TAURUS, Lieutenant-General to Cæ- CHARMIAN and IRAS, Attendants on

Officers, Soldiers, Messengers, and other Attendants.

Enter DEMETRIUS and PHILO.

Phi. Nay, but this dotage of our general's O'erflows the measure: those his goodly eyes,

That o'er the files and musters of the war

Have glow'd like plated Mars', now bend, now turn,
The office and devotion of their view

Upon a tawny front: his captain's heart,

Which in the scuffles of great fights hath burst

1

The buckles on his breast, reneags 1 all temper,

And is become the bellows and the fan

To cool a gipsy's lust. [Flourish within.] Look where they

come:

Take but good note, and you shall see in him

The triple 2 pillar of the world transform'd

Into a strumpet's Fool: 3 behold and see.

Enter ANTONY and CLEOPATRA, with their Trains; Eunuchs fanning her.

Cleo. If it be love indeed, tell me how much.

Ant. There's beggary in the love that can be reckon'd. Cleo. I'll set a bourn how far to be beloved.

Ant. Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new earth.

Enter an Attendant.

Att. News, my good lord, from Rome.

Ant.

Cleo. Nay, hear them,4 Antony :

Grates me. The sum.

Fulvia perchance is angry; or, who knows

If the scarce-bearded Cæsar have not sent

1 Reneag is an old word for renounce or refuse. See vol. xv. page 57,

note 18.

2 Triple for third, or one of three; one of the Triumvirs, or three masters of the world. See vol. iv. page 40, note 17.

3 It seems that the "allowed Fool" was a frequent appendage to persons and houses of ill-repute. See vol. vi. page 155, note 20.

4 News is singular or plural indifferently in Shakespeare. Here it is used as both at the same time. Grates me means it is irksome to me; grates on my disposition. -The sum means, speak it in a word.

His powerful mandate to you, Do this, or this;
Take-in that kingdom and enfranchise that;
Perform't, or else we damn thee.

Ant.

How, my love!

Cleo. Perchance ·

nay, and most like

You must not stay here longer; your dismission
Is come from Cæsar; therefore hear it, Antony.
Where's Fulvia's process? 6 Cæsar's I would say? both?
Call in the messengers. As I am Egypt's Queen,

Thou blushest, Antony; and that blood of thine
Is Cæsar's homager: else so thy cheek pays shame
When shrill-tongued Fulvia scolds. The messengers !

Ant. Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide arch
Of the ranged empire 7 fall! Here is my space.
Kingdoms are clay: our dungy earth alike
Feeds beast as man: the nobleness of life

Is to do thus; [Embracing.] when such a mutual pair
And such a twain can do't; in which I bind,

On pain of punishment, the world to weet 8

We stand up peerless.

Cleo.

Excellent falsehood!

Why did he marry Fulvia, and not love her?

I'll seem the fool I am not; Antony

Will be himself.

Ant.

But stirr'd by Cleopatra.9

5 Take-in signifies subdue, conquer. See vol. vii. page 235, note 60. 6 Process here means summons. "" which a man is called into the court, and no more.

is to cite, to summon." - MINSHEU.

Lawyers call that the processe by
To serve with processe

7 The ranged empire is the well-arranged, well-ordered empire. Shakespeare uses the expression again in Coriolanus: "Bury all, which yet distinctly ranges, in heaps and piles of ruins."

8 To weet is to know. Wit, wite, wise, &c., have the same root.

9 But it will be himself as quickened and inspired by Cleopatra, or with her inspiration added to what he is in himself.

Now, for the love of Love 10 and her soft hours,
Let's not confound the time with conference harsh :
There's not a minute of our lives should stretch
What sport to-night?

Without some pleasure now.
Cleo. Hear the ambassadors.

Ant.

Fie, wrangling Queen!

Whom every thing becomes, to chide, to laugh,
To weep; whose every passion fully strives
To make itself, in thee, fair and admired!
No messenger but thine; and all alone

To-night we'll wander through the streets, and note
The qualities of people. Come, my Queen ;

Last night you did desire it.

- Speak not to us.

[Exeunt ANT. and CLEO. with their Train. Dem. Is Cæsar with Antonius prized so slight? Phi. Sir, sometimes, when he is not Antony, He comes too short of that great property Which still should go with Antony.

Dem.

I am full sorry

That he approves the common liar,11 who
Thus speaks of him at Rome; but I will hope

Of better deeds to-morrow.

Rest you happy!

[Exeunt.

Enter CHARMIAN, IRAS, ALEXAS, and a Soothsayer.

Char. Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most-any-thing Alexas, almost-most absolute Alexas, where's the soothsayer that you praised so to the Queen? O, that I knew this husband, which, you say, must charge his horns with garlands !

10.

10 For the sake of the goddess of Love. To confound the time, is to consume it, to lose it. See vol. xi. page 26, note 11 The common liar is Fame or Rumour. used in the sense of makes good, or proves true.

Approves is evidently here
Often so.

Eno. Bring in the banquet quickly; wine enough Cleopatra's health to drink.

Char. Good sir, give me good fortune.

Sooth. I make not, but foresee.

Char. Pray, then, foresee me one.

Sooth. You shall be yet far fairer than you are.

Char. He means in flesh.

Iras. No, you shall paint when you are old.
Char. Wrinkles forbid !

Alex. Vex not his prescience; be attentive.
Char. Hush!

Sooth. You shall be more beloving than beloved.
Char. I had rather heat my liver with drinking.1

Alex. Nay, hear him.

Char. Good now,2 some excellent fortune! Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon, and widow them all : let me have a child at fifty,3 to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage: find me to marry me with Octavius Cæsar, and companion me with my mistress.4

1 The liver being considered the seat of love, Charmian says she would rather heat her liver with drinking than with love's fire. A heated liver was supposed to make a pimpled face.

2 Good now was an equivalent to well now. See vol. xiv. p. 147, note 16. 8 This is one of Shakespeare's natural touches. Few circumstances are more flattering to the fair sex, than breeding at an advanced period of life. - JOHNSON.

4 That is, make me equal with my mistress.