CORIOLANUS.
Menenius ever, ever.
HERALD.
Give way there, and go on!
CORIOLANUS.
[To Volumnia and Virgilia.] Your hand, and yours.
Ere in our own house I do shade my head,
The good patricians must be visited,
From whom I have received not only greetings,
But with them change of honours.
VOLUMNIA.
I have lived
To see inherited my very wishes
And the buildings of my fancy. Only
There’s one thing wanting, which I doubt not but
Our Rome will cast upon thee.
CORIOLANUS.
Know, good mother,
I had rather be their servant in my way
Than sway with them in theirs.
COMINIUS.
On, to the Capitol.
[Flourish of cornets. Exeunt in state, as before.]
Brutus and Sicinius come forward.
BRUTUS.
All tongues speak of him, and the bleared sights
Are spectacled to see him. Your prattling nurse
Into a rapture lets her baby cry
While she chats him. The kitchen malkin pins
Her richest lockram ’bout her reechy neck,
Clamb’ring the walls to eye him. Stalls, bulks, windows
Are smothered up, leads filled, and ridges horsed
With variable complexions, all agreeing
In earnestness to see him. Seld-shown flamens
Do press among the popular throngs and puff
To win a vulgar station. Our veiled dames
Commit the war of white and damask in
Their nicely-gauded cheeks to th’ wanton spoil
Of Phoebus’ burning kisses. Such a pother,
As if that whatsoever god who leads him
Were slyly crept into his human powers
And gave him graceful posture.
SICINIUS.
On the sudden
I warrant him consul.