Page 2878 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

Resume that spirit when you were wont to say,
If you had been the wife of Hercules,
Six of his labours you’d have done, and saved
Your husband so much sweat. Cominius,

Droop not. Adieu. Farewell, my wife, my mother. [20]
I’ll do well yet. Thou old and true Menenius,
Thy tears are salter than a younger man’s
And venomous to thine eyes. My sometime general,

I have seen thee stern, and thou hast oft beheld
Heart-hardening spectacles. Tell these sad women [25]
’Tis fond to wail inevitable strokes,
As ’tis to laugh at ’em. My mother, you wot well

My hazards still have been your solace, and
Believe’t not lightly − though I go alone,
Like to a lonely dragon that his fen [30]
Makes feared and talked of more than seen − your son

Will or exceed the common or be caught
With cautelous baits and practice.

VOLUMNIA
My first son,
Whither wilt thou go? Take good Cominius
With thee awhile. Determine on some course [35]

More than a wild exposture to each chance
That starts i’th’way before thee.

VIRGILIA
O the gods!

COMINIUS
I’ll follow thee a month, devise with thee

Where thou shalt rest, that thou mayst hear of us
And we of thee. So, if the time thrust forth [40]
A cause for thy repeal, we shall not send
O’er the vast world to seek a single man,
And lose advantage, which doth ever cool

I’th’absence of the needer.