Enter LUCIUS, with his Sword drawn. Luc. O, noble father, you lament in vain; Tit. Ah, Lucius, for thy brothers let me plead : Grave tribunes, once more I entreat of you, Luc. My gracious lord, no tribune hears you speak, Tit. Why, 'tis no matter, man: if they did hear, They would not mark me; or, if they did mark, All bootless to them, they'd not pity me. Therefore I tell my sorrows to the stones; Who, though they cannot answer my distress, Yet in some sort they're better than the tribunes, For that they will not intercept my tale: When I do weep, they humbly at my feet Receive my tears, and seem to weep with me; And, were they but attired in grave weeds, Rome could afford no tribune like to these. A stone is soft as wax, tribunes more hard than stones : A stone is silent, and offendeth not; And tribunes with their tongues doom men to death. Tit. O happy man! they have befriended thee. From these devourers to be banished? But who comes with our brother Marcus here? Enter MARCUS and LAVINIA. Mar. Titus, prepare thy noble eyes to weep; Or, if not so, thy noble heart to break; I bring consuming sorrow to thine age. Tit. Will it consume me? let me see it then. Tit. Why, Marcus, so she is. Luc. Ah me! this object kills me! Tit. Faint-hearted boy, arise, and look her : upon Speak, my Lavinia, what accursed hand Luc. Speak, gentle sister, who hath martyr'd thee? Luc. O, say thou for her, who hath done this deed? Mar. O, thus, I found her, straying in the park, Seeking to hide herself; as doth the deer, That hath receiv'd some unrecuring wound. Tit. It was my deer; and he, that wounded her, Hath hurt me more, than had he kill'd me dead: For now I stand as one upon a rock, Environ'd with a wilderness of sea; Who marks the waxing tide grow wave by wave, Thou hast no hands, to wipe away thy tears; Mar. Perchance, she weeps because they kill'd her husband: Perchance, because she knows them innocent. Or make some sign how I may do thee ease: Looking all downwards, to behold our cheeks What shall we do? let us, that have our tongues, To make us wonder'd at in time to come. Luc. Sweet father, cease your tears; for, at your See, how grief, my wretched sister sobs and weeps. Mar. Patience, dear niece:-good Titus, dry thine eyes, Tit. Ah, Marcus, Marcus! brother, well I wot, Thy napkin cannot drink a tear of mine, For thou, poor man, hast drown'd it with thine own. Luc. Ab, my Lavinia, I will wipe thy cheeks. Tit. Mark, Marcus, mark! I understand her signs : Had she a tongue to speak, now would she That to her brother which I said to thee; His napkin, with his true tears all bewet, Can do no service on her sorrowful cheeks, O, what a sympathy of woe is this? As far from help as limbo is from bliss!" Enter AARON, say Aar. Titus Andronicus, my lord the emperor Sends thee this word,-That, if thou love thy sons, 7 as limbo is from bliss!] The Limbus patrum, as it was called, is a place that the schoolmen supposed to be in the neighbourhood of hell, where the souls of the patriarchs were detained, and those good men who died before our Saviour's resurrection. Milton gives the name of Limbo to his Paradise of Fools, REED. Let Marcus, Lucius, or thyself old Titus, That gives sweet tidings of the sun's uprise? Good Aaron, wilt thou help to chop it off? Luc. Stay, father: for that noble hand of thine, And rear'd aloft the bloody battle-axe, Aar. Nay, come agree, whose hand shall go along, For fear they die before their pardon come. Mar. My hand shall go. By heaven, it shall not go. Tit. Sirs, strive no more; such wither'd herbs as these Are meet for plucking up, and therefore mine. Mar. And, for our father's sake, and mother's care, Now let me show a brother's love to thee. |