Page 2482 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

’Tis done already, and the messenger gone.
I have told him, Lepidus was grown too cruel,
That he his high authority abus’d,
And did deserve his change: for what I have conquer’d,

I grant him part: but then in his Armenia, [35]
And other of his conquer’d kingdoms, I
Demand the like.

MÆCENAS
He’ll never yield to that.

CÆSAR
Nor must not then be yielded to in this.

Enter Octavia with her Train.

OCTAVIA
Hail, Cæsar, and my lords! Hail, most dear Cæsar!

CÆSAR
That ever I should call thee castaway! [40]

OCTAVIA
You have not call’d me so, nor have you cause.

CÆSAR
Why have you stol’n upon us thus? You come not
Like Cæsar’s sister: the wife of Antony

Should have an army for an usher, and
The neighs of horse to tell of her approach, [45]
Long ere she did appear. The trees by the way
Should have borne men, and expectation fainted,
Longing for what it had not. Nay, the dust

Should have ascended to the roof of heaven,
Rais’d by your populous troops: but you are come [50]
A market-maid to Rome, and have prevented

The ostentation of our love; which, left unshown,