MENAS And thus it may be. Come, sir, will you aboard?
I have a health for you.
ENOBARBUS I shall take it, sir. We have used our throats
in Egypt.
135
MENAS Come, let’s away. Exeunt.
2.7 Music plays. Enter two or three Servants with a banquet.
1 SERVANT Here they’ll be man. Some o’ their plants are
ill-rooted already; the least wind i’th’ world will blow
them down.
2 SERVANT Lepidus is high-coloured.
1 SERVANT They have made him drink alms-drink.
5
2 SERVANT As they pinch one another by the
disposition, he cries out ‘No more’, reconciles them to
his entreaty, and himself to th’ drink.
1 SERVANT But it raises the greater war between him
and his discretion.
10
2 SERVANT Why, this it is to have a name in great men’s
fellowship. I had as lief have a reed that will do me no
service as a partisan I could not heave.
1 SERVANT To be called into a huge sphere and not to be
seen to move in’t, are the holes where eyes should be,
15
which pitifully disaster the cheeks.
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 the flow o’th’ Nile
By certain scales i’th’ pyramid. They know
By th’height, the lowness, or the mean, if dearth
Or foison follow. The higher Nilus swells,
20
The more it promises. As it ebbs, the seedsman
Upon the slime and ooze scatters his grain,
And shortly comes to harvest.
LEPIDUS You’ve strange serpents there?
ANTONY Ay, Lepidus.
25
LEPIDUS Your serpent of Egypt is bred, now, of your
mud by the operation of your sun; so is your crocodile.
ANTONY They are so.
POMPEY Sit, and some wine! A health to Lepidus!
[They sit and drink.]
LEPIDUS I am not so well as I should be, but I’ll ne’er
30
out.
ENOBARBUS [aside] Not till you have slept. I fear me
you’ll be in till then.
LEPIDUS Nay, certainly, I have heard the Ptolemies’
pyramises are very goodly things. Without contra-
35
diction I have heard that.
MENAS [aside to Pompey] Pompey, a word.
POMPEY [aside to Menas] Say in mine ear what is’t.
MENAS [Whispers in his ear.]
Forsake thy seat, I do beseech thee, captain,
And hear me speak a word.
POMPEY [aside to Menas]
Forbear me till anon. – This wine for Lepidus!
40
LEPIDUS What manner o’ thing is your crocodile?
ANTONY It is shaped, sir, like itself, and it is as broad as
it hath breadth. It is just so high as it is, and moves
with it own organs. It lives by that which nourisheth
it, and the elements once out of it, it transmigrates.
45
LEPIDUS What colour is it of?
ANTONY Of it own colour too.
LEPIDUS ’Tis a strange serpent.
ANTONY ’Tis so, and the tears of it are wet.
CAESAR Will this description satisfy him?
50
ANTONY With the health that Pompey gives him, else
he is a very epicure. [Menas whispers again.]
POMPEY [aside to Menas]
Go hang, sir, hang! Tell me of that? Away!
Do as I bid you. – Where’s this cup I called for?
MENAS [aside to Pompey]
If for the sake of merit thou wilt hear me,
55
Rise from thy stool.
POMPEY [aside to Menas]
I think thou’rt mad. The matter?
[Rises and walks aside with Menas.]
MENAS I have ever held my cap off to thy fortunes.
POMPEY
Thou hast served me with much faith. What’s else to
say? –
Be jolly, lords.
ANTONY These quicksands, Lepidus,
Keep off them, for you sink.
60
MENAS Wilt thou be lord of all the world?
POMPEY What sayst thou?
MENAS Wilt thou be lord of the whole world?
That’s twice.
POMPEY How should that be?
MENAS But entertain it,
And, though thou think me poor, I am the man
Will give thee all the world.
POMPEY Hast thou drunk well?
65
MENAS No, Pompey, I have kept me from the cup.
Thou art, if thou dar’st be, the earthly Jove,
Whate’er the ocean pales or sky inclips
Is thine, if thou wilt ha’t.
POMPEY Show me which way.
MENAS These three world-sharers, these competitors,
70
Are in thy vessel. Let me cut the cable,
And when we are put off, fall to their throats.
All then is thine.
POMPEY Ah, this thou shouldst have done
And not have spoke on’t. In me ’tis villainy;
In thee’t had been good service. Thou must know
75
’Tis not my profit that does lead mine honour;
Mine honour, it. Repent that e’er thy tongue
Hath so betrayed thine act. Being done unknown,
I should have found it afterwards well done,
But must condemn it now. Desist and drink.
80
[Returns to the others.]
MENAS [aside] For this,
I’ll never follow thy palled fortunes more.
Who seeks and will not take, when once ’tis offered,
Shall never find it more.
POMPEY This health to Lepidus!
ANTONY
Bear him ashore. I’ll pledge it for him, Pompey.
85
ENOBARBUS Here’s to thee, Menas!
MENAS Enobarbus, welcome!
POMPEY
Fill till the cup be hid.
ENOBARBUS There’s a strong fellow, Menas.
[Points to the attendant who carries off Lepidus.]
MENAS Why?
ENOBARBUS
’A bears the third part of the world, man. Seest not?
90
MENAS
The third part then he is drunk. Would it were all,
That it might go on wheels!
ENOBARBUS Drink thou! Increase the reels!
MENAS Come!
POMPEY This is not yet an Alexandrian feast.
95
ANTONY It ripens towards it. Strike the vessels, ho!
Here’s to Caesar!
CAESAR I could well forbear’t.
It’s monstrous labour when I wash my brain
And it grows fouler.
ANTONY Be a child o’th’ time.
CAESAR ‘Possess it’, I’ll make answer.
100
But I had rather fast from all, four days,
Than drink so much in one.
ENOBARBUS [to Antony] Ha, my brave emperor,
Shall we dance now the Egyptian Bacchanals
And celebrate our drink?
POMPEY Let’s ha’t, good soldier.
ANTONY Come, let’s all take hands
105
Till that the conquering wine hath steeped our sense
In soft and delicate Lethe.
ENOBARBUS All take hands.
Make battery to our ears with the loud music,
The while I’ll place
you; then the boy shall sing.
The holding every man shall beat as loud
110
As his strong sides can volley.
[Music plays. Enobarbus places them hand in hand.]
The Song.
BOY Come, thou monarch of the vine,
Plumpy Bacchus with pink eyne!
In thy vats our cares be drowned;
With thy grapes our hairs be crowned.
115
ALL Cup us till the world go round!
Cup us till the world go round!
CAESAR
What would you more? Pompey, good night. Good
brother,
Let me request you off. Our graver business
Frowns at this levity. Gentle lords, let’s part.
120
You see we have burnt our cheeks. Strong Enobarb
Is weaker than the wine, and mine own tongue
Splits what it speaks. The wild disguise hath almost
Anticked us all. What needs more words? Good
night.
Good Antony, your hand.
125
POMPEY I’ll try you on the shore.
ANTONY And shall, sir. Give’s your hand.
POMPEY O, Antony, you have my father’s house.
But what? We are friends! Come down into the boat.
ENOBARBUS Take heed you fall not.
Exeunt all but Enobarbus and Menas.
Menas, I’ll not on shore.
130
MENAS
No, to my cabin! These drums, these trumpets,
flutes! What!
Let Neptune hear we bid a loud farewell
To these great fellows. Sound and be hanged! Sound
out! [Sound a flourish with drums.]
ENOBARBUS Hoo, says ’a! There’s my cap!
[Flings his cap in the air.]
MENAS Hoo! Noble captain, come! Exeunt.
135
3.1 Enter VENTIDIUS as it were in triumph, with SILIUS and other Romans, officers and soldiers, the dead body of Pacorus borne before him.
VENTIDIUS
Now, darting Parthia, art thou struck, and now
Pleased Fortune does of Marcus Crassus’ death
Make me revenger. Bear the King’s son’s body
Before our army. Thy Pacorus, Orodes,
Pays this for Marcus Crassus.
SILIUS Noble Ventidius,
5
Whilst yet with Parthian blood thy sword is warm,
The fugitive Parthians follow. Spur through Media,
Mesopotamia, and the shelters whither
The routed fly. So thy grand captain Antony
Shall set thee on triumphant chariots and
10
Put garlands on thy head.
VENTIDIUS O Silius, Silius,
I have done enough. A lower place, note well,
May make too great an act. For learn this, Silius:
Better to leave undone than, by our deed,
Acquire too high a fame when him we serve’s away.
15
Caesar and Antony have ever won
More in their officer than person. Sossius,
One of my place in Syria, his lieutenant,
For quick accumulation of renown,
Which he achieved by th’ minute, lost his favour.
20
Who does i’th’ wars more than his captain can,
Becomes his captain’s captain; and ambition,
The soldier’s virtue, rather makes choice of loss
Than gain which darkens him.
I could do more to do Antonius good,
25
But ’twould offend him, and in his offence
Should my performance perish.
SILIUS
Thou hast, Ventidius, that
Without the which a soldier and his sword
Grants scarce distinction. Thou wilt write to Antony?
30
VENTIDIUS I’ll humbly signify what in his name,
That magical word of war, we have effected;
How, with his banners and his well-paid ranks,
The ne’er-yet-beaten horse of Parthia
We have jaded out o’th’ field.
SILIUS Where is he now?
35
VENTIDIUS
He purposeth to Athens, whither, with what haste
The weight we must convey with’s will permit,
We shall appear before him. On there! Pass along!
Exeunt.
3.2 Enter AGRIPPA at one door, ENOBARBUS at another.
AGRIPPA What, are the brothers parted?
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 52
