Antony and Cleopatra

too. But you shall find, the band that seems to tie their friendship together will be the very strangler of their amity: Octavia is of a holy, cold, and still conversation. Menas Who would not have his wife so? Enobarbas Not he that himself is not so; which is Mark Antony. He will to his Egyptian dish again: then shall the sighs of Octavia blow the fire up in Caesar; and, as I said before, that which is the strength of their amity shall prove the immediate author of their variance. Antony will use his affection where it is: he married but his occasion here. Menas And thus it may be. Come, sir, will you aboard? I have a health for you. Enobarbas I shall take it, sir: we have used our throats in Egypt. Menas Come, let’s away. Exeunt.

Scene VII

On board Pompey’s galley, off Misenum.

	Music plays. Enter two or three Servants with a banquet.
First Servant	Here they’ll be, man. Some o’ their plants are ill-rooted already; the least wind i’ the world will blow them down.
Second Servant	Lepidus is high-coloured.
First Servant	They have made him drink alms-drink.
Second Servant	As they pinch one another by the disposition, he cries out “No more;” reconciles them to his entreaty, and himself to the drink.
First Servant	But it raises the greater war between him and his discretion.
Second 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.
First Servant	To be called into a huge sphere, and not to be seen to move in’t, are the holes where eyes should be, which pitifully disaster the cheeks.
	A sennet sounded. Enter Caesar, Antony, Lepidus, Pompey, Agrippa, Mecaenas, Enobarbas, Menas, with other captains.
Antony	To Caesar. Thus do they, sir: they take the flow o’ the Nile By certain scales i’ the pyramid; they know, By the height, the lowness, or the mean, if dearth Or foison follow: the higher Nilus swells, 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.
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!
Lepidus	I am not so well as I should be, but I’ll ne’er out.
Enobarbas	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 contradiction, I have heard that.
Menas	Aside to Pompey. Pompey, a word.
Pompey	Aside to Menas. Say in mine ear: what is’t?
Menas	Aside to Pompey. 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!
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 its own organs: it lives by that which nourisheth it; and the elements once out of it, it transmigrates.
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?
Antony	With the health that Pompey gives him, else he is a very epicure.
Pompey	Aside to Menas. Go hang, sir, hang! Tell me of that? away! Do as I bid you. Where’s this cup I call’d for?
Menas	Aside to Pompey. If for the sake of merit thou wilt hear me, Rise from thy stool.
Pompey	Aside to Menas. I think thou’rt mad. The matter? Rises, and walks aside.
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 quick-sands, Lepidus, Keep off them, for you sink.
Menas	Wilt thou be lord of all the world?
Pompey	What say’st 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?
Menas	No, Pompey, I have kept me from the cup. Thou art, if thou darest 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, Are in thy vessel: let me cut the cable; And, when we are put off, fall to their throats: All there is thine.
Pompey	Ah, this thou shouldst have done, And not have spoke on’t! In me ’tis villany; In thee’t had been good service. Thou must know, ’Tis not my profit that does lead mine honour; Mine honour, it. Repent that e’er thy tongue Hath so betray’d thine act: being done unknown, I should have found it afterwards well done; But must condemn it now. Desist, and drink.
Menas	Aside. For this, I’ll never follow thy pall’d fortunes more. Who seeks, and will not take when once ’tis offer’d, Shall never find it more.
Pompey	This health to Lepidus!
Antony	Bear him ashore. I’ll pledge it for him, Pompey.
Enobarbas	Here’s to thee, Menas!
Menas	Enobarbus, welcome!
Pompey	Fill till the cup be hid.
Enobarbas	There’s a strong fellow, Menas. Pointing to the Attendant who carries off Lepidus.
Menas	Why?
Enobarbas	A’ bears the third part of the world, man; see’st not?
Menas	The third part, then, is drunk: would it were all, That it might go on wheels!
Enobarbas	Drink thou; increase the reels.
Menas	Come.
Pompey	This is not yet an Alexandrian feast.
Antony	It ripens towards it. Strike the vessels, ho! Here is 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’ the time.
Caesar	Possess it, I’ll make answer: But I had rather fast