In the same spirit of royal bravado, but finer still, and worked up with a truly Oriental exuberance of fancy and imagery, is her famous description of Antony, addressed to Dolabella:-- Most noble empress you have heard of me? CLEOPATRA. I cannot tell. DOLABELLA. Assuredly, you know me. CLEOPATRA. No matter, sir, what I have heard or known. You laugh when boys, or women, tell their dreams Is't not your trick? DOLABELLA. I understand not, madam. CLEOPATRA. I dream'd there was an emperor Antony; O such another sleep, that I might see But such another man! DOLABELLA. If it might please you-- CLEOPATRA. His face was as the heavens; and therein stuck A sun and moon; which kept their course, and lighted The little O, the earth. DOLABELLA. Most sovereign creature-- CLEOPATRA. His legs bestrid the ocean: his reared arm Crested the world; his voice was propertied As all the tuned spheres, and that to friends; But when he meant to quail or shake the orb He was as rattling thunder. For his bounty, There was no winter in't; an autumn 'twas, That grew the more by reaping. His delights Were dolphin like; they show'd his back above The element they liv'd in. In his livery[72] Walk'd crowns and coronets; realms and islands were As plates[73] dropp'd from his pocket. DOLABELLA. Cleopatra! CLEOPATRA. Think you there was, or might be, such a man As this I dream'd of? DOLABELLA. Gentle madam, no. CLEOPATRA. You lie,--up to the hearing of the gods! There was no room left in this amazing picture for the display of that passionate maternal tenderness, which was a strong and redeeming feature in Cleopatra's historical character; but it is not left untouched, for when she is imprecating mischiefs on herself, she wishes, as the last and worst of possible evils, that "thunder may smite Caesarion!"