba, Hellena, Andromache, Hellena, Cassandra, Polyxena, Polites, Astianax.
An Alarum.
All La.
Oh helpe vs father Priam, Oh the Greeks.

Pri.
I haue done more then age would suffer me
They haue tilted masts against my Pallace gates,
And burst them open.

All La.
Oh father Priam, whether shall we flye?

Pri.
We are incompast round with sword & fire,
'Las Daughters, 'las my young Astianax.

All La.
Oh heauen, they come, where may we hide vs safe?

Pri.
Safety and helpe are both fled out of Troy,
And left behind nothing but massacre:
My Pallace is surpris'd my guard all slaine,
My selfe am wounded, but more with your shreeks,
Then by the swords of Grecians: come let's flie
Vnto the sacred Altar of the gods.

All La.
May we be safe there father?

Pri.
Safe? Oh no;
Safety is fled. Death hath our liues in chase,
And since we needes must dye, let's chuse this place.

Exeunt
Alarum. Enter at the one doore Hellen, at the other Cresida.
Cres.
Whither runnes Hellen?

Hel.
Whither should I fly?

Cres.
See, Troy is not it selfe, oh wretched Hellen!
To shunne the Greekes to run into the fire,
Or flying fire, perish by Greekish steele:
Which hadst thou rather chuse?

Hel.
Death, in what shape soeuer hee appeares
To me is welcome, I'le no longer shun him;
But here with Cresida abide him: here,
Oh, why was Hellen at the first so faire,
To be come subiect to so foule an end?
Or how hath Cresids beauty sinn'd 'gainst Heauen,
That it is branded thus with leprosie?

Cres.
I in conceit thought that I might contend
Against Heauens splendor, I did once suppose,
There was no beauty but in Cresids lookes,
But in her eyes no pure diuinity:
But now behold mee Hellen.

Hel.
In her I see
All beauties frailty, and this obiect makes
All fairenesse to show vgly in it selfe:
But to see breathlesse Virgins pil'd on heape,
What lesse can Hellen doe then curse these Starres
That shin'd so bright at her natiuity,
And with her nayles teare out these shining balls
That haue set Troy on fire?

Enter Pyrhus, Agamemnon, Menelaus, &c.
Pyr.
Pierce all the Troian Ladies with your swords,
Least 'mongst them you might spare Polixena.

Agam.
Stay, I should know that face, tis Helena.

Mene.
My Queene?

Hel.
I am not Hellen, but Polixena?
Therefore reuengfull Neoptolemus
Doe Iustice on me for thy fathers death.

Pyr.
Polixena? by all Achilles honours
Ile part thee limbe from limbe.

Cres.
Pyrhus forbeare,
It's the Spartan Queene.

Men.
If Hellen, the adulterous strumpet dyes,
Ile be her deaths-man.

Hel.
Strike home Menelaus,
Death from thy hand is welcome.

Aga.
Hold I say,
Shee's Clitemnestras sister, for her sake
Hellen shall liue, and Kingly Menelaus
Receiue her into fauour.

Pyr.
Agamemnon
Is too remisse, I haue sworne all blood to spill
I meet with, and this one will Pyrhus kill.

Men.
And I this other.

Aga.
For our sake Menelaus let her liue.
Was not our sister borne against her will
From Sparta? for that wrong done by the Troians
Doth not Troy burne? and are not all our swords
Stain'd in the blood of Paris slaughtered friends?
You shall be reconcil'd to Helena,
And beare her backe to Greece.

Enter Thersites.
Ther.
Hellen at shrift. alas poore penitent Queane,
Dost heare me Menelaus? pardon her,
Take her againe to Sparta, thou'lt else want
So kind a bed-fellow.

Men.
Take backe my shame?

Ther.
Yes for thy pleasure.
There's in the world as rich and honourable
As thou, who lend the pleasures of their bed
To others, and then take them backe agayne
As they can get them.

Men,
My brow shall neuer beare
Such Characters of shame.

Ther,
Thy browes beares hornes already, but who sees them?
When thou return'st to Sparta, some will thinke
Thou art a Cuckold, but who is't dare say so?
Thou art a King, thy sinnes are clouded o're,
Where poore mens faults by tongues are made much more.
Of all men liuing, Kings are last shall heare
Of their dishonours.

Aga.
What inferiour Beast
Dares tell the Lyon of his Tyranny,
Who is not torne asunder with his pawes?
The King of Sparta therefore needs not feare
The tongues of subiects bid our sister rise
To safety in thine armes.

Ther.
Doe Menelaus.

Mene.
But will my Hellen then by future vertue
Redeeme her long lost honour?

Hel.
If with teares
The Heauens may be appeas'd for Hellens sinnes,
They shall haue penitent showers: If Menelaus
May with the spirit of loue be satisfied,
Ile ten times rectifie my forfet honour
Before I touch his bed.

Men.
Arise then Hellen, Menelaus armes
Thus welcome thee to safety.

Ther.
Ha, ha, ha,
Why this is well, for he that's borne to dye
A branded Cuckhold, huggs his destiny:
Goe, get you after Pyrhus to the slaughter,
Ile looke to Hellen.

Aga.
Conueigh her to our guard.

Exit.
Ther.
Hellen, hereafter see thou proou'st more wise,
If not more honest, yet be more precise.

Exit.
Enter Prince Chorebus with other Troians in Greekish habits.
Cho.
These shapes thriue well, we haue guilt our Greekish arm
With blood of their owne nation: some we haue sent
To euerlasting darknesse, some repulst
Backe to their ships: some we haue made to flye
Into their horses bulke, whence Pyrhus first
Lept downe vpon his speare.

Enter Synon, Thersites, and the Greekes dragging in Cassandra.
Syn,
Come souldiers, this is stately tragicall,
The Greekes wade vp euen to the brawny thighes
In luke-warme blood of our despoyled foes.
Aboue Melpomene's huge buskind top
We plunge at euery stepp, and brauely fought
By Troyes bright burning flame: that's now our light.

Ther.
More of our valiant mates, let's ioyne with them,
This streete yet's vnassaulted and vnfir'd:
Some balls of wild-fire streight, and hurle this Lady
Into the fury of the burning flame.

Cho.
My wife Cassandra?

Syn.
Courage, let none scape
Fire, vengeance, blood, death, murder, spoyle and rape.

Cho.
All these on Greece and twenty thousand more,
Till they like Troy be drown'd in teares and goare.

Chorebus and the rest beate off the Greekes, and rescue Cassandra.
Cass.
From Greekes to Greeks, from fire kept for the sword,
From one death to another.

Cho.
Cassandra no.

Cass.
My Lord the Prince Chorebus?

Cho.
Yes the same,
Who hath preseru'd thee both from sword and flame.

Enter Æneas with his father, who taking Chorebus for a Grecian by reason of his habite, fights with him and kils him.
Æne.
More Greekes and see Cassandra captiue made,
Assault them Troians, rescue the faire Princesse;
This way deare father mount my backe againe.

Cass.
Oh false Æneas, thou hast slaine thy friend:
Many a Greeke (thus shapt) he sent to hell,
And being a Troian by a Troian fell.

Æne.
He dy'd not by my hand, but his owne fate.

Cass.
And I forgiue thee good Æneas, flie,
Thou shalt suruiue, but Troy and wee must fall:
The hope of all our future memories
Are stor'd in thee, take vp thy sacred load
Reuerent Anchises bed-rid through his age,
We are all doom'd, faire Troy must perish here,
But thou art borne a greater Troy to reare.

Æne.
The Heauens haue hand in all things, to their pleasure
Wee must subscribe: Creusa, where's my wife?
In loosing her I saue but halfe my life.
Come reuerent father, on my shoulders mount,
Though thousand dangers dogge vs at the heeles,
Yet will wee force our passage.

Exeunt.
King Priam discouered kneeling at the Altar, with him Hecuba, Polixena, Andromache, Aftianax: to them enter Pyrhus, and all the Greekes, Pyrhus killing Polytes Priams sonne before the Altar.
Pyr.
Still let your voyces to hye Heauen aspire
For Pyrhus vengeance, murdring steele and fire.

All the Ladies.
Oh, oh.

Pri.
My sonne Polytes? oh thou more hard hearted
Then fatall Pyrhus or his fathers guard,
That in the shadow of this sacred place
Durst sprinke the childs blood in the fathers face.

Pyr.
Priam? thanks sweet reuenge, through swords & armour
Through mures, and Counter-mures of men and steele;
Through many a corner, and blind entries mouth
I haue followed this thy bleeding sonne to death,
Whose swift persuite hath traind me to this Altar
To be reueng'd on thee for the sad fate
Of great Achilles.

Pri.
Thou art Pyrhus then?

Pyr.
My acts shall speake my name,
I am that Pyrhus who did mount yon Horse
Hyding mine armour in his deepe vast bulke,
The first that lept out of his spacious side,
And tost consuming fire in euery street,
Which climb'd, as if it meant to meete the stars,
I am that Pyrhus before whom Troy falls:
Before whom all the Vanes and Pinacles
Bend their high tops, and from the battlements
On which they stand, breake their aspiring necks.
The proudest roofe and most imperious spyre
Hath vaild to vs and our all wasting fire.

Pri.
Pyrhus, I know thee for my destin'd plague,
I know the gods haue left vs to our weaknesse,
I see our glories ended and extinct,
And I stand ready to abide their doome;
Onely for pitty and for pieties sake
Be gracious to these Ladies.

Syn.
Pyrhus no,
Such grace as they did to Achilles shew,
Let them all tast; let grace be farre exil'd,
Kill from the elder to the sucking child.

Pri.
Hee's prone enough to mischiefe of himselfe,
Spurre not that fury on which runnes too fast,
Nor adde thou to old Priams misery
Which scarce can be augmented tis so great.

Pyr.
Dye in thy tortures then.

Hecu.
Oh spare his life.

Asti.
Good man kill not my Grandsire.

Pri.
Good man doe.

Hecu.
Kill mee for him.

Asti.
No, shee's my Grandam too,
Indeed shee's a good woman, chuse some other
If you must needes kill.

Pyr.
This then.

Asti.
Shee's my Mother, you shall not hurt her.

Pri.
This boy had a father,
Hector his name, who had hee liu'd to see
A sword bent 'gainst his wife, this Queene, or me,
He would haue made all Greece as hot to hold him
As burning Troy is now to shelter vs.

Asti.
Good Grandsire weepe not, Grandam, Mother, Aunt
Alas, what meane you? If you be good men
Put vp your swords and helpe to quench these flames,
Or if in killing you such pleasure haue,
Practise on him, kill that ill fauoured knaue.

Syn.
Mee bratt?

Pyr.
Ulysses, Agamemnon. Menelaus,
Synon, Thersites, and you valiant Greekes;
Behold the vengeance wrathfull Pyrhus takes
On Priams body for Achilles death:
Synon, take thou that Syren Polixene,
And hew her peece-meale on my fathers Tombe.
Thersites, make the wombe of fifty Princes
A royall sheath for thy victorious blade:
Diomed, let Cassandra dye by thee,
And Agamemnon kill Andromache:
And as my sword through Priams bulke shall flie,
Let them in death consort him, and so dye.

Ther.
When, when, for Ioues sake when?

Syn.
Some expeditious fate this motion further,
Me thinks tis long since that I did a murder.

Pri.
Oh Heauen, oh Ioue, Stars, Planets, fortune, fate,
To thinke what I haue beene, and what am now;
Father of fifty braue Heroick sonnes,
But now no Father, for they all are slaine.
Queene Hecuba the Mother of so many,
But now no Mother: for her barren wombe
Hath not one child to shew, these fatall warres
Haue eate vp all our issue.

Asti.
My deare Father,
And all my princely Vnkles.

Andr.
My deare Husband,
And all my royall brothers.

Hecu.
Worthy Hector,
And all my valiant sonnes.

Pri.
And now that Priam that commanded Asia,
And sate inthron'd aboue the Kings of Greece,
Whose dreaded Nauy scowerd the Hellespont,
Sees the rich towers hee built now burnt to ashes:
The stately walls he reard, leuel'd and euen'd;
His Treasures rifled and his people spoyl'd:
All that he hath on earth beneath the Sunne
Bereft him, sauing his owne life and these,
And my poore life with these, are (as you see)
worse then the rest: they dead, we dying bee.
Strike my sterne foe, and proue in this my friend,
One blow my vniuersall cares shall end.

Pyr.
And that blow Pirhus strikes, at once strike all.

Syn.
Why so, so, this was stately tragicall.

They are all slaine at once.
Asti.
Where shall I hide me?

Pyr.
So nimble Hectors bastard?
My father slew thy father, I the sonne:
Thus will I tosse thy carkas vp on hie,
The brat aboue his fathers fame shall flie.

He tosseth him about his head and kills him.
Syn.
No, somewhat doth remayne,
Alarum still, the peoples not all slaine,
Let not one soule suruiue.

Pyr.
Then Trumpets sound
Till burning Troy in Troian blood be drown'd.

Exeunt
The Alarum continued, shreiks and clamours are heard within. Enter with Drumme, Colours, and Souldiers Agamemnon, Pyrhus, Vlysses, Diomed, Menelaus, Hellen, Thersites, Synon, &c.
Pyr.
What more remaines t'accomplish our reuenge?
The proudest Nation that great Asia nurst
Is now extinct in Lethe.

Mene.
All by Hellen,
Oh had that tempting beauty ne're beene borne,
By whom so many worthies now lie dead.

Syn.
A hot Pest take the strumpet.

Ther.
And a mischiefe.

Syn.
Twas this hot whore that set all Troy a fire.

Hel.
Forgiue me Pyrhus for thy fathers death,
Troy for thy sack, King Priam for thy sonnes,
Greece for an infinite slaughter, and you Husband
For all your nuptiall wrongs, King Menelaus,
must confesse, my inconsiderate deed
Haue made a world of valiant hearts to bleed.

Dio.
What, note is that which Pyrhus eye dwels on?

Pyr.
The perfect number
Of Greekes and Troians slayne on either part.
The siege ten yeares, ten moneths, ten dayes indur'd,
In which there perish't of the Greekes 'fore Troy
Eight hundred thousand & sixe thousand fighting men:
Of Troians fell sixe hundred sixe and fifty thousand,
All souldiers; besides women, children, babes,
Whom this night massacred.

Hel.
All these I slew.

Syn.
Nay, some this hand sent packing, that's not true.

Vlys.
Æneas, with twenty two ships well furnish't,
(The selfe same ships in which young Paris sayl'd
When hee from Sparta stole faire Helena,)
Is fled to Sea.

Dio.
Anthenor with fiue hundred Troians more
Scap't through the gate cal'd Dardan.

Pyr.
Let them goe,
That of Troyes sack the world by them may know,
Where aboue thirty braue Heroick Kings
Haue breath'd their last: besides inferior Princes,
Barons and Knights, eighteene imperiall Monarches
With his owne hands renowned Hector slew:
My father besides Troilus and that Hector,
Eight famous Kings that came in ayd of Troy.
Three Troian Paris with his Arrowes slew,
Of which one was my father: Diomed
Foure Monarches with his bright sword sent to death.
Our selfe the warlike Queene of Æmazons,
And aged Priam.

Ther.
Brauely boast he can,
A wretched woman and a weake old man.

Pyr.
And now Troyes warres are ended, we in peace
With glorious conquest to sayle backe to Greece.
Their Nation's vanish'd like their Citties smoake,
Our enemies are all ashes: worlds to come
Shall Cronicle our pittilesse reuenge
In Bookes of Brasse and leaues of Adamant.
Towards Greece victorious Leaders, our toyle's past;
Troy and Troyes people we haue burn't in flames,
And of them both left nothing but their names.

Exeunt.