Act II.
Sc. 1.
"Salt Cleopatra, soften thy wand lip."
I see no sense in in 'wand.' Some editors read wan'd, taking perhaps the image from the moon. I have read wanton, in the sense of soft, yielding like "the wanton rushes" (1 H. IV. iii. 1), "the wanton air" (L. L. L. iv. 3), which would also suit the metre better. I, however, strongly suspect that the poet's word may have been tann'd, spelt of course tand, so that a printer's error was very obvious. She is more than once called gypsy; she has "a tawny front" (i. 1); and she says of herself (i. 5.) that she is "with Phœbus' amorous kisses black." In Son. cxv. we have "tan sacred beauty;" and in Son. lxii.,
"But when my glass shows me myself indeed,
Beated and chopp'd with tann'd antiquity."
'Salt' is wanton, lascivious; perhaps from salax.
Sc. 2.
"I should do thus.—Welcome to Rome.—I thank you."