Enter Pandarus and Troilus’s Man, meeting. PANDARUS
How now? Where’s thy master? At my
cousin Cressida’s? MAN
No, sir, he stays for you to conduct him thither. Enter Troilus. PANDARUS
O, here he comes.—How now, how now? TROILUS, to his Man
Sirrah, walk off. 5 Man exits. PANDARUS
Have you seen my cousin? TROILUS
No, Pandarus. I stalk about her door
Like a strange soul upon the Stygian banks
Staying for waftage. O, be thou my Charon,
And give me swift transportance to those fields 10
Where I may wallow in the lily beds
Proposed for the deserver! O, gentle Pandar,
From Cupid’s shoulder pluck his painted wings
And fly with me to Cressid! PANDARUS Walk here i’ th’ orchard. I’ll bring her 15
straight. Pandarus exits. TROILUS
I am giddy; expectation whirls me round.
Th’ imaginary relish is so sweet
That it enchants my sense. What will it be
When that the wat’ry palate taste indeed 20
Love’s thrice-repurèd nectar? Death, I fear me,
Swooning destruction, or some joy too fine,
Too subtle-potent, tuned too sharp in sweetness
For the capacity of my ruder powers.
I fear it much; and I do fear besides 25
That I shall lose distinction in my joys,
As doth a battle when they charge on heaps
The enemy flying. | Pandarus arrives at Calchas' garden, where Troilus has been pacing around waiting so Pandarus can escort him to Cressida's bedroom. (Pandarus sure is a very hands-on go-between, don't you think?) Troilus gets chatty when he's nervous, so he compares Pandarus to "Charon." You know, the infamous ferryman who gives passengers a lift across the River Styx. Which, yikes! Why is Troilus comparing his trip to Cressida's bedroom to a mythological journey to the underworld? Could this be a wee bit of foreshadowing? Pandarus runs off to get Cressida. While Troilus waits, he tells us he's so excited about finally hooking up with Cressida that he's salivating just thinking about what it's going to be like to finally "taste" her sweet "nectar." But then he gets nervous again and says he's afraid something terrible is going to happen. Yeah, we're getting a bad feeling about this, too. |
Enter Pandarus. PANDARUS
She’s making her ready; she’ll come straight.
You must be witty now. She does so blush and 30
fetches her wind so short as if she were frayed with
a spirit. I’ll fetch her. It is the prettiest villain. She
fetches her breath as short as a new-ta’en sparrow. Pandarus exits. TROILUS
Even such a passion doth embrace my bosom.
My heart beats thicker than a feverous pulse, 35
And all my powers do their bestowing lose,
Like vassalage at unawares encount’ring
The eye of majesty. Enter Pandarus, and Cressida veiled. PANDARUS, to Cressida
Come, come, what need you
blush? Shame’s a baby.—Here she is now. Swear 40
the oaths now to her that you have sworn to me.
Cressida offers to leave. What, are you gone again?
You must be watched ere you be made tame, must
you? Come your ways; come your ways. An you
draw backward, we’ll put you i’ th’ thills.—Why 45
do you not speak to her?—Come, draw this curtain
and let’s see your picture. He draws back her veil. Alas the day, how loath you are to offend daylight!
An ’twere dark, you’d close sooner.—So, so, rub on,
and kiss the mistress. (They kiss.) How now? A 50
kiss in fee-farm? Build there, carpenter; the air is
sweet. Nay, you shall fight your hearts out ere I
part you. The falcon as the tercel, for all the ducks
i’ th’ river. Go to, go to. TROILUS You have bereft me of all words, lady. 55 PANDARUS
Words pay no debts; give her deeds. But
she’ll bereave you o’ th’ deeds too, if she call your
activity in question. (They kiss.) What, billing
again? Here’s “In witness whereof the parties
interchangeably—.” Come in, come in. I’ll go get a fire. 60 Pandarus exits. CRESSIDA
Will you walk in, my lord? TROILUS
O Cressid, how often have I wished me thus! CRESSIDA “Wished,” my lord? The gods grant—O, my
lord! TROILUS
What should they grant? What makes this 65
pretty abruption? What too-curious dreg espies
my sweet lady in the fountain of our love? CRESSIDA
More dregs than water, if my fears have eyes. TROILUS
Fears make devils of cherubins; they never
see truly. 70 CRESSIDA
Blind fear, that seeing reason leads, finds
safer footing than blind reason, stumbling without
fear. To fear the worst oft cures the worse. TROILUS
O, let my lady apprehend no fear. In all
Cupid’s pageant there is presented no monster. 75 CRESSIDA
Nor nothing monstrous neither? TROILUS
Nothing but our undertakings, when we vow
to weep seas, live in fire, eat rocks, tame tigers,
thinking it harder for our mistress to devise imposition
enough than for us to undergo any difficulty 80
imposed. This is the monstruosity in love, lady, that
the will is infinite and the execution confined, that
the desire is boundless and the act a slave to limit. CRESSIDA
They say all lovers swear more performance
than they are able and yet reserve an ability that 85
they never perform, vowing more than the perfection
of ten and discharging less than the tenth part
of one. They that have the voice of lions and the
act of hares, are they not monsters? TROILUS
Are there such? Such are not we. Praise us as 90
we are tasted, allow us as we prove; our head shall
go bare till merit crown it. No perfection in reversion
shall have a praise in present. We will not
name desert before his birth, and, being born, his
addition shall be humble. Few words to fair faith. 95
Troilus shall be such to Cressid as what envy can
say worst shall be a mock for his truth, and what
truth can speak truest not truer than Troilus. CRESSIDA Will you walk in, my lord? | Pandarus finally shows up with Cressida. Cue awkward flirting, complete with blushing, sighing, stammering, and promise making. (Think Romeo and Juliet, but not quite so poetic.) Plus, it must be hard to get all romantic with your uncle hovering over you cracking dirty jokes—which Pandarus is totally doing. Eventually, Pandarus excuses himself to make a fire in Cressida's chamber. (He's a full service pimp.) While he's gone, Troilus and Cressida talk and flirt some more. |
Enter Pandarus. PANDARUS
What, blushing still? Have you not done 100
talking yet? CRESSIDA
Well, uncle, what folly I commit I dedicate
to you. PANDARUS
I thank you for that. If my lord get a boy of
you, you’ll give him me. Be true to my lord. If he 105
flinch, chide me for it. TROILUS, to Cressida
You know now your hostages:
your uncle’s word and my firm faith. PANDARUS
Nay, I’ll give my word for her too. Our kindred,
though they be long ere they be wooed, they 110
are constant being won. They are burrs, I can tell
you; they’ll stick where they are thrown. CRESSIDA
Boldness comes to me now and brings me heart.
Prince Troilus, I have loved you night and day
For many weary months. 115 TROILUS
Why was my Cressid then so hard to win? CRESSIDA
Hard to seem won; but I was won, my lord,
With the first glance that ever—pardon me;
If I confess much, you will play the tyrant.
I love you now, but till now not so much 120
But I might master it. In faith, I lie;
My thoughts were like unbridled children grown
Too headstrong for their mother. See, we fools!
Why have I blabbed? Who shall be true to us
When we are so unsecret to ourselves? 125
But though I loved you well, I wooed you not;
And yet, good faith, I wished myself a man;
Or that we women had men’s privilege
Of speaking first. Sweet, bid me hold my tongue,
For in this rapture I shall surely speak 130
The thing I shall repent. See, see, your silence,
Cunning in dumbness, from my weakness draws
My very soul of counsel! Stop my mouth. TROILUS
And shall, albeit sweet music issues thence. They kiss. PANDARUS Pretty, i’ faith! 135 CRESSIDA, to Troilus
My lord, I do beseech you pardon me.
’Twas not my purpose thus to beg a kiss.
I am ashamed. O heavens, what have I done!
For this time will I take my leave, my lord. TROILUS
Your leave, sweet Cressid? 140 PANDARUS Leave? An you take leave till tomorrow
morning— CRESSIDA
Pray you, content you. TROILUS What offends you, lady? CRESSIDA
Sir, mine own company. 145 TROILUS You cannot shun yourself. CRESSIDA
Let me go and try.
I have a kind of self resides with you,
But an unkind self that itself will leave
To be another’s fool. I would be gone. 150
Where is my wit? I know not what I speak. TROILUS
Well know they what they speak that speak so wisely. CRESSIDA
Perchance, my lord, I show more craft than love
And fell so roundly to a large confession
To angle for your thoughts. But you are wise, 155
Or else you love not; for to be wise and love
Exceeds man’s might. That dwells with gods above. TROILUS
O, that I thought it could be in a woman—
As, if it can, I will presume in you—
To feed for aye her lamp and flames of love, 160
To keep her constancy in plight and youth,
Outliving beauty’s outward, with a mind
That doth renew swifter than blood decays!
Or that persuasion could but thus convince me
That my integrity and truth to you 165
Might be affronted with the match and weight
Of such a winnowed purity in love;
How were I then uplifted! But, alas,
I am as true as truth’s simplicity
And simpler than the infancy of truth. 170 CRESSIDA
In that I’ll war with you. TROILUS
O virtuous fight,
When right with right wars who shall be most right!
True swains in love shall in the world to come
Approve their truth by Troilus. When their rhymes, 175
Full of protest, of oath and big compare,
Wants similes, truth tired with iteration—
“As true as steel, as plantage to the moon,
As sun to day, as turtle to her mate,
As iron to adamant, as Earth to th’ center”— 180
Yet, after all comparisons of truth,
As truth’s authentic author to be cited,
“As true as Troilus” shall crown up the verse
And sanctify the numbers. CRESSIDA Prophet may you be! 185
If I be false or swerve a hair from truth,
When time is old and hath forgot itself,
When water drops have worn the stones of Troy
And blind oblivion swallowed cities up,
And mighty states characterless are grated 190
To dusty nothing, yet let memory,
From false to false, among false maids in love,
Upbraid my falsehood! When they’ve said “as false
As air, as water, wind or sandy earth,
As fox to lamb, or wolf to heifer’s calf, 195
Pard to the hind, or stepdame to her son,”
Yea, let them say, to stick the heart of falsehood,
“As false as Cressid.” | Pandarus is back! And he's surprised they're still just blushing and talking. What's holding them back? Cressida admits to Troilus that she's loved him for a long time, but was playing hard to get to make sure his feelings were true. Troilus assures here they are. He promises to be so faithful to her that future love poets will write all about his devotion and use the phrase "as true as Troilus." Not to be outdone, Cressida swears that if she ever cheats on Troilus, she hopes people will say that all promiscuous women are "as false as Cressid." |
PANDARUS
Go to, a bargain made. Seal it, seal it. I’ll be
the witness. Here I hold your hand, here my 200
cousin’s. If ever you prove false one to another, since
I have taken such pains to bring you together, let
all pitiful goers-between be called to the world’s
end after my name: call them all panders. Let all
constant men be Troiluses, all false women Cressids, 205
and all brokers-between panders. Say “Amen.” TROILUS
Amen. CRESSIDA
Amen. PANDARUS
Amen. Whereupon I will show you a chamber
with a bed, which bed, because it shall not 210
speak of your pretty encounters, press it to death.
Away. Troilus and Cressida exit. And Cupid grant all tongue-tied maidens here
Bed, chamber, pander to provide this gear. He exits. | Then Pandarus jumps in and says something like, "Listen kids, if things don't work out between you two, let all the future go-betweens in the world be called "Pandars." (You got that right, Pandarus!) Troilus, Cressida, and Pandarus say "Amen." Pandarus has had enough of all this romantic talk, so he sends Troilus and Cressida off to a room with a "bed." |