Page 2911 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

A pair of Tribunes that have wracked for Rome
To make coals cheap − a noble memory!

COMINIUS
I minded him how royal ’twas to pardon
When it was less expected. He replied,
It was a bare petition of a state [20]

To one whom they had punished.

MENENIUS
Very well. Could he say less?

COMINIUS
I offered to awaken his regard
For’s private friends. His answer to me was,

He could not stay to pick them in a pile [25]
Of noisome musty chaff. He said ’twas folly,
For one poor grain or two, to leave unburnt
And still to nose th’offence.

MENENIUS
For one poor grain or two!

I am one of those; his mother, wife, his child, [30]
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.

SICINIUS

Nay, pray be patient. If you refuse your aid
In this so-never-needed help, yet do not [35]
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,

Might stop our countryman.

MENENIUS
No, I’ll not meddle.