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Eno. Why, sir, give the gods a thankful sacrifice. When it pleaseth their deities to take the wife of a man from him, it shews to man the tailors of the earth; comforting therein, that when 15 old robes are worn out, there are members to make new. If there were no more women but Fulvia, then had you indeed a cut, and the case to be lamented: this grief is crown'd with consolation; your old smock brings forth a new 20 petticoat: and, indeed, the tears live in an onion, that should water this sorrow.

[state,

Ant. The business she hath broach'd in the Cannot endure my absence.

Eno. And the business you have broach'd here, 25 cannot be without you; especially that of Cleopatra's, which wholly depends on your abode.

2

30

Say, I am dancing; if in mirth, report,
That I am sudden sick: Quick, and return.

[Exit Alex. Char. Madam, methinks, if you did love him dearly,

You do not hold the method to enforce
The like from him.

Cleo. What should I do, I do not?

Char. In each thing give him way, cross him in
nothing.
[him.
Cleo. Thou teachest like a fool: the way to lose
Char. Tempt him not so too far: I wish, forbear;
In time we hate that which we often fear.
Enter Antony.

But here comes Antony.
Cleo. I am sick, and sullen.

[pose.

Ant. I am sorry to give breathing to my pur-
Cleo. Help me away, dear Charmian, Í shall
It cannot be thus long, the sides of nature [fall;
Will not sustain it.

Ant. Now, my dearest queen,-
Cleo. Pray you, stand farther from me.
Ant. What's the matter?

[news.

Cleo. I know, by that same eye, there's some good
What says the marry'd woman?-You may go;
'Would, she had never given you leave to come!
Let her not say, 'tis I that keep you here,

I have no power upon you; hers you are.
Ant. The gods best know,-

Cleo. O, never was there queen

So mightily betray'd! Yet, at the first,
I saw the treasons planted.

Ant. Cleopatra,—

[true,

Cleo. Why should I think, you can be mine, and 35 Though you in swearing shake the throned gods, Who have been false to Fulvia? Riotous madness, To be entangled with those mouth-made vows, Which break themselves in swearing!

Ant. No more light answers. Let our officers
Have notice what we purpose: I shall break
The cause of our expedience to the queen,
And get her love to part. For not alone
The death of Fulvia, with more urgent touches',
Do strongly speak to us; but the letters too
Of many our contriving friends in Rome
Petition us at home: Sextus Pompeius
Hath given the dare to Cæsar, and commands
The empire of the sea: our slippery people
(Whose love is never link'd to the deserver,
"Till his deserts are past) begin to throw
Pompey the great, and all his dignities
Upon his son; who, high in name and power,
Higher than both in blood and life, stands up
For the main soldier: whose quality, going on,
Thesideso'theworldmaydanger:much is breeding,
Which, like the courser's hair, hath yet but life, 45
And not a serpent's poison. Say, our pleasure,
To such whose place is under us, requires
Our quick remove from hence.

Eno. I shall do't.

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[Exeunt.

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1401

Ant. Most sweet queen,—

[going,
Cleo. Nay, pray you, seek no colour for your
But bid farewell, and go: when you su'd staying,
Then was the time for words: No going then;-
Eternity was in our lips, and eyes;

Bliss in our brows' bent'; none our parts so poor,
But was a race of heaven: They are so still,
Or thou, the greatest soldier of the world,
Art turn'd the greatest liar,

Ant. How now, lady!

[know,

Cleo. I would, I had thy inches; thou should'st

50 There were a heart in Ægypt.

Cleo. See where he is, who's with him, what he 55 I did not send you‘;--If you find him sad,

Ant. Hear me, queen:

The strong necessity of time commands
Our services a while; but my full heart
Remains in use with you. Our Italy

Shines o'er with civil swords: Sextus Pompeius
Makes his approaches to the port of Rome:

The meaning is this: "As the gods have been pleased to take away your wife Fulvia, so they have provided you with a new one in Cleopatra; in like manner as the tailors of the earth, when your old garments are worn out, accommodate you with new ones." 2 Expedience for expedition. i. e. things that touch me more sensibly. * i. e. wish us at home. "Alluding to an old idle notion, that the hair of a horse dropped into corrupted water, will turn to an animal. 6 You must go as if you came without my order or knowledge. i. e. in the arch of our eye-brows. * i. e. had a smack or flavour of heaven.-The race of wine is the taste of the soil.

7

Equality

Equality of two domestic powers
Breeds scrupulous faction: The hated, grown to
strength,

Are newlygrown to love: the condemn'd Pompey,
Rich in his father's honour, creeps apace
Into the hearts of such as have not thriv'd
Upon the present state, whose numbers threaten ;
And quietness, grown sick of rest, would purge
By any desperate change: My more particular,
And thatwhich most with you should sate mygoing,
[freedom,
Cleo. Though age from folly could not give me
It does from childishness:-Can Fulvia die?

Is Fulvia's death.

Ant. She's dead, my queen:
Look here, and, at thy sovereign leisure, read
The garboils' she awak'd; at the last, best:
See, when, and where she died.

Cleo. O most false love!

Where be the sacred vials thou should'st fill
With sorrowful water?? Now I see, I see,
In Fulvia's death, how mine receiv'd shall be.
Ant. Quarrel no more, but be prepar'd to know
The purposes I bear; which are, or cease,
As shall give the advice: By the fire,
That quickens Nilus' slime, I go from hence,
Thy soldier, servant; making peace, or war,
As thou affect'st.

you

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Ant. My precious queen, forbear;

And give true evidence to his love, which stands
An honourable trial.

I

Cleo. So Fulvia told me.

pr'ythee, turn aside, and weep for her;
Then bid adieu to me, and say, the tears
Belong to Egypt. Good now, play one scene
Of excellent dissembling; and let it look
Like perfect honour.

Ant. You'll heat my blood; no more.
Cleo. You can do better yet; but this is meetly.
Ant. Now, by my sword,-

Cleo. And target.-Still he mends;

But this is not the best: Look, pr'ythee, Charmian,
How this Herculean' Roman does become
The carriage of his chafe.

Ant. I'll leave you, lady.

Cleo. Courteous lord, one word.
Sir, you and I must part,-but that's not it:
Sir, you and I have lov'd,—but there's not it;
That you know well:-Something it is I would,-

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Casar's Palace in Rome.

Enter Octavius Cæsar, Lepidus, and Attendants.
Cas. You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth
[know,

25 It is not Cæsar's natural vice to hate
One great competitor: From Alexandria
This is the news; He fishes, drinks, and wastes
The lamps of night in revel: is not more manlike
Than Cleopatra; nor the queen of Ptolemy
30 More womanly than he: hardly gave audience, or
Vouchsaf'd to think he had partners: You shall
find there

35

A man, who is the abstract of all faults.
That all men follow.

Lep. I must not think, there are
Evils enough to darken all his goodness:
His faults, in him, seem as the spots of heaven,
More fiery by night's blackness; hereditary,
Rather than purchas'd'; what he cannot change,
[not
40 Than what he chooses.

Cas. You are too indulgent: Let us grant, it is
Amiss to tumble on the bed of Ptolemy;
To give a kingdom for a mirth; to sit
And keep the turn of tippling with a slave;

45 To reel the streets at noon, and stand the buffet
With knaves that smell of sweat; say, this be-

comes him,

[tony

(As his composure must be rare indeed,
Whom these things cannot blemish!) yetmust An-
50 No way excuse his foils, when we do bear
So great weight in his lightness 10: If he fill'd

6 The by calling forget'i. e. according to

1i. e. the commotion she occasioned. The word is derived from the old French garbouil, which Cotgrave explains by hurlyburly, great stir. Alluding to the lacrymatory vials, or bottles of 3 So for us. 4 i. e. to me, tears, which the Romans sometimes put into the urn of a friend. the queen of Ægypt. "Antony traced his descent from Anton, a son of Hercules. plain meaning is, My forgetfulness makes me forget myself.—But she expresses fulness Antony; because forgetfulness had forgot her, as Antony had done. Warburton," But that your charms hold me, who am the greatest fool on earth, in chains, I should have adjudged you to be the greatest." * Cleopatra may perhaps here allude to Antony having before called her, in the first scene, "wrangling queen, whom every thing becomes." meaning, according to Mr. Malone, is, "As the stars or spots of heaven are not obscured, but rather rendered more bright, by the blackness of the night; so neither is the goodness of Antony eclipsed by his evil qualities, but, on the contrary, his faults seem enlarged and aggravated by his virtues," 10 i. e. trifling levity.

3D 2

The

His

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His vacancy with his voluptuousness,
Full surfeits, and the dryness of his bones,
Call on him' for't; but, to confound such time,--|
That drums him from his sport, and speaks as loud
As his own state, and ours,-'tis to be chid
As we rate boys; who, being mature in knowledge2,
Pawn their experience to their present pleasure,
And so rebel to judgement.

Enter a Messenger.

Lep. Here's more news.

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Of stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir,

[hour, 10 To let me be partaker.

Mes. Thy biddings have been done; and every
Most noble Cæsar, shalt thou have report
How 'tis abroad. Pompey is strong at sea;
And it appears, he is belov'd of those
That only have fear'd Cæsar: to the ports
The discontents repair, and men's reports
Give him much wrong'o
'd.

Cas. I should have known no less:-
It hath been taught us from the primal state,
That he, which is, was wish'd, until he were;
And the ebb'dman,ne'er lov'd till ne'er worth love,
'Comes dear'd, by being lack'd. This common
Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream, [body,
Goes to, and back, lackying the varying tide,
To rot itself with motion.

Mes. Cæsar, I bring thee word,
Menecrates and Menas, famous pirates, [wound
Make the sea serve them; which they ear and
With keels of every kind: Many hot inroads
They make in Italy; the borders maritime
Lack blood to think on't, and flush youth' re-
volt:

No vessel can peep forth, but 'tis as soon
Taken as seen; for Pompey's name strikes more,
Than could his war resisted.

Cæs. Antony,

Leave thy lascivious wassels. When thou once
Wast beaten from Modena, where thou slew'st
Hirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel

15

20

25

Cas. Doubt it not, sir; I knew it for my bond. [Exeunt.

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30 In aught an eunuch has: 'Tis well for thee,
That, being unseminar'd, thy freer thoughts
May not fly forth of Egypt. Hast thou affections?
Mar, Yes, gracious madam.

35

Did famine follow; whom thou fought'st against, 40
Though daintily brought up, with patience more
Than savages could suffer: Thou didst drink
The stale of horses', and the gilded puddle
Which beasts would cough at: thy palate then
did deign

The roughest berry on the rudest hedge;
Yea, like the stag, when snow the pasture sheets,
The barks of trees thou browsedst: on the Alps,
It is reported, thou didst eat strange flesh,
Which some did die to look on: And all this
(It wounds thine honour, that I speak it now)
Was borne so like a soldier, that thy cheek
So much as lank'd not.

Lep. It is pity of him.

Cas. Let his shames quickly

Drive him to Rome: Time is it, that we twain
Did shew ourselves i' the field; and, to that end,
Assemble me immediate council: Pompey
Thrives in our idleness.

Cleo. Indeca?

[thing

Mar. Not in deed, madam; for I can do no
But what in deed is honest to be done:
Yet have I fierce affections, and think,
What Venus did with Mars.

Cleo. O Charmian!

[he?

Where think'st thou he is now? Stands he, or sits
Or does he walk? or is he on his horse?
O happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony!
Do bravely, horse! for wot'st thou whom thou
mov'st?

45 The demy Atlas of this earth, the arm

And burgonet of man.-He's speaking now,
Or murmuring, 'Where's my serpent of old Nike?'
For so he calls me;-Now I feed myself

With most delicious poison: Think on me,
50That am with Phoebus' amorous pinches black,
And wrinkled deep in time! 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;
There would he anchor his aspect, and die
With looking on his life.

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3 To car is to

Call on him, is visit him for it. 2 i. e. boys old enough to know their duty. plow. * i. e. turn pale at the thought of it. Flush youth is youth ripened to manhood; youth whose blood is at the flow. Wassel is here put for intemperance in general. 'All these circumstances of Antony's distress are taken literally from Plutarch.

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

How goes it with my brave Mark Antony?
Alex. Last thing he did, dear queen,
He kiss'd, the last of many doubled kisses,
This orient 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
"Her opulent throne with kingdoms: All the east,
"Say thou,shall call her mistress." So he nodded,
And soberly did mount an arm-gaunt steed,
Who neigh'd so high, that what I would have spoke
Was beastly dumb'd 3 by him.

Cleo. What, was he sad, or merry?

Alex. Like to the time o' the year between the

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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.-Met'st thou my posts?
Alex. Ay, madam, twenty several messengers :
Why do you send so thick?

Cleo. Who's born that day

When I forget to send to Antony,

Shall die a beggar.-Ink and paper, Charmian.10 Welcome, my good Alexas.-Did I, Charmian, Ever love Casar so?

15

Char. O that brave Cæsar!

Cleo. Be choak'd 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. By your most gracious pardon,
20 I sing but after you.

25

Cleo. My sallad days!

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

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Enter Pompey, Menecrates, and Menas.

He loses hearts: Lepidus flatters both,
Of both is flatter'd; but he neither loves,
Nor either cares for him.

Men. Cæsar and Lepidus are in the field;

Pomp. IF the great gods be just, they shall assist 40 A mighty strength they carry.

The deeds of justest men.

Men. Know, worthy Pompey,

That what they do delay, they not deny. [cays
Pomp. Whiles we are suitors to their throne, de-
The thing we sue for".

Men. 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.

Pomp. I shall do well:

The people love me, and the sea is mine;

My power's a crescent, and my auguring hope

Says, it will come to the full. Mark Antony

In Egypt sits at dinner, and will make

Pomp. Where have you this? 'tis false.
Men. From Silvius, sir.

Pomp. He dreams; I know, they are in Rome

together,

45 Looking for Antony: But all the charms of love,
Salt Cleopatra, soften thy wan lip!
Let witchcraft join with beauty, fust with both;
Tie up the libertine in a field of feasts,
Keep his brain fuming: Epicurean cooks,
50 Sharpen with cloyless sauce his appetite;
That sleep and feeding may prorogue his honour,
Even'till a Lethe'd dulness-How now, Varrius?
Enter Varrius.

Var. This is most certain, that I shall deliver: No wars without doors: Cæsar gets money, where 55 Mark Antony is every hour in Rome

2 Arm

Alluding to the philosopher's stone, which, by its touch, converts base metal into gold. The alchemists call the matter, whatever it be, by which they perform transmutation, a medicine. gaunt perhaps means, a horse so slender that a man might clasp him, and therefore formed for expedition.—In Chaucer's description of a king of Thrace in the Knight's Tale, armgrcle is used to signify as big as the arm; arm-gaunt therefore may mean as slender as the arm. We still say, in vulgar comparison, as long as my arm, as thick as my leg, &c. i. e. put to silence by him. 4 The meaning is, Those were my sallad days, when I was green in judgement; but your blood is as cold as my judgement, if you have the same opinion of things now as I had then. By sending out messengers. The meaning is, While we are praying, the thing for which we pray is losing its value.

3D 3

5

Expected;

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To don is do on, to put on.

or subject of conversation.

never

10

Did urge me in his act: I did enquire it;
And have my learning from some true reports
That drew their swords with you. Did he not
rather

Discredit my authority with yours;

And make the wars alike against my stomach, Having alike your cause"? Of this my letters Before did satisfy you. If you'll patch a quarrel, 50 As matter whole you have not to make it with, It must not be with this.

1551

Cas. You praise yourself,

By laying defects of judgement to me; but
You patch'd up your excuses.

Ant. Not so, not so:

I know you could not lack, I am certain on 't,
Very necessity of this thought, that I,

2

Hope for expect.

i. e. quarrel.

4 i. e. I would meet

7

him undressed, without shew of respect. ' i. e. Let not ill humour be added to the subject of our difference. To practise means to employ unwarrantable arts or stratagems. i. e. The pretence of the war was on your account; arms in your name, and you were made the theme and subject of their insurrection. did make use of my name as a pretence for the war. 10 Reports for reporters. same cause as you to be offended with me.

i.e. my theme they took up , í. e. never "Having the

Your

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