child?

NURSE

Cornelia the midwife, and myself,

And no one else but the delivered Empress.

AARON

The Empress, the midwife, and yourself.

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.

DEMETRIUS

What mean’st thou, Aaron? Wherefore didst thou this?

AARON

OLord, sir, ’tis a deed of policy.

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 Muliteus my countryman

His wife but yesternight was brought to bed.

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,

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.

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.

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

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,

And cabin in a cave, and bring you up

To be a warrior and command a camp.

Exit with the child

4.3 Enter Titus, old Marcus, his son Publius, young Lucius, and other gentlemen (Sempronius, Caius) 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. 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.

’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,

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.

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,

To see thy noble uncle thus distraught?

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.

MARCUS

Kinsmen, his sorrows are past remedy,

But ⌈ ⌉

Join with the Goths, and with revengeful war

Take wreak on Rome for this ingratitude,

And vengeance on the traitor Saturnine.

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 now employed,

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.

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,

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 Iovem’, that’s for you. Here, ’ad Apollinem’.

‘Ad Martem’, that’s for myself. 55

Here, boy, ‘to Pallas’. Here ‘to Mercury’.