ACT.. SCENE I.-Alexandria. A Room in CLEOPATRA'S || Flourish. Enter ANTONY, and Cleopatra, with Palace. their Trains; Eunuchs fanning her. Take but good note, and you shall see in him Cleo. If it be love indeed, tell me how much. Ant. There's beggary in the love that can be reckon'd. Cleo. I'll set a bourn how far to be belov'd. Ant. Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new earth. Enter an Attendant. 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 admir'd! No messenger; but thine and all alone, To-night we'll wander through the streets, and note The qualities of people. Come, my queen; Last night you did desire it :- Speak not to us. [Exeunt ANTONY, and CLEOPATRA, with their Train. Dem. Is Cæsar with Antonius priz'd so slight ? He comes too short of that great property Dem. I'm full sorry That he approves the common liar, who [Exeunt. SCENE II. The Same. Another Room. 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? Enter ENOBARBUS. Eno. Bring in the banquet quickly; wine enos Cleopatra's health to drink. Char. Good sir, give me good fortune. Iras. No, you shall paint when you are old. Alex. Vex not his prescience; be attentive. Char. Hush! Sooth. You shall be more beloving than belo Char. I had rather heat my liver with drinking Alex. Nay, hear him. Char. Good now, some excellent fortune! LA me be married to three kings in a forenoon, as widow them all: let me have a child at fifty, ba whom Herod of Jewry may do homage: find to marry me with Octavius Cæsar, and compan me with my mistress. Sooth. You shall outlive the lady whom you serve Char. O excellent! I love long life better tha figs. Sooth. You have seen and prov'd a fairer former fortune Than that which is to approach. Char. Then, belike my children shall have names: Prithee, how many boys and wenches mas 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. Char. Nay, come, tell Iras hers. Eno. Mine, and most of our fortunes, to-night. shall be drunk to bed. Iras. There's a palm presages chastity, if noth ing else. Char. Even as the o'erflowing Nilus presageth famine. Sooth. I have said. Iras. Am I not an inch of fortune better than she? better than I, where would you choose it! Char. Our worser thoughts heavens mend! Alexas, come, his fortune, his fortune!-0, 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! Char. Is this the man?-Is't you, sir, that know the people! for, as it is a heart-breaking to see & things? Sooth. In nature's infinite book of secrecy A little I can read. Iras. Amen. Dear goddess, hear that prayer of 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! Ch Ale me a vat th E Ch But soon that war had end, and the time's state Whose better issue in the war, from Italy, Ant. Well, what worst? Mess. The nature of bad news infects the teller. Ant. 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 flatter'd. Mess. Labienus (This is stiff news) hath, with his Parthian force, Extended Asia from Euphrates; His conquering banner shook from Syria Ant. Antony, thou wouldst say,- O, my lord! Ant. Speak to me home, mince not the general tongue; Name Cleopatra as she's call'd in Rome: Have power to utter. O, then we bring forth weeds When our quick minds lie still; and our ills told us, brings forth a new petticoat:-and, indeed, the ten live in an onion that should water this sorrow. A Ant. The business she hath broached in the state Som Cannot endure my absence. I sav A C 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 almanacs can To Eno. And the business you have broached her breeding, Char. Madam, methinks, if you did love him You do not hold the method to enforce Cleo. What should I do I do not! Char. In each thing give him way, cross him in nothing. Cleo. Thou teachest like a fool: the way to lose him. Char. Tempt him not so too far: I wish, forbear; report: this cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she In time we hate that which we often fear. 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 wonder ful 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. Eno. Fulvia? Ant. Dead. Now, my dearest queen, - 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 || I have no power upon you; hers you are. What says the married woman? - You may go; |