Brut. The whole root lurks under a single trunk.
Cass. Think’st thou so? I shall say no more. Thy will
be done: we all follow thy guidance.[43]
The chorus sings the glories of those who, like Harmodius with his “amiculus,” destroy the tyrants, and the risks these tyrants run.
In the third act Calpurnia, flying in panic to her chamber, is met by her nurse, to whom she discloses the cause of her distress. She has dreamed that Caesar lies dead in her arms covered with blood, and stabbed with many wounds. The nurse points out the vanity of dreams and the unlikelihood of any attempt against one so great and beneficent, whose clemency has changed even foes to friends. Calpurnia, only half comforted, rejoins that she will at least beseech him to remain at home that day, and the chorus prays that misfortune may be averted.
In the fourth act Calpurnia tries her powers of persuasion. To her passionate appeal, her husband answers:
What? Dost thou ask me to trust thy dreams?
Cal. No; but to concede something to my fear.
Caes. But that fear of thine rests on dreams alone.
Cal. Assume it to be vain; grant something to thy wife.[44]