abler Collier.]

[Note 55: Two lines in Ff.]

[Note 51-54: This mistake of Brutus is well conceived. Cassius
was much the abler soldier, and Brutus knew it; and the
mistake grew from his consciousness of the truth of what he
thought he heard. Cassius had served as quaestor under Marcus
Crassus in his expedition against the Parthians; and, when the
army was torn all to pieces, both Crassus and his son being
killed, Cassius displayed great ability in bringing off a
remnant. He showed remarkable military power, too, in Syria.]

[Page 128]

BRUTUS. You have done that you should be sorry for. 65
There is no terror, Cassius, in your threats;
For I am arm'd so strong in honesty,
That they pass by me as the idle wind,
Which I respect not. I did send to you
For certain sums of gold, which you denied me: 70
For I can raise no money by vile means:
By heaven, I had rather coin my heart,
And drop my blood for drachmas, than to wring
From the hard hands of peasants their vile trash
By any indirection. I did send 75
To you for gold to pay my legions,
Which you denied me. Was that done like Cassius?
Should I have answer'd Caius Cassius so?
When Marcus Brutus grows so covetous,
To lock such rascal counters from his friends, 80
Be ready, gods, with all your thunderbolts,
Dash him to pieces!

[Note 75: /indirection:/ crookedness, malpractice. In _King
John_, III, i, 275-278, is an interesting passage illustrating
this use of 'indirection.' Cf. _2 Henry IV_, IV, v, 185.]

[Note 80: The omission of the conjunction 'as' before
expressions denoting result is a common usage in
Shakespeare.--/rascal counters:/ worthless money. 'Rascal' is
properly a technical term for a deer out of condition. So used
literally in _As You Like It_, III, iii, 58. 'Counters' were
disks of metal, of very small intrinsic value, much used for
reckoning. Cf. _As You Like It_, II, vii, 63; _The Winter's
Tale_, IV, iii, 38. Professor Dowden comments aptly on what we
have here: "Brutus loves virtue and despises gold; but in the
logic of facts there is an irony cruel or pathetic. Brutus
maintains a lofty position of immaculate honour above Cassius;
but ideals, and a heroic contempt for gold, will not fill the
military coffer, or pay the legions, and the poetry of noble
sentiment suddenly drops down to the prosaic complaint that
Cassius had deni