Antony and Cleopatra - Entire Play
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Antony and Cleopatra - Entire PlaySynopsis:
Antony and Cleopatra tells the story of a romance between two powerful lovers: Cleopatra, the queen of Egypt, and Mark Antony, who rules the Roman Empire with Octavius Caesar and Lepidus.
Although he is needed in Rome, Antony lingers in Egypt with Cleopatra. He finally returns to Rome when Pompey, another military leader, tries to gain control of the empire. Once in Rome, Antony marries Caesar’s sister Octavia.
After Pompey is defeated, Caesar imprisons Lepidus and turns on Antony. Octavia attempts to reconcile them, but fails. Antony returns to Cleopatra. He challenges Caesar at sea, adding Cleopatra’s ships to his own. When she and her navy flee in mid-battle, Antony follows, abandoning his men.
Antony fails in a second battle at sea. At first, he blames Cleopatra and plans to kill her. He responds to false news of her death, however, by attempting suicide; fatally wounded, he reunites with her as he dies. Faced with Caesar’s plans to humiliate her in Rome, Cleopatra kills herself with poisonous snakes.
PHILO
0001 Nay, but this dotage of our general’s
0002 O’erflows the measure. Those his goodly eyes,
0003 That o’er the files and musters of the war
0004 Have glowed like plated Mars, now bend, now turn
0005 5 The office and devotion of their view
0006 Upon a tawny front. His captain’s heart,
0007 Which in the scuffles of great fights hath burst
0008 The buckles on his breast, reneges all temper
0009 And is become the bellows and the fan
0010 10 To cool a gypsy’s lust.
Flourish. Enter Antony, Cleopatra, her Ladies, the Train,
with Eunuchs fanning her.
0011 Look where they come.
0012 Take but good note, and you shall see in him
0013 The triple pillar of the world transformed
0014 Into a strumpet’s fool. Behold and see.
CLEOPATRA
0015 15 If it be love indeed, tell me how much.
ANTONY
0016 There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned.
CLEOPATRA
0017 I’ll set a bourn how far to be beloved.
0018 Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new
0019 Earth.
Enter a Messenger.
MESSENGER 0020 20News, my good lord, from Rome.
ANTONY 0021 Grates me, the sum.
CLEOPATRA 0022 Nay, hear them, Antony.
0023 Fulvia perchance is angry. Or who knows
0024 If the scarce-bearded Caesar have not sent
0025 25 His powerful mandate to you: “Do this, or this;
0026 Take in that kingdom, and enfranchise that.
0027 Perform ’t, or else we damn thee.”
ANTONY 0028 How, my love?
CLEOPATRA 0029 Perchance? Nay, and most like.
0030 30 You must not stay here longer; your dismission
0031 Is come from Caesar. Therefore hear it, Antony.
0032 Where’s Fulvia’s process? Caesar’s, I would say—
0033 both?
0034 Call in the messengers. As I am Egypt’s queen,
0035 35 Thou blushest, Antony, and that blood of thine
0036 Is Caesar’s homager; else so thy cheek pays shame
0037 When shrill-tongued Fulvia scolds. The messengers!
ANTONY
0038 Let Rome in Tiber melt and the wide arch
0039 Of the ranged empire fall. Here is my space.
0040 40 Kingdoms are clay. Our dungy earth alike
0041 Feeds beast as man. The nobleness of life
0042 Is to do thus; when such a mutual pair
0043 And such a twain can do ’t, in which I bind,
0044 On pain of punishment, the world to weet
0045 45 We stand up peerless.
CLEOPATRA 0046 Excellent falsehood!
0047 Why did he marry Fulvia and not love her?
0048 I’ll seem the fool I am not. Antony
0049 Will be himself.
0051 Now for the love of Love and her soft hours,
0052 Let’s not confound the time with conference harsh.
0053 There’s not a minute of our lives should stretch
0054 Without some pleasure now. What sport tonight?
CLEOPATRA
0055 55 Hear the ambassadors.
ANTONY 0056 Fie, wrangling queen,
0057 Whom everything becomes—to chide, to laugh,
0058 To weep; ⌜whose⌝ every passion fully strives
0059 To make itself, in thee, fair and admired!
0060 60 No messenger but thine, and all alone
0061 Tonight we’ll wander through the streets and note
0062 The qualities of people. Come, my queen,
0063 Last night you did desire it. ⌜To the Messenger.⌝
0064 Speak not to us.
⌜Antony and Cleopatra⌝ exit with the Train.
DEMETRIUS
0065 65 Is Caesar with Antonius prized so slight?
PHILO
0066 Sir, sometimes when he is not Antony
0067 He comes too short of that great property
0068 Which still should go with Antony.
DEMETRIUS 0069 I am full sorry
0070 70 That he approves the common liar who
0071 Thus speaks of him at Rome; but I will hope
0072 Of better deeds tomorrow. Rest you happy!
They exit.
Lucillius, Charmian, Iras, Mardian the Eunuch, Alexas,
⌜and Servants.⌝
CHARMIAN 0073 Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most anything
0074 Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where’s the
0076 I knew this husband which you say must ⌜charge⌝
0077 5 his horns with garlands!
ALEXAS 0078 Soothsayer!
SOOTHSAYER 0079 Your will?
CHARMIAN
0080 Is this the man?—Is ’t you, sir, that know things?
SOOTHSAYER
0081 In nature’s infinite book of secrecy
0082 10 A little I can read.
ALEXAS, ⌜to Charmian⌝ 0083 Show him your hand.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜to Servants⌝
0084 Bring in the banquet quickly, wine enough
0085 Cleopatra’s health to drink.
CHARMIAN, ⌜giving her hand to the Soothsayer⌝ 0086 Good sir,
0087 15 give me good fortune.
SOOTHSAYER 0088 I make not, but foresee.
CHARMIAN 0089 Pray then, foresee me one.
SOOTHSAYER
0090 You shall be yet far fairer than you are.
CHARMIAN 0091 He means in flesh.
IRAS 0092 20No, you shall paint when you are old.
CHARMIAN 0093 Wrinkles forbid!
ALEXAS 0094 Vex not his prescience. Be attentive.
CHARMIAN 0095 Hush.
SOOTHSAYER
0096 You shall be more beloving than beloved.
CHARMIAN 0097 25I had rather heat my liver with drinking.
ALEXAS 0098 Nay, hear him.
CHARMIAN 0099 Good now, some excellent fortune! Let me
0100 be married to three kings in a forenoon and widow
0101 them all. Let me have a child at fifty to whom Herod
0102 30 of Jewry may do homage. Find me to marry me
0103 with Octavius Caesar, and companion me with my
0104 mistress.
0105 You shall outlive the lady whom you serve.
CHARMIAN 0106 O, excellent! I love long life better than figs.
SOOTHSAYER
0107 35 You have seen and proved a fairer former fortune
0108 Than that which is to approach.
CHARMIAN 0109 Then belike my children shall have no
0110 names. Prithee, how many boys and wenches must
0111 I have?
SOOTHSAYER
0112 40 If every of your wishes had a womb,
0113 And ⌜fertile⌝ every wish, a million.
CHARMIAN 0114 Out, fool! I forgive thee for a witch.
ALEXAS 0115 You think none but your sheets are privy to
0116 your wishes.
CHARMIAN, ⌜to Soothsayer⌝ 0117 45Nay, come. Tell Iras hers.
ALEXAS 0118 We’ll know all our fortunes.
ENOBARBUS 0119 Mine, and most of our fortunes tonight,
0120 shall be—drunk to bed.
IRAS, ⌜giving her hand to the Soothsayer⌝ 0121 There’s a palm
0122 50 presages chastity, if nothing else.
CHARMIAN 0123 E’en as the o’erflowing Nilus presageth
0124 famine.
IRAS 0125 Go, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay.
CHARMIAN 0126 Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication,
0127 55 I cannot scratch mine ear.—Prithee
0128 tell her but a workaday fortune.
SOOTHSAYER 0129 Your fortunes are alike.
IRAS 0130 But how, but how? Give me particulars.
SOOTHSAYER 0131 I have said.
IRAS 0132 60Am I not an inch of fortune better than she?
CHARMIAN 0133 Well, if you were but an inch of fortune
0134 better than I, where would you choose it?
IRAS 0135 Not in my husband’s nose.
CHARMIAN 0136 Our worser thoughts heavens mend. Alexas—
0137 65 come, his fortune, his fortune! O, let him marry a
0139 let her die, too, and give him a worse, and let worse
0140 follow worse, till the worst of all follow him laughing
0141 to his grave, fiftyfold a cuckold. Good Isis, hear me
0142 70 this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more
0143 weight, good Isis, I beseech thee!
IRAS 0144 Amen, dear goddess, hear that prayer of the
0145 people. For, as it is a heartbreaking to see a handsome
0146 man loose-wived, so it is a deadly sorrow to
0147 75 behold a foul knave uncuckolded. Therefore, dear
0148 Isis, keep decorum and fortune him accordingly.
CHARMIAN 0149 Amen.
ALEXAS 0150 Lo now, if it lay in their hands to make me a
0151 cuckold, they would make themselves whores but
0152 80 they’d do ’t.
ENOBARBUS 0153 Hush, here comes Antony.
CHARMIAN 0154 Not he. The Queen.
Enter Cleopatra.
CLEOPATRA 0155 ⌜Saw⌝ you my lord?
ENOBARBUS 0156 No, lady.
CLEOPATRA 0157 85Was he not here?
CHARMIAN 0158 No, madam.
CLEOPATRA
0159 He was disposed to mirth, but on the sudden
0160 A Roman thought hath struck him.—Enobarbus!
ENOBARBUS 0161 Madam?
CLEOPATRA
0162 90 Seek him and bring him hither.—Where’s Alexas?
ALEXAS
0163 Here at your service. My lord approaches.
Enter Antony with a Messenger.
CLEOPATRA
0164 We will not look upon him. Go with us.
⌜All but Antony and the Messenger⌝ exit.
0165 Fulvia thy wife first came into the field.
ANTONY 0166 Against my brother Lucius?
MESSENGER 0167 95Ay.
0168 But soon that war had end, and the time’s state
0169 Made friends of them, jointing their force ’gainst
0170 Caesar,
0171 Whose better issue in the war from Italy
0172 100 Upon the first encounter drave them.
ANTONY 0173 Well, what worst?
MESSENGER
0174 The nature of bad news infects the teller.
ANTONY
0175 When it concerns the fool or coward. On.
0176 Things that are past are done, with me. ’Tis thus:
0177 105 Who tells me true, though in his tale lie death,
0178 I hear him as he flattered.
MESSENGER 0179 Labienus—
0180 This is stiff news—hath with his Parthian force
0181 Extended Asia: from Euphrates
0182 110 His conquering banner shook, from Syria
0183 To Lydia and to Ionia,
0184 Whilst—
ANTONY 0185 “Antony,” thou wouldst say?
MESSENGER 0186 O, my lord!
ANTONY
0187 115 Speak to me home; mince not the general tongue.
0188 Name Cleopatra as she is called in Rome;
0189 Rail thou in Fulvia’s phrase, and taunt my faults
0190 With such full license as both truth and malice
0191 Have power to utter. O, then we bring forth weeds
0192 120 When our quick winds lie still, and our ills told us
0193 Is as our earing. Fare thee well awhile.
MESSENGER 0194 At your noble pleasure.Messenger exits.
ANTONY
0195 From Sicyon how the news? Speak there.
⌜SECOND⌝ MESSENGER
0196 The man from Sicyon—
⌜ANTONY⌝ 0197 125 Is there such an one?
SECOND MESSENGER
0198 He stays upon your will.
ANTONY 0199 Let him appear.
⌜Second Messenger exits.⌝
0200 These strong Egyptian fetters I must break,
0201 Or lose myself in dotage.
Enter another Messenger with a letter.
0202 130 What are you?
THIRD MESSENGER
0203 Fulvia thy wife is dead.
ANTONY 0204 Where died she?
⌜THIRD⌝ MESSENGER 0205 In Sicyon.
0206 Her length of sickness, with what else more serious
0207 135 Importeth thee to know, this bears.
⌜He hands Antony the letter.⌝
ANTONY 0208 Forbear me.
⌜Third Messenger exits.⌝
0209 There’s a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it.
0210 What our contempts doth often hurl from us,
0211 We wish it ours again. The present pleasure,
0212 140 By revolution lowering, does become
0213 The opposite of itself. She’s good, being gone.
0214 The hand could pluck her back that shoved her on.
0215 I must from this enchanting queen break off.
0216 Ten thousand harms more than the ills I know
0217 145 My idleness doth hatch.—How now, Enobarbus!
Enter Enobarbus.
ANTONY 0219 I must with haste from hence.
ENOBARBUS 0220 Why then we kill all our women. We see
0221 how mortal an unkindness is to them. If they suffer
0222 150 our departure, death’s the word.
ANTONY 0223 I must be gone.
ENOBARBUS 0224 Under a compelling occasion, let women
0225 die. It were pity to cast them away for nothing,
0226 though between them and a great cause, they
0227 155 should be esteemed nothing. Cleopatra, catching
0228 but the least noise of this, dies instantly. I have seen
0229 her die twenty times upon far poorer moment. I do
0230 think there is mettle in death which commits some
0231 loving act upon her, she hath such a celerity in
0232 160 dying.
ANTONY 0233 She is cunning past man’s thought.
ENOBARBUS 0234 Alack, sir, no, her passions are made of
0235 nothing but the finest part of pure love. We cannot
0236 call her winds and waters sighs and tears; they are
0237 165 greater storms and tempests than almanacs can
0238 report. This cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she
0239 makes a shower of rain as well as Jove.
ANTONY 0240 Would I had never seen her!
ENOBARBUS 0241 O, sir, you had then left unseen a wonderful
0242 170 piece of work, which not to have been blest
0243 withal would have discredited your travel.
ANTONY 0244 Fulvia is dead.
ENOBARBUS 0245 Sir?
ANTONY 0246 Fulvia is dead.
ENOBARBUS 0247 175Fulvia?
ANTONY 0248 Dead.
ENOBARBUS 0249 Why, sir, give the gods a thankful sacrifice.
0250 When it pleaseth their deities to take the wife of a
0251 man from him, it shows to man the tailors of the
0253 worn out, there are members to make new. If there
0254 were no more women but Fulvia, then had you
0255 indeed a cut, and the case to be lamented. This grief
0256 is crowned with consolation; your old smock brings
0257 185 forth a new petticoat, and indeed the tears live in an
0258 onion that should water this sorrow.
ANTONY
0259 The business she hath broachèd in the state
0260 Cannot endure my absence.
ENOBARBUS 0261 And the business you have broached here
0262 190 cannot be without you, especially that of Cleopatra’s,
0263 which wholly depends on your abode.
ANTONY
0264 No more light answers. Let our officers
0265 Have notice what we purpose. I shall break
0266 The cause of our expedience to the Queen
0267 195 And get her ⌜leave⌝ to part. For not alone
0268 The death of Fulvia, with more urgent touches,
0269 Do strongly speak to us, but the letters too
0270 Of many our contriving friends in Rome
0271 Petition us at home. Sextus Pompeius
0272 200 ⌜Hath⌝ given the dare to Caesar and commands
0273 The empire of the sea. Our slippery people,
0274 Whose love is never linked to the deserver
0275 Till his deserts are past, begin to throw
0276 Pompey the Great and all his dignities
0277 205 Upon his son, who—high in name and power,
0278 Higher than both in blood and life—stands up
0279 For the main soldier; whose quality, going on,
0280 The sides o’ th’ world may danger. Much is
0281 breeding
0282 210 Which, like the courser’s hair, hath yet but life
0283 And not a serpent’s poison. Say our pleasure,
0285 Our quick remove from hence.
ENOBARBUS 0286 I shall do ’t.
⌜They exit.⌝
CLEOPATRA
0287 Where is he?
CHARMIAN 0288 I did not see him since.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜to Alexas⌝
0289 See where he is, who’s with him, what he does.
0290 I did not send you. If you find him sad,
0291 5 Say I am dancing; if in mirth, report
0292 That I am sudden sick. Quick, and return.
⌜Alexas exits.⌝
CHARMIAN
0293 Madam, methinks, if you did love him dearly,
0294 You do not hold the method to enforce
0295 The like from him.
CLEOPATRA 0296 10 What should I do I do not?
CHARMIAN
0297 In each thing give him way; cross him in nothing.
CLEOPATRA
0298 Thou teachest like a fool: the way to lose him.
CHARMIAN
0299 Tempt him not so too far. I wish, forbear.
0300 In time we hate that which we often fear.
Enter Antony.
0301 15 But here comes Antony.
CLEOPATRA 0302 I am sick and sullen.
ANTONY
0303 I am sorry to give breathing to my purpose—
0304 Help me away, dear Charmian! I shall fall.
0305 It cannot be thus long; the sides of nature
0306 20 Will not sustain it.
ANTONY 0307 Now, my dearest queen—
CLEOPATRA
0308 Pray you stand farther from me.
ANTONY 0309 What’s the matter?
CLEOPATRA
0310 I know by that same eye there’s some good news.
0311 25 What, says the married woman you may go?
0312 Would she had never given you leave to come.
0313 Let her not say ’tis I that keep you here.
0314 I have no power upon you. Hers you are.
ANTONY
0315 The gods best know—
CLEOPATRA 0316 30 O, never was there queen
0317 So mightily betrayed! Yet at the first
0318 I saw the treasons planted.
ANTONY 0319 Cleopatra—
CLEOPATRA
0320 Why should I think you can be mine, and true—
0321 35 Though you in swearing shake the thronèd gods—
0322 Who have been false to Fulvia? Riotous madness,
0323 To be entangled with those mouth-made vows
0324 Which break themselves in swearing!
ANTONY 0325 Most sweet
0326 40 queen—
CLEOPATRA
0327 Nay, pray you seek no color for your going,
0328 But bid farewell and go. When you sued staying,
0329 Then was the time for words. No going then!
0330 Eternity was in our lips and eyes,
0331 45 Bliss in our brows’ bent; none our parts so poor
0332 But was a race of heaven. They are so still,
0334 Art turned the greatest liar.
ANTONY 0335 How now, lady?
CLEOPATRA
0336 50 I would I had thy inches. Thou shouldst know
0337 There were a heart in Egypt.
ANTONY 0338 Hear me, queen:
0339 The strong necessity of time commands
0340 Our services awhile, but my full heart
0341 55 Remains in use with you. Our Italy
0342 Shines o’er with civil swords; Sextus Pompeius
0343 Makes his approaches to the port of Rome;
0344 Equality of two domestic powers
0345 Breed scrupulous faction; the hated grown to
0346 60 strength
0347 Are newly grown to love; the condemned Pompey,
0348 Rich in his father’s honor, creeps apace
0349 Into the hearts of such as have not thrived
0350 Upon the present state, whose numbers threaten;
0351 65 And quietness, grown sick of rest, would purge
0352 By any desperate change. My more particular,
0353 And that which most with you should safe my going,
0354 Is Fulvia’s death.
CLEOPATRA
0355 Though age from folly could not give me freedom,
0356 70 It does from childishness. Can Fulvia die?
ANTONY 0357 She’s dead, my queen.⌜He shows her papers.⌝
0358 Look here, and at thy sovereign leisure read
0359 The garboils she awaked; at the last, best,
0360 See when and where she died.
CLEOPATRA 0361 75 O, most false love!
0362 Where be the sacred vials thou shouldst fill
0363 With sorrowful water? Now I see, I see,
0364 In Fulvia’s death, how mine received shall be.
ANTONY
0365 Quarrel no more, but be prepared to know
0367 As you shall give th’ advice. By the fire
0368 That quickens Nilus’ slime, I go from hence
0369 Thy soldier, servant, making peace or war
0370 As thou affects.
CLEOPATRA 0371 85 Cut my lace, Charmian, come!
0372 But let it be; I am quickly ill and well;
0373 So Antony loves.
ANTONY 0374 My precious queen, forbear,
0375 And give true evidence to his love, which stands
0376 90 An honorable trial.
CLEOPATRA 0377 So Fulvia told me.
0378 I prithee turn aside and weep for her,
0379 Then bid adieu to me, and say the tears
0380 Belong to Egypt. Good now, play one scene
0381 95 Of excellent dissembling, and let it look
0382 Like perfect honor.
ANTONY 0383 You’ll heat my blood. No more!
CLEOPATRA
0384 You can do better yet, but this is meetly.
ANTONY
0385 Now by ⌜my⌝ sword—
CLEOPATRA 0386 100 And target. Still he mends.
0387 But this is not the best. Look, prithee, Charmian,
0388 How this Herculean Roman does become
0389 The carriage of his chafe.
ANTONY 0390 I’ll leave you, lady.
CLEOPATRA 0391 105Courteous lord, one word.
0392 Sir, you and I must part, but that’s not it;
0393 Sir, you and I have loved, but there’s not it;
0394 That you know well. Something it is I would—
0395 O, my oblivion is a very Antony,
0396 110 And I am all forgotten.
ANTONY 0397 But that your Royalty
0398 Holds idleness your subject, I should take you
0399 For idleness itself.
0401 115 To bear such idleness so near the heart
0402 As Cleopatra this. But, sir, forgive me,
0403 Since my becomings kill me when they do not
0404 Eye well to you. Your honor calls you hence;
0405 Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly,
0406 120 And all the gods go with you. Upon your sword
0407 Sit laurel victory, and smooth success
0408 Be strewed before your feet.
ANTONY 0409 Let us go. Come.
0410 Our separation so abides and flies
0411 125 That thou, residing here, goes yet with me,
0412 And I, hence fleeting, here remain with thee.
0413 Away!
They exit.
Lepidus, and their Train.
CAESAR
0414 You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know,
0415 It is not Caesar’s natural vice to hate
0416 ⌜Our⌝ great competitor. From Alexandria
0417 This is the news: he fishes, drinks, and wastes
0418 5 The lamps of night in revel, is not more manlike
0419 Than Cleopatra, nor the queen of Ptolemy
0420 More womanly than he; hardly gave audience, or
0421 ⌜Vouchsafed⌝ to think he had partners. You shall
0422 find there
0423 10 A man who is th’ ⌜abstract⌝ of all faults
0424 That all men follow.
LEPIDUS 0425 I must not think there are
0426 Evils enough to darken all his goodness.
0428 15 More fiery by night’s blackness, hereditary
0429 Rather than purchased, what he cannot change
0430 Than what he chooses.
CAESAR
0431 You are too indulgent. Let’s grant it is not
0432 Amiss to tumble on the bed of Ptolemy,
0433 20 To give a kingdom for a mirth, to sit
0434 And keep the turn of tippling with a slave,
0435 To reel the streets at noon and stand the buffet
0436 With knaves that smells of sweat. Say this becomes
0437 him—
0438 25 As his composure must be rare indeed
0439 Whom these things cannot blemish—yet must
0440 Antony
0441 No way excuse his foils when we do bear
0442 So great weight in his lightness. If he filled
0443 30 His vacancy with his voluptuousness,
0444 Full surfeits and the dryness of his bones
0445 Call on him for ’t. But to confound such time
0446 That drums him from his sport and speaks as loud
0447 As his own state and ours, ’tis to be chid
0448 35 As we rate boys who, being mature in knowledge,
0449 Pawn their experience to their present pleasure
0450 And so rebel to judgment.
Enter a Messenger.
LEPIDUS 0451 Here’s more news.
MESSENGER
0452 Thy biddings have been done, and every hour,
0453 40 Most noble Caesar, shalt thou have report
0454 How ’tis abroad. Pompey is strong at sea,
0455 And it appears he is beloved of those
0456 That only have feared Caesar. To the ports
0457 The discontents repair, and men’s reports
0458 45 Give him much wronged.
0460 It hath been taught us from the primal state
0461 That he which is was wished until he were,
0462 And the ebbed man, ne’er loved till ne’er worth love,
0463 50 Comes feared by being lacked. This common body,
0464 Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream,
0465 Goes to and back, ⌜lackeying⌝ the varying tide
0466 To rot itself with motion.
⌜Enter a Second Messenger.⌝
⌜SECOND⌝ MESSENGER 0467 Caesar, I bring thee word
0468 55 Menecrates and Menas, famous pirates,
0469 Makes the sea serve them, which they ear and
0470 wound
0471 With keels of every kind. Many hot inroads
0472 They make in Italy—the borders maritime
0473 60 Lack blood to think on ’t—and flush youth revolt.
0474 No vessel can peep forth but ’tis as soon
0475 Taken as seen, for Pompey’s name strikes more
0476 Than could his war resisted.
CAESAR 0477 Antony,
0478 65 Leave thy lascivious ⌜wassails.⌝ When thou once
0479 Was beaten from Modena, where thou slew’st
0480 Hirsius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel
0481 Did famine follow, whom thou fought’st against,
0482 Though daintily brought up, with patience more
0483 70 Than savages could suffer. Thou didst drink
0484 The stale of horses and the gilded puddle
0485 Which beasts would cough at. Thy palate then did
0486 deign
0487 The roughest berry on the rudest hedge.
0488 75 Yea, like the stag when snow the pasture sheets,
0489 The barks of trees thou browsèd. On the Alps
0490 It is reported thou didst eat strange flesh
0491 Which some did die to look on. And all this—
0493 80 Was borne so like a soldier that thy cheek
0494 So much as lanked not.
LEPIDUS 0495 ’Tis pity of him.
CAESAR 0496 Let his shames quickly
0497 Drive him to Rome. ’Tis time we twain
0498 85 Did show ourselves i’ th’ field, and to that end
0499 Assemble ⌜we⌝ immediate council. Pompey
0500 Thrives in our idleness.
LEPIDUS 0501 Tomorrow, Caesar,
0502 I shall be furnished to inform you rightly
0503 90 Both what by sea and land I can be able
0504 To front this present time.
CAESAR 0505 Till which encounter,
0506 It is my business too. Farewell.
LEPIDUS
0507 Farewell, my lord. What you shall know meantime
0508 95 Of stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir,
0509 To let me be partaker.
CAESAR
0510 Doubt not, sir. I knew it for my bond.
They exit.
CLEOPATRA 0511 Charmian!
CHARMIAN 0512 Madam?
CLEOPATRA 0513 Ha, ha! Give me to drink mandragora.
CHARMIAN 0514 Why, madam?
CLEOPATRA
0515 5 That I might sleep out this great gap of time
0516 My Antony is away.
CHARMIAN 0517 You think of him too much.
0518 O, ’tis treason!
CHARMIAN 0519 Madam, I trust not so.
CLEOPATRA
0520 10 Thou, eunuch Mardian!
MARDIAN 0521 What’s your Highness’ pleasure?
CLEOPATRA
0522 Not now to hear thee sing. I take no pleasure
0523 In aught an eunuch has. ’Tis well for thee
0524 That, being unseminared, thy freer thoughts
0525 15 May not fly forth of Egypt. Hast thou affections?
MARDIAN 0526 Yes, gracious madam.
CLEOPATRA 0527 Indeed?
MARDIAN
0528 Not in deed, madam, for I can do nothing
0529 But what indeed is honest to be done.
0530 20 Yet have I fierce affections, and think
0531 What Venus did with Mars.
CLEOPATRA 0532 O, Charmian,
0533 Where think’st thou he is now? Stands he, or sits he?
0534 Or does he walk? Or is he on his horse?
0535 25 O happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony!
0536 Do bravely, horse, for wot’st thou whom thou
0537 mov’st?
0538 The demi-Atlas of this Earth, the arm
0539 And burgonet of men. He’s speaking now,
0540 30 Or murmuring “Where’s my serpent of old Nile?”
0541 For so he calls me. Now I feed myself
0542 With most delicious poison. Think on me
0543 That am with Phoebus’ amorous pinches black,
0544 And wrinkled deep in time? Broad-fronted Caesar,
0545 35 When thou wast here above the ground, I was
0546 A morsel for a monarch. And great Pompey
0547 Would stand and make his eyes grow in my brow;
0548 There would he anchor his aspect, and die
0549 With looking on his life.
ALEXAS 0550 40Sovereign of Egypt, hail!
CLEOPATRA
0551 How much unlike art thou Mark Antony!
0552 Yet coming from him, that great med’cine hath
0553 With his tinct gilded thee.
0554 How goes it with my brave Mark Antony?
ALEXAS 0555 45Last thing he did, dear queen,
0556 He kissed—the last of many doubled kisses—
0557 This orient pearl. His speech sticks in my heart.
CLEOPATRA
0558 Mine ear must pluck it thence.
ALEXAS 0559 “Good friend,” quoth
0560 50 he,
0561 “Say the firm Roman to great Egypt sends
0562 This treasure of an oyster; at whose foot,
0563 To mend the petty present, I will piece
0564 Her opulent throne with kingdoms. All the East,
0565 55 Say thou, shall call her mistress.” So he nodded
0566 And soberly did mount an arm-gaunt steed,
0567 Who neighed so high that what I would have spoke
0568 Was beastly ⌜dumbed⌝ by him.
CLEOPATRA 0569 What, was he sad, or merry?
ALEXAS
0570 60 Like to the time o’ th’ year between th’ extremes
0571 Of hot and cold, he was nor sad nor merry.
CLEOPATRA
0572 O, well-divided disposition!—Note him,
0573 Note him, good Charmian, ’tis the man! But note
0574 him:
0575 65 He was not sad, for he would shine on those
0576 That make their looks by his; he was not merry,
0577 Which seemed to tell them his remembrance lay
0578 In Egypt with his joy; but between both.
0580 70 The violence of either thee becomes,
0581 So does it no man’s else.—Met’st thou my posts?
ALEXAS
0582 Ay, madam, twenty several messengers.
0583 Why do you send so thick?
CLEOPATRA 0584 Who’s born that day
0585 75 When I forget to send to Antony
0586 Shall die a beggar.—Ink and paper, Charmian.—
0587 Welcome, my good Alexas.—Did I, Charmian,
0588 Ever love Caesar so?
CHARMIAN 0589 O, that brave Caesar!
CLEOPATRA
0590 80 Be choked with such another emphasis!
0591 Say “the brave Antony.”
CHARMIAN 0592 The valiant Caesar!
CLEOPATRA
0593 By Isis, I will give thee bloody teeth
0594 If thou with Caesar paragon again
0595 85 My man of men.
CHARMIAN 0596 By your most gracious pardon,
0597 I sing but after you.
CLEOPATRA 0598 My salad days,
0599 When I was green in judgment, cold in blood,
0600 90 To say as I said then. But come, away,
0601 Get me ink and paper.
0602 He shall have every day a several greeting,
0603 Or I’ll unpeople Egypt.
They exit.
in warlike manner.
POMPEY
0604 If the great gods be just, they shall assist
0605 The deeds of justest men.
MENAS 0606 Know, worthy Pompey,
0607 That what they do delay they not deny.
POMPEY
0608 5 Whiles we are suitors to their throne, decays
0609 The thing we sue for.
MENAS 0610 We, ignorant of ourselves,
0611 Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers
0612 Deny us for our good; so find we profit
0613 10 By losing of our prayers.
POMPEY 0614 I shall do well.
0615 The people love me, and the sea is mine;
0616 My powers are crescent, and my auguring hope
0617 Says it will come to th’ full. Mark Antony
0618 15 In Egypt sits at dinner, and will make
0619 No wars without doors. Caesar gets money where
0620 He loses hearts. Lepidus flatters both,
0621 Of both is flattered; but he neither loves,
0622 Nor either cares for him.
MENAS 0623 20 Caesar and Lepidus
0624 Are in the field. A mighty strength they carry.
0625 Where have you this? ’Tis false.
MENAS 0626 From Silvius, sir.
POMPEY
0627 He dreams. I know they are in Rome together,
0628 25 Looking for Antony. But all the charms of love,
0629 Salt Cleopatra, soften thy wanned lip!
0630 Let witchcraft join with beauty, lust with both;
0631 Tie up the libertine in a field of feasts;
0632 Keep his brain fuming. Epicurean cooks
0633 30 Sharpen with cloyless sauce his appetite,
0634 That sleep and feeding may prorogue his honor
0635 Even till a Lethe’d dullness—
Enter Varrius.
0636 How now, Varrius?
VARRIUS
0637 This is most certain that I shall deliver:
0638 35 Mark Antony is every hour in Rome
0639 Expected. Since he went from Egypt ’tis
0640 A space for farther travel.
POMPEY 0641 I could have given less matter
0642 A better ear.—Menas, I did not think
0643 40 This amorous surfeiter would have donned his helm
0644 For such a petty war. His soldiership
0645 Is twice the other twain. But let us rear
0646 The higher our opinion, that our stirring
0647 Can from the lap of Egypt’s widow pluck
0648 45 The ne’er lust-wearied Antony.
MENAS 0649 I cannot hope
0650 Caesar and Antony shall well greet together.
0651 His wife that’s dead did trespasses to Caesar;
0652 His brother ⌜warred⌝ upon him, although I think
0653 50 Not moved by Antony.
POMPEY 0654 I know not, Menas,
0656 Were ’t not that we stand up against them all,
0657 ’Twere pregnant they should square between
0658 55 themselves,
0659 For they have entertainèd cause enough
0660 To draw their swords. But how the fear of us
0661 May cement their divisions and bind up
0662 The petty difference, we yet not know.
0663 60 Be ’t as our gods will have ’t. It only stands
0664 Our lives upon to use our strongest hands.
0665 Come, Menas.
They exit.
LEPIDUS
0666 Good Enobarbus, ’tis a worthy deed,
0667 And shall become you well, to entreat your captain
0668 To soft and gentle speech.
ENOBARBUS 0669 I shall entreat him
0670 5 To answer like himself. If Caesar move him,
0671 Let Antony look over Caesar’s head
0672 And speak as loud as Mars. By Jupiter,
0673 Were I the wearer of Antonio’s beard,
0674 I would not shave ’t today.
LEPIDUS
0675 10 ’Tis not a time for private stomaching.
ENOBARBUS 0676 Every time serves for the matter that is
0677 then born in ’t.
LEPIDUS
0678 But small to greater matters must give way.
ENOBARBUS 0679 Not if the small come first.
LEPIDUS
0680 15 Your speech is passion; but pray you stir
0681 No embers up. Here comes the noble Antony.
ENOBARBUS 0682 And yonder Caesar.
Enter, ⌜at another door,⌝ Caesar,
Maecenas, and Agrippa.
ANTONY, ⌜to Ventidius⌝
0683 If we compose well here, to Parthia.
0684 Hark, Ventidius.⌜They talk aside.⌝
CAESAR, ⌜to Maecenas⌝
0685 20 I do not know, Maecenas. Ask Agrippa.
LEPIDUS, ⌜to Caesar and Antony⌝ 0686 Noble friends,
0687 That which combined us was most great, and let not
0688 A leaner action rend us. What’s amiss,
0689 May it be gently heard. When we debate
0690 25 Our trivial difference loud, we do commit
0691 Murder in healing wounds. Then, noble partners,
0692 The rather for I earnestly beseech,
0693 Touch you the sourest points with sweetest terms,
0694 Nor curstness grow to th’ matter.
ANTONY 0695 30 ’Tis spoken well.
0696 Were we before our armies, and to fight,
0697 I should do thus.Flourish.
CAESAR 0698 Welcome to Rome.
ANTONY 0699 Thank you.
CAESAR 0700 35Sit.
ANTONY 0701 Sit, sir.
CAESAR 0702 Nay, then.⌜They sit.⌝
ANTONY
0703 I learn you take things ill which are not so,
0704 Or, being, concern you not.
CAESAR 0705 40 I must be laughed at
0706 If or for nothing or a little, I
0707 Should say myself offended, and with you
0708 Chiefly i’ th’ world; more laughed at, that I should
0710 45 name
0711 It not concerned me.
ANTONY
0712 My being in Egypt, Caesar, what was ’t to you?
CAESAR
0713 No more than my residing here at Rome
0714 Might be to you in Egypt. Yet if you there
0715 50 Did practice on my state, your being in Egypt
0716 Might be my question.
ANTONY 0717 How intend you, practiced?
CAESAR
0718 You may be pleased to catch at mine intent
0719 By what did here befall me. Your wife and brother
0720 55 Made wars upon me, and their contestation
0721 Was theme for you; you were the word of war.
ANTONY
0722 You do mistake your business. My brother never
0723 Did urge me in his act. I did inquire it,
0724 And have my learning from some true reports
0725 60 That drew their swords with you. Did he not rather
0726 Discredit my authority with yours,
0727 And make the wars alike against my stomach,
0728 Having alike your cause? Of this my letters
0729 Before did satisfy you. If you’ll patch a quarrel,
0730 65 As matter whole you have to make it with,
0731 It must not be with this.
CAESAR 0732 You praise yourself
0733 By laying defects of judgment to me; but
0734 You patched up your excuses.
ANTONY 0735 70 Not so, not so.
0736 I know you could not lack—I am certain on ’t—
0737 Very necessity of this thought, that I,
0738 Your partner in the cause ’gainst which he fought,
0739 Could not with graceful eyes attend those wars
0741 I would you had her spirit in such another.
0742 The third o’ th’ world is yours, which with a snaffle
0743 You may pace easy, but not such a wife.
ENOBARBUS 0744 Would we had all such wives, that the men
0745 80 might go to wars with the women!
ANTONY
0746 So much uncurbable, her garboils, Caesar,
0747 Made out of her impatience—which not wanted
0748 Shrewdness of policy too—I grieving grant
0749 Did you too much disquiet. For that you must
0750 85 But say I could not help it.
CAESAR 0751 I wrote to you
0752 When rioting in Alexandria; you
0753 Did pocket up my letters, and with taunts
0754 Did gibe my missive out of audience.
ANTONY 0755 90 Sir,
0756 He fell upon me ere admitted, then;
0757 Three kings I had newly feasted, and did want
0758 Of what I was i’ th’ morning. But next day
0759 I told him of myself, which was as much
0760 95 As to have asked him pardon. Let this fellow
0761 Be nothing of our strife; if we contend,
0762 Out of our question wipe him.
CAESAR 0763 You have broken
0764 The article of your oath, which you shall never
0765 100 Have tongue to charge me with.
LEPIDUS 0766 Soft, Caesar!
ANTONY 0767 No, Lepidus, let him speak.
0768 The honor is sacred which he talks on now,
0769 Supposing that I lacked it.—But on, Caesar:
0770 105 The article of my oath?
CAESAR
0771 To lend me arms and aid when I required them,
0772 The which you both denied.
0774 And then when poisoned hours had bound me up
0775 110 From mine own knowledge. As nearly as I may
0776 I’ll play the penitent to you. But mine honesty
0777 Shall not make poor my greatness, nor my power
0778 Work without it. Truth is that Fulvia,
0779 To have me out of Egypt, made wars here,
0780 115 For which myself, the ignorant motive, do
0781 So far ask pardon as befits mine honor
0782 To stoop in such a case.
LEPIDUS 0783 ’Tis noble spoken.
MAECENAS
0784 If it might please you to enforce no further
0785 120 The griefs between you, to forget them quite
0786 Were to remember that the present need
0787 Speaks to atone you.
LEPIDUS 0788 Worthily spoken, Maecenas.
ENOBARBUS 0789 Or, if you borrow one another’s love for
0790 125 the instant, you may, when you hear no more words
0791 of Pompey, return it again. You shall have time to
0792 wrangle in when you have nothing else to do.
ANTONY
0793 Thou art a soldier only. Speak no more.
ENOBARBUS 0794 That truth should be silent I had almost
0795 130 forgot.
ANTONY
0796 You wrong this presence; therefore speak no more.
ENOBARBUS 0797 Go to, then. Your considerate stone.
CAESAR
0798 I do not much dislike the matter, but
0799 The manner of his speech; for ’t cannot be
0800 135 We shall remain in friendship, our conditions
0801 So diff’ring in their acts. Yet if I knew
0802 What hoop should hold us staunch, from edge to
0803 edge
0804 O’ th’ world I would pursue it.
CAESAR 0806 Speak, Agrippa.
AGRIPPA
0807 Thou hast a sister by the mother’s side,
0808 Admired Octavia. Great Mark Antony
0809 Is now a widower.
CAESAR 0810 145 Say not ⌜so,⌝ Agrippa.
0811 If Cleopatra heard you, your ⌜reproof⌝
0812 Were well deserved of rashness.
ANTONY
0813 I am not married, Caesar. Let me hear
0814 Agrippa further speak.
AGRIPPA
0815 150 To hold you in perpetual amity,
0816 To make you brothers, and to knit your hearts
0817 With an unslipping knot, take Antony
0818 Octavia to his wife, whose beauty claims
0819 No worse a husband than the best of men;
0820 155 Whose virtue and whose general graces speak
0821 That which none else can utter. By this marriage
0822 All little jealousies, which now seem great,
0823 And all great fears, which now import their dangers,
0824 Would then be nothing. Truths would be tales,
0825 160 Where now half-tales be truths. Her love to both
0826 Would each to other and all loves to both
0827 Draw after her. Pardon what I have spoke,
0828 For ’tis a studied, not a present thought,
0829 By duty ruminated.
ANTONY 0830 165 Will Caesar speak?
CAESAR
0831 Not till he hears how Antony is touched
0832 With what is spoke already.
ANTONY 0833 What power is in Agrippa,
0834 If I would say “Agrippa, be it so,”
0835 170 To make this good?
0837 His power unto Octavia.
ANTONY 0838 May I never
0839 To this good purpose, that so fairly shows,
0840 175 Dream of impediment. Let me have thy hand.
0841 Further this act of grace; and from this hour
0842 The heart of brothers govern in our loves
0843 And sway our great designs.
CAESAR 0844 There’s my hand.
⌜They clasp hands.⌝
0845 180 A sister I bequeath you whom no brother
0846 Did ever love so dearly. Let her live
0847 To join our kingdoms and our hearts; and never
0848 Fly off our loves again.
LEPIDUS 0849 Happily, amen!
ANTONY
0850 185 I did not think to draw my sword ’gainst Pompey,
0851 For he hath laid strange courtesies and great
0852 Of late upon me. I must thank him only,
0853 Lest my remembrance suffer ill report;
0854 At heel of that, defy him.
LEPIDUS 0855 190 Time calls upon ’s.
0856 Of us must Pompey presently be sought,
0857 Or else he seeks out us.
ANTONY 0858 Where lies he?
CAESAR 0859 About the Mount Misena.
ANTONY 0860 195What is his strength by land?
CAESAR 0861 Great and increasing;
0862 But by sea he is an absolute master.
ANTONY 0863 So is the fame.
0864 Would we had spoke together. Haste we for it.
0865 200 Yet, ere we put ourselves in arms, dispatch we
0866 The business we have talked of.
CAESAR 0867 With most gladness,
0869 Whither straight I’ll lead you.
ANTONY
0870 205 Let us, Lepidus, not lack your company.
LEPIDUS
0871 Noble Antony, not sickness should detain me.
Flourish. All but Enobarbus, Agrippa, and
Maecenas exit.
MAECENAS, ⌜to Enobarbus⌝ 0872 Welcome from Egypt, sir.
ENOBARBUS 0873 Half the heart of Caesar, worthy
0874 Maecenas!—My honorable friend Agrippa!
AGRIPPA 0875 210Good Enobarbus!
MAECENAS 0876 We have cause to be glad that matters are so
0877 well digested. You stayed well by ’t in Egypt.
ENOBARBUS 0878 Ay, sir, we did sleep day out of countenance
0879 and made the night light with drinking.
MAECENAS 0880 215Eight wild boars roasted whole at a breakfast,
0881 and but twelve persons there. Is this true?
ENOBARBUS 0882 This was but as a fly by an eagle. We had
0883 much more monstrous matter of feast, which worthily
0884 deserved noting.
MAECENAS 0885 220She’s a most triumphant lady, if report be
0886 square to her.
ENOBARBUS 0887 When she first met Mark Antony, she
0888 pursed up his heart upon the river of Cydnus.
AGRIPPA 0889 There she appeared indeed, or my reporter
0890 225 devised well for her.
ENOBARBUS 0891 I will tell you.
0892 The barge she sat in like a burnished throne
0893 Burned on the water. The poop was beaten gold,
0894 Purple the sails, and so perfumed that
0895 230 The winds were lovesick with them. The oars were
0896 silver,
0897 Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
0898 The water which they beat to follow faster,
0900 235 It beggared all description: she did lie
0901 In her pavilion—cloth-of-gold, of tissue—
0902 O’erpicturing that Venus where we see
0903 The fancy outwork nature. On each side her
0904 Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
0905 240 With divers-colored fans, whose wind did seem
0906 To ⌜glow⌝ the delicate cheeks which they did cool,
0907 And what they undid did.
AGRIPPA 0908 O, rare for Antony!
ENOBARBUS
0909 Her ⌜gentlewomen,⌝ like the Nereides,
0910 245 So many mermaids, tended her i’ th’ eyes,
0911 And made their bends adornings. At the helm
0912 A seeming mermaid steers. The silken tackle
0913 Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands
0914 That yarely frame the office. From the barge
0915 250 A strange invisible perfume hits the sense
0916 Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast
0917 Her people out upon her; and Antony,
0918 Enthroned i’ th’ market-place, did sit alone,
0919 Whistling to th’ air, which but for vacancy
0920 255 Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too
0921 And made a gap in nature.
AGRIPPA 0922 Rare Egyptian!
ENOBARBUS
0923 Upon her landing, Antony sent to her,
0924 Invited her to supper. She replied
0925 260 It should be better he became her guest,
0926 Which she entreated. Our courteous Antony,
0927 Whom ne’er the word of “No” woman heard speak,
0928 Being barbered ten times o’er, goes to the feast,
0929 And for his ordinary pays his heart
0930 265 For what his eyes eat only.
AGRIPPA 0931 Royal wench!
0933 He ploughed her, and she cropped.
ENOBARBUS 0934 I saw her once
0935 270 Hop forty paces through the public street,
0936 And having lost her breath, she spoke and panted,
0937 That she did make defect perfection,
0938 And breathless pour breath forth.
MAECENAS
0939 Now Antony must leave her utterly.
ENOBARBUS 0940 275Never. He will not.
0941 Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
0942 Her infinite variety. Other women cloy
0943 The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry
0944 Where most she satisfies. For vilest things
0945 280 Become themselves in her, that the holy priests
0946 Bless her when she is riggish.
MAECENAS
0947 If beauty, wisdom, modesty can settle
0948 The heart of Antony, Octavia is
0949 A blessèd lottery to him.
AGRIPPA 0950 285 Let us go.
0951 Good Enobarbus, make yourself my guest
0952 Whilst you abide here.
ENOBARBUS 0953 Humbly, sir, I thank you.
They exit.
ANTONY
0954 The world and my great office will sometimes
0955 Divide me from your bosom.
OCTAVIA 0956 All which time
0957 Before the gods my knee shall bow my prayers
0958 5 To them for you.
0960 Read not my blemishes in the world’s report.
0961 I have not kept my square, but that to come
0962 Shall all be done by th’ rule. Good night, dear
0963 10 lady.—
0964 Good night, sir.
CAESAR 0965 Goodnight.⌜Caesar and Octavia⌝ exit.
Enter Soothsayer.
ANTONY
0966 Now, sirrah, you do wish yourself in Egypt?
SOOTHSAYER 0967 Would I had never come from thence,
0968 15 nor you thither.
ANTONY 0969 If you can, your reason?
SOOTHSAYER 0970 I see it in my motion, have it not in my
0971 tongue. But yet hie you to Egypt again.
ANTONY
0972 Say to me, whose fortunes shall rise higher,
0973 20 Caesar’s or mine?
SOOTHSAYER 0974 Caesar’s.
0975 Therefore, O Antony, stay not by his side.
0976 Thy dæmon—that thy spirit which keeps thee—is
0977 Noble, courageous, high, unmatchable,
0978 25 Where Caesar’s is not. But near him, thy angel
0979 Becomes ⌜afeard,⌝ as being o’erpowered. Therefore
0980 Make space enough between you.
ANTONY 0981 Speak this no more.
SOOTHSAYER
0982 To none but thee; no more but when to thee.
0983 30 If thou dost play with him at any game,
0984 Thou art sure to lose; and of that natural luck
0985 He beats thee ’gainst the odds. Thy luster thickens
0986 When he shines by. I say again, thy spirit
0987 Is all afraid to govern thee near him;
0988 35 But he ⌜away,⌝ ’tis noble.
0990 Say to Ventidius I would speak with him.
⌜Soothsayer⌝ exits.
0991 He shall to Parthia. Be it art or hap,
0992 He hath spoken true. The very dice obey him,
0993 40 And in our sports my better cunning faints
0994 Under his chance. If we draw lots, he speeds;
0995 His cocks do win the battle still of mine
0996 When it is all to naught, and his quails ever
0997 Beat mine, inhooped, at odds. I will to Egypt.
0998 45 And though I make this marriage for my peace,
0999 I’ th’ East my pleasure lies.
Enter Ventidius.
1000 O, come, Ventidius.
1001 You must to Parthia; your commission’s ready.
1002 Follow me and receive ’t.
They exit.
LEPIDUS
1003 Trouble yourselves no further. Pray you hasten
1004 Your generals after.
AGRIPPA 1005 Sir, Mark Antony
1006 Will e’en but kiss Octavia, and we’ll follow.
LEPIDUS
1007 5 Till I shall see you in your soldiers’ dress,
1008 Which will become you both, farewell.
MAECENAS 1009 We shall,
1010 As I conceive the journey, be at ⌜the⌝ Mount
1011 Before you, Lepidus.
1013 My purposes do draw me much about.
1014 You’ll win two days upon me.
BOTH 1015 Sir, good success.
LEPIDUS 1016 Farewell.
They exit.
CLEOPATRA
1017 Give me some music—music, moody food
1018 Of us that trade in love.
ALL 1019 The music, ho!
Enter Mardian the eunuch.
CLEOPATRA
1020 Let it alone. Let’s to billiards. Come, Charmian.
CHARMIAN
1021 5 My arm is sore. Best play with Mardian.
CLEOPATRA
1022 As well a woman with an eunuch played
1023 As with a woman.—Come, you’ll play with me, sir?
MARDIAN 1024 As well as I can, madam.
CLEOPATRA
1025 And when good will is showed, though ’t come too
1026 10 short,
1027 The actor may plead pardon. I’ll none now.
1028 Give me mine angle; we’ll to th’ river. There,
1029 My music playing far off, I will betray
1030 ⌜Tawny-finned⌝ fishes. My bended hook shall pierce
1031 15 Their slimy jaws, and as I draw them up
1032 I’ll think them every one an Antony
1033 And say “Aha! You’re caught.”
1035 You wagered on your angling; when your diver
1036 20 Did hang a salt fish on his hook, which he
1037 With fervency drew up.
CLEOPATRA 1038 That time?—O, times!—
1039 I laughed him out of patience; and that night
1040 I laughed him into patience; and next morn,
1041 25 Ere the ninth hour, I drunk him to his bed,
1042 Then put my tires and mantles on him, whilst
1043 I wore his sword Philippan.
Enter a Messenger.
1044 O, from Italy!
1045 Ram thou thy fruitful tidings in mine ears,
1046 30 That long time have been barren.
MESSENGER 1047 Madam, madam—
CLEOPATRA
1048 Antonio’s dead! If thou say so, villain,
1049 Thou kill’st thy mistress. But well and free,
1050 If thou so yield him, there is gold, and here
1051 35 My bluest veins to kiss, a hand that kings
1052 Have lipped and trembled kissing.
MESSENGER 1053 First, madam, he is well.
CLEOPATRA
1054 Why, there’s more gold. But sirrah, mark, we use
1055 To say the dead are well. Bring it to that,
1056 40 The gold I give thee will I melt and pour
1057 Down thy ill-uttering throat.
MESSENGER 1058 Good madam, hear me.
CLEOPATRA 1059 Well, go to, I will.
1060 But there’s no goodness in thy face—if Antony
1061 45 Be free and healthful, so tart a favor
1062 To trumpet such good tidings! If not well,
1063 Thou shouldst come like a Fury crowned with snakes,
1064 Not like a formal man.
CLEOPATRA
1066 50 I have a mind to strike thee ere thou speak’st.
1067 Yet if thou say Antony lives, ⌜is⌝ well,
1068 Or friends with Caesar or not captive to him,
1069 I’ll set thee in a shower of gold and hail
1070 Rich pearls upon thee.
MESSENGER 1071 55 Madam, he’s well.
CLEOPATRA 1072 Well said.
MESSENGER
1073 And friends with Caesar.
CLEOPATRA 1074 Th’ art an honest man.
MESSENGER
1075 Caesar and he are greater friends than ever.
CLEOPATRA
1076 60 Make thee a fortune from me.
MESSENGER 1077 But yet, madam—
CLEOPATRA
1078 I do not like “But yet.” It does allay
1079 The good precedence. Fie upon “But yet.”
1080 “But yet” is as a jailer to bring forth
1081 65 Some monstrous malefactor. Prithee, friend,
1082 Pour out the pack of matter to mine ear,
1083 The good and bad together: he’s friends with Caesar,
1084 In state of health, thou say’st, and, thou say’st, free.
MESSENGER
1085 Free, madam, no. I made no such report.
1086 70 He’s bound unto Octavia.
CLEOPATRA 1087 For what good turn?
MESSENGER
1088 For the best turn i’ th’ bed.
CLEOPATRA 1089 I am pale, Charmian.
MESSENGER
1090 Madam, he’s married to Octavia.
1091 75 The most infectious pestilence upon thee!
Strikes him down.
MESSENGER 1092 Good madam, patience!
CLEOPATRA 1093 What say you?Strikes him.
1094 Hence, horrible villain, or I’ll spurn thine eyes
1095 Like balls before me! I’ll unhair thy head!
She hales him up and down.
1096 80 Thou shalt be whipped with wire and stewed in
1097 brine,
1098 Smarting in ling’ring pickle.
MESSENGER 1099 Gracious madam,
1100 I that do bring the news made not the match.
CLEOPATRA
1101 85 Say ’tis not so, a province I will give thee
1102 And make thy fortunes proud. The blow thou hadst
1103 Shall make thy peace for moving me to rage,
1104 And I will boot thee with what gift beside
1105 Thy modesty can beg.
MESSENGER 1106 90 He’s married, madam.
CLEOPATRA
1107 Rogue, thou hast lived too long.Draw a knife.
MESSENGER 1108 Nay then, I’ll run.
1109 What mean you, madam? I have made no fault.
He exits.
CHARMIAN
1110 Good madam, keep yourself within yourself.
1111 95 The man is innocent.
CLEOPATRA
1112 Some innocents ’scape not the thunderbolt.
1113 Melt Egypt into Nile, and kindly creatures
1114 Turn all to serpents! Call the slave again.
1115 Though I am mad, I will not bite him. Call!
CHARMIAN
1116 100 He is afeard to come.
1118 These hands do lack nobility that they strike
1119 A meaner than myself, since I myself
1120 Have given myself the cause.
Enter the Messenger again.
1121 105 Come hither, sir.
1122 Though it be honest, it is never good
1123 To bring bad news. Give to a gracious message
1124 An host of tongues, but let ill tidings tell
1125 Themselves when they be felt.
MESSENGER 1126 110I have done my duty.
CLEOPATRA 1127 Is he married?
1128 I cannot hate thee worser than I do
1129 If thou again say “yes.”
MESSENGER 1130 He’s married, madam.
CLEOPATRA
1131 115 The gods confound thee! Dost thou hold there still?
MESSENGER
1132 Should I lie, madam?
CLEOPATRA 1133 O, I would thou didst,
1134 So half my Egypt were submerged and made
1135 A cistern for scaled snakes! Go, get thee hence.
1136 120 Hadst thou Narcissus in thy face, to me
1137 Thou wouldst appear most ugly. He is married?
MESSENGER
1138 I crave your Highness’ pardon.
CLEOPATRA 1139 He is married?
MESSENGER
1140 Take no offense that I would not offend you.
1141 125 To punish me for what you make me do
1142 Seems much unequal. He’s married to Octavia.
CLEOPATRA
1143 O, that his fault should make a knave of thee
1145 The merchandise which thou hast brought from
1146 130 Rome
1147 Are all too dear for me. Lie they upon thy hand,
1148 And be undone by ’em!⌜Messenger exits.⌝
CHARMIAN 1149 Good your Highness,
1150 patience.
CLEOPATRA
1151 135 In praising Antony, I have dispraised Caesar.
CHARMIAN 1152 Many times, madam.
CLEOPATRA
1153 I am paid for ’t now. Lead me from hence;
1154 I faint. O, Iras, Charmian! ’Tis no matter.—
1155 Go to the fellow, good Alexas. Bid him
1156 140 Report the feature of Octavia, her years,
1157 Her inclination; let him not leave out
1158 The color of her hair. Bring me word quickly.
⌜Alexas exits.⌝
1159 Let him forever go—let him not, Charmian.
1160 Though he be painted one way like a Gorgon,
1161 145 The other way ’s a Mars. (⌜To Mardian.⌝) Bid you
1162 Alexas
1163 Bring me word how tall she is.—Pity me,
1164 Charmian,
1165 But do not speak to me. Lead me to my chamber.
They exit.
with Drum and Trumpet; at another Caesar, Lepidus,
Antony, Enobarbus, Maecenas, ⌜and⌝ Agrippa,
with Soldiers marching.
POMPEY
1166 Your hostages I have, so have you mine,
1167 And we shall talk before we fight.
1169 That first we come to words, and therefore have we
1170 5 Our written purposes before us sent,
1171 Which if thou hast considered, let us know
1172 If ’twill tie up thy discontented sword
1173 And carry back to Sicily much tall youth
1174 That else must perish here.
POMPEY 1175 10 To you all three,
1176 The senators alone of this great world,
1177 Chief factors for the gods: I do not know
1178 Wherefore my father should revengers want,
1179 Having a son and friends, since Julius Caesar,
1180 15 Who at Philippi the good Brutus ghosted,
1181 There saw you laboring for him. What was ’t
1182 That moved pale Cassius to conspire? And what
1183 Made ⌜the⌝ all-honored, honest, Roman Brutus,
1184 With the armed rest, courtiers of beauteous
1185 20 freedom,
1186 To drench the Capitol, but that they would
1187 Have one man but a man? And that ⌜is⌝ it
1188 Hath made me rig my navy, at whose burden
1189 The angered ocean foams, with which I meant
1190 25 To scourge th’ ingratitude that despiteful Rome
1191 Cast on my noble father.
CAESAR 1192 Take your time.
ANTONY
1193 Thou canst not fear us, Pompey, with thy sails.
1194 We’ll speak with thee at sea. At land thou know’st
1195 30 How much we do o’ercount thee.
POMPEY 1196 At land indeed
1197 Thou dost o’ercount me of my father’s house;
1198 But since the cuckoo builds not for himself,
1199 Remain in ’t as thou mayst.
LEPIDUS 1200 35 Be pleased to tell us—
1201 For this is from the present—how you take
1202 The offers we have sent you.
ANTONY
1204 Which do not be entreated to, but weigh
1205 40 What it is worth embraced.
CAESAR 1206 And what may follow
1207 To try a larger fortune.
POMPEY 1208 You have made me offer
1209 Of Sicily, Sardinia; and I must
1210 45 Rid all the sea of pirates; then to send
1211 Measures of wheat to Rome. This ’greed upon,
1212 To part with unhacked edges and bear back
1213 Our targes undinted.
ALL 1214 That’s our offer.
POMPEY 1215 50 Know then
1216 I came before you here a man prepared
1217 To take this offer. But Mark Antony
1218 Put me to some impatience.—Though I lose
1219 The praise of it by telling, you must know
1220 55 When Caesar and your brother were at blows,
1221 Your mother came to Sicily and did find
1222 Her welcome friendly.
ANTONY 1223 I have heard it, Pompey,
1224 And am well studied for a liberal thanks,
1225 60 Which I do owe you.
POMPEY 1226 Let me have your hand.
⌜They clasp hands.⌝
1227 I did not think, sir, to have met you here.
ANTONY
1228 The beds i’ th’ East are soft; and thanks to you,
1229 That called me timelier than my purpose hither,
1230 65 For I have gained by ’t.
CAESAR, ⌜to Pompey⌝ 1231 Since I saw you last,
1232 There’s a change upon you.
POMPEY 1233 Well, I know not
1234 What counts harsh Fortune casts upon my face,
1236 To make my heart her vassal.
LEPIDUS 1237 Well met here.
POMPEY
1238 I hope so, Lepidus. Thus we are agreed.
1239 I crave our composition may be written
1240 75 And sealed between us.
CAESAR 1241 That’s the next to do.
POMPEY
1242 We’ll feast each other ere we part, and let’s
1243 Draw lots who shall begin.
ANTONY 1244 That will I, Pompey.
POMPEY
1245 80 No, Antony, take the lot. But, first or last,
1246 Your fine Egyptian cookery shall have
1247 The fame. I have heard that Julius Caesar
1248 Grew fat with feasting there.
ANTONY 1249 You have heard much.
POMPEY 1250 85I have fair ⌜meanings,⌝ sir.
ANTONY 1251 And fair words to them.
POMPEY 1252 Then so much have I heard.
1253 And I have heard Apollodorus carried—
ENOBARBUS
1254 No more ⌜of⌝ that. He did so.
POMPEY 1255 90 What, I pray you?
ENOBARBUS
1256 A certain queen to Caesar in a mattress.
POMPEY
1257 I know thee now. How far’st thou, soldier?
ENOBARBUS 1258 Well,
1259 And well am like to do, for I perceive
1260 95 Four feasts are toward.
POMPEY 1261 Let me shake thy hand.
1262 I never hated thee. I have seen thee fight
1263 When I have envied thy behavior.
1265 100 I never loved you much, but I ha’ praised you
1266 When you have well deserved ten times as much
1267 As I have said you did.
POMPEY 1268 Enjoy thy plainness;
1269 It nothing ill becomes thee.—
1270 105 Aboard my galley I invite you all.
1271 Will you lead, lords?
ALL 1272 Show ’s the way, sir.
POMPEY 1273 Come.
They exit, except for Enobarbus and Menas.
MENAS, ⌜aside⌝ 1274 Thy father, Pompey, would ne’er have
1275 110 made this treaty.—You and I have known, sir.
ENOBARBUS 1276 At sea, I think.
MENAS 1277 We have, sir.
ENOBARBUS 1278 You have done well by water.
MENAS 1279 And you by land.
ENOBARBUS 1280 115I will praise any man that will praise me,
1281 though it cannot be denied what I have done by
1282 land.
MENAS 1283 Nor what I have done by water.
ENOBARBUS 1284 Yes, something you can deny for your own
1285 120 safety: you have been a great thief by sea.
MENAS 1286 And you by land.
ENOBARBUS 1287 There I deny my land service. But give me
1288 your hand, Menas. ⌜They clasp hands.⌝ If our eyes
1289 had authority, here they might take two thieves
1290 125 kissing.
MENAS 1291 All men’s faces are true, whatsome’er their
1292 hands are.
ENOBARBUS 1293 But there is never a fair woman has a true
1294 face.
MENAS 1295 130No slander. They steal hearts.
ENOBARBUS 1296 We came hither to fight with you.
MENAS 1297 For my part, I am sorry it is turned to a
1299 fortune.
ENOBARBUS 1300 135If he do, sure he cannot weep ’t back
1301 again.
MENAS 1302 You’ve said, sir. We looked not for Mark Antony
1303 here. Pray you, is he married to Cleopatra?
ENOBARBUS 1304 Caesar’s sister is called Octavia.
MENAS 1305 140True, sir. She was the wife of Caius Marcellus.
ENOBARBUS 1306 But she is now the wife of Marcus
1307 Antonius.
MENAS 1308 Pray you, sir?
ENOBARBUS 1309 ’Tis true.
MENAS 1310 145Then is Caesar and he forever knit together.
ENOBARBUS 1311 If I were bound to divine of this unity, I
1312 would not prophesy so.
MENAS 1313 I think the policy of that purpose made more in
1314 the marriage than the love of the parties.
ENOBARBUS 1315 150I think so, too. But you shall find the band
1316 that seems to tie their friendship together will be
1317 the very strangler of their amity. Octavia is of a holy,
1318 cold, and still conversation.
MENAS 1319 Who would not have his wife so?
ENOBARBUS 1320 155Not he that himself is not so, which is
1321 Mark Antony. He will to his Egyptian dish again.
1322 Then shall the sighs of Octavia blow the fire up in
1323 Caesar, and, as I said before, that which is the
1324 strength of their amity shall prove the immediate
1325 160 author of their variance. Antony will use his affection
1326 where it is. He married but his occasion here.
MENAS 1327 And thus it may be. Come, sir, will you aboard?
1328 I have a health for you.
ENOBARBUS 1329 I shall take it, sir. We have used our throats
1330 165 in Egypt.
MENAS 1331 Come, let’s away.
They exit.
with a banquet.
FIRST SERVANT 1332 Here they’ll be, man. Some o’ their
1333 plants are ill-rooted already. The least wind i’ th’
1334 world will blow them down.
SECOND SERVANT 1335 Lepidus is high-colored.
FIRST SERVANT 1336 5They have made him drink alms-drink.
SECOND SERVANT 1337 As they pinch one another by the
1338 disposition, he cries out “No more,” reconciles
1339 them to his entreaty and himself to th’ drink.
FIRST SERVANT 1340 But it raises the greater war between
1341 10 him and his discretion.
SECOND SERVANT 1342 Why, this it is to have a name in great
1343 men’s fellowship. I had as lief have a reed that will
1344 do me no service as a partisan I could not heave.
FIRST SERVANT 1345 To be called into a huge sphere, and not
1346 15 to be seen to move in ’t, are the holes where eyes
1347 should be, which pitifully disaster the cheeks.
A sennet sounded. Enter Caesar, Antony, Pompey,
Lepidus, Agrippa, Maecenas, Enobarbus, Menas, with
other Captains ⌜and a Boy.⌝
ANTONY
1348 Thus do they, sir: they take the flow o’ th’ Nile
1349 By certain scales i’ th’ Pyramid; they know
1350 By th’ height, the lowness, or the mean if dearth
1351 20 Or foison follow. The higher Nilus swells,
1352 The more it promises. As it ebbs, the seedsman
1353 Upon the slime and ooze scatters his grain,
1354 And shortly comes to harvest.
LEPIDUS 1355 You’ve strange serpents there?
ANTONY 1356 25Ay, Lepidus.
LEPIDUS 1357 Your serpent of Egypt is bred now of your
1359 crocodile.
ANTONY 1360 They are so.
POMPEY
1361 30 Sit, and some wine. A health to Lepidus!
LEPIDUS 1362 I am not so well as I should be, but I’ll ne’er
1363 out.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside⌝ 1364 Not till you have slept. I fear me
1365 you’ll be in till then.
LEPIDUS 1366 35Nay, certainly, I have heard the Ptolemies’
1367 pyramises are very goodly things. Without contradiction
1368 I have heard that.
MENAS, ⌜aside to Pompey⌝
1369 Pompey, a word.
POMPEY, ⌜aside to Menas⌝ 1370 Say in mine ear what is ’t.
MENAS (whispers in ’s ear)
1371 40 Forsake thy seat, I do beseech thee, captain,
1372 And hear me speak a word.
POMPEY, ⌜aside to Menas⌝
1373 Forbear me till anon.—This wine for Lepidus!
LEPIDUS 1374 What manner o’ thing is your crocodile?
ANTONY 1375 It is shaped, sir, like itself, and it is as broad as
1376 45 it hath breadth. It is just so high as it is, and moves
1377 with it own organs. It lives by that which nourisheth
1378 it, and the elements once out of it, it
1379 transmigrates.
LEPIDUS 1380 What color is it of?
ANTONY 1381 50Of it own color too.
LEPIDUS 1382 ’Tis a strange serpent.
ANTONY 1383 ’Tis so, and the tears of it are wet.
CAESAR, ⌜aside to Antony⌝ 1384 Will this description satisfy
1385 him?
ANTONY 1386 55With the health that Pompey gives him, else he
1387 is a very epicure.
1388 Go hang, sir, hang! Tell me of that? Away!
1389 Do as I bid you.—Where’s this cup I called for?
MENAS, ⌜aside to Pompey⌝
1390 If for the sake of merit thou wilt hear me,
1391 60 Rise from thy stool.
POMPEY 1392 I think th’ art mad!
⌜He rises, and they walk aside.⌝
1393 The matter?
MENAS
1394 I have ever held my cap off to thy fortunes.
POMPEY
1395 Thou hast served me with much faith. What’s else
1396 65 to say?—
1397 Be jolly, lords.
ANTONY 1398 These quicksands, Lepidus,
1399 Keep off them, for you sink.
MENAS, ⌜aside to Pompey⌝
1400 Wilt thou be lord of all the world?
POMPEY 1401 70 What sayst thou?
MENAS
1402 Wilt thou be lord of the whole world? That’s twice.
POMPEY 1403 How should that be?
MENAS 1404 But entertain it,
1405 And though thou think me poor, I am the man
1406 75 Will give thee all the world.
POMPEY 1407 Hast thou drunk well?
MENAS
1408 No, Pompey, I have kept me from the cup.
1409 Thou art, if thou dar’st be, the earthly Jove.
1410 Whate’er the ocean pales or sky inclips
1411 80 Is thine, if thou wilt ha ’t.
POMPEY 1412 Show me which way.
MENAS
1413 These three world-sharers, these competitors,
1414 Are in thy vessel. Let me cut the cable,
1416 85 All there is thine.
POMPEY 1417 Ah, this thou shouldst have done
1418 And not have spoke on ’t! In me ’tis villainy;
1419 In thee ’t had been good service. Thou must know
1420 ’Tis not my profit that does lead mine honor;
1421 90 Mine honor, it. Repent that e’er thy tongue
1422 Hath so betrayed thine act. Being done unknown,
1423 I should have found it afterwards well done,
1424 But must condemn it now. Desist and drink.
MENAS, ⌜aside⌝ 1425 For this
1426 95 I’ll never follow thy palled fortunes more.
1427 Who seeks and will not take when once ’tis offered
1428 Shall never find it more.
POMPEY 1429 This health to Lepidus!
ANTONY, ⌜to Servant⌝
1430 Bear him ashore.—I’ll pledge it for him, Pompey.
ENOBARBUS
1431 100 Here’s to thee, Menas.
MENAS 1432 Enobarbus, welcome.
POMPEY 1433 Fill till the cup be hid.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜pointing to the Servant carrying Lepidus⌝
1434 There’s a strong fellow, Menas.
MENAS 1435 Why?
ENOBARBUS 1436 105 He bears
1437 The third part of the world, man. Seest not?
MENAS
1438 The third part, then, is drunk. Would it were all,
1439 That it might go on wheels.
ENOBARBUS 1440 Drink thou. Increase the reels.
MENAS 1441 110Come.
POMPEY
1442 This is not yet an Alexandrian feast.
ANTONY
1443 It ripens towards it. Strike the vessels, ho!
1444 Here’s to Caesar.
1446 115 It’s monstrous labor when I wash my brain
1447 And it ⌜grows⌝ fouler.
ANTONY 1448 Be a child o’ th’ time.
CAESAR 1449 Possess it, I’ll make answer.
1450 But I had rather fast from all, four days,
1451 120 Than drink so much in one.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜to Antony⌝ 1452 Ha, my brave emperor,
1453 Shall we dance now the Egyptian bacchanals
1454 And celebrate our drink?
POMPEY 1455 Let’s ha ’t, good soldier.
ANTONY 1456 125Come, let’s all take hands
1457 Till that the conquering wine hath steeped our
1458 sense
1459 In soft and delicate Lethe.
ENOBARBUS 1460 All take hands.
1461 130 Make battery to our ears with the loud music,
1462 The while I’ll place you; then the boy shall sing.
1463 The holding every man shall beat as loud
1464 As his strong sides can volley.
Music plays. Enobarbus places them hand in hand.
⌜BOY⌝ 1465 Come, thou monarch of the vine,
1466 135 Plumpy Bacchus, with pink eyne.
1467 In thy vats our cares be drowned.
1468 With thy grapes our hairs be crowned.
⌜ALL⌝ 1469 Cup us till the world go round,
1470 Cup us till the world go round.
CAESAR
1471 140 What would you more?—Pompey, goodnight.—
1472 Good brother,
1473 Let me request you off. Our graver business
1474 Frowns at this levity.—Gentle lords, let’s part.
1475 You see we have burnt our cheeks. Strong Enobarb
1476 145 Is weaker than the wine, and mine own tongue
1478 Anticked us all. What needs more words?
1479 Goodnight.
1480 Good Antony, your hand.
POMPEY 1481 150I’ll try you on the shore.
ANTONY 1482 And shall, sir. Give ’s your hand.
POMPEY
1483 O, Antony, you have my ⌜father’s⌝ house.
1484 But what? We are friends! Come down into the boat.
ENOBARBUS
1485 Take heed you fall not.
⌜All but Menas and Enobarbus exit.⌝
1486 155 Menas, I’ll not on shore.
⌜MENAS⌝
1487 No, to my cabin. These drums, these trumpets,
1488 flutes! What!
1489 Let Neptune hear we bid a loud farewell
1490 To these great fellows. Sound and be hanged. Sound
1491 160 out!Sound a flourish, with drums.
ENOBARBUS 1492 Hoo, says ’a! There’s my cap!
⌜He throws his cap in the air.⌝
MENAS 1493 Hoo! Noble captain, come.
They exit.
Pacorus borne before him; ⌜with Silius and Soldiers.⌝
VENTIDIUS
1494 Now, darting Parthia, art thou struck, and now
1495 Pleased Fortune does of Marcus Crassus’ death
1496 Make me revenger. Bear the King’s son’s body
1497 Before our army. Thy Pacorus, Orodes,
1498 5 Pays this for Marcus Crassus.
⌜SILIUS⌝ 1499 Noble Ventidius,
1500 Whilst yet with Parthian blood thy sword is warm,
1501 The fugitive Parthians follow. Spur through Media,
1502 Mesopotamia, and the shelters whither
1503 10 The routed fly. So thy grand captain, Antony,
1504 Shall set thee on triumphant chariots and
1505 Put garlands on thy head.
VENTIDIUS 1506 O, Silius, Silius,
1507 I have done enough. A lower place, note well,
1508 15 May make too great an act. For learn this, Silius:
1509 Better to leave undone than by our deed
1510 Acquire too high a fame when him we serve ’s away.
1511 Caesar and Antony have ever won
1512 More in their officer than person. Sossius,
1513 20 One of my place in Syria, his lieutenant,
1514 For quick accumulation of renown,
1515 Which he achieved by th’ minute, lost his favor.
1517 Becomes his captain’s captain; and ambition,
1518 25 The soldier’s virtue, rather makes choice of loss
1519 Than gain which darkens him.
1520 I could do more to do Antonius good,
1521 But ’twould offend him. And in his offense
1522 Should my performance perish.
⌜SILIUS⌝ 1523 30Thou hast, Ventidius, that
1524 Without the which a soldier and his sword
1525 Grants scarce distinction. Thou wilt write to
1526 Antony?
VENTIDIUS
1527 I’ll humbly signify what in his name,
1528 35 That magical word of war, we have effected;
1529 How, with his banners and his well-paid ranks,
1530 The ne’er-yet-beaten horse of Parthia
1531 We have jaded out o’ th’ field.
⌜SILIUS⌝ 1532 Where is he now?
VENTIDIUS
1533 40 He purposeth to Athens, whither, with what haste
1534 The weight we must convey with ’s will permit,
1535 We shall appear before him.—On there, pass along!
They exit.
AGRIPPA 1536 What, are the brothers parted?
ENOBARBUS
1537 They have dispatched with Pompey; he is gone.
1538 The other three are sealing. Octavia weeps
1539 To part from Rome. Caesar is sad, and Lepidus,
1540 5 Since Pompey’s feast, as Menas says, is troubled
1541 With the greensickness.
ENOBARBUS
1543 A very fine one. O, how he loves Caesar!
AGRIPPA
1544 Nay, but how dearly he adores Mark Antony!
ENOBARBUS
1545 10 Caesar? Why, he’s the Jupiter of men.
⌜AGRIPPA⌝
1546 What’s Antony? The god of Jupiter.
ENOBARBUS
1547 Spake you of Caesar? How, the nonpareil!
AGRIPPA
1548 O Antony, O thou Arabian bird!
ENOBARBUS
1549 Would you praise Caesar, say “Caesar.” Go no
1550 15 further.
AGRIPPA
1551 Indeed, he plied them both with excellent praises.
ENOBARBUS
1552 But he loves Caesar best, yet he loves Antony.
1553 Hoo, hearts, tongues, ⌜figures,⌝ scribes, bards, poets,
1554 cannot
1555 20 Think, speak, cast, write, sing, number—hoo!—
1556 His love to Antony. But as for Caesar,
1557 Kneel down, kneel down, and wonder.
AGRIPPA 1558 Both he loves.
ENOBARBUS
1559 They are his shards and he their beetle.
⌜Trumpet within.⌝
1560 25 So,
1561 This is to horse. Adieu, noble Agrippa.
AGRIPPA
1562 Good fortune, worthy soldier, and farewell.
Enter Caesar, Antony, Lepidus, and Octavia.
ANTONY 1563 No further, sir.
1564 You take from me a great part of myself.
1565 30 Use me well in ’t.—Sister, prove such a wife
1566 As my thoughts make thee, and as my farthest bond
1567 Shall pass on thy approof.—Most noble Antony,
1568 Let not the piece of virtue which is set
1569 Betwixt us, as the cement of our love
1570 35 To keep it builded, be the ram to batter
1571 The fortress of it. For better might we
1572 Have loved without this mean, if on both parts
1573 This be not cherished.
ANTONY 1574 Make me not offended
1575 40 In your distrust.
CAESAR 1576 I have said.
ANTONY 1577 You shall not find,
1578 Though you be therein curious, the least cause
1579 For what you seem to fear. So the gods keep you,
1580 45 And make the hearts of Romans serve your ends.
1581 We will here part.
CAESAR
1582 Farewell, my dearest sister, fare thee well.
1583 The elements be kind to thee and make
1584 Thy spirits all of comfort. Fare thee well.
OCTAVIA 1585 50My noble brother.⌜She weeps.⌝
ANTONY
1586 The April’s in her eyes. It is love’s spring,
1587 And these the showers to bring it on.—Be cheerful.
OCTAVIA, ⌜to Caesar⌝
1588 Sir, look well to my husband’s house, and—
CAESAR
1589 What, Octavia?
OCTAVIA 1590 55 I’ll tell you in your ear.
⌜Caesar and Octavia walk aside.⌝
ANTONY
1591 Her tongue will not obey her heart, nor can
1593 feather
1594 That stands upon the swell at the full of tide
1595 60 And neither way inclines.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside to Agrippa⌝ 1596 Will Caesar weep?
AGRIPPA 1597 He has a cloud in ’s face.
ENOBARBUS
1598 He were the worse for that were he a horse;
1599 So is he being a man.
AGRIPPA 1600 65 Why, Enobarbus,
1601 When Antony found Julius Caesar dead,
1602 He cried almost to roaring. And he wept
1603 When at Philippi he found Brutus slain.
ENOBARBUS
1604 That year indeed he was troubled with a rheum.
1605 70 What willingly he did confound he wailed,
1606 Believe ’t, till I ⌜wept⌝ too.
CAESAR, ⌜coming forward with Octavia⌝ 1607 No, sweet Octavia,
1608 You shall hear from me still. The time shall not
1609 Outgo my thinking on you.
ANTONY 1610 75 Come, sir, come,
1611 I’ll wrestle with you in my strength of love.
1612 Look, here I have you, thus I let you go,
1613 And give you to the gods.
CAESAR 1614 Adieu, be happy.
LEPIDUS, ⌜to Antony⌝
1615 80 Let all the number of the stars give light
1616 To thy fair way.
CAESAR 1617 Farewell, farewell.Kisses Octavia.
ANTONY 1618 Farewell.
Trumpets sound. They exit.
CLEOPATRA
1619 Where is the fellow?
ALEXAS 1620 Half afeard to come.
CLEOPATRA
1621 Go to, go to.—Come hither, sir.
Enter the Messenger as before.
ALEXAS 1622 Good Majesty,
1623 5 Herod of Jewry dare not look upon you
1624 But when you are well pleased.
CLEOPATRA 1625 That Herod’s head
1626 I’ll have! But how, when Antony is gone,
1627 Through whom I might command it?—Come thou
1628 10 near.
MESSENGER
1629 Most gracious Majesty!
CLEOPATRA 1630 Did’st thou behold Octavia?
MESSENGER
1631 Ay, dread queen.
CLEOPATRA 1632 Where?
MESSENGER 1633 15 Madam, in Rome.
1634 I looked her in the face and saw her led
1635 Between her brother and Mark Antony.
CLEOPATRA
1636 Is she as tall as me?
MESSENGER 1637 She is not, madam.
CLEOPATRA
1638 20 Didst hear her speak? Is she shrill-tongued or low?
MESSENGER
1639 Madam, I heard her speak. She is low-voiced.
CLEOPATRA
1640 That’s not so good. He cannot like her long.
CHARMIAN
1641 Like her? O Isis, ’tis impossible!
1642 I think so, Charmian: dull of tongue, and
1643 25 dwarfish!—
1644 What majesty is in her gait? Remember,
1645 If e’er thou ⌜looked’st⌝ on majesty.
MESSENGER 1646 She creeps.
1647 Her motion and her station are as one.
1648 30 She shows a body rather than a life,
1649 A statue than a breather.
CLEOPATRA 1650 Is this certain?
MESSENGER
1651 Or I have no observance.
CHARMIAN 1652 Three in Egypt
1653 35 Cannot make better note.
CLEOPATRA 1654 He’s very knowing.
1655 I do perceive ’t. There’s nothing in her yet.
1656 The fellow has good judgment.
CHARMIAN 1657 Excellent.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜to Messenger⌝ 1658 40Guess at her years, I
1659 prithee.
MESSENGER 1660 Madam, she was a widow.
CLEOPATRA 1661 Widow? Charmian, hark.
MESSENGER 1662 And I do think she’s thirty.
CLEOPATRA
1663 45 Bear’st thou her face in mind? Is ’t long or round?
MESSENGER 1664 Round even to faultiness.
CLEOPATRA
1665 For the most part, too, they are foolish that are so.
1666 Her hair what color?
MESSENGER 1667 Brown, madam, and her forehead
1668 50 As low as she would wish it.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜giving money⌝ 1669 There’s gold for thee.
1670 Thou must not take my former sharpness ill.
1671 I will employ thee back again. I find thee
1672 Most fit for business. Go, make thee ready.
1673 55 Our letters are prepared.⌜Messenger exits.⌝
CLEOPATRA
1675 Indeed he is so. I repent me much
1676 That so I harried him. Why, methinks, by him,
1677 This creature’s no such thing.
CHARMIAN 1678 60 Nothing, madam.
CLEOPATRA
1679 The man hath seen some majesty, and should know.
CHARMIAN
1680 Hath he seen majesty? Isis else defend,
1681 And serving you so long!
CLEOPATRA
1682 I have one thing more to ask him yet, good
1683 65 Charmian,
1684 But ’tis no matter. Thou shalt bring him to me
1685 Where I will write. All may be well enough.
CHARMIAN 1686 I warrant you, madam.
They exit.
ANTONY
1687 Nay, nay, Octavia, not only that—
1688 That were excusable, that and thousands more
1689 Of semblable import—but he hath waged
1690 New wars ’gainst Pompey; made his will and read it
1691 5 To public ear;
1692 Spoke scantly of me; when perforce he could not
1693 But pay me terms of honor, cold and sickly
1694 He vented ⌜them,⌝ most narrow measure lent me;
1695 When the best hint was given him, he not ⌜took ’t,⌝
1696 10 Or did it from his teeth.
OCTAVIA 1697 O, my good lord,
1699 Stomach not all. A more unhappy lady,
1700 If this division chance, ne’er stood between,
1701 15 Praying for both parts.
1702 The good gods will mock me presently
1703 When I shall pray “O, bless my lord and husband!”
1704 Undo that prayer by crying out as loud
1705 “O, bless my brother!” Husband win, win brother
1706 20 Prays and destroys the prayer; no midway
1707 ’Twixt these extremes at all.
ANTONY 1708 Gentle Octavia,
1709 Let your best love draw to that point which seeks
1710 Best to preserve it. If I lose mine honor,
1711 25 I lose myself; better I were not yours
1712 Than ⌜yours⌝ so branchless. But, as you requested,
1713 Yourself shall go between ’s. The meantime, lady,
1714 I’ll raise the preparation of a war
1715 Shall stain your brother. Make your soonest haste,
1716 30 So your desires are yours.
OCTAVIA 1717 Thanks to my lord.
1718 The Jove of power make me, most weak, most weak,
1719 ⌜Your⌝ reconciler. Wars ’twixt you twain would be
1720 As if the world should cleave, and that slain men
1721 35 Should solder up the rift.
ANTONY
1722 When it appears to you where this begins,
1723 Turn your displeasure that way, for our faults
1724 Can never be so equal that your love
1725 Can equally move with them. Provide your going;
1726 40 Choose your own company, and command what cost
1727 Your heart ⌜has⌝ mind to.
They exit.
ENOBARBUS 1728 How now, friend Eros?
EROS 1729 There’s strange news come, sir.
ENOBARBUS 1730 What, man?
EROS 1731 Caesar and Lepidus have made wars upon
1732 5 Pompey.
ENOBARBUS 1733 This is old. What is the success?
EROS 1734 Caesar, having made use of him in the wars
1735 ’gainst Pompey, presently denied him rivality,
1736 would not let him partake in the glory of the action;
1737 10 and, not resting here, accuses him of letters he had
1738 formerly wrote to Pompey; upon his own appeal
1739 seizes him. So the poor third is up, till death enlarge
1740 his confine.
ENOBARBUS
1741 Then, ⌜world,⌝ thou ⌜hast⌝ a pair of chaps, no more,
1742 15 And throw between them all the food thou hast,
1743 They’ll grind ⌜the one⌝ the other. Where’s Antony?
EROS
1744 He’s walking in the garden, thus, and spurns
1745 The rush that lies before him; cries “Fool Lepidus!”
1746 And threats the throat of that his officer
1747 20 That murdered Pompey.
ENOBARBUS 1748 Our great navy’s rigged.
EROS
1749 For Italy and Caesar. More, Domitius:
1750 My lord desires you presently. My news
1751 I might have told hereafter.
ENOBARBUS 1752 25 ’Twill be naught,
1753 But let it be. Bring me to Antony.
EROS 1754 Come, sir.
They exit.
CAESAR
1755 Contemning Rome, he has done all this and more
1756 In Alexandria. Here’s the manner of ’t:
1757 I’ th’ marketplace, on a tribunal silvered,
1758 Cleopatra and himself in chairs of gold
1759 5 Were publicly enthroned. At the feet sat
1760 Caesarion, whom they call my father’s son,
1761 And all the unlawful issue that their lust
1762 Since then hath made between them. Unto her
1763 He gave the stablishment of Egypt, made her
1764 10 Of lower Syria, Cyprus, Lydia,
1765 Absolute queen.
MAECENAS 1766 This in the public eye?
CAESAR
1767 I’ th’ common showplace where they exercise.
1768 His sons ⌜he there⌝ proclaimed the ⌜kings⌝ of kings.
1769 15 Great Media, Parthia, and Armenia
1770 He gave to Alexander; to Ptolemy he assigned
1771 Syria, Cilicia, and Phoenicia. She
1772 In th’ habiliments of the goddess Isis
1773 That day appeared, and oft before gave audience,
1774 20 As ’tis reported, so.
MAECENAS 1775 Let Rome be thus informed.
AGRIPPA
1776 Who, queasy with his insolence already,
1777 Will their good thoughts call from him.
CAESAR
1778 The people knows it and have now received
1779 25 His accusations.
AGRIPPA 1780 Who does he accuse?
CAESAR
1781 Caesar, and that, having in Sicily
1782 Sextus Pompeius spoiled, we had not rated him
1783 His part o’ th’ isle. Then does he say he lent me
1785 That Lepidus of the triumvirate
1786 Should be deposed and, being, that we detain
1787 All his revenue.
AGRIPPA 1788 Sir, this should be answered.
CAESAR
1789 35 ’Tis done already, and the messenger gone.
1790 I have told him Lepidus was grown too cruel,
1791 That he his high authority abused
1792 And did deserve his change. For what I have
1793 conquered,
1794 40 I grant him part; but then in his Armenia
1795 And other of his conquered kingdoms I
1796 Demand the like.
MAECENAS 1797 He’ll never yield to that.
CAESAR
1798 Nor must not then be yielded to in this.
Enter Octavia with her Train.
OCTAVIA
1799 45 Hail, Caesar, and my lord! Hail, most dear Caesar.
CAESAR
1800 That ever I should call thee castaway!
OCTAVIA
1801 You have not called me so, nor have you cause.
CAESAR
1802 Why have you stol’n upon us thus? You come not
1803 Like Caesar’s sister. The wife of Antony
1804 50 Should have an army for an usher and
1805 The neighs of horse to tell of her approach
1806 Long ere she did appear. The trees by th’ way
1807 Should have borne men, and expectation fainted,
1808 Longing for what it had not. Nay, the dust
1809 55 Should have ascended to the roof of heaven,
1810 Raised by your populous troops. But you are come
1811 A market-maid to Rome, and have prevented
1813 Is often left unloved. We should have met you
1814 60 By sea and land, supplying every stage
1815 With an augmented greeting.
OCTAVIA 1816 Good my lord,
1817 To come thus was I not constrained, but did it
1818 On my free will. My lord, Mark Antony,
1819 65 Hearing that you prepared for war, acquainted
1820 My grievèd ear withal, whereon I begged
1821 His pardon for return.
CAESAR 1822 Which soon he granted,
1823 Being an abstract ’tween his lust and him.
OCTAVIA
1824 70 Do not say so, my lord.
CAESAR 1825 I have eyes upon him,
1826 And his affairs come to me on the wind.
1827 Where is he now?
OCTAVIA 1828 My lord, in Athens.
CAESAR
1829 75 No, my most wrongèd sister. Cleopatra
1830 Hath nodded him to her. He hath given his empire
1831 Up to a whore, who now are levying
1832 The kings o’ th’ Earth for war. He hath assembled
1833 Bocchus, the King of Libya; Archelaus
1834 80 Of Cappadocia; Philadelphos, King
1835 Of Paphlagonia; the Thracian king, Adallas;
1836 King Manchus of Arabia; King of Pont;
1837 Herod of Jewry; Mithridates, King
1838 Of Comagen; Polemon and Amyntas,
1839 85 The Kings of Mede and Lycaonia,
1840 With a more larger list of scepters.
OCTAVIA 1841 Ay me, most wretched,
1842 That have my heart parted betwixt two friends
1843 That does afflict each other!
CAESAR 1844 90 Welcome hither.
1845 Your letters did withhold our breaking forth
1847 And we in negligent danger. Cheer your heart.
1848 Be you not troubled with the time, which drives
1849 95 O’er your content these strong necessities,
1850 But let determined things to destiny
1851 Hold unbewailed their way. Welcome to Rome,
1852 Nothing more dear to me. You are abused
1853 Beyond the mark of thought, and the high gods,
1854 100 To do you justice, makes his ministers
1855 Of us and those that love you. Best of comfort,
1856 And ever welcome to us.
AGRIPPA 1857 Welcome, lady.
MAECENAS 1858 Welcome, dear madam.
1859 105 Each heart in Rome does love and pity you;
1860 Only th’ adulterous Antony, most large
1861 In his abominations, turns you off
1862 And gives his potent regiment to a trull
1863 That noises it against us.
OCTAVIA, ⌜to Caesar⌝ 1864 110 Is it so, sir?
CAESAR
1865 Most certain. Sister, welcome. Pray you
1866 Be ever known to patience. My dear’st sister!
They exit.
CLEOPATRA
1867 I will be even with thee, doubt it not.
ENOBARBUS 1868 But why, why, why?
CLEOPATRA
1869 Thou hast forspoke my being in these wars
1870 And say’st it ⌜is⌝ not fit.
ENOBARBUS 1871 5 Well, is it, is it?
1872 ⌜Is ’t⌝ not denounced against us? Why should not we
1873 Be there in person?
ENOBARBUS 1874 Well, I could reply:
1875 If we should serve with horse and mares together,
1876 10 The horse were merely lost. The mares would bear
1877 A soldier and his horse.
CLEOPATRA 1878 What is ’t you say?
ENOBARBUS
1879 Your presence needs must puzzle Antony,
1880 Take from his heart, take from his brain, from ’s time
1881 15 What should not then be spared. He is already
1882 Traduced for levity, and ’tis said in Rome
1883 That Photinus, an eunuch, and your maids
1884 Manage this war.
CLEOPATRA 1885 Sink Rome, and their tongues rot
1886 20 That speak against us! A charge we bear i’ th’ war,
1887 And as the president of my kingdom will
1888 Appear there for a man. Speak not against it.
1889 I will not stay behind.
Enter Antony and Canidius.
ENOBARBUS 1890 Nay, I have done.
1891 25 Here comes the Emperor.
ANTONY 1892 Is it not strange, Canidius,
1893 That from Tarentum and Brundusium
1894 He could so quickly cut the Ionian Sea
1895 And take in Toryne?—You have heard on ’t, sweet?
CLEOPATRA
1896 30 Celerity is never more admired
1897 Than by the negligent.
ANTONY 1898 A good rebuke,
1899 Which might have well becomed the best of men,
1900 To taunt at slackness.—Canidius, we will fight
1901 35 With him by sea.
CANIDIUS 1903 Why will
1904 My lord do so?
ANTONY 1905 For that he dares us to ’t.
ENOBARBUS
1906 40 So hath my lord dared him to single fight.
CANIDIUS
1907 Ay, and to wage this battle at Pharsalia,
1908 Where Caesar fought with Pompey. But these offers,
1909 Which serve not for his vantage, he shakes off,
1910 And so should you.
ENOBARBUS 1911 45 Your ships are not well manned,
1912 Your mariners are muleteers, reapers, people
1913 Engrossed by swift impress. In Caesar’s fleet
1914 Are those that often have ’gainst Pompey fought.
1915 Their ships are yare, yours heavy. No disgrace
1916 50 Shall fall you for refusing him at sea,
1917 Being prepared for land.
ANTONY 1918 By sea, by sea.
ENOBARBUS
1919 Most worthy sir, you therein throw away
1920 The absolute soldiership you have by land,
1921 55 Distract your army, which doth most consist
1922 Of war-marked footmen, leave unexecuted
1923 Your own renownèd knowledge, quite forgo
1924 The way which promises assurance, and
1925 Give up yourself merely to chance and hazard
1926 60 From firm security.
ANTONY 1927 I’ll fight at sea.
CLEOPATRA
1928 I have sixty sails, Caesar none better.
ANTONY
1929 Our overplus of shipping will we burn,
1930 And with the rest full-manned, from th’ head of
1931 65 Actium
1933 We then can do ’t at land.
Enter a Messenger.
1934 Thy business?
MESSENGER
1935 The news is true, my lord; he is descried.
1936 70 Caesar has taken Toryne.⌜He exits.⌝
ANTONY
1937 Can he be there in person? ’Tis impossible;
1938 Strange that his power should be. Canidius,
1939 Our nineteen legions thou shalt hold by land,
1940 And our twelve thousand horse. We’ll to our ship.—
1941 75 Away, my Thetis.
Enter a Soldier.
1942 How now, worthy soldier?
SOLDIER
1943 O noble emperor, do not fight by sea!
1944 Trust not to rotten planks. Do you misdoubt
1945 This sword and these my wounds? Let th’ Egyptians
1946 80 And the Phoenicians go a-ducking. We
1947 Have used to conquer standing on the earth
1948 And fighting foot to foot.
ANTONY 1949 Well, well, away.
Antony, Cleopatra, and Enobarbus exit.
SOLDIER
1950 By Hercules, I think I am i’ th’ right.
CANIDIUS
1951 85 Soldier, thou art, but his whole action grows
1952 Not in the power on ’t. So our leader’s led,
1953 And we are women’s men.
SOLDIER 1954 You keep by land
1955 The legions and the horse whole, do you not?
⌜CANIDIUS⌝
1956 90 Marcus Octavius, Marcus Justeius,
1958 But we keep whole by land. This speed of Caesar’s
1959 Carries beyond belief.
SOLDIER 1960 While he was yet in Rome,
1961 95 His power went out in such distractions as
1962 Beguiled all spies.
CANIDIUS 1963 Who’s his lieutenant, hear you?
SOLDIER
1964 They say one Taurus.
CANIDIUS 1965 Well I know the man.
Enter a Messenger.
MESSENGER 1966 100The Emperor calls Canidius.
CANIDIUS
1967 With news the time’s ⌜in⌝ labor, and throws forth
1968 Each minute some.
They exit.
CAESAR 1969 Taurus!
TAURUS 1970 My lord?
CAESAR
1971 Strike not by land, keep whole. Provoke not battle
1972 Till we have done at sea. Do not exceed
1973 5 The prescript of this scroll.⌜Hands him a scroll.⌝
1974 Our fortune lies
1975 Upon this jump.
⌜They⌝ exit.
ANTONY
1976 Set we our squadrons on yond side o’ th’ hill
1977 In eye of Caesar’s battle, from which place
1978 We may the number of the ships behold
1979 And so proceed accordingly.
⌜They⌝ exit.
over the stage, and Taurus the lieutenant of Caesar
the other way. After their going in is heard the
noise of a sea fight.
Alarum. Enter Enobarbus.
ENOBARBUS
1980 Naught, naught, all naught! I can behold no longer.
1981 Th’ Antoniad, the Egyptian admiral,
1982 With all their sixty, fly and turn the rudder.
1983 To see ’t mine eyes are blasted.
Enter Scarus.
SCARUS 1984 5 Gods and goddesses,
1985 All the whole synod of them!
ENOBARBUS 1986 What’s thy passion?
SCARUS
1987 The greater cantle of the world is lost
1988 With very ignorance. We have kissed away
1989 10 Kingdoms and provinces.
ENOBARBUS 1990 How appears the fight?
SCARUS
1991 On our side, like the tokened pestilence,
1992 Where death is sure. Yon ribaudred nag of Egypt,
1993 Whom leprosy o’ertake, i’ th’ midst o’ th’ fight,
1994 15 When vantage like a pair of twins appeared
1996 The breeze upon her like a cow in ⌜June,⌝
1997 Hoists sails and flies.
ENOBARBUS 1998 That I beheld.
1999 20 Mine eyes did sicken at the sight and could not
2000 Endure a further view.
SCARUS 2001 She once being loofed,
2002 The noble ruin of her magic, Antony,
2003 Claps on his sea-wing and, like a doting mallard,
2004 25 Leaving the fight in height, flies after her.
2005 I never saw an action of such shame.
2006 Experience, manhood, honor ne’er before
2007 Did violate so itself.
ENOBARBUS 2008 Alack, alack.
Enter Canidius.
CANIDIUS
2009 30 Our fortune on the sea is out of breath
2010 And sinks most lamentably. Had our general
2011 Been what he knew himself, it had gone well.
2012 O, ⌜he⌝ has given example for our flight
2013 Most grossly by his own.
ENOBARBUS
2014 35 Ay, are you thereabouts? Why then goodnight
2015 indeed.
CANIDIUS 2016 Toward Peloponnesus are they fled.
SCARUS
2017 ’Tis easy to ’t, and there I will attend
2018 What further comes.⌜He exits.⌝
CANIDIUS 2019 40 To Caesar will I render
2020 My legions and my horse. Six kings already
2021 Show me the way of yielding.⌜He exits.⌝
ENOBARBUS 2022 I’ll yet follow
2023 The wounded chance of Antony, though my reason
2024 45 Sits in the wind against me.
⌜He exits.⌝
ANTONY
2025 Hark, the land bids me tread no more upon ’t.
2026 It is ashamed to bear me. Friends, come hither.
2027 I am so lated in the world that I
2028 Have lost my way forever. I have a ship
2029 5 Laden with gold. Take that, divide it. Fly,
2030 And make your peace with Caesar.
ALL 2031 Fly? Not we!
ANTONY
2032 I have fled myself and have instructed cowards
2033 To run and show their shoulders. Friends, begone.
2034 10 I have myself resolved upon a course
2035 Which has no need of you. Begone.
2036 My treasure’s in the harbor; take it. O,
2037 I followed that I blush to look upon!
2038 My very hairs do mutiny, for the white
2039 15 Reprove the brown for rashness, and they them
2040 For fear and doting. Friends, begone. You shall
2041 Have letters from me to some friends that will
2042 Sweep your way for you. Pray you look not sad,
2043 Nor make replies of loathness. Take the hint
2044 20 Which my despair proclaims. Let ⌜that⌝ be left
2045 Which leaves itself. To the seaside straightway!
2046 I will possess you of that ship and treasure.
2047 Leave me, I pray, a little—pray you, now,
2048 Nay, do so—for indeed I have lost command.
2049 25 Therefore I pray you—I’ll see you by and by.
⌜Attendants move aside. Antony⌝ sits down.
Enter Cleopatra led by Charmian, ⌜Iras,⌝ and Eros.
EROS
2050 Nay, gentle madam, to him, comfort him.
CHARMIAN 2052 Do! Why, what else?
CLEOPATRA 2053 Let me sit down. O Juno!⌜She sits down.⌝
ANTONY 2054 30No, no, no, no, no.
EROS 2055 See you here, sir?
ANTONY 2056 Oh fie, fie, fie!
CHARMIAN 2057 Madam.
IRAS 2058 Madam, O good empress!
EROS 2059 35Sir, sir—
ANTONY
2060 Yes, my lord, yes. He at Philippi kept
2061 His sword e’en like a dancer, while I struck
2062 The lean and wrinkled Cassius, and ’twas I
2063 That the mad Brutus ended. He alone
2064 40 Dealt on lieutenantry, and no practice had
2065 In the brave squares of war, yet now—no matter.
CLEOPATRA
2066 Ah, stand by.
EROS 2067 The Queen, my lord, the Queen.
IRAS
2068 Go to him, madam; speak to him.
2069 45 He’s unqualitied with very shame.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜rising⌝ 2070 Well, then, sustain me. O!
EROS
2071 Most noble sir, arise. The Queen approaches.
2072 Her head’s declined, and death will seize her but
2073 Your comfort makes the rescue.
ANTONY 2074 50I have offended reputation,
2075 A most unnoble swerving.
EROS 2076 Sir, the Queen.
ANTONY, ⌜rising⌝
2077 O, whither hast thou led me, Egypt? See
2078 How I convey my shame out of thine eyes,
2079 55 By looking back what I have left behind
2080 ’Stroyed in dishonor.
2082 Forgive my fearful sails! I little thought
2083 You would have followed.
ANTONY 2084 60 Egypt, thou knew’st too well
2085 My heart was to thy rudder tied by th’ strings,
2086 And thou shouldst ⌜tow⌝ me after. O’er my spirit
2087 ⌜Thy⌝ full supremacy thou knew’st, and that
2088 Thy beck might from the bidding of the gods
2089 65 Command me.
CLEOPATRA 2090 O, my pardon!
ANTONY 2091 Now I must
2092 To the young man send humble treaties, dodge
2093 And palter in the shifts of lowness, who
2094 70 With half the bulk o’ th’ world played as I pleased,
2095 Making and marring fortunes. You did know
2096 How much you were my conqueror, and that
2097 My sword, made weak by my affection, would
2098 Obey it on all cause.
CLEOPATRA 2099 75 Pardon, pardon!
ANTONY
2100 Fall not a tear, I say; one of them rates
2101 All that is won and lost. Give me a kiss.⌜They kiss.⌝
2102 Even this repays me.—
2103 We sent our schoolmaster. Is he come back?—
2104 80 Love, I am full of lead.—Some wine
2105 Within there, and our viands! Fortune knows
2106 We scorn her most when most she offers blows.
They exit.
Dolabella, with others.
CAESAR
2107 Let him appear that’s come from Antony.
2108 Know you him?
2110 An argument that he is plucked, when hither
2111 5 He sends so poor a pinion of his wing,
2112 Which had superfluous kings for messengers
2113 Not many moons gone by.
Enter Ambassador from Antony.
CAESAR 2114 Approach, and speak.
AMBASSADOR
2115 Such as I am, I come from Antony.
2116 10 I was of late as petty to his ends
2117 As is the morn-dew on the myrtle leaf
2118 To his grand sea.
CAESAR 2119 Be ’t so. Declare thine office.
AMBASSADOR
2120 Lord of his fortunes he salutes thee, and
2121 15 Requires to live in Egypt, which not granted,
2122 He ⌜lessens⌝ his requests, and to thee sues
2123 To let him breathe between the heavens and Earth,
2124 A private man in Athens. This for him.
2125 Next, Cleopatra does confess thy greatness,
2126 20 Submits her to thy might, and of thee craves
2127 The circle of the Ptolemies for her heirs,
2128 Now hazarded to thy grace.
CAESAR 2129 For Antony,
2130 I have no ears to his request. The Queen
2131 25 Of audience nor desire shall fail, so she
2132 From Egypt drive her all-disgracèd friend,
2133 Or take his life there. This if she perform,
2134 She shall not sue unheard. So to them both.
AMBASSADOR
2135 Fortune pursue thee!
CAESAR 2136 30 Bring him through the bands.
⌜Ambassador exits, with Attendants.⌝
2137 ⌜To Thidias.⌝ To try thy eloquence now ’tis time.
2138 Dispatch.
2140 And in our name, what she requires; add more,
2141 35 From thine invention, offers. Women are not
2142 In their best fortunes strong, but want will perjure
2143 The ne’er-touched vestal. Try thy cunning, Thidias.
2144 Make thine own edict for thy pains, which we
2145 Will answer as a law.
THIDIAS 2146 40 Caesar, I go.
CAESAR
2147 Observe how Antony becomes his flaw,
2148 And what thou think’st his very action speaks
2149 In every power that moves.
THIDIAS 2150 Caesar, I shall.
They exit.
CLEOPATRA
2151 What shall we do, Enobarbus?
ENOBARBUS 2152 Think, and die.
CLEOPATRA
2153 Is Antony or we in fault for this?
ENOBARBUS
2154 Antony only, that would make his will
2155 5 Lord of his reason. What though you fled
2156 From that great face of war, whose several ranges
2157 Frighted each other? Why should he follow?
2158 The itch of his affection should not then
2159 Have nicked his captainship, at such a point,
2160 10 When half to half the world opposed, he being
2161 The merèd question. ’Twas a shame no less
2162 Than was his loss, to course your flying flags
2163 And leave his navy gazing.
CLEOPATRA 2164 Prithee, peace.
ANTONY 2165 15Is that his answer?
AMBASSADOR 2166 Ay, my lord.
ANTONY
2167 The Queen shall then have courtesy, so she
2168 Will yield us up?
AMBASSADOR 2169 He says so.
ANTONY 2170 20 Let her know ’t.—
2171 To the boy Caesar send this grizzled head,
2172 And he will fill thy wishes to the brim
2173 With principalities.
CLEOPATRA 2174 That head, my lord?
ANTONY, ⌜to Ambassador⌝
2175 25 To him again. Tell him he wears the rose
2176 Of youth upon him, from which the world should
2177 note
2178 Something particular: his coin, ships, legions
2179 May be a coward’s, whose ministers would prevail
2180 30 Under the service of a child as soon
2181 As i’ th’ command of Caesar. I dare him therefore
2182 To lay his gay ⌜caparisons⌝ apart
2183 And answer me declined, sword against sword,
2184 Ourselves alone. I’ll write it. Follow me.
⌜Antony and Ambassador exit.⌝
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside⌝
2185 35 Yes, like enough, high-battled Caesar will
2186 Unstate his happiness and be staged to th’ show
2187 Against a sworder! I see men’s judgments are
2188 A parcel of their fortunes, and things outward
2189 Do draw the inward quality after them
2190 40 To suffer all alike. That he should dream,
2191 Knowing all measures, the full Caesar will
2192 Answer his emptiness! Caesar, thou hast subdued
2193 His judgment too.
SERVANT 2194 A messenger from Caesar.
CLEOPATRA
2195 45 What, no more ceremony? See, my women,
2196 Against the blown rose may they stop their nose
2197 That kneeled unto the buds.—Admit him, sir.
⌜Servant exits.⌝
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside⌝
2198 Mine honesty and I begin to square.
2199 The loyalty well held to fools does make
2200 50 Our faith mere folly. Yet he that can endure
2201 To follow with allegiance a fall’n lord
2202 Does conquer him that did his master conquer,
2203 And earns a place i’ th’ story.
Enter Thidias.
CLEOPATRA 2204 Caesar’s will?
THIDIAS
2205 55 Hear it apart.
CLEOPATRA 2206 None but friends. Say boldly.
THIDIAS
2207 So haply are they friends to Antony.
ENOBARBUS
2208 He needs as many, sir, as Caesar has,
2209 Or needs not us. If Caesar please, our master
2210 60 Will leap to be his friend. For us, you know
2211 Whose he is we are, and that is Caesar’s.
THIDIAS 2212 So.—
2213 Thus then, thou most renowned: Caesar entreats
2214 Not to consider in what case thou stand’st
2215 65 Further than he is ⌜Caesar.⌝
CLEOPATRA 2216 Go on; right royal.
THIDIAS
2217 He knows that you embrace not Antony
2218 As you did love, but as you feared him.
THIDIAS
2220 70 The scars upon your honor therefore he
2221 Does pity as constrainèd blemishes,
2222 Not as deserved.
CLEOPATRA 2223 He is a god and knows
2224 What is most right. Mine honor was not yielded,
2225 75 But conquered merely.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside⌝ 2226 To be sure of that,
2227 I will ask Antony. Sir, sir, thou art so leaky
2228 That we must leave thee to thy sinking, for
2229 Thy dearest quit thee.Enobarbus exits.
THIDIAS 2230 80 Shall I say to Caesar
2231 What you require of him? For he partly begs
2232 To be desired to give. It much would please him
2233 That of his fortunes you should make a staff
2234 To lean upon. But it would warm his spirits
2235 85 To hear from me you had left Antony
2236 And put yourself under his shroud,
2237 The universal landlord.
CLEOPATRA 2238 What’s your name?
THIDIAS
2239 My name is Thidias.
CLEOPATRA 2240 90 Most kind messenger,
2241 Say to great Caesar this in ⌜deputation:⌝
2242 I kiss his conqu’ring hand. Tell him I am prompt
2243 To lay my crown at ’s feet, and there to kneel.
2244 Tell him, from his all-obeying breath I hear
2245 95 The doom of Egypt.
THIDIAS 2246 ’Tis your noblest course.
2247 Wisdom and fortune combating together,
2248 If that the former dare but what it can,
2249 No chance may shake it. Give me grace to lay
2250 100 My duty on your hand.
⌜She gives him her hand to kiss.⌝
2252 When he hath mused of taking kingdoms in,
2253 Bestowed his lips on that unworthy place
2254 As it rained kisses.
Enter Antony and Enobarbus.
ANTONY 2255 105 Favors? By Jove that thunders!
2256 What art thou, fellow?
THIDIAS 2257 One that but performs
2258 The bidding of the fullest man and worthiest
2259 To have command obeyed.
ENOBARBUS 2260 110 You will be whipped.
ANTONY, ⌜calling for Servants⌝
2261 Approach there!—Ah, you kite!—Now, gods and
2262 devils,
2263 Authority melts from me. Of late when I cried “Ho!”
2264 Like boys unto a muss kings would start forth
2265 115 And cry “Your will?” Have you no ears? I am
2266 Antony yet.
Enter ⌜Servants.⌝
2267 Take hence this jack and whip him.
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside⌝
2268 ’Tis better playing with a lion’s whelp
2269 Than with an old one dying.
ANTONY 2270 120 Moon and stars!
2271 Whip him! Were ’t twenty of the greatest tributaries
2272 That do acknowledge Caesar, should I find them
2273 So saucy with the hand of she here—what’s her
2274 name
2275 125 Since she was Cleopatra? Whip him, fellows,
2276 Till like a boy you see him cringe his face
2277 And whine aloud for mercy. Take him hence.
THIDIAS
2278 Mark Antony—
2280 130 Bring him again. ⌜This⌝ jack of Caesar’s shall
2281 Bear us an errand to him.
⌜Servants⌝ exit with Thidias.
2282 ⌜To Cleopatra.⌝ You were half blasted ere I knew you.
2283 Ha!
2284 Have I my pillow left unpressed in Rome,
2285 135 Forborne the getting of a lawful race,
2286 And by a gem of women, to be abused
2287 By one that looks on feeders?
CLEOPATRA 2288 Good my lord—
ANTONY 2289 You have been a boggler ever.
2290 140 But when we in our viciousness grow hard—
2291 O, misery on ’t!—the wise gods seel our eyes,
2292 In our own filth drop our clear judgments, make us
2293 Adore our errors, laugh at ’s while we strut
2294 To our confusion.
CLEOPATRA 2295 145 O, is ’t come to this?
ANTONY
2296 I found you as a morsel cold upon
2297 Dead Caesar’s trencher; nay, you were a fragment
2298 Of Gneius Pompey’s, besides what hotter hours,
2299 Unregistered in vulgar fame, you have
2300 150 Luxuriously picked out. For I am sure,
2301 Though you can guess what temperance should be,
2302 You know not what it is.
CLEOPATRA 2303 Wherefore is this?
ANTONY
2304 To let a fellow that will take rewards
2305 155 And say “God quit you!” be familiar with
2306 My playfellow, your hand, this kingly seal
2307 And plighter of high hearts! O, that I were
2308 Upon the hill of Basan, to outroar
2309 The hornèd herd! For I have savage cause,
2310 160 And to proclaim it civilly were like
2312 For being yare about him.
Enter a Servant with Thidias.
2313 Is he whipped?
SERVANT 2314 Soundly, my lord.
ANTONY 2315 165Cried he? And begged he pardon?
SERVANT 2316 He did ask favor.
ANTONY, ⌜to Thidias⌝
2317 If that thy father live, let him repent
2318 Thou wast not made his daughter; and be thou sorry
2319 To follow Caesar in his triumph, since
2320 170 Thou hast been whipped for following him.
2321 Henceforth
2322 The white hand of a lady fever thee;
2323 Shake thou to look on ’t. Get thee back to Caesar.
2324 Tell him thy entertainment. Look thou say
2325 175 He makes me angry with him; for he seems
2326 Proud and disdainful, harping on what I am,
2327 Not what he knew I was. He makes me angry,
2328 And at this time most easy ’tis to do ’t,
2329 When my good stars that were my former guides
2330 180 Have empty left their orbs and shot their fires
2331 Into th’ abysm of hell. If he mislike
2332 My speech and what is done, tell him he has
2333 Hipparchus, my enfranchèd bondman, whom
2334 He may at pleasure whip, or hang, or torture,
2335 185 As he shall like to quit me. Urge it thou.
2336 Hence with thy stripes, begone!Thidias exits.
CLEOPATRA 2337 Have you done yet?
ANTONY
2338 Alack, our terrene moon is now eclipsed,
2339 And it portends alone the fall of Antony.
CLEOPATRA 2340 190I must stay his time.
2341 To flatter Caesar, would you mingle eyes
2342 With one that ties his points?
CLEOPATRA 2343 Not know me yet?
ANTONY
2344 Coldhearted toward me?
CLEOPATRA 2345 195 Ah, dear, if I be so,
2346 From my cold heart let heaven engender hail
2347 And poison it in the source, and the first stone
2348 Drop in my neck; as it determines, so
2349 Dissolve my life! The next Caesarion ⌜smite,⌝
2350 200 Till by degrees the memory of my womb,
2351 Together with my brave Egyptians all,
2352 By the discandying of this pelleted storm
2353 Lie graveless till the flies and gnats of Nile
2354 Have buried them for prey!
ANTONY 2355 205 I am satisfied.
2356 Caesar ⌜sits⌝ down in Alexandria, where
2357 I will oppose his fate. Our force by land
2358 Hath nobly held; our severed navy too
2359 Have knit again, and fleet, threatening most sealike.
2360 210 Where hast thou been, my heart? Dost thou hear,
2361 lady?
2362 If from the field I shall return once more
2363 To kiss these lips, I will appear in blood.
2364 I and my sword will earn our chronicle.
2365 215 There’s hope in ’t yet.
CLEOPATRA 2366 That’s my brave lord!
ANTONY
2367 I will be treble-sinewed, -hearted, -breathed,
2368 And fight maliciously; for when mine hours
2369 Were nice and lucky, men did ransom lives
2370 220 Of me for jests. But now I’ll set my teeth
2371 And send to darkness all that stop me. Come,
2372 Let’s have one other gaudy night. Call to me
2374 Let’s mock the midnight bell.
CLEOPATRA 2375 225 It is my birthday.
2376 I had thought t’ have held it poor. But since my lord
2377 Is Antony again, I will be Cleopatra.
ANTONY 2378 We will yet do well.
CLEOPATRA
2379 Call all his noble captains to my lord.
ANTONY
2380 230 Do so; we’ll speak to them, and tonight I’ll force
2381 The wine peep through their scars.—Come on, my
2382 queen,
2383 There’s sap in ’t yet. The next time I do fight
2384 I’ll make Death love me, for I will contend
2385 235 Even with his pestilent scythe.
⌜All but Enobarbus⌝ exit.
ENOBARBUS
2386 Now he’ll outstare the lightning. To be furious
2387 Is to be frighted out of fear, and in that mood
2388 The dove will peck the estridge; and I see still
2389 A diminution in our captain’s brain
2390 240 Restores his heart. When valor preys ⌜on⌝ reason,
2391 It eats the sword it fights with. I will seek
2392 Some way to leave him.
⌜He⌝ exits.
Caesar reading a letter.
CAESAR
2393 He calls me “boy,” and chides as he had power
2394 To beat me out of Egypt. My messenger
2395 He hath whipped with rods, dares me to personal
2396 combat,
2397 5 Caesar to Antony. Let the old ruffian know
2398 I have many other ways to die; meantime
2399 Laugh at his challenge.
MAECENAS 2400 Caesar must think,
2401 When one so great begins to rage, he’s hunted
2402 10 Even to falling. Give him no breath, but now
2403 Make boot of his distraction. Never anger
2404 Made good guard for itself.
CAESAR 2405 Let our best heads
2406 Know that tomorrow the last of many battles
2407 15 We mean to fight. Within our files there are,
2408 Of those that served Mark Antony but late,
2409 Enough to fetch him in. See it done,
2410 And feast the army; we have store to do ’t,
2411 And they have earned the waste. Poor Antony.
They exit.
with others.
ANTONY
2412 He will not fight with me, Domitius?
ENOBARBUS 2413 No.
ANTONY 2414 Why should he not?
ENOBARBUS
2415 He thinks, being twenty times of better fortune,
2416 5 He is twenty men to one.
ANTONY 2417 Tomorrow, soldier,
2418 By sea and land I’ll fight. Or I will live
2419 Or bathe my dying honor in the blood
2420 Shall make it live again. Woo’t thou fight well?
ENOBARBUS
2421 10 I’ll strike and cry “Take all.”
ANTONY 2422 Well said. Come on.
2423 Call forth my household servants.
Enter three or four Servitors.
2424 Let’s tonight
2425 Be bounteous at our meal.—Give me thy hand;
2426 15 Thou hast been rightly honest.—So hast thou,—
2427 Thou,—and thou,—and thou. You have served me
2428 well,
2429 And kings have been your fellows.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜aside to Enobarbus⌝ 2430 What means this?
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside to Cleopatra⌝
2431 20 ’Tis one of those odd tricks which sorrow shoots
2432 Out of the mind.
ANTONY, ⌜to another Servitor⌝ 2433 And thou art honest too.
2434 I wish I could be made so many men,
2435 And all of you clapped up together in
2436 25 An Antony, that I might do you service
2437 So good as you have done.
ANTONY
2439 Well, my good fellows, wait on me tonight.
2440 Scant not my cups, and make as much of me
2441 30 As when mine empire was your fellow too
2442 And suffered my command.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜aside to Enobarbus⌝ 2443 What does he mean?
ENOBARBUS, ⌜aside to Cleopatra⌝
2444 To make his followers weep.
ANTONY, ⌜to the Servitors⌝ 2445 Tend me tonight;
2446 35 May be it is the period of your duty.
2447 Haply you shall not see me more, or if,
2448 A mangled shadow. Perchance tomorrow
2449 You’ll serve another master. I look on you
2450 As one that takes his leave. Mine honest friends,
2451 40 I turn you not away, but, like a master
2452 Married to your good service, stay till death.
2453 Tend me tonight two hours—I ask no more—
2454 And the gods yield you for ’t!
ENOBARBUS 2455 What mean you, sir,
2456 45 To give them this discomfort? Look, they weep,
2457 And I, an ass, am onion-eyed. For shame,
2458 Transform us not to women.
ANTONY 2459 Ho, ho, ho!
2460 Now the witch take me if I meant it thus!
2461 50 Grace grow where those drops fall! My hearty
2462 friends,
2463 You take me in too dolorous a sense,
2464 For I spake to you for your comfort, did desire you
2465 To burn this night with torches. Know, my hearts,
2466 55 I hope well of tomorrow, and will lead you
2467 Where rather I’ll expect victorious life
2468 Than death and honor. Let’s to supper, come,
2469 And drown consideration.
They exit.
FIRST SOLDIER
2470 Brother, goodnight. Tomorrow is the day.
SECOND SOLDIER
2471 It will determine one way. Fare you well.
2472 Heard you of nothing strange about the streets?
FIRST SOLDIER 2473 Nothing. What news?
SECOND SOLDIER
2474 5 Belike ’tis but a rumor. Goodnight to you.
FIRST SOLDIER 2475 Well, sir, goodnight.
They meet other Soldiers ⌜who are entering.⌝
SECOND SOLDIER 2476 Soldiers, have careful watch.
⌜THIRD⌝ SOLDIER 2477 And you. Goodnight, goodnight.
They place themselves in every corner of the stage.
SECOND SOLDIER 2478 Here we; and if tomorrow
2479 10 Our navy thrive, I have an absolute hope
2480 Our landmen will stand up.
FIRST SOLDIER 2481 ’Tis a brave army, and full of purpose.
Music of the hautboys is under the stage.
SECOND SOLDIER 2482 Peace. What noise?
FIRST SOLDIER 2483 List, list!
SECOND SOLDIER 2484 15Hark!
FIRST SOLDIER 2485 Music i’ th’ air.
THIRD SOLDIER 2486 Under the earth.
FOURTH SOLDIER 2487 It signs well, does it not?
THIRD SOLDIER 2488 No.
FIRST SOLDIER 2489 20Peace, I say. What should this mean?
SECOND SOLDIER
2490 ’Tis the god Hercules, whom Antony loved,
2491 Now leaves him.
2493 Do hear what we do.
SECOND SOLDIER 2494 25How now, masters?Speak together.
ALL 2495 How now? How now? Do you hear this?
FIRST SOLDIER 2496 Ay. Is ’t not strange?
THIRD SOLDIER 2497 Do you hear, masters? Do you hear?
FIRST SOLDIER
2498 Follow the noise so far as we have quarter.
2499 30 Let’s see how it will give off.
ALL 2500 Content. ’Tis strange.
They exit.
⌜Charmian, and⌝ others.
ANTONY, ⌜calling⌝
2501 Eros! Mine armor, Eros!
CLEOPATRA 2502 Sleep a little.
ANTONY
2503 No, my chuck.—Eros, come, mine armor, Eros.
Enter Eros, ⌜carrying armor.⌝
2504 Come, good fellow, put thine iron on.
2505 5 If fortune be not ours today, it is
2506 Because we brave her. Come.
CLEOPATRA 2507 Nay, I’ll help too.
2508 What’s this for?
⌜ANTONY⌝ 2509 Ah, let be, let be! Thou art
2510 10 The armorer of my heart. False, false. This, this!
⌜CLEOPATRA⌝
2511 Sooth, la, I’ll help. Thus it must be.
ANTONY 2512 Well, well,
2513 We shall thrive now.—Seest thou, my good fellow?
2514 Go, put on thy defenses.
CLEOPATRA
2516 Is not this buckled well?
ANTONY 2517 Rarely, rarely.
2518 He that unbuckles this, till we do please
2519 To daff ’t for our repose, shall hear a storm.—
2520 20 Thou fumblest, Eros, and my queen’s a squire
2521 More tight at this than thou. Dispatch.—O love,
2522 That thou couldst see my wars today, and knew’st
2523 The royal occupation, thou shouldst see
2524 A workman in ’t.
Enter an armed Soldier.
2525 25 Good morrow to thee. Welcome.
2526 Thou look’st like him that knows a warlike charge.
2527 To business that we love we rise betime
2528 And go to ’t with delight.
SOLDIER 2529 A thousand, sir,
2530 30 Early though ’t be, have on their riveted trim
2531 And at the port expect you.Shout. Trumpets flourish.
Enter Captains and Soldiers.
⌜CAPTAIN⌝
2532 The morn is fair. Good morrow, general.
ALL
2533 Good morrow, general.
ANTONY 2534 ’Tis well blown, lads.
2535 35 This morning, like the spirit of a youth
2536 That means to be of note, begins betimes.
2537 So, so.—Come, give me that. This way.—Well said.—
2538 Fare thee well, dame.⌜He kisses her.⌝
2539 Whate’er becomes of me,
2540 40 This is a soldier’s kiss. Rebukable
2541 And worthy shameful check it were to stand
2542 On more mechanic compliment. I’ll leave thee
2544 Follow me close. I’ll bring you to ’t.—Adieu.
⌜Antony, Eros, Captains, and Soldiers⌝ exit.
CHARMIAN
2545 45 Please you retire to your chamber?
CLEOPATRA 2546 Lead me.
2547 He goes forth gallantly. That he and Caesar might
2548 Determine this great war in single fight,
2549 Then Antony—but now—. Well, on.
They exit.
who meets them.⌝
⌜SOLDIER⌝
2550 The gods make this a happy day to Antony.
ANTONY
2551 Would thou and those thy scars had once prevailed
2552 To make me fight at land.
⌜SOLDIER⌝ 2553 Had’st thou done so,
2554 5 The kings that have revolted and the soldier
2555 That has this morning left thee would have still
2556 Followed thy heels.
ANTONY 2557 Who’s gone this morning?
⌜SOLDIER⌝ 2558 Who?
2559 10 One ever near thee. Call for Enobarbus,
2560 He shall not hear thee, or from Caesar’s camp
2561 Say “I am none of thine.”
ANTONY 2562 What sayest thou?
SOLDIER 2563 Sir,
2564 15 He is with Caesar.
EROS 2565 Sir, his chests and treasure
2566 He has not with him.
SOLDIER 2568 Most certain.
ANTONY
2569 20 Go, Eros, send his treasure after. Do it.
2570 Detain no jot, I charge thee. Write to him—
2571 I will subscribe—gentle adieus and greetings.
2572 Say that I wish he never find more cause
2573 To change a master. O, my fortunes have
2574 25 Corrupted honest men. Dispatch.—Enobarbus!
⌜They⌝ exit.
Enobarbus and Dolabella.
CAESAR
2575 Go forth, Agrippa, and begin the fight.
2576 Our will is Antony be took alive;
2577 Make it so known.
AGRIPPA 2578 Caesar, I shall.⌜He exits.⌝
CAESAR
2579 5 The time of universal peace is near.
2580 Prove this a prosp’rous day, the three-nooked world
2581 Shall bear the olive freely.
Enter a Messenger.
MESSENGER 2582 Antony
2583 Is come into the field.
CAESAR 2584 10 Go charge Agrippa
2585 Plant those that have revolted in the vant
2586 That Antony may seem to spend his fury
2587 Upon himself.⌜All but Enobarbus⌝ exit.
ENOBARBUS
2588 Alexas did revolt and went to Jewry on
2590 Great Herod to incline himself to Caesar
2591 And leave his master Antony. For this pains,
2592 Caesar hath hanged him. Canidius and the rest
2593 That fell away have entertainment but
2594 20 No honorable trust. I have done ill,
2595 Of which I do accuse myself so sorely
2596 That I will joy no ⌜more.⌝
Enter a Soldier of Caesar’s.
SOLDIER 2597 Enobarbus, Antony
2598 Hath after thee sent all thy treasure, with
2599 25 His bounty overplus. The messenger
2600 Came on my guard, and at thy tent is now
2601 Unloading of his mules.
ENOBARBUS 2602 I give it you.
SOLDIER 2603 Mock not, Enobarbus.
2604 30 I tell you true. Best you safed the bringer
2605 Out of the host. I must attend mine office
2606 Or would have done ’t myself. Your emperor
2607 Continues still a Jove.He exits.
ENOBARBUS
2608 I am alone the villain of the Earth,
2609 35 And feel I am so most. O Antony,
2610 Thou mine of bounty, how wouldst thou have paid
2611 My better service, when my turpitude
2612 Thou dost so crown with gold! This blows my
2613 heart.
2614 40 If swift thought break it not, a swifter mean
2615 Shall outstrike thought, but thought will do ’t, I feel.
2616 I fight against thee? No. I will go seek
2617 Some ditch wherein to die; the foul’st best fits
2618 My latter part of life.
He exits.
⌜with other of Caesar’s soldiers.⌝
AGRIPPA
2619 Retire! We have engaged ourselves too far.
2620 Caesar himself has work, and our oppression
2621 Exceeds what we expected.⌜They⌝ exit.
Alarums. Enter Antony, and Scarus wounded.
SCARUS
2622 O my brave emperor, this is fought indeed!
2623 5 Had we done so at first, we had droven them home
2624 With clouts about their heads.
ANTONY 2625 Thou bleed’st apace.
SCARUS
2626 I had a wound here that was like a T,
2627 But now ’tis made an H.⌜Sound of retreat⌝ far off.
ANTONY 2628 10 They do retire.
SCARUS
2629 We’ll beat ’em into bench-holes. I have yet
2630 Room for six scotches more.
Enter Eros.
EROS
2631 They are beaten, sir, and our advantage serves
2632 For a fair victory.
SCARUS 2633 15 Let us score their backs
2634 And snatch ’em up as we take hares, behind.
2635 ’Tis sport to maul a runner.
ANTONY 2636 I will reward thee
2637 Once for thy sprightly comfort and tenfold
2638 20 For thy good valor. Come thee on.
SCARUS 2639 I’ll halt after.
They exit.
Scarus, with others.
ANTONY
2640 We have beat him to his camp. Run one before
2641 And let the Queen know of our ⌜gests.⌝
⌜A Soldier exits.⌝
2642 Tomorrow
2643 Before the sun shall see ’s, we’ll spill the blood
2644 5 That has today escaped. I thank you all,
2645 For doughty-handed are you, and have fought
2646 Not as you served the cause, but as ’t had been
2647 Each man’s like mine. You have shown all Hectors.
2648 Enter the city. Clip your wives, your friends.
2649 10 Tell them your feats, whilst they with joyful tears
2650 Wash the congealment from your wounds and kiss
2651 The honored gashes whole.
Enter Cleopatra.
⌜To Scarus.⌝ 2652 Give me thy hand.
2653 To this great fairy I’ll commend thy acts,
2654 15 Make her thanks bless thee.—O, thou day o’ th’
2655 world,
2656 Chain mine armed neck. Leap thou, attire and all,
2657 Through proof of harness to my heart, and there
2658 Ride on the pants triumphing.
CLEOPATRA 2659 20 Lord of lords!
2660 O infinite virtue, com’st thou smiling from
2661 The world’s great snare uncaught?
ANTONY 2662 Mine nightingale,
2663 We have beat them to their beds. What, girl, though
2664 25 gray
2665 Do something mingle with our younger brown, yet
2666 ha’ we
2668 Get goal for goal of youth. Behold this man.
2669 30 Commend unto his lips thy favoring hand.—
2670 Kiss it, my warrior.⌜Scarus kisses her hand.⌝
2671 He hath fought today
2672 As if a god in hate of mankind had
2673 Destroyed in such a shape.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜to Scarus⌝ 2674 35 I’ll give thee, friend,
2675 An armor all of gold. It was a king’s.
ANTONY
2676 He has deserved it, were it carbuncled
2677 Like holy Phoebus’ car. Give me thy hand.
2678 Through Alexandria make a jolly march.
2679 40 Bear our hacked targets like the men that owe
2680 them.
2681 Had our great palace the capacity
2682 To camp this host, we all would sup together
2683 And drink carouses to the next day’s fate,
2684 45 Which promises royal peril.—Trumpeters,
2685 With brazen din blast you the city’s ear.
2686 Make mingle with our rattling taborins,
2687 That heaven and Earth may strike their sounds
2688 together,
2689 50 Applauding our approach.
They exit.
SENTRY
2690 If we be not relieved within this hour,
2691 We must return to th’ court of guard. The night
2692 Is shiny, and they say we shall embattle
2693 By th’ second hour i’ th’ morn.
ENOBARBUS 2695 O, bear me witness, night—
SECOND WATCH 2696 What man is this?
FIRST WATCH 2697 Stand close, and list him.
ENOBARBUS
2698 Be witness to me, O thou blessèd moon,
2699 10 When men revolted shall upon record
2700 Bear hateful memory, poor Enobarbus did
2701 Before thy face repent.
SENTRY 2702 Enobarbus?
SECOND WATCH 2703 Peace! Hark further.
ENOBARBUS
2704 15 O sovereign mistress of true melancholy,
2705 The poisonous damp of night dispunge upon me,
2706 That life, a very rebel to my will,
2707 May hang no longer on me. Throw my heart
2708 Against the flint and hardness of my fault,
2709 20 Which, being dried with grief, will break to powder
2710 And finish all foul thoughts. O Antony,
2711 Nobler than my revolt is infamous,
2712 Forgive me in thine own particular,
2713 But let the world rank me in register
2714 25 A master-leaver and a fugitive.
2715 O Antony! O Antony!⌜He dies.⌝
FIRST WATCH 2716 Let’s speak to him.
SENTRY 2717 Let’s hear him, for the things he speaks may
2718 concern Caesar.
SECOND WATCH 2719 30Let’s do so. But he sleeps.
SENTRY
2720 Swoons rather, for so bad a prayer as his
2721 Was never yet for sleep.
FIRST WATCH 2722 Go we to him.
SECOND WATCH 2723 Awake, sir, awake! Speak to us.
FIRST WATCH 2724 35Hear you, sir?
SENTRY
2725 The hand of death hath raught him.Drums afar off.
2727 Demurely wake the sleepers. Let us bear him
2728 To th’ court of guard; he is of note. Our hour
2729 40 Is fully out.
SECOND WATCH 2730 Come on then. He may recover yet.
They exit, ⌜carrying Enobarbus’ body.⌝
ANTONY
2731 Their preparation is today by sea;
2732 We please them not by land.
SCARUS 2733 For both, my lord.
ANTONY
2734 I would they’d fight i’ th’ fire or i’ th’ air;
2735 5 We’d fight there too. But this it is: our foot
2736 Upon the hills adjoining to the city
2737 Shall stay with us—order for sea is given;
2738 They have put forth the haven—
2739 Where their appointment we may best discover
2740 10 And look on their endeavor.
They exit.
CAESAR
2741 But being charged, we will be still by land—
2742 Which, as I take ’t, we shall, for his best force
2743 Is forth to man his galleys. To the vales,
2744 And hold our best advantage.
They exit.
ANTONY
2745 Yet they are not joined. Where yond pine does stand,
2746 I shall discover all. I’ll bring thee word
2747 Straight how ’tis like to go.He exits.
Alarum afar off, as at a sea fight.
SCARUS 2748 Swallows have built
2749 5 In Cleopatra’s sails their nests. The ⌜augurs⌝
2750 Say they know not, they cannot tell, look grimly
2751 And dare not speak their knowledge. Antony
2752 Is valiant and dejected, and by starts
2753 His fretted fortunes give him hope and fear
2754 10 Of what he has and has not.
Enter Antony.
ANTONY 2755 All is lost!
2756 This foul Egyptian hath betrayèd me.
2757 My fleet hath yielded to the foe, and yonder
2758 They cast their caps up and carouse together
2759 15 Like friends long lost. Triple-turned whore! ’Tis thou
2760 Hast sold me to this novice, and my heart
2761 Makes only wars on thee. Bid them all fly—
2762 For when I am revenged upon my charm,
2763 I have done all. Bid them all fly. Begone!
⌜Scarus exits.⌝
2764 20 O sun, thy uprise shall I see no more.
2765 Fortune and Antony part here; even here
2766 Do we shake hands. All come to this? The hearts
2767 That ⌜spanieled⌝ me at heels, to whom I gave
2768 Their wishes, do discandy, melt their sweets
2769 25 On blossoming Caesar, and this pine is barked
2770 That overtopped them all. Betrayed I am.
2771 O, this false soul of Egypt! This grave charm,
2773 home,
2774 30 Whose bosom was my crownet, my chief end,
2775 Like a right gypsy hath at fast and loose
2776 Beguiled me to the very heart of loss.—
2777 What Eros, Eros!
Enter Cleopatra.
2778 Ah, thou spell! Avaunt!
CLEOPATRA
2779 35 Why is my lord enraged against his love?
ANTONY
2780 Vanish, or I shall give thee thy deserving
2781 And blemish Caesar’s triumph. Let him take thee
2782 And hoist thee up to the shouting plebeians!
2783 Follow his chariot, like the greatest spot
2784 40 Of all thy sex; most monster-like be shown
2785 For poor’st diminutives, for dolts, and let
2786 Patient Octavia plow thy visage up
2787 With her preparèd nails.Cleopatra exits.
2788 ’Tis well th’ art gone,
2789 45 If it be well to live. But better ’twere
2790 Thou fell’st into my fury, for one death
2791 Might have prevented many.—Eros, ho!—
2792 The shirt of Nessus is upon me. Teach me,
2793 Alcides, thou mine ancestor, thy rage.
2794 50 Let me lodge Lichas on the horns o’ th’ moon,
2795 And with those hands that grasped the heaviest
2796 club
2797 Subdue my worthiest self. The witch shall die.
2798 To the young Roman boy she hath sold me, and I
2799 55 fall
2800 Under this plot. She dies for ’t.—Eros, ho!
He exits.
CLEOPATRA
2801 Help me, my women! O, he’s more mad
2802 Than Telamon for his shield; the boar of Thessaly
2803 Was never so embossed.
CHARMIAN 2804 To th’ monument!
2805 5 There lock yourself and send him word you are
2806 dead.
2807 The soul and body rive not more in parting
2808 Than greatness going off.
CLEOPATRA 2809 To th’ monument!—
2810 10 Mardian, go tell him I have slain myself.
2811 Say that the last I spoke was “Antony,”
2812 And word it, prithee, piteously. Hence, Mardian,
2813 And bring me how he takes my death.—To th’
2814 monument!
They exit.
ANTONY
2815 Eros, thou yet behold’st me?
EROS 2816 Ay, noble lord.
ANTONY
2817 Sometime we see a cloud that’s dragonish,
2818 A vapor sometime like a bear or lion,
2819 5 A ⌜towered⌝ citadel, a pendent rock,
2820 A forkèd mountain, or blue promontory
2821 With trees upon ’t that nod unto the world
2822 And mock our eyes with air. Thou hast seen these
2823 signs.
2824 10 They are black vesper’s pageants.
EROS 2825 Ay, my lord.
2826 That which is now a horse, even with a thought
2827 The rack dislimns and makes it indistinct
2828 As water is in water.
EROS 2829 15 It does, my lord.
ANTONY
2830 My good knave Eros, now thy captain is
2831 Even such a body. Here I am Antony,
2832 Yet cannot hold this visible shape, my knave.
2833 I made these wars for Egypt, and the Queen,
2834 20 Whose heart I thought I had, for she had mine—
2835 Which whilst it was mine had annexed unto ’t
2836 A million more, now lost—she, Eros, has
2837 Packed cards with ⌜Caesar⌝ and false-played my glory
2838 Unto an enemy’s triumph.
2839 25 Nay, weep not, gentle Eros. There is left us
2840 Ourselves to end ourselves.
Enter Mardian.
2841 O, thy vile lady!
2842 She has robbed me of my sword.
MARDIAN 2843 No, Antony,
2844 30 My mistress loved thee and her fortunes mingled
2845 With thine entirely.
ANTONY 2846 Hence, saucy eunuch! Peace!
2847 She hath betrayed me and shall die the death.
MARDIAN
2848 Death of one person can be paid but once,
2849 35 And that she has discharged. What thou wouldst do
2850 Is done unto thy hand. The last she spake
2851 Was “Antony, most noble Antony.”
2852 Then in the midst a tearing groan did break
2853 The name of Antony; it was divided
2854 40 Between her heart and lips. She rendered life
2855 Thy name so buried in her.
MARDIAN 2857 Dead.
ANTONY
2858 Unarm, Eros. The long day’s task is done,
2859 45 And we must sleep.—That thou depart’st hence safe
2860 Does pay thy labor richly. Go.Mardian exits.
2861 Off, pluck off!
⌜Eros begins to remove Antony’s armor.⌝
2862 The sevenfold shield of Ajax cannot keep
2863 The battery from my heart. O, cleave, my sides!
2864 50 Heart, once be stronger than thy continent;
2865 Crack thy frail case. Apace, Eros, apace!
2866 No more a soldier. Bruisèd pieces, go.
2867 You have been nobly borne.—From me awhile.
Eros exits.
2868 I will o’ertake thee, Cleopatra, and
2869 55 Weep for my pardon. So it must be, for now
2870 All length is torture. Since the torch is out,
2871 Lie down and stray no farther. Now all labor
2872 Mars what it does; yea, very force entangles
2873 Itself with strength. Seal, then, and all is done.—
2874 60 Eros!—I come, my queen.—Eros!—Stay for me.
2875 Where souls do couch on flowers, we’ll hand in hand,
2876 And with our sprightly port make the ghosts gaze.
2877 Dido and her Aeneas shall want troops,
2878 And all the haunt be ours.—Come, Eros, Eros!
Enter Eros.
EROS
2879 65 What would my lord?
ANTONY 2880 Since Cleopatra died
2881 I have lived in such dishonor that the gods
2882 Detest my baseness. I, that with my sword
2883 Quartered the world and o’er green Neptune’s back
2884 70 With ships made cities, condemn myself to lack
2886 Than she which, by her death, our Caesar tells
2887 “I am conqueror of myself.” Thou art sworn, Eros,
2888 That when the exigent should come, which now
2889 75 Is come indeed, when I should see behind me
2890 Th’ inevitable prosecution of
2891 Disgrace and horror, that on my command
2892 Thou then wouldst kill me. Do ’t. The time is come.
2893 Thou strik’st not me; ’tis Caesar thou defeat’st.
2894 80 Put color in thy cheek.
EROS 2895 The gods withhold me!
2896 Shall I do that which all the Parthian darts,
2897 Though enemy, lost aim and could not?
ANTONY 2898 Eros,
2899 85 Wouldst thou be windowed in great Rome and see
2900 Thy master thus with pleached arms, bending down
2901 His corrigible neck, his face subdued
2902 To penetrative shame, whilst the wheeled seat
2903 Of fortunate Caesar, drawn before him, branded
2904 90 His baseness that ensued?
EROS 2905 I would not see ’t.
ANTONY
2906 Come, then, for with a wound I must be cured.
2907 Draw that thy honest sword, which thou hast worn
2908 Most useful for thy country.
EROS 2909 95 O, sir, pardon me!
ANTONY
2910 When I did make thee free, swor’st thou not then
2911 To do this when I bade thee? Do it at once,
2912 Or thy precedent services are all
2913 But accidents unpurposed. Draw, and come.
EROS
2914 100 Turn from me then that noble countenance
2915 Wherein the worship of the whole world lies.
ANTONY 2916 Lo thee!⌜He turns away.⌝
2917 My sword is drawn.
ANTONY 2918 Then let it do at once
2919 105 The thing why thou hast drawn it.
EROS 2920 My dear master,
2921 My captain, and my emperor, let me say,
2922 Before I strike this bloody stroke, farewell.
ANTONY 2923 ’Tis said, man, and farewell.
EROS
2924 110 Farewell, great chief. Shall I strike now?
ANTONY 2925 Now, Eros.
EROS
2926 Why, there, then.⌜Stabs⌝ himself.
2927 Thus I do escape the sorrow
2928 Of Antony’s death.⌜Dies.⌝
ANTONY 2929 115 Thrice nobler than myself,
2930 Thou teachest me, O valiant Eros, what
2931 I should and thou couldst not. My queen and Eros
2932 Have by their brave instruction got upon me
2933 A nobleness in record. But I will be
2934 120 A bridegroom in my death and run into ’t
2935 As to a lover’s bed. Come then, and, Eros,
2936 Thy master dies thy scholar. To do thus
2937 I learned of thee. ⌜He stabs himself.⌝ How, not dead?
2938 Not dead?
2939 125 The guard, ho! O, dispatch me!
Enter a ⌜company of the⌝ Guard, ⌜one of them named
Dercetus.⌝
FIRST GUARD 2940 What’s the noise?
ANTONY
2941 I have done my work ill, friends. O, make an end
2942 Of what I have begun!
SECOND GUARD 2943 The star is fall’n.
FIRST GUARD
2944 130 And time is at his period.
ANTONY 2946 Let him that loves me strike me dead.
FIRST GUARD 2947 Not I.
SECOND GUARD 2948 Nor I.
THIRD GUARD 2949 135Nor anyone.
⌜All but Antony and Dercetus⌝ exit.
DERCETUS
2950 Thy death and fortunes bid thy followers fly.
⌜He takes Antony’s sword.⌝
2951 This sword but shown to Caesar with this tidings
2952 Shall enter me with him.
Enter Diomedes.
DIOMEDES 2953 Where’s Antony?
DERCETUS 2954 140There, Diomed, there.
DIOMEDES 2955 Lives he? Wilt thou not answer, man?
⌜Dercetus exits.⌝
ANTONY
2956 Art thou there, Diomed? Draw thy sword, and give me
2957 Sufficing strokes for death.
DIOMEDES 2958 Most absolute lord,
2959 145 My mistress Cleopatra sent me to thee.
ANTONY
2960 When did she send thee?
DIOMEDES 2961 Now, my lord.
ANTONY 2962 Where is she?
DIOMEDES
2963 Locked in her monument. She had a prophesying
2964 150 fear
2965 Of what hath come to pass. For when she saw—
2966 Which never shall be found—you did suspect
2967 She had disposed with Caesar, and that your rage
2968 Would not be purged, she sent you word she was
2969 155 dead;
2970 But fearing since how it might work, hath sent
2972 I dread, too late.
ANTONY
2973 Too late, good Diomed. Call my guard, I prithee.
DIOMEDES
2974 160 What ho! The Emperor’s guard! The guard, what ho!
2975 Come, your lord calls.
Enter four or five of the Guard of Antony.
ANTONY
2976 Bear me, good friends, where Cleopatra bides.
2977 ’Tis the last service that I shall command you.
FIRST GUARD
2978 Woe, woe are we, sir, you may not live to wear
2979 165 All your true followers out.
ALL 2980 Most heavy day!
ANTONY
2981 Nay, good my fellows, do not please sharp fate
2982 To grace it with your sorrows. Bid that welcome
2983 Which comes to punish us, and we punish it,
2984 170 Seeming to bear it lightly. Take me up.
2985 I have led you oft; carry me now, good friends,
2986 And have my thanks for all.
⌜They⌝ exit bearing Antony ⌜and the body of Eros.⌝
Charmian and Iras.
CLEOPATRA
2987 O Charmian, I will never go from hence.
CHARMIAN
2988 Be comforted, dear madam.
CLEOPATRA 2989 No, I will not.
2990 All strange and terrible events are welcome,
2992 Proportioned to our cause, must be as great
2993 As that which makes it.
Enter Diomedes ⌜below.⌝
2994 How now? Is he dead?
DIOMEDES
2995 His death’s upon him, but not dead.
2996 10 Look out o’ th’ other side your monument.
2997 His guard have brought him thither.
Enter Antony ⌜below,⌝ and the Guard ⌜bearing him.⌝
CLEOPATRA 2998 O sun,
2999 Burn the great sphere thou mov’st in. Darkling stand
3000 The varying shore o’ th’ world! O Antony, Antony,
3001 15 Antony! Help, Charmian! Help, Iras, help!
3002 Help, friends below! Let’s draw him hither.
ANTONY 3003 Peace!
3004 Not Caesar’s valor hath o’erthrown Antony,
3005 But Antony’s hath triumphed on itself.
CLEOPATRA
3006 20 So it should be that none but Antony
3007 Should conquer Antony, but woe ’tis so!
ANTONY
3008 I am dying, Egypt, dying. Only
3009 I here importune death awhile until
3010 Of many thousand kisses the poor last
3011 25 I lay upon thy lips.
CLEOPATRA 3012 I dare not, dear,
3013 Dear my lord, pardon, I dare not,
3014 Lest I be taken. Not th’ imperious show
3015 Of the full-fortuned Caesar ever shall
3016 30 Be brooched with me; if knife, drugs, serpents have
3017 Edge, sting, or operation, I am safe.
3018 Your wife Octavia, with her modest eyes
3020 Demuring upon me. But come, come, Antony.—
3021 35 Help me, my women!—We must draw thee up.—
3022 Assist, good friends.⌜They begin lifting him.⌝
ANTONY 3023 O, quick, or I am gone.
CLEOPATRA
3024 Here’s sport indeed. How heavy weighs my lord!
3025 Our strength is all gone into heaviness;
3026 40 That makes the weight. Had I great Juno’s power,
3027 The strong-winged Mercury should fetch thee up
3028 And set thee by Jove’s side. Yet come a little.
3029 Wishers were ever fools. O, come, come, come!
They heave Antony aloft to Cleopatra.
3030 And welcome, welcome! Die when thou hast lived;
3031 45 Quicken with kissing. Had my lips that power,
3032 Thus would I wear them out.⌜She kisses him.⌝
ALL 3033 A heavy sight!
ANTONY 3034 I am dying, Egypt, dying.
3035 Give me some wine, and let me speak a little.
CLEOPATRA
3036 50 No, let me speak, and let me rail so high
3037 That the false huswife Fortune break her wheel,
3038 Provoked by my offense.
ANTONY 3039 One word, sweet queen:
3040 Of Caesar seek your honor with your safety—O!
CLEOPATRA
3041 55 They do not go together.
ANTONY 3042 Gentle, hear me.
3043 None about Caesar trust but Proculeius.
CLEOPATRA
3044 My resolution and my hands I’ll trust,
3045 None about Caesar.
ANTONY
3046 60 The miserable change now at my end
3047 Lament nor sorrow at, but please your thoughts
3049 Wherein I lived the greatest prince o’ th’ world,
3050 The noblest, and do now not basely die,
3051 65 Not cowardly put off my helmet to
3052 My countryman—a Roman by a Roman
3053 Valiantly vanquished. Now my spirit is going;
3054 I can no more.
CLEOPATRA 3055 Noblest of men, woo’t die?
3056 70 Hast thou no care of me? Shall I abide
3057 In this dull world, which in thy absence is
3058 No better than a sty? O see, my women,
3059 The crown o’ th’ Earth doth melt.—My lord!
⌜Antony dies.⌝
3060 O, withered is the garland of the war;
3061 75 The soldier’s pole is fall’n; young boys and girls
3062 Are level now with men. The odds is gone,
3063 And there is nothing left remarkable
3064 Beneath the visiting moon.
CHARMIAN 3065 O, quietness, lady!
⌜Cleopatra swoons.⌝
IRAS 3066 80She’s dead, too, our sovereign.
CHARMIAN 3067 Lady!
IRAS 3068 Madam!
CHARMIAN 3069 O madam, madam, madam!
IRAS 3070 Royal Egypt! Empress!⌜Cleopatra stirs.⌝
CHARMIAN 3071 85Peace, peace, Iras!
CLEOPATRA
3072 No more but e’en a woman, and commanded
3073 By such poor passion as the maid that milks
3074 And does the meanest chares. It were for me
3075 To throw my scepter at the injurious gods,
3076 90 To tell them that this world did equal theirs
3077 Till they had stolen our jewel. All’s but naught.
3078 Patience is sottish, and impatience does
3079 Become a dog that’s mad. Then is it sin
3081 95 Ere death dare come to us? How do you, women?
3082 What, what, good cheer! Why, how now, Charmian?
3083 My noble girls! Ah, women, women! Look,
3084 Our lamp is spent; it’s out. Good sirs, take heart.
3085 We’ll bury him; and then, what’s brave, what’s
3086 100 noble,
3087 Let’s do ’t after the high Roman fashion
3088 And make death proud to take us. Come, away.
3089 This case of that huge spirit now is cold.
3090 Ah women, women! Come, we have no friend
3091 105 But resolution and the briefest end.
They exit, bearing off Antony’s body.
Gallus, and Proculeius,⌝ his council of war.
CAESAR, ⌜aside to Dolabella⌝
3092 Go to him, Dolabella, bid him yield.
3093 Being so frustrate, tell him, he mocks
3094 The pauses that he makes.
DOLABELLA 3095 Caesar, I shall.
⌜Dolabella exits.⌝
Enter Dercetus with the sword of Antony.
CAESAR
3096 5 Wherefore is that? And what art thou that dar’st
3097 Appear thus to us?
DERCETUS 3098 I am called Dercetus.
3099 Mark Antony I served, who best was worthy
3100 Best to be served. Whilst he stood up and spoke,
3101 10 He was my master, and I wore my life
3102 To spend upon his haters. If thou please
3103 To take me to thee, as I was to him
3104 I’ll be to Caesar; if thou pleasest not,
3105 I yield thee up my life.
CAESAR 3106 15 What is ’t thou say’st?
DERCETUS
3107 I say, O Caesar, Antony is dead.
3108 The breaking of so great a thing should make
3109 A greater crack. The round world
3110 Should have shook lions into civil streets
3111 20 And citizens to their dens. The death of Antony
3112 Is not a single doom; in the name lay
3113 A moiety of the world.
DERCETUS 3114 He is dead, Caesar,
3115 Not by a public minister of justice,
3116 25 Nor by a hirèd knife, but that self hand
3117 Which writ his honor in the acts it did
3118 Hath, with the courage which the heart did lend it,
3119 Splitted the heart. This is his sword.
3120 I robbed his wound of it. Behold it stained
3121 30 With his most noble blood.
CAESAR 3122 Look you sad, friends?
3123 The gods rebuke me, but it is tidings
3124 To wash the eyes of kings.
⌜AGRIPPA⌝ 3125 And strange it is
3126 35 That nature must compel us to lament
3127 Our most persisted deeds.
MAECENAS 3128 His taints and honors
3129 Waged equal with him.
⌜AGRIPPA⌝ 3130 A rarer spirit never
3131 40 Did steer humanity, but you gods will give us
3132 Some faults to make us men. Caesar is touched.
MAECENAS
3133 When such a spacious mirror’s set before him,
3134 He needs must see himself.
CAESAR 3135 O Antony,
3136 45 I have followed thee to this, but we do lance
3137 Diseases in our bodies. I must perforce
3138 Have shown to thee such a declining day
3139 Or look on thine. We could not stall together
3140 In the whole world. But yet let me lament
3141 50 With tears as sovereign as the blood of hearts
3143 In top of all design, my mate in empire,
3144 Friend and companion in the front of war,
3145 The arm of mine own body, and the heart
3146 55 Where mine his thoughts did kindle—that our stars
3147 Unreconciliable should divide
3148 Our equalness to this. Hear me, good friends—
Enter an Egyptian.
3149 But I will tell you at some meeter season.
3150 The business of this man looks out of him.
3151 60 We’ll hear him what he says.—Whence are you?
EGYPTIAN
3152 A poor Egyptian yet, the Queen my mistress,
3153 Confined in all she has, her monument,
3154 Of thy intents desires instruction,
3155 That she preparedly may frame herself
3156 65 To th’ way she’s forced to.
CAESAR 3157 Bid her have good heart.
3158 She soon shall know of us, by some of ours,
3159 How honorable and how kindly we
3160 Determine for her. For Caesar cannot ⌜live⌝
3161 70 To be ungentle.
EGYPTIAN 3162 So the gods preserve thee.He exits.
CAESAR
3163 Come hither, Proculeius. Go and say
3164 We purpose her no shame. Give her what comforts
3165 The quality of her passion shall require,
3166 75 Lest, in her greatness, by some mortal stroke
3167 She do defeat us, for her life in Rome
3168 Would be eternal in our triumph. Go,
3169 And with your speediest bring us what she says
3170 And how you find of her.
PROCULEIUS 3171 80 Caesar, I shall.
Proculeius exits.
3172 Gallus, go you along.⌜Gallus exits.⌝
3173 Where’s Dolabella,
3174 To second Proculeius?
ALL 3175 Dolabella!
CAESAR
3176 85 Let him alone, for I remember now
3177 How he’s employed. He shall in time be ready.
3178 Go with me to my tent, where you shall see
3179 How hardly I was drawn into this war,
3180 How calm and gentle I proceeded still
3181 90 In all my writings. Go with me and see
3182 What I can show in this.
They exit.
CLEOPATRA
3183 My desolation does begin to make
3184 A better life. ’Tis paltry to be Caesar;
3185 Not being Fortune, he’s but Fortune’s knave,
3186 A minister of her will. And it is great
3187 5 To do that thing that ends all other deeds,
3188 Which shackles accidents and bolts up change,
3189 Which sleeps and never palates more the dung,
3190 The beggar’s nurse, and Caesar’s.
Enter Proculeius.
PROCULEIUS
3191 Caesar sends greeting to the Queen of Egypt,
3192 10 And bids thee study on what fair demands
3193 Thou mean’st to have him grant thee.
CLEOPATRA 3194 What’s thy name?
PROCULEIUS
3195 My name is Proculeius.
3197 15 Did tell me of you, bade me trust you, but
3198 I do not greatly care to be deceived
3199 That have no use for trusting. If your master
3200 Would have a queen his beggar, you must tell him
3201 That majesty, to keep decorum, must
3202 20 No less beg than a kingdom. If he please
3203 To give me conquered Egypt for my son,
3204 He gives me so much of mine own as I
3205 Will kneel to him with thanks.
PROCULEIUS 3206 Be of good cheer.
3207 25 You’re fall’n into a princely hand; fear nothing.
3208 Make your full reference freely to my lord,
3209 Who is so full of grace that it flows over
3210 On all that need. Let me report to him
3211 Your sweet dependency, and you shall find
3212 30 A conqueror that will pray in aid for kindness
3213 Where he for grace is kneeled to.
CLEOPATRA 3214 Pray you tell him
3215 I am his fortune’s vassal and I send him
3216 The greatness he has got. I hourly learn
3217 35 A doctrine of obedience, and would gladly
3218 Look him i’ th’ face.
PROCULEIUS 3219 This I’ll report, dear lady.
3220 Have comfort, for I know your plight is pitied
3221 Of him that caused it.
⌜Gallus and Soldiers enter and seize Cleopatra.⌝
⌜GALLUS⌝
3222 40 You see how easily she may be surprised.
3223 Guard her till Caesar come.
IRAS 3224 Royal queen!
CHARMIAN
3225 O, Cleopatra, thou art taken, queen!
CLEOPATRA, ⌜drawing a dagger⌝
3226 Quick, quick, good hands!
3228 Do not yourself such wrong, who are in this
3229 Relieved, but not betrayed.
CLEOPATRA 3230 What, of death, too,
3231 That rids our dogs of languish?
PROCULEIUS 3232 50 Cleopatra,
3233 Do not abuse my master’s bounty by
3234 Th’ undoing of yourself. Let the world see
3235 His nobleness well acted, which your death
3236 Will never let come forth.
CLEOPATRA 3237 55 Where art thou, Death?
3238 Come hither, come! Come, come, and take a queen
3239 Worth many babes and beggars.
PROCULEIUS 3240 O, temperance, lady!
CLEOPATRA
3241 Sir, I will eat no meat; I’ll not drink, sir.
3242 60 If idle talk will once be necessary—
3243 I’ll not sleep neither. This mortal house I’ll ruin,
3244 Do Caesar what he can. Know, sir, that I
3245 Will not wait pinioned at your master’s court,
3246 Nor once be chastised with the sober eye
3247 65 Of dull Octavia. Shall they hoist me up
3248 And show me to the shouting varletry
3249 Of censuring Rome? Rather a ditch in Egypt
3250 Be gentle grave unto me; rather on Nilus’ mud
3251 Lay me stark naked, and let the waterflies
3252 70 Blow me into abhorring; rather make
3253 My country’s high pyramides my gibbet
3254 And hang me up in chains!
PROCULEIUS 3255 You do extend
3256 These thoughts of horror further than you shall
3257 75 Find cause in Caesar.
Enter Dolabella.
DOLABELLA 3258 Proculeius,
3259 What thou hast done thy master Caesar knows,
3261 I’ll take her to my guard.
PROCULEIUS 3262 80 So, Dolabella,
3263 It shall content me best. Be gentle to her.
3264 ⌜To Cleopatra.⌝ To Caesar I will speak what you
3265 shall please,
3266 If you’ll employ me to him.
CLEOPATRA 3267 85 Say I would die.
Proculeius, ⌜Gallus, and Soldiers⌝ exit.
DOLABELLA
3268 Most noble empress, you have heard of me.
CLEOPATRA
3269 I cannot tell.
DOLABELLA 3270 Assuredly you know me.
CLEOPATRA
3271 No matter, sir, what I have heard or known.
3272 90 You laugh when boys or women tell their dreams;
3273 Is ’t not your trick?
DOLABELLA 3274 I understand not, madam.
CLEOPATRA
3275 I dreamt there was an emperor Antony.
3276 O, such another sleep, that I might see
3277 95 But such another man.
DOLABELLA 3278 If it might please you—
CLEOPATRA
3279 His face was as the heavens, and therein stuck
3280 A sun and moon, which kept their course and
3281 lighted
3282 100 The little O, the Earth.
DOLABELLA 3283 Most sovereign creature—
CLEOPATRA
3284 His legs bestrid the ocean, his reared arm
3285 Crested the world. His voice was propertied
3286 As all the tunèd spheres, and that to friends;
3287 105 But when he meant to quail and shake the orb,
3289 There was no winter in ’t; an ⌜autumn ’twas⌝
3290 That grew the more by reaping. His delights
3291 Were dolphin-like; they showed his back above
3292 110 The element they lived in. In his livery
3293 Walked crowns and crownets; realms and islands
3294 were
3295 As plates dropped from his pocket.
DOLABELLA 3296 Cleopatra—
CLEOPATRA
3297 115 Think you there was, or might be, such a man
3298 As this I dreamt of?
DOLABELLA 3299 Gentle madam, no.
CLEOPATRA
3300 You lie up to the hearing of the gods!
3301 But if there be nor ever were one such,
3302 120 It’s past the size of dreaming. Nature wants stuff
3303 To vie strange forms with fancy, yet t’ imagine
3304 An Antony were nature’s piece ’gainst fancy,
3305 Condemning shadows quite.
DOLABELLA 3306 Hear me, good madam.
3307 125 Your loss is as yourself, great; and you bear it
3308 As answering to the weight. Would I might never
3309 O’ertake pursued success but I do feel,
3310 By the rebound of yours, a grief that ⌜smites⌝
3311 My very heart at root.
CLEOPATRA 3312 130 I thank you, sir.
3313 Know you what Caesar means to do with me?
DOLABELLA
3314 I am loath to tell you what I would you knew.
CLEOPATRA
3315 Nay, pray you, sir.
DOLABELLA 3316 Though he be honorable—
CLEOPATRA 3317 135He’ll lead me, then, in triumph.
DOLABELLA 3318 Madam, he will. I know ’t.
and others of his train.
ALL 3319 Make way there! Caesar!
CAESAR 3320 Which is the Queen of Egypt?
DOLABELLA 3321 It is the Emperor, madam.
Cleopatra kneels.
CAESAR 3322 140Arise. You shall not kneel.
3323 I pray you, rise. Rise, Egypt.
CLEOPATRA 3324 Sir, the gods
3325 Will have it thus. My master and my lord
3326 I must obey.⌜She stands.⌝
CAESAR 3327 145 Take to you no hard thoughts.
3328 The record of what injuries you did us,
3329 Though written in our flesh, we shall remember
3330 As things but done by chance.
CLEOPATRA 3331 Sole sir o’ th’ world,
3332 150 I cannot project mine own cause so well
3333 To make it clear, but do confess I have
3334 Been laden with like frailties which before
3335 Have often shamed our sex.
CAESAR 3336 Cleopatra, know
3337 155 We will extenuate rather than enforce.
3338 If you apply yourself to our intents,
3339 Which towards you are most gentle, you shall find
3340 A benefit in this change; but if you seek
3341 To lay on me a cruelty by taking
3342 160 Antony’s course, you shall bereave yourself
3343 Of my good purposes, and put your children
3344 To that destruction which I’ll guard them from
3345 If thereon you rely. I’ll take my leave.
CLEOPATRA
3346 And may through all the world. ’Tis yours, and we,
3347 165 Your scutcheons and your signs of conquest, shall
3348 Hang in what place you please. Here, my good lord.
⌜She holds out a paper.⌝
3349 You shall advise me in all for Cleopatra.
CLEOPATRA
3350 This is the brief of money, plate, and jewels
3351 I am possessed of. ’Tis exactly valued,
3352 170 Not petty things admitted.—Where’s Seleucus?
⌜Enter Seleucus.⌝
SELEUCUS 3353 Here, madam.
CLEOPATRA
3354 This is my treasurer. Let him speak, my lord,
3355 Upon his peril, that I have reserved
3356 To myself nothing.—Speak the truth, Seleucus.
SELEUCUS
3357 175 Madam, I had rather seel my lips
3358 Than to my peril speak that which is not.
CLEOPATRA 3359 What have I kept back?
SELEUCUS
3360 Enough to purchase what you have made known.
CAESAR
3361 Nay, blush not, Cleopatra. I approve
3362 180 Your wisdom in the deed.
CLEOPATRA 3363 See, Caesar, O, behold
3364 How pomp is followed! Mine will now be yours,
3365 And should we shift estates, yours would be mine.
3366 The ingratitude of this Seleucus does
3367 185 Even make me wild.—O slave, of no more trust
3368 Than love that’s hired! What, goest thou back? Thou
3369 shalt
3370 Go back, I warrant thee! But I’ll catch thine eyes
3371 Though they had wings. Slave, soulless villain, dog!
3372 190 O rarely base!
CAESAR 3373 Good queen, let us entreat you—
CLEOPATRA
3374 O Caesar, what a wounding shame is this,
3375 That thou vouchsafing here to visit me,
3377 195 To one so meek, that mine own servant should
3378 Parcel the sum of my disgraces by
3379 Addition of his envy! Say, good Caesar,
3380 That I some lady trifles have reserved,
3381 Immoment toys, things of such dignity
3382 200 As we greet modern friends withal, and say
3383 Some nobler token I have kept apart
3384 For Livia and Octavia, to induce
3385 Their mediation, must I be unfolded
3386 With one that I have bred? The gods! It smites me
3387 205 Beneath the fall I have. ⌜To Seleucus.⌝ Prithee, go
3388 hence,
3389 Or I shall show the cinders of my spirits
3390 Through th’ ashes of my chance. Wert thou a man,
3391 Thou wouldst have mercy on me.
CAESAR 3392 210 Forbear, Seleucus.
⌜Seleucus exits.⌝
CLEOPATRA
3393 Be it known that we, the greatest, are misthought
3394 For things that others do; and when we fall,
3395 We answer others’ merits in our name—
3396 Are therefore to be pitied.
CAESAR 3397 215 Cleopatra,
3398 Not what you have reserved nor what acknowledged
3399 Put we i’ th’ roll of conquest. Still be ’t yours!
3400 Bestow it at your pleasure, and believe
3401 Caesar’s no merchant to make prize with you
3402 220 Of things that merchants sold. Therefore be
3403 cheered.
3404 Make not your thoughts your prisons. No, dear
3405 queen,
3406 For we intend so to dispose you as
3407 225 Yourself shall give us counsel. Feed and sleep.
3408 Our care and pity is so much upon you
3409 That we remain your friend. And so adieu.
3410 My master and my lord!
CAESAR 3411 Not so. Adieu.
Flourish. Caesar and his train exit.
CLEOPATRA
3412 230 He words me, girls, he words me, that I should not
3413 Be noble to myself. But hark thee, Charmian.
⌜She whispers to Charmian.⌝
IRAS
3414 Finish, good lady. The bright day is done,
3415 And we are for the dark.
CLEOPATRA, ⌜to Charmian⌝ 3416 Hie thee again.
3417 235 I have spoke already, and it is provided.
3418 Go put it to the haste.
CHARMIAN 3419 Madam, I will.
Enter Dolabella.
DOLABELLA
3420 Where’s the Queen?
CHARMIAN 3421 Behold, sir.⌜She exits.⌝
CLEOPATRA 3422 240 Dolabella.
DOLABELLA
3423 Madam, as thereto sworn by your command,
3424 Which my love makes religion to obey,
3425 I tell you this: Caesar through Syria
3426 Intends his journey, and within three days
3427 245 You with your children will he send before.
3428 Make your best use of this. I have performed
3429 Your pleasure and my promise.
CLEOPATRA 3430 Dolabella,
3431 I shall remain your debtor.
DOLABELLA 3432 250 I your servant.
3433 Adieu, good queen. I must attend on Caesar.
CLEOPATRA
3434 Farewell, and thanks.He exits.
3435 Now, Iras, what think’st thou?
3437 255 In Rome as well as I. Mechanic slaves
3438 With greasy aprons, rules, and hammers shall
3439 Uplift us to the view. In their thick breaths,
3440 Rank of gross diet, shall we be enclouded
3441 And forced to drink their vapor.
IRAS 3442 260 The gods forbid!
CLEOPATRA
3443 Nay, ’tis most certain, Iras. Saucy lictors
3444 Will catch at us like strumpets, and scald rhymers
3445 ⌜Ballad⌝ us out o’ tune. The quick comedians
3446 Extemporally will stage us and present
3447 265 Our Alexandrian revels. Antony
3448 Shall be brought drunken forth, and I shall see
3449 Some squeaking Cleopatra boy my greatness
3450 I’ th’ posture of a whore.
IRAS 3451 O the good gods!
CLEOPATRA 3452 270Nay, that’s certain.
IRAS
3453 I’ll never see ’t! For I am sure mine nails
3454 Are stronger than mine eyes.
CLEOPATRA 3455 Why, that’s the way
3456 To fool their preparation and to conquer
3457 275 Their most absurd intents.
Enter Charmian.
3458 Now, Charmian!
3459 Show me, my women, like a queen. Go fetch
3460 My best attires. I am again for Cydnus
3461 To meet Mark Antony. Sirrah Iras, go.—
3462 280 Now, noble Charmian, we’ll dispatch indeed,
3463 And when thou hast done this chare, I’ll give thee
3464 leave
3465 To play till Doomsday.—Bring our crown and all.
⌜Iras exits.⌝ A noise within.
3466 Wherefore’s this noise?
GUARDSMAN 3467 285 Here is a rural fellow
3468 That will not be denied your Highness’ presence.
3469 He brings you figs.
CLEOPATRA
3470 Let him come in.Guardsman exits.
3471 What poor an instrument
3472 290 May do a noble deed! He brings me liberty.
3473 My resolution’s placed, and I have nothing
3474 Of woman in me. Now from head to foot
3475 I am marble-constant. Now the fleeting moon
3476 No planet is of mine.
Enter Guardsman and ⌜Countryman, with a basket.⌝
GUARDSMAN 3477 295 This is the man.
CLEOPATRA 3478 Avoid, and leave him.Guardsman exits.
3479 Hast thou the pretty worm of Nilus there
3480 That kills and pains not?
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3481 Truly I have him, but I would not be
3482 300 the party that should desire you to touch him, for
3483 his biting is immortal. Those that do die of it do
3484 seldom or never recover.
CLEOPATRA 3485 Remember’st thou any that have died on ’t?
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3486 Very many, men and women too. I
3487 305 heard of one of them no longer than yesterday—a
3488 very honest woman, but something given to lie, as a
3489 woman should not do but in the way of honesty—
3490 how she died of the biting of it, what pain she felt.
3491 Truly, she makes a very good report o’ th’ worm.
3492 310 But he that will believe all that they say shall never
3493 be saved by half that they do. But this is most
3494 falliable, the worm’s an odd worm.
CLEOPATRA 3495 Get thee hence. Farewell.
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3496 I wish you all joy of the worm.
⌜He sets down the basket.⌝
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3498 You must think this, look you, that the
3499 worm will do his kind.
CLEOPATRA 3500 Ay, ay, farewell.
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3501 Look you, the worm is not to be trusted
3502 320 but in the keeping of wise people, for indeed there
3503 is no goodness in the worm.
CLEOPATRA 3504 Take thou no care; it shall be heeded.
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3505 Very good. Give it nothing, I pray you,
3506 for it is not worth the feeding.
CLEOPATRA 3507 325Will it eat me?
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3508 You must not think I am so simple but
3509 I know the devil himself will not eat a woman. I
3510 know that a woman is a dish for the gods if the devil
3511 dress her not. But truly these same whoreson devils
3512 330 do the gods great harm in their women, for in every
3513 ten that they make, the devils mar five.
CLEOPATRA 3514 Well, get thee gone. Farewell.
⌜COUNTRYMAN⌝ 3515 Yes, forsooth. I wish you joy o’ th’
3516 worm.He exits.
⌜Enter Iras bearing Cleopatra’s royal regalia.⌝
CLEOPATRA
3517 335 Give me my robe. Put on my crown. I have
3518 Immortal longings in me. Now no more
3519 The juice of Egypt’s grape shall moist this lip.
⌜Charmian and Iras begin to dress her.⌝
3520 Yare, yare, good Iras, quick. Methinks I hear
3521 Antony call. I see him rouse himself
3522 340 To praise my noble act. I hear him mock
3523 The luck of Caesar, which the gods give men
3524 To excuse their after wrath.—Husband, I come!
3525 Now to that name my courage prove my title.
3526 I am fire and air; my other elements
3527 345 I give to baser life.—So, have you done?
3529 Farewell, kind Charmian.—Iras, long farewell.
⌜She kisses them. Iras falls and dies.⌝
3530 Have I the aspic in my lips? Dost fall?
3531 If thou and nature can so gently part,
3532 350 The stroke of death is as a lover’s pinch,
3533 Which hurts and is desired. Dost thou lie still?
3534 If thus thou vanishest, thou tell’st the world
3535 It is not worth leave-taking.
CHARMIAN
3536 Dissolve, thick cloud, and rain, that I may say
3537 355 The gods themselves do weep!
CLEOPATRA 3538 This proves me base.
3539 If she first meet the curlèd Antony,
3540 He’ll make demand of her, and spend that kiss
3541 Which is my heaven to have.—Come, thou mortal
3542 360 wretch,⌜She places an asp on her breast.⌝
3543 With thy sharp teeth this knot intrinsicate
3544 Of life at once untie. Poor venomous fool,
3545 Be angry and dispatch. O, couldst thou speak,
3546 That I might hear thee call great Caesar ass
3547 365 Unpolicied!
CHARMIAN 3548 O eastern star!
CLEOPATRA 3549 Peace, peace!
3550 Dost thou not see my baby at my breast,
3551 That sucks the nurse asleep?
CHARMIAN 3552 370 O, break! O, break!
CLEOPATRA
3553 As sweet as balm, as soft as air, as gentle—
3554 O Antony!—Nay, I will take thee too.
⌜She places an asp on her arm.⌝
3555 What should I stay—Dies.
CHARMIAN 3556 In this wild world? So, fare thee well.
3557 375 Now boast thee, Death, in thy possession lies
3558 A lass unparalleled. Downy windows, close,
⌜She closes Cleopatra’s eyes.⌝
3560 Of eyes again so royal. Your crown’s ⌜awry.⌝
3561 I’ll mend it, and then play—
Enter the Guard rustling in.
FIRST GUARD
3562 380 Where’s the Queen?
CHARMIAN 3563 Speak softly. Wake her not.
FIRST GUARD
3564 Caesar hath sent—
CHARMIAN 3565 Too slow a messenger.
⌜She takes out an asp.⌝
3566 O, come apace, dispatch! I partly feel thee.
FIRST GUARD
3567 385 Approach, ho! All’s not well. Caesar’s beguiled.
SECOND GUARD
3568 There’s Dolabella sent from Caesar. Call him.
⌜A Guardsman exits.⌝
FIRST GUARD
3569 What work is here, Charmian? Is this well done?
CHARMIAN
3570 It is well done, and fitting for a princess
3571 Descended of so many royal kings.
3572 390 Ah, soldier!Charmian dies.
Enter Dolabella.
DOLABELLA
3573 How goes it here?
SECOND GUARD 3574 All dead.
DOLABELLA 3575 Caesar, thy thoughts
3576 Touch their effects in this. Thyself art coming
3577 395 To see performed the dreaded act which thou
3578 So sought’st to hinder.
Enter Caesar and all his train, marching.
ALL 3579 A way there, a way for Caesar!
3580 O sir, you are too sure an augurer:
3581 That you did fear is done.
CAESAR 3582 400Bravest at the last,
3583 She leveled at our purposes and, being royal,
3584 Took her own way. The manner of their deaths?
3585 I do not see them bleed.
DOLABELLA 3586 Who was last with them?
FIRST GUARD
3587 405 A simple countryman that brought her figs.
3588 This was his basket.
CAESAR 3589 Poisoned, then.
FIRST GUARD 3590 O Caesar,
3591 This Charmian lived but now; she stood and spake.
3592 410 I found her trimming up the diadem
3593 On her dead mistress; tremblingly she stood,
3594 And on the sudden dropped.
CAESAR 3595 O, noble weakness!
3596 If they had swallowed poison, ’twould appear
3597 415 By external swelling; but she looks like sleep,
3598 As she would catch another Antony
3599 In her strong toil of grace.
DOLABELLA 3600 Here on her breast
3601 There is a vent of blood, and something blown.
3602 420 The like is on her arm.
FIRST GUARD
3603 This is an aspic’s trail, and these fig leaves
3604 Have slime upon them, such as th’ aspic leaves
3605 Upon the caves of Nile.
CAESAR 3606 Most probable
3607 425 That so she died, for her physician tells me
3608 She hath pursued conclusions infinite
3609 Of easy ways to die. Take up her bed,
3610 And bear her women from the monument.
3611 She shall be buried by her Antony.
3613 A pair so famous. High events as these
3614 Strike those that make them; and their story is
3615 No less in pity than his glory which
3616 Brought them to be lamented. Our army shall
3617 435 In solemn show attend this funeral,
3618 And then to Rome. Come, Dolabella, see
3619 High order in this great solemnity.
They all exit, ⌜the Guards
bearing the dead bodies.⌝