Cleo. Good my lord,

Ant. You have been a boggler ever :-
But when we in our viciousness grow hard,
(O misery on't!) the wise gods seal our eyes;
In our own filth drop our clear judgments; make us
Adore our errors; laugh at us, while we strut
To our confusion.

Cleo. O, is it come to this?

Ant. I found you as a morsel, cold upon
Dead Cæsar's trencher: nay, you were a fragment
Of Cneius Pompey's; besides what hotter hours,
Unregister'd in vulgar fame, you have
Luxuriously pick'd out :-For, I am sure,

Though you can guess what temperance should be,
You know not what it is.

Cleo. Wherefore is this?

Ant. To let a fellow that will take rewards,
And say, God quit you! be familiar with
My play fellow, your hand; this kingly seal,
And plighter of high hearts!--O, that I were
Upon the hill of Basan, to outroar

The horned herd!" for I have savage cause;
And to proclaim it civilly, were like

A halter'd neck, which does the hangman thank
For being yare about him.-Is he whipp'd?
Re-enter Attendants, with THYREUS.

1 Att. Soundly, my lord.

Ant. Cry'd he? and begg'd he pardon?

1 Att. He did ask favour.

Ant. If that thy father live, let him repent

Thou wast not made his daughter: and be thou sorry
To follow Cæsar in his triumph, since

Thou hast been whipp'd for following him: henceforth,
The white hand of a lady fever thee,

Shake thou to look on't.-Get thee back to Cæsar,
Tell him thy entertainment: Look, thou say,
He makes me angry with him: for he seems
Proud and disdainful; harping on what I am;
Not what he knew I was: he makes me angry;
And at this time most easy 'tis to do't;

[7] It is not without pity and indignation that the reader of this great poet meets so often with this low jest, which is too much a favourite to be left out of either mirth or fury. JOHNSON. The idea of the horned herd was caught from Psalm xxii. 12: "Many oxen are come about me: fat bulls of Basan close me in on every / side."

STEEVENS.

10

VOL. VIII.

G

When my good stars, that were my former guides,
Have empty left their orbs, and shot their fires
Into the abism of hell. If he mislike
My speech, and what is done; tell him, he has
Hipparchus, my enfranchis'd bondman, whom
He may at pleasure whip, or hang, or torture,
As he shall like, to quit me : Urge it thou:
Hence, with thy stripes, begone.
Cleo. Have you done yet?

Ant. Alack, our terrene moon

Is now eclips'd; and it portends alone
The fall of Antony !

Cleo. I must stay his time.

[Exit THYREUS.

Ant. To flatter Cæsar, would you mingle eyes With one that ties his points?

Cleo. Not know me yet?

Ant. Cold-hearted toward me?

Cleo. Ah, dear, if I be so,

From my cold heart let heaven engender hail,
And poison it in the source; and the first stone
Drop in my neck: as it determines, so
Dissolve my life! The next Cæsarion smite !!
Till, by degrees, the memory of my womb,
Together with my brave Egyptians all,
By the discandying of this pelleted storm,
Lie graveless; till the flies and gnats of Nile
Have buried them for prey!

Ant. I am satisfied:

Cæsar sits down in Alexandria; where

I will oppose his fate. Our force by land
Hath nobly held; our sever'd navy too

Have knit again, and fleet,' threat'ning most sea-like.
Where hast thou been, my heart ?-Dost thou hear, lady?

If from the field I shall return once more

To kiss these lips, I will appear in blood;

I and my sword will earn our chronicle;

There is hope in't yet.

Cleo. That's my brave lord!

Ant. I will be treble-sinew'd, hearted, breath'd, And fight maliciously for when mine hours

:

[8] To repay me this insult to requite me.

[9] Determines, that is, dissolves.

M. MASON.

JOHNSON.

STEEV.

Cesarion was son to Cleopatra by Julius Cesar.
Fleet is the old word for float. TYRWHITT.

Were nice and lucky, men did ransome lives
Of me for jests; but now, I'll set my teeth,
And send to darkness all that stop me.-Come,
Let's have one other gaudy night :' call to me
All my sad captains, fill our bowls; once more
Let's mock the midnight bell.

Cleo. It is my birth-day:

I had thought, to have held it poor; but, since my lord Is Antony again, I will be Cleopatra.

Ant. We'll yet do well.

Cleo. Call all his noble captains to my lord.

Ant. Do so, we'll speak to them; and to-night I'll force The wine peep through their scars.-Come on, my queen ; There's sap in't yet. The next time I do fight,

I'll make death love me; for I will contend

Even with his pestilent scythe.

[Exeunt ANT. CLEO. and Attend.

Eno. Now he'll out-stare the lightning. To be furious,

Is, to be frighted out of fear; and in that mood,

The dove will peck the estridge; and I see still,

A diminution in our captain's brain

Restores his heart. When valour preys on reason,
It eats the sword it fights with. I will seek
Some way to leave him.

[Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.-CÆSAR's Camp at Alexandria. Enter CÆSAR, reading a letter; AGRIPPA, MECENAS, and others.

Cas. He calls me boy; and chides, as he had power To beat me out of Egypt: my messenger

He hath whipp'd with rods; dares me to personal combat, Cæsar to Antony: Let the old ruffian know,

I have many other ways to die; mean time,

[3] Nice--seems to be, just fit for my purpose, agreeable to my wish. So we vulgarly say of any thing that is done better than was expected, it is nice. JOHNSON.

[4] This is still an epithet bestowed on feast days in the colleges of either univer sity. STEEVENS. Gawdy, or Grand Days in the Inns of court, are four in the year, Ascension day, Midsummer day, All-saints day, and Candlemas day. REED

Laugh at his challenge."

Mec. Cæsar must think,

When one so great begins to rage, he's hunted
Even to falling. Give him no breath, but now
Make boot of his distraction : Never anger
Made good guard for itself.

Cæs. Let our best heads

Know, that to-morrow the last of many battles
We mean to fight :-Within our files there are
Of those that serv'd Mark Antony but late,
Enough to fetch him in. See it be done;
And feast the army: we have store to do't,
And they have earn'd the waste.

Poor Antony !

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Alexandria. A Room in the Palace. Enter ANTONY, CLEOPATRA, ENOBARBUS, CHARMIAN, IRAS, ALEXAS, and others.

Ant. He will not fight with me, Domitius.

Eno. No.

Ant. Why should he not?

Eno. He thinks, being twenty times of better fortune, He is twenty men to one.

Ant. To-morrow, soldier,

By sea and land I'll fight: or I will live,

Or bathe my dying honour in the blood

Shall make it live again. Woo't thou fight well?
Eno. I'll strike; and cry, Take all.8

Ant. Well said; come on.

Call forth my household servants; let's to-night,

[5] What a reply is this to Antony's challenge? 'tis acknowledged that he should die under the unequal combat; but if we read--

He hath many other ways to die: mean time,

I laugh at his challenge.

In this reading we have poignancy, and the very repartee of Cæsar. Let's hear Plutarch. After this, Antony sent a challenge to Cesar, to fight him hand to hand, and received for answer, that he might find several other ways to end his life. UPTON. Most indisputably this is the sense of Plutarch, and given so in the modern transla. tions; but Shakespeare was misled by the ambiguity of the old one. [6] Read:

FARMER.

Cæsar needs must think.
Take advantage of JOHNSON.

RITSON.

[8] Let the survivor take all. No composition, victory or death.

JOHNSON.

Enter Servants.

Be bounteous at our meal.-Give me thy hand,
Thou hast been rightly honest ;-so hast thou ;-

And thou ;-and thou,--and thou :-you have serv'd me well,

And kings have been your fellows.

Cleo. What means this?

Eno. [Aside.] 'Tis one of those odd tricks, which sor-row shoots

Out of the mind.

Ant. And thou art honest too.

I wish, I could be made so many men ;
And all of you clapp'd up together in
An Antony; that I might do you service,
So good as you have done.

Serv. The gods forbid !

Ant. Well, my good fellows, wait on me to-night:
Scant not my cups; and make as much of me,
As when mine empire was your fellow too,

And suffer'd my command.

Cleo. What does he mean?

Eno. To make his followers weep.

Ant. Tend me to-night;

May be, it is the period of your duty;
Haply, you shall not see me morc; or if,
A mangled shadow perchance, to-morrow
You'll serve another master.
As one that takes his leave.

I look on you,
Mine honest friends,

I turn you not away; but, like a master
Married to your good service, stay till death:
Tend me to-night two hours, I ask no more,
And the gods yield you for't!

Eno. What mean you, sir,

To give them this discomfort? Look, they weep;
And I, an ass, am onion-ey'd :' for shame,

Transform us not to women.

Ant. Ho, ho, ho!2

[1] I have my eyes as full of tears as if they had been fretted by onions.

JOHNSON.

[2] That is, stop, or desist. So, in Chaucer, The Knightes Tale, v. 1706, edit.

1775:

"This duk his courser with his sporres smote,

And at a stert he was betwixt hem two,

And pulled out a swerd, and cried, ho!
No more, up peine of lesing of your hed."

And in Myrrour of good Manners, Ambition is compared to

"The sacke insatiable,

The sacke without bottome, which never can say ho."

H. WHITE.