Page:Julius Caesar (1919) Yale.djvu/25

Julius Cæsar, I. ii  have had it. Then he offered it to him again; then he put it by again; but, to my thinking, he was very loath to lay his fingers off it. And then he offered it the third time; he put it the third time by; and still as he refused it the rabblement shouted and clapped their chopped hands, and threw up their sweaty night-caps, and uttered such a deal of stinking breath because Cæsar refused the crown, that it had almost choked Cæsar; for he swounded and fell down at it: and for mine own part, I durst not laugh, for fear of opening my lips and receiving the bad air.

Cas. But soft, I pray you: what! did Cæsar swound?

Casca. He fell down in the market-place, and foamed at mouth, and was speechless.

Bru. 'Tis very like: he hath the falling-sickness.

Cas. No, Cæsar hath it not; but you, and I, And honest Casca, we have the falling-sickness.

Casca. I know not what you mean by that; but I am sure Cæsar fell down. If the tag-rag people did not clap him and hiss him, according as he pleased and displeased them, as they use to do the players in the theatre, I am no true man.

Bru. What said he, when he came unto himself?

Casca. Marry, before he fell down, when he perceiv'd the common herd was glad he refused the crown, he plucked me ope his doublet and offered them his throat to cut. An I had been a  244 still: always, ever 245 chopped: chapped, callous 249 swounded: fainted 252 soft: stop, wait 255 like: likely falling-sickness: epilepsy 259 tag-rag: beggarly, common 262 true: honest 267 me: expletive 'dative of interest' ope: open doublet: Elizabethan jacket 268 An: if 