PROCULEIUS

Cleopatra,

Do not abuse my master’s bounty by

Th’undoing of yourself. Let the world see

His nobleness well acted, which your death

Will never let come forth.

CLEOPATRA

Where art thou, death?

Come hither, come. Come, come, and take a queen

Worth many babes and beggars.

PROCULEIUS

O temperance, lady!

CLEOPATRA

Sir, I will eat no meat. I’ll not drink, sir.

If idle talk will once be necessary,

I’ll not sleep, neither. This mortal house I’ll ruin,

Do Caesar what he can. Know, sir, that I

Will not wait pinioned at your master’s court,

Nor once be chastised with the sober eye

Of dull Octavia. Shall they hoist me up

And show me to the shouting varletry

Of censuring Rome? Rather a ditch in Egypt

Be gentle grave unto me; rather on Nilus’ mud

Lay me stark naked, and let the waterflies

Blow me into abhorring; rather make

My country’s high pyramides my gibbet,

And hang me up in chains.

PROCULEIUS

You do extend

These thoughts of horror further than you shall

Find cause in Caesar.

Enter Dolabella

DOLABELLA

Proculeius,

What thou hast done thy master Caesar knows,

And he hath sent for thee. For the Queen,

I’ll take her to my guard.

PROCULEIUS

So, Dolabella,

It shall content me best. Be gentle to her.

(To Cleopatra) To Caesar I will speak what you shall

please,

If you’ll employ me to him.

CLEOPATRA

Say I would die.

Exit Proculeius

DOLABELLA

Most noble Empress, you have heard of me.

CLEOPATRA

I cannot tell.

DOLABELLA

Assuredly you know me.

CLEOPATRA

No matter, sir, what I have heard or known.

You laugh when boys or women tell their dreams;

Is’t not your trick?

DOLABELLA

I understand not, madam.

CLEOPATRA

I dreamt there was an Emperor Antony.

O, such another sleep, that I might see

But such another man!

DOLABELLA

If it might please ye—

CLEOPATRA

His face was as the heav‘ns, and therein stuck

A sun and moon, which kept their course and lighted

The little O o’th’ earth.

DOLABELLA

Most sovereign creature—

CLEOPATRA

His legs bestrid the ocean; his reared arm

Crested the world. His voice was propertied

As all the tuned spheres, and that to friends;

But when he meant to quail and shake the orb,

He was as rattling thunder. For his bounty,

There was no winter in’t; an autumn ’twas,

That grew the more by reaping. His delights

Were dolphin-like; they showed his back above

The element they lived in. In his livery

Walked crowns and crownets. Realms and islands were

As plates dropped from his pocket.

DOLABELLA

Cleopatra—

CLEOPATRA

Think you there was, or might be, such a man

As this I dreamt of?

DOLABELLA

Gentle madam, no.

CLEOPATRA

You lie, up to the hearing of the gods.

But if there be, or ever were one such,

It’s past the size of dreaming. Nature wants stuff

To vie strange forms with fancy; yet t‘imagine

An Antony were nature’s piece ’gainst fancy,

Condemning shadows quite.

DOLABELLA

Hear me, good madam: Your loss is as yourself, great, and you bear it

As answering to the weight. Would I might never

O’ertake pursued success but I do feel,

By the rebound of yours, a grief that smites

My very heart at root.

CLEOPATRA

I thank you, sir.

Know you what Caesar means to do with me?

DOLABELLA

I am loath to tell you what I would you knew.

CLEOPATRA

Nay, pray you, sir.

DOLABELLA

Though he be honourable—

CLEOPATRA

He’ll lead me then in triumph.

DOLABELLA

Madam, he will, I know’t.

Flourish. Enter Caesar, with Proculeius, Gallus, Maecenas, and others of his train

ALL

Make way, there! Caesar!

CAESAR

Which is the Queen of Egypt?

DOLABELLA (to Cleopatra)

It is the Emperor, madam.

Cleopatra kneels

CAESAR

Arise! You shall not kneel.

I pray you rise, rise, Egypt.

CLEOPATRA (rising)

Sir, the gods

Will have it thus. My master and my lord

I must obey.

CAESAR

Take to you no hard thoughts.

The record of what injuries you did us,

Though written in our flesh, we shall remember

As things but done by chance.

CLEOPATRA

Sole sir o’th’ world, I cannot project mine own cause so well

To make it clear, but do confess I have

Been laden with like frailties which before

Have often shamed our sex.

CAESAR

Cleopatra, know

We will extenuate rather than enforce.

If you apply yourself to our intents,

Which towards you are most gentle, you shall find

A benefit in this change; but if you seek

To lay on me a cruelty by taking

Antony’s course, you shall bereave yourself

Of my good purposes and put your children

To that destruction which I’ll guard them from,

If thereon you rely. I’ll take my leave.

CLEOPATRA

And may through all the world! ’Tis yours, and we,

Your scutcheons and your signs of conquest, shall

Hang in what place you please. (Giving a paper) Here,

my good lord.

CAESAR

You shall advise me in all for Cleopatra.

CLEOPATRA

This is the brief of money, plate, and jewels

I am possessed of. ’Tis exactly valued,