Category: Anne of Green Gables

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ACT I SCENE III Setting: The same. A street.

Thunder and lightning. Enter from opposite sides, CASCA, with his sword drawn, and CICERO.

CICERO	Good even, Casca: brought you Caesar home?
	Why are you breathless? and why stare you so?
CASCA	Are not you moved, when all the sway of earth
	Shakes like a thing unfirm? O Cicero,
	I have seen tempests, when the scolding winds
	Have rived the knotty oaks, and I have seen
	The ambitious ocean swell and rage and foam,
	To be exalted with the threatening clouds:
	But never till to–night, never till now,
	Did I go through a tempest dropping fire.	10
	Either there is a civil strife in heaven,
	Or else the world, too saucy with the gods,
	Incenses them to send destruction.
CICERO	Why, saw you any thing more wonderful?
CASCA	A common slave––you know him well by sight––	15
	Held up his left hand, which did flame and burn
	Like twenty torches join'd, and yet his hand,
	Not sensible of fire, remain'd unscorch'd.
	Besides––I ha' not since put up my sword––
	Against the Capitol I met a lion,	20
	Who glared upon me, and went surly by,
	Without annoying me: and there were drawn
	Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women,
	Transformed with their fear; who swore they saw
	Men all in fire walk up and down the streets.	25
	And yesterday the bird of night did sit
	Even at noon–day upon the market–place,
	Hooting and shrieking. When these prodigies
	Do so conjointly meet, let not men say
	These are their reasons; they are natural;'	30
	For, I believe, they are portentous things
	Unto the climate that they point upon.
CICERO	Indeed, it is a strange–disposed time:
	But men may construe things after their fashion,
	Clean from the purpose of the things themselves.	35
	Come Caesar to the Capitol to–morrow?
CASCA	He doth; for he did bid Antonius
	Send word to you he would be there to–morrow.
CICERO	Good night then, Casca: this disturbed sky	39
	Is not to walk in.
CASCA	Farewell, Cicero.
	Exit CICERO.
	Enter CASSIUS.
CASSIUS	Who's there?
CASCA	A Roman.
CASSIUS	Casca, by your voice.
CASCA	Your ear is good. Cassius, what night is this!
CASSIUS	A very pleasing night to honest men.
CASCA	Who ever knew the heavens menace so?
CASSIUS	Those that have known the earth so full of faults.
	For my part, I have walk'd about the streets,	46
	Submitting me unto the perilous night,
	And, thus unbraced, Casca, as you see,
	Have bared my bosom to the thunder–stone;
	And when the cross blue lightning seem'd to open
	The breast of heaven, I did present myself
	Even in the aim and very flash of it.
CASCA	But wherefore did you so much tempt the heavens?
	It is the part of men to fear and tremble,
	When the most mighty gods by tokens send	55
	Such dreadful heralds to astonish us.
CASSIUS	You are dull, Casca, and those sparks of life
	That should be in a Roman you do want,
	Or else you use not. You look pale and gaze
	And put on fear and cast yourself in wonder,	60
	To see the strange impatience of the heavens:
	But if you would consider the true cause
	Why all these fires, why all these gliding ghosts,
	Why birds and beasts from quality and kind,
	Why old men fool and children calculate,	65
	Why all these things change from their ordinance
	Their natures and preformed faculties
	To monstrous quality,––why, you shall find
	That heaven hath infused them with these spirits,
	To make them instruments of fear and warning	70
	Unto some monstrous state.
	Now could I, Casca, name to thee a man
	Most like this dreadful night,
	That thunders, lightens, opens graves, and roars
	As doth the lion in the Capitol,	75
	A man no mightier than thyself or me
	In personal action, yet prodigious grown
	And fearful, as these strange eruptions are.
CASCA	Tis Caesar that you mean; is it not, Cassius?
CASSIUS	Let it be who it is: for Romans now	80
	Have thews and limbs like to their ancestors;
	But, woe the while! our fathers' minds are dead,
	And we are govern'd with our mothers' spirits;
	Our yoke and sufferance show us womanish.
CASCA	Indeed, they say the senators tomorrow	85
	Mean to establish Caesar as a king;
	And he shall wear his crown by sea and land,
	In every place, save here in Italy.
CASSIUS	I know where I will wear this dagger then;
	Cassius from bondage will deliver Cassius:	90
	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 iron,
	Can be retentive to the strength of spirit;	95
	But life, being weary of these worldly bars,
	Never lacks power to dismiss itself.
	If I know this, know all the world besides,
	That part of tyranny that I do bear
	I can shake off at pleasure.
	Thunder still
CASCA	So can I:
	So every bondman in his own hand bears
	The power to cancel his captivity.
CASSIUS	And why should Caesar be a tyrant then?
	Poor man! I know he would not be a wolf,
	But that he sees the Romans are but sheep:	105
	He were no lion, were not Romans hinds.
	Those that with haste will make a mighty fire
	Begin it with weak straws: what trash is Rome,
	What rubbish and what offal, when it serves
	For the base matter to illuminate	110
	So vile a thing as Caesar! But, O grief,
	Where hast thou led me? I perhaps speak this
	Before a willing bondman; then I know
	My answer must be made. But I am arm'd,
	And dangers are to me indifferent.	115
CASCA	You speak to Casca, and to such a man
	That is no fleering tell–tale. Hold, my hand:
	Be factious for redress of all these griefs,
	And I will set this foot of mine as far
	As who goes farthest.
CASSIUS	There's a bargain made.	120
	Now know you, Casca, I have moved already
	Some certain of the noblest–minded Romans
	To undergo with me an enterprise
	Of honourable–dangerous consequence;
	And I do know, by this, they stay for me	125
	In Pompey's porch: for now, this fearful night,
	There is no stir or walking in the streets;
	And the complexion of the element
	In favour's like the work we have in hand,
	Most bloody, fiery, and most terrible.	130
CASCA	Stand close awhile, for here comes one in haste.
CASSIUS	Tis Cinna; I do know him by his gait;
	He is a friend.
	Enter CINNA.
	Cinna, where haste you so?
CINNA	To find out you. Who's that? Metellus Cimber?
CASSIUS	No, it is Casca; one incorporate	135
	To our attempts. Am I not stay'd for, Cinna?
CINNA	I am glad on 't. What a fearful night is this!
	There's two or three of us have seen strange sights.
CASSIUS	Am I not stay'd for? tell me.
CINNA	Yes, you are.
	O Cassius, if you could	140
	But win the noble Brutus to our party––
CASSIUS	Be you content: good Cinna, take this paper,
	And look you lay it in the praetor's chair,
	Where Brutus may but find it; and throw this
	In at his window; set this up with wax	145
	Upon old Brutus' statue: all this done,
	Repair to Pompey's porch, where you shall find us.
	Is Decius Brutus and Trebonius there?
CINNA	All but Metellus Cimber; and he's gone
	To seek you at your house. Well, I will hie,	150
	And so bestow these papers as you bade me.
CASSIUS	That done, repair to Pompey's theatre.
	Exit CINNA.
	Come, Casca, you and I will yet ere day
	See Brutus at his house: three parts of him
	Is ours already, and the man entire
	Upon the next encounter yields him ours.
CASCA	O, he sits high in all the people's hearts:
	And that which would appear offence in us,
	His countenance, like richest alchemy,
	Will change to virtue and to worthiness.
CASSIUS	Him and his worth and our great need of him
	You have right well conceited. Let us go,
	For it is after midnight; and ere day	163
	We will awake him and be sure of him.
	Exeunt