CHAPTER XII.

Laugh and the world laughs with you;Weep and you weep alone,This grand old earth must borrow its mirth,It has troubles enough of its own.Sing and the hills will answer,Sigh, it is lost on the air,The echoes bound to a joyful sound,But shrink from voicing care.Be glad and your friends are many;Be sad and you lose them all;There are none to decline your nectared wine,But alone we must drink life's gall.There's room in the halls of pleasure,For a long and lordly train,But one by one we must all file on;Through the narrow aisles of pain.Feast, and your halls are crowded,Fast, and the world goes by,Succeed and give, 'twill help you live;But no one can help you die!Rejoice, and men will seek you,Grieve, and they turn and go,They want full measure of all your pleasureBut they do not want your woe!

Be glad and your friends are many;Be sad and you lose them all;There are none to decline your nectared wine,But alone we must drink life's gall.There's room in the halls of pleasure,For a long and lordly train,But one by one we must all file on;Through the narrow aisles of pain.

Feast, and your halls are crowded,Fast, and the world goes by,Succeed and give, 'twill help you live;But no one can help you die!Rejoice, and men will seek you,Grieve, and they turn and go,They want full measure of all your pleasureBut they do not want your woe!

These lines impressed me very much at the time and from that day to this I have never ceased to act on the philosophy of the poem.

It has been part of my nature, and during my wanderings for the past three hundred and twenty years I have never failed to carry in my train of thought and action—sunshine, beauty, song, loveand laughter—advance agents to secure welcome in all hearts and homes throughout the world.

We were beautifully entertained by Mrs. Daisy Davenant at the Crown Tavern in Oxford, and many of the college "boys," who heard of our arrival in the city, hurried to pay their classic friendship to the "Divine" William.

We arrived in London on the 20th of September, and found that our old maid landlady had died of the plague, but had kindly sent all our literary and wardrobe effects to Florio, who was still alive and well at the Red Lion.

In a couple of days William was up to his head and ears in theatrical composition and stage structure.

A few years before the Bard had "dashed off" a love tragedy entitled "Romeo and Juliet," taken from an Italian novel of the thirteenth century, and a translation of the old family feud in poetry, by Walter Brooke, who had but recently delighted London with the story.

Shakspere never hesitated to take crude ore and rough ashler from any quarry of thought; and out of the dull, leaden material of others, produced characters in living form to walk the stage of life forever, teaching the lesson of virtue triumphant over vice.

The exemplification of true love, as pictured in the pure affection of Juliet and the intense, heroic devotion of Romeo, have never been equaled or surpassed by any other dramatic characters.

The lordly and wealthy gentry of Italy have been noted for their family feuds for the past three thousand years, and the party followers ofthese blood-stained rivals have desolated many happy homes in Rome, Florence, Milan, Naples, Venice and Verona.

Shakspere showed the finished play of "Romeo and Juliet" to Burbage, and the old manager fairly jumped with joy and astonishment at the eloquence of the love and ruin drama.

The families of Capulet and Montague of Verona, stuffed with foolish pride about the matrimonial choice of their daughters and sons, can be found in every city in the world where a tyrant father or purse-proud mother insist on selecting life partners for their children.

The story of Romeo and Juliet shows the utter failure of such parental folly.

The play was largely advertised among the lights of London and announced to come off in all its glory at the Blackfriars on the last Saturday of December, 1595.

Queen Elizabeth, in a special box, was there incog, with a royal train of lords and ladies; and such another audience for dress and stunning show was never seen in London.

Burleigh, Bacon, Essex, Southampton, Derby, Raleigh, Spenser, Warwick, Gray, Montague, Lancaster, Mountjoy, Blake, and all the great soldiers and sailors of the realm then in London were boxed for a sight of the greatest love tragedy ever enacted on the dramatic stage. All the dramatic authors were present.

William himself took the part of Romeo, for he was a perfect exemplification of the hero of the play. Jo Taylor took the part of Juliet, and I can assure you that his makeup, in the form and dressof the fourteen-year-old Italian beauty, was a great success.

Dick Burbage took the part of Friar Laurence, Condell played Mercutio, Arnim the part of Paris, Field played old Capulet, and Florio played Montague, Hemmings played Benvolio, and John Underwood played the part of Tybalt, and Escalus, the Prince, was played by Phillips.

The curtain went up on a street scene in Verona, where the partisans of the houses of Capulet and Montague quarreled, while Paris, Mercutio, Romeo and Tybalt worked up their hot blood and came to blows.

Romeo and his friends, in mask, attended a ball at the home of Juliet, in a clandestine fashion, and on first sight of this immaculate beauty Romeo exclaims:

"O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of nightLike a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear;Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.The dancing done, I'll watch her place of stand,And, touching hers, make happy my rude hand,Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight,For I ne'er saw true beauty till to-night!"

The poetic apostrophe of Romeo to his new discovered beauty elicited universal applause, led by the "Virgin Queen," who imagined, no doubt, that his tribute to beauty was intended for herself.She never lost an opportunity to appropriate anything that came her way. An epigram of strenuous audacity. A winner!

In the second act Romeo climbs the wall, hemming in his beautiful Juliet, and in defiance of the familyfeud, locks and bars of old man Capulet, and seeks a clandestine interview with his true love, although at the risk of his life.

It was the evening of the twenty-first birthday of Romeo, and with love as his guide and subject, he felt strong enough to attack a warring world.

Beneath the window of the fair Juliet, Romeo soliloquizes:

"He jests at scars, that never felt a wound—(Juliet appears at an upper window.)But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks!It is the East, and Juliet is the sun!Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,Who is already sick and pale with grief,That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she;Be not her maid since she is envious;Her vestal livery is but sick and green,And none but fools do wear it; cast it off—It is my lady; O, it is my love;O, that she knew she were!—She speaks, yet she says nothing: What of that:Her eye discourses, I will answer it.I am too bold, 'tis not to me she speaks;Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,Having some business, do entreat her eyesTo twinkle in their spheres till they return.What if her eyes were there, they in her head?The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars.As daylight doth a lamp; her eye in heavenWould through the airy region stream so brightThat birds would sing, and think it were not night.See how she leans her cheek upon her hand!O, that I were a glove upon that hand,That I might touch that cheek!"

Juliet speaks, and finally out of her fevered, love-lit mind says:

"O, Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?Deny thy father and refuse thy name;Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,And I'll no longer be a Capulet!"

Romeo replies:

"I take thee at thy word;Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized,Henceforth I never will be Romeo."

She says:

"How cam'st thou hither?The orchard walls are too high and hard to climb;And the place death, considering who thou art."

Romeo quickly responds:

"With love's light wings did I o'erperch these walls;For stony limits cannot hold love out;And what love can do, that dares love attempt,Therefore thy kinsmen are no hindrance to me!I am no pilot, yet wert thou as farAs that vast shore washed with the further seaI would adventure for such merchandise!"

Then Juliet, with her fine Italian cunning makes the following declaration of her love; and considering that she is only fourteen years of age, yet in the hands of a house nurse, older and wiser girls could not give a better gush of affectionate eloquence:

"Thou know'st the mask of night is on my face,Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek,For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night.Fain would I dwell on form, fain, fain, fain, denyWhat I have spoke; But, farewell compliment!Dost thou love me? I know thou wilt say, Ay;And I will take thy word, yet if thou swear'st,Thou may'st prove false; at lover's perjuriesThey say Jove laughs. O, gentle Romeo,If thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully;Or, if thou think'st I am too quickly won,I'll frown and be perverse, and say thee nay,So thou wilt woo; but else, not for the world,In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond;And therefore thou may'st think my conduct light;But, trust me, gentleman, I'll prove more trueThan those that have more cunning to be strange.I should have been more shy, I must confess,But that thou overheard'st, ere I was aware,My true love's passion; therefore, pardon me;And not impute this yielding to light love,Which the dark night hath so discovered,My bounty is as boundless as the sea,My love as deep; the more I give to thee,The more I have, for both are infinite!"

The lovers part, promising eternal love and marriage "to-morrow" at the cell of good Friar Laurence, the confessor of the fair Juliet.

The friar, priest, preacher and bishop have ever been great matrimonial matchmakers, and when "Love's young dream" is foiled or withered by parental tyranny, these velvet-handed philosophers find a way to tie the hymeneal knot, even in personal and legal defiance of cruel, social dictation.

Friar Laurence, in contemplation of tying love-knots soliloquizes in the following lofty lines:

"The gray-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,Checkering the eastern clouds with streaks of light;And flecked darkness like a drunkard reelsFrom forth day's pathway, made by Titan's wheels.Now ere the sun advance his burning eye,The day to cheer, and night's dark dew to try,I must fill up this osier cage of oursWith baleful needs and precious-juiced flowers.The earth that's Nature's mother, is her tomb;What is her burying grave, that is her womb;And from her womb children of divers kindWe sucking on her natural bosom find,Many for many virtues excellent,None, but for some, and yet all different;O, mickle is the powerful grace that liesIn herbs, plants, stones and their true qualities;For naught so vile that on the earth doth live,But to the earth some special good doth give;Nor aught so good, but strained from that fair use,Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse.Virtue itself turns vice, being misappliedAnd vice sometimes by action dignified.Within the infant rind of this small flower,Poison hath residence and medicine power,For, this being smelt, with that part cheers each part,Being tasted, slays all senses with the heart.Two such opposed foes encamp them stillIn man as well as herbs, grace and rude will,And where the worser is predominant,Full soon the canker death eats up that plant!"

Romeo implores the holy Friar:

"Do thou but close our hands with holy words,Then love devouring death do what he dare,It is enough I may but call her mine!"

Juliet addressing Romeo in the Friar's cell exclaims:

"Imagination more rich in matter than in words,Brags of his substance, not of ornament;They are but beggars that can count their worth;But my true love is grown to such excess,I cannot sum up half my sum of wealth."

The good old Friar then says:

"Come, come with me and we will make short work;For, by your leaves, you shall not stay aloneTill holy church incorporate two in one!"

Mercutio and Tybalt fight, in faction of the Capulet and Montague houses. Mercutio is killed, and then Romeo kills Tybalt and is banished from the State by Prince Escalus.

Juliet awaits Romeo in her room the night after marriage, and with passionate, impatient longing exclaims:

"Give me my Romeo; and when he shall dieTake him and cut him out in little stars,And he will make the face of heaven so brightThat all the world will be in love with night,And pay no worship to the garish sun.O, I have bought the mansion of a love,But not possessed it; and, though I am sold;Not yet enjoyed; so tedious is this day,As is the night before some festivalTo an impatient child that hath new robes,And may not wear them!"

Although the verdict of banishment was pronounced against Romeo to go to Mantua instanter, he found means through the old nurse and good Friar Laurence to visit his new-made bride the night before his forced departure; and in spite of locks, bars, law, parents and princes, plucked the ripe fruit from the tree of virginity.

Romeo must be gone before the first crowingof the cock and ere the rosy fingers of the dawn light up the bridal chamber, else death would be his portion.

Juliet importunes him to stay, and says:

"Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day;It was the nightingale, and not the lark,That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear;Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree;Believe me, love, it was the nightingale."

Romeo replies:

"It was the lark, the herald of the morn,No nightingale; look, love, what envious streaksDo lace the severing clouds in yonder East;Night's candles are burnt, and jocund day,Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops;I must be gone and live, or stay and die!"

Juliet further implores him to stay:

"Yon light is not daylight, I know it;It is some meteor that the sun exhales;To be to thee this night a torch bearer,And light thee on thy way to Mantua;Therefore stay yet, thou need'st not be gone."

Romeo willingly consents:

"Let me be taken, let me be put to death;I am content so thou wilt have it so;I'll say yon gray is not the morning's eye,'Tis but the pale reflex of Cynthia's brow!Nor that it is not the lark, whose notes do beatThe vaulty heaven so high above our heads;I have more care to stay than will to go;—Come, death, and welcome! Juliet wills it so—How is it, my soul? Let's talk, it is not day!"

Juliet alarmed exclaims:

"It is, it is, hie hence, begone away;It is the lark that sings so out of tune,Straining harsh discords and unpleasing sharps.Some say the lark makes sweet division;This doth not so, for she divideth us;Some say, the lark and lothed toad change eyes;O, now I would they had changed voices too;Since arm from arm that voice doth us affray,Hunting thee hence with hunts up to the day.O, now begone; more light and light it grows."

Romeo descends the ladder, saying his last words to the beautiful Juliet:

"And trust me, love, in mine eye so do you,Dry sorrow drinks our blood. Adieu! Adieu!"

After the banishment of Romeo, old Capulet and his wife insisted that Juliet marry young Paris, a kinsman of Prince Escalus, and sorrows unnumbered crowded on the new-made secret bride.

To escape marriage with Paris, Juliet consulted Friar Laurence, who gives her a drug to be taken the night before the prearranged marriage, that will dull all life and the body remain as dead for forty-two hours. This scheme of the Friar worksout favorably until Juliet is laid away with her ancestors in the grand tomb of the Capulets.

But Romeo hears of the whole trouble and hurries back from banishment, dashing his way through all impediments until he kills Paris, grieving at midnight by the grave of Juliet.

Then, tearing his way into the tomb of Juliet throws himself upon the gorgeous bier and exclaims:

"Oh, my love! my wife!Death that hath sucked the honey of thy breath,Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty;Thou art not conquered; beauty's ensign yetIs crimson on thy lips, and in thy cheeks,And death's pale flag is not advanced there;Tybalt, liest thou there in thy bloody sheet?O, what more favor can I do thee,Than with that hand that cut thy youth in twain,To sunder his that was thine enemy!Forgive me, cousin! Ah, dear Juliet,Why art thou yet so fair? Shall I believeThat unsubstantial death is amorous;And that the lean abhorred monster keepsThee here in dark to be his paramour?For fear of that I will still stay with thee;And never from this palace of dim nightDepart again; here, here will I remainWith worms that are thy chambermaids; O, hereWill I set up my everlasting rest;And shake the yoke of inauspicious starsFrom this world-wearied flesh; eyes, look your last!Arms, take your last embrace! and lips, O, you,The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kissA dateless bargain to engrossing death!Come, bitter conductor, come, unsavory guide!Thou desperate pilot, now and at once run onThe dashing rocks thy sea-sick, weary bark!Here's to my love!(Drinks poison.)O, true apothecary!Thy drugs are quick; thus with a kiss I die!"

Friar Laurence and Balthazar with dark lantern, at this moment approach the tomb to extricate and save Juliet from the sleeping drug. She awakes with the noise in the tomb and views the deadly situation.

The Friar implores her to come, depart at once, as the night watch approach. She says:

"Go, get thee hence, for I will not away;What's here? a cup close in my true love's hand;Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end;O churl! drink all; and leave me no friendly dropTo help me after? I will kiss thy lips;Haply, some poison yet doth hang on them,To make me die with a restorative.Thy lips are warm!Yea, noise? Then I'll he brief. O happy dagger!(Snatches Romeo's dagger.)This is thy sheath, there rust and let me die!"(Stabs herself through the heart.)

The Prince, Capulet and Montague family soon discover all, and Friar Laurence tells the true story, punishment follows, and the two contendinghouses of Verona clasp hands over the ruin they have wrought, while the Prince exclaims:

"For, never was a story of more woe,Than this of Juliet and her Romeo!"

The drop curtain was rung down and up three times, and the storm of applause that greeted Shakspere and Taylor, as the representatives of Romeo and Juliet, was never equaled before at the Blackfriars.

The Queen called William and Jo to the royal box and by her own firm hand presented a signet ring to Romeo and a lace handkerchief to Juliet!

"What fates impose, that men must needs abide;It boots not to resist both wind and tide!"

"O mighty Cæsar! Dost thou lie so low?Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoilsShrunk to this little measure?"

The assassination of Julius Cæsar by Brutus, Cassius, Casca and twenty other Roman Senators, in the capital of the Empire in broad daylight, was one of the most cowardly and infamous crimes recorded in the annals of time.

The historical and philosophical friends of Brutus and Cassius have tried to justify the conspiracy and assassination by imputing the deep design of tyranny to Cæsar, who was bent on trampling down the rights of the people and securing for himself a kingly crown.

They say the motive of the conspirators in the deep damnation of Cæsar's "taking off" was purely patriotism. Many murderers have used the same argument.

The facts do not justify the excuse. For more than thirty years Julius Cæsar had been a star performer on the boards of the Roman Empire, and his family had been illustrious for five hundred years. Sylla, Marius, Cicero, Cato, Brutusand Pompey had crossed lances with this civil and military genius, and had all become very jealous of his increasing fame.

From boyhood Cæsar had been a mixer with the common people, and in midnight hours in Rome, among tradesmen, merchants, students, authors, sailors and soldiers, he became imbued with their wants and impulsive nature. He had no reason to doubt or oppress the people.

As commander of invincible troops in Spain, Gaul, Germany and Britain, Cæsar had secured a world-wide reputation, for the eagles of his victorious legions had swept across the mountains and seas to the shore end of Europe and screamed in triumph among the palms and sands of Africa and Asia!

Cæsar was a poet, orator, historian, warrior and statesman, and the imperial families and politicians of Rome, who were forced to sit in the shade of his triumphs and glory, felt a secret pang of jealousy at the stride of this colossal character.

He was the pride and idol of his soldiers, and whether in the forests of Gaul and Germany, the swamps of Britain, mountains of Spain, or among Ionian isles, his presence was ever worth a thousand men in battle action.

His plans were mathematical, his soul sublime and his purpose eternal victory!

Bravery and Cæsar were synonymous terms, and the little, mean, pismire ambitions of Roman politicians he despised, striding over their corrupt schemes for pelf and office like a winter whirlwind.

Brutus, while professing horror at the contemplated assassination of his friend and naturalfather Cæsar, lent a willing ear and sympathetic voice to the prime conspirator—Cassius; and although seemingly dragged into the murderous plot, he was in heart the grand villain of the conspiracy, believing he might rise to supreme control of the Roman Empire when Julius the Great lay weltering in his heroic blood.

Brutus was a dastard, an ingrate, a coward and a murderer, and no pretense of patriotism can save him from the contempt and condemnation of mankind. There is no justification for assassination!

The death of Cæsar was the first great blow in the final destruction of the Roman Empire, for up to this time the people had a voice in electing their tribunes, consuls and governors, and were consulted as to the burden of taxation, although many of their previous rulers had been terrible tyrants.

Brutus and Cassius, and their coconspirators, city senators, who dipped their hands in Cæsar's sacred blood, were finally driven from all political power, their estates confiscated, fleeing like frightened wolves to foreign fields and forests and perishing in battle as enemies to their country.

When brought to bay at Philippi, Brutus and Cassius mustered up enough courage to commit suicide, which is confession of guilt.

In the winter of 1597 William was deeply studying the new translation of Petrarch, and Florio was nightly teaching us the lofty philosophy of Grecian and Roman classics. The lives of noted ancient poets, orators, warriors, statesmen, governors, kings and philosophers, as written or compiled by the great Plutarch has furnished a mine of historic thought for the dramatic artist, and Shakspere, above all the men who ever thought, wrote or talked on the stage, took most advantage of the lines of Plutarch.

The British people were clamoring for grand historical plays, not only for the actions of their own kings and queens, but demanded the enactment of the reigns of great, ancient warriors and kings who had given glory to Greece and Rome and left imperishable memories for posterity to avoid or emulate.

Burbage, Henslowe and other theatrical managers, were ever on the lookout for plays to suit cash customers, and of course, the Bard of Avon had first call, because his plays went on the various stages like a torchlight procession, while those of his so-called compeers, struggled through the acts and scenes with only the flicker and sputter of tallow dips of dramatic thought.

He knew, and I knew, that his plays would be enacted down the circling centuries as long as vice and virtue, hate and love, cowardice and bravery, fun, folly, wit and wisdom characterized humanity.

William told Essex and Southampton that he had just composed a play with Julius Cæsar as the central figure, and wished an opportunity to test its merits before a private party of authors, students and lords at the Holborn House, the grand castle of Southampton.

These noblemen were delighted with the suggestion, and on the night of the first of March, 1597, Burbage, with his whole tribe of theatrical "rounders," appeared in the grand banquet roomof Southampton, and, under the guidance of Shakspere, rendered for the first time "Julius Cæsar."

Jo Taylor took the part of Cæsar, Dick Burbage acted Brutus, Condell represented Cassius and Shakspere played Marcus Antonius, while the other characters were distributed among the "stock" as their various talents justified.

Calphurnia, wife to Cæsar, and Portia, wife to Brutus, were represented respectively by Hemmings andArnim.

The play opens with a street scene in Rome filled with working, rabble citizens who have turned out to give Cæsar a great triumph on his return from successful war.

Flavius and Marullus, tribunes, enter and rebuke the people for greeting Cæsar.

Flavius twits the turncoat rabble in this style:

"O you hard hearts, you cruel men of Rome,Knew ye not Pompey? Many a time and oftHave you climbed up to walls and battlements,To towers and windows, yea, to chimney-tops,Your infants in your arms, and there have satThe livelong day, with patient expectation,To see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome;And when you saw his chariot but appear,Have you not made a 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?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?"

Brutus and Cassius witness the triumphal march of Cæsar with jealous, vengeful and dagger hearts, and Cassius, the old, desperate soldier, first hints at blood conspiracy.

Brutus asks:

"What is it that you would impart to me?If it be aught toward the general good,Set honor in eye and death in the other,And I will look on both indifferently."

Fine talk! Brutus is not the only political murderer that talks of "honor" through the centuries, a cloak for devils in human shape to work a personal purpose and not "the general good."

Cassius delivers this eloquent indictment against Cæsar, the grandest of its kind in all history:

"Well, Honor is the subject of my story—I cannot tell what you and other menThink of this life; but, for my single self,I had as lief not to be, as live to beIn awe of such a thing as I, myself.I was born free as Cæsar; so were you.We both have fed as well; and we can bothEndure the winter's cold as well as he.For once, upon a raw and gusty day,The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,Cæsar said to me, 'Dar'st thou, Cassius, nowLeap in with me, into this angry floodAnd swim to yonder point?' Upon the word,Accoutered as I was, I plunged inAnd bade him follow; so, indeed, he did.The torrent roared and we did buffet itWith lusty sinews; throwing it asideAnd stemming it with hearts of controversy.But ere we could arrive at the point proposed,Cæsar cried, 'Help me, Cassius, or I sink!'I, as Aeneas, our great ancestor,Did from the flames of Troy upon his shouldersThe old Anchisas bear, so, from the waves of TiberDid I the tired Cæsar; and this manIs now become a god, and Cassius isA wretched creature, and must bend his body,If Cæsar carelessly but nod on him.He had a fever, when he was in Spain,And when the fit was on him, I did markHow he did shake; 'tis true, this god did shake,His coward lips did from their color fly;And that same eye, whose bend doth awe the worldDid lose his lustre; I did hear him groan;Ay, and that tongue of his, that bade the RomansMark 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 shouldSo get the start of the majestic worldAnd bear the palm alone!Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow worldLike a Colossus; and we petty menWalk under his huge legs, and peep aboutTo find ourselves dishonorable graves.Men at some time are masters of their fates.The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,But in ourselves, that we are underlings.Brutus and Cæsar; what should be in that Cæsar?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;Weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with themBrutus will start a spirit as soon as Cæsar.Now in the name of all the gods at once,Upon what meat doth this our Cæsar feedThat he is grown so great?"

Unanimous applause followed this cunning conspiracy speech, and Jonson, Lodge and Drayton gave loud exclamations of approval.

Cæsar, with his staff, returning from the games in his honor, sees Cassius and remarks to Antonius:

"Let me have men about me that are fat;Sleek-headed men and such as sleep of nights;Yonder Cassius has a lean and hungry look;He thinks too much; such men are dangerous;And are never at heart's easeWhiles they behold a greater than themselves!"

Casca, one of the senatorial conspirators, tells Cassius that Cæsar is to be crowned king, and he replies thus, contemplating suicide:

"I know where I will wear this dagger then;Cassius from bondage will deliver Cassius;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 ironCan be retentive to the strength of spirit;But life being weary of these worldly bars,Never lacks power to dismiss itself;That part of tyranny that I do bearI can shake off at pleasure!"

Brutus, contemplating assassination, says in soliloquy:

"To speak the truth of Cæsar,I have not known when his affections swayedMore than his reason. But 'tis a common proof,That lowliness is young ambition's ladder,Whereto the climber upward turns his face;But when he once attains the upmost round,He then unto the ladder turns his back,Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degreesBy which he did ascend!"

This ingratitude of the great to the people is often recompensed by defeat and death.

After the senatorial conspirators decided that Cæsar should die, Cassius insisted wisely that Marcus Antonius should not outlive the great Julius, and said:

"Let Antony and Cæsar fall together!"

But Brutus would not consent to the death of Antony, believing that he was not dangerous to their future, yet insisting that "Cæsar must bleed for it."

"Let's kill him bodily, but not wrathfully;Let's carve him as a dish fit for the gods,Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds;And let our hearts as subtle masters do,Stir up their servants to an act of rage,And after seem to chide them!"

And yet this is the sweet-scented assassin who prates of "honor," and is sometimes known as "the noblest Roman of them all!"

Portia, the wife of Brutus, felt a strange alarm at his recent conduct, and Calphurnia, the wife of Cæsar, implored him not to attend the session of the senate, reminding him of the soothsayer's warning—"Beware the ides of March."

Yet, Cæsar threw off all fear and suspicion and said:

Back to Index Next