AARON Sooner this sword shall plough thy bowels up.
[Draws his sword and takes the child.]
Stay, murderous villains, will you kill your brother?
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Now, by the burning tapers of the sky
That shone so brightly when this boy was got,
He dies upon my scimitar’s sharp point
That touches this, my first-born son and heir.
I tell you, younglings, not Enceladus
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With all his threatening band of Typhon’s brood,
Nor great Alcides, nor the god of war,
Shall seize this prey out of his father’s hands.
What, what, ye sanguine, shallow-hearted boys,
Ye white-limed walls, ye alehouse painted signs!
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Coal-black is better than another hue
In that it scorns to bear another hue;
For all the water in the ocean
Can never turn the swan’s black legs to white,
Although she lave them hourly in the flood.
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Tell the empress from me I am of age
To keep mine own, excuse it how she can.
DEMETRIUS Wilt thou betray thy noble mistress thus?
AARON My mistress is my mistress, this myself,
The vigour and the picture of my youth.
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This before all the world do I prefer,
This maugre all the world will I keep safe,
Or some of you shall smoke for it in Rome.
DEMETRIUS By this our mother is for ever shamed.
CHIRON Rome will despise her for this foul escape.
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NURSE The emperor in his rage will doom her death.
CHIRON I blush to think upon this ignomy.
AARON Why, there’s the privilege your beauty bears.
Fie, treacherous hue, that will betray with blushing
The close enacts and counsels of thy heart.
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Here’s a young lad framed of another leer:
Look how the black slave smiles upon the father,
As who should say, ‘Old lad, I am thine own.’
He is your brother, lords, sensibly fed
Of that self blood that first gave life to you,
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And from that womb where you imprisoned were
He is enfranchised and come to light.
Nay, he is your brother by the surer side,
Although my seal be stamped in his face.
NURSE Aaron, what shall I say unto the empress?
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DEMETRIUS Advise thee, Aaron, what is to be done
And we will all subscribe to thy advice.
Save thou the child, so we may all be safe.
AARON Then sit we down and let us all consult.
My son and I will have the wind of you.
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Keep there. [They sit.]
Now talk at pleasure of your safety.
DEMETRIUS [to the Nurse]
How many women saw this child of his?
AARON Why, so, brave lords, when we join in league
I am a lamb – but if you brave the Moor,
The chafed boar, the mountain lioness,
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The ocean, swells not so as Aaron storms.
[to the Nurse] But say again, how many saw the child?
NURSE Cornelia the midwife, and myself,
And no one else but the delivered empress.
AARON The empress, the midwife and yourself.
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Two may keep counsel when the third’s away.
Go to the empress, tell her this I said: [He kills her.]
‘Wheak, wheak!’ – so cries a pig prepared to the spit. [All stand up.]
DEMETRIUS
What mean’st thou, Aaron? Wherefore didst thou
this?
AARON O Lord, sir, ’tis a deed of policy:
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Shall she live to betray this guilt of ours?
A long-tongued, babbling gossip? No, lords, no.
And now be it known to you, my full intent.
Not far one Muly lives, my countryman:
His wife but yesternight was brought to bed;
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His child is like to her, fair as you are.
Go pack with him and give the mother gold,
And tell them both the circumstance of all,
And how by this their child shall be advanced
And be received for the emperor’s heir,
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And substituted in the place of mine,
To calm this tempest whirling in the court;
And let the emperor dandle him for his own.
Hark ye, lords, you see I have given her physic,
And you must needs bestow her funeral;
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The fields are near and you are gallant grooms.
This done, see that you take no longer days,
But send the midwife presently to me.
The midwife and the nurse well made away,
Then let the ladies tattle what they please.
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CHIRON Aaron, I see thou wilt not trust the air With secrets.
DEMETRIUS For this care of Tamora,
Herself and hers are highly bound to thee.
Exeunt Chiron and Demetrius, with the Nurse’s body.
AARON Now to the Goths, as swift as swallow flies,
There to dispose this treasure in mine arms
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And secretly to greet the empress’ friends.
Come on, you thick-lipped slave, I’ll bear you hence,
For it is you that puts us to our shifts.
I’ll make you feed on berries and on roots,
And fat on curds and whey, and suck the goat,
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And cabin in a cave, and bring you up
To be a warrior and command a camp. Exit.
4.3 Enter TITUS, OLD MARCUS, YOUNG LUCIUS, and other gentlemen, Marcus’ son PUBLIUS; kinsmen of the Andronici, CAIUS and SEMPRONIUS with bows; and Titus bears the arrows with letters on the ends of them.
TITUS Come, Marcus, come; kinsmen, this is the way.
Sir Boy, let me see your archery.
Look ye draw home enough, and ’tis there straight.
Terras Astraea reliquit: be you remembered, Marcus,
She’s gone, she’s fled. Sirs, take you to your tools.
5
You, cousins, shall go sound the ocean
And cast your nets:
Happily you may catch her in the sea;
Yet there’s as little justice as at land.
No, Publius and Sempronius, you must do it,
10
’Tis you must dig with mattock and with spade,
And pierce the inmost centre of the earth.
Then, when you come to Pluto’s region,
I pray you deliver him this petition.
Tell him it is for justice and for aid,
15
And that it comes from old Andronicus,
Shaken with sorrows in ungrateful Rome.
Ah, Rome! Well, well, I made thee miserable
What time I threw the people’s suffrages
On him that thus doth tyrannize o’er me.
20
Go, get you gone, and pray be careful all,
And leave you not a man-of-war unsearched:
This wicked emperor may have shipped her hence,
And, kinsmen, then we may go pipe for justice.
MARCUS O Publius, is not this a heavy case,
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To see thy noble uncle thus distract?
PUBLIUS Therefore, my lords, it highly us concerns
By day and night t’attend him carefully
And feed his humour kindly as we may,
Till time beget some careful remedy.
30
MARCUS Kinsmen, his sorrows are past rem
edy,
But let us live in hope that Lucius will
Join with the Goths and with revengeful war
Take wreak on Rome for this ingratitude,
And vengeance on the traitor Saturnine.
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TITUS Publius, how now? How now, my masters?
What, have you met with her?
PUBLIUS No, my good lord, but Pluto sends you word
If you will have Revenge from hell, you shall.
Marry, for Justice, she is so employed,
40
He thinks with Jove in heaven or somewhere else,
So that perforce you must needs stay a time.
TITUS He doth me wrong to feed me with delays.
I’ll dive into the burning lake below
And pull her out of Acheron by the heels.
45
MARCUS, we are but shrubs, no cedars we,
No big-boned men framed of the Cyclops’ size,
But metal, Marcus, steel to the very back,
Yet wrung with wrongs more than our backs can bear.
And sith there’s no justice in earth nor hell,
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We will solicit heaven and move the gods
To send down Justice for to wreak our wrongs.
Come, to this gear. You are a good archer, Marcus:
[He gives them the arrows.]
‘Ad Jovem’, that’s for you; here, ‘ad Apollinem’;
‘Ad Martem’, that’s for myself;
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Here, boy, ‘to Pallas’; here, ‘to Mercury’;
‘To Saturn’, Caius – not to Saturnine:
You were as good to shoot against the wind.
To it, boy; Marcus, loose when I bid.
Of my word, I have written to effect:
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There’s not a god left unsolicited.
MARCUS Kinsmen, shoot all your shafts into the court;
We will afflict the emperor in his pride.
TITUS Now, masters, draw. [They shoot.]
O, well said, Lucius,
Good boy: in Virgo’s lap! Give it Pallas.
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MARCUS My lord, I aimed a mile beyond the moon:
Your letter is with Jupiter by this.
TITUS Ha, ha! Publius, Publius, what hast thou done?
See, see, thou hast shot off one of Taurus’ horns.
MARCUS
This was the sport, my lord: when Publius shot,
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The Bull, being galled, gave Aries such a knock
That down fell both the Ram’s horns in the court,
And who should find them but the empress’ villain!
She laughed and told the Moor he should not choose
But give them to his master for a present.
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TITUS
Why, there it goes; God give his lordship joy.
Enter the Clown with a basket and two pigeons in it.
News, news, from heaven! Marcus, the post is come.
Sirrah, what tidings? Have you any letters?
Shall I have justice? What says Jupiter?
CLOWN Ho, the gibbet-maker? He says that he hath
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taken them down again, for the man must not be
hanged till the next week.
TITUS But what says Jupiter, I ask thee?
CLOWN
Alas, sir, I know not Jubiter, I never drank with him in all my life.
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TITUS Why, villain, art not thou the carrier?
CLOWN Ay, of my pigeons, sir – nothing else.
TITUS Why, didst thou not come from heaven?
CLOWN From heaven? Alas, sir, I never came there. God
forbid I should be so bold to press to heaven in my
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young days. Why, I am going with my pigeons to the
tribunal plebs to take up a matter of brawl betwixt my
uncle and one of the emperal’s men.
MARCUS [to Titus] Why, sir, that is as fit as can be to
serve for your oration, and let him deliver the pigeons
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to the emperor from you.
TITUS Tell me, can you deliver an oration to the
emperor with a grace?
CLOWN Nay, truly, sir, I could never say grace in all
my life.
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TITUS Sirrah, come hither; make no more ado,
But give your pigeons to the emperor.
By me thou shalt have justice at his hands.
Hold, hold – meanwhile here’s money for thy charges.
Give me pen and ink. [Writes.]
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Sirrah, can you with a grace deliver up a supplication?
CLOWN Ay, sir.
TITUS [Gives letter.] Then here is a supplication for
you, and when you come to him, at the first approach
you must kneel, then kiss his foot, then deliver up your
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pigeons, and then look for your reward. I’ll be at hand,
sir; see you do it bravely.
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 501