Men. What work's, my countrymen, in hand? Where go you With bats and clubs? The matter? Speak, I pray you. 2 Cit. Our business is not unknown to the senate: they have had inkling this fortnight what we intend to do, which now we'll show 'em in deeds. They say, poor suitors have strong breaths: they shall know, we have strong arms too2. Men. Why, masters, my good friends, mine honest. neighbours, Will you undo yourselves? 2 Cit. We cannot, sir; we are undone already. Thither where more attends you; and you slander 2 Cit. Care for us?-True, indeed! They ne'er cared for us yet. Suffer us to famish, and their storehouses crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act established against the rich, and provide more piercing - we have strong arms, too.] This and various subsequent speeches are assigned in the folios to the second Citizen. Malone thought they should rather belong to the first Citizen, and he altered the prefix accordingly. We adhere to the reading of the old copies, not thinking the reason assigned by Malone, of discordance with what the second Citizen had previously said, at all sufficient to warrant so repeated a deviation. statutes daily to chain up and restrain the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and there's all the love they bear us. Men. Either you must Confess yourselves wondrous malicious, Or be accus'd of folly. I shall tell you A pretty tale: it may be, you have heard it; 2 Cit. Well, I'll hear it, sir: yet you must not think to fob off our disgrace with a tale; but, an't please you, deliver. Men. There was a time, when all the body's mem bers Rebell'd against the belly; thus accus'd it :— That only like a gulf it did remain I' the midst o' the body', idle and unactive, Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing Like labour with the rest; where th' other instruments 2 Cit. Well, sir, what answer made the belly? As well as speak) it tauntingly replied 5 T' the discontented members, the mutinous parts 3 TO SCALE 't a little more.] To "scale" is to disperse, as many instances might be brought to prove. The word is still used in our northern counties, with reference to the scattering of seed, or the spreading of manure. Sce Holloway's General Provincial Dictionary, 8vo. 1838. 4 I' the midst o' the body,] This tale is taken very literally from North's Plutarch-"That on a time all the members of man's bodie dyd rebell against the bellie, complaining of it that it only remained in the middest of the bodie," &c. p. 240, edit. 1579, folio. it TAUNTINGLY replied] The folio reads, “it taintingly replied.” As you malign our senators, for that They are not such as you. 2 Cit. Your belly's answer? What! The kingly crowned head, the vigilant eye, The counsellor heart, the arm our soldier, Our steed the leg, the tongue our trumpeter, With other muniments and petty helps In this our fabric, if that they Men. What then? 'Fore me, this fellow speaks!—what then? what then? 2 Cit. Should by the cormorant belly be restrain'd, Who is the sink o' the body, Men. I will tell you, Men. Note me this, good friend; Your most grave belly was deliberate, Not rash like his accusers, and thus answer'd : "True is it, my incorporate friends,” quoth he, "That I receive the general food at first, Which you do live upon; and fit it is, Because I am the store-house, and the shop Of the whole body: but if you do remember, I send it through the rivers of your blood, Even to the court, the heart, to the seat o' the brain; And through the cranks and offices of man, The strongest nerves, and small inferior veins, From me receive that natural competency Whereby they live. And though that all at once, You, my good friends," this says the belly, mark me,2 Cit. Ay, sir; well, well. Men. "Though all at once cannot See what I do deliver out to each, VOL. VI. L Yet I can make my audit up, that all What say you to't? 2 Cit. It was an answer. How apply you this? Men. The senators of Rome are this good belly, And you the mutinous members: for examine Their counsels, and their cares; digest things rightly, Touching the weal o' the common, you shall find, No public benefit which you receive, But it proceeds, or comes, from them to you, And no way from yourselves.-What do you think? You, the great toe of this assembly?— 2 Cit. I the great toe? Men. For that being poorest, Why the great toe? one o' the lowest, basest, Of this most wise rebellion, thou go'st foremost : But make you ready your stiff bats and clubs, Enter CAIUS MARCIUS. Mar. Thanks.-What's the matter, you dissentious rogues, That rubbing the poor itch of your opinion, Make yourselves scabs? 2 Cit. We have ever your good word. Mar. He that will give good words to thee, will flatter Beneath abhorring.-What would you have, you curs, That like nor peace, nor war? the one affrights you; The other makes you proud. He that trusts to you, Where he should find you lions, finds you hares; Where foxes, geese: you are no surer, no, 6 The one side must have BALE.] i. e. sorrow, calamity. Than is the coal of fire upon the ice, Or hailstone in the sun. Your virtue is To make him worthy, whose offence subdues him, A sick man's appetite, who desires most that And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye! Trust ye? With every minute you do change a mind, And call him noble, that was now your hate, Him vile, that was your garland. What's the matter, That in these several places of the city You cry against the noble senate, who, Under the gods, keep you in awe, which else Would feed on one another?-What's their seeking? Men. For corn at their own rates; whereof, they say, The city is well stor❜d. Mar. Hang 'em! They say? They'll sit by the fire, and presume to know What's done i' the Capitol; who's like to rise, Who thrives, and who declines; side factions, and give out Conjectural marriages; making parties strong, And feebling such as stand not in their liking Below their cobbled shoes. They say, there's grain enough? Would the nobility lay aside their ruth, And let me use my sword, I'd make a quarry' With thousands of these quarter'd slaves, as high 71 I'd make a QUARRY] "Quarry" generally means a heap of dead game; and Bullokar, in his "English Expositor," (as quoted by Malone,) 8vo, 1616, says, also, that "a quarry among hunters signifieth the reward given to hounds after they have hunted, or the venison which is taken by hunting." 8 As I could PICK my lance.] i. e. Pitch my lance: a pitch-fork is still called a pick-fork in some parts of the country. |