Page:Titus Andronicus (1926) Yale.djvu/73

Titus Andronicus, IV. ii

You may be armed and appointed well.

And so I leave you both: [Aside.] like bloody villains.

Exit [with Attendant].

Dem. What's here? A scroll, and written round about?

Let's see:—

[Reads.] 'Integer vitæ, scelerisque purus,

Non eget Mauri jaculis, nec arcu.'

Chi. O! 'tis a verse in Horace; I know it well:

I read it in the grammar long ago

Aar. Ay, just, a verse in Horace; right, you have it.

[Aside.] Now, what a thing it is to be an ass!

Here's no sound jest! the old man hath found their guilt

And sends them weapons wrapp'd about with lines,

That wound, beyond their feeling, to the quick:

But were our witty empress well afoot,

She would applaud Andronicus' conceit:

But let her rest in her unrest awhile.

[To them.] And now, young lords, was 't not a happy star

Led us to Rome, strangers and more than so,

Captives, to be advanced to this height?

It did me good before the palace gate

To brave the tribune in his brother's hearing.

Dem. But me more good, to see so great a lord

Basely insinuate and send us gifts.

Aar. Had he not reason, Lord Demetrius?

Did you not use his daughter very friendly?

Dem. I would we had a thousand Roman dames

At such a bay, by turn to serve our lust.

 16 appointed: equipped

20 Integer vitæ, etc.; cf. n.

24 just: just so

26 sound jest; cf. n.

42 At such a bay: under such circumstances

