PATROCLUS.
O, then, beware:
Those wounds heal ill that men do give themselves;
Omission to do what is necessary
Seals a commission to a blank of danger;
And danger, like an ague, subtly taints
Even then when they sit idly in the sun.
ACHILLES.
Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus.
I’ll send the fool to Ajax, and desire him
T’invite the Trojan lords, after the combat,
To see us here unarm’d. I have a woman’s longing,
An appetite that I am sick withal,
To see great Hector in his weeds of peace;
To talk with him, and to behold his visage,
Even to my full of view.
Enter Thersites.
A labour sav’d!
THERSITES.
A wonder!
ACHILLES.
What?
THERSITES.
Ajax goes up and down the field asking for himself.
ACHILLES.
How so?
THERSITES.
He must fight singly tomorrow with Hector, and is so prophetically proud of an heroical cudgelling that he raves in saying nothing.
ACHILLES.
How can that be?