Hath not a tomb so evident as a chair,

T' extol what it hath done.8

One fire drives out one fire; 9 one nail, one nail;

Rights by rights fouler, strengths by strengths, do fail.10
Come, let's away. — When, Caius, Rome is thine,

Thou'rt poor'st of all; then shortly art thou mine. [Exeunt.

hatred, will become as intolerable to the Volscians after he has taken Rome as he did to the Romans after he had taken Corioli.

8 Shakespeare repeatedly uses evident in the sense of certain or inevitable. So in the next scene: "We must find an evident calamity, though we had our wish, which side should win." A chair refers to the sella curulis, the distinctive official seat of the higher Roman magistracies. "A chair, to extol" is a chair that extols; just as, a little before, “a merit, to choke" is a merit that chokes. The speaker's argument is, that Coriolanus, by his arrogance and tyranny in peace, will surely and speedily kill the popularity he has gained in war. And so the meaning here is, that power, joined to a haughty, domineering temper, and loved and gloried in for its own sake, hath no grave so certain, or so imminent, as a chair of state bestowed in honour and extolment of its deeds. Or, to put the matter in a concrete form, let Coriolanus, with his habits of military prerogative, and of lording it over all about him, be once advanced to a place of civil authority, and he will soon become an object of public hatred; so that the very seat which rewards and blazons his exploits will be sure to prove his ruin and the tomb of his power. See Critical Notes.

9 That is, heat expels heat; alluding to the old notion of curing a burn by holding the burnt place up to the fire. Shakespeare has the same allusion repeatedly. So in Julius Cæsar, iii. 1: As fire drives out fire, so pity pity." See, also, vol. xiii. page 134, note 5.

10 The meaning of this line, expressed in full, probably is, that the better rights succumb to the worse, and the nobler strengths to the meaner; the sense of fail being anticipated in the first clause, and that of fouler continued over the second. Here, as elsewhere, Aufidius is fully conscious of the foulness of his purposes. The only thing he cares for is to get a sure twist on his antagonist. See Critical Notes.

Enter MENENIUS, COMINIUS, SICINIUS, BRUTUS, and others. Men. No, I'll not go: you hear what he hath said Which was sometime his general; who loved him In a most dear particular. He call'd me father: But what o' that? Go, you that banish'd him ; A mile before his tent fall down, and knee The way into his mercy: nay, if he coy'd To hear 2 Cominius speak, I'll keep at home. Com. He would not seem to know me.

1

Men.
Do you hear?
Com. Yet one time he did call me by my name :
I urged our old acquaintance, and the drops

That we have bled together. Coriolanus
He would not answer to; forbade all names;

He was a kind of nothing, titleless,

Till he had forged himself a name o' the fire
Of burning Rome.

Men.

Why, so; you've made good work!

A pair of tribunes that have wreck'd fair Rome
To make coals cheap,· a noble memory ! 3

1 To knee one's way is to go on one's knees, as to foot one's way is to go on one's feet. So, some one having remarked that Lord Malmesbury had been a long time in getting to Paris, Burke is said to have replied, "No wonder; every step he took was on his knees."

2 Coy'd to hear is the same as was coy of hearing; that is, was distant and reserved, -was shy and scrupulous of lending his ear.

3 The meaning is, "who have erected a noble memorial or monument for themselves by wrecking fair Rome in order to cheapen the price of fuel. We have had memory just so before. See page 288, note 3.

Com. I minded him how royal 'twas to pardon When it was least expected: he replied,

It was a rare petition of a State

To one whom they had punish'd.

Men..

Could he say less?

Very well:

Com. I offer'd.to awaken his regard
For's private friends: his answer to me was,
He could not stay to pick them in a pile
Of noisome musty chaff: he said 'twas folly,
For one poor grain or two, to leave't unburnt,
And still to nose th' offence.

Men.

For one poor grain or two!

I'm one of those; his mother, wife, his child,
And this brave fellow too, we are the grains :
You are the musty chaff; and you are smelt
Above the Moon: we must be burnt for you.

Sic. Nay, pray, be patient: if you refuse your aid
In this so never-needed help, yet do not

Upbraid's with our distress. But, sure, if you

Would be your country's pleader, your good tongue,
More than the instant army we can make,4

Might stop our countryman.

Men.

No, I'll not meddle.

What should I do?

Sic. Pray you now, go to him.

Men.

Bru. Only make trial what your love can do

For Rome, towards Marcius.

Men.

Well, and say that Marcius

Return me, as Cominius is return'd,

Unheard; what then? or not unheard, but as

A discontented friend, grief-shot with his
Unkindness?

4 That is, the army we can levy on the instant, or at present.

Sic.

Say't be so, yet your good will

Must have that thanks from Rome, after the measure

As

you intended well.5

Men.

I'll undertake't:

I think he'll hear me. Yet, to bite his lip

And hum at good Cominius, much unhearts me.
He was not taken well; he had not dined:
The veins unfill'd, our blood is cold, and then
We pout upon the morning, are unapt

To give or to forgive; but, when we've stuff'd
These pipes and these conveyances of our blood
With wine and feeding, we have suppler souls
Than in our priest-like fasts: therefore I'll watch him
Till he be dieted to my request,

And then I'll set upon him.

Bru. You know the very road into his kindness, And cannot lose your way.

Men.

Good faith, I'll prove him.

[Exit.

Speed how it will, you shall ere long have knowledge
Of my success.6

8

Not?

Com. I tell you, he does sit in gold,7 his eye
Red as 'twould burn Rome; and his injury
The jailer to his pity. I kneel'd before him;
'Twas very faintly he said Rise; dismiss'd me
Thus, with his speechless hand: what he would do,
He sent in writing after me, what he would not;

5 "Such gratitude as will accord with the measure of your good intentions." After often means according to.

6 Success, again, in its Latin sense of result. See page 196, note 26.

7 This is well explained from North's Plutarch: He was set in his

chair of state, with a marvellous and unspeakable majesty."

8 His remembrance of the wrong done him kept his pity under lock and key.

Bound with an oath to yield to his conditions: 9

So that all hope is vain,

Unless in's noble mother and his wife ;

Who, as I hear, mean to solicit him

For mercy to his country. Therefore let's hence,

And with our fair entreaties haste them on.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. - An Outpost of the Volscian Camp before Rome. The Sentinels at their Stations.

Enter to them MENENIUS.

I Sen. Stay whence are you?

:

2 Sen. Stand, and go back.

Men. You guard like men; 'tis well: but, by your leave,

I am an officer of State, and come

To speak with Coriolanus.

I Sen.

Men.

From whence?

From Rome.

I Sen. You may not pass, you must return: our general Will no more hear from thence.

2 Sen. You'll see your Rome embraced with fire, before You'll speak with Coriolanus.

Men.

Good my friends,

If you have heard your general talk of Rome,
And of his friends there, it is lots to blanks 1

9 A passage hard to be understood at the best, and still more obscure as commonly pointed, thus: "What he would do, he sent in writing after me; what he would not, bound with an oath, to yield to his conditions" which is severing "what he would do" from "bound with an oath," and "what he would not from "he sent in writing after me." As here given the sense may be rendered thus: "He sent in writing after me both what he would do and what he would not; binding the whole with an oath that we should yield to his conditions." See Critical Notes.

1 Lots to blanks is chances to nothing.