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I shall be furnished to inform you rightly

Both what by sea and land I can be able,1
To front this present time.

Cæs.

Till which encounter,2

It is my business too. Farewell.

Lep. Farewell, my lord; what you shall know meantime

Of stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir,

To let me be partaker.

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Enter CLEOPATRA, CHARMIAN, IRAS, and MARDIAN.

Cleo. Charmian,—

Char. Madam.

Cleo. Ha, ha !—Give me to drink mandragora.4
Char. Why, Madam?

Cleo. That I might sleep out this great gap of time
My Antony is away.

Char.

You think of him too much.

Cleo. O, 't is treason !5

Char. Madam, I trust not so.

Cleo.

O, Charmian,

I can be able.] I can be in ability or force.

2 Encounter.] Meeting with you.

I knew it for my bond.] I knew it to be my duty from the terms of the covenant of our triumvirate. See Extracts from Plutarch, 18.

4 Mandragora.] A herb of soporific quality, referred to in Pliny's Natural History. 'Not poppy, nor mandragora, nor all the drowsy ayrups of the world.' Othello, iii. 3.

5 'Tis treason.] His departure is treacherous.

Where think'st thou he is now? Stands he, or sits he? Or does he walk? or is he on his horse?

O, happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony!

Do bravely, horse! for wott'st thou whom thou mov'st? The demi-Atlas of this earth, the arm

And burgonet of men.-He's speaking now,

Or murmuring, Where's my serpent of old Nile?
For so he calls me :-now I feed myself
With most delicious poison.-Think on me,
That am with Phoebus' amorous pinches black,
And wrinkled deep in time?1 Broad-fronted Cæsar,
When thou wast here above the ground, I was
A morsel for a monarch: and great Pompey
Would stand, and make his eyes grow in my brow;2
There would he anchor his aspéct, and die

With looking on his life.

Alex.

Enter ALEXAS.

Sovereign of Egypt, hail!

Cleo. How much unlike art thou Mark Antony! Yet, coming from him, that great medicine hath With his tinct gilded thee.3—

How goes it with my brave Mark Antony?

Alex. Last thing he did, dear queen,

He kissed, the last of many doubled kisses,

Think on me, &c.] Will he think of me, whose complexion the

sun has made so dark, and who am now so old?

2 Make his eyes grow in my brow.] Look with fixed gaze at, or plant, as it were, his eyes in, my brow.

The philosopher's

3 With his tinct, &c.] With its tinct, &c. stone, or powder of projection, was often called a medicine. The old alchymists pretended that with this powder they could transmute prepared metal into gold. I will make admirable use i' the pro· jection of my medicine upon this lump of copper.' B. Jonson's Every Man out of his Humour, i. 2.

C

This orient1 pearl:-his speech sticks in my heart.
Cleo. Mine ear must pluck it thence.
Alex.

Good friend, quoth he,

Say, the firm Roman to great Egypt sends
This treasure of an oyster; at whose foot,
To mend the petty present, I will piece 2

Her opulent throne with kingdoms: all the east,
Say thou, shall call her mistress.

So he nodded,

And soberly did mount an arm-gaunt3 steed,

Who neighed so high, that what I would have spoke
Was beastly dumbed1 by him.

Cleo.

What, was he sad or merry?

Alex. Like to the time o' the year between the extremes Of hot and cold, he was nor sad nor merry.

Cleo. O, well-divided disposition!-Note him,

Note him, good Charmian, 't is the man; but 5 note him:
He was not sad,-for he would shine on those
That make their looks by his; he was not merry,—
Which seemed to tell them his remembrance lay

In Egypt with his joy; but between both :
O, heavenly mingle !-Be'st thou sad or merry,
The violence of either thee becomes

So does it no man else.-Mett'st thou my posts?
Alex. Ay, madam, twenty several messengers:
Why do you send so thick?

1 Orient.] Bright; glittering.

2 Piece.] Eke; make addition to.

Piece out our imperfections

with your thoughts.' K. Henry V., Chorus to Act i.

3 Arm-gaunt.] Wright says the epithet here means lean, thin as an arm. We think it refers to the angular parts of the horse's armour,

as resembling the projecting bones of a gaunt or lean animal.

Dumbed.] So in Pericles, v. 1, Gower says of Marina-' Deep clerks she dumbs.'

5 But.] Only.

So does it.] So as it does; in such a way as it does.

Cleo.

Who's born that day

When I forget to send to Antony,

Shall die a beggar.-Ink and paper, Charmian.—
Welcome, my good Alexas.-Did I, Charmian,
Ever love Cæsar so?

Char.

O, that brave Cæsar!

Cleo. Be choked with such another emphasis !

Say, the brave Antony !

Char.

The valiant Cæsar!

Cleo. By Isis, I will give thee bloody teeth,

If thou with Cæsar paragon again

My man of men !

Char.

I sing but after you.

Cleo.

By your most gracious pardon,

My salad days;

When I was green in judgment, cold in blood:
To say as I said then !1-But come, away:
Get me ink and paper: he shall have every day
A several greeting, or I'll unpeople Egypt.2 [Exeunt.

1 To say as I said then!] That you should say the brave Cæsar! How can you say as I said in my cool salad days?

2 Or I'll unpeople Egypt.] Though by sending so many I should unpeople Egypt. Or has the sense of though in K. Richard III. i. 1, 'I will deliver you, or lie [though I lie in prison] for you;' and in Hamlet, ii. 2, ‹ The lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt for it.

АСТ II.

SCENE I.-Messina. A Room in Pompey's House.

Enter POMPEY, MENECRATES, and MENAS.

Pom. If the great gods be just, they shall assist1 The deeds of justest men.

Mene.

Know, worthy Pompey,

That what they do delay, they not deny.

Pom. Whiles we are suitors to their throne, decays

The thing we sue for.2

Mene.

We, ignorant of ourselves,

Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers
Deny us for our good; so find we profit,

By losing of our prayers.

Pom.

I shall do well:

The people love me, and the sea is mine;

My powers are crescent,3 and my auguring hope
Says it will come to the full. Mark Antony
In Egypt sits at dinner, and will make

No wars without doors: Cæsar gets money where
He loses hearts: Lepidus flatters both,

1 They shall assist.] We should now say They will assist.

2 Decays, &c.] The thing we sue for decays. 3 Crescent.] Growing like the waxing moon. though an adjective, that the pronoun it in the hope says that crescent will come to full.

It is to this word,

next line refers:

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