ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. LITERARY AND HISTORICAL NOTICE. THIS play is supposed to have been written in the year 1608; and some of its incidents may have been borrowed from a production of Daniel's, called "The Tragedie of Cleopatra," which was entered on the books of the Stationers' Company in the year 1593. It rapidly condenses the events of a considerable period, commencing with the triple partition of the empire at the death of Brutus, B. C. 41, and terminating with the final overthrow of the Ptolemean dynasty, B. C. 23. Its historical features are, upon the whole, accurately drawn ; and the sentiments of many of the characters are literally copied from Plutarch and other biographers.---An" tony's illicit connection with Cleopatra, his brutal treatment of the amiable Octavia, and his absurd assumption of despotic power in bequeathing the Roman provinces to a degraded progeny, were the ostensible grounds of the rupture which ended in his death, and united the whole extent of Roman conquest under one imperial sceptre. The character of Cleopatra, the fascinating, dexterous, and incontinent Egyptian, abounds in poetical beauty; and the rough soldier's description of her passage down the Cydnus, has ever been considered a luxuriant specimen of glowing oriental description. But it is in the portrait of Antony that the discriminating reader will chiefly discover the pencil of a master. It is a choice finish to the outline of his character, as given in the play of Julius Cesar. He was then "a masker and a reveller," of comely person, lively wit, and insinuating address :---but the fire of youth, and the dictates of ambition, restrained his licentious cravings within tolerable bounds. In the decline of life, and in the lap of voluptuousness, with wealth at his command, and monarchs at his footstool, we find him alternately playing the fool, the hero, or the barbarian, triding away the treasures of the East in sensuality and indolence, and destroying a noble army by cowardice and obstinacy. Still, the rays of inherent greatness occasionally gleam through a cloud of ignoble propensities, and glimmerings of Roman greatness partially reclaim a career of the most doting effeminacy. The philosophy of his mind, and the cool superiority of maturer years, are admirably pourtrayed in the first recriminatory scene with Octavius Cesar, who, notwithstanding the flattery of historians," was deceitful, meanspirited, proud, and revengeful."---Dr. Johnson says: "This play keeps curiosity always busy, and the pas sions always interested. The continual hurry of the action, the variety of incidents, and the quick succession of one passage to another, call the mind forwards without intermission from the first act to the last. But the power of delighting is derived principally from the frequent changes of the scene; for, except the feminine arts (some of which are too low) which distinguish Cleopatra, no character is very strongly discriminated. Upton, who did not easily miss what he desired to find, has discovered that the language of Antony is, with great skill and learning, made pompous and superb, according to his real practice. But I think his diction not distinguishable from that of others the most tumid speech in the play is that which Cesar makes to Antony." EROS, SCARUS, DERCETAS, DEMETRIUS, PHILO, MECENAS, DRAMATIS PERSONE. Cesar. Friends of Antony. ALEXAS, MARDIAN, SELEUCUS, and DIOMEDES, Attendants on Cleopatra. A SOOTHSAYER.-A CLOWN. CLEOPATRA, Queen of Egypt. OCTAVIA, Sister to Cesar, and wife to Antony. SCENE, changes to several Parts of the Roman Empire. Officers, Soldiers, Messengers, and other ACT I. Upon a tawny front: his captain's heart, SCENE 1.-Alexandria.-A Room in CLEO-The buckles on his breast, reneges all temper; PATRA'S Palace. Enter DEMETRIUS and PHILO. And is become the bellows and the fan • Renounces. 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. Att. News, my good lord, from Rome- Cleo. Nay, hear them, Antony: His powerful mandate to you, Do this, or this: Ant. How, my love! Cleo. Perchance,-nay, and most like, You must not stay here longer, your dismission Is come from Cesar; therefore hear it, Antony.Where's Fulvia's process ! Cesar's, I would say?-Both ? Call in the messengers.-As I am Egypt's queen, Thou blushest, Antony; and that blood of thine Is Cesar's homager; else so thy cheek pays shame, When shrill-tongu'd Fulvia scolds-The mes sengers. Ant. Let Rome in Tyber melt! and the wide arch Of the rang'd empire fall! Here is my space : [Embracing. And such a twain can do't, in which, I bind Cleo. Excellent falsehold! Why did he marry Fulvia, and not love her ?— Ant. But stirr'd 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 stretch Without some pleasure now: What sport to night? Cleo. Hear the ambassadors. Whom every thing becomes, to chide, to laugh, Dem. I'm full sorry, That he approves the common liar, ++ who Sooth. In nature's infinite book of secrecy, A little I can read. Alex. Show him your hand. Enter ENOBARBUS. Eno. Bring in the banquet quickly; wine Cleopatra's health to drink. Char. Good Sir, give me good fortune. enough, Sooth. You shall be yet far fairer than you are. Char. He means, in flesh. Iras. No, you shall paint when you are old. Alex. Vex not his prescience: be attentive. Sooth. You shall be more beloving than be. loved. Char. I had rather heat my liver with drinking. 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 Cesar, and companion me with my mistress. Sooth. You shall outlive the lady whom you serve. Char. O excellent! I love long life better than figs. + 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'ythee, 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. Char. Nay, come, tell fras her's. Alex. We'll know all our fortunes. Eno. Mine, and most of our fortunes, to-night, shall be-drunk to bed. Iras. There's a palm presages chastity, if nothing else. Char. Even as the overflowing Nilus presageth famine. Iras. Go, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay. 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.-Oh! 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 Therefore, dear Isis, keep decorum, and fortune sorrow to behold a foul knave uncuckolded. him accordingly! Vulgarly esteemed the fiercest and proudest monarch of antiquity. † A common proverb. 1 Sha be bastards. An Egyptian godess. Mess. Labienus (This is stiff news) hath, with his Parthian force, His conquering banner shook, from Syria Whilst Ant. Antony, thou would'st say,- Ant. Speak to me home; mince not the There's a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it : on. I must from this enchanting queen break off; Enter ENOBARBUS. Eno. What's your pleasure, Sir? Ant. I must with haste from hence. Eno. Why, then, we h. 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 ber 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. Eno. Fulvia? 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 ge- to be lamented: this grief is crowned with consolation-your old stock brings forth a new petticoat-and indeed the tears live in an onion, that should water this sorrow. Name Cleopatra as she's call'd in Rome; When our quick winds + lie still; and our ills told Ant. The business she hath broached in the Cannot endure my absence. [state 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 Which, like the courser's hair, hath yet but life, Upon far less reason. • Expedition. : Leave. Horse's hair, aropt into putrid water, was supposed to turn into an animal. Char. I did not see him since. Cleo. See where he is, who's with him, what he does : I did not send you; -If you find him sad, You do not hold the method to enforce Cleo. What should I do, I do not? Cleo. Thou teachest like a fool lose him. cross him the way to Ant. Cleopatra, Cleo. Why should I think you can be mine, and true, Though you in swearing shake the thronged gods, Who have been false to Fulvia? Riotous madness, To be entangled with those mouth-made vows, Which break themselves in swearing! Ant. Most sweet queen, Cleo. Nay, pray you, seek no colour for your going, [ing, But bid farewell, and go when you sued stay. 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 poor, Breeds scrupulous faction: The hated, grown to my Cleo. Though age from folly could not give me freedom, It does from childishness :-Can Fulvia die ? + Look here, and, at thy sovereign leisure, read Cleo. O most false love! Where be the sacred vials thou should'st fill Cleo. Cut my lace, Charmian, come ;- Ant. My precious queen, forbear; And give true evidence to his love, which stands An honourable trial. Cleo. So Fulvia told me. I pr'ythee turn aside, and weep for her; Ant. You'll heat my blood; no more. Cleo. You can do better yet; but this is meetly. Ant. Now, by my sword, Cleo. And target,-Still he mends; But this is not the best: Look, pr'ythee, Charmian, How this Herculean Roman does become Ant. I'll leave, you, lady. Cleo. Courteous lord, one word. Sir, you and I must part,-but that's not it: Ant. But that your royalty Holds idleness your subject, I should take you Cleo. 'Tis sweating labour, To bear such idleness so near the heart Ant. Let us go. Come: Our separation so abides, and flies, SCENE IV.-Rome.-An apartment in Enter OCTAVIUS CESAR, LEPIDUS, and Atten dants. Ces. You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know, It is not Cesar's natural vice to hate One great competitor : from Alexandria Render my going agreeable. Can Fulvia be dead? The commotion she occasioned. Obliv ous memory. 1 Associate or partner. This is the news-He fishes, drinks, and wastes Yea, like the stag, when snow the pasture sheets, The lamps of night in revel: is not more man-The barks of trees thou browsed'st; on the Alps like Than Cleopatra; nor the queen Ptolemy A mau, who is the abstract of all faults Lep. I must not think there are Ces. You are too indulgent: let us grant, it is every hour, Most noble Cesar, shalt thou have report Ces. I should have known no less :- Mess. Cesar, I bring thee word, Menecrates and Menas, famous pirates, Make the sea serve them which they ear ** and wound With keels of every kind: Many hot inroads revolt : It is reported, thou did'st eat strange flesh, Lep. It is pity of him. Ces. Let his shames quickly Drive him to Rome: 'Tis time we twain Lep. To-morrow, Cesar, 1 shall be furnish'd to inform you rightly Both what by sea and land I can be able, To 'front this present time. Ces. Till which encounter, It is my business too. Farewell. Lep. Farewell, my lord: What you shall know mean time Of stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, Sir, To let me be partaker. Ces. Doubt not, Sir; I knew it for my bond.⚫ [Exeunt. Cleo. 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 The demi-Atlas of this earth, the arm For so he calls me: Now I feed myself Cesar, When thou wast here above the ground, I was There would he anchor his aspéct, and die Enter ALEXAS. Alex. Sovereign of Egypt, hail! • My bounden duty. Unmanned. ↑ A sleepy potion. A helmet. |