The triple pillar of the world transform'd Into a strumpet's fool: behold and see. Cleo. If it be love indeed, tell me how much. Ani. There's beggary in the love that can be reckon❜d. Ant. Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new earth. Enter an ATTENDANT. Att. News, my good lord, from Rome. Fulvia, perchance is angry: Or, who knows Ant. How, my love! Cleo. Perchance,-nay, and most like, You must not stay here longer, your dismission Is come from Cæsar; therefore hear it, Antony. Where's Fulvia's process!§ Cæsar's, I would say ?-Both ?- Cleo. Excellent Falsehood! Why did we marry Fulvia, and not love her ?- Will be himself. Ant. But stirr'd by Cleopatra. Now, for the love of Love, and her soft hours, [Embracing. Let's not confound** the time with conference harsh: There's not a minute of our lives should stretch Without some pleasure now: What sport to-night? Ant. Fie, wrangling queen! Whom everything becomes, to chide, to laugh, To weep; whose every passion fully strives To make itself, in thee, fair and admired! No messenger; but thine and all alone, To-night, we'll wander through the streets, and note Last night you did desire it :-Speak not to us. [Exeunt ANTONY and CLEOPATRA, with their train. *Bound, limit. § Summons. † Offends. Wide spread. ¶ To wit. Subdue, conquer. Dem. Is Cæsar with Antonius prized so slight? Dem. I'm full sorry, That he approves the common liar, who SCENE II.-The same. Another Room. [Exeunt. Enter CHARMIAN, IRAS, ALEXAS, and a SOOTHSAYER. Char. Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most anything Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where's the soothsayer that you praised so to the queen? O, that I knew this husband, which, you say, must charge his horns with garlands! Alex. Soothsayer. Sooth. Your will? Char. Is this the man ?-Is't you, Sir, that know things? A little I can read. Alex. Show him your hand. Enter ENOBARBUS. Eno. Bring in the banquet quickly; wine enough, Cleopatra's health to drink. Char. Good Sir, give me good fortune. Sooth. I make not, but foresee. Char. Pray then, foresee me one. Sooth. You shall be yet far fairer than you are. Char. He means, in flesh. Iras. No, you shall paint when you are old. Char. Wrinkles forbid ! Alex. Vex not his prescience; be attentive. Char. Hush! Sooth. You shall be more beloving, than beloved. Alex. Nay, hear him. Char. 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 Cæsar, and companion me with my mistress. Sooth. You shall outlive the lady whom you serve. Sooth. You have seen and proved a fairer former fortune Than that which is to approach. Char. Then, belike, my children shall have no names:† Pr'y thee, how many boys and wenches must I have? Sooth. If every of your wishes had a womb, And fertile every wish, a million. Char. Out, fool! I forgive thee for a witch. Alex. You think, none but your sheets are privy to your wishes. *Confirms fame, rumour. † Shall be bastards. Eno. Mine, and most of our fortunes, to-night, shall bedrunk to bed. Iras. There's a palm presages chastity, if nothing else. Char. Even as the overflowing Nilus presageth famine. Char. Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear.-Pr'ythee, tell her but a worky-day fortune. Sooth. Your fortunes are alike. Iras. But how, but how? give me particulars. Sooth. I have said. Iras. Am I not an inch of fortune better than she? Char. Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it? Iras. Not in my husband's nose. Char. 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, fifty-fold 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 heart-breaking 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! Char. Amen. Alex. Lo, now! if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores, but they'd do't. Eno. Hush! here comes Antony. Char. Not he, the queen. Cleo. He was disposed to mirth; but on the sudden A Roman thought hath struck him.-Enobarbus, Eno. Madam. Cleo. Seek him, and bring him hither. Where's Alexas? [Exeunt CLEOPATRA, ENOBARBUS, ALEXAS, IRAS, Mess. Ay: But soon that war had end, and the time's state Made friends of them, joining their force 'gainst Cæsar; Upon the first encounter, drave them. Ant. Well, What worst? Mess. The nature of bad news infects the teller. Mess. Labienus (This is stiff news) hath with his Parthian force, Extended* Asia from Euphrates; His conquering banner shook, from Syria To Lydia, and to Ionia; Whilst Ant. Antony, thou would'st say, Mess. O, my lord! Ant. Speak to me home, mince not the general tongue; Rail thou in Fulvia's phrase; and taunt my faults Mess. At your noble pleasure. Ant. From Sicyon how the news? Speak there. 1 Att. The man from Sicyon.-Is there such a one ? 2 Att. He stays upon your will. Ant. Let him appear, These strong Egyptian fetters I must break, Enter another MESSENGER. Or lose myself in dotage.-What are you? 2 Mess. Fulvia thy wife is dead. Ant. Where died she? 2 Mess. In Sicyon: Her length of sickness, with what else more serious Ant. Forbear me. [Exit. [Gives a letter. [Exit MESSENGER. There's a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it: The opposite of itself: she's good, being gone; * Seized. † Tilling. I. e. withdraw. § Could here means would. Enter ENOBARBUS. Eno. What's your pleasure, Sir ? Ant. I must with haste from hence. Eno. 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. Ant. I must be gone. Eno. 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. Ant. She is cunning past man's thought. Eno. 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 almanacks can report: this cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she makes a shower of rain as well as Jove. Ant. 'Would I had never seen her! Eno. O, Sir, you had then left unseen a wonderful piece of work; which not to have been blessed withal, would have discredited your travel. Ant. Fulvia is dead. Eno. Sir? Ant. Fulvia is dead. Ant. Dead. Eno. 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. Ant. The business she hath broach'd in the state, Cannot endure my absence. Eno. And the business you have broached here cannot be without you; especially that of Cleopatra's, which wholly depends on your abode. Ant. No more light answers. Let our officers *For much less matter. #Love's leave.) |