etire
To Antium a while, and leave Rome free.

AGRIPPINA. [_Starting up._] Leave Rome!
Why, I would die as I did step
Outside her gates, and glide henceforth a shadow.
The blood would cease to run in my veins, my heart
Stop, and my breath subside without her walls.
All without Rome is darkness: you will not
Despatch my shadow down to Antium?

NERO. We were remembering your toils, your age.

AGRIPPINA. My age! Am I old then?
Look on this face,
Where am I scarred, who have steered the bark of State
As it plunged, as it rose over the waves of change?
I was renewed with salt of such a sea.
Empires and Emperors I have outlived;
A thousand loves and lusts have left no line;
Tremendous fortunes have not touched my hair,
Murder hath left my cheek as the cheek of a babe.

[_At this moment_ BURRUS, SENECA, _and_ TIGELLINUS _return,
hearing the scene; and as_ AGRIPPINA _continues her imprecations,
the COURT return and stand in groups listening._

AGRIPPINA. My age! Who then accuses me of age?
Was this a flash from budding Seneca,
Or the boy Burrus' inspiration? Say?
Do I owe it to the shrivelled or the maimed?

SENECA. Empress, it is determined you retire.
And you will better your own dignity
And his assert, if you will make this going
To seem a free inclining from yourself.

AGRIPPINA. Bookman, shall I learn policy from you?
Be patient with me. Nero, you I ask,
Not schoolmasters or stewards I promoted.
Is it your will I go to Antium?
Speak, speak. Be not the mouthpiece of these men:
Domitius!

NERO. Mother, 'tis my will you go.

AGRIPPINA. Then, sir, discharge me not from your employ
Without some written commendation,
That I can tire the hair or pare the nails,
That those who were my friends may take me in!

NERO. Lady!

AGRIPPINA. O, lady now? Mother, no more!

NERO. [_Pacing fiercely to and fro._] Beware
the son you bore: look lest I turn!
Chafe not too far the master of this world.

AGRIPPINA. See the new tiger in the dancer's eye:
'Ware of him, keepers--then, you bid me go?
[_A pause._
Then I will go. But think not, though I go,
My spirit shall not pace the palace still.
I am too bound by guilt unto these walls.
Still shall you hear a step in dead of night;
In stillness the long rustle of my robe.
So long as stand these walls I cannot leave them.
Yet will I go: behold you, that st