Antony and Cleopatra

Antony and Cleopatra

ACT II SCENE II	Rome. The house of LEPIDUS.
	Enter DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS and LEPIDUS
LEPIDUS	Good Enobarbus, 'tis a worthy deed,
	And shall become you well, to entreat your captain
	To soft and gentle speech.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	I shall entreat him	5
	To answer like himself: if Caesar move him,
	Let Antony look over Caesar's head
	And speak as loud as Mars. By Jupiter,
	Were I the wearer of Antonius' beard,
	I would not shave't to-day.	10
LEPIDUS	'Tis not a time
	For private stomaching.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Every time
	Serves for the matter that is then born in't.
LEPIDUS	But small to greater matters must give way.	15
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Not if the small come first.
LEPIDUS	Your speech is passion:
	But, pray you, stir no embers up. Here comes
	The noble Antony.
	Enter MARK ANTONY and VENTIDIUS
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	And yonder, Caesar.	20
	Enter OCTAVIUS CAESAR, MECAENAS, and AGRIPPA
MARK ANTONY	If we compose well here, to Parthia:
	Hark, Ventidius.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	I do not know,
	Mecaenas; ask Agrippa.
LEPIDUS	Noble friends,	25
	That which combined us was most great, and let not
	A leaner action rend us. What's amiss,
	May it be gently heard: when we debate
	Our trivial difference loud, we do commit
	Murder in healing wounds: then, noble partners,	30
	The rather, for I earnestly beseech,
	Touch you the sourest points with sweetest terms,
	Nor curstness grow to the matter.
MARK ANTONY	'Tis spoken well.
	Were we before our armies, and to fight.	35
	I should do thus.
	Flourish
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Welcome to Rome.
MARK ANTONY	Thank you.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Sit.
MARK ANTONY	Sit, sir.	40
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Nay, then.
MARK ANTONY	I learn, you take things ill which are not so,
	Or being, concern you not.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	I must be laugh'd at,
	If, or for nothing or a little, I	45
	Should say myself offended, and with you
	Chiefly i' the world; more laugh'd at, that I should
	Once name you derogately, when to sound your name
	It not concern'd me.
MARK ANTONY	My being in Egypt, Caesar,	50
	What was't to you?
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	No more than my residing here at Rome
	Might be to you in Egypt: yet, if you there
	Did practise on my state, your being in Egypt
	Might be my question.	55
MARK ANTONY	How intend you, practised?
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	You may be pleased to catch at mine intent
	By what did here befal me. Your wife and brother
	Made wars upon me; and their contestation
	Was theme for you, you were the word of war.	60
MARK ANTONY	You do mistake your business; my brother never
	Did urge me in his act: I did inquire it;
	And have my learning from some true reports,
	That drew their swords with you. Did he not rather
	Discredit my authority with yours;	65
	And make the wars alike against my stomach,
	Having alike your cause? Of this my letters
	Before did satisfy you. If you'll patch a quarrel,
	As matter whole you have not to make it with,
	It must not be with this.	70
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	You praise yourself
	By laying defects of judgment to me; but
	You patch'd up your excuses.
MARK ANTONY	Not so, not so;
	I know you could not lack, I am certain on't,	75
	Very necessity of this thought, that I,
	Your partner in the cause 'gainst which he fought,
	Could not with graceful eyes attend those wars
	Which fronted mine own peace. As for my wife,
	I would you had her spirit in such another:	80
	The third o' the world is yours; which with a snaffle
	You may pace easy, but not such a wife.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Would we had all such wives, that the men might go
	to wars with the women!
MARK ANTONY	So much uncurbable, her garboils, Caesar	85
	Made out of her impatience, which not wanted
	Shrewdness of policy too, I grieving grant
	Did you too much disquiet: for that you must
	But say, I could not help it.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	I wrote to you	90
	When rioting in Alexandria; you
	Did pocket up my letters, and with taunts
	Did gibe my missive out of audience.
MARK ANTONY	Sir,
	He fell upon me ere admitted: then	95
	Three kings I had newly feasted, and did want
	Of what I was i' the morning: but next day
	I told him of myself; which was as much
	As to have ask'd him pardon. Let this fellow
	Be nothing of our strife; if we contend,	100
	Out of our question wipe him.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	You have broken
	The article of your oath; which you shall never
	Have tongue to charge me with.
LEPIDUS	Soft, Caesar!	105
MARK ANTONY	No,
	Lepidus, let him speak:
	The honour is sacred which he talks on now,
	Supposing that I lack'd it. But, on, Caesar;
	The article of my oath.	110
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	To lend me arms and aid when I required them;
	The which you both denied.
MARK ANTONY	Neglected, rather;
	And then when poison'd hours had bound me up
	From mine own knowledge. As nearly as I may,	115
	I'll play the penitent to you: but mine honesty
	Shall not make poor my greatness, nor my power
	Work without it. Truth is, that Fulvia,
	To have me out of Egypt, made wars here;
	For which myself, the ignorant motive, do	120
	So far ask pardon as befits mine honour
	To stoop in such a case.
LEPIDUS	'Tis noble spoken.
MECAENAS	If it might please you, to enforce no further
	The griefs between ye: to forget them quite	125
	Were to remember that the present need
	Speaks to atone you.
LEPIDUS	Worthily spoken, Mecaenas.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Or, if you borrow one another's love for the
	instant, you may, when you hear no more words of	130
	Pompey, return it again: you shall have time to
	wrangle in when you have nothing else to do.
MARK ANTONY	Thou art a soldier only: speak no more.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	That truth should be silent I had almost forgot.
MARK ANTONY	You wrong this presence; therefore speak no more.	135
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Go to, then; your considerate stone.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	I do not much dislike the matter, but
	The manner of his speech; for't cannot be
	We shall remain in friendship, our conditions
	So differing in their acts. Yet if I knew	140
	What hoop should hold us stanch, from edge to edge
	O' the world I would pursue it.
AGRIPPA	Give me leave, Caesar,--
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Speak, Agrippa.
AGRIPPA	Thou hast a sister by the mother's side,	145
	Admired Octavia: great Mark Antony
	Is now a widower.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Say not so, Agrippa:
	If Cleopatra heard you, your reproof
	Were well deserved of rashness.	150
MARK ANTONY	I am not married, Caesar: let me hear
	Agrippa further speak.
AGRIPPA	To hold you in perpetual amity,
	To make you brothers, and to knit your hearts
	With an unslipping knot, take Antony	155
	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,	160
	And all great fears, which now import their dangers,
	Would then be nothing: truths would be tales,
	Where now half tales be truths: her love to both
	Would, each to other and all loves to both,
	Draw after her. Pardon what I have spoke;	165
	For 'tis a studied, not a present thought,
	By duty ruminated.
MARK ANTONY	Will Caesar speak?
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Not till he hears how Antony is touch'd
	With what is spoke already.	170
MARK ANTONY	What power is in Agrippa,
	If I would say, 'Agrippa, be it so,'
	To make this good?
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	The power of Caesar, and
	His power unto Octavia.	175
MARK ANTONY	May I never
	To this good purpose, that so fairly shows,
	Dream of impediment! Let me have thy hand:
	Further this act of grace: and from this hour
	The heart of brothers govern in our loves	180
	And sway our great designs!
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	There is my hand.
	A sister I bequeath you, whom no brother
	Did ever love so dearly: let her live
	To join our kingdoms and our hearts; and never	185
	Fly off our loves again!
LEPIDUS	Happily, amen!
MARK ANTONY	I did not think to draw my sword 'gainst Pompey;
	For he hath laid strange courtesies and great
	Of late upon me: I must thank him only,	190
	Lest my remembrance suffer ill report;
	At heel of that, defy him.
LEPIDUS	Time calls upon's:
	Of us must Pompey presently be sought,
	Or else he seeks out us.	195
MARK ANTONY	Where lies he?
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	About the mount Misenum.
MARK ANTONY	What is his strength by land?
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	Great and increasing: but by sea
	He is an absolute master.	200
MARK ANTONY	So is the fame.
	Would we had spoke together! Haste we for it:
	Yet, ere we put ourselves in arms, dispatch we
	The business we have talk'd of.
OCTAVIUS CAESAR	With most gladness:	205
	And do invite you to my sister's view,
	Whither straight I'll lead you.
MARK ANTONY	Let us, Lepidus,
	Not lack your company.
LEPIDUS	Noble Antony,	210
	Not sickness should detain me.
	Flourish. Exeunt OCTAVIUS CAESAR, MARK ANTONY,and LEPIDUS
MECAENAS	Welcome from Egypt, sir.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Half the heart of Caesar, worthy Mecaenas! My
	honourable friend, Agrippa!
AGRIPPA	Good Enobarbus!	215
MECAENAS	We have cause to be glad that matters are so well
	digested. You stayed well by 't in Egypt.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Ay, sir; we did sleep day out of countenance, and
	made the night light with drinking.
MECAENAS	Eight wild-boars roasted whole at a breakfast, and	220
	but twelve persons there; is this true?
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	This was but as a fly by an eagle: we had much more
	monstrous matter of feast, which worthily deserved noting.
MECAENAS	She's a most triumphant lady, if report be square to
	her.	225
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	When she first met Mark Antony, she pursed up
	his heart, upon the river of Cydnus.
AGRIPPA	There she appeared indeed; or my reporter devised
	well for her.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	I will tell you.	230
	The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne,
	Burn'd on the water: the poop was beaten gold;
	Purple the sails, and so perfumed that
	The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver,
	Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made	235
	The water which they beat to follow faster,
	As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,
	It beggar'd all description: she did lie
	In her pavilion--cloth-of-gold of tissue--
	O'er-picturing that Venus where we see	240
	The fancy outwork nature: on each side her
	Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
	With divers-colour'd fans, whose wind did seem
	To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool,
	And what they undid did.	245
AGRIPPA	O, rare for Antony!
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	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	250
	Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands,
	That yarely frame the office. From the barge
	A strange invisible perfume hits the sense
	Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast
	Her people out upon her; and Antony,	255
	Enthroned i' 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.
AGRIPPA	Rare Egyptian!	260
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Upon her landing, Antony sent to her,
	Invited her to supper: she replied,
	It should be better he became her guest;
	Which she entreated: our courteous Antony,
	Whom ne'er the word of 'No' woman heard speak,	265
	Being barber'd ten times o'er, goes to the feast,
	And for his ordinary pays his heart
	For what his eyes eat only.
AGRIPPA	Royal wench!
	She made great Caesar lay his sword to bed:	270
	He plough'd her, and she cropp'd.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	I saw her once
	Hop forty paces through the public street;
	And having lost her breath, she spoke, and panted,
	That she did make defect perfection,	275
	And, breathless, power breathe forth.
MECAENAS	Now Antony must leave her utterly.
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Never; he will not:
	Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
	Her infinite variety: other women cloy	280
	The 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.
MECAENAS	If beauty, wisdom, modesty, can settle	285
	The heart of Antony, Octavia is
	A blessed lottery to him.
AGRIPPA	Let us go.
	Good Enobarbus, make yourself my guest
	Whilst you abide here.	290
DOMITIUS ENOBARBUS	Humbly, sir, I thank you.
	Exeunt