SCENE II.

The same. Another room.

Enter Charmian, Iras, Alexas, and a Soothsayer.

Char. Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most any thing 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 change his horns with garlands !

Alex. Soothsayer.

Sooth. Your will?

Char. Is this the man?-Is't you, sir, that know things?

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 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. Char. I had rather heat my liver with drinking. Alex. Nay, hear him.

Let

Char. Good now, some excellent fortune! 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. 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. Aler. You think, noue but your sheets are privy to your wishes.

Char. Nay, come, tell Iras hers.

Alex. We'll know all our fortunes.

Eno. Mine, and most of our fortunes, to-night, shall be drunk to bed.

Irus. There's a palm presages chastity, if nothing else.

Char. Even as the o'erflowing 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.

lras. 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 be

Shall be bastards.

seech 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.

Cleo. He was dispos'd to mirth; but on the sud

den

A Roman thought hath struck him.-Enobarbus,Eno. Madam.

Cleo. Seek him, and bring him hither. Where's

Alexas?

Alex. Here, madam, at your service.-My lord approaches.

Enter Antony, with a Messenger and Attendants.
Cleo. We will not look upon him: Go with us.
[Exeunt Cleopatra, Enobarbus, Alexas, Iras,
Charmian, Soothsayer, and Attendants.

An Egyptian goddess.

Mess. Fulvia thy wife first came into the field.
Ant. Against my brother Lucius?

Mess. Ay:

But soon that war had end, and the time's state

Made friends of them, joining their force 'gainst

Cæsar;

Whose better issue in the war, from Italy,

Upon the first encounter, drave them.

Ant.

What worst?

Well,

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

To Lydia, and to Ionia;

Whilst

Ant.

Mess.

Antony, thou would'st say,

O, my lord!

Ant. Speak to me home, mince not the general tongue;

Name Cleopatra as she's call'd in Rome:
Rail thou in Fulvia's phrase; and taunt my faults
With such full licence, as both truth and malice
Have power to utter. O, then we bring forth weeds,
When our quick winds + lie still; and ourills told us,
Is as our earingt. Fare thee well a while.

Mess. At your noble pleasure.

[Exit.

Ant. From Sicyon how the news? Speak there.

1 Att. The man from Sicyon.-Is there such an

one?

2 Att. He stays § upon your will.

• Seized.

+ In some editions minds.

Tilling, ploughing; prepares us to produce good § Waits.

seed.

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.

2 Mess. In Sicyon:

Where died she?

Her length of sickness, with what else more serious Importeth thee to know, this bears, [Gives a letter. Forbear me.[Exit Messenger.

Ant.

There's a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it:
What our contempts do often hurl from us,
We wish it ours again; the present pleasure,
By revolution lowering, does become

The opposite of itself: she's good, being gone;
The hand could pluck her back, that shov'd her on.
I must from this enchanting queen break off;
Ten thousand harms, more than the ills I know,
My idleness doth hatch-How now! Enobarbus!

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.