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 Trojan 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.
O’ the t’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
to-day; whereupon the Grecians begin to proclaim
barbarism, and policy grows into an ill opinion.
Soft! here comes sleeve, and t’other.
[Enter DIOMEDES, TROILUS following]
TROILUS Fly not; for shouldst thou take the river Styx,
I would swim after.
DIOMEDES Thou dost miscall retire:
I do not fly, but advantageous care
Withdrew me from the odds of multitude:
Have at thee!
THERSITES Hold thy whore, Grecian!
–now for thy whore,
Trojan!–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 honour?
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 frightening 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.
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