-+ + SHAKESPEARE YEAR + - BIOGRAPHY: POEMS PLAYS (see note above) -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1601 Father died. The Julius Caesar Phoenix and Turtle -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1602 Purchased more Hamlet (1603) Stratford real estate -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1603 His company acted Troilus and before the Queen Cressida -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1604 Sued Rogers at Measure for Othello Stratford Measure -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1605 Godfather to Macbeth William D'Avenant -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1606 King Lear given King Lear before Court (1608) -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1607 Daughter Susanna Timon of married Dr. Hall Athens -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1608 Birth of Pericles (1609) Antony and granddaughter Cleopatra Elizabeth Hall. Death of mother (Mary Arden) -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1609 Sonnets. A Lover's Coriolanus Complaint -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1610 Purchased more real Cymbeline estate -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1611 Subscribed for Winter's Tale better highways The Tempest -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1613 Invested in London Henry VIII house property. Brother Richard died -+ + -+ -+ -+ 1616 Made his will. Daughter Judith married Thomas Quiney. Died April 23 (May 3, New Style) -+ + -+ -+ -+

-+ -+ -+ BRITISH AND HISTORY YEAR FOREIGN AND LITERATURE BIOGRAPHY -+ -+ -+ 1601 Jonson's Poetaster The Essex plot. Rivalry between London adult and boy actors -+ -+ -+ 1602 Dekker's Satiromastix Bodleian Library founded -+ -+ -+ 1603 Jonson's Sejanus Queen Elizabeth died. Millenary Petition -+ -+ -+ 1604 Marlowe's Faustus Hampton Court (1588-1589) Conference -+ -+ -+ 1605 Don Quixote (pt. 1) Gunpowder plot. Sir Thomas Browne born -+ -+ -+ 1606 Chapman's Monsieur Lyly died. D'Olive Corneille born -+ -+ -+ 1607 Dekker and Webster's Settlement of Westward Ho! Jamestown -+ -+ -+ 1608 Captain John Smith's Milton born. A True Relation. Quebec founded Middleton's A Mad World -+ -+ -+ 1609 The Douai Old Separatists Testament (Pilgrims) in Leyden -+ -+ -+ 1610 Strachey's Wracke Henry IV (Navarre) and Redemption assassinated -+ -+ -+ 1611 King James Bible Gustavus Adolphus, (A.V.). Bellarmine's King of Sweden Puissance du Pape -+ -+ -+ 1613 Drayton's Polyolbion Globe Theatre burned -+ -+ -+ 1616 Captain John Smith's Cervantes died. New England. Folio Beaumont died. edition of Jonson's Baffin explores Poems. D'Aubigne's Baffin's Bay. Les Tragiques Harvey lectured (1577) on the circulation of the blood -+ -+ -+



DISTRIBUTION OF CHARACTERS

In this analysis are shown the acts and scenes in which the characters (see Dramatis Personae, page 2) appear, with the number of speeches and lines given to each.

NOTE. Parts of lines are counted as whole lines.

================================= NO. OF NO. OF SPEECHES LINES - CAESAR I, ii 14 39 II, ii 16 72 III, i 10 39 === === 40 150 OCTAVIUS IV, i 6 12 V, i 9 25 V, v 4 10 === === 19 47 ANTONY I, ii 4 6 II, ii 1 1 III, i 10 98 III, ii 20 147 IV, i 5 38 V, i 8 22 V, iv 2 8 V, v 1 8 === === 51 328 LEPIDUS IV, i 3 4 CICERO I, iii 4 9 PUBLIUS II, ii 1 1 III, i 1 1 === === 2 2 POPILIUS III, i 2 2 BRUTUS I, ii 22 73 II, i 35 182 II, ii 2 3 III, i 23 78 III, ii 5 49 IV, ii 10 34 IV, iii 69 204 V, i 11 33 V, ii 1 6 V, iii 4 18 V, iv 1 1 V, v 10 39 === === 193 720 CASSIUS I, ii 24 143 I, iii 15 119 II, i 14 37 III, i 18 44 IV, ii 4 7 IV, iii 46 98 V, i 11 49 V, iii 6 32 === === 138 529 CASCA I, ii 19 60 I, iii 14 57 II, i 4 10 III, i 3 4 === === 40 131 TREBONIUS II, i 2 3 II, ii 1 2 III, i 1 3 === === 4 8 LIGARIUS II, i 5 15 DECIUS II, i 3 12 II, ii 4 25 III, i 5 7 === === 12 44 METELLUS II, i 2 9 III, i 3 8 === === 5 17 CINNA I, iii 4 9 II, i 3 4 III, i 4 5 === === 11 18 FLAVIUS I, i 6 27 MARULLUS I, i 5 32 ARTEMIDORUS II, iii 1 14 III, i 3 4 === === 4 18 SOOTHSAYER I, ii 3 3 II, iv 5 14 III, i 1 1 === === 9 18 CINNA, A POET III, iii 8 14 ANOTHER POET IV, iii 3 7 LUCILIUS IV, ii 4 10 IV, iii 1 1 V, i 1 1 V, iv 3 14 V, v 1 2 === === 10 28 TITINIUS IV, iii 1 1 V, iii 9 31 === === 10 32 MESSALA IV, iii 9 14 V, i 2 2 V, iii 7 19 V, v 3 4 === === 21 39 CATO V, iii 2 3 V, iv 1 5 === === 3 8 VOLUMNIUS V, v 3 3 VARRO IV, iii 6 6 CLITUS V, v 8 10 CLAUDIUS IV, iii 4 4 STRATO V, v 4 6 LUCIUS II, i 10 17 II, iv 4 6 IV, iii 10 10 === === 24 33 DARDANIUS V, v 3 3 PINDARUS IV, ii 1 3 V, iii 4 13 === === 5 16 CALPURNIA I, ii 1 1 II, ii 5 26 === === 6 27 PORTIA II, i 6 62 II, iv 10 30 === === 16 92 CARPENTER I, i 1 1 COBBLER I, i 6 17 SERVANT II, ii 3 5 SERVANT III, i 2 16 SERVANT III, i 3 5 GHOST IV, iii 3 3 CITIZENS (ALL) III, ii 13 14 1 CITIZEN III, ii 14 17 III, iii 4 4 === === 18 21 2 CITIZEN III, ii 14 16 III, iii 4 6 === === 18 22 3 CITIZEN III, ii 12 16 III, iii 4 7 === === 16 23 4 CITIZEN III, ii 11 14 III, iii 5 7 === === 16 21 SERVANT III, ii 3 4 1 SOLDIER IV, ii 1 1 V, iv 3 4 === === 4 5 2 SOLDIER IV, ii 1 1 V, iv 1 1 === === 2 2 3 SOLDIER IV, ii 1 1 MESSENGER V, i 1 4 ===================================



JULIUS CAESAR



[Page 2]

DRAMATIS PERSONAE[1]

JULIUS CAESAR.

OCTAVIUS CAESAR, } triumvirs after MARCUS ANTONIUS,[2] } the death of M. AEMILIUS LEPIDUS, } Julius Caesar.

CICERO, } PUBLIUS, } senators. POPILIUS LENA, }

MARCUS BRUTUS, } CASSIUS, } CASCA, } conspirators TREBONIUS, } against LIGARIUS, } Julius Caesar. DECIUS BRUTUS,[3] } METELLUS CIMBER, } CINNA, }

FLAVIUS and MARULLUS,[4] tribunes. ARTEMIDORUS of Cnidos, a teacher of Rhetoric.[5] A Soothsayer. CINNA, a poet. Another Poet.

LUCILIUS, } TITINIUS, } MESSALA, } friends to Brutus Young CATO, } and Cassius. VOLUMNIUS, }

VARRO, } CLITUS, } CLAUDIUS, } servants to STRATO, } Brutus. LUCIUS, } DARDANIUS, }

PINDARUS, servant to Cassius.

CALPURNIA,[6] wife to Caesar. PORTIA, wife to Brutus.

Senators, Commoners, Guards, Attendants, &c.

SCENE: Rome; the neighborhood of Sardis; the neighborhood of Philippi.

[Footnote 1: DRAMATIS PERSONAE. Rowe was the first to give a list of Dramatis Personae. His list was imperfect and Theobald enlarged it.]

[Footnote 2: ANTONIUS. In I, ii, 3, 4, 6, the First Folio gives the name in the Italian form, 'Antonio.' See note, p. 9, l. 3.]

[Footnote 3: DECIUS BRUTUS. The true classical name was Decimus Brutus. In Amyot's Les Vies des hommes illustres grecs et latins (1559) and in North's Plutarch (1579) the name is given as in Shakespeare.]

[Footnote 4: MARULLUS. Theobald's emendation for the Murellus (Murrellus, I, ii, 281) of the First Folio. Marullus is the spelling in North's Plutarch.]

[Footnote 5: ARTEMIDORUS. Rowe (1709) had 'Artimedorus (Artemidorus, 1714) a Soothsayer.' This Theobald altered to 'Artemidorus, a Sophist of Cnidos,' and made the Soothsayer a separate character].

[Footnote 6: CALPURNIA. Occasionally in North's Plutarch (twice in Julius Caesar) and always in the First Folio the name is given as 'Calphurnia.']

[Page 3]



ACT I

SCENE I. Rome. A street

Enter FLAVIUS, MARULLUS, and certain Commoners over the stage

FLAVIUS. Hence! home, you idle creatures, get you home: Is this a holiday? what! know you not, Being mechanical, you ought not walk Upon a labouring day without the sign Of your profession? Speak, what trade art thou? 5

CARPENTER. Why, sir, a carpenter.

MARULLUS. Where is thy leather apron and thy rule? What dost thou with thy best apparel on? You, sir, what trade are you? 9

[Note: ACT I, SCENE I Actus Primus. Scoena Prima Ff. Rome. A street Capell Rome Rowe Ff omit. Commoners Ff Plebeians Hanmer.]

[Note 6: CARPENTER Car. Ff First Com. Camb 1 Pleb. Hanmer.]

[Note: ACT I. In the First Folio The Tragedie of Julius Caesar is divided into acts but not into scenes, though 'Scoena (so spelled in the Folios) Prima' is given here after 'Actus Primus.'—over the stage. This, the Folio stage direction, suggests a mob.]

[Note 3: /Being mechanical:/ being mechanics. Shakespeare often uses adjectives with the sense of plural substantives. Cf. 'subject' in Hamlet, I, i, 72. Twice in North's Plutarch occurs "base mechanical people."—/ought not walk/. See Abbott, Sect. 349.]

[Note 4-5: Shakespeare transfers to ancient Rome the English customs and usages of his own time. In Porter and Clarke's 'First Folio' Julius Caesar, it is mentioned that Shakespeare's uncle Henry, a farmer in Snitterfield, according to a court order of October 25, 1583, was fined "viii d for not havinge and wearinge cappes on Sondayes and hollydayes."]

[Note 9: /You./ On 'you' as distinct from 'thou,' see Abbott, Sect. 232.]

[Page 4]

COBBLER. Truly, sir, in respect of a fine workman, I am but, as you would say, a cobbler. 11

MARULLUS. But what trade art thou? answer me directly.

COBBLER. A trade, sir, that I hope I may use with a safe conscience; which is, indeed, sir, a mender of bad soles. 15

FLAVIUS. What trade, thou knave? thou naughty knave, what trade?

COBBLER. Nay, I beseech you, sir, be not out with me: yet, if you be out, sir, I can mend you. 18

MARULLUS. What mean'st thou by that? mend me, thou saucy fellow?

COBBLER. Why, sir, cobble you.

FLAVIUS. Thou art a cobbler, art thou? 22

[Note 10: COBBLER Cobl. Ff Sec. Com. Camb.]

[Note 15: /soles/ soules F1 F2 soals F4.]

[Note 16: FLAVIUS Fla. Ff Mur. Capell Mar. Globe Camb.]

[Note 19: MARULLUS Mur. Ff.]

[Note 10: /in respect of/: in comparison with. So in The Psalter (Book of Common Prayer), xxxix, 6. Cf. Hamlet, V, ii, 120.]

[Note 11: /cobbler/. This word was used of a coarse workman, or a bungler, in any mechanical trade. So the Cobbler's answer does not give the information required, though it contains a quibble.]

[Note 12: /directly/: in a straightforward manner, without evasion.]

[Note 15: /soles/. The First Folio spelling, 'soules,' brings out the pun. This 'immemorial quibble,' as Craik calls it, is found also in The Merchant of Venice, IV, i, 123: "Not on thy sole, but on thy soul."]

[Note 16: Modern editors give this speech to Marullus, but the Folio arrangement is more natural and dramatic, the two Tribunes alternately rating the people, as Knight puts it, like two smiths smiting on the same anvil.]

[Note 17-18: A quibble upon two common meanings of 'out'—(1) 'at variance,' as in "Launcelot and I are out," The Merchant of Venice, III, v, 34; and (2) as in 'out at heels,' or 'out at toes.']

[Page 5]

COBBLER. Truly, sir, all that I live by is with the awl: I meddle with no tradesman's matters, nor women's matters, but withal I am, indeed, sir, a surgeon to old shoes; when they are in great danger, I recover them. As proper men as ever trod upon neat's-leather have gone upon my handiwork. 28

FLAVIUS. But wherefore art not in thy shop to-day? Why dost thou lead these men about the streets?

COBBLER. Truly, sir, to wear out their shoes, to get myself into more work. But, indeed, sir, we make holiday, to see Caesar and to rejoice in his triumph. 33

[Note 25: withal I F1 withall I F2 F3 withawl. I (Farmer's conj.) Camb Globe with all. I Capell.]

[Note 34: Two lines in Ff.]

[Note 39-40: Pompey? Many ... oft Have Rowe Pompey many ... oft? Have Ff.]

[Note 25: The text of the First Folio needs no emendation. It is good prose and involves a neat pun.]

[Note 26: /proper:/ goodly, handsome. This word has often this meaning in Elizabethan literature, and is still so used in provincial England. Cf. The Tempest, II, ii, 63; Hebrews (King James version), xi, 23; Burns's The Jolly Beggars: "And still my delight is in proper young men."]

[Note 27: /trod upon neat's-leather/. This expression and "as proper a man as" are repeated in the second scene of the second act of The Tempest.—/neat's-leather/: ox-hide. 'Neat' is Anglo-Saxon neat, 'ox,' 'cow,' 'cattle,' and is still used in 'neat-herd,' 'neat's-foot oil.' See The Winter's Tale, I, ii, 125. The form 'nowt' is still in common use in the North of England and the South of Scotland. Cf. Burns's The Twa Dogs: "To thrum guitars an' fecht wi nowte."]

[Page 6]

MARULLUS. Wherefore rejoice? What conquest brings he home? What tributaries follow him to Rome, 35 To grace in captive bonds his chariot-wheels? You blocks, you stones, you worse than senseless things! O you hard hearts, you cruel men of Rome, Knew you not Pompey? Many a time and oft Have you climb'd up to walls and battlements, 40 To towers and windows, yea, to chimney-tops, Your infants in your arms, and there have sat The live-long day, with patient expectation, To see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome: And when you saw his chariot but appear, 45 Have you not made an universal shout, That Tiber trembled underneath her banks To hear the replication of your sounds Made in her concave shores? And do you now put on your best attire? 50 And do you now cull out a holiday? And do you now strew flowers in his way That comes in triumph over Pompey's blood? Be gone! Run to your houses, fall upon your knees, 55 Pray to the gods to intermit the plague That needs must light on this ingratitude.

[Note 39: /Many a time and oft/. This form of emphasis occurs also in The Merchant of Venice, I, iii, 107. Cf. Timon of Athens, III, i, 25.]

[Note 41: /windows/, Rowe Windowes? Ff.]

[Note 44: /Rome/: Ff Rome? Rowe.]

[Note 47, 49: /her/ his Rowe.]

[Note 47: /That/: so that. For the omission of 'so' before 'that,' see Abbott, Sect. 283.—/her/. In Latin usage rivers are masculine, and 'Father' is a common appellation of 'Tiber.' In Elizabethan literature Drayton generally makes rivers feminine, while Spenser tends to make them masculine.]

[Note 48: /To hear/: at hearing. A gerundive use of the infinitive.—/replication/: echo, repetition (Lat. replicare, to roll back).]

[Note 51: Is this a day to pick out for a holiday?]

[Note 53: The reference is to the great battle of Munda, in Spain, which took place in March of the preceding year, B.C. 45. Caesar was now celebrating his fifth triumph, which was in honor of his final victory over the Pompeian, or conservative, faction. Cnaeus and Sextus, the two sons of Pompey the Great, were leaders in that battle, and Cnaeus perished. "And because he had plucked up his race by the roots, men did not think it meet for him to triumph so for the calamities of his country."—Plutarch, Julius Caesar.]

[Note 57: "It is evident from the opening scene, that Shakespeare, even in dealing with classical subjects, laughed at the classic fear of putting the ludicrous and sublime into juxtaposition. After the low and farcical jests of the saucy cobbler, the eloquence of Marullus 'springs upwards like a pyramid of fire.'"—Campbell.]

[Page 7]

FLAVIUS. Go, go, good countrymen, and, for this fault, Assemble all the poor men of your sort; Draw them to Tiber banks, and weep your tears 60 Into the channel, till the lowest stream Do kiss the most exalted shores of all.

[Exeunt all the Commoners]

See, where their basest metal be not mov'd! They vanish tongue-tied in their guiltiness. Go you down that way towards the Capitol; 65 This way will I: disrobe the images, If you do find them deck'd with ceremonies.

[Note 62: [Exeunt ... ] Ff Exeunt Citizens Capell.]

[Note 63: /where/ Ff whe're Theobald wher Dyce whether Camb.]

[Note 61-62: Till the river rises from the extreme low-water mark to the extreme high-water mark.]

[Note 63: /where:/ whether. As in V, iv, 30, the 'where' of the Folios represents the monosyllabic pronunciation of this word common in the sixteenth century. In Shakespeare's verse the 'th' between two vowels, as in 'brother,' 'other,' 'whither,' is frequently mute.—/basest metal./—The Folio spelling is 'mettle,' and the word here may connote 'spirit,' 'temper.' If it be taken literally, the reference may be to 'lead.' Cf. 'base lead,' The Merchant of Venice, II, ix, 19. In this case the meaning may be that even these men, though as dull and heavy as lead, have yet the sense to be tongue-tied with shame at their conduct. 'Mettle' occurs again in I, ii, 293; 'metal' (First Folio, 'mettle') in I, ii, 306.]

[Note 66: /images./ These images were the busts and statues of Caesar, ceremoniously decked with scarfs and badges in honor of his triumph.]

[Note 67: /ceremonies:/ ceremonial symbols, festal ornaments. Cf. 'trophies' in l. 71 and 'scarfs' in I, ii, 282. Shakespeare employs the word in the same way, as an abstract term used for the concrete thing, in Henry V, IV, i, 109; and, in the singular, in Measure for Measure, II, ii, 59. "After that, there were set up images of Caesar in the city, with diadems on their heads like kings. Those the two tribunes, Flavius and Marullus, went and pulled down."—Plutarch, Julius Caesar.]

[Page 8]

MARULLUS. May we do so? You know it is the feast of Lupercal.

FLAVIUS. It is no matter; let no images 70 Be hung with Caesar's trophies. I'll about, And drive away the vulgar from the streets: So do you too, where you perceive them thick. These growing feathers pluck'd from Caesar's wing Will make him fly an ordinary pitch, 75 Who else would soar above the view of men, And keep us all in servile fearfulness. [Exeunt]

[Note 69: /Lupercal./ The Lupercalia, originally a shepherd festival, were held in honor of Lupercus, the Roman Pan, on the 15th of February, the month being named from Februus, a surname of the god. Lupercus was, primarily, the god of shepherds, said to have been so called because he protected the flocks from wolves. His wife Luperca was the deified she-wolf that suckled Romulus. The festival, in its original idea, was concerned with purification and fertilization.]

[Note 71: /Caesar's trophies./ These are the scarfs and badges mentioned in note on l. 66, as appears from ll. 281-282 in the next scene, where it is said that the Tribunes "for pulling scarfs off Caesar's images, are put to silence."]

[Note 72: /the vulgar:/ the common people. So in Love's Labour's Lost, I, ii, 51; Henry V, IV, vii, 80.]

[Note 75: /pitch./ A technical term in falconry, denoting the height to which a hawk or falcon flies. Cf. I Henry VI, II, iv, 11: "Between two hawks, which flies the higher pitch."]

[Page 9]

SCENE II. A public place

Enter CAESAR; ANTONY, for the course; CALPURNIA, PORTIA, DECIUS, CICERO, BRUTUS, CASSIUS, and CASCA; a great crowd following, among them a Soothsayer.

CAESAR. Calpurnia!

CASCA. Peace, ho! Caesar speaks.

CAESAR. Calpurnia!

CALPURNIA. Here, my lord.

CAESAR. Stand you directly in Antonius' way, When he doth run his course. Antonius!

ANTONY. Caesar, my lord? 5

CAESAR. Forget not, in your speed, Antonius, To touch Calpurnia; for our elders say, The barren, touched in this holy chase, Shake off their sterile curse.

ANTONY. I shall remember: When Caesar says 'Do this,' it is perform'd. 10

[Note: SCENE ... place Ff omit.]

[Note 3: /Antonius'/ Pope Antonio's Ff.]

[Note 4, 6: /Antonius/ Pope Antonio Ff (and so elsewhere).]

[Note 3: /Antonius'./ The 'Antonio's' of the Folios is the Italian form with which both actors and audience would be more familiar. So in IV, iii, 102, the Folios read "dearer than Pluto's (i.e. Plutus') mine." Antonius was at this time Consul, as Caesar himself also was. Each Roman gens had its own priesthood, and also its peculiar religious rites. The priests of the Julian gens (so named from Iulus the son of Aeneas) had lately been advanced to the same rank with those of the god Lupercus; and Antony was at this time at their head. It was probably as chief of the Julian Luperci that he officiated on this occasion, stripped, as the old stage direction has it, "for the course."]

[Note 8-9: It was an old custom at these festivals for the priests, naked except for a girdle about the loins, to run through the streets of the city, waving in the hand a thong of goat's hide, and striking with it such women as offered themselves for the blow, in the belief that this would prevent or avert "the sterile curse." Caesar was at this time childless; his only daughter, Julia, married to Pompey the Great, having died some years before, upon the birth of her first child, who also died soon after.]

[Page 10]

CAESAR. Set on; and leave no ceremony out. [Flourish]

SOOTHSAYER. Caesar!

CAESAR. Ha! who calls?

CASCA. Bid every noise be still. Peace yet again!

CAESAR. Who is it in the press that calls on me? 15 I hear a tongue, shriller than all the music, Cry 'Caesar!' Speak; Caesar is turn'd to hear.

SOOTHSAYER. Beware the Ides of March.

CAESAR. What man is that?

BRUTUS. A soothsayer bids you beware the Ides of March.

CAESAR. Set him before me; let me see his face. 20

CASSIUS. Fellow, come from the throng; look upon Caesar.

CAESAR. What say'st thou to me now? speak once again.

SOOTHSAYER. Beware the Ides of March.

CAESAR. He is a dreamer; let us leave him. Pass.

[Sennet. Exeunt all but BRUTUS and CASSIUS]

CASSIUS. Will you go see the order of the course? 25

[Note 11: [Flourish] Ff omit.]

[Note 25: Scene III Pope.]

[Note 18: /the Ides of March:/ March 15th.]

[Note 19: Coleridge has a remark on this line, which, whether true to the subject or not, is very characteristic of the writer: "If my ear does not deceive me, the metre of this line was meant to express that sort of mild philosophic contempt, characterizing Brutus even in his first casual speech."—/soothsayer./ By derivation, 'truth teller.']

[Note 24: /Sennet./ This is an expression occurring repeatedly in old stage directions. It is of uncertain origin (but cf. 'signature' in musical notation) and denotes a peculiar succession of notes on a trumpet, used, as here, to signal the march of a procession.]

[Page 11]

BRUTUS. Not I.

CASSIUS. I pray you, do.

BRUTUS. I am not gamesome: I do lack some part Of that quick spirit that is in Antony. Let me not hinder, Cassius, your desires; 30 I'll leave you.

CASSIUS. Brutus, I do observe you now of late: I have not from your eyes that gentleness And show of love as I was wont to have: You bear too stubborn and too strange a hand 35 Over your friend that loves you.

[Note 36: /friend/ F1 Friends F2 F3.]

[Note 28: /gamesome:/ fond of games. Here as in Cymbeline, I, vi, 60, the word seems to be used in a literal and restricted sense.]

[Note 29: /quick spirit:/ lively humor. The primary meaning of 'quick' is 'alive,' as in the phrase "the quick and the dead." See Skeat.]

[Note 34: /as./ The three forms 'that,' 'who' ('which'), and 'as' are often interchangeable in Elizabethan usage. So in line 174. See Abbott, Sect. 112, 280.]

[Note 35: You hold me too hard on the bit, like a strange rider who is doubtful of his steed, and not like one who confides in his faithful horse, and so rides him with an easy rein. See note on l. 310.]

[Note 36: Caius Cassius Longinus had married Junia, a sister of Brutus. Both had lately stood for the chief praetorship of the city, and Brutus, through Caesar's favor, had won it; though Cassius was at the same time elected one of the sixteen praetors or judges of the city. This is said to have produced a coldness between Brutus and Cassius, so that they did not speak to each other, till this extraordinary flight of patriotism brought them together.]

[Page 12]

BRUTUS. Cassius, Be not deceiv'd: if I have veil'd my look, I turn the trouble of my countenance Merely upon myself. Vexed I am Of late with passions of some difference, 40 Conceptions only proper to myself, Which give some soil, perhaps, to my behaviours; But let not therefore my good friends be griev'd— Among which number, Cassius, be you one— Nor construe any further my neglect, 45 Than that poor Brutus, with himself at war, Forgets the shows of love to other men.

CASSIUS. Then, Brutus, I have much mistook your passion; By means whereof this breast of mine hath buried Thoughts of great value, worthy cogitations. 50 Tell me, good Brutus, can you see your face?

BRUTUS. No, Cassius; for the eye sees not itself But by reflection, by some other things.

[Note 52-53: Three irregular lines in Ff.]

[Note 52: /itself/ it selfe F1 himselfe F2 himself, F3 himself: F4.]

[Note 53: /by some/ Ff from some Pope.]

[Note 39: /Merely:/ altogether, entirely. So in The Tempest, I, i, 59.]

[Note 40: /passions of some difference:/ conflicting emotions.]

[Note 41: /only proper to myself:/ belonging exclusively to myself.]

[Note 42: /give some soil to:/ to a certain extent tarnish.—/behaviours./ Shakespeare often uses abstract nouns in the plural. This usage is common in Carlyle. Here, however, and elsewhere in Shakespeare, as in Much Ado about Nothing, II, iii, 100, the plural 'behaviours' may be regarded as denoting the particular acts which make up what we call 'behavior.' See Clar.]

[Note 48: /mistook./ The en of the termination of the past participle of strong verbs is often dropped, and when the resulting word might be mistaken for the infinitive, the form of the past tense is frequently substituted.—/passion./ Shakespeare uses 'passion' for any feeling, sentiment, or emotion, whether painful or pleasant. So in Henry V, II, ii. 132: "Free from gross passion or of mirth or anger."]

[Note 49: /By means whereof:/ and because of my mistaking it. 'Means' was sometimes used in the sense of 'cause.']

[Note 53: Except by an image or 'shadow' (l. 68; cf. Venus and Adonis, 162) reflected from a mirror, or from water, or some polished surface. Cf. Troilus and Cressida, III, iii, 105-111.]

[Page 13]

CASSIUS. 'Tis just: And it is very much lamented, Brutus, 55 That you have no such mirrors as will turn Your hidden worthiness into your eye, That you might see your shadow. I have heard, Where many of the best respect in Rome, Except immortal Caesar, speaking of Brutus, 60 And groaning underneath this age's yoke, Have wish'd that noble Brutus had his eyes.

BRUTUS. Into what dangers would you lead me, Cassius, That you would have me seek into myself For that which is not in me? 65

CASSIUS. Therefore, good Brutus, be prepar'd to hear: And, since you know you cannot see yourself So well as by reflection, I, your glass, Will modestly discover to yourself That of yourself which you yet know not of. 70 And be not jealous on me, gentle Brutus: Were I a common laughter, or did use To stale with ordinary oaths my love To every new protester; if you know That I do fawn on men and hug them hard, 75 And after scandal them; or if you know That I profess myself in banqueting To all the rout, then hold me dangerous. [Flourish and shout]

[Note 58: Two lines in Ff.]

[Note 63: Two lines in Ff. /Cassius/, Pope Camb Globe Cassius? Ff.]

[Note 70: /you yet/ F1 F2 yet you F3 F4.]

[Note 72: /laughter/ Laughter Ff laugher Rowe Camb Globe.]

[Note 77: /myself/ my selfe F1 omitted in F2 F3 F4.]

[Note 54: /'Tis just:/ that's so, exactly so. Cf. All's Well that Ends Well, II, iii, 21; As You Like It, III, ii, 281; 2 Henry IV, III, ii, 89.]

[Note 59: /Where./ The adverb is here used of occasion, not of place.—/of the best respect:/ held in the highest estimation.]

[Note 60: /Except immortal Caesar./ Keen, double-edged irony.]

[Note 71: /jealous on:/ suspicious of. In Shakespeare we find 'on' and 'of' used indifferently, even in the same sentence, as in Hamlet, IV, v, 200. Cf. Macbeth, I, iii, 84; Sonnets, LXXXIV, 14. See Abbott, Sect. 181.]

[Note 72: /laughter:/ laughing-stock. Although most modern editors have adopted Rowe's emendation, 'laugher,' the reading of the Folios is perfectly intelligible and thoroughly Shakespearian. Cf. IV, iii, 114.]

[Note 73: /To stale:/ to make common by frequent repetition, to cheapen. So again in IV, i, 38. Cf. Antony and Cleopatra, II, ii, 240.]

[Note 74: 'To protest' is used by Shakespeare in the sense of 'to profess,' 'to declare,' 'to vow,' as in All's Well that Ends Well, IV, ii, 28, and A Midsummer Night's Dream, I, i, 89. The best commentary on ll. 72-74 is Hamlet, I, iii, 64-65: "But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatch'd, unfledged comrade."]

[Page 14]

BRUTUS. What means this shouting? I do fear, the people Choose Caesar for their king.

CASSIUS. Ay, do you fear it? 80 Then must I think you would not have it so.

BRUTUS. I would not, Cassius; yet I love him well. But wherefore do you hold me here so long? What is it that you would impart to me? If it be aught toward the general good, 85 Set honour in one eye and death i' the other, And I will look on both indifferently; For let the gods so speed me as I love The name of honour more than I fear death.

[Note 79-80: Three irregular lines in Ff.]

[Note 85: /aught/ Theobald ought Ff.]

[Note 87: /both/ Ff death Theobald (Warburton).]

[Note 76-78: If you know that, when banqueting, I make professions of friendship to all the crowd.]

[Note 87: "Warburton would read 'death' for 'both'; but I prefer the old text. There are here three things, the public good, the individual Brutus' honour, and his death. The latter two so balanced each other, that he could decide for the first by equipoise; nay—the thought growing—that honour had more weight than death."—Coleridge.—/indifferently:/ without emotion. 'Impartially.'—Clar.]

[Note 88: /speed:/ prosper, bless. So in II, iv, 41. "The notion of 'haste' which now belongs to the word is apparently a derived sense. It is thus curiously parallel to the Latin expedio, with which some would connect it etymologically.... The proverb 'more haste, worse speed' shows that haste and speed are not the same."—Clar.]

[Page 15-17]

CASSIUS. I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus, 90 As well as I do know your outward favour. Well, honour is the subject of my story. I cannot tell what you and other men Think of this life; but, for my single self, I had as lief not be as live to be 95 In awe of such a thing as I myself. I was born free as Caesar; so were you: We both have fed as well; and we can both Endure the winter's cold as well as he: For once, upon a raw and gusty day, 100 The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores, Caesar said to me, 'Dar'st thou, Cassius, now Leap in with me into this angry flood, And swim to yonder point?' Upon the word, Accoutred as I was, I plunged in, 105 And bade him follow: so indeed he did. The torrent roar'd, and we did buffet it With lusty sinews, throwing it aside And stemming it with hearts of controversy; But ere we could arrive the point propos'd, 110 Caesar cried, 'Help me, Cassius, or I sink!' I, as Aeneas, our great ancestor, Did from the flames of Troy upon his shoulder The old Anchises bear, so from the waves of Tiber Did I the tired Caesar: and this man 115 Is now become a god, and Cassius is A wretched creature, and must bend his body If Caesar carelessly but nod on him. He had a fever when he was in Spain; And, when the fit was on him, I did mark 120 How he did shake: 't is true, this god did shake: His coward lips did from their colour fly; And that same eye whose bend doth awe the world Did lose his lustre. I did hear him groan: Ay, and that tongue of his, that bade the Romans 125 Mark him and write his speeches in their books, Alas, it cried, 'Give me some drink, Titinius,' As a sick girl. Ye gods, it doth amaze me A man of such a feeble temper should So get the start of the majestic world 130 And bear the palm alone. [Shout. Flourish]

BRUTUS. Another general shout! I do believe that these applauses are For some new honours that are heap'd on Caesar.

[Note 94: /for/ F1 omitted in F2 F3 F4.]

[Note 101: /chafing/ F1 F4 chasing F2 F3.]

[Note 102: /said/ saide F1 saies F2 F3.]

[Note 105: /Accoutred/ F1 Accounted F2.]

[Note 124: /lose/ loose F1.]

[Note 125: /bade/ Theobald bad Ff.]

[Note 91: /favour:/ appearance. The word has often this meaning in Shakespeare. Cf. 'well-favored,' 'ill-favored,' and such a provincial expression as 'the child favors his father.']

[Note 95: /lief:/ readily. The pronunciation of the f as v brings out the quibble. From the Anglo-Saxon leof, 'dear.' See Murray.]

[Note 101: /chafing./ See Skeat for the interesting development of the meanings of the verb 'chafe (Fr. chauffer),' which Shakespeare uses twenty times, sometimes transitively, sometimes intransitively.]

[Note 109: /hearts of controversy:/ controversial hearts, emulation. In Shakespeare are many similar constructions and expressions. Cf. 'passions of some difference,' l. 40, and 'mind of love' for 'loving mind,' The Merchant of Venice, II, viii, 42.]

[Note 110: /arrive the point./ In sixteenth and early seventeenth century literature the omission of the preposition with verbs of motion is common. Cf. 'pass the streets' in I, i, 44.]

[Note 119: In Elizabethan literature 'fever' is often used for sickness in general as well as for what is now specifically called a fever. Caesar had three several campaigns in Spain at different periods of his life, and the text does not show which of these Shakespeare had in mind. One passage in Plutarch indicates that Caesar was first taken with the 'falling-sickness' during his third campaign, which closed with the great battle of Munda, March 17, B.C. 45. See note, p. 25, l. 252, and quotation from Plutarch, p. 26, l. 268.]

[Note 122: The image, very bold, somewhat forced, and not altogether happy, is of a cowardly soldier running away from his flag.]

[Note 123: /bend:/ look. So in Antony and Cleopatra, II, ii, 213: "tended her i' the eyes, And made their bends adornings." In Shakespeare the verb 'bend,' when used of the eyes, has usually the sense of 'direct,' as in Hamlet, II, i, 100: "bended their light on me"; III, iv, 117: "That you do bend your eye on vacancy."]

[Note 124: /his:/ its. 'Its' was just creeping into use at the close of the sixteenth century. It does not occur once in the King James version of the Bible as originally printed; it occurs ten times in the First Folio, generally in the form 'it's'; it occurs only three times in Milton's poetry. See Masson's Essay on Milton's English; Abbott, Sect. 228; Sweet's New English Grammar, Sect. 1101.]

[Note 129: /temper:/ temperament, constitution. "The lean and wrinkled Cassius" venting his spite at Caesar, by ridiculing his liability to sickness and death, is charmingly characteristic. The mighty Caesar, with all his electric energy of mind and will, was of a rather fragile and delicate make; and his countenance, as we have it in authentic busts, is of almost feminine beauty. Cicero, who did not love him at all, in one of his Letters applies to him the Greek word that is used for 'miracle' or 'wonder' in the New Testament; the English of the passage being, "This miracle (monster?) is a thing of terrible energy, swiftness, diligence."]

[Page 18-19]

CASSIUS. Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world Like a Colossus, and we petty men 136 Walk under his huge legs, and peep about To find ourselves dishonourable graves. Men at some time are masters of their fates: The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, 140 But in ourselves, that we are underlings. Brutus and Caesar: what should be in that 'Caesar?' Why should that name be sounded more than yours? Write them together, yours is as fair a name; Sound them, it doth become the mouth as well; 145 Weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with 'em, 'Brutus' will start a spirit as soon as 'Caesar.' Now, in the names of all the gods at once, Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed, That he is grown so great? Age, thou art sham'd! 150 Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods! When went there by an age, since the great flood, But it was fam'd with more than with one man? When could they say, till now, that talk'd of Rome, That her wide walks encompass'd but one man? 155 Now is it Rome indeed, and room enough, When there is in it but one only man. O, you and I have heard our fathers say There was a Brutus once that would have brook'd That he is grown so great? Age, thou art sham'd! 150 Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods! When went there by an age, since the great flood, But it was fam'd with more than with one man? When could they say, till now, that talk'd of Rome, That her wide walks encompass'd but one man? 155 Now is it Rome indeed, and room enough, When there is in it but one only man. O, you and I have heard our fathers say There was a Brutus once that would have brook'd Th' eternal devil to keep his state in Rome 160 As easily as a king.

[Note 155: /walks/ F4 Walkes F1 F2 F3 walls Rowe.]

[Note 135: Observe the force of 'narrow' here; as if Caesar were grown so enormously big that even the world seemed a little thing under him. Some while before this, the Senate had erected a bronze statue of Caesar, standing on a globe, and inscribed to "Caesar the Demigod," but this inscription Caesar erased.]

[Note 136: It is only a legend that the bronze Colossus of Rhodes bestrode the entrance to the famous harbor. The story probably arose from the statement that the figure, which represented Helios, the national deity of the Rhodians, was so high that a ship might sail between its legs.]

[Note 140: In Shakespeare are many such allusions to the tenets of the old astrology and the belief in planetary influence upon the fortunes and characters of men which Scott describes in the Introduction to Guy Mannering and makes the atmosphere of the story.]

[Note 142: /should be:/ can be. So in The Tempest, I, ii, 387: "Where should this music be? i' the air or the earth?"]

[Note 146-147: The allusion is to the old custom of muttering certain names, supposed to have in them "the might of magic spells," in raising or conjuring up spirits.]

[Note 152: /the great flood./ By this an ancient Roman would understand the universal deluge of classical mythology, from which only Deucalion and his wife Pyrrha escaped alive. The story is told in Ovid's Metamorphoses, I. Shakespeare mentions Deucalion twice.]

[Note 155: /walks./ The reasons why Rowe's emendation, 'walls,' is almost universally accepted, are that 'walls' would be easily corrupted into 'walks' from the nearness of 'talk'd,' and that there is a disagreeable assonance in 'talk'd' and 'walks' in successive lines. But 'walks' is picturesque and poetical; compared with it, 'walls' is commonplace and obvious. Cf. Paradise Lost, IV, 586.]

[Note 156: A play upon 'Rome' and 'room,' which appear to have been sounded more alike in Shakespeare's time than they are now. So again in III, i, 289-290: "A dangerous Rome, No Rome of safety for Octavius yet." Cf. also King John, III, i, 180.]

[Note 159: The allusion is to Lucius Junius Brutus, who bore a leading part in driving out the Tarquins and in turning the kingdom into a republic. Afterwards, as consul, he condemned his own sons to death for attempting to restore the kingdom. The Marcus Junius Brutus of the play, according to Plutarch, supposed himself to be descended from him. His mother, Servilia, also derived her lineage from Servilius Ahala, who slew Spurius Maelius for aspiring to royalty. Merivale remarks that "the name of Brutus forced its possessor into prominence as soon as royalty began to be discussed."—/brook'd:/ endured, tolerated. See Murray for the history of this word.]

[Note 160: /eternal./ Johnson suggested 'infernal.' Dr. Wright (Clar.) points out that in three plays printed in 1600 Shakespeare uses 'infernal,' but substitutes 'eternal' in Julius Caesar, Hamlet, and Othello, in obedience probably to the popular Puritan agitation against profanity on the stage. This has been used as evidence to determine dates of composition. See Introduction, page xx. Cf. with this use of 'eternal' the old Yankee term 'tarnal' in such expressions as 'tarnal scamp,' 'tarnal shame,' etc.]

[Page 20]

BRUTUS. That you do love me, I am nothing jealous; What you would work me to, I have some aim: How I have thought of this and of these times, I shall recount hereafter; for this present, 165 I would not, so with love I might entreat you, Be any further mov'd. What you have said I will consider; what you have to say I will with patience hear, and find a time Both meet to hear and answer such high things. 170 Till then, my noble friend, chew upon this: Brutus had rather be a villager Than to repute himself a son of Rome Under these hard conditions as this time Is like to lay upon us. 175

[Note 166: /not, so with ... you/ not so (with ... you) Ff.]

[Note 162: /am nothing jealous:/ do not doubt. Cf. l. 71. 'Jealous' and 'zealous' are etymologically the same word. See Skeat.]

[Note 163: /work me to:/ prevail upon me to do. Cf. Hamlet, IV, vii, 64.—/aim:/ guess. Cf. The Two Gentlemen of Verona, III, i, 28. Similarly with the verb in Romeo and Juliet, I, i, 211; Othello, III, iii, 223.]

[Note 171: 'To chew' is, literally, in the Latin equivalent, 'to ruminate.' Cf. As You Like It, IV, iii, 102: "Chewing the food of sweet and bitter fancy." In Bacon's Essays, Of Studies, we have, with reference to books: "Some few are to be chewed and digested." So in Lyly's Euphues: "Philantus went into the fields to walk there, either to digest his choler, or chew upon his melancholy."]

[Note 174: /these ... as./ See note, l. 34; Abbott, Sect. 112, 280.]

[Page 21]

CASSIUS. I am glad that my weak words Have struck but thus much show of fire from Brutus.

Enter CAESAR and his train

BRUTUS. The games are done, and Caesar is returning.

CASSIUS. As they pass by, pluck Casca by the sleeve; And he will, after his sour fashion, tell you 180 What hath proceeded worthy note to-day.

BRUTUS. I will do so. But, look you, Cassius, The angry spot doth glow on Caesar's brow, And all the rest look like a chidden train: Calpurnia's cheek is pale; and Cicero 185 Looks with such ferret and such fiery eyes As we have seen him in the Capitol, Being cross'd in conference by some senators.

[Note 178: Scene IV Pope.]

[Note 178-179: Four lines in Ff.]

[Note 177: In Troilus and Cressida, III, iii, 256, Thersites says of the wit of Ajax: "It lies as coldly in him as fire in a flint, which will not show without knocking." The same figure is found in the description which Brutus gives of his unimpassioned nature, IV, iii, 112-114.]

[Note 181: /proceeded:/ happened, come to pass. So in All's Well that Ends Well, IV, ii, 62.—/worthy note./ Cf. All's Well that Ends Well, III, v, 104. For the ellipsis of the preposition, see Abbott, Sect. 198 a.]

[Note 186: One of the marked physical characteristics of the albinotic ferret is the red or pink eye. Shakespeare turns the noun 'ferret' into an adjective. The description of Cicero is purely imaginary; but the angry spot on Caesar's brow, Calpurnia's pale cheek, and Cicero with fire in his eyes when kindled by opposition in the Senate, make an exceedingly vivid picture.]

[Page 22]

CASSIUS. Casca will tell us what the matter is.

CAESAR. Antonius! 190

ANTONY. Caesar?

CAESAR. Let me have men about me that are fat, Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep o' nights: Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look; He thinks too much: such men are dangerous. 195

ANTONY. Fear him not, Caesar; he's not dangerous; He is a noble Roman, and well given.

[Note 191: /Caesar/? Theobald Caesar. Ff.]

[Note 193: /o' nights/ Capeli a-nights F1 F2.]

[Note 192-195: "Another time when Caesar's friends complained unto him of Antonius and Dolabella, that they pretended some mischief towards him, he answered them again, As for those fat men, and smooth-combed heads, quoth he, I never reckon of them; but these pale visaged and carrion lean people, I fear them most; meaning Brutus and Cassius."—Plutarch, Julius Caesar. There are similar passages in Plutarch's Life of Brutus and in the Life of Marcus Antonius. Cf. Antony and Cleopatra, III, xi, 37. Falstaff's famous cry was for 'spare men.' See 2 Henry IV, III, ii, 288. 'Sleek-headed' recalls Lamb's wish that the baby son of the tempestuous Hazlitt should be "like his father, with something of a better temper and a smoother head of hair."]

[Note 197: /well given:/ well disposed. So in 2 Henry VI, III, i, 72.]

[Page 23]

CAESAR. Would he were fatter! but I fear him not: Yet if my name were liable to fear, I do not know the man I should avoid 200 So soon as that spare Cassius. He reads much; He is a great observer, and he looks Quite through the deeds of men: he loves no plays, As thou dost, Antony; he hears no music: Seldom he smiles, and smiles in such a sort 205 As if he mock'd himself, and scorn'd his spirit That could be mov'd to smile at any thing. Such men as he be never at heart's ease Whiles they behold a greater than themselves, And therefore are they very dangerous. 210 I rather tell thee what is to be fear'd Than what I fear, for always I am Caesar. Come on my right hand, for this ear is deaf, And tell me truly what thou think'st of him.

[Sennet. Exeunt CAESAR and all his train but CASCA]

CASCA. You pull'd me by the cloak; would you speak with me? 215

BRUTUS. Ay, Casca; tell us what hath chanc'd to-day, That Caesar looks so sad.

CASCA. Why, you were with him, were you not?

BRUTUS. I should not then ask Casca what had chanc'd.

[Note 215: Scene V Pope.]

[Note 203: /he loves no plays./ "In his house they did nothing but feast, dance, and masque; and himself passed away the time in hearing of foolish plays, and in marrying these players, tumblers, jesters, and such sort of people."—Plutarch, Marcus Antonius.]

[Note 204: The power of music is repeatedly celebrated by Shakespeare, and sometimes in strains that approximate the classical hyperboles about Orpheus, Amphion, and Arion. What is here said of Cassius has an apt commentary in The Merchant of Venice, V, 1, 83-85:

The man that hath no music in himself, Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds, Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils.]

[Note 213: This is one of the little touches of invention that so often impart a fact-like vividness to Shakespeare's scenes.]

[Note 217: /sad./ The word is used here probably in its early sense of 'weary' (as in Middle English) or 'resolute' (as in Chaucer and old Ballads). In 2 Henry IV, V, i, 92, is the expression "a jest with a sad brow," where 'sad' evidently means 'wise,' 'sage.']

[Page 24]

CASCA. Why, there was a crown offer'd him; and being offer'd him, he put it by with the back of his hand, thus; and then the people fell a-shouting. 222

BRUTUS. What was the second noise for?

CASCA. Why, for that too.

CASSIUS. They shouted thrice: what was the last cry for?

CASCA. Why, for that too. 226

BRUTUS. Was the crown offer'd him thrice?

CASCA. Ay, marry, was't, and he put it by thrice, every time gentler than other; and at every putting by mine honest neighbours shouted. 230

CASSIUS. Who offer'd him the crown?

CASCA. Why, Antony.

BRUTUS. Tell us the manner of it, gentle Casca.

CASCA. I can as well be hang'd as tell the manner of it: it was mere foolery; I did not mark it. I saw Mark Antony offer him a crown—yet 'twas not a crown neither, 'twas one of these coronets—and, as I told you, he put it by once: but, for all that, to my thinking, he would fain have had it. Then he offer'd it to him again; then he put it by again: but, to my thinking, he was very loth to lay his fingers off it. And then he offer'd it the third time; he put it the third time by: and, still, as he refus'd it, the rabblement hooted and clapp'd their chopp'd hands, and threw up their sweaty nightcaps and utter'd such a deal of stinking breath because Caesar refus'd the crown, that it had almost chok'd Caesar; for he swounded and fell down at it: and for mine own part, I durst not laugh, for fear of opening my lips and receiving the bad air. 248

[Note 222: /a-shouting/ Dyce a shouting Ff a' shouting Capell.]

[Note 235: /it was/ F1 it were F2 F3 F4.]

[Note 242: /hooted/ Johnson howted F1 F2 F3 houted F4.]

[Note 243: /chopp'd/ chopt Ff.]

[Note 246: /swounded/ swoonded Ff swooned Rowe.]

[Note 220: /there was a crown offer'd him./ In the Life of Marcus Antonius Plutarch gives a detailed and vivid description of this scene.]

[Page 25]

CASSIUS. But, soft! I pray you: what, did Caesar swound?

CASCA. He fell down in the market-place, and foam'd at mouth, and was speechless.

BRUTUS. 'Tis very like; he hath the falling-sickness.

CASSIUS. No, Caesar hath it not; but you, and I, And honest Casca, we have the falling-sickness. 254

CASCA. I know not what you mean by that, but I am sure Caesar fell down. If the tag-rag people did not clap him and hiss him, according as he pleas'd and displeas'd them, as they use to do the players in the theatre, I am no true man.

BRUTUS. What said he when he came unto himself? 260

[Note 249: /swound/ Ff swoon Rowe.]

[Note 252: /like; he/ Theobald like he Ff.]

[Note 249: /soft!/ This is an elliptical use of the adverb 'soft' and was much used as an exclamation for arresting or retarding the speed of a person or thing; meaning about the same as 'hold!' 'stay!' or 'not too fast!' So in Othello, V, ii, 338: "Soft you; a word or two before you go"; and The Merchant of Venice, IV, i, 320: "Soft! The Jew shall have all justice; soft! no haste."]

[Note 252: /falling-sickness./ An old English name for epilepsy (Lat. morbus caducus, German fallende Sucht) used by North in translating Plutarch. Another form of the word is 'falling-evil,' also used by North (see quotation, p. 26, l. 268). It is an interesting fact that the best authorities allow that Napoleon suffered from epileptic seizures towards the close of his life.]

[Note 256: /tag-rag people:/ Cf. 'the tag' in Coriolanus, III, i, 248.]

[Note 259: /true:/ honest. Shakespeare frequently uses 'true' in this sense, especially as opposed to 'thief.' Cf. Cymbeline, II, iii, 76; Venus and Adonis, 724: "Rich preys make true men thieves."]

[Page 26]

CASCA. Marry, before he fell down, when he perceiv'd the common herd was glad he refus'd the crown, he pluck'd me ope his doublet and offer'd them his throat to cut. And I had been a man of any occupation, if I would not have taken him at a word, I would I might go to hell among the rogues. And so he fell. When he came to himself again, he said, if he had done or said any thing amiss, he desir'd their worships to think it was his infirmity. Three or four wenches, where I stood, cried, 'Alas, good soul!' and forgave him with all their hearts. But there's no heed to be taken of them: if Caesar had stabb'd their mothers, they would have done no less. 272

[Note 263: /And/ Ff an (an') Theobald.]

[Note 270: /no/ omitted in F2.]

[Note 261: /Marry./ The common Elizabethan exclamation of surprise, or asseveration, corrupted from the name of the Virgin Mary.]

[Note 263: /me./ The ethical dative. Cf. III, iii, 18; The Merchant of Venice, I, iii, 85; Romeo and Juliet, III, i, 6. See Abbott, Sect. 220.—/doublet./ This was the common English name of a man's outer body-garment. Shakespeare dresses his Romans like Elizabethan Englishmen (cf. II, i, 73-74), but the expression 'doublet-collar' occurs in North's Plutarch (see quotation in note on ll. 268-270).—/And:/ if. For 'and' in this sense, see Murray, and Abbott, Sect. 101.]

[Note 264: /a man of any occupation./ This probably means not only a mechanic or user of cutting-tools, but also a man of business and of action, as distinguished from a gentleman of leisure, or an idler.]

[Note 265-266: /to hell among the rogues./ The early English drama abounds in examples of such historical confusion. For example, in the Towneley Miracle Plays Noah's wife swears by the Virgin Mary.]

[Note 268-270: "Thereupon Caesar rising departed home to his house; and, tearing open his doublet-collar, making his neck bare, he cried out aloud to his friends, that his throat was ready to offer to any man that would come and cut it.... Afterwards, to excuse his folly, he imputed it to his disease, saying that their wits are not perfect which have this disease of the falling-evil."—Plutarch, Julius Caesar.]

[Page 27]

BRUTUS. And after that, he came, thus sad, away?

CASCA. Ay.

CASSIUS. Did Cicero say any thing? 275

CASCA. Ay, he spoke Greek.

CASSIUS. To what effect?

CASCA. Nay, and I tell you that, I'll ne'er look you i' the face again: but those that understood him smil'd at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me. I could tell you more news too: Marullus and Flavius, for pulling scarfs off Caesar's images, are put to silence. Fare you well. There was more foolery yet, if I could remember it.

CASSIUS. Will you sup with me to-night, Casca? 285

CASCA. No, I am promis'd forth.

CASSIUS. Will you dine with me to-morrow?

CASCA. Ay, if I be alive, and your mind hold, and your dinner worth the eating.

CASSIUS. Good; I will expect you. 290

CASCA. Do so: farewell, both. [Exit]

[Note 273: /away?/ Theobald away F1.]

[Note 278: /and/ Ff an (an') Theobald.]

[Note 275-281: A charming invention, though in his Life of Cicero Plutarch refers to the orator's nicknames, 'Grecian' and 'scholer,' due to his ability to "declaim in Greek." Cicero had a sharp, agile tongue, and was fond of using it; and nothing was more natural than that he should snap off some keen, sententious sayings, prudently veiling them, however, in a foreign language from all but those who might safely understand them.—/Greek to me./ 'Greek,' often 'heathen Greek,' was a common Elizabethan expression for unintelligible speech. In Dekker's Grissil (1600) occurs "It's Greek to him." So in Dickens's Barnaby Rudge: "this is Greek to me."]

[Note 286: /I am promis'd forth:/ I have promised to go out. 'Forth' is often used in this way in Elizabethan literature without any verb of motion. Cf. The Merchant of Venice, II, v, 11. See Abbott, Sect. 41.]

[Page 28]

BRUTUS. What a blunt fellow is this grown to be! He was quick mettle when he went to school.

CASSIUS. So is he now, in execution Of any bold or noble enterprise, 295 However he puts on this tardy form. This rudeness is a sauce to his good wit, Which gives men stomach to digest his words With better appetite.

BRUTUS. And so it is. For this time I will leave you: 300 To-morrow, if you please to speak with me, I will come home to you; or, if you will, Come home to me, and I will wait for you.

[Note 298: /digest/ F3 F4 disgest F1 F2.]

[Note 299: /appetite/ F1 appetites F2 F3 F4.]

[Note 300: Ff print as two lines.]

[Note 292: /blunt:/ dull, slow. Or there may be a quibble involved in connection with 'mettle' in the next line. Brutus alludes to the 'tardy form' (l. 296) Casca has just 'put on' in winding so long about the matter before coming to the point.]

[Note 293: /quick mettle:/ lively spirit. Collier conjectured 'quick-mettl'd.' 'Mettlesome' is still used of spirited horses. Cf. I, i, 63.]

[Note 296: /However:/ notwithstanding. Cf. Troilus and Cressida, I, iii, 322.—/tardy form:/ appearance of tardiness. The construction in this expression is common in Shakespeare, as 'shady stealth' for 'stealing shadow,' in Sonnets, LXXVII, 7; 'negligent danger' for 'danger from negligence,' in Antony and Cleopatra, III, v, 81.]

[Page 29]

CASSIUS. I will do so: till then, think of the world.

[Exit BRUTUS]

Well, Brutus, thou art noble; yet, I see, 305 Thy honourable metal may be wrought From that it is dispos'd: therefore it is meet That noble minds keep ever with their likes; For who so firm that cannot be seduc'd? Caesar doth bear me hard, but he loves Brutus: 310 If I were Brutus now and he were Cassius, He should not humour me. I will this night, In several hands, in at his windows throw, As if they came from several citizens, Writings, all tending to the great opinion 315 That Rome holds of his name; wherein obscurely Caesar's ambition shall be glanced at: And after this let Caesar seat him sure; For we will shake him, or worse days endure. [Exit]

[Note 306: /metal/ F3 F4 mettle F1 mettall F2.]

[Note 307: /that it is dispos'd:/ that which it is disposed to. For the omission of prepositions in Shakespeare, see Abbott, Sect. 198-202. Cassius in this speech is chuckling over the effect his talk has had upon Brutus.]

[Note 310: /bear me hard:/ has a grudge against me. This remarkable expression occurs three times in this play, but nowhere else in Shakespeare. Professor Hales quotes an example of it from Ben Jonson's Catiline, IV, v. It seems to have been borrowed from horsemanship, and to mean 'carries tight rein,' or 'reins hard,' like one who distrusts his horse. So before, ll. 35, 36:

You bear too stubborn and too strange a hand Over your friend that loves you.]

[Note 312: /humour./ To 'humor' a man, as the word is here used, is to turn and wind and manage him by watching his moods and crotchets, and to touch him accordingly. It is somewhat in doubt whether the 'he' in the preceding line refers to Brutus or to Caesar. If to Brutus, the meaning of course is: he should not play upon my humors and fancies as I do upon his. And this sense is fairly required by the context, for the whole speech is occupied with the speaker's success in cajoling Brutus, and with plans for cajoling and shaping him still further. Johnson refers 'he' to Caesar.]

[Note 313: /hands:/ handwritings. So the word is used colloquially to-day.]

[Note 319: We will either shake him, or endure worse days in suffering the consequences of our attempt.—Shakespeare makes Cassius overflow with intense personal spite against Caesar. This is in accordance with what he read in North's Plutarch.]

[Page 30]

SCENE III. The same. A street

Thunder and lightning. Enter, from opposite sides, CASCA, with his sword drawn, and CICERO

CICERO. Good even, Casca: brought you Caesar home? Why are you breathless? and why stare you so?

CASCA. Are you not mov'd, when all the sway of earth Shakes like a thing unfirm? O Cicero, I have seen tempests, when the scolding winds 5 Have riv'd the knotty oaks, and I have seen Th' ambitious ocean swell and rage and foam, To be exalted with the threatening clouds; But never till to-night, never till now, Did I go through a tempest dropping fire. 10 Either there is a civil strife in heaven, Or else the world, too saucy with the gods, Incenses them to send destruction.

[Note: SCENE III Capell Scene VI Pope.]

[Note: Enter, from ... Enter Caska, and Cicero Ff.]

[Note 10: /tempest dropping fire/ Rowe tempest-dropping-fire Ff.]

[Note: SCENE III. Rowe added "with his sword drawn" to the Folio stage direction, basing the note on l. 19.

A month has passed since the machinery of the conspiracy was set in motion. The action in the preceding scene took place on the day of the Lupercalia; the action in this is on the eve of the Ides of March.]

[Note 1: /brought:/ accompanied. Cf. Richard II, I, iv, 2.]

[Note 3-4: /sway of earth:/ established order. "The balanced swing of earth."—Craik. "The whole weight or momentum of this globe."—Johnson. In such a raging of the elements, it seems as if the whole world were going to pieces, or as if the earth's steadfastness were growing 'unfirm.' "'Unfirm' is not firm; while 'infirm' is weak."—Clar.]

[Note 11-13: Either the gods are fighting among themselves, or else they are making war on the world for being overbearing in its attitude towards them. For Shakespeare's use of 'saucy,' see Century.]

[Note 13: /destruction./ Must be pronounced as a quadrisyllable.]

[Page 31]

CICERO. Why, saw you any thing more wonderful?

[Note 14: /any thing more wonderful./ This may be interpreted as 'anything that was more wonderful,' or 'anything more that was wonderful.' The former seems the true interpretation. For the 'wonderful' things that Casca describes, Shakespeare was indebted to the following passage from Plutarch's Julius Caesar, which North in the margin entitles "Predictions and foreshews of Caesar's death": "Certainly destiny may easier be foreseen than avoided, considering the strange and wonderful signs that were said to be seen before Caesar's death. For, touching the fires in the element, and spirits running up and down in the night, and also the solitary birds to be seen at noondays sitting in the great market-place, are not all these signs perhaps worth the noting, in such a wonderful chance as happened? But Strabo the philosopher writeth, that divers men were seen going up and down in fire, and furthermore, that there was a slave of the soldiers that did cast a marvellous burning flame out of his hand, insomuch as they that saw it thought he had been burnt; but when the fire was out, it was found he had no hurt. Caesar self also, doing sacrifice unto the gods, found that one of the beasts which was sacrificed had no heart: and that was a strange thing in nature, how a beast could live without a heart." This passage is worth special attention, as Shakespeare uses many of the details again in II, ii, 17-24, 39-40. Cf. Hamlet, I, i, 113-125.]

[Page 32]

CASCA. A common slave—you know him well by sight— 15 Held up his left hand, which did flame and burn Like twenty torches join'd, and yet his hand, Not sensible of fire, remain'd unscorch'd. Besides—I ha' not since put up my sword— Against the Capitol I met a lion, 20 Who glaz'd upon me and went surly by Without annoying me: and there were drawn Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women, Transformed with their fear, who swore they saw Men all in fire walk up and down the streets. 25 And yesterday the bird of night did sit Even at noon-day upon the market-place, Hooting and shrieking. When these prodigies Do so conjointly meet, let not men say, 'These are their reasons; they are natural;' 30 For, I believe, they are portentous things Unto the climate that they point upon.

[Note 21: /glaz'd/ Ff glar'd Rowe. /surly/ F1 F4 surely F2 F3.]

[Note 28: /Hooting/ Johnson Howting F1 F2 F3 Houting F4.]

[Note: 15. /you know./ Dyce suggested 'you'd know'; Craik, 'you knew.' But the text as it stands is dramatically vivid and realistic.]

[Note 21: /Who./ See Abbott, Sect. 264.—/glaz'd./ Rowe's change to 'glar'd' is usually adopted as the reading here, but 'glaze' is used intransitively in Middle English in the sense of 'shine brilliantly,' and Dr. Wright (Clar) says: "I am informed by a correspondent that the word 'glaze' in the sense of 'stare' is common in some parts of Devonshire, and that 'glazing like a conger' is a familiar expression in Cornwall." See Murray for additional examples.]

[Note 23: /Upon a heap:/ together in a crowd. 'Heap' is often used in this sense in Middle English as it is colloquially to-day. The Anglo-Saxon heap almost always refers to persons. In Richard III, II, i, 53, occurs "princely heap." So "Let us on heaps go offer up our lives" in Henry V, IV, v, 18.]

[Note 26: /the bird of night./ The old Roman horror of the owl is well shown in this passage (spelling modernized) of Holland's Pliny, quoted by Dr. Wright (Clar): "The screech-owl betokeneth always some heavy news, and is most execrable ... in the presages of public affairs.... In sum, he is the very monster of the night.... There fortuned one of them to enter the very sanctuary of the Capitol, in that year when Sextus Papellio Ister and Lucius Pedanius were Consuls; whereupon, at the Nones of March, the city of Rome that year made general processions, to appease the wrath of the gods, and was solemnly purged by sacrifices."]

[Note 30: /These:/ such and such. Cf. "these and these" in II, i, 31. Casca refers to the doctrine of the Epicureans, who were slow to believe that such pranks of the elements had any moral significance in them, or that moral causes had anything to do with them, and held that the explanation of them was to be sought for in the simple working of natural laws and forces. Shakespeare deals humorously with these views in All's Well that Ends Well, II, iii, 1-6.]

[Note 32: /climate:/ region, country. So Richard II, IV, i, 130. Cf. Hamlet, I, i, 125: "Unto our climatures and countrymen."]

[Page 33]

CICERO. Indeed, it is a strange-disposed time: But men may construe things after their fashion, Clean from the purpose of the things themselves. 35 Comes Caesar to the Capitol to-morrow?

CASCA. He doth; for he did bid Antonius Send word to you he would be there to-morrow.

CICERO. Good night then, Casca: this disturbed sky 39 Is not to walk in.

CASCA. Farewell, Cicero. [Exit CICERO]

Enter CASSIUS

CASSIUS. Who's there?

CASCA. A Roman.

CASSIUS. Casca, by your voice.

CASCA. Your ear is good. Cassius, what night is this!

[Note 36: /to/ F1 F2 up F3 F4.]

[Note 41: Scene VII Pope.]

[Note 42: Two lines in Ff.—/this!/ Dyce this? Ff.]

[Note 35: /Clean:/ quite, completely. From the fourteenth century to the seventeenth 'clean' was often used in this sense, usually with verbs of removal and the like, and so it is still used colloquially. For 'from' without a verb of motion, see Abbott, Sect. 158.]

[Note 42: /what:/ what a. For the omission of the indefinite article, common in Shakespeare, see Abbott, Sect. 86. In the Folios the interrogation mark and the exclamation mark are often interchanged.]

[Page 34]

CASSIUS. A very pleasing night to honest men.

CASCA. Who ever knew the heavens menace so?

CASSIUS. Those that have known the earth so full of faults. For my part, I have walk'd about the streets, 46 Submitting me unto the perilous night, And thus unbraced, Casca, as you see, Have bar'd my bosom to the thunder-stone: And when the cross blue lightning seem'd to open 50 The breast of heaven, I did present myself Even in the aim and very flash of it.

CASCA. But wherefore did you so much tempt the heavens? It is the part of men to fear and tremble When the most mighty gods by tokens send 55 Such dreadful heralds to astonish us.

[Note 50: /blue/ blew F1.]

[Note 48: /unbraced:/ unbuttoned, with open doublet. For such anachronisms see note, p. 26, l. 263; also p. 48, l. 73.]

[Note 49: /thunder-stone:/ thunder-bolt. It is still a common belief in Scotland and Ireland that a stone or bolt falls with lightning. Cf. Cymbeline, IV, ii, 271: "Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone."]

[Note 50: /cross:/ zigzag. So in King Lear, IV, vii, 33-35:

To stand against the deep, dread-bolted thunder? In the most terrible and nimble stroke Of quick, cross lightning?]

[Page 35]

CASSIUS. You are dull, Casca; and those sparks of life That should be in a Roman you do want, Or else you use not. You look pale and gaze And put on fear and cast yourself in wonder, 60 To see the strange impatience of the heavens: But if you would consider the true cause Why all these fires, why all these gliding ghosts, Why birds and beasts from quality and kind, Why old men, fools, and children calculate; 65 Why all these things change from their ordinance, Their natures and preformed faculties, To monstrous quality, why, you shall find That heaven hath infus'd them with these spirits, To make them instruments of fear and warning 70 Unto some monstrous state. Now could I, Casca, name to thee a man Most like this dreadful night, That thunders, lightens, opens graves, and roars As doth the lion in the Capitol, 75 A man no mightier than thyself or me In personal action, yet prodigious grown, And fearful, as these strange eruptions are.

[Note 57-60: Five lines in Ff.]

[Note 65: /old men, fools, and/ Old men, Fooles, and F1 F2 Old men, Fools, and F3 F4 old men fools, and Steevens old men fool and White.]

[Note 74: /roars/ roares F1 teares F2.]

[Note 60: /cast yourself in:/ throw yourself into a state of. In previous editions of Hudson's Shakespeare Jervis's conjecture 'case' for 'cast' was adopted. The change is unnecessary. Cf. Cymbeline, III, ii, 38: "Though forfeiters you cast in prison."]

[Note 63-68: The construction here is involved, and the grammar confused, but the meaning is clear enough. The general idea is that of elements and animals, and even human beings, acting in a manner out of or against their nature, or changing their natures and original faculties from the course in which they were ordained to move, to monstrous or unnatural modes of action.]

[Note 64: /from quality and kind:/ turn from their disposition and nature. Emerson and Browning use 'quality' (cf. l. 68) in this old sense of 'disposition.' 'Kind,' meaning 'nature,' is common in Shakespeare.]

[Note 65: There seems no necessity for changing the reading of the Folios. This conjunction of old men, fools, and children is found in country sayings in England to-day. So in a Scottish proverb: "Auld fowks, fules, and bairns should never see wark half dune," White's reading was first suggested by Mitford.]

[Note 67: /preformed:/ originally created for some special purpose.]

[Note 71: /monstrous state:/ abnormal condition of things. 'Enormous state' occurs with probably the same general meaning in King Lear, II, ii, 176. As Cassius is an avowed Epicurean, it may seem out of character to make him speak thus. But he is here talking for effect, his aim being to kindle and instigate Casca into the conspiracy; and to this end he does not hesitate to say what he does not himself believe.]

[Note 75: This reads as if a lion were kept in the Capitol. But the meaning probably is that Caesar roars in the Capitol, like a lion. Perhaps Cassius has the idea of Caesar's claiming or aspiring to be among men what the lion is among beasts. Dr. Wright suggests that Shakespeare had in mind the lions kept in the Tower of London, "which there is reason to believe from indications in the play represented the Capitol to Shakespeare's mind." It is possible, too, that we have here a reference to the lion described by Casca in ll. 20-22.]

[Note 77: /prodigious:/ portentous. As in A Midsummer Night's Dream, V, i, 419: "Never mole, hare lip, nor scar, Nor mark prodigious."]

[Page 36]

CASCA. 'Tis Caesar that you mean, is it not, Cassius?

CASSIUS. Let it be who it is; for Romans now 80 Have thews and limbs like to their ancestors; But, woe the while! our fathers' minds are dead, And we are govern'd with our mothers' spirits; Our yoke and sufferance show us womanish.

CASCA. Indeed, they say the senators to-morrow 85 Mean to establish Caesar as a king; And he shall wear his crown by sea and land, In every place save here in Italy.

[Note 79: Two lines in Ff.]

[Note 81: /thews/ Thewes F1 F2 Sinews F3 F4.]

[Note 80: /Let it be who it is:/ "no matter who it is."—Clar.]

[Note 81: /thews:/ muscles. So in Hamlet, I, iii, 12, and 2 Henry IV, III, ii, 276. In Chaucer and Middle English the word means 'manners,' though in Layamon's Brut (l. 6361), in the singular, it seems to mean 'sinew' or 'strength.' See Skeat for a suggestive discussion.]

[Note 83: /with:/ by. So in III, ii, 196. See Abbott, Sect. 193.]

[Page 37]

CASSIUS. I know where I will wear this dagger then; Cassius from bondage will deliver Cassius. 90 Therein, ye gods, you make the weak most strong; Therein, ye gods, you tyrants do defeat: Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass, Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron, Can be retentive to the strength of spirit; 95 But life, being weary of these worldly bars, Never lacks power to dismiss itself. If I know this, know all the world besides, That part of tyranny that I do bear I can shake off at pleasure. [Thunder still]

CASCA. So can I: 100 So every bondman in his own hand bears The power to cancel his captivity.

CASSIUS. And why should Caesar be a tyrant then? Poor man! I know he would not be a wolf, But that he sees the Romans are but sheep: 105 He were no lion, were not Romans hinds. Those that with haste will make a mighty fire Begin it with weak straws: what trash is Rome, What rubbish and what offal, when it serves For the base matter to illuminate 110 So vile a thing as Caesar! But, O grief, Where hast thou led me? I perhaps speak this Before a willing bondman; then I know My answer must be made. But I am arm'd, And dangers are to me indifferent. 115

[Note 95: Can repress by force man's energy of soul.]

[Note 101: /bondman./ The word 'cancel' in the next line shows that Casca plays on the two senses of 'bond.' Cf. Cymbeline, V, iv, 28.]

[Note 107-108: The idea seems to be that, as men start a huge fire with worthless straws or shavings, so Caesar is using the degenerate Romans of the time to set the whole world a-blaze with his own glory. Cassius's enthusiastic hatred of "the mightiest Julius" is irresistibly delightful. For a good hater is the next best thing to a true friend; and Cassius's honest gushing malice is surely better than Brutus's stabbing sentimentalism.]

[Note 112-115: The meaning is, Perhaps you will go and tell Caesar all I have said about him, and then he will call me to account for it. Very well; go tell him; and let him do his worst. I care not.]

[Page 38]

CASCA. You speak to Casca, and to such a man That is no fleering tell-tale. Hold, my hand: Be factious for redress of all these griefs, And I will set this foot of mine as far As who goes farthest.

CASSIUS. There's a bargain made. 120 Now know you, Casca, I have mov'd already Some certain of the noblest-minded Romans To undergo with me an enterprise Of honourable-dangerous consequence; And I do know, by this they stay for me 125 In Pompey's porch: for now, this fearful night, There is no stir or walking in the streets, And the complexion of the element In favour's like the work we have in hand, Most bloody, fiery, and most terrible. 130

[Note 129: /In favour's like/ Camb In favour's, like Johnson Is Favors, like F1 F2 Is Favours, like F3 F4 Is favour'd like Capell Is feav'rous, like Rowe.]

[Note 130: /bloody, fiery/ bloodie, fierie Ff bloody-fiery Dyce.]

[Note 117: /Fleering./ This word of Scandinavian origin seems to unite the senses of 'grinning,' 'flattering' (see Love's Labour's Lost, V, ii, 109, and Ben Jonson's "fawn and fleer" in Volpone, III, i, 20), and 'sneering,' and so is just the right epithet for a telltale, who flatters you into saying that of another which you ought not to say, and then mocks you by going to that other and telling what you have said.—/Hold, my hand:/ stay! here is my hand. As men clasp hands in sealing a bargain. In Rowe's text the comma is omitted.]

[Note 118: /Be factious:/ be active. Or it may mean, 'form a party,' 'join a conspiracy.'—/griefs:/ grievances. The effect put for the cause. A common Shakespearian metonymy. Cf. III, ii, 211; IV, ii, 42, 46.]

[Note 123: /undergo:/ undertake. So in 2 Henry IV, I, iii, 54; The Winter's Tale, II, iii, 164; IV, iv, 554.]

[Note 125: /by this:/ by this time. So in King Lear, IV, vi, 45.]

[Note 126: /Pompey's porch./ This was a spacious adjunct to the huge theater that Pompey had built in the Campus Martius, outside of the city proper; and there, as Plutarch says in Marcus Brutus, "was set up the image of Pompey, which the city had made and consecrated in honour of him, when he did beautify that part of the city with the theatre he built, with divers porches about it." Here it was that Caesar was stabbed to death; and though Shakespeare transfers the assassination to the Capitol, he makes Caesar's blood stain the statue of Pompey. See III, ii, 187, 188.]

[Note 128: /element:/ sky. Twice Shakespeare seems to poke fun at the way in which the Elizabethans overdid the use of 'element' in this sense, in Twelfth Night, III, i, 65, and in 2 Henry IV, IV, iii, 58.]

[Note 129: /favour:/ appearance. So in I, ii, 91. Johnson's emendation, though pleonastic, makes least change upon the text of the Folios.]

[Page 39]

Enter CINNA.

CASCA. Stand close awhile, for here comes one in haste.

CASSIUS. 'Tis Cinna; I do know him by his gait; He is a friend. Cinna, where haste you so?

CINNA. To find out you. Who's that? Metellus Cimber?

CASSIUS. No, it is Casca; one incorporate 135 To our attempts. Am I not stay'd for, Cinna?

[Note 132: /gait/ Johnson gate Ff.]

[Note 131: /close:/ hidden. So in 1 Chronicles, xii, 1: "He yet kept himself close because of Saul the son of Kish."]

[Note 135: /incorporate:/ closely united. Shakespeare uses this word nine times,—four times as an adjective and five times as a verb. With regard to the omission of -ed in participial forms, see Abbott, Sect. 342.]

[Page 40]

CINNA. I'm glad on't. What a fearful night is this! There's two or three of us have seen strange sights.

CASSIUS. Am I not stay'd for? tell me.

CINNA. Yes, you are. O, Cassius, if you could 140 But win the noble Brutus to our party—

CASSIUS. Be you content. Good Cinna, take this paper, And look you lay it in the praetor's chair, Where Brutus may but find it; and throw this In at his window; set this up with wax 145 Upon old Brutus' statue: all this done, Repair to Pompey's porch, where you shall find us. Is Decius Brutus and Trebonius there?

[Note 137: Two lines in Ff.]

[Note 140: /O, Cassius/ Ff print in line 139.]

[Note 141: /the noble Brutus/ Ff print in line 140.]

[Note 143: /in the praetor's chair./ "But for Brutus, his friends and countrymen, both by divers procurements and sundry rumours of the city, and by many bills[A] also, did openly call and procure him to do that he did. For under the image of his ancestor Junius Brutus, (that drave the kings out of Rome) they wrote: 'O, that it pleased the gods thou wert now alive, Brutus!' and again, 'that thou wert here among us now!' His tribunal or chair, where he gave audience during the time he was Praetor, was full of such bills: 'Brutus, thou art asleep, and art not Brutus indeed.'"—Plutarch, Marcus Brutus.]

[Note A: i.e. /scrolls/.]

[Note 144: /Brutus may but find it:/ only Brutus may find it.]

[Note 148: For a discussion of singular verbs with plural subjects, see Abbott, Sect. 333. Cf. l. 138, l. 155; III, ii, 26.—/Decius Brutus/. As indicated in the notes to the Dramatis Personae, this should be 'Decimus Brutus.' Shakespeare found the form 'Decius' in North's Plutarch, who translated from Amyot, in whose French version the blunder was originally made. Decimus Brutus is said to have been cousin to the other Brutus of the play. He had been one of Caesar's ablest, most favored, and most trusted lieutenants, and had particularly distinguished himself in his naval service at Venetia and Massilia. After the murder of Caesar, he was found to be written down in his will as second heir.]

[Page 41]

CINNA. All but Metellus Cimber; and he's gone To seek you at your house. Well, I will hie, 150 And so bestow these papers as you bade me.

CASSIUS. That done, repair to Pompey's theatre.

[Exit CINNA]

Come, Casca, you and I will yet ere day See Brutus at his house: three parts of him Is ours already, and the man entire 155 Upon the next encounter yields him ours.

CASCA. O, he sits high in all the people's hearts; And that which would appear offence in us, His countenance, like richest alchemy, Will change to virtue and to worthiness. 160

CASSIUS. Him and his worth and our great need of him, You have right well conceited. Let us go, For it is after midnight, and ere day 163 We will awake him and be sure of him. [Exeunt]

[Note 151: /bade/ Rowe bad Ff.]

[Note 159: /countenance/: support.—/alchemy/: the old ideal art of turning base metals into gold. So in Sonnets, XXXIII, 4: "Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy." Cf. King John, III, i, 78.]

[Note 162: /conceited/: formed an idea of, conceived, judged. 'Conceit' as a verb occurs again in III, i, 193, and in Othello, III, iii, 149.]

[Page 42]



ACT II

SCENE I. Rome. BRUTUS'S orchard

Enter BRUTUS

BRUTUS. What, Lucius, ho! I cannot, by the progress of the stars, Give guess how near to day. Lucius, I say! I would it were my fault to sleep so soundly. When, Lucius, when? awake, I say! what, Lucius!

Enter LUCIUS

LUCIUS. Call'd you, my lord?

BRUTUS. Get me a taper in my study, Lucius: When it is lighted, come and call me here.

LUCIUS. I will, my lord. [Exit]

[Note: Rome ... Enter BRUTUS Malone Enter Brutus in his Orchard Ff.]

[Note 5: /when?/ Ff when! Delius. /what, Lucius!/ what Lucius? Ff.]

[Note: orchard. Shakespeare generally uses 'orchard' in its original sense of 'garden' (literally 'herb-garden,' Anglo-Saxon ort-geard).]

[Note 1: /What./ A common exclamation frequent in Shakespeare. So in V, iii, 72. The 'when' of l. 5 shows increasing impatience.]