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Troilus and Cressida: Act 5 Scene 5

Scene V Another part of the plains.

[Enter DIOMEDES and a Servant]

DIOMEDES

Go, go, my servant, take thou Troilus' horse;

Present the fair steed to my lady Cressid:

Fellow, commend my service to her beauty;

Tell her I have chastised the amorous Trojan,

And am her knight by proof.

Servant

I go, my lord.

[Exit]

[Enter AGAMEMNON]

AGAMEMNON

Renew, renew! The fierce Polydamas

Hath beat down Menon: bastard Margarelon

Hath Doreus prisoner,

And stands colossus-wise, waving his beam,

Upon the pashed corses of the kings

Epistrophus and Cedius: Polyxenes is slain,

Amphimachus and Thoas deadly hurt,

Patroclus ta'en or slain, and Palamedes

Sore hurt and bruised: the dreadful Sagittary

Appals our numbers: haste we, Diomed,

To reinforcement, or we perish all.

[Enter NESTOR]

NESTOR

Go, bear Patroclus' body to Achilles;

And bid the snail-paced Ajax arm for shame.

There is a thousand Hectors in the field:

Now here he fights on Galathe his horse,

And there lacks work; anon he's there afoot,

And there they fly or die, like scaled sculls

Before the belching whale; then is he yonder,

And there the strawy Greeks, ripe for his edge,

Fall down before him, like the mower's swath:

Here, there, and every where, he leaves and takes,

Dexterity so obeying appetite

That what he will he does, and does so much

That proof is call'd impossibility.

[Enter ULYSSES]

ULYSSES

O, courage, courage, princes! great Achilles

Is arming, weeping, cursing, vowing vengeance:

Patroclus' wounds have roused his drowsy blood,

Together with his mangled Myrmidons,

That noseless, handless, hack'd and chipp'd, come to him,

Crying on Hector. Ajax hath lost a friend

And foams at mouth, and he is arm'd and at it,

Roaring for Troilus, who hath done to-day

Mad and fantastic execution,

Engaging and redeeming of himself

With such a careless force and forceless care

As if that luck, in very spite of cunning,

Bade him win all.

[Enter AJAX]

AJAX

Troilus! thou coward Troilus!

[Exit]

DIOMEDES

Ay, there, there.

NESTOR

So, so, we draw together.

[Enter ACHILLES]

ACHILLES

Where is this Hector?

Come, come, thou boy-queller, show thy face;

Know what it is to meet Achilles angry:

Hector? where's Hector? I will none but Hector.

[Exeunt]