Cæs.

Say not so, Agrippa:

If Cleopatra heard you, your reproof

Were well deserved of rashness.

Ant. I am not married, Cæsar: let me hear Agrippa further speak.

Agr. To hold you in perpetual amity, To make you brothers, and to knit your hearts With an unslipping knot, take Antony Octavia to his wife: whose beauty claims No worse a husband than the best of men; Whose virtue and whose general graces speak That which none else can utter. By this marriage, All little jealousies which now seem great,

Agr. Good Enobarbus!

Mec. We have cause to be glad that matters are so well digested. You stayed well by it in Egypt.

Eno. Ay, sir; we did sleep day out of countenance, and made the night light with drinking.

Mec. Eight wild boars roasted whole at a breakfast, and but twelve persons there: is this true?

Eno. This was but as a fly by an eagle: we had much more monstrous matter of feasts, which worthily deserved noting.

Mec. She's a most triumphant lady, if report

be square to her.

Eno. When she first met Marc Antony, she pursed up his heart, upon the river of Cydnus.

Agr. There she appeared indeed! or my reporter devised well for her.

Eno. I will tell you:

The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne, Burned on the water: the poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed that

The winds were lovesick with them: the oars were silver;

Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster,

Eno. Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides, So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes, And made their bends adornings: at the helm A seeming mermaid steers: the silken tackle Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands That yarely frame the office. From the barge A strange invisible pérfume hits the sense Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast Her people out upon her; and Antony, Enthroned in the market-place, did sit alone, Whistling to the air; which, but for vacancy, Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too, And made a gap in nature.

Hop forty paces through the public street :
And having lost her breath, she spoke and panted
That she did make defect perfection,
And (breathless) power breathe forth.

Mec. Now Antony must leave her utterly.
Eno. Never; he will not:

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety. Other women
Cloy th' appetites they feed, but she makes hungry
Where most she satisfies: for vilest things
Become themselves in her, that the holy priests
Bless her when she is riggish.

Mec. If beauty, wisdom, modesty, can settle The heart of Antony, Octavia is

A blessed lottery to him.

SCENE III.-The same. A Room in CESAR's House. Enter CESAR, ANTONY, OCTAVIA between them; Attendants, and a Soothsayer.

Ant. The world and my great office will sometimes

Divide me from your bosom.
Octa.
All which time
Before the gods my knee shall bow my prayers
To them for you.

Ant. Good night, sir.-My Octavia,
Read not my blemishes in the world's report:
I have not kept my square, but that to come
Shall all be done by the rule. Good night, dear

lady.

Octa. Good night, sir. Cæs. Good night.

[Exeunt CESAR and OCTAVIA. Ant. Now, sirrah; you do wish yourself in Egypt ?

Sooth. 'Would I had never come from thence; nor you thither!

Ant. If you can, your reason?

Sooth. I see it in my motion; have it not in
my tongue but yet hie you to Egypt again.
Ant. Say to me,
Whose fortunes shall rise higher, Cæsar's or mine?
Sooth. Cæsar's.

Therefore, O Antony, stay not by his side:
Thy dæmon (that 's thy spirit which keeps thee) is
Noble, courageous, high, unmatchable,
Where Cæsar's is not; but near him, thy angel
Becomes a Fear, as being o'erpowered: therefore
Make space enough between you.

Say to Ventidius I would speak with him:-
[Exit Soothsayer.

He shall to Parthia.-Be it art or hap,
He hath spoken true. The very dice obey him,
And in our sports my better cunning faints
Under his chance: if we draw lots, he speeds:
His cocks do win the battle still of mine
When it is all to nought; and his quails ever
Beat mine, inhooped, at odds. I will to Egypt:
And though I make this marriage for my peace
Enter VENTIDIUS.

I' the east my pleasure lies.-O! come, Ventidius,

Mar. As well as I can, madam.

Cleo. And when good will is shewed, though it come too short,

The actor may plead pardon.—I 'll none now :
Give me mine angle; we 'll to the river: there,
My music playing far off, I will betray
Tawny-finned fishes: my bended hook shall pierce
Their slimy jaws; and, as I draw them up,
I'll think them every one an Antony,
And say, "Ah, ah! you 're caught."

Cleo. I do not like "but yet;" it does allay The good precedence: fie upon "but yet:" "But yet" is as a gaoler to bring forth Some monstrous malefactor. Pr'y thee, friend, Pour out the pack of matter to mine ear, The good and bad together. He's friends with Cæsar,

In state of health, thou sayst; and thou sayst, free.

Mess. Free, madam! no; I made no such

report:

He's bound unto Octavia.