Confin'd in all she has, her monument, CES. 8 Bid her have good heart; She soon shall know of us, by some of ours, How honourable and how kindly we Determine for her: for Cæsar cannot live To be ungentle 9. MESS. So the gods preserve thee! [Exit. Lest, in her greatness, by some mortal stroke Would be eternal in our triumph': Go, And, with your speediest, bring us what she says, And how you find of her. PRO. Cæsar, I shall. [Exit PROCULEIUS. Ægyptian," that is, “ yet a servant of the Queen of Egypt," though soon to become a subject of Rome. JOHNSON. 8 HOW HONOURABLE and how kindly we-] Our author often uses adjectives adverbially. So, in Julius Cæsar: See 66 Young man, thou could'st not die more honourable." p. 228. The modern editors, however, all read-honourably. MALONE. 9 - for Cæsar cannot LIVE To be ungentle.] The old copy has leave. Mr. Pope made the emendation. MALOne. I - her life in Rome Would be ETERNAL IN our triumph :] Hanmer reads, judiciously enough, but without necessity: "Would be eternalling our triumph." The sense is, "If she dies here, she will be forgotten, but if I send her in triumph to Rome, her memory and my glory will be eternal." JOHNSON. The following passage in The Scourge of Venus, &c. a poem, 1614, will sufficiently support the old reading: "If some foule-swelling ebon cloud would fall, STEEVENS. CES. Gallus, go you along.—Where's Dolabella, To second Proculeius? [Exit GALLUS. CES. Let him alone, for I remember now [Exeunt. SCENE II. Alexandria. A Room in the Monument. Enter CLEOPATra2, Charmian, and Iras. 2 Enter Cleopatra, &c.] Our author, here, (as in King Henry VIII. Act V. Sc. I.) has attempted to exhibit at once the outside and the inside of a building. It would be impossible to represent this scene in any way on the stage, but by making Cleopatra and her attendants speak all their speeches, till the queen is seized, within the monument. 3 4 fortune's KNANE,] The servant of fortune. And it is great To do that thing that ends all other deeds; MALONE. Which shackles accidents, and bolts up change; JOHNSON. Which sleeps, and never palates more the DUNG, The beggar's nurse and Cæsar's.] The difficulty of the passage, if any difficulty there be, arises only from this, that the act Enter, to the Gates of the Monument, PROCULEIUS, GALLUS, and Soldiers. PRO. Cæsar sends greeting to the queen of Egypt; of suicide, and the state which is the effect of suicide, are confounded. Voluntary death, says she, is an act which bolts up change; it produces a state, "Which sleeps, and never palates more the dung, "The beggar's nurse and Cæsar's." Which has no longer need of the gross and terrene sustenance, in the use of which Cæsar and the beggar are on a level. The speech is abrupt, but perturbation in such a state is surely natural. JOHNSON. "The beggar's nurse and Cæsar's" means, I apprehend, ‘death,' (as Warburton has observed, in a note which I have restored,) and not, as Johnson supposed, the gross substance on which Cæsar and the beggar were fed. BOSWELL. It has been already said in this play, that 66 our dungy earth alike "Feeds man as beast And Mr. Tollet observes, "that in Herodotus, b. iii. the Æthiopian king, upon hearing a description of the nature of wheat, replied, that he was not at all surprized, if men, who eat nothing but dung, did not attain a longer life." Shakspeare has the same epithet in The Winter's Tale: 66 - the face to sweeten "Of the whole dungy earth Again, in Timon: " "That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen The action of suicide is here said to shackle accidents; to bolt up change; to be the beggar's nurse and Cæsar's. So far the description is intelligible. But when it is said that it sleeps and never palates more the dung, we find neither sense nor propriety : which is occasioned by the loss of a whole line between the third and fourth, and the corrupt reading of the last word in the fourth. We should read the passage thus: 66 And it is great "To do the thing that ends all other deeds; "Which shackles accidents, and bolts up change; 66 [Lulls wearied nature to a sound repose ;] "Which sleeps, and never palates more the dugg: "The beggar's nurse and Cæsar's." That this line in hooks was the substance of that lost, is evi dent from its making sense of all the rest: which are to this ef And bids thee study on what fair demands CLEO. [Within.] PRO. My name is Proculeius. CLEO. [Within.] What's thy name? Antony Did tell me of you, bade me trust you; but I do not greatly care to be deceiv'd, That have no use for trusting. If your master Would have a queen his beggar, you must tell him, No less beg than a kingdom: if he please Be of good cheer; PRO. You are fallen into a princely hand, fear nothing: Make your full reference freely to my lord, Who is so full of grace, that it flows over On all that need: Let me report to him Your sweet dependancy; and you shall find A conqueror, that will pray in aid for kindness", Where he for grace is kneel'd to. CLEO. [Within.] Pray you, tell him I am his fortune's vassal, and I send him The greatness he has got 7. I hourly learn fect. "It is great to do that which frees us from all the accidents of humanity, lulls our over-wearied nature to repose, (which now sleeps and has no more appetite for worldly enjoyments,) and is equally the nurse of Cæsar and the beggar." WARBURTON. 5 He gives me so much of mine own, as I Will kneel to him with thanks.] I would read-and I, instead of as I. M. MASON. I believe the old reading to be the true one. STEEVENS. Praying in aid is a term used for a petition made in a court of justice for the calling in of help from another that hath an interest in the cause in quesHANMER. 6 that WILL PRAY IN AID for kindness,] tion. 7 send him The greatness he has got.] I allow him to be my conqueror; I own his superiority with complete submission. JOHNSON. A doctrine of obedience; and would gladly PRO. GAL. You see how easily she may be surpriz'd; A kindred idea seems to occur in The Tempest: "Then, as my gift, and thy own acquisition, "Worthily purchas'd, take my daughter." STEEVENS. Johnson has mistaken the meaning of this passage, nor will the words bear the construction he gives them. It appears to me, that by the greatness he has got, she means her crown which he has won; and I suppose that when she pronounces these words, she delivers to Proculeius either her crown, or some other ensign or royalty. M. MASON. 8 In the old copy there is no stage-direction. That which is now inserted is formed on the old translation of Plutarch: "Proculeius came to the gates that were very thicke and strong, and surely barred; but yet there were some cranews through the which her voyce might be heard, and so they without understood that Cleopatra demaunded the kingdome of Egypt for her sonnes : and that Proculeius aunswered her, that she should be of good cheere and not be affrayed to refer all unto Cæsar. After he had viewed the place very well, he came and reported her aunswere unto Cæsar: who immediately sent Gallus to speak once againe with her, and bad him purposely hold her with talk, whilst Proculeius did set up a ladder against that high windowe by the which Antonius was tresed ир, and came down into the monument with two of his men hard by the gate, where Cleopatra stood to hear what Gallus said unto her. One of her women which was shut in her monument with her, sawe Proculeius by chaunce, as he came downe, and shreeked out, O, poore Cleopatra, thou art taken. Then when she sawe Proculeius behind her as she came from the gate, she thought to have stabbed herself with a short dagger she wore of purpose by her side. But Proculeius came sodainly upon her, and taking her by both the hands, sayd unto her, Cleopatra, first thou shalt doe thy selfe great wrong, and secondly unto Cæsar, to deprive him of the occasion and opportunitie openlie to shew his |
