Sardou's Cleopatra — page 164: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SARDOU’S CLEOPATRA. 149 from here her despair! I wish to console her. I wish—I wish to see her!” Ventidius was silent. His anger, quickly aroused, was quickly allayed. He saw that he had made a mistake, and he sought to atone for it. “Antony,” he said, very earnestly, after a long pause, “if it were a question of yourself, of your interests alone, of your happiness, in short, I would resign myself to see your valor lulled to sleep, your name extinct. But itis the fatal love of a queen who is our natural enemy. It means the Roman Empire destroyed, ruined, lost for- ever! What matters,in such acase, her tears © and cries? General your foolish pity dishonors -you. And, in the name of our old friendship, in the name of your country, in the name of Rome, who will judge you, I implore you to abandon Egypt and wed Octavia.” “It seems to me,” said Antony, sullenly, “that Octavius has his friends, and that they serve him well.” “Do you think that?” cried Ventidius. “Ah! that speech was unworthy of you. Pompey is dead. Lepidus is in Africa. Without you, Ceesar would have sole sway. But he offers to. give you his sister, his well-beloved sister, and, % (Elo) comircbooks: a=