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 dreamt 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 and 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 showed his back above The element they lived in. In his livery Walked crowns and crownets; realms and islands were As plates dropped from his pocket. DOLABELLA. Cleopatra— CLEOPATRA. Think you there was or might be such a man As this I dreamt of? DOLABELLA. Gentle madam, no. CLEOPATRA. You lie up to the hearing of the gods! But if there be nor ever were one such, It’s past the size of dreaming. Nature wants stuff To vie strange forms with fancy; yet t’ imagine An Antony were nature’s piece ’gainst fancy, Condemning shadows quite. DOLABELLA. Hear me, good madam. Your loss is, as yourself, great; and you bear it As answering to the weight. Would I might never O’ertake pursued success, but I do feel, By the rebound of yours, a grief that smites My very heart at root. CLEOPATRA. I thank you, sir. Know you what Caesar means to do with me? DOLABELLA. I am loath to tell you what I would you knew. CLEOPATRA. Nay, pray you, sir. DOLABELLA. Though he be honourable— CLEOPATRA. He’ll lead me, then, in triumph. DOLABELLA. Madam, he will. I know it. Flourish. Enter Caesar, Proculeius, Gallus, Maecenas and others of his train. ALL. Make way there! Caesar! CAESAR. Which is the Queen of Egypt? DOLABELLA. It is the Emperor, madam. [_Cleopatra kneels._] CAESAR. Arise, you shall not kneel. I pray you, rise. Rise, Egypt. CLEOPATRA. Sir, the gods Will have it thus. My master and my lord I must obey. CAESAR. Take to you no hard thoughts. The record of what injuries you did us, Though written in our flesh, we shall remember As things but done by chance. CLEOPATRA. Sole sir o’ th’ world, I cannot project mine own cause so well To make it clear, but do confess I have Been laden with like frailties which before Have often shamed our sex. CAESAR. Cleopatra, know We will extenuate rather than enforce. If you apply yourself to our intents, Which towards you are most gentle, you shall find A benefit in this change; but if you seek To lay on me a cruelty by taking Antony’s course, you shall bereave yourself Of my good purposes, and put your children To that destruction which I’ll guard them from If thereon you rely. I’ll take my leave.