adminCharles Dube
In the previous episode we saw the great bond of love between Brutus and his wife Portia. Brutus stops Portia from kneeling before him begging to know the secret behind his unusual behaviour. Portia says she should not have any need to kneel if Brutus was gentle.
She asks him if she is not expected to know his secrets in the bond of marriage. She asks, “Am I yourself but, as it were, in sort or limitation? To keep with you at meals, comfort your bed, and talk to you sometimes? Dwell I in the suburbs of your good pleasure? If it be no more, Portia is Brutus’ harlot, not his wife”.
In simpler terms she asks Brutus if she is his other half only to a limited extent, like being with him only at meals, comfort him in his bed and talk to him sometimes? She asks whether she lives only in the outskirts of his heart.
She declares that if she is no more than this, then she is Brutus’ prostitute, not his wife.
These are stinging words and Brutus reacts to them declaring that Portia is his true and honourable wife, dear to him as blood that runs through his sad heart. Portia says if that is true then she deserves to know his secrets. She accepts that she is a woman, but she is a woman whom the mighty Lord Brutus took as his wife. She feels she deserves better treatment because she is a woman of great repute, since she is Cato’s daughter. She asks if Brutus thinks she is not as strong as any other woman, having such a father and such a husband.
In other words Portia claims she has this royalty of nature. She is no ordinary woman. She insists Brutus should tell her all his secrets and she shall not reveal them to anyone. She proves she is worthy to hear the plans of her husband, Brutus. “I have made strong proof of my constancy; giving myself a voluntary wound, here in the thigh can I bear that with patience, and not my husband’s secrets?” She states that she has proved her worth by giving herself a wound in the thigh and asks if Brutus thinks she can endure that patiently and fail to keep her husband’s secrets?
This proves beyond doubt that Portia is strong-willed and is not just an ordinary woman who can be pushed around like the helpless Calpurnia in the presence of her husband Julius Caesar. Portia cuts herself in the thigh and suffers the pain of both the wound and the infection it causes in silence. Portia’s show of bravery and self-control convinces Brutus that she is “stronger than her sex” and he agrees to confide in her only to be interrupted by other conspirators before he gets a chance to do so.
But all is not done yet. We find Portia pacing up and down in her house unsettled by what is happening at the Senate House where Brutus and the other conspirators have a suit to present to Caesar. She appeals to constancy to be by her side so that she might keep Brutus’ secret. She claims to have a man’s mind, but a woman’s lack of restraint.
Portia is unsettled almost giving out the secret as asks Lucius about the noise only sensed by herself. Portia asks the Soothsayer if he knows of any harm intended towards Caesar but the latter says that he does not know of any.
Portia cries about the weakness of a woman’s heart and prays for the success of Brutus in his enterprise. She thinks Lucius could have had what she said for Brutus has a suit for Caesar which he cannot grant. Artemidorus asks Caesar to read his schedule first for it affects Caesar closer than anything else.
That is where Artemidorus loses it to save Caesar for Caesar as a public leader must attend to matters of the State first before personal issues. As the conspirators are pressing against Caesar Popilius says, “I wish your enterprise to-day may thrive” sending panic to Cassius.
Cassius thinks their mission has been uncovered before it is carried out as Cassius explains to Brutus that Popilius wishes that their business might thrive and he fears their conspiracy has been found out.
When Metellus Cimber presents a petition to Caesar to pardon his brother who has been banished Caesar is firm in his decision stating that he would not be moved by anything not even bowings and humiliating salutations.
Caesar is furious with Metellus’ bending and praying and flattery for his brothers such that he spurns him like a dog out of his way. Caesar declares that he cannot be moved if he were as Brutus or Cassius but he is constant as the northern star and he says he can show it a little that he was constant in saying Cimber should be banished and he remains so.
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