Brutus: Farewell to you; and you; and you, Volumnius.
Strato, thou hast been all this while asleep;
Farewell to thee too, Strato! Countrymen,
My heart doth joy that yet in all my life
I found so man but he was true to me.
Ye gods! but it's grand. I wish to our God that I could say as
much--or that man or woman [n]ever found me untrue. Could Antony say
as much, afterwards, in Egypt--or Octavius! with Antony then on his
mind? Even Antony's last man and servant failed him in the end,
killing himself rather than kill his master. But Strato---
There are more alarums and voices calling to them to run. They urge
Brutus again, and he tells them to go and he'll follow. They all run
except Strato, who hesitates.
Brutus: I prithee, Strato, stay thou by thy lord:
Thou art a fellow of a good respect;
Thy life hath had some snatch of honour in it
Hold then my sword, and turn away thy face,
While I do run upon it. Wilt thou, Strato?
Strato: Give me your hand first: fare you well, my lord.
Brutus: Farewell, good Strato. Caesar, now be still:
I kill'd not thee with half so good a will.
Brutus, good night!
I like Shakespeare's servants. They seem to show that he sprang from
servants or common people rather than from lords and masters, for he
deals with them very gently. It must be understood that servants,
bond and free, were born unto the same house and served it for
generations; and so down to modern England, where the old nurse and
the tottering old gardener often nursed and played with "Master
Will," when his father, the dead and gone old squire, was a young
man.
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