Chapter: ACT V. SCENE I.
Plains near Rome

Enter LUCIUS with an army of GOTHS with drums and colours

  LUCIUS. Approved warriors and my faithful friends,
    I have received letters from great Rome
    Which signifies what hate they bear their Emperor
    And how desirous of our sight they are.
    Therefore, great lords, be, as your titles witness,
    Imperious and impatient of your wrongs;
    And wherein Rome hath done you any scath,
    Let him make treble satisfaction.
  FIRST GOTH. Brave slip, sprung from the great Andronicus,
    Whose name was once our terror, now our comfort,
    Whose high exploits and honourable deeds
    Ingrateful Rome requites with foul contempt,
    Be bold in us: we'll follow where thou lead'st,
    Like stinging bees in hottest summer's day,
    Led by their master to the flow'red fields,
    And be aveng'd on cursed Tamora.
  ALL THE GOTHS. And as he saith, so say we all with him.
  LUCIUS. I humbly thank him, and I thank you all.
    But who comes here, led by a lusty Goth?

     Enter a GOTH, leading AARON with his CHILD in his arms

  SECOND GOTH. Renowned Lucius, from our troops I stray'd
    To gaze upon a ruinous monastery;
    And as I earnestly did fix mine eye
    Upon the wasted building, suddenly
    I heard a child cry underneath a wall.
    I made unto the noise, when soon I heard
    The crying babe controll'd with this discourse:
    'Peace, tawny slave, half me and half thy dam!
    Did not thy hue bewray whose brat thou art,
    Had nature lent thee but thy mother's look,
    Villain, thou mightst have been an emperor;
    But where the bull and cow are both milk-white,
    They never do beget a coal-black calf.
    Peace, villain, peace!'- even thus he rates the babe-
    'For I must bear thee to a trusty Goth,
    Who, when he knows thou art the Empress' babe,
    Will hold thee dearly for thy mother's sake.'
    With this, my weapon drawn, I rush'd upon him,
    Surpris'd him suddenly, and brought him hither
    To use as you think needful of the man.
  LUCIUS. O worthy Goth, this is the incarnate devil
    That robb'd Andronicus of his good hand;
    This is the pearl that pleas'd your Empress' eye;
    And here's the base fruit of her burning lust.
    Say, wall-ey'd slave, whither wouldst thou convey
    This growing image of thy fiend-like face?
    Why dost not speak? What, deaf? Not a word?
    A halter, soldiers! Hang him on this tree,
    And by his side his fruit of bastardy.
  AARON. Touch not the boy, he is of royal blood.
  LUCIUS. Too like the sire for ever being good.
    First hang the child, that he may see it sprawl-
    A sight to vex the father's soul withal.
    Get me a ladder.
                [A ladder brought, which AARON is made to climb]
  AARON. Lucius, save the child,
    And bear it from me to the Empress.
    If thou do this, I'll show thee wondrous things
    That highly may advantage thee to hear;
    If thou wilt not, befall what may befall,
    I'll speak no more but 'Vengeance rot you all!'
  LUCIUS. Say on; an if it please me which thou speak'st,
    Thy child shall live, and I will see it nourish'd.
  AARON. An if it please thee! Why, assure thee, Lucius,
    'Twill vex thy soul to hear what I shall speak;
    For I must talk of murders, rapes, and massacres,
    Acts of black night, abominable deeds,
    Complots of mischief, treason, villainies,
    Ruthful to hear, yet piteously perform'd;
    And this shall all be buried in my death,
    Unless thou swear to me my child shall live.
  LUCIUS. Tell on thy mind; I say thy child shall live.
  AARON. Swear that he shall, and then I will begin.
  LUCIUS. Who should I swear by? Thou believest no god;
    That granted, how canst thou believe an oath?
  AARON. What if I do not? as indeed I do not;
    Yet, for I know thou art religious
    And hast a thing within thee called conscience,
    With twenty popish tricks and ceremonies
    Which I have seen thee careful to observe,
    Therefore I urge thy oath. For that I know
    An idiot holds his bauble for a god,
    And keeps the oath which by that god he swears,
    To that I'll urge him. Therefore thou shalt vow
    By that same god- what god soe'er it be
    That thou adorest and hast in reverence-
    To save my boy, to nourish and bring him up;
    Or else I will discover nought to thee.
  LUCIUS. Even by my god I swear to thee I will.
  AARON. First know thou, I begot him on the Empress.
  LUCIUS. O most insatiate and luxurious woman!
  AARON. Tut, Lucius, this was but a deed of charity
    To that which thou shalt hear of me anon.
    'Twas her two sons that murdered Bassianus;
    They cut thy sister's tongue, and ravish'd her,
    And cut her hands, and trimm'd her as thou sawest.
  LUCIUS. O detestable villain! Call'st thou that trimming?
  AARON. Why, she was wash'd, and cut, and trimm'd, and 'twas
    Trim sport for them which had the doing of it.
  LUCIUS. O barbarous beastly villains like thyself!
  AARON. Indeed, I was their tutor to instruct them.
    That codding spirit had they from their mother,
    As sure a card as ever won the set;
    That bloody mind, I think, they learn'd of me,
    As true a dog as ever fought at head.
    Well, let my deeds be witness of my worth.
    I train'd thy brethren to that guileful hole
    Where the dead corpse of Bassianus lay;
    I wrote the letter that thy father found,
    And hid the gold within that letter mention'd,
    Confederate with the Queen and her two sons;
    And what not done, that thou hast cause to rue,
    Wherein I had no stroke of mischief in it?
    I play'd the cheater for thy father's hand,
    And, when I had it, drew myself apart
    And almost broke my heart with extreme laughter.
    I pried me through the crevice of a wall,
    When, for his hand, he had his two sons' heads;
    Beheld his tears, and laugh'd so heartily
    That both mine eyes were rainy like to his;
    And when I told the Empress of this sport,
    She swooned almost at my pleasing tale,
    And for my tidings gave me twenty kisses.
  GOTH. What, canst thou say all this and never blush?
  AARON. Ay, like a black dog, as the saying is.
  LUCIUS. Art thou not sorry for these heinous deeds?
  AARON. Ay, that I had not done a thousand more.
    Even now I curse the day- and yet, I think,
    Few come within the compass of my curse-
    Wherein I did not some notorious ill;
    As kill a man, or else devise his death;
    Ravish a maid, or plot the way to do it;
    Accuse some innocent, and forswear myself;
    Set deadly enmity between two friends;
    Make poor men's cattle break their necks;
    Set fire on barns and hay-stacks in the night,
    And bid the owners quench them with their tears.
    Oft have I digg'd up dead men from their graves,
    And set them upright at their dear friends' door
    Even when their sorrows almost was forgot,
    And on their skins, as on the bark of trees,
    Have with my knife carved in Roman letters
    'Let not your sorrow die, though I am dead.'
    Tut, I have done a thousand dreadful things
    As willingly as one would kill a fly;
    And nothing grieves me heartily indeed
    But that I cannot do ten thousand more.
  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 AEMILIUS

  GOTH. My lord, there is a messenger from Rome
    Desires to be admitted to your presence.
  LUCIUS. Let him come near.
    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 II.
Rome. Before TITUS' house

Enter TAMORA, and her two sons, 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 and TITUS opens his study door, above

  TITUS. 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 deceiv'd; 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. No, not a word. How can I grace my talk,
    Wanting a hand to give it that accord?
    Thou hast the odds of me; therefore no more.
  TAMORA. If thou didst know me, thou wouldst talk with me.
  TITUS. 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 th' 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. 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. Do me some service ere I come to thee.
    Lo, by thy side where Rape and Murder stands;
    Now give 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 globes.
    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 thy 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. Are they thy ministers? What are they call'd?
  TAMORA. Rape and Murder; therefore called so
    'Cause they take vengeance of such kind of men.
  TITUS. 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.
  TAMORA. This closing with him fits his lunacy.
    Whate'er I forge to feed his brain-sick humours,
    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 practice 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. Long have I been forlorn, and all for thee.
    Welcome, dread Fury, to my woeful 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 reveng'd on him.
  TAMORA. Show me a thousand that hath done thee wrong,
    And I will be revenged on them all.
  TITUS. 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 is a ravisher.
    Go thou with them; and in the Emperor's court
    There is a queen, attended by a Moor;
    Well shalt thou know her by thine 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 shall they stoop and kneel,
    And on them shalt thou ease thy angry heart.
    What says Andronicus to this device?
  TITUS. 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. 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. 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
abide
      with him,
    Whiles I go tell my lord the Emperor
    How I have govern'd our determin'd jest?
    Yield to his humour, smooth and speak him fair,
    And tarry with him till I turn again.
  TITUS.  [Aside]  I knew them all, though they suppos'd me mad,
    And will o'er reach 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. I know thou dost; and, sweet Revenge, farewell.
                                                     Exit TAMORA
  CHIRON. Tell us, old man, how shall we be employ'd?
  TITUS. Tut, I have work enough for you to do.
    Publius, come hither, Caius, and Valentine.

          Enter PUBLIUS, CAIUS, and VALENTINE

  PUBLIUS. What is your will?
  TITUS. Know you these two?
  PUBLIUS. The Empress' sons, I take them: Chiron, Demetrius.
  TITUS. Fie, Publius, fie! thou art too much deceiv'd.
    The one is Murder, and Rape is the other's name;
    And therefore bind them, gentle Publius-
    Caius and Valentine, lay hands on them.
    Oft have you heard me wish for such an hour,
    And now I find it; therefore bind them sure,
    And stop their mouths if they begin to cry.             Exit
                         [They lay hold on CHIRON and DEMETRIUS]
  CHIRON. Villains, forbear! we are the Empress' sons.
  PUBLIUS. And therefore do we what we are commanded.
    Stop close their mouths, let them not speak a word.
    Is he sure bound? Look that you bind them fast.

               Re-enter TITUS ANDRONICUS
        with a knife, and LAVINIA, with a basin

  TITUS. Come, come, Lavinia; look, thy foes are bound.
    Sirs, stop their mouths, let them not speak to me;
    But let them hear what fearful words I utter.
    O villains, Chiron and Demetrius!
    Here stands the spring whom you have stain'd with mud;
    This goodly summer with your winter mix'd.
    You kill'd her husband; and for that vile fault
    Two of her brothers were condemn'd to death,
    My hand cut off and made a merry jest;
    Both her sweet hands, her tongue, and that more dear
    Than hands or tongue, her spotless chastity,
    Inhuman traitors, you constrain'd and forc'd.
    What would you say, if I should let you speak?
    Villains, for shame you could not beg for grace.
    Hark, wretches! how I mean to martyr you.
    This one hand yet is left to cut your throats,
    Whiles that Lavinia 'tween her stumps doth hold
    The basin that receives your guilty blood.
    You know your mother means to feast with me,
    And calls herself Revenge, and thinks me mad.
    Hark, villains! I will grind your bones to dust,
    And with your blood and it I'll make a paste;
    And of the paste a coffin I will rear,
    And make two pasties of your shameful heads;
    And bid that strumpet, your unhallowed dam,
    Like to the earth, swallow her own increase.
    This is the feast that I have bid her to,
    And this the banquet she shall surfeit on;
    For worse than Philomel you us'd my daughter,
    And worse than Progne I will be reveng'd.
    And now prepare your throats. Lavinia, come,
    Receive the blood; and when that they are dead,
    Let me go grind their bones to powder small,
    And with this hateful liquor temper it;
    And in that paste let their vile heads be bak'd.
    Come, come, be every one officious
    To make this banquet, which I wish may prove
    More stern and bloody than the Centaurs' feast.
                                         [He cuts their throats]
    So.
    Now bring them in, for I will play the cook,
    And see them ready against their mother comes.
                                 Exeunt, bearing the dead bodies

 In the Goth camp, Lucius tells the Goths that he has received news from Rome detailing how much the Romans hate their emperor, and how eagerly they await Lucius's coming. The Goths are proud to fight alongside the man who was once their bane, and promise to follow his lead into battle. A Goth soldier has discovered the fugitive Aaron, along with his baby, in an abandoned monastery, and brought him back to camp. Lucius's impulse is to hang the father and child, letting the child hang first so that the father will have to watch. The Goths bring a ladder and make Aaron climb it. From that position, he makes a bargain with Lucius to preserve the child in exchange for Aaron's knowledge of all the horrors that have occurred. When Lucius swears by his gods that he will spare the child, Aaron reveals the parenthood of the child, the rapists of Lavinia, the murderers of Bassianus, his own trickery to get Titus's hand; finally, he takes credit for every act, saying, "And what not done, that thou hast cause to rue, / Wherein I has no stroke of mischief in it?" Lucius is aghast, but the inveterate Moore goes on to list the other crimes he has committed in his life, claiming his sole regret is that he does not have the chance to commit ten thousand more. Lucius is so horrified that he has Aaron taken down, claiming hanging is too sweet a death for the Moore. Aaron is gagged so that he will stop speaking. Aemilius enters then with the request from Saturninus for a meeting. Lucius agrees. In the second scene, Tamora and her sons appear to Titus in disguise, masquerading as Revenge and her attendants Rape and Murder. She says to Titus, whom she believes to be mad, that she will punish all his enemies if he will convince Lucius to attend a banquet at Titus's house. Her plan is to wreak confusion among the Goths while their new leader, Lucius, is at the banquet. Titus, who has simply been playing at madness all along, agrees on the condition that Revenge leave Rape and Murder  with him. Upon Tamora's departure, Titus gets his kinsmen to gag and bind the two young Goths. With Lavinia holding the basin to catch their blood, Titus "play the cook" who slits their throats. He elaborates on his plan to grind their bones to dust and to make a paste of it with their blood, which he will turn into "coffins," a word that also meant pie crust. He will then bake Tamora's sons in their "coffins," and serve the dish to their mother at the banquet.

