of his death, and showed him the sword that was bloodied. Cæsar, hearing this, straight withdrew into a secret place of his tent, and there burst out with tears, lamenting his hard fortune that had been his friend and brother-in-law, his equal in the Empire, and companion with him in sundry great exploits and battles. Then he called for his friends, and showed them the letters Antony had written to him, and his answers also, during their quarrel and strife; and how fiercely and proudly the other answered to all just and reasonable matters he wrote unto him.

After this, he sent Proculeius to do what he could to get Cleopatra alive, fearing lest otherwise all the treasure would be lost; and he thought that if he could bring her alive to Rome, she would marvelously beautify and set out his triumph. But Cleopatra would never put herself into Proculeius' hands, although they spake together. For he came to the gates that were thick and strong; yet there were some cranneys through the which her voice might be heard, and so they without understood that she demanded the kingdom of Egypt for her sons. Proculeius answered her, that she should be of good cheer, and not be afraid to refer all unto Cæsar. After he had viewed the place very well, he came and reported her answer unto Cæsar; who immediately sent Gallus to speak again with her, and bade him hold her in talk, whilst Proculeius set up a ladder against the window by which Antony was trised up, and come down into the monument with two of his men. One of her women saw Proculeius by chance as he came down, and shrieked out,-"O, poor Cleopatra! thou art taken.” When she saw him behind her as she came from the gate, she thought to have stabbed herself with a short dagger; but he came suddenly upon her, and, taking her by both the hands, said unto her, "Cleopatra, thou shalt do thyself great wrong, and Cæsar also, to deprive him of the opportunity to show his bounty and mercy, and to give his enemies cause to accuse the most courteous and noble prince that ever was, as though he were a cruel man. So he took the dagger from her, and shook her clothes for fear

of any poison hidden about her. Afterwards Cæsar sent one of his men, whom he straightly charged to look well unto her, and to beware that she made not herself away; and, for the rest, to use her with all the courtesy possible.

Now, she was altogether overcome with sorrow and passion of mind, so that she fell into a fever; whereof she was very glad, hoping thereby to have a good color to abstain from meat, that so she might die. But Cæsar mistrusted her, and therefore did threaten to put her children to a shameful death. With these threats, Cleopatra suffered herself to be cured and dieted as they listed. Shortly after, Cæsar came in person to see her. Cleopatra, being laid on a little low bed, when she saw him suddenly rose up, and fell down at his feet marvelously disfigured: for she had plucked her hair from her head, and martyred all her face with her nails; and her voice was small and trembling, and her eyes sunk into her head with continued blubbering; yet her good grace and the force of her beauty were not altogether defaced. When Cæsar had made her lie down again, and sat by her bedside, she began to excuse herself for that she had done, laying all to the fear she had of Antony, and prayed him to pardon her, as though she were afraid to die. At length, she gave him a brief of all the money and treasure she had. But by chance there stood one Seleucus by, one of her treasurers, who, to seem a good servant, came straight to disprove her, that she had not set in all, but kept many things back. Cleopatra was in such a rage that she flew upon him, and took him by the hair and boxed him well. Cæsar fell a-laughing, and parted the fray. "Alas!" said she, "O Cæsar, is not this a great shame, that, thou having vouchsafed to come unto me, and done me this honor, poor wretch and caitiff creature, mine own servants should come to accuse me? though it may be I have reserved some jewels and trifles fit for women, not for me to set out myself withal, but to give some pretty presents to Octavia and Livia; that, they making intercession for me, thou mightest yet extend thy favor and mercy upon me." Cæsar was glad to hear her say so, persuading himself that

she had yet a desire to save her life. So he made answer, that he did not only give her that to dispose of at her pleasure, which she had kept back, but further promised to use her more bountifully than she would think for; and so he took his leave, supposing he had deceived her, but indeed he was deceived himself.

There was a young gentleman, Cornelius Dolabella, that was one of Cæsar's very great familiars, and, besides, did bear no ill-will unto Cleopatra. He sent her word secretly, as she had requested him, that Cæsar determined to take his journey through Syria, and that within three days he would send her away before with her children. Now, whilst she was at dinner there came a countryman, and brought a basket. The soldiers that warded at the gates asked him what he had in his basket. He opened it, and showed them that they were figs he brought. They all marveled to see so goodly figs. He laughed to hear them, and bade them take some, if they would. They believed he told them truly, and so bade him carry them in. After Cleopatra had dined, she sent a certain table written and sealed unto Cæsar, and commanded all to go out of the tomb but the two women; then she shut the doors to her. Cæsar, when he received this table, and began to read her petition, requesting him to let her be buried with Antony, found straight what she meant, and sent one in all haste to see what it was. Her death was very sudden; for those whom Cæsar sent ran thither and found the soldiers standing at the gate, mistrusting nothing, nor understanding of her death. But when they had opened the doors, they found Cleopatra stark dead, laid upon a bed of gold, arrayed in her royal robes, and one of her women, called Iris, dead at her feet; and her other woman, called Charmian, half dead and trembling, trimming the diadem which Cleopatra wore upon her head. One of the soldiers, seeing her, angrily said unto her, "Is that well done, Charmian ?" "Very well," said she, "and meet for a princess descended of so many noble kings." She said no more, but fell down dead hard by the bed.

Some report that the aspic was brought unto her in the basket with figs, and that she had commanded to hide it under the leaves, that when she should think to take out the figs, the aspic should bite her before she should see it: howbeit, when she would have taken away the leaves she perceived it, and said,-"Art thou there, then?" and so, her arm being naked, she put it to the aspic to be bitten. Some say, also, that they found two little pretty bitings in her arm, scant to be discerned; the which it seemeth Cæsar himself gave credit unto; because in his triumph he carried Cleopatra's image, with an aspic biting of her arm. Now, Cæsar, though he was marvelous sorry for the death of Cleopatra, yet wondered at her noble mind and courage, and therefore commanded she should be nobly buried and laid by Antony; and willed also that her two women should have honorable burial.

In one or two particulars the Poet is traceable to other sources than Plutarch; especially in the account which Antony gives to Cæsar, Act II, sc. vii, how "they take the flow o'the Nile." For this matter he probably resorted either to Holland's translation of Pliny, or to Leo's History of Africa translated by John Pory, in which is a description of the Nileometer. Both these works were published early in the seventeenth century. In the case of Lepidus, again, Plutarch could but have yielded a few very slight hints, at the most, towards his character as drawn by Shakespeare. The Lepidus of the play, the "barren-spirited fellow," the "slight unmeritable man meet to be sent on errands," bears a strong likeness to the veritable pack-horse of the Triumvirate, trying to strut and swell himself up to the dimensions of his place, while his strutting and swelling only serve to betray his emptiSuch appears to have been about the real pitch and quality of the man, according to the notices given of him by other writers; as Paterculus, for example, who calls him "vir omnium vanissimus": but whether the Poet used any of those authorities, or merely drew from his own intuitive knowledge of human nature, thus in effect writing his

ness.

tory without having studied it,—is a question not easily answered. Before leaving this part of the subject, it may be well to remark that the events of the play cover a period of about ten years: as the death of Fulvia took place in the early part of the year, B. C., 40; the sea-fight at Actium, in September, 31, and the death of Cleopatra, the year after. As for the other dates, Antony's marriage with Octavia and the agreement of peace with Pompey occurred in 39; the return of Antony to the East, in 37; and his conquest of Armenia, in 34; soon after which, he set up his rest in Alexandria, laying off the style of a Roman citizen, and assuming that of an Eastern despot.

Judging by our own experience, Antony and Cleopatra is the last of Shakespeare's plays that one grows to appreciate. This seems owing partly to the excellence of the drama, and partly not. For it is marked beyond any other by a superabundance of external animation and diversion, as well as by a surpassing fineness of workmanship such as needs oft-repeated and most careful perusal to bring out full upon the mind's eye. The great number and variety of events crowded together in it, the rapidity with which they pass before us, and, consequently, the frequent changes of scene, hold curiosity on the stretch, and overfill the mind with sensuous effect, and thus for a long time distract and divert the thoughts from those subtleties of characterization and delicacies of poetry which everywhere accompany them. In such a redundancy of incidental interest and excitement, one cannot without long familiarity so possess his faculties as to wait and take time for such recondite and protean efficacies to work their proper effect. We are by no means sure but that the two things necessarily go together; yet we have to confess it has long seemed to us, that by selecting fewer incidents for working out the sense and design of the play, or by extracting and condensing the import and spirit of the incidents into larger masses, what is now a serious fault in the drama might have been avoided.

Bating this defect, if indeed it be a defect, there is none of Shakespeare's plays that, after many years of study,