CLEOPATRA   Thou, eunuch Mardian!

MARDIAN       What’s your highness’ pleasure?

CLEOPATRA   Not now to hear thee sing. I take no pleasure

In aught an eunuch has. ’Tis well for thee

That, being unseminared, thy freer thoughts

May not fly forth of Egypt. Hast thou affections?

MARDIAN       Yes, gracious madam.

CLEOPATRA               Indeed?

MARDIAN       Not in deed, madam, for I can do nothing

But what indeed is honest to be done.

Yet have I fierce affections, and think

What Venus did with Mars.             (1.5.8-18)

Cleopatra’s on to her next target, having temporarily exhausted the delights of sparring with Charmian, and perhaps taking some pleasure in ignoring her closest woman friend and ally, turning her attention elsewhere. Time to tease Mardian the eunuch, appealing to the prurience of a London audience and adding another layer of decadence to the scene. A eunuch! (not really a eunuch; there could be a laugh in that, at the expense of the actor playing Mardian, perhaps even more so if he has a reputation as a lover, or indeed the opposite; he might be being played by one of the boys). What’s your highness’ pleasure? A standard enough way of replying, politely, so what do you want, then? What can I do for you? But it gets the crucial word in there, pleasure, and Cleopatra’s off again. The obvious joke is delayed—not now to hear thee sing, she retorts, so Mardian could have a distinctive falsetto voice, or appear over-ready to sing at this point, or perhaps he’s already singing or has sung in another scene. (Eunuchs were often associated with music; the castrati used in some chapel choirs on the continent – for example in the Vatican – were notorious in England.) But then Cleopatra moves into the more obvious territory: well, I can take no pleasure in aught an eunuch has. Because you are a EUNUCH and I have Insatiable Appetites, and you are no good to me, being a EUNUCH. Boom. Then, inevitably, albeit briefly, she brings it back to herself: ’tis well for thee that, being unseminared, thy freer thoughts may not fly forth of Egypt. It’s all very well for you, being unseminared—literally unseeded, castrated; its meaning is clear to an etymologically-minded audience, but Cleopatra can linger on the ridiculousness of the word, probably Shakespeare’s invention, its linguistic evasiveness—because that means that your mind doesn’t wander, your looser imaginings don’t run away with themselves, and in particular roam free of Egypt. (As mine do, she means; all her desires are concentrated abroad, on Antony.) But then another thought strikes her: hast thou affections? I’ve been assuming that you were tamed, damped down, like a neutered tomcat, but perhaps you don’t have any desires at all? She’s genuinely interested, for a nano-second. Yes, gracious madam, Mardian replies, perhaps with some dignity. Yes, I do. I have Feelings. Indeed? (Still interested? Some kind of record.) Really, you do? Mostly she’s setting up the rest of the joke for him, though, well, not in deed, madam, for I can do nothing (boom!) but what indeed is honest to be done. I have to be a good boy! I have to live a chaste life! (Depending on how decadent a production’s version of Egypt is, there might be a suggestion that Mardian’s offering no-risk, no-strings sex.) Yet have I fierce affections, and think what Venus did with Mars. Fierce affections, strong desires—that focuses and raises the temperature of the scene and, even more, Cleopatra and the audience are also now thinking of what Venus did with Mars, the great adulterous lovers of the classical pantheon, goddess of love and god of war, adulterous like Cleopatra and Antony, and (much more frequently than them) depicted in compromising positions in visual art, luxuriously fleshly images which can flash before the mind’s eye in this moment.