LUCIUS Bring down the devil; for he must not die
So sweet a death as hanging presently.
AARON If there be devils, would I were a devil,
To live and burn in everlasting fire,
So I might have your company in hell,
But to torment you with my bitter tongue!
LUCIUS Sirs, stop his mouth, and let him speak no more.
Enter a Goth
Third Goth My lord, there is a messenger from Rome
Desires to be admitted to your presence.
LUCIUS Let him come near.
Enter AEMILIUS
Welcome, AEmilius what’s the news from Rome?
AEMILIUS Lord Lucius, and you princes of the Goths,
The Roman emperor greets you all by me;
And, for he understands you are in arms,
He craves a parley at your father’s house,
Willing you to demand your hostages,
And they shall be immediately deliver’d.
First Goth What says our general?
LUCIUS AEmilius, let the emperor give his pledges
Unto my father and my uncle Marcus,
And we will come. March away.
Exeunt
Scene 2
Rome. Before TITUS’s house.
Enter TAMORA, DEMETRIUS, and CHIRON, disguised
TAMORA Thus, in this strange and sad habiliment,
I will encounter with Andronicus,
And say I am Revenge, sent from below
To join with him and right his heinous wrongs.
Knock at his study, where, they say, he keeps,
To ruminate strange plots of dire revenge;
Tell him Revenge is come to join with him,
And work confusion on his enemies.
They knock
Enter TITUS, above
TITUS ANDRONICUS Who doth molest my contemplation?
Is it your trick to make me ope the door,
That so my sad decrees may fly away,
And all my study be to no effect?
You are deceived: for what I mean to do
See here in bloody lines I have set down;
And what is written shall be executed.
TAMORA Titus, I am come to talk with thee.
TITUS ANDRONICUS No, not a word; how can I grace my talk,
Wanting a hand to give it action?
Thou hast the odds of me; therefore no more.
TAMORA If thou didst know me, thou wouldest talk with me.
TITUS ANDRONICUS I am not mad; I know thee well enough:
Witness this wretched stump, witness these crimson lines;
Witness these trenches made by grief and care,
Witness the tiring day and heavy night;
Witness all sorrow, that I know thee well
For our proud empress, mighty Tamora:
Is not thy coming for my other hand?
TAMORA Know, thou sad man, I am not Tamora;
She is thy enemy, and I thy friend:
I am Revenge: sent from the infernal kingdom,
To ease the gnawing vulture of thy mind,
By working wreakful vengeance on thy foes.
Come down, and welcome me to this world’s light;
Confer with me of murder and of death:
There’s not a hollow cave or lurking-place,
No vast obscurity or misty vale,
Where bloody murder or detested rape
Can couch for fear, but I will find them out;
And in their ears tell them my dreadful name,
Revenge, which makes the foul offender quake.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Art thou Revenge? and art thou sent to me,
To be a torment to mine enemies?
TAMORA I am; therefore come down, and welcome me.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Do me some service, ere I come to thee.
Lo, by thy side where Rape and Murder stands;
Now give me some surance that thou art Revenge,
Stab them, or tear them on thy chariot-wheels;
And then I’ll come and be thy waggoner,
And whirl along with thee about the globe.
Provide thee two proper palfreys, black as jet,
To hale thy vengeful waggon swift away,
And find out murderers in their guilty caves:
And when thy car is loaden with their heads,
I will dismount, and by the waggon-wheel
Trot, like a servile footman, all day long,
Even from Hyperion’s rising in the east
Until his very downfall in the sea:
And day by day I’ll do this heavy task,
So thou destroy Rapine and Murder there.
TAMORA These are my ministers, and come with me.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Are these thy ministers? what are they call’d?
TAMORA Rapine and Murder; therefore called so,
Cause they take vengeance of such kind of men.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Good Lord, how like the empress’ sons they are!
And you, the empress! but we worldly men
Have miserable, mad, mistaking eyes.
O sweet Revenge, now do I come to thee;
And, if one arm’s embracement will content thee,
I will embrace thee in it by and by.
Exit above
TAMORA This closing with him fits his lunacy
Whate’er I forge to feed his brain-sick fits,
Do you uphold and maintain in your speeches,
For now he firmly takes me for Revenge;
And, being credulous in this mad thought,
I’ll make him send for Lucius his son;
And, whilst I at a banquet hold him sure,
I’ll find some cunning practise out of hand,
To scatter and disperse the giddy Goths,
Or, at the least, make them his enemies.
See, here he comes, and I must ply my theme.
Enter TITUS below
TITUS ANDRONICUS Long have I been forlorn, and all for thee:
Welcome, dread Fury, to my woful house:
Rapine and Murder, you are welcome too.
How like the empress and her sons you are!
Well are you fitted, had you but a Moor:
Could not all hell afford you such a devil?
For well I wot the empress never wags
But in her company there is a Moor;
And, would you represent our queen aright,
It were convenient you had such a devil:
But welcome, as you are. What shall we do?
TAMORA What wouldst thou have us do, Andronicus?
DEMETRIUS Show me a murderer, I’ll deal with him.
CHIRON Show me a villain that hath done a rape,
And I am sent to be revenged on him.
TAMORA Show me a thousand that have done thee wrong,
And I will be revenged on them all.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Look round about the wicked streets of Rome;
And when thou find’st a man that’s like thyself.
Good Murder, stab him; he’s a murderer.
Go thou with him; and when it is thy hap
To find another that is like to thee,
Good Rapine, stab him; he’s a ravisher.
Go thou with them; and in the emperor’s court
There is a queen, attended by a Moor;
Well mayst thou know her by thy own proportion,
for up and down she doth resemble thee:
I pray thee, do on them some violent death;
They have been violent to me and mine.
TAMORA Well hast thou lesson’d us; this shall we do.
But would it please thee, good Andronicus,
To send for Lucius, thy thrice-valiant son,
Who leads towards Rome a band of warlike Goths,
And bid him come and banquet at thy house;
When he is here, even at thy solemn feast,
I will bring in the empress and her sons,
The emperor himself and all thy foes;
And at thy mercy shalt they stoop and kneel,
And on them shalt thou ease thy angry heart.
What says Andronicus to this device?
TITUS ANDRONICUS Marcus, my brother! ’tis sad Titus calls.
Enter MARCUS
Go, gentle Marcus, to thy nephew Lucius;
Thou shalt inquire him out among the Goths:
Bid him repair to me, and bring with him
Some of the chiefest princes of the Goths;
Bid him encamp his soldiers where they are:
Tell him the emperor and the empress too
Feast at my house, and he shall feast with them.
This do thou for my love; and so let him,
As he regards his aged father’s life.
MARCUS ANDRONICUS This will I do, and soon return again.
Exit
TAMORA Now will I hence about thy business,
And take my ministers along with me.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Nay, nay, let Rape and Murder stay with me;
Or else I’ll call my brother back again,
And cleave to no revenge but Lucius.
TAMORA [Aside to her sons]
What say you, boys? will you
bide with him,
Whiles I go tell my lord the emperor
How I have govern’d our determined jest?
Yield to his humour, smooth and speak him fair,
And tarry with him till I turn again.
TITUS ANDRONICUS [Aside]
I know them all, though they suppose me mad,
And will o’erreach them in their own devices:
A pair of cursed hell-hounds and their dam!
DEMETRIUS Madam, depart at pleasure; leave us here.
TAMORA Farewell, Andronicus: Revenge now goes
To lay a complot to betray thy foes.
TITUS ANDRONICUS I know thou dost; and, sweet Revenge, farewell.
Exit TAMORA
CHIRON Tell us, old man, how shall we be employ’d?
TITUS ANDRONICUS Tut, I have work enough for you to do.
Publius, come hither, Caius, and Valentine!
Enter PUBLIUS and others
PUBLIUS What is your will?
TITUS ANDRONICUS Know you these two?
PUBLIUS The empress’ sons, I take them, Chiron and Demetrius.
TITUS ANDRONICUS Fie, Publius, fie! thou art too much deceived;
The one is Murder, Rape is the other’s name;