Harp on that still—but by our putting on;
And presently when you have drawn your number,
Repair to th’ Capitol.
⌈A CITIZEN⌉ We will so.
⌈ANOTHER CITIZEN⌉ Almost all
Repent in their election.
Exeunt Citizens
BRUTUS Let them go on.
This mutiny were better put in hazard
Than stay, past doubt, for greater.
If, as his nature is, he fall in rage
With their refusal, both observe and answer
The vantage of his anger.
SICINIUS To th’ Capitol, come.
We will be there before the stream o‘th’ people,
And this shall seem, as partly ’tis, their own,
Which we have goaded onward.
Exeunt
![William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition _135.jpg](https://litlife.club/books/248589/read/images/_135.jpg)
3.1 Cornetts. Enter Coriolanus, Menenius, all the gentry; Cominius, Lartius, and other Senators
CORIOLANUS
Tullus Aufidius then had made new head?
LARTIUS
He had, my lord, and that it was which caused
Our swifter composition.
CORIOLANUS
So then the Volsces stand but as at first,
Ready when time shall prompt them to make raid
Upon’s again.
COMINIUS They are worn, lord consul, so
That we shall hardly in our ages see
Their banners wave again.
CORIOLANUS (to Lartius) Saw you Aufidius?
LARTIUS
On safeguard he came to me, and did curse
Against the Volsces for they had so vilely
Yielded the town. He is retired to Antium.
CORIOLANUS
Spoke he of me?
LARTIUS
He did, my lord.
CORIOLANUS
How? What?
LARTIUS
How often he had met you sword to sword;
That of all things upon the earth he hated
Your person most; that he would pawn his fortunes
To hopeless restitution, so he might
Be called your vanquisher.
CORIOLANUS At Antium lives he?
LARTIUS At Antium.
CORIOLANUS
I wish I had a cause to seek him there,
To oppose his hatred fully. Welcome home.
Enter Sicinius and Brutus
Behold, these are the tribunes of the people,
The tongues o’th’ common mouth. I do despise them,
For they do prank them in authority
Against all noble sufferance.
SICINIUS Pass no further.
CORIOLANUS Ha, what is that?
BRUTUS
It will be dangerous to go on. No further.
CORIOLANUS What makes this change?
MENENIUS The matter?
COMINIUS
Hath he not passed the noble and the common?
BRUTUS
Cominius, no.
CORIOLANUS Have I had children’s voices?
⌈FIRST⌉ SENATOR
Tribunes, give way. He shall to th’ market-place.
BRUTUS
The people are incensed against him.
SICINIUS
Stop,
Or all will fall in broil.
CORIOLANUS Are these your herd?
Must these have voices, that can yield them now
And straight disclaim their tongues? What are your
offices?
You being their mouths, why rule you not their
teeth?
Have you not set them on?
MENENIUS
Be calm, be calm.
CORIOLANUS
It is a purposed thing, and grows by plot
To curb the will of the nobility.
Suffer’t, and live with such as cannot rule
Nor ever will be ruled.
BRUTUS
Call’t not a plot.
The people cry you mocked them, and of late
When corn was given them gratis, you repined,
Scandalled the suppliants for the people, called them
Time-pleasers, flatterers, foes to nobleness.
CORIOLANUS
Why, this was known before.
BRUTUS
Not to them all.
CORIOLANUS
Have you informed them sithence?
BRUTUS
How, I inform them?
⌈CORIOLANUS⌉
You are like to do such business.
BRUTUS Not unlike
Each way to better yours.
CORIOLANUS
Why then should I be consul? By yon clouds,
Let me deserve so ill as you, and make me
Your fellow tribune.
SICINIUS
You show too much of that
For which the people stir. If you will pass
To where you are bound, you must enquire your way,
Which you are out of, with a gentler spirit,
Or never be so noble as a consul,
Nor yoke with him for tribune.
MENENIUS
Let’s be calm.
COMINIUS
The people are abused, set on. This palt‘ring
Becomes not Rome, nor has Coriolanus
Deserved this so dishonoured rub, laid falsely
I’th’ plain way of his merit.
CORIOLANUS
Tell me of corn?
This was my speech, and I will speak’t again.
MENENIUS Not now, not now.
⌈FIRST⌉ SENATOR Not in this heat, sir, now.
CORIOLANUS Now as I live,
I will. My nobler friends, I crave their pardons.
For the mutable rank-scented meinie,
Let them regard me, as I do not flatter,
And therein behold themselves. I say again,
In soothing them we nourish ’gainst our Senate
The cockle of rebellion, insolence, sedition,
Which we ourselves have ploughed for, sowed, and
scattered
By mingling them with us, the honoured number
Who lack not virtue, no, nor power, but that
Which they have given to beggars.
MENENIUS
Well, no more.
⌈FIRST⌉ SENATOR
No more words, we beseech you.
CORIOLANUS How, no more?
As for my country I have shed my blood,
Not fearing outward force, so shall my lungs
Coin words till their decay against those measles
Which we disdain should tetter us, yet sought
The very way to catch them.
BRUTUS
You speak o’th’ people as if you were a god
To punish, not a man of their infirmity.
SICINIUS
’Twere well we let the people know’t.
MENENIUS
What, what, his choler?
CORIOLANUS
Choler? Were I as patient as the midnight sleep,