Complete Plays, The (162 page)

Pompey

To you all three,
The senators alone of this great world,
Chief factors for the gods, I do not know
Wherefore my father should revengers want,
Having a son and friends; since Julius Caesar,
Who at Philippi the good Brutus ghosted,
There saw you labouring for him. What was’t
That moved pale Cassius to conspire; and what
Made the all-honour’d, honest Roman, Brutus,
With the arm’d rest, courtiers and beauteous freedom,
To drench the Capitol; but that they would
Have one man but a man? And that is it
Hath made me rig my navy; at whose burthen
The anger’d ocean foams; with which I meant
To scourge the ingratitude that despiteful Rome
Cast on my noble father.

Octavius Caesar

Take your time.

Mark Antony

Thou canst not fear us, Pompey, with thy sails;
We’ll speak with thee at sea: at land, thou know’st
How much we do o’er-count thee.

Pompey

At land, indeed,
Thou dost o’er-count me of my father’s house:
But, since the cuckoo builds not for himself,
Remain in’t as thou mayst.

Lepidus

Be pleased to tell us —
For this is from the present — how you take
The offers we have sent you.

Octavius Caesar

There’s the point.

Mark Antony

Which do not be entreated to, but weigh
What it is worth embraced.

Octavius Caesar

And what may follow,
To try a larger fortune.

Pompey

You have made me offer
Of Sicily, Sardinia; and I must
Rid all the sea of pirates; then, to send
Measures of wheat to Rome; this ’greed upon
To part with unhack’d edges, and bear back
Our targes undinted.

Octavius Caesar

Mark Antony

Lepidus

That’s our offer.

Pompey

Know, then,
I came before you here a man prepared
To take this offer: but Mark Antony
Put me to some impatience: though I lose
The praise of it by telling, you must know,
When Caesar and your brother were at blows,
Your mother came to Sicily and did find
Her welcome friendly.

Mark Antony

I have heard it, Pompey;
And am well studied for a liberal thanks
Which I do owe you.

Pompey

Let me have your hand:
I did not think, sir, to have met you here.

Mark Antony

The beds i’ the east are soft; and thanks to you,
That call’d me timelier than my purpose hither;
For I have gain’d by ’t.

Octavius Caesar

Since I saw you last,
There is a change upon you.

Pompey

Well, I know not
What counts harsh fortune casts upon my face;
But in my bosom shall she never come,
To make my heart her vassal.

Lepidus

Well met here.

Pompey

I hope so, Lepidus. Thus we are agreed:
I crave our composition may be written,
And seal’d between us.

Octavius Caesar

That’s the next to do.

Pompey

We’ll feast each other ere we part; and let’s
Draw lots who shall begin.

Mark Antony

That will I, Pompey.

Pompey

No, Antony, take the lot: but, first
Or last, your fine Egyptian cookery
Shall have the fame. I have heard that Julius Caesar
Grew fat with feasting there.

Mark Antony

You have heard much.

Pompey

I have fair meanings, sir.

Mark Antony

And fair words to them.

Pompey

Then so much have I heard:
And I have heard, Apollodorus carried —

Domitius Enobarbus

No more of that: he did so.

Pompey

What, I pray you?

Domitius Enobarbus

A certain queen to Caesar in a mattress.

Pompey

I know thee now: how farest thou, soldier?

Domitius Enobarbus

Well;
And well am like to do; for, I perceive,
Four feasts are toward.

Pompey

Let me shake thy hand;
I never hated thee: I have seen thee fight,
When I have envied thy behavior.

Domitius Enobarbus

Sir,
I never loved you much; but I ha’ praised ye,
When you have well deserved ten times as much
As I have said you did.

Pompey

Enjoy thy plainness,
It nothing ill becomes thee.
Aboard my galley I invite you all:
Will you lead, lords?

Octavius Caesar

Mark Antony

Lepidus

Show us the way, sir.

Pompey

Come.

Exeunt all but Menas and Enobarbus

Menas

[Aside]
 
Thy father, Pompey, would ne’er have made this treaty.— You and I have known, sir.

Domitius Enobarbus

At sea, I think.

Menas

We have, sir.

Domitius Enobarbus

You have done well by water.

Menas

And you by land.

Domitius Enobarbus

I will praise any man that will praise me; though it cannot be denied what I have done by land.

Menas

Nor what I have done by water.

Domitius Enobarbus

Yes, something you can deny for your own safety: you have been a great thief by sea.

Menas

And you by land.

Domitius Enobarbus

There I deny my land service. But give me your hand, Menas: if our eyes had authority, here they might take two thieves kissing.

Menas

All men’s faces are true, whatsome’er their hands are.

Domitius Enobarbus

But there is never a fair woman has a true face.

Menas

No slander; they steal hearts.

Domitius Enobarbus

We came hither to fight with you.

Menas

For my part, I am sorry it is turned to a drinking.
Pompey doth this day laugh away his fortune.

Domitius Enobarbus

If he do, sure, he cannot weep’t back again.

Menas

You’ve said, sir. We looked not for Mark Antony here: pray you, is he married to Cleopatra?

Domitius Enobarbus

Caesar’s sister is called Octavia.

Menas

True, sir; she was the wife of Caius Marcellus.

Domitius Enobarbus

But she is now the wife of Marcus Antonius.

Menas

Pray ye, sir?

Domitius Enobarbus

’Tis true.

Menas

Then is Caesar and he for ever knit together.

Domitius Enobarbus

If I were bound to divine of this unity, I would not prophesy so.

Menas

I think the policy of that purpose made more in the marriage than the love of the parties.

Domitius Enobarbus

I think so 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?

Domitius Enobarbus

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.

Domitius Enobarbus

I shall take it, sir: we have used our throats in Egypt.

Menas

Come, let’s away.

Exeunt

S
CENE
VII. O
N
BOARD
P
OMPEY
’
S
GALLEY
,
OFF
M
ISENUM
.

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 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 Octavius Caesar, Mark Antony, Lepidus, Pompey, Agrippa, Mecaenas, Domitius Enobarbus, Menas, with other captains

Mark Antony

[To Octavius 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.

Mark Antony

Ay, Lepidus.

Lepidus

Your serpent of Egypt is bred now of your mud by the operation of your sun: so is your crocodile.

Mark 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.

Domitius Enobarbus

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?

Mark 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?

Mark Antony

Of it own colour too.

Lepidus

’Tis a strange serpent.

Mark Antony

’Tis so. And the tears of it are wet.

Octavius Caesar

Will this description satisfy him?

Mark 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.

Mark 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

Now, 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!

Mark Antony

Bear him ashore. I’ll pledge it for him, Pompey.