| [Enter MENENIUS and SICINIUS] | |
| MENENIUS | See you yond coign o' the Capitol, yond corner-stone? |
| SICINIUS | Why, what of that? |
| 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. |
| [Enter a Messenger] | |
| Messenger | Sir, if you'ld 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. |
| [Enter a second Messenger] | |
| SICINIUS | What's the news? |
| Second Messenger | Good news, good news; the ladies have prevail'd, The Volscians are dislodged, 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 it 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; hautboys; drums beat; all together] | |
| The trumpets, sackbuts, psalteries and fifes, Tabours and cymbals and the shouting Romans, Make the sun dance. Hark you! |
|
| [A shout within] | |
| 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 I'd not have given a doit. Hark, how they joy! |
| [Music still, with shouts] | |
| 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? |
| Second Messenger | Almost at point to enter. |
| SICINIUS | We will meet them, And help the joy. |
| [Exeunt] |