Page 2565 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

CLEOPATRA

Well, get thee gone, farewell.

CLOWN
Yes, forsooth: I wish you joy o’ the worm.
(Exit.)

(Re-enter Charmian and Iras with a robe, crown, and other jewels.)

CLEOPATRA
Give me my robe, put on my crown, I have

Immortal longings in me. Now no more [280]
The juice of Egypt’s grape shall moist this lip.
Yare, yare, good Iras; quick: methinks I hear
Antony call. I see him rouse himself

To praise my noble act. I hear him mock
The luck of Cæsar, which the gods give men [285]
To excuse their after wrath. Husband, I come:
Now to that name, my courage prove my title!

I am fire, and air; my other elements
I give to baser life. So, have you done?
Come then, and take the last warmth of my lips. [290]
Farewell, kind Charmian, Iras, long farewell.

(Kisses them. Iras falls and dies.)
Have I the aspic in my lips? Dost fall?
If thou and nature can so gently part,
The stroke of death is as a lover’s pinch,

Which hurts, and is desir’d. Dost thou lie still? [295]
If thus thou vanishest, thou tell’st the world
It is not worth leave-taking.

CHARMIAN
Dissolve, thick cloud, and rain, that I may say,

The gods themselves do weep!

CLEOPATRA

This proves me base:
If she first meet the curled Antony, [300]