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Antony and Cleopatra: Act III, Scene 13

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Antony and Cleopatra
Act III, Scene 13

Alexandria. Cleopatra’s palace.

Byam Shaw, 1901

  1. Enter Cleopatra, Enobarbus, Charmian, and Iras.

Cleopatra

1
  1. What shall we do, Enobarbus?

Domitius Enobarbus

2
  1.                              Think, and die.

Cleopatra

3
  1. Is Antony or we in fault for this?

Domitius Enobarbus

4 - 13
  1. Antony only, that would make his will
  2. Lord of his reason. What though you fled
  3. From that great face of war, whose several ranges
  4. Frighted each other? Why should he follow?
  5. The itch of his affection should not then
  6. Have nick’d his captainship, at such a point,
  7. When half to half the world oppos’d, he being
  8. The mered question. ’Twas a shame no less
  9. Than was his loss, to course your flying flags,
  10. And leave his navy gazing.

Cleopatra

14
  1.                            Prithee peace.
  1. Enter the Ambassador with Antony.

Mark Antony

15
  1. Is that his answer?

Ambassador

16
  1. Ay, my lord.

Mark Antony

17 - 18
  1. The Queen shall then have courtesy, so she
  2. Will yield us up.

Ambassador

19
  1.                   He says so.

Mark Antony

20 - 23
  1.             Let her know’t.
  2. To the boy Caesar send this grizzled head,
  3. And he will fill thy wishes to the brim
  4. With principalities.

Cleopatra

24
  1.                      That head, my lord?

Mark Antony

25 - 33
  1. To him again, tell him he wears the rose
  2. Of youth upon him; from which the world should note
  3. Something particular. His coin, ships, legions,
  4. May be a coward’s, whose ministers would prevail
  5. Under the service of a child as soon
  6. As i’ th’ command of Caesar. I dare him therefore
  7. To lay his gay comparisons apart,
  8. And answer me declin’d, sword against sword,
  9. Ourselves alone. I’ll write it. Follow me.
  1. Exeunt Antony and Ambassador.

Domitius Enobarbus

34 - 42
  1. Aside.
  2. Yes, like enough! High-battled Caesar will
  3. Unstate his happiness, and be stag’d to th’ show
  4. Against a sworder! I see men’s judgments are
  5. A parcel of their fortunes, and things outward
  6. Do draw the inward quality after them,
  7. To suffer all alike. That he should dream,
  8. Knowing all measures, the full Caesar will
  9. Answer his emptiness! Caesar, thou hast subdu’d
  10. His judgment too.
  1. Enter First Egyptian Servant.

First Egyptian Servant

43
  1.                   A messenger from Caesar.

Cleopatra

44 - 46
  1. What, no more ceremony? See, my women,
  2. Against the blown rose may they stop their nose
  3. That kneel’d unto the buds. Admit him, sir.
  1. Exit First Egyptian Servant.

Domitius Enobarbus

47 - 52
  1. Aside.
  2. Mine honesty and I begin to square.
  3. The loyalty well held to fools does make
  4. Our faith mere folly; yet he that can endure
  5. To follow with allegiance a fall’n lord
  6. Does conquer him that did his master conquer,
  7. And earns a place i’ th’ story.
  1. Enter Thidias.

Cleopatra

53
  1.                                 Caesar’s will?

Thidias

54
  1. Hear it apart.

Cleopatra

55
  1.                None but friends: say boldly.

Thidias

56
  1. So haply are they friends to Antony.

Domitius Enobarbus

57 - 60
  1. He needs as many, sir, as Caesar has,
  2. Or needs not us. If Caesar please, our master
  3. Will leap to be his friend; for us, you know
  4. Whose he is we are, and that is Caesar’s.

Thidias

61 - 64
  1.                                           So.
  2. Thus then, thou most renown’d: Caesar entreats
  3. Not to consider in what case thou stand’st
  4. Further than he is Caesar.

Cleopatra

65
  1.                            Go on: right royal.

Thidias

66 - 67
  1. He knows that you embrace not Antony
  2. As you did love, but as you fear’d him.

Cleopatra

68
  1.                                         O!

Thidias

69 - 71
  1. The scars upon your honor, therefore, he
  2. Does pity, as constrained blemishes,
  3. Not as deserved.

Cleopatra

72 - 74
  1.                  He is a god and knows
  2. What is most right. Mine honor was not yielded,
  3. But conquer’d merely.

Domitius Enobarbus

75 - 78
  1. Aside.
  2.                       To be sure of that,
  3. I will ask Antony. Sir, sir, thou art so leaky
  4. That we must leave thee to thy sinking, for
  5. Thy dearest quit thee.
  1. Exit Enobarbus.

Thidias

79 - 86
  1.                        Shall I say to Caesar
  2. What you require of him? For he partly begs
  3. To be desir’d to give. It much would please him,
  4. That of his fortunes you should make a staff
  5. To lean upon; but it would warm his spirits
  6. To hear from me you had left Antony,
  7. And put yourself under his shroud,
  8. The universal landlord.

Cleopatra

87
  1.                         What’s your name?

Thidias

88
  1. My name is Thidias.

Cleopatra

89 - 94
  1.                     Most kind messenger,
  2. Say to great Caesar this in deputation:
  3. I kiss his conqu’ring hand. Tell him, I am prompt
  4. To lay my crown at ’s feet, and there to kneel.
  5. Tell him, from his all-obeying breath I hear
  6. The doom of Egypt.

Thidias

95 - 99
  1.                    ’Tis your noblest course.
  2. Wisdom and fortune combating together,
  3. If that the former dare but what it can,
  4. No chance may shake it. Give me grace to lay
  5. My duty on your hand.

Cleopatra

100 - 103
  1.                       Your Caesar’s father oft
  2. (When he hath mus’d of taking kingdoms in)
  3. Bestow’d his lips on that unworthy place,
  4. As it rain’d kisses.
  1. Enter Antony and Enobarbus.

Mark Antony

104 - 105
  1.                      Favors? By Jove that thunders!
  2. What art thou, fellow?

Thidias

106 - 108
  1.                        One that but performs
  2. The bidding of the fullest man, and worthiest
  3. To have command obey’d.

Domitius Enobarbus

109
  1. Aside.
  2.                         You will be whipt.

Mark Antony

110 - 115
  1. Calling for Servants.
  2. Approach there!—Ah, you kite!—Now gods and devils!
  3. Authority melts from me. Of late, when I cried “Ho!”
  4. Like boys unto a muss, kings would start forth
  5. And cry, “Your will?”—Have you no ears?—I am
  6. Antony yet.
  7. Enter First Egyptian Servant, others following.
  8.             Take hence this Jack and whip him.

Domitius Enobarbus

116 - 117
  1. Aside.
  2. ’Tis better playing with a lion’s whelp
  3. Than with an old one dying.

Mark Antony

118 - 124
  1.                             Moon and stars!
  2. Whip him. Were’t twenty of the greatest tributaries
  3. That do acknowledge Caesar, should I find them
  4. So saucy with the hand of she here—what’s her name,
  5. Since she was Cleopatra? Whip him, fellows,
  6. Till like a boy you see him cringe his face,
  7. And whine aloud for mercy. Take him hence.

Thidias

125
  1. Mark Antony—

Mark Antony

126 - 133
  1.              Tug him away. Being whipt,
  2. Bring him again; the Jack of Caesar’s shall
  3. Bear us an arrant to him.
  4. Exeunt Egyptian Servants with Thidias.
  5. You were half blasted ere I knew you; ha?
  6. Have I my pillow left unpress’d in Rome,
  7. Forborne the getting of a lawful race,
  8. And by a gem of women, to be abus’d
  9. By one that looks on feeders?
Sarah Bernhardt as Cleopatra

Sarah Bernhardt as Cleopatra

Georges Clairin, Selmar Hess, 1894

Cleopatra

134
  1.                               Good my lord—

Mark Antony

135 - 140
  1. You have been a boggler ever,
  2. But when we in our viciousness grow hard
  3. (O misery on’t!), the wise gods seel our eyes,
  4. In our own filth drop our clear judgments, make us
  5. Adore our errors, laugh at ’s while we strut
  6. To our confusion.

Cleopatra

141
  1.                   O, is’t come to this?

Mark Antony

142 - 148
  1. I found you as a morsel, cold upon
  2. Dead Caesar’s trencher; nay, you were a fragment
  3. Of Cneius Pompey’s—besides what hotter hours,
  4. Unregist’red in vulgar fame, you have
  5. Luxuriously pick’d out; for I am sure,
  6. Though you can guess what temperance should be,
  7. You know not what it is.

Cleopatra

149
  1.                          Wherefore is this?

Mark Antony

150 - 159
  1. To let a fellow that will take rewards
  2. And say “God quit you!” be familiar with
  3. My playfellow, your hand, this kingly seal
  4. And plighter of high hearts! O that I were
  5. Upon the hill of Basan, to outroar
  6. The horned herd! For I have savage cause,
  7. And to proclaim it civilly were like
  8. A halter’d neck which does the hangman thank
  9. For being yare about him.
  10. Enter First Egyptian Servant with Thidias.
  11.                           Is he whipt?

First Egyptian Servant

160
  1. Soundly, my lord.

Mark Antony

161
  1.                   Cried he? And begg’d ’a pardon?

First Egyptian Servant

162
  1. He did ask favor.

Mark Antony

163 - 181
  1. If that thy father live, let him repent
  2. Thou wast not made his daughter, and be thou sorry
  3. To follow Caesar in his triumph, since
  4. Thou hast been whipt for following him. Henceforth
  5. The white hand of a lady fever thee,
  6. Shake thou to look on’t. Get thee back to Caesar,
  7. Tell him thy entertainment. Look thou say
  8. He makes me angry with him; for he seems
  9. Proud and disdainful, harping on what I am,
  10. Not what he knew I was. He makes me angry,
  11. And at this time most easy ’tis to do’t:
  12. When my good stars, that were my former guides,
  13. Have empty left their orbs, and shot their fires
  14. Into th’ abysm of hell. If he mislike
  15. My speech and what is done, tell him he has
  16. Hipparchus, my enfranched bondman, whom
  17. He may at pleasure whip, or hang, or torture,
  18. As he shall like, to quit me. Urge it thou:
  19. Hence with thy stripes, be gone!
  1. Exit Thidias.

Cleopatra

182
  1. Have you done yet?

Mark Antony

183 - 185
  1.                    Alack, our terrene moon
  2. Is now eclips’d, and it portends alone
  3. The fall of Antony!

Cleopatra

186
  1.                     I must stay his time.

Mark Antony

187 - 188
  1. To flatter Caesar, would you mingle eyes
  2. With one that ties his points?

Cleopatra

189
  1.                                Not know me yet?

Mark Antony

190
  1. Cold-hearted toward me?

Cleopatra

191 - 200
  1.                         Ah, dear, if I be so,
  2. From my cold heart let heaven engender hail,
  3. And poison it in the source, and the first stone
  4. Drop in my neck; as it determines, so
  5. Dissolve my life! The next Caesarion smite,
  6. Till by degrees the memory of my womb,
  7. Together with my brave Egyptians all,
  8. By the discandying of this pelleted storm,
  9. Lie graveless, till the flies and gnats of Nile
  10. Have buried them for prey!

Mark Antony

201 - 210
  1.                            I am satisfied.
  2. Caesar sets down in Alexandria, where
  3. I will oppose his fate. Our force by land
  4. Hath nobly held; our sever’d navy too
  5. Have knit again, and fleet, threat’ning most sea-like.
  6. Where hast thou been, my heart? Dost thou hear, lady?
  7. If from the field I shall return once more
  8. To kiss these lips, I will appear in blood;
  9. I and my sword will earn our chronicle.
  10. There’s hope in’t yet.

Cleopatra

211
  1.                        That’s my brave lord!

Mark Antony

212 - 219
  1. I will be treble-sinew’d, hearted, breath’d,
  2. And fight maliciously; for when mine hours
  3. Were nice and lucky, men did ransom lives
  4. Of me for jests; but now I’ll set my teeth,
  5. And send to darkness all that stop me. Come,
  6. Let’s have one other gaudy night. Call to me
  7. All my sad captains, fill our bowls once more;
  8. Let’s mock the midnight bell.

Cleopatra

220 - 222
  1.                               It is my birthday,
  2. I had thought t’ have held it poor; but since my lord
  3. Is Antony again, I will be Cleopatra.

Mark Antony

223
  1. We will yet do well.

Cleopatra

224
  1. Call all his noble captains to my lord.

Mark Antony

225 - 229
  1. Do so, we’ll speak to them, and tonight I’ll force
  2. The wine peep through their scars. Come on, my queen,
  3. There’s sap in’t yet. The next time I do fight,
  4. I’ll make death love me; for I will contend
  5. Even with his pestilent scythe.
  1. Exeunt all but Enobarbus.

Domitius Enobarbus

230 - 236
  1. Now he’ll outstare the lightning: to be furious
  2. Is to be frighted out of fear, and in that mood
  3. The dove will peck the estridge; and I see still
  4. A diminution in our captain’s brain
  5. Restores his heart. When valor preys on reason,
  6. It eats the sword it fights with. I will seek
  7. Some way to leave him.
  1. Exit.
Page decoration from Duprant & Co. edition of Antony and Cleopatra

Page decoration from Duprant & Co. edition of Antony and Cleopatra

W. J. Rolfe, Paul Avril, 1891

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