See, when, and where fhe died. O moft falfe love! CLEO. ANT. Quarrel no more, but be prepar'd to know CLEO. Cut my lace, Charmian, come ;But let it be. I am quickly ill, and well: In Cawdrey's Alphabetical Table of hard Words, 8vo. 1604, garboile is explained by the word hurlyburly. MALONE. I at the laft, beft:] This conjugal tribute to the memory of Fulvia, may be illuftrated by Malcolm's eulogium on the thane of Cawdor: nothing in his life "Became him, like the leaving it." STEEVENS. 2 O moft falfe love! Where be the facred vials thou should't fill With forrowful water?] Alluding to the lachrymatory vials, or bottles of tears, which the Romans sometimes put into the urn of a friend. JOHNSON. So, in the first Act of The Two Noble Kinfmen, faid to be written by Fletcher, in conjunction with Shakspeare: 3 "Balms and gums, and heavy cheers, STEEVENS. Now, by the fire, &c.] Some word, in the old copies, being here wanting to the metre, I have not fcrupled to infert the adverb-Now, on the authority of the following paffage in King John, as well as on that of many others in the different pieces of our author: Now, by the fky that hangs above our heads, "I like it well :- STEEVENS. So Antony loves.4 ANT. My precious queen, forbear; And give true evidence to his love, which stands An honourable trial. CLEO. So Fulvia told me. I pr'ythee, turn afide, and weep for her; ANT. You'll heat my blood; no more. CLEO. You can do better yet; but this is meetly. ANT. Now, by my fword, CLEO. And target,-Still he mends; But this is not the beft: Look, pr'ythee, Charmian, How this Herculean Roman" does become The carriage of his chafe. ANT. I'll leave you, lady. CLEO. Courteous lord, one word. Sir, you and I muft part,--but that's not it: 4 So Antony loves.] i. e. uncertain as the state of my health is the love of Antony. STEEVENS. I believe Mr. Steevens is right; yet before I read his note, I thought the meaning to be," My fears quickly render me ill; and I am as quickly well again, when I am convinced that Antony has an affection for me." So, for fo that. If this be the true fenfe of the paffage, it ought to be regulated thus: I am quickly ill, and well again, So Antony loves. Thus, in a subsequent scene: -I would, thou didft; "So half my Egypt were fubmerg'd." MALONE. to Egypt:] To me, the Queen of Egypt. JOHNSON. Herculean Roman] Antony traced his descent from Anton, a fon of Hercules. STEEVENS. 6 ᎠᏎ Sir, you and I have lov'd,-but there's not it; That you know well: Something it is I would,— O, my oblivion is a very Antony, And I am all forgotten.7 ANT. But that your royalty Holds idleness your fubject, I fhould take you 7 O, my oblivion is a very Antony, And I am all forgotten.] Cleopatra has fomething to fay, which feems to be fuppreffed by forrow; and after many attempts to produce her meaning, the cries out: O, this oblivious memory of mine is as falfe and treacherous to me as Antony is, and I forget every thing. Oblivion, I believe, is boldly ufed for a memory apt to be deceitful. If too much latitude be taken in this explanation, we might with little violence read, as Mr. Edwards has propofed in his MS. notes: Oh me! oblivion is a very Antony, &c. STEEVENS. Perhaps nothing more is neceffary here than a change of punctuation; O my! being ftill an exclamation frequently used in the Weft of England. HENLEY. Oh my! in the provincial sense of it, is only an imperfect exclamation of Oh my God! The decent exclaimer always ftops before the facred name is pronounced. Could fuch an exclamation therefore have been uttered by the Pagan Cleopatra ? STEEVENS. The fenfe of the paffage appears to me to be this: "O, my oblivion, as if it were another Antony, poffeffes me fo entirely, that I quite forget myself." M. MASON. I have not the smallest doubt that Mr. Steevens's explanation of this paffage is juft. Dr. Johnson fays, that "it was her memory, not her oblivion, that like Antony, was forgetting and deferting her." It certainly was; it was her oblivious memory, as Mr. Steevens has well interpreted it; and the licence is much in our author's manner. MALONE. 8 But that your royalty, Holds idleness your fubject, I fhould take For idleness itself.] i. e. But that your charms hold me, who am the greatest fool on earth, in chains, I fhould have adjudged you to be the greateft. That this is the fense is shown by her anfwer: CLEO. 'Tis fweating labour, To bear fuch idlenefs fo near the heart As Cleopatra this. But, fir, forgive me; Since my becomings kill me, when they do not And all the gods go with you! upon your fword 'Tis fweating labour, To bear fuch idleness fo near the heart, Dr. Warburton's explanation is a very coarse one. The fenfe may be :-But that your queenfhip chooses idleness for the subject of your converfation, I fhould take you for idleness itself. So Webfter, (who was often a clofe imitator of Shakspeare,) in his Vittoria Corombona, 1612: "To queftion my own idleness!" Or an antithefis may be defigned between royalty and fubject. But that I know you to be a queen, and that your royalty holds idleness in fubjection to you, exalting you far above its influence, I should suppose you to be the very genius of idleness itself. STEEVENS. Mr. Steevens's latter interpretation is, I think, nearer the truth. But perhaps your subject rather means, whom being in fubjection to you, you can command at pleasure, "to do your bidding," to affume the airs of coquetry, &c. Were not this coquet one of your attendants, I fhould fuppofe you yourself were this capricious being. Malone. 9 Since my becomings kill me,] There is fomewhat of obfcurity in this expreffion. In the first scene of the play Antony had called her wrangling queen, "Whom every thing becomes." It is to this, perhaps, that the alludes. Or the may meanThat conduct which, in my own opinion, becomes me, as often as it appears ungraceful to you, is a fhock to my sensibility. I STEEVENS. laurel'd victory!] Thus the fecond folio. The inaccurate predeceffor of it-laurel victory. STEEVENS. ANT. 2 Let us go. Come; Our feparation fo abides, and flies, Away. [Exeunt. SCENE IV. Rome. An Apartment in Cæfar's House. Enter OCTAVIUS CESAR, LEPIDUS, and Attendants. CES. You may fee, Lepidus, and henceforth know, It is not Cæfar's natural vice to hate One great competitor: 3 From Alexandria 2 That thou, refiding here, &c.] This conceit might have been fuggefted by the following paffage in Sidney's Arcadia, Book I: "She went they ftaid; or, rightly for to fay, "She ftaid with them, they went in thought with her." Thus alfo, in The Mercator of Plautus: "Si domi fum, foris eft animus; fin foris fum, animus domi est." STEEVENS. 3 One great competitor :] Perhaps-Our great competitor. JOHNSON. Johnfon is certainly right in his conjecture that we ought to read" Our great competitor," as this fpeech is addreffed to Lepidus, his partner in the empire. Competitor means here, as it does wherever the word occurs in Shakspeare, affociate or partner. So Menas fays: "These three world-fharers, these competitors, And again, Cæfar, fpeaking of Antony, fays- M: MASON. |