ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.] Among the entries in the books of the Stationers' Company, October 19, 1593, I find " A Booke entituled the Tragedie of Cleopatra." It is entered by Symon Waterfon, for whom fome of Daniel's works were printed; and therefore it is probably by that author, of whofe Cleopatra there are feveral editions; and, among others, one in 1594. In the fame volumes, May 2, 1608, Edward Blount entered "A Booke called Anthony and Cleopatra." This is the first notice I have met with concerning any edition of this play more ancient than the folio, 1623. STEEVENS. Antony and Cleopatra was written, I imagine, in the year 1608. See An Attempt to ascertain the order of Shakspeare's plays, Vol. I. MALONE. Taurus, Lieutenant-General to Cæfar. A Soothsayer. A Clown. Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. Octavia, Sifter to Cæfar, and Wife to Antony. Charmian, Iras, } Attendants on Cleopatra. Officers, Soldiers, Meffengers, and other Attendants. SCENE, difperfed; in feveral parts of the Roman Empire. 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,* O'erflows the measure: those his goodly eyes, That o'er the files and mufters of the war Have glow'd like plated Mars, now bend, now turn, The office and devotion of their view Upon a tawny front: his captain's heart, Which in the fcuffles of great fights hath burst The buckles on his breaft, reneges all temper; And is become the bellows, and the fan, To cool a gipfy's luft. Look, where they come! 2 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. 3 reneges-] Renounces. POPE. So, in King Lear: " Renege, affirm," &c. This word is likewife ufed by Stanyhurst in his version of the fecond book of Virgil's Æneid': " "To live now longer, Troy burnt, he flatly reneageth. STEEVENS. + And is become the bellows, and the fan, To cool a giply'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: Flourish. Enter ANTONY and CLEOPATRA, with their trains; Eunuchs fanning her. Take but good note, and you fhall fee in him 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 use 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 secks." The following lines in Spenfer's Faery Queen, B. II. c. ix. at once fupport and explain the text: "But to delay the heat, left by mifchaunce "It might breake out, and fet the whole on fyre, A huge great payre of bellowes, which did ftyre "Continually, and cooling breath infpyre." MALONE. Johnfon's amendment is unneceffary, and his reafons 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 ufed both in the original meaning for an Egyptian, and in its accidental fenfe for a bad woman. JOHNSON. 6 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 deareft iffue of his practice, "He bade me ftore up as a triple eye." MALONE. |