[Enter MENENIUS and SICINIUS.]
MENENIUS
See you yond coign o' the Capitol,—yond corner-stone?
MENENIUS
If it be possible for you to displace it with your little
finger, there is some hope the ladies of Rome, especially his
mother, may prevail with him. But I say there is no hope in't:
our throats are sentenced, and stay upon execution.
SICINIUS
Is't possible that so short a time can alter the condition of a
man?
MENENIUS
There is differency between a grub and a butterfly; yet your
butterfly was a grub. This Marcius is grown from man to dragon;
he has wings; he's more than a creeping thing.
SICINIUS
He loved his mother dearly.
MENENIUS
So did he me: and he no more remembers his mother now than an
eight-year-old horse. The tartness of his face sours ripe grapes:
when he walks, he moves like an engine, and the ground shrinks
before his treading: he is able to pierce a corslet with his eye,
talks like a knell, and his hum is a battery. He sits in his
state as a thing made for Alexander. What he bids be done is
finished with his bidding. He wants nothing of a god but
eternity, and a heaven to throne in.
SICINIUS
Yes, mercy, if you report him truly.
MENENIUS
I paint him in the character. Mark what mercy his mother shall
bring from him. There is no more mercy in him than there is
milk in a male tiger; that shall our poor city find: and all this
is 'long of you.
SICINIUS
The gods be good unto us!
MENENIUS
No, in such a case the gods will not be good unto us. When we
banished him we respected not them; and, he returning to break
our necks, they respect not us.
MESSENGER
Sir, if you'd save your life, fly to your house:
The plebeians have got your fellow-tribune
And hale him up and down; all swearing, if
The Roman ladies bring not comfort home
They'll give him death by inches.
SECOND MESSENGER
Good news, good news;—the ladies have prevail'd,
The Volscians are dislodg'd, and Marcius gone:
A merrier day did never yet greet Rome,
No, not the expulsion of the Tarquins.
SICINIUS
Friend,
Art thou certain this is true? is't most certain?
SECOND MESSENGER
As certain as I know the sun is fire:
Where have you lurk'd, that you make doubt of it?
Ne'er through an arch so hurried the blown tide
As the recomforted through the gates. Why, hark you!
[Trumpets and hautboys sounded, drums beaten, and shouting within.] The trumpets, sackbuts, psalteries, and fifes,
Tabors and cymbals, and the shouting Romans,
Make the sun dance. Hark you!
MENENIUS
This is good news.
I will go meet the ladies. This Volumnia
Is worth of consuls, senators, patricians,
A city full: of tribunes such as you,
A sea and land full. You have pray'd well to-day:
This morning for ten thousand of your throats
Ied not have given a doit. Hark, how they joy!
SICINIUS
First, the gods bless you for your tidings; next,
Accept my thankfulness.
SECOND MESSENGER
Sir, we have all
Great cause to give great thanks.
SICINIUS
They are near the city?
MESSENGER
Almost at point to enter.
