SCENE I. Rome. A street.
Enter Flavius, Marullus, and certain Commoners.
FLAVIUS. Hence, home, you idle creatures, get you home. Is this a
holiday? What, know you not, Being mechanical, you ought not walk
Upon a laboring day without the sign Of your profession? Speak, what
trade art thou? FIRST COMMONER. Why, sir, a carpenter. MARULLUS.
Where is thy leather apron and thy rule? What dost thou with thy best
apparel on? You, sir, what trade are you? SECOND COMMONER. Truly,
sir, in respect of a fine workman, I am but, as you would say, a cobbler.
MARULLUS. But what trade art thou? Answer me directly. SECOND
COMMONER. A trade, sir, that, I hope, I may use with a safe conscience,
which is indeed, sir, a mender of bad soles. MARULLUS. What trade,
thou knave? Thou naughty knave, what trade? SECOND COMMONER.
Nay, I beseech you, sir, be not out with me; yet, if you be out, sir, I can
mend you. MARULLUS. What mean\'st thou by that? Mend me, thou
saucy fellow! SECOND COMMONER. Why, sir, cobble you. FLAVIUS.
Thou art a cobbler, art thou? SECOND COMMONER. Truly, Sir, all that I
live by is with the awl; I meddle with no tradesman\'s matters, nor women\'s
matters, but with awl. I am indeed, sir, a surgeon to old shoes; when they
are in great danger, I recover them. As proper men as ever trod upon neat\'s
leather have gone upon my handiwork. FLAVIUS. But wherefore art not
in thy shop today? Why dost thou lead these men about the streets?
SECOND COMMONER. Truly, sir, to wear out their shoes to get myself
into more work. But indeed, sir, we make holiday to see Caesar and to
rejoice in his triumph. MARULLUS. Wherefore rejoice? What conquest
brings he home? What tributaries follow him to Rome To grace in captive
bonds his chariot wheels? You blocks, you stones, you worse than
senseless things! O you hard hearts, you cruel men of Rome, Knew you
not Pompey? Many a time and oft Have you climb\'d up to walls and
battlements, To towers and windows, yea, to chimney tops, Your infants in
your arms, and there have sat The livelong day with patient expectation To
see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome.