Chapter CXXVI: Act II

SC. 1. "Salt Cleopatra, soften thy wand lip."

I see no sense in in 'wand.' Some editors read _wan'd_, taking perhaps the image from the moon. I have read _wanton_, in the sense of soft, yielding like "the wanton rushes" (1 H. IV. iii. 1), "the wanton air" (L. L. L. iv. 3), which would also suit the metre better. I, however, strongly suspect that the poet's word may have been _tann'd_, spelt of course _tand_, so that a printer's error was very obvious. She is more than once called _gypsy_; she has "a _tawny_ front" (i. 1); and she says of herself (i. 5.) that she is "with Phoebus' amorous kisses _black_." In Son. cxv. we have "_tan_ sacred beauty;" and in Son. lxii.,

"But when my glass shows me myself indeed,
Beated and chopp'd with _tann'd_ antiquity."

'Salt' is wanton, lascivious; perhaps from _salax_.

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SC. 2. "I should do thus.--Welcome to Rome.--_I_ thank you."

* * * * *

"Your wife and brother
Made wars upon me, and their contestation
Was theme for you."

I am not satisfied with this passage. Perhaps for 'their' and 'you' we should read _your_ and _them_, as I have done.

* * * * *

"If you'll patch a quarrel.
As matter whole you have _not_ to make it with."

The negative was properly inserted by Rowe.

* * * * *

"Go to them; your considerate stone _am I_."

* * * * *

"Truths would be tales _only_,
Where now half-tales be truths."

Hanmer read '_but_ tales'; Steevens '_as_ tales'; Capell '_then_ be tales.' We might also read '_mere_ tales.'

* * * * *

"Or else he seeks us out.--Where lies he _now_?--
About the Mount Misenum.--What's his strength?--
By land great and increasing; but by sea
He is an absolute master."

I give 'By land' to Cæsar. See on As You Like it, ii. 1.

* * * * *

"In her pavilion (cloth of gold of tissue)."

With Collier's folio I read _and_ for 'of.' See Final Note to Comus in my Milton.

* * * * *

"The silken tackle
Swell with the touches of the flower-soft hands,
That yarely frame the office."

'Swell' (_sc._ with pride, _i.e._ are elate) no doubt makes good sense; but the words of North's Plutarch are "Others tending the tackle and ropes of the barge, out of which there came a wonderful sweet savour of perfumes, that perfumed the wharf's side." _Smell_, the reading of Collier's folio, is therefore probably right. In the last line 'the' should, I think, be _their_.

* * * * *

SC. 3. "Would I had never come from thence nor you
_Come_ thither."

* * * * *

"I see it in my motion, have it not in my tongue."

We should probably read _notion_, i.e. idea, mind.

* * * * *

"But near him thy angel
Becomes a fear."

Upton read _afear'd_, and, I think, rightly; a Fear was a source of terror, not an object of it. In the corresponding place of North's Plutarch the word is _afraid_.

* * * * *

SC. 4. "We shall,
As I conceive the journey, be at Mount _Misenum_."

* * * * *

"Tawny-finn'd fishes."

Theobald's correction of 'tawny-_fine_' of the folio.

* * * * *

"Ram thou thy fruitful tidings in mine ears,
That long time have been barren."

I adopt without hesitation the excellent correction of _Rain_ for 'Ram.' "Rain sacrificial whisperings in his ear" (Tim. i. 1). "In measure rain thy joy" (Mer. of Ven. iii. 2).

* * * * *

SC. 5. "If Antony
Be free and healthful, so tart a favour _suits_ not
To trumpet such good tidings."

We might also read, as is usually done, '_why_ so tart a favour?'

* * * * *

SC. 6. "Made _the_ all-honour'd honest Roman Brutus."

The _the_ was properly inserted in the 2nd folio.

* * * * *

SC. 7. "The third part of the world, man? Seest _thou_ not?"

* * * * *

"The holding every man shall bear as loud
As his strong sides can volley."

'Bear' is, as usual, one of Theobald's excellent corrections for 'beat' of the folio; 'holding' is burthen.