Our equalness to this."-Hear me, good friends,But I will tell you at fome meeter season; Enter a Meffenger. The business of this man looks out of him, We'll hear him what he fays.-Whence are you? MES. A poor Egyptian yet. miftrefs,' The queen my Confin'd in all fhe has, her monument, That the preparedly may frame herself CAS. Bid her have good heart; She foon fhall know of us, by fome of ours, 3 Our equalness to this.] That is, should have made us, in our equality of fortune, difagree to a pitch like this, that one of us muft die. JOHNSON. 4 - Whence are you?] The defective metre of this line, and the irregular reply to it, may authorize a fuppofition that it originally ftood thus: We'll hear him what he fays.-Whence, and who are you? A poor Egyptian yet. The queen my mistress, &c.] If this punctuation be right, the man means to fay, that he is yet an Egyptian, that is, yet a fervant of the queen of Egypt, though foon to become a fubject of Rome. JOHNSON. 6 How honourable and how kindly we -] Our author often ufes adjectives adverbially. So, in Julius Cæfar: 66 Young man, thou could'ft not die more honourable." See alfo Vol. VIII. p. 552, n. 5. The modern editors, however, all read-honourably. MALONE. 7 -for Cæfar cannot live To be ungentle.] The old copy has leave. Mr. Pope made the emendation. MALONE. MES. So the gods preferve thee! [Exit. CES. Come hither, Proculeius; Go, and fay, We purpose her no fhame: give her what comforts The quality of her paffion fhall require; Left, in her greatnefs, by fome mortal stroke She do defeat us: for her life in Rome Would be eternal in our triumph: Go, And, with your speedieft, bring us what she says, And how you find of her. PRO. Cæfar, I fhall. [Exit PROCULEIUS. CES. Gallus, go you along.-Where's Dolabella, To fecond Proculeius? [Exit GALLUS. AGR. MEC. Dolabella! CES. Let him alone, for I remember now 7 -- her life in Rome [Exeunt. Would be eternal in our triumph:] Hanmer reads judiciously enough, but without neceffity: Would be eternalling our triumph: The fenfe is, If he dies here, he will be forgotten, but if I fend her in triumph to Rome, her memory and my glory will be eternal. The following paffage in The Scourge of Venus, &c. a poem, JOHNSON. 1614, will fufficiently fupport the old reading: "If fome foule-fwelling ebon cloud would fall, CLEO. My defolation does begin to make To do that thing that ends all other deeds; 8 Enter Cleopatra, &c.] Our author here (as in K. Henry VIII. Vol. XI. p. 177, n. 8.) has attempted to exhibit at once the outfide and the infide of a building. It would be impoffible to reprefent this fcene in any way on the ftage, but by making Cleopatra and her attendants fpeak all their fpeeches till the queen is feized, within the monument. MALONE. 9 -fortune's knave,] The fervant of fortune. JOHNSON. 2 -And it is great To do that thing that ends all other deeds; Which Shackles accidents, and bolts up change; Which fleeps, and never palates more the dung, The beggar's nurfe and Cæfar's.] The difficulty of the paffage, if any difficulty there be, arifes only from this, that the act of fuicide, and the ftate which is the effect of fuicide are confounded. Voluntary death, fays fhe, is an act which bolts up change; it produces a state, Which fleeps, and never palates more the dung, The beggar's nurse, and Cæfar's. Which has no longer need of the grofs and terrene fustenance, in the ufe of which Cæfar and the beggar are on a level. The fpeech is abrupt, but perturbation in fuch a state is furely natural. JOHNSON. It has been already faid in this play, that Enter, to the gates of the Monument, PROCULEIUS, GALLUS, and Soldiers. PRO. Cæfar fends greeting to the queen of Egypt; And bids thee ftudy on what fair demands Thou mean'ft to have him grant thee. CLEO. [Within.] PRO. My name is Proculeius. CLEO. [Within.] What's thy name? Antony Did tell me of you, bade me truft you; but I do not greatly care to be deceiv'd, That have no ufe for trufting. If your master PRO. Be of good cheer; You are fallen into a princely hand, fear nothing: and Mr. Tollet observes," that in Herodotus, B. III. the Æthiopian king, upon hearing a defcription of the nature of wheat, replied, that he was not at all furprized, if men, who eat nothing but dung, did not attain a longer life." Shak fpeare has the fame epithet in The Winter's Tale: the face to fweeten Again, in Timon : 66 - the earth's a thief "That feeds and breeds by a composture ftolen Your fweet dependancy; and you fhall find CLEO. [Within.] Pray you, tell him PRO. This I'll report, dear lady. Have comfort; for, I know, your plight is pity'd Of him that caus'd it. GAL. You fee how easily she may be furpriz'd; [Here PROCULEIUS, and two of the guard, afcend the monument by a ladder placed against a window, and having defcended, come behind CLEOPATRA. Some of the guard unbar and open the gates. Guard her till Cæfar come." [to PROCULEIUS and the guard. Exit GALLUS. 3 that will pray in aid for kindness,] Praying in aid is a term used for a petition made in a court of juftice for the calling in of help from another that hath an intereft in the caufe in queftion. HANMER. -Send him The greatness he has got.] I allow him to be my conqueror; I own his fuperiority with complete fubmiffion. JOHNSON. A kindred idea feems to occur in The Tempest: "Then, as my gift, and thy own acquifition, "Worthily purchas'd, take my daughter." STEEVENS. Johnson has mistaken the meaning of this paffage, nor will the words bear the conftruction he gives them. It appears to me, that by the greatness he has got, fhe means her crown which he has won; and I fuppofe that when fhe pronounces thefe words, the delivers to Proculeius either her crown, or fome other enfign of royalty. M. MASON. In the old copy there is no ftage-direction. That which is now inferted is formed on the old tranflation of Plutarch: "Proculeius came to the gates that were very thicke and strong, and furely |