Then was the time for words: no going then ;- As you shall give the advice. By the fire Eternity was in our lips and eyes, That quickens Nilus’ slime, I go from hence Bliss in our brows' bent; none our parts so poor, Thy soldier-servant; making peace or war CLEO. Cut my lace, Charmian, come ! Art turn’d the greatest liar. But let it be:-I am quickly ill, and well, ANT. How now, lady! So Antony loves." Cleo. I would I had thy inches; thou shouldst Ant. My precious queen, forbear; know And give true evidences to his love, which stands There were a heart in Egypt. An honourable trial. ANT. Hear me, queen : CLEO. So Fulvia told me. The strong necessity of time commands I pr’ythee, turn aside and weep for her ; Our services a while; but my full heart Then bid adieu to me, and say the tears Remains in use with you. Our Italy Belong to Egypt. Good now, play one scene Shines o'er with civil swords : Sextus Pompeius Of excellent dissembling; and let it look Makes his approaches to the port of Rome: Like perfect honour. Equality of two domestic powers ANT. You 'll heat my blood : no more ! Breeds scrupulous faction: the hated, grown to Cleo. You can do better yet; but this is strength, meetly. Are newly-grown to love: the cordemn’d Pompey, Ant. Now, by my* sword, Rich in his father's honour, creeps apace Cleo. And target !-Still he mends; Into the hearts of such as have not thriv'd But this is not the best look, prythee, Upon the present state, whose numbers threaten ; Charmian, CLEO. Courteous lord, one word. Is Fulvia's death. Sir, you and I must part, —but that's not it: Cleo. Though age from folly could not give Sir, you and I have lov’d, -but there's not it; me freedom, That you know well : something it is I would, It does from childishness :can Fulvia die ? O, my oblivion is a very Antony, Ant. She's dead, my queen : And I am all forgotten ! Look here, and, at thy sovereign leisure, read Ant. But that your royalty The garboils" she awak'd; at the last, best, Holds idleness your subject, I should take you See when and where she died. For idleness itself. CLEO. 0, most false love! Cleo. 'Tis sweating labour Where be the sacred vials thou shouldst fill To bear such idleness so near the heart With sorrowful water ? Now I see, I see, As Cleopatra this. But, sir, forgive me; In Fulvia's death how mine receiv'd shall be. Since my becomings kill me, when they do not Ant. Quarrel no more, but be prepar'd to Eye well to you : your honour calls you hence, know Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly, The purposes I bear; which are, or cease, And all the gods go with you! upon your sword h d e b C d a - a race of heaven :) The meaning is probably-of divine mould, or origin. in use-] In possession. (*) First folio omits, my. trial of absence." In adopting his mythical corrector's "excellent emendation,” Mr. Collier had, of course, forgotten that the very phrase rejected may be found in another of these plays, – at the last, best, See, &c.) The commentators will have the word best to relate to the "good end” made by Fulvia. But it is no more than an epithet of endearment which Antony applies to Cleopatra;-read at your leisure the troubles she awakened; and at the last, my best one, see when and where she died. f I am quickly ill, and well, šo Antony loves.) This has been misconceived: "So Antony loves" is " As Antony loves," and the sense therefore,- My health is as fickle as the love of Antony. 6 And give true evidence to his love, &c.) Mr. Collier's annotator, in his eagerness to confound all traces of our early language, would poorly read, “ true credence," which, like many of his suggestions, is very specious and yuite wrong. The meaning of Antony is this, -.“ Forbear ihese taunts, and demonstrate to the world your confidence in my love by submitting it freely to the “ Proceed no straiter 'gainst our uncle Gloster, Than from true eridence, of good esteem, He be approv'd," &c.-Henry VI. Pt. II. Act III. Sc. 2. b How this Herculean Roman does become The carriage of his chief.] The old and every modern edition read, “The carriage of his chafe." But can any one who considers the epithet “Herculean," which Cleopatra applies to Antony, and reads the following extract from Shakespeare's authority, hesitate for an instant to pronounce chase a silly blunder of the transcriber or compositor for chief," meaning Hercules, the head or principal of the house of the antonii? ** Now it had bene a speech of old time, that the family of the Antonij were descended from one Anton the son of Hercules, wh of family took the na This opini did Antonius seeke to confirme in all his doings : not only resembling him in the likenesse of his body, as we hare said before, bul also in the wearing of his garments."--Life of Antonius. NORTH's Plutarch. ne. Sit laurel Victory! and smooth success As we rate boys, who, being mature in knowBe strew'd before your ledge, ANT. Let us go. Come : Pawn their experience to their present pleasure, Our separation so abides, and fies, And so rebel to judgment. That thou, residing here, go'st yet with me, LEP. Here's more news, And I, hence fleeting, here remain with thee. Away! [Exeunt. Enter a Messenger. SCENE IV.-Rome. An Apartment in Cæsar's House. Enter OCTAVIUS CÆSAR, reading a letter, LEPIDUS, and Attendants. Mess. Thy biddings have been done; and every hour, I should have known no less :- love, Comes dear'd* by being lack’d. This common body, Cæsar, I bring thee word, wound With keels of every hot inroads They make in Italy; the borders maritime Lack blood to think on 't, and flush youth revolt: No vessel can peep forth, but 't is as soon Taken as seen ; for Pompey's name strikes more Than could his war resisted. Cæs. Antony, Leave thy lascivious wassails. I When thou once Wast beaten from Modena, where thou slew'st Hirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel Did famine follow; whom thou fought'st against, Though daintily brought up, with patience more Than savages could suffer: thou didst drink The stale of horses, and the gilded puddle Which beasts would cough at: thy palate then did deign The roughest berry on the rudest hedge; Yea, like the stag, when snow the pasture sheets, The barks of trees thou browsed'st; on the Alps It is reported thou didst eat strange flesh, Which some did die to look on :(3) and all this Cæs. You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know, sball find there I must not think there are 'tis not amiss To tumble on the bed of Ptolemy; To give a kingdom for a mirth ; to sit a And keep the turn of tippling with a slave; To reel the streets at noon, and stand the buffet With knaves that smell of sweat; say, this becomes bim, As his composure must be rare indeed Whom these things cannot blemish,—yet must Antony No way excuse his soils, when we do bear So great weight in his lightness. If he fill'd His vacancy with his voluptuousness, Full surfeits, and the dryness of his bones, Call on him for 't:but to confound such time, That drums him from his sport, and speaks as loud As his own state and ours,—'t is to be chid kind : many (*) Old text, fear'd. Corrected by Warburton. (1) Old text, Vassailes. (*) First folio, vouchsafe. (t) First folio, abstracts. Our great competitor :) So Heath; the old text having, “ One great competitor." b- his soils,-). A reading suggested by Malone in lieu of " foyles," the very doubtful word of the old text. Call on him for 'ı:] Call him to account for it. The change, tor is a dern “Fall on him," &c. of Mr. Collier's d - they ear-) They plough. (It wounds thine honour that I speak it now) MAR. Not in deed, madam; for I can do Was borne so like a soldier, that thy cheek nothing So much as lank'd not. But what indeed is honest to be done : LEP. 'T is pity of him. Yet I have fierce affections, and think CÆs. Let his shames quickly What Venus did with Mars. Drive him to Rome: 't is time we twain CLEO. O, Charmian, Did show ourselves i’ the field; and to that end Where think'st thou he is now ? Stands he, or Assemble we* immediate council. Pompey sits he? Thrives in our idleness. Or does he walk ? or is he on his horse ? LEP. To-morrow, Cæsar, O, happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony ! I shall be furnish'd to inform you rightly Do bravely, horse! for wott'st thou whom thou Both what by sea and land I can be able, mov'st? To front this present time. The demi-Atlas of this earth, the arm Cæs. Till which encounter, And burgonet of men.—He's speaking now, It is my business too. Farewell. Or murmuring, Where's my serpent of old Nile ? LEP. Farewell, my lord; what you shall know For so he calls me :-now I feed myself meantime With most delicious poison.—Think on me, Of stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir, That am with Phæbus' amorous pinches black, To let me be partaker. And wrinkled deep in time? Broad-fronted Cæs. Doubt not, sir; Cæsar, I knew it for my bond. [Exeunt. When thou wast here above the ground, I was A morsel for a monarch: and great Pompey brow; SCENE V.-Alexandria. A Room in the There would he anchor his aspect, and die With looking on his life. Enter CLEOPATRA, CHARMIAN, IRAs, and MARDIAN. Enter ALEXAS. CLEO. Charmian,- gora. time, You think of him too much. Madam, I trust not so. pleasure Mar. Yes, gracious madam. ALEX. Sovereign of Egypt, hail ! Clxo. How much unlike art thou Mark Antony ! Yet, coming from him, that great med'cine hath With his tinct gilded thee. How goes it with my brave Mark Antony ? heart. Good friend, quoth he, spoke b (*) First folio, me. -orient-] Pellucid, lustrous. See note (a), p. 395. an arm-gaunt steed,--) The epithet "arm-gaunt" has been fruitful of controversy. Hanmer reads arm-girt; Mason suggests, not unhappily, termagant; and Mr. Boaden, arrogant. If the original lection be genuine, which we doubt,“ unt must be understood to mean fierce, eager; a sense it, perhaps, bears in the following passage from Ben Jonson's "Catiline," Act III. Sc. 3, "and let that what I would have spoke as made by Theobald, and is countenanced by a passage ir 1 him : CLEO. Who's born that day ALEX. Like to the time o' the year between When I forget to send to Antony, the extremes Shall die a beggar.-Ink and paper, Charmian.Of hot and cold, he was nor sad nor merry. Welcome, my good Alexas.—Did I, Charmian, CLEO. O, well-divided disposition !—Note him, Ever love Cæsar so ? 1 0, that brave Cæsar ! Cleo. Be chok'd with such another emphasis ! He was not sad,—for he would shine on those Say, the brave Antony ! That make their looks by his; he was not merry, CHAR. The valiant Cæsar! Which seem'd to tell them his remembrance lay Cleo. By Isis, I will give thee bloody teeth, In Egypt with his joy; but between both : If thou with Cæsar paragon again O, heavenly mingle ! -Be’st thou sad or merry, My man of men ! The violence of either thee becomes CHAR. By your most gracious pardon, So“ does it no man* else.—Mett’st thou my posts ? I sing but after you. ALEX. Ay, madam, twenty several messengers: CLEO. My salad days; When I was green in judgment, cold in blood : Get me ink and paper : he shall have every day (*) Old text, mans. A several greeting, or I'll unpeople Egypt. * So does it-] That is, As does it. ¡Exeunt. Says it will come to the full. Mark Antony Enter POMPEY, MENECRATES, and MENAS. In Egypt sits at dinner, and will make No wars without doors : Cæsar gets money where Of both is flatter'd; but he neither loves, , That what they do delay, they not deny. MEN. Cæsar and Lepidus are in the field ; Pom. Whiles we are suitors to their throne, A mighty strength they carry. decays Pom. Where have you this ? 'tis false. The thing we sue for. MEN. From Silvius, sir. MENE. We, ignorant of ourselves, Pom. He dreams; I know they are in Rome Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers together, Deny us for our good; so find we profit, Looking for Antony. But all the charms of love, By losing of our prayers. Salt Cleopatra, soften thy wan’d lip ! Let witchcraft join with beauty, lust with both ! The people love me, and the sea is mine ; Tie the libertine in a field of feasts ; My powers are crescent, and my auguring hope Keep his brain fuming ; Epicurean cooks а b a — they shall assist-] The precision now observable in the mployment of shall and will among the best writers was not regarded in Shakespeare's day. He commonly follows the old custom of using the former for the latter to denote futurity, whether in the second and third persons or in the first. b My powers are crescent, and my auguring hope Says it will come to the full.) Theobald, for the sake of concord, reads, “My power's a crescent," &c., a change generally, though perhaps too readily, adopted by subsequent editors. |