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But now nor Lucius nor Lavinia lives |
But in oblivion and hateful griefs. |
If Lucius live, he will requite your wrongs |
And make proud Saturnine and his emperess |
Beg at the gates like Tarquin and his queen. |
Now will I to the Goths, and raise a pow'r |
To be reveng'd on Rome and Saturnine. Exit |
SCENE II. |
Rome. TITUS' house |
A banquet. |
Enter TITUS, MARCUS, LAVINIA, and the boy YOUNG LUCIUS |
TITUS. So so, now sit; and look you eat no more |
Than will preserve just so much strength in us |
As will revenge these bitter woes of ours. |
Marcus, unknit that sorrow-wreathen knot; |
Thy niece and I, poor creatures, want our hands, |
And cannot passionate our tenfold grief |
With folded arms. This poor right hand of mine |
Is left to tyrannize upon my breast; |
Who, when my heart, all mad with misery, |
Beats in this hollow prison of my flesh, |
Then thus I thump it down. |
[To LAVINIA] Thou map of woe, that thus dost talk in signs! |
When thy poor heart beats with outrageous beating, |
Thou canst not strike it thus to make it still. |
Wound it with sighing, girl, kill it with groans; |
Or get some little knife between thy teeth |
And just against thy heart make thou a hole, |
That all the tears that thy poor eyes let fall |
May run into that sink and, soaking in, |
Drown the lamenting fool in sea-salt tears. |
MARCUS. Fie, brother, fie! Teach her not thus to lay |
Such violent hands upon her tender life. |
TITUS. How now! Has sorrow made thee dote already? |
Why, Marcus, no man should be mad but I. |
What violent hands can she lay on her life? |
Ah, wherefore dost thou urge the name of hands? |
To bid Aeneas tell the tale twice o'er |
How Troy was burnt and he made miserable? |
O, handle not the theme, to talk of hands, |
Lest we remember still that we have none. |
Fie, fie, how franticly I square my talk, |
As if we should forget we had no hands, |
If Marcus did not name the word of hands! |
Come, let's fall to; and, gentle girl, eat this: |
Here is no drink. Hark, Marcus, what she says- |
I can interpret all her martyr'd signs; |
She says she drinks no other drink but tears, |
Brew'd with her sorrow, mesh'd upon her cheeks. |
Speechless complainer, I will learn thy thought; |
In thy dumb action will I be as perfect |
As begging hermits in their holy prayers. |
Thou shalt not sigh, nor hold thy stumps to heaven, |
Nor wink, nor nod, nor kneel, nor make a sign, |
But I of these will wrest an alphabet, |
And by still practice learn to know thy meaning. |
BOY. Good grandsire, leave these bitter deep laments; |
Make my aunt merry with some pleasing tale. |
MARCUS. Alas, the tender boy, in passion mov'd, |
Doth weep to see his grandsire's heaviness. |
TITUS. Peace, tender sapling; thou art made of tears, |
And tears will quickly melt thy life away. |
[MARCUS strikes the dish with a knife] |
What dost thou strike at, Marcus, with thy knife? |
MARCUS. At that that I have kill'd, my lord- a fly. |
TITUS. Out on thee, murderer, thou kill'st my heart! |
Mine eyes are cloy'd with view of tyranny; |
A deed of death done on the innocent |
Becomes not Titus' brother. Get thee gone; |
I see thou art not for my company. |
MARCUS. Alas, my lord, I have but kill'd a fly. |
TITUS. 'But!' How if that fly had a father and mother? |
How would he hang his slender gilded wings |
And buzz lamenting doings in the air! |
Poor harmless fly, |
That with his pretty buzzing melody |
Came here to make us merry! And thou hast kill'd him. |
MARCUS. Pardon me, sir; it was a black ill-favour'd fly, |
Like to the Empress' Moor; therefore I kill'd him. |
TITUS. O, O, O! |
Then pardon me for reprehending thee, |
For thou hast done a charitable deed. |
Give me thy knife, I will insult on him, |
Flattering myself as if it were the Moor |
Come hither purposely to poison me. |
There's for thyself, and that's for Tamora. |
Ah, sirrah! |
Yet, I think, we are not brought so low |
But that between us we can kill a fly |
That comes in likeness of a coal-black Moor. |
MARCUS. Alas, poor man! grief has so wrought on him, |
He takes false shadows for true substances. |
TITUS. Come, take away. Lavinia, go with me; |
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