y all unkindness, Cassius.
(Drinks.)

Cassius: My heart is thirsty for that noble pledge.
Fill, Lucius, till the wine o'erswell the cup;
I cannot drink too much of Brutus' love.
(Drinks.)

You ought to read that scene carefully. It will do no one any harm. It
did me a lot of good one time, when I was about to quarrel with a friend
whose heart was sick with many griefs that I knew nothing of at the
time. You never know what's behind.

Titinius and Messala come in, and proceed to discuss the situation.

Brutus: Come in, Titinius!! Welcome, good Messala.
Now sit we close about this taper here,
And call in question our necessities.

Cassius (on whom the wine seems to have taken some effect):
Portia, art thou gone?

Brutus: No more, I pray you.
Messala, I have here received letters,
That young Octavius and Mark Antony
Come down upon us with a mighty power,
Bending their expedition towards Philippi.

Messala has also letters to the same purpose, and they have likewise
news of the murder, or execution, of upwards of a hundred senators in
Rome.

Cassius: Cicero one!
Messala: Cicero is dead.

Poor Brutus! His heart had cause to be sick of many griefs that day.
Messala thinks he has news to break, and Brutus draws him out. How many
and many a man and woman, with a lump in the throat, have broken sad and
bad news since that day, and started out to do it in the same old gentle
way:

Messala: Had you your letters from your wife, my lord?

Brutus: No, Messala.

Messala: Nor nothing in your letters writ of her?

Brutus: Nothing, Messala.

Messala: That, methinks, is strange.

Brutus: Why ask you? Hear you aught of her in yours?

Maybe it strikes Messala like a flash that Brutus is in no need of any
more bad news just now, and it had better be postponed till after the
battle:

Messala: No, my lord.

Brutus: Now, as you are a Roman, tell me true.

Messala: Then like a Roman bear the truth I tell:
For certain she is dead, and by strange manner.

Brutus: Why, farewell, Portia. We must die, Messala:
With meditating that she must die once
I have the patience to endure it now.

Poor Messala comes to the scratch again