UNIV. OF CALIFORNIA ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA. ACT I. SCENE I. Alexandria. A Room in Cleopatra's Palace. Enter DEMETRIUS and PHILO. PHI. Nay, but this dotage of our general's,' Upon a tawny front: his captain's heart, Which in the fcuffles of great fights hath burft I - of our general's,] It has already been obferved that this phrafeology (not, of our general,) was the common phraseology of Shakspeare's time. MALONE. An erroneous reference in Mr. Malone's edition, prevents me from doing complete juftice to his remark. STEEVENS. 2 reneges-] Renounces. PoPe. So, in King Lear: " Renege, affirm," &c. This word is likewise used by Stanyhurft, in his verfion of the second Book of Virgil's Eneid: "To live now longer, Troy burnt, he flatly reneageth." STEEVENS, And is become the bellows, and the fan, 3 And is become the bellows, and the fan, To cool a gipfy's luft.] In this paffage fomething feems to be wanting. The bellows and fan being commonly used for contrary purposes, were probably oppofed by the author, who might perhaps have written: is become the bellows, and the fan, To kindle and to cool a gypfy's luft. JOHNSON. In Lyly's Midas, 1592, the bellows is ufed both to cool and to kindle: "Methinks Venus and Nature ftand with each of them a pair of bellows, one cooling my low birth, the other kindling my lofty affections." STEEVENS. The text is undoubtedly right. The bellows, as well as the fan, cools the air by ventilation; and Shakspeare confidered it here merely as an inftrument of wind, without attending to the domeftick ufe to which it is commonly applied. We meet with a fimilar phrafeology in his Venus and Adonis : "Then, with her windy fighs, and golden hairs, "To fan and blow them dry again, the feeks." The following lines in Spenfer's Fairy Queen, B. II. c. ix. at once support and explain the text: "But to delay the heat, left by mischaunce "It might breake out, aud fet the whole on fyre, "A huge great payre of bellowes, which did ftyre Continually, and cooling breath infpyre." MALONE. Johnson's amendment is unneceffary, and his reasons for it ill founded. The bellows and the fan have the fame effects. When applied to a fire, they increase it; but when applied to any other warm fubftance, they cool it. M. MASON. —gipfy's luft.] Gipfy is here used both in the original meaning for an Ægyptian, and in its accidental sense for a bad woman. JOHNSON. Flourish. Enter ANTONY and CLEOPATRA, with their Trains; Eunuchs fanning her. Take but good note, and you fhall fee in him CLEO. If it be love indeed, tell me how much. ANT. There's beggary in the love that can be reckon❜d.5 CLEO. I'll fet a bourn how far to be belov'd. The triple pillar-] Triple is here ufed improperly for third, or one of three. One of the triumvirs, one of the three mafters of the world. WARBURTON. So, in All's well that ends well: "Which, as the dearest iffue of his practice, "He bade me store up as a triple eye." MALONE. To fuftain the pillars of the earth is a scriptural phrafe. Thus, in Pfalm 75: "The earth and all the inhabitants thereof are diffolved. I bear up the pillars of it." STEEVENS. 5 There's beggary in the love that can be reckon'd.] So, in Romeo and Juliet: They are but beggars that can count their worth." "Bafia pauca cupit, qui numerare poteft." Mart. L. VI. Ep. 36. Again, in the 13th Book of Ovid's Metamorphofis; as tranflated by Golding, p. 172: Pauperis eft numerare pecus. "Tuth! beggars of their cattel use the number for to know." STEEVENS. Again, in Much Ado about Nothing: "I were but little happy, If I could fay how much." 6 bourn-] Bound or limit. POPE. So, in The Winter's Tale: one that fixes "No bourn 'twixt his and mine." STEEVENS, MALONE. ANT. Then must thou needs find out new hea ven, new earth," Enter an Attendant. ATT. News, my good lord, from Rome. ANT. Grates me:-The fum. CLEO. Nay, hear them,9 Antony: Fulvia, perchance, is angry; Or, who knows ANT. How, my love! CLEO. Perchance,-nay, and most like, You must not stay here longer, your dismission Is come from Cæfar; therefore hear it, Antony.Where's Fulvia's procefs? Cæfar's, I would fay?Both? Call in the meffengers.-As I am Egypt's queen, Then must thou needs find out new heaven, &c.] Thou muft fet the boundary of my love at a greater diftance than the prefent vifible univerfe affords. JOHNSON. The fum.] Be brief, fum thy business in a few words. JOHNSON. This word, in Shak 9 Nay, hear them,] i. e. the news. fpeare's time, was confidered as plural. So, in Plutarch's Life of Antony: "Antonius hearing these newes," &c. MALONE. Take in &c.] i. e. fubdue, conquer. See Vol. IX. p. 374, n. 9; and Vol. XVI. p. 27, n. 9. REED. 2 Where's Fulvia's procefs?] Procefs here means fummons. M. MASON. "The writings of our common lawyers fometimes call that the proceffe, by which a man is called into the court and no more." Mintheu's Dict. 1617, in v. Proceffè.—" To ferve with proceffe. Vide to cite, to fummon." Ibid. MALONE. Thou blufheft, Antony; and that blood of thine gers. ANT. Let Rome in Tyber melt! and the wide arch Of the rang'd empire fall!3 Here is my space; Kingdoms are clay: our dungy earth alike Feeds beaft as man: the noblenefs of life Is, to do thus; when fuch a mutual pair, [Embracing. And such a twain can do't, in which, Ï bind On pain of punishment, the world to weet,4 We stand up peerless. CLEO. Excellent falfhood! Why did he marry Fulvia, and not love her?— 3 -and the wide arch Of the rang'd empire fall!] Taken from the Roman cuftom of raifing triumphal arches to perpetuate their victories. Extremely noble. WARBURTON. I am in doubt whether Shakspeare had any idea but of a fabrick ftanding on pillars. The later editions have all printed the raised empire, for the ranged empire, as it was first given. The ran JOHNSON. empire is certainly right. Shakspeare uses the fame expreflion in Coriolanus: 66 bury all which yet diftinctly ranges, "In heaps and piles of ruin." Again, in Much Ado about Nothing, A& II. fc. ii: "Whatfoever comes athwart his affection, ranges evenly with mine." STEEVENS. The term range seems to have been applied, in a peculiar fenfe, to mafon-work, in our author's time. So, in Spenser's Fairy Queen, B. II. c. ix: "It was a vault y-built for great dispence, "With many raunges rear'd along the wall." MALONE. What, in ancient mafons' or bricklayers' work, was denominated a range, is now called a courfe. STEEVENS. |
