Tit. Hear me, grave fathers! noble tribunes, stay!
For pity of mine age, whose youth was spent
In dangerous wars, whilst you securely slept;
For all my blood in Rome's great quarrel shed;
For all the frosty nights that I have watch'd; 5
And for these bitter tears, which now you see[4324]
Filling the aged wrinkles in my cheeks;
Be pitiful to my condemned sons,
Whose souls are not corrupted as 'tis thought.[4325]
For two and twenty sons I never wept, 10
Because they died in honour's lofty bed.
[Lieth down; the Judges, &c. pass by him, and Exeunt.[4326]
For these, tribunes, in the dust I write[4327]
My heart's deep languor and my soul's sad tears:[4328]
Let my tears stanch the earth's dry appetite;[4329]
My sons' sweet blood will make it shame and blush. 15
O earth, I will befriend thee more with rain,[4330]
That shall distil from these two ancient urns,[4331]
Than youthful April shall with all his showers:[4332][4333]
In summer's drought I'll drop upon thee still;[4333]
In winter with warm tears I'll melt the snow, 20
And keep eternal spring-time on thy face,
So thou refuse to drink my dear sons' blood.
Enter Lucius, with his weapon drawn.[4334]
O reverend tribunes! O gentle, aged men![4335]
Unbind my sons, reverse the doom of death;
And let me say, that never wept before, 25
My tears are now prevailing orators.
Luc. O noble father, you lament in vain:
The tribunes hear you not; no man is by;[4336]
And you recount your sorrows to a stone.
Tit. Ah, Lucius, for thy brothers let me plead. 30
Grave tribunes, once more I entreat of you,—[4337]
Luc. My gracious lord, no tribune hears you speak.
Tit. Why, 'tis no matter, man: if they did hear,[4338]
They would not mark me; or if they did mark,[4339]
They would not pity me; yet plead I must,[4339] 35
And bootless unto them....[4339]
Therefore I tell my sorrows to the stones;[4340]
Who, though they cannot answer my distress,
Yet in some sort they are better than the tribunes,[4341]
For that they will not intercept my tale:[4342] 40
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;[4343] 45
A stone is silent and offendeth not,
And tribunes with their tongues doom men to death. [Rises.[4344]
But wherefore stand'st thou with thy weapon drawn?[4345]
Luc. To rescue my two brothers from their death:
For which attempt the judges have pronounced[4346] 50
My everlasting doom of banishment.