University of Virginia Library

Scene V.

—The battle-field.
Enter Aruns, Sextus, and Etruscans.
Aruns.
Advance, the light yet tarries, clear and full.
At night-fall we are victors.

Sextus.
Grant, O Mars,
I meet this Brutus in his borrowed mantle,
And strike him down beneath his lictors' feet!
The lust of battle scorches me.

Aruns.
Lead on
The troops of Veii; the Tarquinian band,
Follow my voice and guidance!

Sextus.
I will sweep
Round to the left wing of the enemy.
Our wrongs! Revenge!

[Exit with Veientines.
Aruns.
Here tramps the Roman front.
[Enter Brutus and Romans.]
Gods of my fathers, purple-robèd shades
Of rod-encircled kings, avert your gaze;
Wail in dishonoured tombs, your state and garb
Consigned to yon plebeian. Regal blood
Within my veins, be tameless; fire my breast,
Ancestral splendours! I will slay the thief,
Or join the plundered spectres.

Brutus.
Yonder rush
The hireling soldiers of a broken cause;
The king's most royal son is at their head,
Aruns. He seeks us. Romans, prove your birth,
Show how free swords can vanquish. Face them! March.

A Roman Soldier.
The generals! Behold! Each bears on each,
Like meeting eagles, and the very dust
They raise conflicts before-hand. Roman gods,
Keep the great consul!

Aruns.
Brutus, in your heart
My spear demands atonement.

Brutus.
And in yours
Mine will complete its labours.

[They engage and fall, transfixed each with the other's dart.
Aruns.
Here we end.
Thus our blood mixes! Brutus, thus we die—
I cannot leave thy side. Air! air!—The kings
Come up from Dis to meet me.

[Dies.
Brutus.
Earth, thy son
Resigns his rule, and faints back to thy arms.
Mother, I kiss thee not; my parting breath
More noiselessly shall greet thee.

[Dies.
Romans.
Let us close,
And crush these hateful strangers. He is slain,
Our consul, our deliverer.

Etruscans.
The prince!
Avenge his bleeding corpse! March on!

Romans.
Attack!

[Exeunt fighting.
[Enter Vindex.]
Vindex.

Where is he? I'm wounded, yet I cannot die
till I've found him. I'm not a slave now, and can follow
to the wars. But it's a strange place this battle-field, and
it dazes one. Or, it may be, I'm faint. [Coming on the

body of Brutus.]
He's turned to earth, and the red blood
in the dust. I'm dying; I cannot raise him. O master,
this is the freedom, and the gods give it to us all. . . .
It grows dark and rains. Tears end our story.

[Dies.

[Enter Romans.]
Romans.

We conquer the Veientines, but the Tarquins
Press hardly on our comrades. Haste to help!

[Exeunt.

[Enter Sextus.]
Sextus.
A hateful sight!—my brother and this man
By their death-dealing spears thus locked together.
Aruns, I grudge thy place, thy streaming blood,
Ennobled for all ages. Here I stand,
Marked for a death obscure. My raging pride
Yearned to be quenched in this avenger's heart;
It groans denied: my brother is preferred.
The Fates are women, and my end will be
Poor with their petty malice; yet their spite
Shall reach not to the generation's goal.
There's in me what is fatal, what shall kill,
When I am dead and swordless. If this man
Is Roman, so am I; my burning lust,
My appetite for domination, greed
Demanding for its ease a universe,
Abashed and sycophant—are these not powers
Of Roman birth, immortal tendencies?
Empire shall triumph. Coldly go the years
'Neath the chaste rule of consuls, but the flame
Is rising with the centuries, until,
Above the city's prostrate purity,
Will breathe compelling lust. Ha, ha! Lucrece,
The Rome that thou didst deem so virgin-like,
Whose gates I cannot force with all my war,
Shall bear the imprint of the ravisher.
I've nature with me; Brutus had the gods;
He trusted to allies: I trust the race,
The ardour of the brood, the burning sky,
The bitter, trampling pride. He drove me forth
From home and rule, he branded me with shame,
He lies with lips to earth, as when I turned
And looked on him at Delphi. Thou didst well,
Thou some-time Lord of Rome, to kiss the ground.
Back to thy mother's arms! Thy destiny
Hath been fulfilled: and mine hath yet to come.

[Exit.
[Enter Publius and Romans.]
Publius.
The sacred ground—Æsuvian meadow-land,
And Arsian grove,—is deluged; rain and blood
Blind us; we cannot see the enemy;
We can but feel, with blundering steps, the slain.
[Enter more Romans.]
How stands the foe?

Soldier.
The wind so baffled us,
It tore away our sight; we dared not pierce
The dark; it stood against us as a host,
And we were driven backward.

2nd Soldier.
Let us pray
The heavens to enlighten us, our case
Is desperate.

[Enter Marcus with Soldiers.]
Publius.
How fares the Etruscan band?

Marcus.
They shriek and count the dead confusedly,
Uncertain of the triumph; here and there
The fight continues 'mid the struggling troops.
We came upon a Tuscan in retreat,
Who groped about, and cursed the elements.
On him we drew; but in a deadly grip
He hugged us, shouting, Sextus has his day,
Then leapt with shrilling laughter in the night.
What after chanced none knows; the hurricane
Spread her fell targe betwixt us; much we fear
He has escaped.

Publius.
And better thus than slain;
Let no free Roman touch him.

A Soldier.
He is dread.
I fear the Tarquins will return to Rome.

Another.
The hateful race! They will enslave the land.
Thus is Lucretia righted?

Publius.
Romans, hear!
Night is upon us, and our destiny
Uncertain; not to-day shall be the end,
Nor I myself shall see the tyrants' blood
Dabbling your fields; but I shall rear ye up
A people of such honour that my rods
Shall be avaled before you. Ye, yourselves,
Shall brave the Latins by Regillus' lake,—
Your youths, so fair a cavalry, the gods
Shall ride beside them, and with them, transfix
The Tarquins on their spears, and over-tramp
Vile, slinking Sextus. When the fight is o'er,
At Vesta's holy temple, where the spring
Gushes, two horsemen shall wash off the stains
Of battle, and when men shall crowd around
For tidings of the field, say how 'twas won.
And a new fane shall rise where Lucrece lay,
In the centre of the forum. I would live
To see that day; I shall not, but 'twill be.

All.
Publius Valerius, our Publicola,
The people's friend!

Publius.
As the deep shadows grow,
Let us all gather where our Brutus lies.

1st Soldier.
We'll raise his statue in our midst.

2nd Soldier.
Our wives
Will never dry their tears for him, he stood
So mightily their friend.

Marcus.
He felt the wrongs
Of women as they'd natures of their own,
And use beyond child-bearing.

Publius.
Sacred use
Is theirs: the State will find her councillors
In creatures that have known no touch of man.
Our pious Numa felt the mystery
Of Vesta's service could not be divined
By families in worship round the hearth,
And to six spotless virgins gave the charge
Of her undying fire. They guard for us
The pledge of fate, the awful, sealèd jar
Of Rome's supremacy. O Marcus, fear
That part of womanhood that's like a shrine:
Methinks as sons we sometimes enter it,
As spouses never.

Marcus.
And you deem Lucrece
Changed all?

Publius.
She changed our Brutus from a baulked,
Uncertain creature to a steadfast man.
[Lifting Brutus.]
Marcus, look long at our dead consul's face.
Shall Tarquin over-live it?

Marcus.
Till the brood
Be wholly extirpate, I cannot die.

Publius.
[Still looking on Brutus.]
Oh, 'tis a further vision, it transcends!
He's dropt a secret in the common ear
Will never be forgotten. Lo, the moon
Shines clear above the tempest, and reveals
Our enemy.

[Enter Etruscans.]
Etruscans.
We claim the day. One man
We've struck beyond the number of your slain.

Voice
(from the Arsian grove).
Rome hath the victory,
She that obeys.
Nature from dewy groves,
High forest ways,
Lifts her mysterious,
Subjugate voice,
Breathing dominion. Hear,
Rome, and rejoice!

Marcus.
Meseemed across the twilight came a sound,
Scarce audible, from out the ancient wood,
Sighing great things that heave tumultuously
'Gainst my enthrallèd heart.

Publius.
Etruscans, say,
Heard ye a solemn, rustling oracle?

Etruscans.
With fear we heard, we throw away our arms,
The powers of earth declare against our strife;
We are your suppliants.

Publius.
Amity and grace
We grant to you for ever, who submit
To law and our Republic. We will keep
This joyful peace with all solemnity.
But first, within the shadow of the trees,
We'll lay great Brutus in his silent tomb,
Where evening winds shall stir the many boughs
That chose uncrownèd Rome to rule the world.