ACT ISCENE I. Alexandria. A Room in Cleopatra’s palace.EnterDemetriusandPhilo.PHILO.Nay, but this dotage of our general’sO’erflows the measure. Those his goodly eyes,That o’er the files and musters of the warHave glowed like plated Mars, now bend, now turnThe office and devotion of their viewUpon a tawny front. His captain’s heart,Which in the scuffles of great fights hath burstThe buckles on his breast, reneges all temperAnd is become the bellows and the fanTo cool a gipsy’s lust.Flourish. EnterAntonyandCleopatra,her Ladies, the Train, with Eunuchs fanning her.Look where they come:Take but good note, and you shall see in himThe triple pillar of the world transform’dInto a strumpet’s fool. Behold and see.CLEOPATRA.If it be love indeed, tell me how much.ANTONY.There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned.CLEOPATRA.I’ll set a bourn how far to be beloved.ANTONY.Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new earth.Enter aMessenger.MESSENGER.News, my good lord, from Rome.ANTONY.Grates me, the sum.CLEOPATRA.Nay, hear them, Antony.Fulvia perchance is angry; or who knowsIf the scarce-bearded Caesar have not sentHis powerful mandate to you: “Do this or this;Take in that kingdom and enfranchise that.Perform’t, or else we damn thee.”ANTONY.How, my love?CLEOPATRA.Perchance! Nay, and most like.You must not stay here longer; your dismissionIs come from Caesar; therefore hear it, Antony.Where’s Fulvia’s process?—Caesar’s I would say? Both?Call in the messengers. As I am Egypt’s queen,Thou blushest, Antony, and that blood of thineIs Caesar’s homager; else so thy cheek pays shameWhen shrill-tongued Fulvia scolds. The messengers!ANTONY.Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide archOf the ranged empire fall! Here is my space.Kingdoms are clay. Our dungy earth alikeFeeds beast as man. The nobleness of lifeIs to do thus [Embracing]; when such a mutual pairAnd such a twain can do’t, in which I bind,On pain of punishment, the world to weetWe stand up peerless.CLEOPATRA.Excellent falsehood!Why did he marry Fulvia, and not love her?I’ll seem the fool I am not. AntonyWill be himself.ANTONY.But stirred by Cleopatra.Now, for the love of Love and her soft hours,Let’s not confound the time with conference harsh.There’s not a minute of our lives should stretchWithout some pleasure now. What sport tonight?CLEOPATRA.Hear the ambassadors.ANTONY.Fie, wrangling queen!Whom everything becomes—to chide, to laugh,To weep; whose every passion fully strivesTo make itself, in thee fair and admired!No messenger but thine, and all aloneTonight we’ll wander through the streets and noteThe qualities of people. Come, my queen,Last night you did desire it. Speak not to us.[ExeuntAntonyandCleopatrawith the Train.]DEMETRIUS.Is Caesar with Antonius prized so slight?PHILO.Sir, sometimes when he is not Antony,He comes too short of that great propertyWhich still should go with Antony.DEMETRIUS.I am full sorryThat he approves the common liar whoThus speaks of him at Rome, but I will hopeOf better deeds tomorrow. Rest you happy![Exeunt.]SCENE II. Alexandria. Another Room in Cleopatra’s palace.EnterEnobarbus,aSoothsayer, Charmian, Iras, MardianandAlexas.CHARMIAN.Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most anything Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where’s the soothsayer that you praised so to th’ queen? O, that I knew this husband which you say must charge his horns with garlands!ALEXAS.Soothsayer!SOOTHSAYER.Your will?CHARMIAN.Is this the man? Is’t you, sir, that know things?SOOTHSAYER.In nature’s infinite book of secrecyA little I can read.ALEXAS.Show him your hand.ENOBARBUS.Bring in the banquet quickly; wine enoughCleopatra’s health to drink.CHARMIAN.Good, sir, give me good fortune.SOOTHSAYER.I make not, but foresee.CHARMIAN.Pray, then, foresee me one.SOOTHSAYER.You shall be yet far fairer than you are.CHARMIAN.He means in flesh.IRAS.No, you shall paint when you are old.CHARMIAN.Wrinkles forbid!ALEXAS.Vex not his prescience. Be attentive.CHARMIAN.Hush!SOOTHSAYER.You shall be more beloving than beloved.CHARMIAN.I had rather heat my liver with drinking.ALEXAS.Nay, hear him.CHARMIAN.Good now, some excellent fortune! Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon and widow them all. Let me have a child at fifty, to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage. Find me to marry me with Octavius Caesar, and companion me with my mistress.SOOTHSAYER.You shall outlive the lady whom you serve.CHARMIAN.O, excellent! I love long life better than figs.SOOTHSAYER.You have seen and proved a fairer former fortuneThan that which is to approach.CHARMIAN.Then belike my children shall have no names. Prithee, how many boys and wenches must I have?SOOTHSAYER.If every of your wishes had a womb,And fertile every wish, a million.CHARMIAN.Out, fool! I forgive thee for a witch.ALEXAS.You think none but your sheets are privy to your wishes.CHARMIAN.Nay, come, tell Iras hers.ALEXAS.We’ll know all our fortunes.ENOBARBUS.Mine, and most of our fortunes tonight, shall be drunk to bed.IRAS.There’s a palm presages chastity, if nothing else.CHARMIAN.E’en as the o’erflowing Nilus presageth famine.IRAS.Go, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay.CHARMIAN.Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear. Prithee, tell her but workaday fortune.SOOTHSAYER.Your fortunes are alike.IRAS.But how, but how? give me particulars.SOOTHSAYER.I have said.IRAS.Am I not an inch of fortune better than she?CHARMIAN.Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it?IRAS.Not in my husband’s nose.CHARMIAN.Our worser thoughts heavens mend! Alexas—come, his fortune! his fortune! O, let him marry a woman that cannot go, sweet Isis, I beseech thee, and let her die too, and give him a worse, and let worse follow worse, till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fiftyfold a cuckold! Good Isis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight; good Isis, I beseech thee!IRAS.Amen. Dear goddess, hear that prayer of the people! For, as it is a heartbreaking to see a handsome man loose-wived, so it is a deadly sorrow to behold a foul knave uncuckolded. Therefore, dear Isis, keep decorum and fortune him accordingly!CHARMIAN.Amen.ALEXAS.Lo now, if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores but they’d do’t!EnterCleopatra.ENOBARBUS.Hush, Here comes Antony.CHARMIAN.Not he, the queen.CLEOPATRA.Saw you my lord?ENOBARBUS.No, lady.CLEOPATRA.Was he not here?CHARMIAN.No, madam.CLEOPATRA.He was disposed to mirth; but on the suddenA Roman thought hath struck him. Enobarbus!ENOBARBUS.Madam?CLEOPATRA.Seek him and bring him hither. Where’s Alexas?ALEXAS.Here, at your service. My lord approaches.EnterAntonywith aMessenger.CLEOPATRA.We will not look upon him. Go with us.[ExeuntCleopatra, Enobarbus, Charmian, Iras, AlexasandSoothsayer.]MESSENGER.Fulvia thy wife first came into the field.ANTONY.Against my brother Lucius.MESSENGER.Ay.But soon that war had end, and the time’s stateMade friends of them, jointing their force ’gainst Caesar,Whose better issue in the war from ItalyUpon the first encounter drave them.ANTONY.Well, what worst?MESSENGER.The nature of bad news infects the teller.ANTONY.When it concerns the fool or coward. On.Things that are past are done with me. ’Tis thus:Who tells me true, though in his tale lie death,I hear him as he flattered.MESSENGER.Labienus—This is stiff news—hath with his Parthian forceExtended Asia from EuphratesHis conquering banner shook from SyriaTo Lydia and to Ionia,Whilst—ANTONY.“Antony”, thou wouldst say—MESSENGER.O, my lord!ANTONY.Speak to me home; mince not the general tongue.Name Cleopatra as she is called in Rome;Rail thou in Fulvia’s phrase, and taunt my faultsWith such full licence as both truth and maliceHave power to utter. O, then we bring forth weedsWhen our quick minds lie still, and our ills told usIs as our earing. Fare thee well awhile.MESSENGER.At your noble pleasure.[ExitMessenger.]Enter anotherMessenger.ANTONY.From Sicyon, ho, the news? Speak there!SECOND MESSENGER.The man from Sicyon—ANTONY.Is there such a one?SECOND MESSENGER.He stays upon your will.ANTONY.Let him appear.[Exit secondMessenger.]These strong Egyptian fetters I must break,Or lose myself in dotage.Enter anotherMessengerwith a letter.What are you?THIRD MESSENGER.Fulvia thy wife is dead.ANTONY.Where died she?THIRD MESSENGER.In Sicyon:Her length of sickness, with what else more seriousImporteth thee to know, this bears.[Gives a letter.]ANTONY.Forbear me.[Exit thirdMessenger.]There’s a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it.What our contempts doth often hurl from us,We wish it ours again. The present pleasure,By revolution lowering, does becomeThe opposite of itself. She’s good, being gone.The hand could pluck her back that shoved her on.I must from this enchanting queen break off.Ten thousand harms, more than the ills I know,My idleness doth hatch. How now, Enobarbus!EnterEnobarbus.ENOBARBUS.What’s your pleasure, sir?ANTONY.I must with haste from hence.ENOBARBUS.Why then we kill all our women. We see how mortal an unkindness is to them. If they suffer our departure, death’s the word.ANTONY.I must be gone.ENOBARBUS.Under a compelling occasion, let women die. It were pity to cast them away for nothing, though, between them and a great cause they should be esteemed nothing. Cleopatra, catching but the least noise of this, dies instantly. I have seen her die twenty times upon far poorer moment. I do think there is mettle in death which commits some loving act upon her, she hath such a celerity in dying.ANTONY.She is cunning past man’s thought.ENOBARBUS.Alack, sir, no; her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love. We cannot call her winds and waters sighs and tears; they are greater storms and tempests than almanacs can report. This cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she makes a shower of rain as well as Jove.ANTONY.Would I had never seen her!ENOBARBUS.O, sir, you had then left unseen a wonderful piece of work, which not to have been blest withal would have discredited your travel.ANTONY.Fulvia is dead.ENOBARBUS.Sir?ANTONY.Fulvia is dead.ENOBARBUS.Fulvia?ANTONY.Dead.ENOBARBUS.Why, sir, give the gods a thankful sacrifice. When it pleaseth their deities to take the wife of a man from him, it shows to man the tailors of the earth; comforting therein that when old robes are worn out, there are members to make new. If there were no more women but Fulvia, then had you indeed a cut, and the case to be lamented. This grief is crowned with consolation; your old smock brings forth a new petticoat: and indeed the tears live in an onion that should water this sorrow.ANTONY.The business she hath broached in the stateCannot endure my absence.ENOBARBUS.And the business you have broached here cannot be without you, especially that of Cleopatra’s, which wholly depends on your abode.ANTONY.No more light answers. Let our officersHave notice what we purpose. I shall breakThe cause of our expedience to the Queen,And get her leave to part. For not aloneThe death of Fulvia, with more urgent touches,Do strongly speak to us, but the letters tooOf many our contriving friends in RomePetition us at home. Sextus PompeiusHath given the dare to Caesar, and commandsThe empire of the sea. Our slippery people,Whose love is never linked to the deserverTill his deserts are past, begin to throwPompey the Great and all his dignitiesUpon his son, who, high in name and power,Higher than both in blood and life, stands upFor the main soldier; whose quality, going on,The sides o’ th’ world may danger. Much is breedingWhich, like the courser’s hair, hath yet but lifeAnd not a serpent’s poison. Say our pleasureTo such whose place is under us, requiresOur quick remove from hence.ENOBARBUS.I shall do’t.[Exeunt.]SCENE III. Alexandria. A Room in Cleopatra’s palace.EnterCleopatra, Charmian, AlexasandIras.CLEOPATRA.Where is he?CHARMIAN.I did not see him since.CLEOPATRA.See where he is, who’s with him, what he does.I did not send you. If you find him sad,Say I am dancing; if in mirth, reportThat I am sudden sick. Quick, and return.[ExitAlexas.]CHARMIAN.Madam, methinks, if you did love him dearly,You do not hold the method to enforceThe like from him.CLEOPATRA.What should I do I do not?CHARMIAN.In each thing give him way; cross him in nothing.CLEOPATRA.Thou teachest like a fool: the way to lose him.CHARMIAN.Tempt him not so too far; I wish, forbear.In time we hate that which we often fear.But here comes Antony.EnterAntony.CLEOPATRA.I am sick and sullen.ANTONY.I am sorry to give breathing to my purpose—CLEOPATRA.Help me away, dear Charmian! I shall fall.It cannot be thus long; the sides of natureWill not sustain it.ANTONY.Now, my dearest queen—CLEOPATRA.Pray you, stand farther from me.ANTONY.What’s the matter?CLEOPATRA.I know by that same eye there’s some good news.What, says the married woman you may go?Would she had never given you leave to come!Let her not say ’tis I that keep you here.I have no power upon you; hers you are.ANTONY.The gods best know—CLEOPATRA.O, never was there queenSo mightily betrayed! Yet at the firstI saw the treasons planted.ANTONY.Cleopatra—CLEOPATRA.Why should I think you can be mine and true,Though you in swearing shake the throned gods,Who have been false to Fulvia? Riotous madness,To be entangled with those mouth-made vowsWhich break themselves in swearing!ANTONY.Most sweet queen—CLEOPATRA.Nay, pray you seek no colour for your going,But bid farewell and go. When you sued staying,Then was the time for words. No going then,Eternity was in our lips and eyes,Bliss in our brows’ bent; none our parts so poorBut was a race of heaven. They are so still,Or thou, the greatest soldier of the world,Art turned the greatest liar.ANTONY.How now, lady!CLEOPATRA.I would I had thy inches, thou shouldst knowThere were a heart in Egypt.ANTONY.Hear me, queen:The strong necessity of time commandsOur services awhile, but my full heartRemains in use with you. Our ItalyShines o’er with civil swords; Sextus PompeiusMakes his approaches to the port of Rome;Equality of two domestic powersBreed scrupulous faction; the hated, grown to strength,Are newly grown to love; the condemned Pompey,Rich in his father’s honour, creeps apaceInto the hearts of such as have not thrivedUpon the present state, whose numbers threaten;And quietness, grown sick of rest, would purgeBy any desperate change. My more particular,And that which most with you should safe my going,Is Fulvia’s death.CLEOPATRA.Though age from folly could not give me freedom,It does from childishness. Can Fulvia die?ANTONY.She’s dead, my queen.Look here, and at thy sovereign leisure readThe garboils she awaked; at the last, best,See when and where she died.CLEOPATRA.O most false love!Where be the sacred vials thou shouldst fillWith sorrowful water? Now I see, I see,In Fulvia’s death how mine received shall be.ANTONY.Quarrel no more, but be prepared to knowThe purposes I bear; which are, or cease,As you shall give th’ advice. By the fireThat quickens Nilus’ slime, I go from henceThy soldier, servant, making peace or warAs thou affects.CLEOPATRA.Cut my lace, Charmian, come!But let it be; I am quickly ill and well,So Antony loves.ANTONY.My precious queen, forbear,And give true evidence to his love, which standsAn honourable trial.CLEOPATRA.So Fulvia told me.I prithee, turn aside and weep for her,Then bid adieu to me, and say the tearsBelong to Egypt. Good now, play one sceneOf excellent dissembling, and let it lookLike perfect honour.ANTONY.You’ll heat my blood. No more.CLEOPATRA.You can do better yet, but this is meetly.ANTONY.Now, by my sword—CLEOPATRA.And target. Still he mends.But this is not the best. Look, prithee, Charmian,How this Herculean Roman does becomeThe carriage of his chafe.ANTONY.I’ll leave you, lady.CLEOPATRA.Courteous lord, one word.Sir, you and I must part, but that’s not it;Sir, you and I have loved, but there’s not it;That you know well. Something it is I would—O, my oblivion is a very Antony,And I am all forgotten.ANTONY.But that your royaltyHolds idleness your subject, I should take youFor idleness itself.CLEOPATRA.’Tis sweating labourTo bear such idleness so near the heartAs Cleopatra this. But, sir, forgive me,Since my becomings kill me when they do notEye well to you. Your honour calls you hence;Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly,And all the gods go with you! Upon your swordSit laurel victory, and smooth successBe strewed before your feet!ANTONY.Let us go. Come.Our separation so abides and fliesThat thou, residing here, goes yet with me,And I, hence fleeting, here remain with thee.Away![Exeunt.]SCENE IV. Rome. An Apartment in Caesar’s House.EnterOctavius [Caesar], Lepidusand their train.CAESAR.You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know,It is not Caesar’s natural vice to hateOur great competitor. From AlexandriaThis is the news: he fishes, drinks, and wastesThe lamps of night in revel: is not more manlikeThan Cleopatra, nor the queen of PtolemyMore womanly than he; hardly gave audience, orVouchsafed to think he had partners. You shall find thereA man who is the abstract of all faultsThat all men follow.LEPIDUS.I must not think there areEvils enough to darken all his goodness.His faults in him seem as the spots of heaven,More fiery by night’s blackness; hereditaryRather than purchased; what he cannot changeThan what he chooses.CAESAR.You are too indulgent. Let’s grant it is notAmiss to tumble on the bed of Ptolemy,To give a kingdom for a mirth, to sitAnd keep the turn of tippling with a slave,To reel the streets at noon, and stand the buffetWith knaves that smell of sweat. Say this becomes him—As his composure must be rare indeedWhom these things cannot blemish—yet must AntonyNo way excuse his foils when we do bearSo great weight in his lightness. If he filledHis vacancy with his voluptuousness,Full surfeits and the dryness of his bonesCall on him for’t. But to confound such timeThat drums him from his sport, and speaks as loudAs his own state and ours, ’tis to be chidAs we rate boys who, being mature in knowledge,Pawn their experience to their present pleasureAnd so rebel to judgment.Enter aMessenger.LEPIDUS.Here’s more news.MESSENGER.Thy biddings have been done, and every hour,Most noble Caesar, shalt thou have reportHow ’tis abroad. Pompey is strong at sea,And it appears he is beloved of thoseThat only have feared Caesar. To the portsThe discontents repair, and men’s reportsGive him much wronged.CAESAR.I should have known no less.It hath been taught us from the primal stateThat he which is was wished until he were,And the ebbed man, ne’er loved till ne’er worth love,Comes deared by being lacked. This common body,Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream,Goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide,To rot itself with motion.Enter a secondMessenger.SECOND MESSENGER.Caesar, I bring thee wordMenecrates and Menas, famous pirates,Make the sea serve them, which they ear and woundWith keels of every kind. Many hot inroadsThey make in Italy—the borders maritimeLack blood to think on’t—and flush youth revolt.No vessel can peep forth but ’tis as soonTaken as seen; for Pompey’s name strikes moreThan could his war resisted.CAESAR.Antony,Leave thy lascivious wassails. When thou onceWas beaten from Modena, where thou slew’stHirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heelDid famine follow, whom thou fought’st against,Though daintily brought up, with patience moreThan savages could suffer. Thou didst drinkThe stale of horses and the gilded puddleWhich beasts would cough at. Thy palate then did deignThe roughest berry on the rudest hedge.Yea, like the stag when snow the pasture sheets,The barks of trees thou browsed. On the AlpsIt is reported thou didst eat strange fleshWhich some did die to look on. And all this—It wounds thine honour that I speak it now—Was borne so like a soldier that thy cheekSo much as lanked not.LEPIDUS.’Tis pity of him.CAESAR.Let his shames quicklyDrive him to Rome. ’Tis time we twainDid show ourselves i’ th’ field, and to that endAssemble we immediate council. PompeyThrives in our idleness.LEPIDUS.Tomorrow, Caesar,I shall be furnished to inform you rightlyBoth what by sea and land I can be ableTo front this present time.CAESAR.Till which encounterIt is my business too. Farewell.LEPIDUS.Farewell, my lord. What you shall know meantimeOf stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir,To let me be partaker.CAESAR.Doubt not, sir.I knew it for my bond.[Exeunt.]SCENE V. Alexandria. A Room in the Palace.EnterCleopatra, Charmian, IrasandMardian.CLEOPATRA.Charmian!CHARMIAN.Madam?CLEOPATRA.Ha, ha!Give me to drink mandragora.CHARMIAN.Why, madam?CLEOPATRA.That I might sleep out this great gap of timeMy Antony is away.CHARMIAN.You think of him too much.CLEOPATRA.O, ’tis treason!CHARMIAN.Madam, I trust not so.CLEOPATRA.Thou, eunuch Mardian!MARDIAN.What’s your highness’ pleasure?CLEOPATRA.Not now to hear thee sing. I take no pleasureIn aught an eunuch has. ’Tis well for theeThat, being unseminared, thy freer thoughtsMay not fly forth of Egypt. Hast thou affections?MARDIAN.Yes, gracious madam.CLEOPATRA.Indeed?MARDIAN.Not in deed, madam, for I can do nothingBut what indeed is honest to be done.Yet have I fierce affections, and thinkWhat Venus did with Mars.CLEOPATRA.O, Charmian,Where think’st thou he is now? Stands he, or sits he?Or does he walk? Or is he on his horse?O happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony!Do bravely, horse, for wot’st thou whom thou mov’st?The demi-Atlas of this earth, the armAnd burgonet of men. He’s speaking now,Or murmuring “Where’s my serpent of old Nile?”For so he calls me. Now I feed myselfWith most delicious poison. Think on meThat am with Phœbus’ amorous pinches black,And wrinkled deep in time? Broad-fronted Caesar,When thou wast here above the ground, I wasA morsel for a monarch. And great PompeyWould stand and make his eyes grow in my brow;There would he anchor his aspect, and dieWith looking on his life.EnterAlexas.ALEXAS.Sovereign of Egypt, hail!CLEOPATRA.How much unlike art thou Mark Antony!Yet, coming from him, that great medicine hathWith his tinct gilded thee.How goes it with my brave Mark Antony?ALEXAS.Last thing he did, dear queen,He kissed—the last of many doubled kisses—This orient pearl. His speech sticks in my heart.CLEOPATRA.Mine ear must pluck it thence.ALEXAS.“Good friend,” quoth he,“Say, the firm Roman to great Egypt sendsThis treasure of an oyster; at whose foot,To mend the petty present, I will pieceHer opulent throne with kingdoms. All the east,Say thou, shall call her mistress.” So he noddedAnd soberly did mount an arm-gaunt steed,Who neighed so high that what I would have spokeWas beastly dumbed by him.CLEOPATRA.What, was he sad or merry?ALEXAS.Like to the time o’ th’ year between the extremesOf hot and cold, he was nor sad nor merry.CLEOPATRA.O well-divided disposition!—Note him,Note him, good Charmian, ’tis the man; but note him:He was not sad, for he would shine on thoseThat make their looks by his; he was not merry,Which seemed to tell them his remembrance layIn Egypt with his joy; but between both.O heavenly mingle!—Be’st thou sad or merry,The violence of either thee becomes,So does it no man else.—Met’st thou my posts?ALEXAS.Ay, madam, twenty several messengers.Why do you send so thick?CLEOPATRA.Who’s born that dayWhen I forget to send to AntonyShall die a beggar.—Ink and paper, Charmian.—Welcome, my good Alexas.—Did I, Charmian,Ever love Caesar so?CHARMIAN.O that brave Caesar!CLEOPATRA.Be choked with such another emphasis!Say “the brave Antony.”CHARMIAN.The valiant Caesar!CLEOPATRA.By Isis, I will give thee bloody teethIf thou with Caesar paragon againMy man of men.CHARMIAN.By your most gracious pardon,I sing but after you.CLEOPATRA.My salad days,When I was green in judgment, cold in blood,To say as I said then. But come, away,Get me ink and paper.He shall have every day a several greeting,Or I’ll unpeople Egypt.[Exeunt.]
EnterDemetriusandPhilo.
PHILO.Nay, but this dotage of our general’sO’erflows the measure. Those his goodly eyes,That o’er the files and musters of the warHave glowed like plated Mars, now bend, now turnThe office and devotion of their viewUpon a tawny front. His captain’s heart,Which in the scuffles of great fights hath burstThe buckles on his breast, reneges all temperAnd is become the bellows and the fanTo cool a gipsy’s lust.
Flourish. EnterAntonyandCleopatra,her Ladies, the Train, with Eunuchs fanning her.
Look where they come:Take but good note, and you shall see in himThe triple pillar of the world transform’dInto a strumpet’s fool. Behold and see.
CLEOPATRA.If it be love indeed, tell me how much.
ANTONY.There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned.
CLEOPATRA.I’ll set a bourn how far to be beloved.
ANTONY.Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new earth.
Enter aMessenger.
MESSENGER.News, my good lord, from Rome.
ANTONY.Grates me, the sum.
CLEOPATRA.Nay, hear them, Antony.Fulvia perchance is angry; or who knowsIf the scarce-bearded Caesar have not sentHis powerful mandate to you: “Do this or this;Take in that kingdom and enfranchise that.Perform’t, or else we damn thee.”
ANTONY.How, my love?
CLEOPATRA.Perchance! Nay, and most like.You must not stay here longer; your dismissionIs come from Caesar; therefore hear it, Antony.Where’s Fulvia’s process?—Caesar’s I would say? Both?Call in the messengers. As I am Egypt’s queen,Thou blushest, Antony, and that blood of thineIs Caesar’s homager; else so thy cheek pays shameWhen shrill-tongued Fulvia scolds. The messengers!
ANTONY.Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide archOf the ranged empire fall! Here is my space.Kingdoms are clay. Our dungy earth alikeFeeds beast as man. The nobleness of lifeIs to do thus [Embracing]; when such a mutual pairAnd such a twain can do’t, in which I bind,On pain of punishment, the world to weetWe stand up peerless.
CLEOPATRA.Excellent falsehood!Why did he marry Fulvia, and not love her?I’ll seem the fool I am not. AntonyWill be himself.
ANTONY.But stirred by Cleopatra.Now, for the love of Love and her soft hours,Let’s not confound the time with conference harsh.There’s not a minute of our lives should stretchWithout some pleasure now. What sport tonight?
CLEOPATRA.Hear the ambassadors.
ANTONY.Fie, wrangling queen!Whom everything becomes—to chide, to laugh,To weep; whose every passion fully strivesTo make itself, in thee fair and admired!No messenger but thine, and all aloneTonight we’ll wander through the streets and noteThe qualities of people. Come, my queen,Last night you did desire it. Speak not to us.
[ExeuntAntonyandCleopatrawith the Train.]
DEMETRIUS.Is Caesar with Antonius prized so slight?
PHILO.Sir, sometimes when he is not Antony,He comes too short of that great propertyWhich still should go with Antony.
DEMETRIUS.I am full sorryThat he approves the common liar whoThus speaks of him at Rome, but I will hopeOf better deeds tomorrow. Rest you happy!
[Exeunt.]
EnterEnobarbus,aSoothsayer, Charmian, Iras, MardianandAlexas.
CHARMIAN.Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most anything Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where’s the soothsayer that you praised so to th’ queen? O, that I knew this husband which you say must charge his horns with garlands!
ALEXAS.Soothsayer!
SOOTHSAYER.Your will?
CHARMIAN.Is this the man? Is’t you, sir, that know things?
SOOTHSAYER.In nature’s infinite book of secrecyA little I can read.
ALEXAS.Show him your hand.
ENOBARBUS.Bring in the banquet quickly; wine enoughCleopatra’s health to drink.
CHARMIAN.Good, sir, give me good fortune.
SOOTHSAYER.I make not, but foresee.
CHARMIAN.Pray, then, foresee me one.
SOOTHSAYER.You shall be yet far fairer than you are.
CHARMIAN.He means in flesh.
IRAS.No, you shall paint when you are old.
CHARMIAN.Wrinkles forbid!
ALEXAS.Vex not his prescience. Be attentive.
CHARMIAN.Hush!
SOOTHSAYER.You shall be more beloving than beloved.
CHARMIAN.I had rather heat my liver with drinking.
ALEXAS.Nay, hear him.
CHARMIAN.Good now, some excellent fortune! Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon and widow them all. Let me have a child at fifty, to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage. Find me to marry me with Octavius Caesar, and companion me with my mistress.
SOOTHSAYER.You shall outlive the lady whom you serve.
CHARMIAN.O, excellent! I love long life better than figs.
SOOTHSAYER.You have seen and proved a fairer former fortuneThan that which is to approach.
CHARMIAN.Then belike my children shall have no names. Prithee, how many boys and wenches must I have?
SOOTHSAYER.If every of your wishes had a womb,And fertile every wish, a million.
CHARMIAN.Out, fool! I forgive thee for a witch.
ALEXAS.You think none but your sheets are privy to your wishes.
CHARMIAN.Nay, come, tell Iras hers.
ALEXAS.We’ll know all our fortunes.
ENOBARBUS.Mine, and most of our fortunes tonight, shall be drunk to bed.
IRAS.There’s a palm presages chastity, if nothing else.
CHARMIAN.E’en as the o’erflowing Nilus presageth famine.
IRAS.Go, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay.
CHARMIAN.Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear. Prithee, tell her but workaday fortune.
SOOTHSAYER.Your fortunes are alike.
IRAS.But how, but how? give me particulars.
SOOTHSAYER.I have said.
IRAS.Am I not an inch of fortune better than she?
CHARMIAN.Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it?
IRAS.Not in my husband’s nose.
CHARMIAN.Our worser thoughts heavens mend! Alexas—come, his fortune! his fortune! O, let him marry a woman that cannot go, sweet Isis, I beseech thee, and let her die too, and give him a worse, and let worse follow worse, till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fiftyfold a cuckold! Good Isis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight; good Isis, I beseech thee!
IRAS.Amen. Dear goddess, hear that prayer of the people! For, as it is a heartbreaking to see a handsome man loose-wived, so it is a deadly sorrow to behold a foul knave uncuckolded. Therefore, dear Isis, keep decorum and fortune him accordingly!
CHARMIAN.Amen.
ALEXAS.Lo now, if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores but they’d do’t!
EnterCleopatra.
ENOBARBUS.Hush, Here comes Antony.
CHARMIAN.Not he, the queen.
CLEOPATRA.Saw you my lord?
ENOBARBUS.No, lady.
CLEOPATRA.Was he not here?
CHARMIAN.No, madam.
CLEOPATRA.He was disposed to mirth; but on the suddenA Roman thought hath struck him. Enobarbus!
ENOBARBUS.Madam?
CLEOPATRA.Seek him and bring him hither. Where’s Alexas?
ALEXAS.Here, at your service. My lord approaches.
EnterAntonywith aMessenger.
CLEOPATRA.We will not look upon him. Go with us.
[ExeuntCleopatra, Enobarbus, Charmian, Iras, AlexasandSoothsayer.]
MESSENGER.Fulvia thy wife first came into the field.
ANTONY.Against my brother Lucius.
MESSENGER.Ay.But soon that war had end, and the time’s stateMade friends of them, jointing their force ’gainst Caesar,Whose better issue in the war from ItalyUpon the first encounter drave them.
ANTONY.Well, what worst?
MESSENGER.The nature of bad news infects the teller.
ANTONY.When it concerns the fool or coward. On.Things that are past are done with me. ’Tis thus:Who tells me true, though in his tale lie death,I hear him as he flattered.
MESSENGER.Labienus—This is stiff news—hath with his Parthian forceExtended Asia from EuphratesHis conquering banner shook from SyriaTo Lydia and to Ionia,Whilst—
ANTONY.“Antony”, thou wouldst say—
MESSENGER.O, my lord!
ANTONY.Speak to me home; mince not the general tongue.Name Cleopatra as she is called in Rome;Rail thou in Fulvia’s phrase, and taunt my faultsWith such full licence as both truth and maliceHave power to utter. O, then we bring forth weedsWhen our quick minds lie still, and our ills told usIs as our earing. Fare thee well awhile.
MESSENGER.At your noble pleasure.
[ExitMessenger.]
Enter anotherMessenger.
ANTONY.From Sicyon, ho, the news? Speak there!
SECOND MESSENGER.The man from Sicyon—
ANTONY.Is there such a one?
SECOND MESSENGER.He stays upon your will.
ANTONY.Let him appear.
[Exit secondMessenger.]
These strong Egyptian fetters I must break,Or lose myself in dotage.
Enter anotherMessengerwith a letter.
What are you?
THIRD MESSENGER.Fulvia thy wife is dead.
ANTONY.Where died she?
THIRD MESSENGER.In Sicyon:Her length of sickness, with what else more seriousImporteth thee to know, this bears.
[Gives a letter.]
ANTONY.Forbear me.
[Exit thirdMessenger.]
There’s a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it.What our contempts doth often hurl from us,We wish it ours again. The present pleasure,By revolution lowering, does becomeThe opposite of itself. She’s good, being gone.The hand could pluck her back that shoved her on.I must from this enchanting queen break off.Ten thousand harms, more than the ills I know,My idleness doth hatch. How now, Enobarbus!
EnterEnobarbus.
ENOBARBUS.What’s your pleasure, sir?
ANTONY.I must with haste from hence.
ENOBARBUS.Why then we kill all our women. We see how mortal an unkindness is to them. If they suffer our departure, death’s the word.
ANTONY.I must be gone.
ENOBARBUS.Under a compelling occasion, let women die. It were pity to cast them away for nothing, though, between them and a great cause they should be esteemed nothing. Cleopatra, catching but the least noise of this, dies instantly. I have seen her die twenty times upon far poorer moment. I do think there is mettle in death which commits some loving act upon her, she hath such a celerity in dying.
ANTONY.She is cunning past man’s thought.
ENOBARBUS.Alack, sir, no; her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love. We cannot call her winds and waters sighs and tears; they are greater storms and tempests than almanacs can report. This cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she makes a shower of rain as well as Jove.
ANTONY.Would I had never seen her!
ENOBARBUS.O, sir, you had then left unseen a wonderful piece of work, which not to have been blest withal would have discredited your travel.
ANTONY.Fulvia is dead.
ENOBARBUS.Sir?
ANTONY.Fulvia is dead.
ENOBARBUS.Fulvia?
ANTONY.Dead.
ENOBARBUS.Why, sir, give the gods a thankful sacrifice. When it pleaseth their deities to take the wife of a man from him, it shows to man the tailors of the earth; comforting therein that when old robes are worn out, there are members to make new. If there were no more women but Fulvia, then had you indeed a cut, and the case to be lamented. This grief is crowned with consolation; your old smock brings forth a new petticoat: and indeed the tears live in an onion that should water this sorrow.
ANTONY.The business she hath broached in the stateCannot endure my absence.
ENOBARBUS.And the business you have broached here cannot be without you, especially that of Cleopatra’s, which wholly depends on your abode.
ANTONY.No more light answers. Let our officersHave notice what we purpose. I shall breakThe cause of our expedience to the Queen,And get her leave to part. For not aloneThe death of Fulvia, with more urgent touches,Do strongly speak to us, but the letters tooOf many our contriving friends in RomePetition us at home. Sextus PompeiusHath given the dare to Caesar, and commandsThe empire of the sea. Our slippery people,Whose love is never linked to the deserverTill his deserts are past, begin to throwPompey the Great and all his dignitiesUpon his son, who, high in name and power,Higher than both in blood and life, stands upFor the main soldier; whose quality, going on,The sides o’ th’ world may danger. Much is breedingWhich, like the courser’s hair, hath yet but lifeAnd not a serpent’s poison. Say our pleasureTo such whose place is under us, requiresOur quick remove from hence.
ENOBARBUS.I shall do’t.
[Exeunt.]
EnterCleopatra, Charmian, AlexasandIras.
CLEOPATRA.Where is he?
CHARMIAN.I did not see him since.
CLEOPATRA.See where he is, who’s with him, what he does.I did not send you. If you find him sad,Say I am dancing; if in mirth, reportThat I am sudden sick. Quick, and return.
[ExitAlexas.]
CHARMIAN.Madam, methinks, if you did love him dearly,You do not hold the method to enforceThe like from him.
CLEOPATRA.What should I do I do not?
CHARMIAN.In each thing give him way; cross him in nothing.
CLEOPATRA.Thou teachest like a fool: the way to lose him.
CHARMIAN.Tempt him not so too far; I wish, forbear.In time we hate that which we often fear.But here comes Antony.
EnterAntony.
CLEOPATRA.I am sick and sullen.
ANTONY.I am sorry to give breathing to my purpose—
CLEOPATRA.Help me away, dear Charmian! I shall fall.It cannot be thus long; the sides of natureWill not sustain it.
ANTONY.Now, my dearest queen—
CLEOPATRA.Pray you, stand farther from me.
ANTONY.What’s the matter?
CLEOPATRA.I know by that same eye there’s some good news.What, says the married woman you may go?Would she had never given you leave to come!Let her not say ’tis I that keep you here.I have no power upon you; hers you are.
ANTONY.The gods best know—
CLEOPATRA.O, never was there queenSo mightily betrayed! Yet at the firstI saw the treasons planted.
ANTONY.Cleopatra—
CLEOPATRA.Why should I think you can be mine and true,Though you in swearing shake the throned gods,Who have been false to Fulvia? Riotous madness,To be entangled with those mouth-made vowsWhich break themselves in swearing!
ANTONY.Most sweet queen—
CLEOPATRA.Nay, pray you seek no colour for your going,But bid farewell and go. When you sued staying,Then was the time for words. No going then,Eternity was in our lips and eyes,Bliss in our brows’ bent; none our parts so poorBut was a race of heaven. They are so still,Or thou, the greatest soldier of the world,Art turned the greatest liar.
ANTONY.How now, lady!
CLEOPATRA.I would I had thy inches, thou shouldst knowThere were a heart in Egypt.
ANTONY.Hear me, queen:The strong necessity of time commandsOur services awhile, but my full heartRemains in use with you. Our ItalyShines o’er with civil swords; Sextus PompeiusMakes his approaches to the port of Rome;Equality of two domestic powersBreed scrupulous faction; the hated, grown to strength,Are newly grown to love; the condemned Pompey,Rich in his father’s honour, creeps apaceInto the hearts of such as have not thrivedUpon the present state, whose numbers threaten;And quietness, grown sick of rest, would purgeBy any desperate change. My more particular,And that which most with you should safe my going,Is Fulvia’s death.
CLEOPATRA.Though age from folly could not give me freedom,It does from childishness. Can Fulvia die?
ANTONY.She’s dead, my queen.Look here, and at thy sovereign leisure readThe garboils she awaked; at the last, best,See when and where she died.
CLEOPATRA.O most false love!Where be the sacred vials thou shouldst fillWith sorrowful water? Now I see, I see,In Fulvia’s death how mine received shall be.
ANTONY.Quarrel no more, but be prepared to knowThe purposes I bear; which are, or cease,As you shall give th’ advice. By the fireThat quickens Nilus’ slime, I go from henceThy soldier, servant, making peace or warAs thou affects.
CLEOPATRA.Cut my lace, Charmian, come!But let it be; I am quickly ill and well,So Antony loves.
ANTONY.My precious queen, forbear,And give true evidence to his love, which standsAn honourable trial.
CLEOPATRA.So Fulvia told me.I prithee, turn aside and weep for her,Then bid adieu to me, and say the tearsBelong to Egypt. Good now, play one sceneOf excellent dissembling, and let it lookLike perfect honour.
ANTONY.You’ll heat my blood. No more.
CLEOPATRA.You can do better yet, but this is meetly.
ANTONY.Now, by my sword—
CLEOPATRA.And target. Still he mends.But this is not the best. Look, prithee, Charmian,How this Herculean Roman does becomeThe carriage of his chafe.
ANTONY.I’ll leave you, lady.
CLEOPATRA.Courteous lord, one word.Sir, you and I must part, but that’s not it;Sir, you and I have loved, but there’s not it;That you know well. Something it is I would—O, my oblivion is a very Antony,And I am all forgotten.
ANTONY.But that your royaltyHolds idleness your subject, I should take youFor idleness itself.
CLEOPATRA.’Tis sweating labourTo bear such idleness so near the heartAs Cleopatra this. But, sir, forgive me,Since my becomings kill me when they do notEye well to you. Your honour calls you hence;Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly,And all the gods go with you! Upon your swordSit laurel victory, and smooth successBe strewed before your feet!
ANTONY.Let us go. Come.Our separation so abides and fliesThat thou, residing here, goes yet with me,And I, hence fleeting, here remain with thee.Away!
[Exeunt.]
EnterOctavius [Caesar], Lepidusand their train.
CAESAR.You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know,It is not Caesar’s natural vice to hateOur great competitor. From AlexandriaThis is the news: he fishes, drinks, and wastesThe lamps of night in revel: is not more manlikeThan Cleopatra, nor the queen of PtolemyMore womanly than he; hardly gave audience, orVouchsafed to think he had partners. You shall find thereA man who is the abstract of all faultsThat all men follow.
LEPIDUS.I must not think there areEvils enough to darken all his goodness.His faults in him seem as the spots of heaven,More fiery by night’s blackness; hereditaryRather than purchased; what he cannot changeThan what he chooses.
CAESAR.You are too indulgent. Let’s grant it is notAmiss to tumble on the bed of Ptolemy,To give a kingdom for a mirth, to sitAnd keep the turn of tippling with a slave,To reel the streets at noon, and stand the buffetWith knaves that smell of sweat. Say this becomes him—As his composure must be rare indeedWhom these things cannot blemish—yet must AntonyNo way excuse his foils when we do bearSo great weight in his lightness. If he filledHis vacancy with his voluptuousness,Full surfeits and the dryness of his bonesCall on him for’t. But to confound such timeThat drums him from his sport, and speaks as loudAs his own state and ours, ’tis to be chidAs we rate boys who, being mature in knowledge,Pawn their experience to their present pleasureAnd so rebel to judgment.
Enter aMessenger.
LEPIDUS.Here’s more news.
MESSENGER.Thy biddings have been done, and every hour,Most noble Caesar, shalt thou have reportHow ’tis abroad. Pompey is strong at sea,And it appears he is beloved of thoseThat only have feared Caesar. To the portsThe discontents repair, and men’s reportsGive him much wronged.
CAESAR.I should have known no less.It hath been taught us from the primal stateThat he which is was wished until he were,And the ebbed man, ne’er loved till ne’er worth love,Comes deared by being lacked. This common body,Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream,Goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide,To rot itself with motion.
Enter a secondMessenger.
SECOND MESSENGER.Caesar, I bring thee wordMenecrates and Menas, famous pirates,Make the sea serve them, which they ear and woundWith keels of every kind. Many hot inroadsThey make in Italy—the borders maritimeLack blood to think on’t—and flush youth revolt.No vessel can peep forth but ’tis as soonTaken as seen; for Pompey’s name strikes moreThan could his war resisted.
CAESAR.Antony,Leave thy lascivious wassails. When thou onceWas beaten from Modena, where thou slew’stHirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heelDid famine follow, whom thou fought’st against,Though daintily brought up, with patience moreThan savages could suffer. Thou didst drinkThe stale of horses and the gilded puddleWhich beasts would cough at. Thy palate then did deignThe roughest berry on the rudest hedge.Yea, like the stag when snow the pasture sheets,The barks of trees thou browsed. On the AlpsIt is reported thou didst eat strange fleshWhich some did die to look on. And all this—It wounds thine honour that I speak it now—Was borne so like a soldier that thy cheekSo much as lanked not.
LEPIDUS.’Tis pity of him.
CAESAR.Let his shames quicklyDrive him to Rome. ’Tis time we twainDid show ourselves i’ th’ field, and to that endAssemble we immediate council. PompeyThrives in our idleness.
LEPIDUS.Tomorrow, Caesar,I shall be furnished to inform you rightlyBoth what by sea and land I can be ableTo front this present time.
CAESAR.Till which encounterIt is my business too. Farewell.
LEPIDUS.Farewell, my lord. What you shall know meantimeOf stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir,To let me be partaker.
CAESAR.Doubt not, sir.I knew it for my bond.
[Exeunt.]
EnterCleopatra, Charmian, IrasandMardian.
CLEOPATRA.Charmian!
CHARMIAN.Madam?
CLEOPATRA.Ha, ha!Give me to drink mandragora.
CHARMIAN.Why, madam?
CLEOPATRA.That I might sleep out this great gap of timeMy Antony is away.
CHARMIAN.You think of him too much.
CLEOPATRA.O, ’tis treason!
CHARMIAN.Madam, I trust not so.
CLEOPATRA.Thou, eunuch Mardian!
MARDIAN.What’s your highness’ pleasure?
CLEOPATRA.Not now to hear thee sing. I take no pleasureIn aught an eunuch has. ’Tis well for theeThat, being unseminared, thy freer thoughtsMay not fly forth of Egypt. Hast thou affections?
MARDIAN.Yes, gracious madam.
CLEOPATRA.Indeed?
MARDIAN.Not in deed, madam, for I can do nothingBut what indeed is honest to be done.Yet have I fierce affections, and thinkWhat Venus did with Mars.
CLEOPATRA.O, Charmian,Where think’st thou he is now? Stands he, or sits he?Or does he walk? Or is he on his horse?O happy horse, to bear the weight of Antony!Do bravely, horse, for wot’st thou whom thou mov’st?The demi-Atlas of this earth, the armAnd burgonet of men. He’s speaking now,Or murmuring “Where’s my serpent of old Nile?”For so he calls me. Now I feed myselfWith most delicious poison. Think on meThat am with Phœbus’ amorous pinches black,And wrinkled deep in time? Broad-fronted Caesar,When thou wast here above the ground, I wasA morsel for a monarch. And great PompeyWould stand and make his eyes grow in my brow;There would he anchor his aspect, and dieWith looking on his life.
EnterAlexas.
ALEXAS.Sovereign of Egypt, hail!
CLEOPATRA.How much unlike art thou Mark Antony!Yet, coming from him, that great medicine hathWith his tinct gilded thee.How goes it with my brave Mark Antony?
ALEXAS.Last thing he did, dear queen,He kissed—the last of many doubled kisses—This orient pearl. His speech sticks in my heart.
CLEOPATRA.Mine ear must pluck it thence.
ALEXAS.“Good friend,” quoth he,“Say, the firm Roman to great Egypt sendsThis treasure of an oyster; at whose foot,To mend the petty present, I will pieceHer opulent throne with kingdoms. All the east,Say thou, shall call her mistress.” So he noddedAnd soberly did mount an arm-gaunt steed,Who neighed so high that what I would have spokeWas beastly dumbed by him.
CLEOPATRA.What, was he sad or merry?
ALEXAS.Like to the time o’ th’ year between the extremesOf hot and cold, he was nor sad nor merry.
CLEOPATRA.O well-divided disposition!—Note him,Note him, good Charmian, ’tis the man; but note him:He was not sad, for he would shine on thoseThat make their looks by his; he was not merry,Which seemed to tell them his remembrance layIn Egypt with his joy; but between both.O heavenly mingle!—Be’st thou sad or merry,The violence of either thee becomes,So does it no man else.—Met’st thou my posts?
ALEXAS.Ay, madam, twenty several messengers.Why do you send so thick?
CLEOPATRA.Who’s born that dayWhen I forget to send to AntonyShall die a beggar.—Ink and paper, Charmian.—Welcome, my good Alexas.—Did I, Charmian,Ever love Caesar so?
CHARMIAN.O that brave Caesar!
CLEOPATRA.Be choked with such another emphasis!Say “the brave Antony.”
CHARMIAN.The valiant Caesar!
CLEOPATRA.By Isis, I will give thee bloody teethIf thou with Caesar paragon againMy man of men.
CHARMIAN.By your most gracious pardon,I sing but after you.
CLEOPATRA.My salad days,When I was green in judgment, cold in blood,To say as I said then. But come, away,Get me ink and paper.He shall have every day a several greeting,Or I’ll unpeople Egypt.
[Exeunt.]