Read Antony and Cleopatra Online
Authors: William Shakespeare
To Iras
Exeunt
Location: near Misena (Misenum), a port in southern Italy
Flourish. Enter Pompey at one door, with
Drum and Trumpet
, at another, Caesar, Lepidus, Antony, Enobarbus, Maecenas, Agrippa, Menas with Soldiers marching
POMPEY
Your hostages I have, so have you mine,
And we shall talk before we fight.
CAESAR
Most
meet
3
That first we come to words, and therefore have we
Our written
purposes
5
before us sent,
Which, if thou hast considered, let us know
If ’twill
tie up
7
thy discontented sword
And carry back to Sicily much
tall
8
youth
That
else
9
must perish here.
POMPEY
To you all three,
The
senators alone
11
of this great world,
Chief
factors
12
for the gods: I do not know
Wherefore
13
my
father
should revengers
want
,
Having a son and friends, since Julius Caesar,
Who at Philippi the good Brutus
ghosted
15
,
There saw you labouring for him. What was’t
That
moved
17
pale Cassius to conspire? And what
Made the all-honoured,
honest
18
Roman, Brutus,
With the armed rest,
courtiers
19
of beauteous freedom,
To
drench
20
the
Capitol
20
, but that they would
Have
one man
21
but a man? And that is it
Hath made me rig my navy, at whose burden
The angered ocean foams, with which I meant
To
scourge
24
th’ingratitude that
despiteful
Rome
Cast on my noble father.
CAESAR
Take your time.
ANTONY
Thou canst not
fear
27
us, Pompey, with thy sails.
We’ll
speak
28
with thee at sea. At land thou know’st
How much we do
o’er-count
29
thee.
POMPEY
At land indeed
Thou dost
o’er-count
me of my father’s house
31
:
But since the
cuckoo builds not for himself
32
,
Remain in’t
as thou mayst
33
.
LEPIDUS
Be pleased to tell us —
For this is
from the present
35
— how you
take
The offers we have sent you.
CAESAR
There’s the point.
ANTONY
Which do not be
entreated to
38
, but
weigh
What it is worth
embraced
39
.
CAESAR
And
what may follow,
To try a larger fortune
40
.
POMPEY
You have made me offer
Of Sicily, Sardinia, and I must
Rid all the sea of pirates. Then to send
Measures of wheat to Rome: this ’greed upon
To
part
46
with
unhacked edges
, and bear back
Our
targes
47
undinted
.
CAESAR, ANTONY
and
LEPIDUS
That’s our offer.
POMPEY
Know, then,
I came before you here a man prepared
To take this offer. But Mark Antony
Put me to some impatience, though I lose
The
praise of
53
it by telling. You
must
know
When Caesar and your brother were at blows,
Your mother came to Sicily and did find
Her welcome friendly.
ANTONY
I have heard it, Pompey,
And am well
studied
58
for a liberal thanks
Which I do owe you.
POMPEY
Let me have your hand:
They shake hands
I did not think, sir, to have met you here.
ANTONY
The beds i’th’east are soft, and thanks to you,
That called me
timelier
63
than
my purpose
hither,
For I have gained by’t.
CAESAR
Since I saw you last, there’s a change upon you.
POMPEY
Well, I know not
What
counts
67
harsh fortune casts upon my face,
But
in my bosom shall she never come
To make my heart her vassal
68
.
LEPIDUS
Well met here.
POMPEY
I hope so, Lepidus. Thus we are agreed:
I crave our
composition
72
may be written
And
sealed between us
73
.
CAESAR
That’s the next to do.
POMPEY
We’ll feast each other ere we part, and let’s
Draw lots who shall begin.
ANTONY
That will I, Pompey.
POMPEY
No, Antony,
take the lot
78
: but,
first
Or last
, your fine Egyptian cookery
Shall
have the fame
80
. I have heard that Julius Caesar
Grew fat with feasting there
81
.
ANTONY
You have heard much.
POMPEY
I have
fair
83
meanings, sir.
ANTONY
And fair words to them
84
.
POMPEY
Then so much have I heard,
And I have heard,
Apollodorus
86
carried—
ENOBARBUS
No more of that: he did so.
POMPEY
What, I pray you?
ENOBARBUS
A certain queen to Caesar in a mattress.
POMPEY
I know thee now. How
far’st
90
thou, soldier?
ENOBARBUS
Well,
And well am like to do, for I perceive
Four feasts are
toward
93
.
POMPEY
Let me shake thy hand.
They shake hands
I never hated thee: I have seen thee fight,
When I have envied thy
behaviour
96
.
ENOBARBUS
Sir,
I never loved you much, but I ha’ praised ye
When you have well deserved ten times as much
As I have said you did.
POMPEY
Enjoy thy
plainness
101
,
It
nothing ill becomes
102
thee.
Aboard my
galley
103
I invite you all.
Will you lead, lords?
CAESAR, ANTONY
and
LEPIDUS
Show’s the way, sir.
POMPEY
Come.
Exeunt. Enobarbus and Menas remain
MENAS
Thy father, Pompey, would ne’er have made
Aside
this treaty.—You and I have
known
108
, sir.
To Enobarbus
ENOBARBUS
At sea, I think.
MENAS
We have, sir.
ENOBARBUS
You have done well by water.
MENAS
And you by land.
ENOBARBUS
I will praise any man that will praise me, though it
cannot be denied what I have done by land.
MENAS
Nor what I have done by water.
ENOBARBUS
Yes, something you can deny for your own safety:
you have been a great thief by sea.
MENAS
And you by land.
ENOBARBUS
There I deny my land service. But give me your
hand, Menas. If our eyes had authority,
They shake hands
here they might
take
121
two
thieves
kissing.
MENAS
All men’s faces are
true
122
, whatsome’er their hands
are.
ENOBARBUS
But there is never a fair woman has a
true
124
face.
MENAS
No slander. They steal hearts.
ENOBARBUS
We came hither to fight with you.
MENAS
For my part, I am sorry it is turned to a drinking.
Pompey doth this day laugh away his fortune.
ENOBARBUS
If he do, sure he cannot weep’t back again.
MENAS
You’ve
said
130
, sir. We
looked not for
Mark Antony
here. Pray you, is he married to Cleopatra?
ENOBARBUS
Caesar’s sister is called Octavia.
MENAS
True, sir, she was the wife of Caius Marcellus.
ENOBARBUS
But she is now the wife of Marcus Antonius.
MENAS
Pray ye, sir?
135
ENOBARBUS
’Tis true.
MENAS
Then is Caesar and he forever knit together.
ENOBARBUS
If I were bound to
divine
138
of this unity, I would not
prophesy so.
MENAS
I think the
policy of that purpose made more in
140
the
marriage than the love of the parties.
ENOBARBUS
I think so too. But you shall find, the
band
142
that
seems to tie their friendship together will be the very
strangler of their amity: Octavia is of a holy,
cold and still
144
conversation
145
.
MENAS
Who would not have his wife so?
ENOBARBUS
Not he that himself is not so, which is Mark
Antony. He will to his
Egyptian dish
148
again: then shall the
sighs of Octavia
blow the fire up
149
in Caesar, and — as I said
before — that which is the strength of their amity shall
prove the immediate
author
151
of their
variance
. Antony will
use his affection where it is
152
. He married but his
occasion
here.
MENAS
And thus it may be. Come, sir, will you aboard? I
have a
health
155
for you.
ENOBARBUS
I shall take it, sir: we have used our throats in
Egypt.
MENAS
Come, let’s away.
Exeunt
Location: on board Pompey’s galley, off Misena (Misenum) in southern Italy
Music plays. Enter two or three Servants with a
banquet
FIRST SERVANT
Here they’ll be, man. Some o’their
plants
1
are ill-rooted
already: the least wind i’th’world will blow them
down.
SECOND SERVANT
Lepidus is
high-coloured
4
.
FIRST SERVANT
They have made him drink
alms-drink
5
.
SECOND SERVANT
As they
pinch one another by the disposition
6
,
he cries out ‘No more’, reconciles them to his entreaty, and
himself to th’drink.
FIRST SERVANT
But it raises the greater war between him and his
discretion
10
.
SECOND SERVANT
Why, this it is to
have a name in great men’s
fellowship
11
: I had
as lief
12
have a reed that will do me no service
as a
partisan
13
I could not
heave
.
FIRST SERVANT
To be called into a huge
sphere
and not to be
seen to move in’t, are the holes where eyes should be, which
pitifully
16
disaster the cheeks
14
.
A
sennet
sounded. Enter Caesar, Antony, Pompey, Lepidus, Agrippa, Maecenas, Enobarbus, Menas, with other Captains
[
and a Boy Singer
]
ANTONY
Thus do they, sir: they
take
17
the flow o’th’Nile
By certain
scales
18
i’th’pyramid
. They know,
By th’height, the lowness, or the
mean
19
, if
dearth
Or
foison
20
follow. The higher Nilus swells,
The more it promises. As it ebbs, the seedsman
Upon the slime and
ooze
22
scatters his grain,
And shortly comes to harvest.