William Shakespeare: The History of Troilus and Cressida

ACT III. SCENE 1. Troy. PRIAM'S palace (continued)

HELEN.
Why, this is kindly done.

PANDARUS.
My niece is horribly in love with a thing you have, sweet
queen.

HELEN.
She shall have it, my lord, if it be not my Lord Paris.

PANDARUS.
He! No, she'll none of him; they two are twain.

HELEN.
Falling in, after falling out, may make them three.

PANDARUS.
Come, come. I'll hear no more of this; I'll sing you a
song now.

HELEN.
Ay, ay, prithee now. By my troth, sweet lord, thou hast a
fine forehead.

PANDARUS.
Ay, you may, you may.

HELEN.
Let thy song be love. This love will undo us all. O Cupid,
Cupid, Cupid!

PANDARUS.
Love! Ay, that it shall, i' faith.

PARIS.
Ay, good now, love, love, nothing but love.

PANDARUS.
In good troth, it begins so.

[Sings.]

Love, love, nothing but love, still love, still more!
For, oh, love's bow
Shoots buck and doe;
The shaft confounds
Not that it wounds,
But tickles still the sore.
These lovers cry, O ho, they die!
Yet that which seems the wound to kill
Doth turn O ho! to ha! ha! he!
So dying love lives still.
O ho! a while, but ha! ha! ha!
O ho! groans out for ha! ha! ha!-hey ho!

HELEN.
In love, i' faith, to the very tip of the nose.

PARIS.
He eats nothing but doves, love; and that breeds hot blood,
and hot blood begets hot thoughts, and hot thoughts beget hot
deeds, and hot deeds is love.

PANDARUS.
Is this the generation of love: hot blood, hot thoughts,
and hot deeds? Why, they are vipers. Is love a generation of
vipers? Sweet lord, who's a-field today?