Enter CLEOPATRA, attended. To this great fairy I'll commend thy acts, Make her thanks bless thee.-O thou day o' the world, Cleo. Lord of lords! O infinite virtue! com'ft thou smiling from Ant. My nightingale, We have beat them to their beds. What, girl? though grey Get goal for goal of youth'. Behold this man ; Cleo. I'll give thee, friend, An armour all of gold; it was a king's Ant. He has deferv'd it, were it carbuncled Like To this great fairy, &c.] Mr. Upton has well obferved, that fairy, which Dr. Warburton and fir T. Hanmer explain by Inchantrefs, comprifes the idea of power and beauty. JOHNSON. Fairy in former times did not fignify only a diminutive imaginary being, but an inchanter, in which laft fenfe, as has been obferved, it is ufed here. But Mr. Upton's affertion that it comprizes the idea of beauty as well as power, feems questionable; for Sir W. D'Avenant employs the word in defcribing the weird filters, (who certainly were not beautiful,) in the argument prefixed to his alteration of Macbeth, 4to 1674: "These two, travelling together through a foreft, were met by three fairie witches, (weirds the Scotch call them,)" &c. See also Vol. II p. 177, n. 9. MALONE. 9-proof of harness,-] i. e. armour of proof. Harnois, French Arnefe, Ital. STEEVENS. See Vol. IV. p. 429, n. I. MALONE. Get goal for goal of youth.] At all plays of barriers, the boundary is called a goal; to win a geal, is to be a fuperiour in a conteft of activi ty. JOHNSON. 2 It was a king's.] So, in fir T. North's translation of Plutarch : "Then came Antony again to the palace greatly boasting of this victo Like holy Phoebus' car.-Give me thy hand;- Bear our hack'd targets like the men that owe them 3: To camp this hoft, we all would fup together; That heaven and earth may ftrike their founds together, Applauding our approach. SCENE IX. [Exeunt. Sentinels on their poft. Enter ENOBARBUS. 1. Sold. If we be not reliev'd within this hour, We must return to the court of guards: The night Is fhiny; and, they fay, we shall embattle By the fecond hour i' the morn. 2. Sold. This last day was A fhrewd one to us. Eno. O, bear me witnefs, night, 3. Sold. What man is this? 2. Sold. Stand close, and lift him. Eno. Be witness to me, O thou bleffed moon, When men revolted fhall upon record Bear hateful memory, poor Enobarbus did ry, and sweetly kiffed Cleopatra, armed as he was when he came from the fight, recommending one of his men of arms unto her, that had valiantly fought in this fkirmish. Cleopatra, to reward his manliness, gave him an armour and head-piece of clean gold." STEEVENS. 3 Bear our back'd targets like the men that owe them :] i. e. hack'd as much as the men to whom they belong. WARBURTON. Why not rather, Bear our back'd targets with fpirit and exultation, fuch as becomes the brave warriors that own them? JOHNSON. 4-tabourines;] A tabourin was a fmall drum. It is often mentioned in our ancient romances. So, in the Hiftory of Helyas Knight of the Swanne, bl. 1. no date: "Trumpetes, clerons, tabourins, and other minftrelly." STEEVENS. s-the court of guard:] i. e. the guard-room, the place where the guard mufters. The expreffion occurs again in Othello. STEEVENS. 3. Sold. 1. Sold. Enobarbus ! 3. Sold. Peace; hark further. Eno. O fovereign miftrefs of true melancholy, May hang no longer on me: Throw my heart 2. Sold. Let's ipeak to him. 1. Sold. Let's hear him, for the things he speaks May concern Cæfar. 3. Sold. Let's do fo. But he fleeps. 1. Sold. Swoons rather; for fo bad a prayer as his Was never yet for fleep. 2. Sold. Go we to him. 3. Sold. Awake, fir, awake; speak to us. 2. Sold. Hear you, fir? [dies 1. Sold. The hand of death hath raught him. Hark, the drums [Drums afar off. Demurely wake the fleepers. Let us bear him To the court of guard; he is of note: our hour Is fully out. 3. Sold. Come on then; he may recover yet. [Exeunt with the body. 6 Tbrow my beart] The pathetick of Shakspeare too often ends in the ridiculous. It is painful to find the gloomy dignity of this noble fcene destroyed by the intrufion of a conceit fo far-fetched and unaffecting. JOHNSON. Shakspeare in most of his conceits is kept in countenance by his contemporaries. Thus Daniel, in his 18th Sonnet, 1594, fomewaht indeed lefs harshly fays, "Still must I whet my young defires abated, "Upon the flint of fuch a heart rebelling." MALONE. 7 The band of death bath raught him.] Raught is the ancient preterite of the verb to reach. STEFVENS. See Vol. VI. p. 156, n. 5. MALONE. the drums demurely-] Demurely for folemnly. WARBURTON. SCENE SCENE X. Between the two Camps. Enter ANTONY, and SCARUS, with forces, marching. Ant. Their preparation is to-day by fea; We please them not by land. Scar. For both, my lord. Ant. I would, they'd fight i' the fire, or in the air; Shall ftay with us: order for fea is given; They have put forth the haven: Let's feek a fpot, [Exeunt. Enter CESAR, and his forces, marching. Caf. But being charg'd, we will be ftill by land, Which, as I take it, we fhall; for his beft force Is 9 They have put forth the baven : &c.] For the infertion of the fubfequent words in this line I am anfwerable. The defect of the metre in the old copy fhews that some words were accidentally omitted. In that copy as here, there is a colon at baven, which is an additional proof that fome. thing must have been faid by Antony, connected with the next line, and relative to the place where the enemy might be reconnoitered. The baven itfelf was not fuch a place; but rather fome hill from which the haven and the fhips newly put forth could be viewed. What Antony fays upon his re-entry, proves decifively that he had not gone to the haven, nor had any thoughts of going thither. "I fee, fays he, they have not yet joined; but I'll now choose a more convenient ftation near yonder pine, and I fhall discover all." A preceding paffage in Act. III. fc. vi. adds fuch fupport to the emendation now made, that I truft I shall be pardoned for giving it a place in the text: "Set we our battles on yon fide of the bill, Mr. Rowe supplied the omiffion by the words-Further on; and the four fubfequent editors adopted his emendation. MAIONE. Where their appointment we may beft difcover, &c.] i. e. where we may best discover their numbers, and fee their motions. WARBURTON, 2 But being charg'd, we will be ftill by land, Which, as I take it, we fhall;]i. e. unless we be charged, we will remain quiet at land, which quiet I suppose we shall keep. But being charged was a phrase of that time, equivalent to unless we be. WARB. So, in Chaucer's Perfones Tale, late edit. "Ful oft time I rede, that no man trust in his owen perfection, but he be ftronger than Samp. Is forth to man his gallies. To the vales, Re-enter ANTONY, and SCARUS. [Exeunt. Ant. Yet they are not join'd: Where yond' pine does ftand, I shall discover all: I'll bring thee word Scar. Swallows have built In Cleopatra's fails their nefts: the augurers 3 [Exit. Say, they know not,-they cannot tell;-look grimly, Is valiant, and dejected; and, by farts, Alarum afar off, as at a fea fight. Ant. All is loft; Re-enter ANTONY. This foul Egyptian hath betrayed me: Haft fon, or holier than David, or wifer than Solomon." But is from the Saxon Butan. Thus, butan leas: abfque falfo, without a lye. Again, in the Vintner's Play in the Chefter collection. Brit. Muf. MS. Harl. 2013. p. 29: "Abraham. Oh comely creature, but I thee kill, "I greeve my God, and that full ill." See alfo Ray's North Country Words. STEEVENS. 3 the augurers-] The old copy has-auguries. This leads us to what feems most likely to be the true reading-augurers, which word is ufed in the laft act: "You are too fure an augurer." For the emendation the present editor is refponfible. MALONE. 4 Triple-turn'd whore!] Cleopatra was firft the mistress of Julius Cæfar, then of Cneius Pompey, and afterwards of Antony. To this, I think, the epithet triple-turn'd alludes. So, in a former scene: "I found you as a morfel, cold upon "Dead Cæfar's trencher; nay, you were a fragment Mr. Mafon fuggefts a different interpretation: "She first (fays he,) belonged to Julius Cæfar, then to Antony, and now, as he supposes, to Auguftus |