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+The Project Gutenberg EBook Cleopatra, by Georg Ebers, Volume 4.
+#38 in our series by Georg Ebers
+
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+Title: Cleopatra, Volume 4.
+
+Author: Georg Ebers
+
+Release Date: April, 2004  [EBook #5476]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on May 21, 2002]
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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLEOPATRA, BY GEORG EBERS, V4 ***
+
+
+
+This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
+
+
+
+[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the
+file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an
+entire meal of them.  D.W.]
+
+
+
+
+
+CLEOPATRA
+
+By Georg Ebers
+
+Volume 4.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+Gorgias went to his work without delay.  When the twin statues were only
+waiting to be erected in front of the Theatre of Dionysus, Dion sought
+him.  Some impulse urged him to talk to his old friend before leaving the
+city with his betrothed bride.  Since they parted the latter had
+accomplished the impossible; for the building of the wall on the Choma,
+ordered by Antony, was commenced, the restoration of the little palace at
+the point, and many other things connected with the decoration of the
+triumphal arches, were arranged.  His able and alert foreman found it
+difficult to follow him as he dictated order after order in his writing-
+tablet.
+
+The conversation with his friend was not a long one, for Dion had
+promised Barine and her mother to accompany them to the country.
+Notwithstanding the betrothal, they were to start that very day;
+for Caesarion had called upon Barine twice that morning.  She had not
+received him, but the unfortunate youth's conduct induced her to hasten
+the preparations for her departure.
+
+To avoid attracting attention, they were to use Archibius's large
+travelling chariot and Nile boat, although Dion's were no less
+comfortable.
+
+The marriage was to take place in the "abode of peace."  The young
+Alexandrian's own ship, which was to convey the newly wedded pair to
+Alexandria, bore the name of Peitho, the goddess of persuasion, for Dion
+liked to be reminded of his oratorical powers in the council.
+Henceforward it would be called the Barine, and was to receive many an
+embellishment.
+
+Dion confided to his friend what he had learned in relation to the fate
+of the Queen and the fleet, and, notwithstanding the urgency of the
+claims upon Gorgias's time, he lingered to discuss the future destiny of
+the city and her threatened liberty; for these things lay nearest to his
+heart.
+
+"Fortunately," cried Dion, "I followed my inclination; now it seems to me
+that duty commands every true man to make his own house a nursery for the
+cultivation of the sentiments which he inherited from his forefathers and
+which must not die, so long as there are Macedonian citizens in
+Alexandria.  We must submit if the superior might of Rome renders Egypt a
+province of the republic, but we can preserve to our city and her council
+the lion's share of their freedom.  Whatever may be the development of
+affairs, we are and shall remain the source whence Rome draws the largest
+share of the knowledge which enriches her brain."
+
+"And the art which adorns her rude life," replied Gorgias.  "If she is
+free to crush us without pity, she will fare, I think, like the maiden
+who raises her foot to trample on a beautiful, rare flower, and then
+withdraws it because it would be a crime to destroy so exquisite a work
+of the Creator."
+
+"And what  does  the  flower owe to your maiden," cried Dion, "or our
+city to Rome?  Let us meet her claims with dignified resolution, then I
+think we shall not have the worst evils to fear."
+
+"Let us hope so.  But, my friend, keep your eyes open for other than
+Roman foes.  Now that it will become known that you do not love her,
+beware of Iras.  There is something about her which reminds me of the
+jackal.  Jealousy!--I believe she would be capable of the worst--"
+
+"Yet," Dion interrupted, "Charmian will soften whatever injury Iras plans
+to do me, and, though I cannot rely much upon my uncle, Archibius is
+above both and favours us and our marriage."
+
+Gorgias uttered a sigh of relief, and exclaimed, "Then on to happiness!"
+
+"And you must also begin to provide for yours," replied Dion warmly.
+"Forbid your heart to continue this wandering, nomad life.  The tent
+which the wind blows down is not fit for the architect's permanent
+residence.  Build yourself a fine house, which will defy storms, as you
+built my palace.  I shall not grudge it, and have already said, the times
+demand it."
+
+"I will remember the advice," replied Gorgias.  "But six eyes are again
+bent upon me for direction.  There are so many important things to be
+done while we waste the hours in building triumphal arches for the
+defeated--trophies for an overthrow.  But your uncle has just issued
+orders to complete the work in the most magnificent style.  The ways of
+destiny and the great are dark; may the brightest sunshine illumine
+yours!  A prosperous journey!  We shall hear, of course, when you
+celebrate the wedding, and if I can I shall join you in the Hymenaeus.
+Lucky fellow that you are!  Now I'm summoned from over yonder!  May
+Castor and Pollux, and all the gods favourable to travel, Aphrodite, and
+all the Loves attend your trip to Irenia, and protect you in the realm of
+Eros and Hymen!"
+
+With these words the warm-hearted man clasped his friend to his breast
+for the first time.  Dion cordially responded, and at last shook his hard
+right hand with the exclamation:
+
+"Farewell, then, till we meet in Irenia on the wedding day, you dear,
+faithful fellow."
+
+Then he entered the chariot which stood waiting, and Gorgias gazed after
+him thoughtfully.  The hyacinthine purple cloak which Dion wore that day
+had not vanished from his sight when a loud crashing, rattling, and
+roaring arose behind him.  A hastily erected scaffold, which was to
+support the pulleys for raising the statues, had collapsed.  The damage
+could be easily repaired, but the accident aroused a troubled feeling in
+the architect's mind.  He was a child of his time, a period when duty
+commanded the prudent man to heed omens.  Experience also taught him that
+when such a thing happened in his work something unpleasant was apt to
+occur within the circle of his friends.  The veil of the future concealed
+what might be in store for the beloved couple; but he resolved to keep
+his eyes open on Dion's behalf and to request Archibius to do the same.
+
+The pressure of work, however, soon silenced the sense of uneasiness.
+The damage was speedily repaired, and later Gorgias, sometimes with one,
+sometimes with another tablet or roll of MS. in his hand, issued the most
+varied orders.
+
+Gradually the light of this dismal day faded.  Ere the night, which
+threatened to bring rain and storm, closed in, he again rode on his mule
+to the Bruchium to overlook the progress of the work in the various
+buildings and give additional directions, for the labour was to be
+continued during the night.
+
+The north wind was now blowing so violently from the sea that it was
+difficult to keep the torches and lamps lighted.  The gale drove the
+drops of rain into his face, and a glance northward showed him masses of
+black clouds beyond the harbour and the lighthouse.  This indicated a bad
+night, and again the boding sense of coming misfortune stole over him.
+Yet he set to work swiftly and prudently, helping with his own hands when
+occasion required.
+
+Night closed in.  Not a star was visible in the sky, and the air, chilled
+by the north wind, grew so cold that Gorgias at last permitted his body
+slave to wrap his cloak around him.  While drawing the hood over his
+head, he gazed at a procession of litters and men moving towards Lochias.
+
+Perhaps the Queen's children were returning home from some expedition.
+But probably they were rather private citizens on their way to some
+festival celebrating the victory; for every one now believed in a great
+battle and a successful issue of the war.  This was proved by the shouts
+and cheers of the people, who, spite of the storm, were still moving to
+and fro near the harbour.
+
+The last of the torch-bearers had just passed Gorgias, and he had told
+himself that a train of litters belonging to the royal family would not
+move through the darkness so faintly lighted, when a single man, bearing
+in his hand a lantern, whose flickering rays shone on his wrinkled face,
+approached rapidly from the opposite direction.  It was old Phryx,
+Didymus's house slave, with whom the architect had become acquainted,
+while the aged scholar was composing the inscription for the Odeum which
+Gorgias had erected.  The aged servant had brought him many alterations
+of his master's first sketch, and Gorgias had reminded him of it the
+previous day.
+
+The workmen by whom the statues had been raised to the pedestal, amid the
+bright glare of torches, to the accompaniment of a regular chant, had
+just dropped the ropes, windlasses, and levers, when the architect
+recognized the slave.
+
+What did the old man want at so late an hour on this dark night?  The
+fall of the scaffold again returned to his mind.
+
+Was the slave seeking for a member of the family?  Did Helena need
+assistance?  He stopped the gray-haired man, who answered his question
+with a heavy sigh, followed by the maxim, "Misfortunes come in pairs,
+like oxen."  Then he continued: "Yesterday there was great anxiety.
+Today, when there was so much rejoicing on account of Barine, I thought
+directly, 'Sorrow follows joy, and the second misfortune won't be spared
+us.'  And so it proved."
+
+Gorgias anxiously begged him to relate what had happened, and the old
+man, drawing nearer, whispered that the pupil and assistant of Didymus--
+young Philotas of Amphissa, a student, and, moreover, a courteous young
+man of excellent family--had gone to a banquet to which Antyllus, the son
+of Antony, had invited several of his classmates.  This had already
+happened several times, and he, Phryx, had warned him, for, when the
+lowly associate with the lofty, the lowly rarely escape kicks and blows.
+The young fellow, who usually had behaved no worse than the other Ephebi,
+had always returned from such festivities with a flushed face and
+unsteady steps, but to-night he had not even reached his room in the
+upper story.  He had darted into the house as though pursued by the
+watch, and, while trying to rush up the stairs--it was really only a
+ladder-he had made a misstep and fell.  He, Phryx, did not believe that
+he was hurt, for none of his limbs ached, even when they were pulled and
+stretched, and Dionysus kindly protected drunkards; but some demon must
+have taken possession of him, for he howled and groaned continually, and
+would answer no questions.  True, he was aware, from the festivals of
+Dionysus, that the young man was one of those who, when intoxicated, weep
+and lament; but this time something unusual must have occurred, for in
+the first place his handsome face was coloured black and looked hideous,
+since his tears had washed away the soot in many places, and then he
+talked nothing but a confused jargon.  It was a pity.
+
+When an attempt was made, with the help of the garden slave, to carry him
+to his room, he dealt blows and kicks like a lunatic.  Didymus now also
+believed that he was possessed by demons, as often happens to those who,
+in falling, strike their heads against the ground, and thus wake the
+demons in the earth.  Well, yes, they might be demons, but only those of
+wine.  The student was just "crazy drunk," as people say.  But the old
+gentleman was very fond of his pupil, and had ordered him, Pliryx, to go
+to Olympus, who, ever since he could remember, had been the family
+physician.
+
+"The Queen's leech?" asked Gorgias, disapprovingly, and when the slave
+assented, the architect exclaimed in a positive tone: "It is not right to
+force the old man out of doors in such a north wind.  Age is not
+specially considerate to age.  Now that the statues stand yonder, I can
+leave my post for half an hour and will go with you.  I don't think a
+leech is needed to drive out these demons."
+
+"True, my lord, true!" cried the slave, "but Olympus is our friend.  He
+visits few patients, but he will come to our house in any weather.  He
+has litters, chariots, and splendid mules.  The Queen gives him whatever
+is best and most comfortable.  He is skilful, and perhaps can render
+speedy help.  People must use what they have."
+
+"Only where it is necessary," replied the architect.  "There are my two
+mules; follow me on the second.  If I don't drive out the demons, you
+will have plenty of time to trot after Olympus."
+
+This proposal pleased the old slave, and a short time after Gorgias
+entered the venerable philosopher's tablinum.
+
+Helena welcomed him like an intimate friend.  Whenever he appeared she
+thought the peril was half over.  Didymus, too, greeted him warmly, and
+conducted him to the little room where the youth possessed by demons lay
+on a divan.
+
+He was still groaning and whimpering.  Tears were streaming down his
+cheeks, and, whenever any member of the household approached, he pushed
+him away.
+
+When Gorgias held his hands and sternly ordered him to confess what wrong
+he had done, he sobbed out that he was the most ungrateful wretch on
+earth.  His baseness would ruin his kind parents, himself, and all his
+friends.
+
+Then he accused himself of having caused the destruction of Didymus's
+granddaughter.  He would not have gone to Antyllus again had not his
+recent generosity bound him to him, but now he must atone-ay, atone.
+Then, as if completely crushed, he continued to mumble the word, "atone!"
+and for a time nothing more could be won from him.
+
+Didymus, however, had the key to the last sentence.  A few weeks before,
+Philotas and several other pupils of the rhetorician whose lectures in
+the museum he attended had been invited to breakfast with Antyllus.  When
+the young student loudly admired the beautiful gold and silver beakers in
+which the wine was served, the reckless host cried: "They are yours; take
+them with you."  When the guests departed the cup-bearer asked Philotas,
+who had been far from taking the gift seriously, to receive his property.
+Antyllus had intended to bestow the goblets; but he advised the youth to
+let him pay their value in money, for among them were several ancient
+pieces of most artistic workmanship, which Antony, the extravagant young
+fellow's father, might perhaps be unwilling to lose.
+
+Thereupon several rolls of gold solidi were paid to the astonished
+student--and they had been of little real benefit, since they had made it
+possible for him to keep pace with his wealthy and aristocratic
+classmates and share many of their extravagances.  Yet he had not ceased
+to fulfil his duty to Didymus.
+
+Though he sometimes turned night into day, he gave no serious cause for
+reproof.  Small youthful errors were willingly pardoned; for he was a
+good-looking, merry young fellow, who knew how to make himself agreeable
+to the entire household, even to the women.
+
+What had befallen the poor youth that day?  Didymus was filled with
+compassion for him, and, though he gladly welcomed Gorgias, he gave him
+to understand that the leech's absence vexed him.
+
+But, during a long bachelor career in Alexandria, a city ever gracious to
+the gifts of Bacchus, Gorgias had become familiar with attacks like those
+of Philotas and their treatment, and after several jars of water had been
+brought and he had been left alone a short time with the sufferer, the
+philosopher secretly rejoiced that he had not summoned the grey-haired
+leech into the stormy night for Gorgias led forth his pupil with dripping
+hair, it is true, but in a state of rapid convalescence.
+
+The youth's handsome face was freed from soot, but his eyes were bent in
+confusion on the ground, and he sometimes pressed his hand upon his
+aching brow.  It needed all the old philosopher's skill in persuasion to
+induce him to speak, and Philotas, before he began, begged Helena to
+leave the room.
+
+He intended to adhere strictly to the truth, though he feared that the
+reckless deed into which he had suffered himself to be drawn might have a
+fatal effect upon his future life.
+
+Besides, he hoped to obtain wise counsel from the architect, to whom he
+owed his speedy recovery, and whose grave, kindly manner inspired him
+with confidence; and, moreover, he was so greatly indebted to Didymus
+that duty required him to make a frank confession--yet he dared not
+acknowledge one of the principal motives of his foolish act.
+
+The plot into which he had been led was directed against Barine, whom he
+had long imagined he loved with all the fervour of his twenty years.
+But, just before he went to the fatal banquet, he had heard that the
+young beauty was betrothed to Dion.  This had wounded him deeply; for in
+many a quiet hour it had seemed possible to win her for himself and lead
+her as his wife to his home in Amphissa.  He was very little younger than
+she, and if his parents once saw her, they could not fail to approve his
+choice.  And the people in Amphissa!  They would have gazed at Barine as
+if she were a goddess.
+
+And now this fine gentleman had come to crush his fairest hopes.  No word
+of love had ever been exchanged between him and Barine, but how kindly
+she had always looked at him, how willingly she had accepted trivial
+services!  Now she was lost.  At first this had merely saddened him, but
+after he had drunk the wine, and Antyllus, Antony's son, in the presence
+of the revellers, over whom Caesarion presided as "symposiarch"--
+[Director of a banquet.]--had accused Barine of capturing hearts by magic
+spells, he had arrived at the conviction that he, too, had been
+shamefully allured and betrayed.
+
+He had served for a toy, he said to himself, unless she had really loved
+him and merely preferred Dion on account of his wealth.  In any case, he
+felt justified in cherishing resentment against Barine, and with the
+number of goblets which he drained his jealous rage increased.
+
+When urged to join in the escapade which now burdened his conscience he
+consented with a burning brain in order to punish her for the wrong
+which, in his heated imagination, she had done him.
+
+All this he withheld from the older men and merely briefly described the
+splendid banquet which Caesarion, pallid and listless as ever, had
+directed, and Antyllus especially had enlivened with the most reckless
+mirth.
+
+The "King of kings" and Antony's son had escaped from their tutors on the
+pretext of a hunting excursion, and the chief huntsman had not grudged
+them the pleasure--only they were obliged to promise him that they would
+be ready to set out for the desert early the next morning.
+
+When, after the banquet, the mixing-vessels were brought out and the
+beakers were filled more rapidly, Antyllus whispered several times to
+Caesarion and then turned the conversation upon Barine, the fairest of
+the fair, destined by the immortals for the greatest and highest of
+mankind.  This was the "King of kings," Caesarion, and he also claimed
+the favour of the gods for himself.  But everybody knew that Aphrodite
+deemed herself greater than the highest of kings, and therefore Barine
+ventured to close her doors upon their august symposiarch in a manner
+which could not fail to be unendurable, not only to him but to all the
+youth of Alexandria.  Whoever boasted of being one of the Ephebi might
+well clench his fist with indignation, when he heard that the insolent
+beauty kept young men at a distance because she considered only the older
+ones worthy of her notice.  This must not be!  The Ephebi of Alexandria
+must make her feel the power of youth.  This was the more urgently
+demanded, because Caesarion would thereby be led to the goal of his
+wishes.
+
+Barine was going into the country that very evening.  Insulted Eros
+himself was smoothing their way.  He commanded them to attack the
+arrogant fair one's carriage and lead her to him who sought her in the
+name of youth, in order to show her that the hearts of the Ephebi, whom
+she disdainfully rejected, glowed more ardently than those of the older
+men on whom she bestowed her favours.
+
+Here Gorgias interrupted the speaker with a loud cry of indignation, but
+old Didymus's eyes seemed to be fairly starting from their sockets as he
+hoarsely shouted an impatient:
+
+"Go on!"
+
+And Philotas, now completely sobered, described with increasing animation
+the wonderful change that had taken place in the quiet Caesarion, as if
+some magic spell had been at work; for scarcely had the revellers greeted
+Antyllus's words with shouts of joy, declaring themselves ready to avenge
+insulted youth upon Barine, than the "King of kings" suddenly sprang from
+the cushions on which he had listlessly reclined, and with flashing eyes
+shouted that whoever called himself his friend must aid him in the
+attack.
+
+Here he was urged to still greater haste by another impatient "Go on!"
+from his master, and hurriedly continued his story, describing how they
+had blackened their faces and armed themselves with Antyllus's swords and
+lances.  As the sun was setting they went in a covered boat through the
+Agathodamon Canal to Lake Mareotis.  Everything must have been arranged
+in advance; for they landed precisely at the right hour.
+
+As, during the trip, they had kept up their courage by swallowing the
+most fiery wine, Philotas had staggered on shore with difficulty and then
+been dragged forward by the others.  After this he knew nothing more,
+except that he had rushed with the rest upon a large harmamaxa,--[A
+closed Asiatic travelling-carriage with four wheels]--and in so doing
+fell.  When he rose from the earth all was over.
+
+As if in a dream he saw Scythians and other guardians of the peace seize
+Antyllus, while Caesarion was struggling on the ground with another man.
+If he was not mistaken it was Dion, Barine's betrothed husband.
+
+These communications were interrupted by many exclamations of impatience
+and wrath; but now Didymus, fairly frantic with alarm, cried:
+
+"And the child--Barine?"
+
+But when Philotas's sole reply to this question was a silent shake of the
+head, indignation conquered the old philosopher, and clutching his
+pupil's chiton with both hands, he shook him violently, exclaiming
+furiously:
+
+"You don't know, scoundrel?  Instead of defending her who should be dear
+to you as a child of this household, you joined the rascally scorners of
+morality and law as the accomplice of this waylayer in purple!"
+
+Here the architect soothed the enraged old man with expostulations,
+and the assertion that everything must now yield to the necessity of
+searching for Barine and Dion.  He did not know which way to turn, in the
+amount of labour pressing upon him, but he would have a hasty talk with
+the foreman and then try to find his friend.
+
+"And I," cried the old man, "must go at once to the unfortunate child.-My
+cloak, Phryx, my sandals!"
+
+In spite of Gorgias's counsel to remember his age and the inclement
+weather, he cried angrily:
+
+"I am going, I say!  If the tempest hurls me to the earth, and the bolts
+of Zeus strike me, so be it.  One misfortune more or less matters little
+in a life which has been a chain of heavy blows of Fate.  I buried three
+sons in the prime of manhood, and two have been slain in battle.  Barine,
+the joy of my heart, I myself, fool that I was, bound to the scoundrel
+who blasted her joyous existence; and now that I believed she would be
+protected from trouble and misconstruction by the side of a worthy
+husband, these infamous rascals, whose birth protects them from
+vengeance, have wounded, perhaps killed her betrothed lover.  They
+trample in the dust her fair name and my white hair!--Phryx, my hat and
+staff."
+
+The storm had long been raging around the house, which stood close by the
+sea, and the sailcloth awning which was stretched over the impluvium
+noisily rattled the metal rings that confined it.  Now so violent a gust
+swept from room to room that two of the flames in the three-branched lamp
+went out.  The door of the house had been opened, and drenched with rain,
+a hood drawn over his black head, Barine's Nubian doorkeeper crossed the
+threshold.
+
+He presented a pitiable spectacle and at first could find no answer to
+the greetings and questions of the men, who had been joined by Helena,
+her grandmother leaning on her arm; his rapid walk against the fury of
+the storm had fairly taken away his breath.
+
+He had little, however, to tell.  Barine merely sent a message to her
+relatives that, no matter what tales rumour might bring, she and her
+mother were unhurt.  Dion had received a wound in the shoulder, but it
+was not serious.  Her grandparents need have no anxiety; the attack had
+completely failed.
+
+Doris, who was deaf, had listened vainly, holding her hand to her ear, to
+catch this report; and Didymus now told his granddaughter as much as he
+deemed it advisable for her to know, that she might communicate it to her
+grandmother, who understood the movements of her lips.
+
+The old man was rejoiced to learn that his granddaughter had escaped so
+great a peril uninjured, yet he was still burdened by sore anxiety.  The
+architect, too, feared the worst, but by dint of assuring him that he
+would return at once with full details when he had ascertained the fate
+of Dion and his betrothed bride, he finally persuaded the old man to give
+up the night walk through the tempest.
+
+Philotas, with tears in his eyes, begged them to accept his services as
+messenger or for any other purpose; but Didymus ordered him to go to bed.
+An opportunity would be found to enable him to atone for the offence so
+recklessly committed.
+
+The scholar's peaceful home was deprived of its nocturnal repose, and
+when Gorgias had gone and Didymus had refused Helena's request to have
+the aged porter take her to her sister, the old man remained alone with
+his wife in the tablinum.
+
+She had been told nothing except that thieves had attacked her
+granddaughter, Barine, and slightly wounded her lover; but her own heart
+and the manner of the husband, at whose side she had grown grey, showed
+that many things were being concealed.  She longed to know the story more
+fully, but it was difficult for Didymus to talk a long time in a loud
+tone, so she silenced her desire to learn the whole truth.  But, in order
+to await the architect's report, they did not go to rest.
+
+Didymus had sunk into an armchair, and Doris sat near at her spindle, but
+without drawing any threads from her distaff.  When she heard her husband
+sigh and saw him bury his face in his hands, she limped nearer to him,
+difficult as it was for her to move, and stroked his head, now nearly
+bald, with her hand.  Then she uttered soothing words, and, as the
+anxious, troubled expression did not yet pass from his wrinkled face,
+she reminded him in faltering yet tender tones how often they had thought
+they must despair, and yet everything had resulted well.
+
+"Ah! husband," she added, "I know full well that the clouds hanging over
+us are very black, and I cannot even see them clearly, because you show
+them at such a distance.  Yet I feel that they threaten us with sore
+tribulation.  But, after all, what harm can they do us, if we only keep
+close together, we two old people and the children of the children whom
+Hades rent from us?  We need only to grow old to perceive that life has a
+head with many faces.  The ugly one of to-day can last no longer than you
+can keep that deeply furrowed brow.  But you need not coerce yourself for
+my sake, husband.  Let it be so.  I need merely close my eyes to see how
+smooth and beautiful it was in youth, and how pleasant it will look when
+better days say, 'Here we are!'"
+
+Didymus, with a mournful smile, kissed her grey hair and shouted into her
+left ear, which was a little less deaf than the other:
+
+"How young you are still, wife!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+The tempest swept howling from the north across the island of Pharos, and
+the shallows of Diabathra in the great harbour of Alexandria.  The water,
+usually so placid, rose in high waves, and the beacon on the lighthouse
+of Sastratus sent the rent abundance of its flames with hostile
+impetuosity towards the city.  The fires in the pitch-pans and the
+torches on the shore sometimes seemed on the point of being extinguished,
+at others burst with a doubly brilliant blaze through the smoke which
+obscured them.
+
+The royal harbour, a fine basin which surrounded in the form of a
+semicircle the southern part of the Lochias and a portion of the northern
+shore of the Bruchium, was brightly illuminated every night; but this
+evening there seemed to be an unusual movement among the lights on its
+western shore, the private anchorage of the royal fleet.
+
+Was it the storm that stirred them?  No.  How could the wind have set
+one torch in the place of another, and moved lights or lanterns in a
+direction opposite to its violent course?  Only a few persons, however,
+perceived this; for, though joyous anticipation or anxious fears urged
+many thither, who would venture upon the quay on such a tempestuous
+night?  Besides, no one would have found admittance to the royal port,
+which was closed on all sides.  Even the mole which, towards the west,
+served as the string to the bow of land surrounding it, had but a single
+opening and--as every one knew--that was closed by a chain in the same
+way as the main entrance to the harbour between the Pharos and Alveus
+Steganus.
+
+About two hours before midnight, spite of the increasing fury of the
+tempest, the singular movement of the lights diminished, but rarely had
+the hearts of those for whom they burned throbbed so anxiously.  These
+were the dignitaries and court officials who stood nearest to Cleopatra
+--about twenty men and a single woman, Iras.  Mardion and she had
+summoned them because the Queen's letter permitted those to whom she had
+given authority to offer her a quiet reception.  After a long
+consultation they had not invited the commanders of the little Roman
+garrison left behind.  It was doubtful whether those whom they expected
+would return that night, and the Roman soldiers who were loyal to Antony
+had gone with him to the war.
+
+The hall in the centre of the private roadstead of the royal harbour,
+where they had assembled, was furnished with regal magnificence; for it
+was a favourite resort of the Queen.  The spacious apartment lacked no
+requisite of comfort, and most of those who were waiting used the well-
+cushioned couches, while others, harassed by mental anxiety, paced to and
+fro.
+
+As the room had remained unused for months, bats had made nests there,
+and now that it was lighted, dazzled by the glare of the lamps and
+candles, they darted to and fro above the heads of the assembly.  Iras
+had ordered the commander of the Mellakes, or youths, a body-guard
+composed of the sons of aristocratic Macedonian families, to expel the
+troublesome creatures, and it diverted the thoughts of these devoted
+soldiers of the Queen to strike at them with their swords.
+
+Others preferred to watch this futile battle rather than give themselves
+up to the anxiety which filled their minds.  The Regent was gazing mutely
+at the ground; Iras, pale and absent-minded, was listening to Zeno's
+statements; and Archibius had gone out of doors, and, unheeding the
+storm, was looking across the tossing waves of the harbour for the
+expected ships.
+
+In a wooden shed, whose roof was supported by gaily painted pillars,
+through which the wind whistled, the servants, from the porters to the
+litter-bearers, had gathered in groups under the flickering light of the
+lanterns.  The Greeks sat on wooden stools, the Egyptians upon mats on
+the floor.  The largest circle contained the parties who attended to the
+Queen's luggage and the upper servants, among whom were several maids.
+
+They had been told that the Queen was expected that night, because it was
+possible that the strong north wind would bear her ship home with
+unexpected speed after the victory.  But they were better informed:
+palaces have chinks in doors and curtains, and are pervaded by a very
+peculiar echo which bears even a whisper distinctly from ear to ear.
+
+The body-slave of the commander-in-chief Seleukus was the principal
+spokesman.  His master had reached Alexandria but a few hours ago from
+the frontier fortress of Pelusium, which he commanded.  A mysterious
+order from Lucilius, Antony's most faithful friend, brought from Taenarum
+by a swift galley, had summoned him hither.
+
+The freedman Beryllus, a loquacious Sicilian, who, as an actor, had seen
+better days ere pirates robbed him of his liberty, had heard many new
+things, and his hearers listened eagerly; for ships coming from the
+north, which touched at Pelusium, had confirmed and completed the evil
+tidings that had penetrated the Sebasteum.
+
+According to his story, he was as well informed as if he had been an eye-
+witness of the naval battle; for he had been present during his master's
+conversation with many ship-captains and messengers from Greece.  He even
+assumed the air of a loyal, strictly silent servant, who would only
+venture to confirm and deny what the Alexandrians had already learned.
+Yet his knowledge consisted merely of a confused medley of false and true
+occurrences.  While the Egyptian fleet had been defeated at Actium, and
+Antony, flying with Cleopatra, had gone first to Taenarum at the end of
+the Peloponnesian coast, he asserted that the army and fleet had met on
+the Peloponnesian coast and Octavianus was pursuing Antony, who had
+turned towards Athens, while Cleopatra was on her way to Alexandria.
+
+His  "trustworthy  intelligence"  had  been patched together from a few
+words caught from Seleukus at table, or while receiving and dismissing
+messengers.  In other matters his information was more accurate.
+
+While for several days the harbour of Alexandria had been closed, vessels
+were permitted to enter Pelusium, and all captains of newly arrived ships
+and caravans were compelled to report to Beryllus's master, the
+commandant of the important frontier fortress.
+
+He had quitted Pelusium the night before.  The strong wind had driven the
+trireme before it so swiftly that it was difficult for even the sea gulls
+to follow.  It was easy for the listeners to believe this; for the storm
+outside howled louder and louder, whistling through the open hall where
+the servants had gathered.  Most of the lamps and torches had been blown
+out, the pitch-pans only sent forth still blacker clouds of smoke, lit by
+red and yellow flames, and the closed lanterns alone continued to diffuse
+a flickering light.  So the wide space, dim with smoke, was illumined
+only by a dull, varying glimmer.
+
+One of the porters had furnished wine to shorten the hours of waiting;
+but it could only be drunk in secret, so there were no goblets.  The jars
+wandered from mouth to mouth, and every sip was welcome, for the wind
+blew keenly, and besides, the smoke irritated their throats.
+
+The freedman, Beryllus, was often interrupted by paroxysms of coughing,
+especially from the women, while relating the evil omens which were told
+to his master in Pelusium.  Each was well authenticated and surpassed its
+predecessor in significance.
+
+Here one of Iras's maids interrupted him to tell the story of the
+swallows on the "Antonius," Cleopatra's admiral galley.  He could
+scarcely report from Pelusium an omen of darker presage.
+
+But Beryllus gazed at her with a pitying smile, which so roused the
+expectations of the others that the overseer of the litter and baggage
+porters, who were talking loudly together, hoarsely shouted, "Silence!"
+
+Soon no sound was heard in the open space save the shrill whistling of
+the wind, a word of command to the harbour-guards, and the freedman's
+voice, which he lowered to increase the charm of the mysterious events he
+was describing.
+
+He began with the most fulsome praise of Cleopatra and Antony, reminding
+his hearers that the Imperator was a descendant of Herakles.  The
+Alexandrians especially were aware that their Queen and Antony claimed
+and desired to be called "The new Isis" and "The new Dionysus."  But
+every one who beheld the Roman must admit that in face and figure he
+resembled a god far more than a man.
+
+The Imperator had appeared as Dionysus, especially to the Athenians.  In
+the proscenium of the theatre in that city was a huge bas-relief of the
+Battle of the Giants, the famous work of an ancient sculptor--he,
+Beryllus, had seen it--and from amid the numerous figures in this piece
+of sculpture the tempest had torn but a single one--which?  Dionysus, the
+god as whose mortal image Antony had once caroused in a vine-clad arbour
+in the presence of the Athenians.  The storm to-night was at the utmost
+like the breath of a child, compared with the hurricane which could wrest
+from the hard marble the form of Dionysus.  But Nature gathers all her
+forces when she desires to announce to short-sighted mortals the approach
+of events which are to shake the world.
+
+The last words were quoted from his master who had studied in Athens.
+They had escaped from his burdened soul when he heard of another portent,
+of which a ship from Ostia had brought tidings.  The flourishing city
+Pisaura--
+
+Here, however, he was interrupted, for several of those present had
+learned, weeks before, that this place had sunk in the sea, but merely
+pitied the unfortunate inhabitants.
+
+Beryllus quietly permitted them to free themselves from the suspicion
+that people in Alexandria had had tidings of so remarkable an event later
+than those in Pelusium, and at first answered their query what this had
+to do with the war merely by a shrug of the shoulders; but when the
+overseer of the porters also put the question, he went on "The omen made
+a specially deep impression upon our minds, for we know what Pisaura is,
+or rather how it came into existence.  The hapless city which dark Hades
+ingulfed really belonged to Antony, for in the days of its prosperity he
+was its founder."
+
+He measured the group with a defiant glance, and there was no lack of
+evidences of horror; nay, one of the maid-servants shrieked aloud, for
+the storm had just snatched a torch from the iron rings in the wall and
+hurled it on the floor close beside the listener.
+
+Suspense seemed to have reached its height.  Yet it was evident that
+Beryllus had not yet drawn his last arrow from the quiver.
+
+The maid-servant, whose scream had startled the others, had regained her
+composure and seemed eager to hear some other new and terrible omen, for,
+with a beseeching glance, she begged the freedman not to withhold the
+knew.
+
+He pointed to the drops of perspiration which, spite of the wind sweeping
+through the hall, covered her brow: "You must use your handkerchief.
+Merely listening to my tale will dampen your skin.  Stone statues are
+made of harder material, but a soul dwells within them too.  Their
+natures may be harsher or more gentle; they bring us woe or heal heavy
+sorrows, according to their mood.  Every one learns this who raises his
+hands to them in prayer.  One of these statues stands in Alba.  It
+represents Mark Antony, in whose honour it was erected by the city.  And
+it foresaw what menaced the man whose stone double it is.  Ay, open your
+ears!  About four days ago a ship's captain came to my master and in my
+presence this man reported--he grew as pale as ashes while he spoke--what
+he himself had witnessed.  Drops of perspiration had oozed from the
+statue of Antony in Alba.  Horror seized all the citizens; men and women
+came to wipe the brow and cheeks of the statue, but the drops of
+perspiration did not cease to drip, and this continued several days and
+nights.  The stone image had felt what was impending over the living Mark
+Antony.  It was a horrible spectacle, the man said."
+
+Here the speaker paused, and the group of listeners started, for the
+clang of a gong was heard outside, and the next instant all were on their
+feet hastening to their posts.
+
+The officials in the magnificent hall had also risen.  Here the silence
+had been interrupted only by low whispers.  The colour had faded from
+most of the grave, anxious faces, and their timid glances shunned one
+another.
+
+Archibius had first perceived, by the flames of the Pharos, the red
+glimmer which announced the approach of the royal galley.  It had not
+been expected so early, but was already passing the islands into the
+great harbour.  It was probably the Antonius, the ship on which the old
+swallows had pecked the young ones to death.
+
+Though the waves were running high, even in the sheltered harbour, they
+scarcely rocked the massive vessel.  An experienced pilot must have
+steered it past the shallows and cliffs on the eastern side of the
+roadstead, for instead of passing around the island of Antirrhodus as
+usual, it kept between the island and the Lochias, steering straight
+towards the entrance into the little royal harbour.  The pitch-pans on
+both sides had been filled with fresh resin and tow to light the way.
+The watchers on the shore could now see its outlines distinctly.
+
+It was the Antonius, and yet it was not.
+
+Zeno, the Keeper of the Seal, who was standing beside Iras, wrapped his
+cloak closer around his shivering limbs, pointed to it, and whispered,
+
+"Like a woman who leaves her parents' house in the rich array of a bride,
+and returns to it an impoverished widow."
+
+Iras drew herself up, and with cutting harshness replied, "Like the sun
+veiled by mists, but which will soon shine forth again more radiantly
+than ever."
+
+"Spoken from the depths of my soul," said the old courtier eagerly, "so
+far as the Queen is concerned.  Of course, I did not allude to her
+Majesty, but to the ship.  You were ill when it left the harbour,
+garlanded with flowers and adorned with purple sails.  And now!  Even
+this flickering light shows the wounds and rents.  I am the last person
+whom you need tell that our sun Cleopatra will soon regain its old
+radiance, but at present it is very chilly and cold here by the
+water's edge in this stormy air; and when I think of our first
+moment of meeting--
+
+"Would it were over!"  murmured Iras, wrapping herself closer in her
+cloak.  Then she drew back shivering, for the rattle of the heavy chain,
+which was drawn aside from the opening of the harbour, echoed with an
+uncanny sound through the silence of the night.  A mountain seemed to
+weigh upon the watchers' breasts, for the wooden monster which now
+entered the little harbour moved forward as slowly and silently as a
+spectral ship.  It seemed as if life were extinct on the huge galley
+usually swarming with a numerous crew; as if a vessel were about to cast
+anchor whose sailors had fallen victims to the plague.  Nothing was heard
+save an occasional word of command, and the signal whistles of the
+fluteplayer who directed the rowers.  A few lanterns burned with a
+wavering light on the vast length of her decks.  The brilliant
+illumination which usually shone through the darkness would have
+attracted the attention of the Alexandrians.
+
+Now it was close to the landing.  The group on shore watched every inch
+of its majestic progress with breathless suspense, but when the first
+rope was flung to the slaves on shore several men in Greek robes pressed
+forward hurriedly among the courtiers.
+
+They had come with a message, whose importance would permit no delay, to
+the Regent Mardion, who stood between Zeno and Iras, gazing gloomily at
+the ground with a frowning brow.  He was pondering over the words in
+which to address the Queen, and within a few minutes the ship would have
+made her landing, and Cleopatra might cross the bridge.  To disturb him
+at that moment was an undertaking few who knew the irritable, uncertain
+temper of the eunuch would care to risk.  But the tall Macedonian, who
+for a short time attracted the eyes of most of the spectators from the
+galley, ventured to do so.  It was the captain of the nightwatch, the
+aristocratic commander of the police force of the city.
+
+"Only a word, my lord," he whispered to the Regent, "though the time may
+be inopportune."
+
+"As inopportune as possible," replied the eunuch with repellent
+harshness.
+
+"We will say as inopportune as the degree of haste necessary for its
+decision.  The King Caesarion, with Antyllus and several companions,
+attacked a woman.  Blackened faces.  A fight.  Caesarion and the woman's
+companion--an aristocrat, member of the Council--slightly wounded.
+Lictors interfered just in time.  The young gentlemen were arrested.
+At first they refused to give their names--"
+
+"Caesarion slightly, really only slightly wounded?" asked the eunuch with
+eager haste.
+
+"Really and positively.  Olympus was summoned at once.  A knock on the
+head.  The man who was attacked flung him on the pavement in the
+struggle."
+
+"Dion, the son of Eumenes, is the man," interrupted Iras, whose quick ear
+had caught the officer's report.  "The woman is Barine, the daughter of
+the artist Leonax."
+
+"Then you know already?" asked the Macedonian in surprise.
+
+"So it seems," answered Mardion, gazing into the girl's face with a
+significant glance.  Then, turning to her rather than to the Macedonian,
+he added, "I think we will have the young rascals set free and brought to
+Lochias with as little publicity as possible."
+
+"To the palace?" asked the Macedonian.
+
+"Of course," replied Iras firmly.  "Each to his own apartments, where
+they must remain until further orders."
+
+"Everything else must be deferred until after the reception," added the
+eunuch, and the Macedonian, with a slight, haughty nod, drew back.
+
+"Another misfortune," sighed the eunuch.
+
+"A boyish prank," Iras answered quickly, "but even a still greater
+misfortune is less than nothing so long as we are not conscious of it.
+This unpleasant occurrence must be concealed for the present from the
+Queen.  Up to this time it is a vexation, nothing more--and it can and
+must remain so; for we have it in our power to uproot the poisonous tree
+whence it emanates."
+
+"You look as if no one could better perform the task," the Regent
+interrupted, with a side glance at the galley, "so you shall have the
+commission.  It is the last one I shall give, during the Queen's absence,
+in her name."
+
+"I shall not fail," she answered firmly.
+
+When Iras again looked towards the landing-place she saw Archibius
+standing alone, with his eyes fixed upon the ground.  Impulse prompted
+her to tell her uncle what had happened; but at the first step she
+paused, and her thin lips uttered a firm "No."
+
+Her friend had become a stone in her path.  If necessary, she would find
+means to thrust him also aside, spite of his sister Charmian and the old
+tie which united him to Cleopatra.  He had grown weak, Charmian had
+always been so.
+
+She would have had time enough now to consider what step to take first,
+had not her heart ached so sorely.
+
+After the huge galley lay moored, several minutes elapsed ere two
+pastophori of the goddess Isis, who guarded the goblet of Nektanebus,
+taken from the temple treasures and borne along in a painted chest,
+stepped upon the bridge, followed by Cleopatra's first chamberlain, who
+in a low tone announced the approach of the Queen and commanded the
+waiting groups to make way.  A double line of torch-bearers had been
+stationed from the landing to the gate leading into the Bruchium, and the
+other on the north, which was the entrance to the palaces on the Lochias,
+since it was not known where Cleopatra would desire to go.  The
+chamberlain, however, said that she would spend the night at Lochias,
+where the children lived, and ordered all the flickering, smoking
+torches, save a few, to be extinguished.
+
+Mardion, the Keeper of the Seal, Archibius, and Iras were standing by the
+bridge a little in advance of the others, when voices were heard on the
+ship, and the Queen appeared, preceded by several lantern-bearers and
+followed by a numerous train of court officials, pages, maids, and female
+slaves.  Cleopatra's little hand rested on Charmian's arm, as, with a
+haughty carriage of the head, she moved towards the shore.  A thick veil
+covered her face, and a large, dark cloak concealed her figure.  How
+elastic her step was still! how proud yet graceful was the gesture with
+which she waved a greeting to Mardion and Zeno.
+
+Extending her hand to raise Iras, who had sunk prostrate before her, she
+kissed her on the forehead, whispering, "The children?"
+
+"All is well with them," replied the girl.
+
+Then the returning sovereign greeted the others with a gracious gesture,
+but vouchsafed a word to no one until the eunuch stepped before her to
+deliver his address of welcome.  She motioned him aside with a curt
+"Later"; and when Zeno held open the door of the litter, she said in a
+stifled tone: "I will walk.  After the rocking of the galley in this
+tempest, I feel reluctant to enter the litter.  There are many things to
+be considered to-day.  An idea carne to me on the way home.  Summon the
+captain of the harbour and his chief counsellors, the heads of the war
+office, the superintendent of the fortifications on land and water,
+especially the Aristarch and Gorgias--I want to see them.  Time presses.
+They must be here in two hours-no, in an hour and a half.  I wish to
+examine all their plans and charts of the eastern frontier, especially
+the river channels and canals in the Delta."
+
+Then she turned to Archibius, who had approached the litter, laid her
+hand upon his arm, and though her veil prevented him from seeing her
+sparkling eyes, he felt them shining deep into his heart, as the voice
+whose melody had often enthralled his soul cried, "We will take it as a
+favourable omen that it is again you who lead me to this palace in a time
+of trouble."
+
+His overflowing heart found expression in the warm reply, "Whenever it
+may be, forever and ever this arm and this life are yours!"  And the
+Queen answered in a tone of earnest belief, "I know it."
+
+Then, with her hand still resting on his arm, she moved forward; but when
+he began to ask whether she really had cause to speak of a time of
+trouble, she cut him short with the entreaty "Not now.  Let us say
+nothing.  It is worse than bad--as evil as possible.  Yet no.  Few are
+permitted, in an hour of trouble, to lean on the arm of a faithful
+friend."
+
+The words were accompanied with a light pressure of her little hand, and
+it seemed as if his old heart was growing young.
+
+He dared not speak, for her wish was law; but while moving silently at
+her side, first along the shore, then through the gate, and finally over
+the marble flagstones which led to the palace portal, it seemed as if he
+beheld, instead of the veiled head of the hapless Queen, the soft, light-
+brown locks which floated around the face of a happy child.  Before his
+mental vision rose the little mistress of the garden of Epicurus.  He saw
+the sparkle of her large blue eyes, which never ceased to question, yet
+appeared to contain the mystery of the world.  He fancied he heard once
+more the silvery cadence of her voice and the bewitching magic of her
+pure, childlike laughter, and it was hard to remember what she had
+become.
+
+Snatched away from the present, yet conscious that Fate had granted him
+a great boon in this sorrowful hour, he moved on at her side and led her
+through the main entrance, the spacious inner court-yard of the palace.
+At the rear was the great door opening into the Queen's apartments,
+before which Mardion, Iras, and their companions had already stationed
+themselves.  At the left was a smaller one leading into the wing occupied
+by the children.
+
+Archibius was about to conduct Cleopatra across the lighted court-yard,
+but she motioned towards the children's rooms, and he understood her.
+
+At the threshold her hand fell from his arm, and when he bowed as if to
+retire, she said kindly: "There is Charmian.  You both deserve to
+accompany me to the spot where childhood is dreaming and peace of mind
+and painlessness have their abode.  But respect for the Queen has
+prevented the brother and sister from greeting each other after so
+long a separation.  Do so now!  Then, follow me."
+
+While speaking, she hastened with the swift step of youth into the atrium
+and up the staircase which led to the sleeping-rooms of the princes and
+princesses.
+
+Archibius and Charmian obeyed her bidding; the brother clasped his sister
+affectionately in his arms, and in hurried tones, with tears streaming
+from her eyes, she informed him that to her all seemed lost.
+
+Antony had behaved in a manner for which no words of condemnation or
+regret were adequate.  Probably he would follow Cleopatra; the fleet, and
+perhaps the army also, were destroyed.  Her fate lay in the hands of
+Octavianus.
+
+Then she preceded him towards the staircase, where Iras was standing with
+a tall Syrian, who bore a striking resemblance to Philostratus, Barine's
+former husband.  It was his brother Alexas, the trusted favourite of Mark
+Antony.  His place should now have been with him, and Archibius asked his
+sister with a hasty look how this man chanced to be in the Queen's train.
+
+"His skill in reading the stars," was the reply.  "His flattering tongue.
+He is a parasite of the worst kind, but he tells her many things,
+he diverts her, and she tolerates him near her person."
+
+As soon as Iras saw the direction in which Cleopatra had turned, she had
+hastened after her to accompany her to the children.  The Syrian Alexas
+had stopped her to express his joy in meeting her again.  Even before the
+outbreak of the war he had devoted himself zealously to her, and he now
+plainly showed that during the long period of separation his feelings had
+by no means cooled.  Like his brother, he had a head too small for his
+body, but his well-formed features were animated by a pair of eyes
+sparkling with a keen, covetous expression.
+
+Iras, too, seemed glad to welcome the favourite, but ere the brother and
+sister reached the staircase she left him to embrace Charmian, her aunt
+and companion, with the affection of a daughter.
+
+They found the Queen in the anteroom of the children's apartments.
+Euphronion, their tutor, had awaited her there, and hurriedly gave, in
+the most rapturous terms, his report of them and the wonderful gifts
+which became more and more apparent in each, now as a heritage from their
+mother, now from their father.
+
+Cleopatra had interrupted the torrent of his enthusiastic speech with
+many a question, meanwhile endeavouring to loose the veil wound about her
+head; but the little hands, unaccustomed to the task, failed.  Iras
+noticed it from the stairs and, hastening up the last steps, skilfully
+released her from the long web of lace.
+
+The Queen acknowledged the service by a gracious nod, but when the chief
+eunuch opened the door leading into the children's rooms, she called
+joyously to the brother and sister, "Come!"  The tutor, who was obliged
+to leave the charge of his pupils' sleeping apartments to the eunuchs and
+nurses, drew back, but Iras felt it a bitter affront to be excluded from
+this visit.  Her cheeks flushed and paled; her thin lips were more firmly
+compressed, and she gazed intently at the basket of fruit in the mosaic
+floor at her feet as if she were counting the cherries that filled it.
+But she suddenly pushed the little curls back from her forehead, darted
+swiftly down the stairs, and called to Alexas just as he was about to
+leave the atrium.
+
+The Syrian hastened towards her, extolling the good fortune that made his
+sun rise for him a second time that night, but she cut him short with the
+words; "Cease this foolish love-making.  It would be far better for us
+both to become allies in serious, bitter earnest.  I am ready."
+
+"So am I!" cried the Syrian rapturously, pressing his hand upon his
+heart.
+
+Meanwhile Cleopatra had entered the chamber where the children lay
+sleeping.  Deep silence pervaded the lofty hall hung with bright-hued
+carpets, and softly lighted by three lamps with rose-colored globes.  An
+arch, supported by pillars of Libyan marble, divided the wide space.  In
+the first, near a window closely muffled with draperies, stood two
+ivory beds, surmounted with crowns of gold and silver set with pearls and
+turquoises.  Around the edge, carved by the hands of a great artist, ran
+a line of happy children dancing to the songs of birds in blossoming
+bushes.
+
+The couches were separated by a heavy curtain which the eunuchs had
+raised at the approach of the Queen.  Cleopatra could now see them all at
+a single glance, and the picture was indeed one of exquisite charm; for
+on these beautiful couches slept the twins, the ten-year-old children of
+Cleopatra and Antony--Antonius Helios and Cleopatra Selene.  The girl was
+pink and white, fair and wonderfully lovely; the boy no less beautiful,
+but with ebon-black hair, like his father.  Both curly heads were turned
+towards the side, and rested on a dimpled hand pressed upon the silken
+pillow.
+
+Upon a third bed, beyond the arch, was Alexander, the youngest prince, a
+lovely boy of six, the Queen's darling.
+
+After gazing a long while at the twins, and pressing a light kiss upon
+cheeks flushed with slumber, she turned to the youngest child and sank
+beside his couch as if forced to bend the knee before some apparition
+which Heaven had vouchsafed to her.  Tears streamed from her eyes as,
+drawing the child carefully towards her, she kissed his mouth, eyes, and
+cheeks, and then laid him gently back upon the pillows.  The boy,
+however, did not instantly relapse into slumber, but threw his little
+plump arms around his mother's neck, murmuring incomprehensible words.
+She joyously submitted to his caresses, till sleep again overpowered him,
+and his little hands fell back upon the bed.
+
+She lingered a short time longer, with her brow resting on the ivory of
+the couch, praying for this child and his brother and sister.  When she
+rose again her cheeks were wet with tears, and she pressed her hand upon
+her breast.  Then, beckoning to Charmian and Archibius, she motioned
+towards Alexander and the twins, saying, as she saw tears glittering in
+the eyes of both: "I know you have lost this happiness for my sake.  For
+each one of these children a great empire would not be too high a price;
+for them all----What does earth contain that I would not bestow?  Yet
+what can I still call my own?"
+
+Her smiling face clouded as she asked the question.  The vision of the
+lost battle again rose before her mind.  Her own power was lost,
+forfeited, and with it the independence of the native land which she
+loved.  Rome was already stretching out her hand to add it to the others
+as a new province.  But this should not be!  Her twin children yonder,
+sleeping beneath crowns, must wear them!  And the boy slumbering on the
+pillows?  How many kingdoms Antony had bestowed!  What remained for her
+to give?
+
+Again she bent to the child.  A beautiful dream must have hovered over
+him, for he was smiling in his sleep.  A flood of maternal love welled up
+in her agitated heart, and, as she saw the companions of her childhood
+also gazing tenderly at the little steeper, she remembered the days of
+her own youth, and the quiet happiness which she had enjoyed in her
+garden of Epicurus.
+
+Power and splendour had begun for her beyond its confines, but the
+greater the heights of worldly grandeur she attained, the more distant,
+the more irrecoverable became the consciousness of the happiness which
+she had once gratefully enjoyed, and for which she had never ceased to
+long.  And as she now gazed once more at the peaceful, smiling face,
+whence all pain and anxiety seemed worlds away, and all the love which
+her heart contained appeared to be pouring towards him, the question
+arose in her mind whether this boy, for whom she possessed no crown,
+might not be the only happy mortal of them all-happy in the sense of the
+master.  Deeply moved by this thought, she turned to Archibius and
+Charmian, exclaiming in a subdued tone, in order not to rouse the
+sleeper: "Whatever destiny may await us, I commend this child to your
+special love and care.  If Fate denies him the lustre of the crown and
+the elation of power, teach him to enjoy that other happiness, which--
+how long ago it is!--your father unfolded to his mother."
+
+Archibius kissed her robe, and Charmian her hands; but Cleopatra, drawing
+a long breath, said: "The mother has already taken too much time from the
+Queen.  I have ordered the news of my arrival to be kept from Caesarion.
+This was well.  The most important matters will be settled before our
+meeting.  Everything relating to me and to the state must be decided
+within an hour.  But, first, I am something more than mother and Queen.
+The woman also asserts her claim.  I will find time for you, my friend,
+to-morrow!-To my chamber first, Charmian.  But you need rest still more
+than I.  Go with your brother.  Send Iras to me.  She will be glad to use
+her skilful fingers again in her mistress's service."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+The Queen had left her bath.  Iras had arranged the still abundant waves
+of her hair, now dark-brown in hue, and robed her magnificently to
+receive the dignitaries whom, spite of the late hour of the night, she
+expected.
+
+How wonderfully she had retained her beauty!  It seemed as if Time had
+not ventured to touch this masterpiece of feminine loveliness; yet the
+Greek's keen eye detected here and there some token of the vanishing
+spell of youth.  She loved her mistress, yet her inmost soul rejoiced
+whenever  she detected in her the same changes which began to appear in
+herself, the woman of seven-and-twenty, so many years her sovereign's
+junior.  She would  gladly have given Cleopatra everything at her
+command, yet she felt as if she must praise Nature for an act of justice,
+when she perceived that even her royal favourite was not wholly relieved
+from the law which applied to all.
+
+"Cease your flattery," said Cleopatra, smiling mournfully.
+"They say that the works of the Pharaohs here on the Nile flout Time.
+The inexorable destroyer is less willing to permit this from the Queen
+of Egypt.  These are grey hairs, and they came from this head, however
+eagerly you may deny it.  Whose save my own are these lines around the
+corners of the eyes and on the brow?  What say you to the tooth which my
+lips do not hide so kindly as you assert?  It was injured the night
+before the luckless battle.  My dear, faithful, skilful Olympus, the
+prince of leeches, is the only one who can conceal such things.  But it
+would not do to take the old man to the war, and Glaucus is far less
+adroit.  How I missed Olympus during those fatal hours!  I seemed a
+monster even to myself, and he--Antony's eye is only too keen for such
+matters.  What is the love of men?  A blackened tooth may prove its
+destruction.  An aspect obnoxious to the gaze will pour water on the
+fiercest fire.  What hours I experienced, Iras!  Many a glance from him
+seemed an insult, and, besides, my heart was filled with torturing
+anxiety.
+
+"Something had evidently come between us!  I felt it.  The trouble began
+soon after he left Alexandria.  It gnawed my soul like a worm, and now
+that I am here again I must see clearly.  He will follow me in a few
+days, I know.  Pinarius Scarpus, with his untouched legions, is in
+Paraetonium, whither he went.  At Taenarum he resolved to retire from the
+world which he, on whom it had bestowed so much that is great, hates
+because he has given it cause for many a shake of the head.  But the old
+spirit woke again, and if Fortune, usually so faithful, still aids him,
+a large force will soon join the new African army.  The Asiatic princes--
+But the ruler of the state must be silent.  I entered this room to give
+the woman her just rights, and the woman shall have them.  He will soon
+be here.  He cannot live without me.  It is not alone the beaker of
+Nektanebus which draws him after me!"
+
+"When the greatest of the great, Julius Caesar, sued for your love in
+Alexandria, and Antony on the Cydnus, you did not possess the goblet,"
+observed Iras.  "It is two years since Anubis permitted you to borrow the
+masterpiece from the temple treasures, and within a few days you will be
+obliged to restore it.  That a mysterious spell emanates from the cup is
+certain, but one still more powerful dwells in the magic of your own
+nature."
+
+"Would that it might assert itself to-day!" cried the Queen.  "At any
+rate the power of the beaker impelled Antony to do many things.  I am not
+vain enough to believe that it was love, that it was solely the spell of
+my own personality which drew him to me in that disastrous hour.  That
+battle, that incomprehensible, disgraceful battle!  You were ill, and
+could not see our fleet when it set sail; but even experienced spectators
+said that handsomer, larger vessels were never beheld.  I was right in
+insisting that the decision of the conflict should be left to them.  I
+was entitled to call them mine.  Had we conquered, what a proud delight
+it would have been to say, 'The weapons which you gave to the man you
+loved gained him the sovereignty of the world!'  Besides, the stars had
+assured me that good fortune would attend us on the sea.  They had given
+the same message to Anubis here and to Alexas upon Antony's galley.  I
+also trusted the spell of the goblet, which had already compelled Antony
+to do many things he opposed.  So I succeeded in having the decision of
+the conflict left to the fleet, but the prediction was false, false,
+false!--how utterly, was to be proved only too soon.
+
+"If I had only been told in time what I learned later!  After the defeat
+people were more loquacious.  That one remark of a veteran commander of
+the foot-soldiers would probably have sufficed to open my eyes.  He had
+asked Mark Antony why he fixed his hopes on miserable wood, exclaiming,
+'Let the Phoenician's and Egyptians war on the water, but leave us the
+land where we are accustomed, with our feet firmly set upon the earth, to
+fight, conquer, or die!'  This alone, I am sure, would have changed my
+resolve in a happy hour.  But it was kept from me.
+
+"The conflict began.  Our troops had lost patience.  The left wing of the
+fleet advanced.  At first I watched the battle eagerly, with a throbbing
+heart.  How proudly the huge galleys moved forward!  Everything was going
+admirably.  Antony had made an address, assuring the warriors that, even
+without soldiers, our ships would destroy the foe by their mere height
+and size.  What orator can so carry his hearers with him!  I, too, was
+still fearless.  Who cherishes anxiety when confidently expecting
+victory?  When he went on board his own ship, after bidding me farewell
+far less cordially than usual, I became more troubled.  I thought it was
+evident that his love was waning.  What had I become since we left
+Alexandria, and Olympus no longer attended me!  Matters could not
+continue in this way.  I would leave the direction of the war to him, and
+vanish from his eyes.  After he had looked into the beaker of Nektanebus,
+he yielded to my will, but often with indignation.  The unconcealed,
+ineffaceable lines, and the years, the cruel years!"
+
+"What thoughts are these?" cried Iras.  "Let me take oath, my sovereign
+mistress, that as you stand before me--"
+
+"Thanks to this toilet-table and the new compounds of Olympus in these
+boxes!  At that time, I tell you, I was fairly startled at the sight of
+my own face.  Trouble does not enhance beauty, and what condemnation the
+Romans had heaped on the woman who meddled with war, the craft of man!
+I had answers for them, but I would not endure it longer.  I had
+previously determined to hold aloof from the battle on land; but even
+at the commencement of the conflict, spite of its favourable promise,
+I longed to leave Antony and return to the children.  They do not heed
+the colour of their mother's hair, nor her wrinkles; and he, when he had
+looked for and called me in vain, would feel for the first time what he
+possessed in me, would miss me, and with the longing the old love would
+awaken with fresh ardour.  As soon as the fleet had gained the victory
+I would have the prow of my galley turned southward and, without a
+farewell, exclaiming only, 'We will meet in Alexandria!' set sail for
+Egypt.
+
+"I summoned Alexas, who had remained with me, and ordered him to give me
+a signal as soon as the battle was decided in our favour.  I remained on
+deck.  Then I saw the ships of the foe describing a wide circle.  The
+nauarch told me that Agrippa was trying to surround us.  This roused a
+feeling of discomfort.  I began to repent having meddled with men's work.
+
+"Antony looked across at me from his galley.  I waved my hand to point
+out the peril, but instead of eagerly and lovingly answering the
+greeting, as of yore, he turned his back, and in a short time after the
+wildest uproar arose around me.  One ship became entangled with another,
+planks and poles shattered with a loud crash.  Shouts, the cries  and
+moans of the combatants and the wounded, mingled with the thunder of the
+stones hurled by the catapults, and the sharp notes of the signals which
+sounded like calls for help.  Two soldiers, stricken by arrows, fell
+beside me.  It was horrible!  Yet my courage remained steadfast, even
+when a squadron--it was commanded by Aruntius--pressed upon the fleet.
+I saw another line of galleys steering directly towards us, and a Roman
+vessel assailed by one of mine--I had named her the Selene--turn on her
+side and sink.  This pleased me and seemed like the first presage of
+victory.  I again ordered Alexas to have the ship's prow turned as soon
+as the result of the battle was decided.  Ere I had ceased speaking,
+Jason, the steward--you know him--appeared with refreshments.  I took the
+beaker, but, ere I could raise it to my lips, he fell to the deck with a
+cloven skull, mingling his blood with the spilled juice of the grape.
+My blood seemed fairly to freeze in my veins, and Alexas, trembling and
+deadly pale, asked, 'Do you command us to quit the battle?'
+
+"Every fibre of my being urged me to give the order, but I controlled
+myself, and asked the nauarch, who was standing on the bridge before me,
+'Are we gaining the advantage?'  The reply was a positive 'Yes.'  I
+thought the fitting time had come, and called to him to steer the galley
+southward.  But the man did not seem to understand.  Meanwhile the noise
+of the conflict had grown louder and louder.  So, in spite of Charmian,
+who besought me not to interfere in the battle, I sent Alexas to the
+commander on the bridge, and while he talked with the grey-bearded
+seaman, who wrathfully answered I know not what, I glanced at the nearest
+ship--I no longer knew whether it was friend or foe--and as I saw the
+rows of restless oars moving in countless numbers to and fro, it seemed
+as if every ship had become a huge spider, and the long wooden handles of
+the oars were its legs and feet.  Each of these monsters appeared to be
+seeking to snare me in a horrible net, and when the nauarch came to
+beseech me to wait, I imperiously commanded him to obey my orders.
+
+"The luckless man bowed, and performed his Queen's behest.  The giant was
+turned, and forced a passage through the maze.
+
+"I breathed more freely.
+
+"What had threatened me like the legs of huge spiders became oars once
+more.  Alexas led me under a roof, where no missiles could reach me.  My
+desire was fulfilled.  I had escaped Antony's eyes, and we were going
+towards Alexandria and my children.  When I at last looked around I saw
+that my other ships were following.  I had not given this order, and was
+terribly startled.  When I sought Alexas, he had vanished.  The centurion
+whom I sent to order the nauarch to give the signal to the other ships to
+return to the battle, reported that the captain's dead body has just been
+borne away, but that the command should be given.  How this was done I do
+not know, but it produced no effect, and no one noticed the anxious
+waving of my handkerchief.
+
+"We had left Antony's galley--he was standing on the bridge--far behind.
+
+"I had waved my hand as we passed close by, and he hurried down to bend
+far over the bulwark and shout to me.  I can still see his hands raised
+to his bearded lips.  I did not understand what he said, and only pointed
+southward and in spirit wished him victory and that this separation might
+tend to the welfare of our love.  But he shook his head, pressed his hand
+despairingly to his brow, and waved his arms as though to give me a sign,
+but the Antonias swept far ahead of his ship and steered straight towards
+the south.
+
+"I breathed more freely, in the pleasant consciousness of escaping a two-
+fold danger.  Had I remained long before Antony's eyes, looking as I did
+then, it might--
+
+"Wretched blunder of a wretched woman, I say now.  But at that time I
+could not suspect what a terrible doom I had brought down in that hour
+upon ourselves, my children, perhaps the whole world; so I remained under
+the thrall of these petty fears and thoughts until wounded men were
+carried past me.  The sight distressed me; you know how sensitive I am,
+and with what difficulty I endure and witness suffering.
+
+"Charmian led me to the cabin.  There I first realized what I had done.
+I had hoped to aid in crushing the hated foe, and now perhaps it was I
+who had built for him the bridge to victory, to sovereignty, to our
+destruction.  Pursued by such thoughts, as if by the Furies, I paced
+restlessly to and fro.
+
+"Suddenly I heard a loud noise on deck.  A crashing blow seemed to shake
+the huge ship.  We were pursued!  A Roman galley had boarded mine!  This
+was my thought as I grasped the dagger Antony had given me.
+
+"But Charmian came back with tidings which seemed scarcely less terrible
+than the baseless fear.  I had angrily commanded her to leave me because
+she had urged me to revoke the command to turn back.  Now, deadly pale,
+she announced that Mark Antony had left his galley, followed me in a
+little five-oared boat, and come on board our ship.
+
+"My blood froze in my veins.
+
+"He had come, I imagined, to force me to return to the battle and,
+drawing a long breath, my defiant pride urged me to show him that I was
+the Queen and would obey only my own will, while my heart impelled me to
+sink at his feet and beseech him, without heeding me, to issue any order
+which promised to secure a victory.
+
+"But he did not come.
+
+"I sent Charmian up again.  Antony had been unable to continue the
+conflict when parted from me.  Now he sat in front of the cabin with his
+head resting on his hands, staring at the planks of the deck like one
+distraught.  He, he--Antony!  The bravest horseman, the terror of the
+foe, let his arms fall like a shepherd-boy whose sheep are stolen by the
+wolves.  Mark Antony, the hero who had braved a thousand dangers, had
+flung down his sword.  Why, why?  Because a woman had yielded to idle
+fears, obeyed the yearning of a mother's heart, and fled?  Of all human
+weaknesses, not one had been more alien than cowardice to the man whose
+recklessness had led him to many an unprecedented venture.  And now?  No,
+a thousand times no!  Fire and water would unite sooner than Mark Antony
+and cowardice!  He had been under the coercive power of a demon; a
+mysterious spell had forced him--"
+
+"The mightiest power, love," interrupted Iras with enthusiastic warmth--
+"a love as great and overmastering as ever subjugated the soul of man."
+
+"Ay, love," repeated  Cleopatra, in a hollow tone.  Then her lips curled
+with a faint tinge of derision, and her voice expressed the very
+bitterness of doubt, as she continued: "Had it been merely the love which
+makes two mortals one, transfers the heart of one to the other, it might
+perchance have borne my timorous soul into the hero's breast!  But no.
+Violent tempests had raged before the battle.  It had not been possible
+always to appear before him in the guise in which we would fain be seen
+by those whom we love.
+
+"Even now, when your skilful hands have served me--there is the mirror--
+the image it reflects--seems to me like a carefully preserved wreck--"
+
+"O my royal mistress," cried Iras, raising her hands beseechingly, "must
+I again declare that neither the grey hairs which are again brown, nor
+the few lines which Olympus will soon render invisible, nor whatever else
+perhaps disturbs you in the image you behold reflected, impairs your
+beauty?  Unclouded and secure of victory, the spell of your godlike
+nature--"
+
+"Cease, cease!" interrupted  Cleopatra.  "I know what I know.  No mortal
+can escape the great eternal laws of Nature.  As surely as birth
+commences life, everything that exists moves onward to destruction
+and decay."
+
+"Yet the gods," Iras persisted, "give to their works different degrees of
+existence.  The waterlily blooms but a single day, yet how full of vigour
+is the sycamore in the garden of the Paneum, which has flourished a
+thousand years!  Not a petal in the blossoms of your youth has faded, and
+is it conceivable that there is even the slightest diminution in the love
+of him who cast away all that man holds dearest because he could not
+endure to part, even for days or weeks, from the woman whom he
+worshipped?"
+
+"Would that he had done so!" cried Cleopatra mournfully.  "But are you so
+sure that it was love which made him follow me?  I am of a different
+opinion.  True love does not paralyze, but doubles the high qualities of
+man.  I learned this when Caesar was prisoned by a greatly superior force
+within this very palace, his ships burned, his supply of water cut off.
+In him also, in Antony, I was permitted to witness this magnificent
+spectacle twenty--what do I say?-a hundred times, so long as he loved me
+with all the ardour of his fiery soul.  But what happened at Actium?
+That shameful flight of the cooing dove after his mate, at which
+generations yet unborn will point in mockery!  He who does not see more
+deeply will attribute to the foolish madness of love this wretched
+forgetfulness of duty, honour, fame, the present and the future; but I,
+Iras--and this is the thought which whitens one hair after another, which
+will speedily destroy the remnant of your mistress's former beauty by the
+exhaustion of sleepless nights--I know better.  It was not love which
+drew Antony after me, not love that trampled in the dust the radiant
+image of reckless courage, not love that constrained the demigod to
+follow the pitiful track of a fugitive woman."
+
+Here her voice fell, and seizing the girl's wrist with a painful
+pressure, she drew her closer to her side and whispered:
+
+"The goblet of Nektanebus is connected with it.  Ay, tremble!  The powers
+that emanate from the glittering wonder are as terrible as they are
+unnatural.  The magic spell exerted by the beaker has transformed the
+heroic son of Herakles, the more than mortal, into the whimpering coward,
+the crushed, broken nonentity I found upon the galley's deck.  You are
+silent?  Your nimble tongue finds no reply.  How could you have forgotten
+that you aided me to win the wager which forced Antony to gaze into the
+beaker before I filled it for him?  How grateful I was to Anubis when
+he finally consented to trust to my care this marvel of the temple
+treasures, when the first trial succeeded, and Antony, at my bidding,
+placed the magnificent wreath which he wore upon the bald brow of that
+crabbed old follower of Aristoteles, Diomedes, whom he detested in his
+inmost soul!  It was scarcely a year ago, and you know how rarely at
+first I used the power of the terrible vessel.  The man whom I loved
+obeyed my slightest glance, without its aid.  But later--before the
+battle--I felt how gladly he would have sent me, who might ruin all, back
+to Egypt.  Besides, I felt--I have already said so--that something had
+come between us.  Yet, often as he was on the point of sacrificing me to
+the importunate Romans, I need only bid him gaze into the beaker, and
+exclaim 'You will not send me hence.  We belong together.  Whither one
+goes, the other will follow!' and he besought me not to leave him.  The
+very morning before the battle I gave him the drinking cup, urging him,
+whatever might happen, never, never to leave me.  And he obeyed this time
+also, though the person to whom a magic spell bound him was a fleeing
+woman.  It is terrible.  And yet, have I a right to execrate the thrall
+of  the beaker?  Scarcely!  For without the Magian's glittering vessel--
+a secret voice in my soul has whispered the warning a thousand times
+during the sleepless nights--he would have taken another on the galley.
+And I believe I know this other--I mean the woman whose singing
+enthralled my heart too at the Adonis festival just before our departure.
+I noticed the look with which his eyes sought hers.  Now I know that it
+was not merely my old deceitful foe, jealousy, which warned me against
+her.  Alexas, the most faithful of his friends, also confirmed what I
+merely feared--ah! and he told me other things which the stars had
+revealed to him.  Besides, he knows the siren, for she was the wife of
+his own brother.  To protect his honour, he cast off the coquettish
+Circe."
+
+"Barine!" fell in resolute tones from the lips of Iras.
+
+"So you know her?" asked Cleopatra, eagerly.  The girl raised her clasped
+hands beseechingly to the Queen, exclaiming:
+
+"I know this woman only too well, and how my heart rages against her!
+O my mistress, that I, too, should aid in darkening this hour!  Yet
+it must be said.  That Antony visited the singer, and even took his son
+there more than once, is known throughout the city.  Yet that is not the
+worst.  A Barine entering into rivalry with you! It would be too
+ridiculous.  But what bounds can be set to the insatiate greed of these
+women?  No rank, no age is sacred.  It was dull in the absence of the
+court and the army.  There were no men who seemed worth the trouble of
+catching, so she cast her net for boys, and the one most closely snared
+was the King Caesarion."
+
+"Caesarion!" exclaimed  Cleopatra, her pale cheeks flushing.  "And his
+tutor Rhodon?  My strict commands?"
+
+"Antyllus secretly presented him to her," replied Iras.  "But I kept my
+eyes open.  The boy clung to the singer with insensate passion.  The only
+expedient was to remove her from the city.  Archibius aided me."
+
+"Then I shall be spared sending her away."
+
+"Nay, that must still be done; for, on the journey to the country
+Caesarion, with several comrades, attacked her."
+
+"And the reckless deed was successful?"
+
+"No, my royal mistress.  I wish it had been.  A love-sick fool who
+accompanied her drew his sword in her defence, raised his hand against
+the son of Caesar, and wounded him.  Calm yourself, I beseech you, I
+conjure you--the wound is slight.  The boy's mad passion makes me far
+more anxious."
+
+The Queen's pouting scarlet lips closed so firmly that her mouth lost the
+winning charm which was peculiar to it, and she answered in a firm,
+resolute tone: "It is the mother's place to protect the son against the
+temptress.  Alexas is right.  Her star stands in the path of mine.  A
+woman like this casts a deep shadow on her Queen's course.  I will defend
+myself.  It is she who has placed herself between us; she has won Antony.
+But no!  Why should I blind myself?  Time and the charms he steals from
+women are far more powerful than twenty such little temptresses.  Then,
+there are the circumstances which prevented my concealing the defects
+that wounded the eyes of this most spoiled of all spoiled mortals.  All
+these things aided the singer.  I feel it.  In her pursuit of men she had
+at her command all the means which aid us women to conceal what is
+unlovely and enhance what is beautiful in a lover's eyes, while I was at
+a disadvantage, lacking your aid and the long-tested skill of Olympus.
+The divinity on the ship, amid the raging of the storm, was forced more
+than once to appear before the worshipper ungarlanded, without ornament
+for the head, or incense."
+
+"But though she used all the combined arts of Aphrodite and Isis, she
+could not vie with you, my royal mistress!" cried Iras.  "How little is
+required to delude the senses of one scarcely more than a child!"
+
+"Poor boy!" sighed the Queen, gently.  "Had he not been wounded, and were
+it not so hard to resign what we love, I should rejoice that he, too,
+understands how to plan and act.  Perhaps--O Iras, would that it might be
+so!--now that the gate is burst open, the brain and energy of the great
+Caesar will enter his living image.  As the Egyptians call Horus 'the
+avenger of his father,' perhaps he may become his mother's defender and
+avenger.  If Caesar's spirit wakes within him, he will wrest from the
+dissembler Octavianus the heritage of which the nephew robbed the son.
+You swear that the wound is but a slight one?"
+
+"The physicians have said so."
+
+"Well, then we will hope so.  Let him enter the conflict of life.  We
+will afford him ample opportunity to test his powers.  No foolish passion
+shall prevent the convalescent youth from following his father upward
+along the pathway of fame.  But send for the woman who ensnared him,
+the audacious charmer whose aspirations mount to those I hold dearest.
+We will see how she appears beside me!"
+
+"These are grievous times," said Iras, who saw in amazement the Queen's
+eyes sparkle with the confident light of victory.  "Grant your foot its
+right.  Let it crush her!  Monsters enough, on whom you cannot set your
+foot, throng your path.  Hence to Hades, in these days of conflict, with
+all who can be quickly removed!"
+
+"Murder?" asked Cleopatra, her noble brow contracting in a frown.
+
+"If it must be, ay," replied Iras, sharply.  "If possible, banishment
+to an island, an oasis.  If necessity requires, to the mines with the
+siren!"
+
+"If necessity requires?" repeated the Queen.  "I think that means, if it
+proves that she has deserved the harshest punishment."
+
+"She has brought it upon herself by every hour of my sovereign's life
+clouded through her wiles.  In the mines the desire to set snares for
+husbands and sons soon vanishes."
+
+"And people languish in the most terrible torture till death ends their
+suffering," added Cleopatra, in a tone of grave reproof.  "No, girl, this
+victory is too easy.  I will not send even my foe to death without a
+hearing, especially at this time, which teaches me what it is to await
+the verdict of one who is more powerful.  This woman who, as it were,
+summons me to battle, shall have her wish.  I am curious to see the
+singer again, and to learn the means by which she has succeeded in
+chaining to her triumphal car so many captives, from boys up to the
+most exacting men."
+
+"What do you intend, my royal  mistress?" cried Iras in horror.
+
+"I intend," said Cleopatra imperiously, "to see the daughter of Leonax,
+the granddaughter of Didymus, two men whom I hold in high esteem, ere I
+decide her destiny.  I wish to behold, test, and judge my rival, heart
+and mind, ere I condemn her.  I will engage in the conflict to which she
+challenged the loving wife and mother!  But--this is my right--I will
+compel her to show herself to me as Antony so often saw me during the
+past few weeks, unaided and unimproved by the arts which we both have at
+command."
+
+Then, without paying any further heed to her attendant, she went to a
+window, and, after a swift glance at the sky, added quietly: "The first
+hour after midnight is drawing to a close.  The council will begin
+immediately.  The matter to be under discussion is a venture which might
+save much from the wreck.  The council will last two hours, perchance
+only one.  The singer can wait.  "Where does she live?"
+
+"In the house which belonged to her father, the artist Leonax, in the
+garden of the Paneum," replied Iras hoarsely.  "But, O my Queen, if ever
+my opinion had the slightest weight with you--"
+
+"I desire no counsel now, but demand the fulfilment of my orders!" cried
+Cleopatra resolutely.  "As soon as those whom I expect are here--"
+
+The Queen was interrupted by a chamberlain, who announced the arrival of
+the men whom she had summoned, and Cleopatra bade him tell them that she
+was on her way to the council chamber.  Then she turned again to Iras and
+in rapid words commanded her to go at once in a closed carriage,
+accompanied by a reliable person, to Barine's house.  She must be brought
+to the palace without the least delay--Iras would understand--even if it
+should be necessary to rouse her from her sleep.  "I wish to see her as
+if a storm had forced her suddenly upon the deck of a ship," she said in
+conclusion.
+
+Then snatching a small tablet from the dressing-table, she scrawled upon
+the wax with a rapid hand: "Cleopatra, the Queen, desires to see Barine,
+the daughter of Leonax, without delay.  She must obey any command of
+Iras, Cleopatra's messenger, and her companion."
+
+Then, closing the diptychon, she handed it to her attendant, asking:
+
+"Whom will you take?"
+
+She answered without hesitation, "Alexas."
+
+"Very well," answered Cleopatra.  "Do not allow her a moment for
+preparations, whatever they may be.  But do not forget--I command you--
+that she is a woman."
+
+With these words she turned to follow the chamberlain, but Iras hurried
+after her to adjust the diadem upon her head and arrange some of the
+folds of her robe.
+
+Cleopatra submitted, saying kindly, "Something else, I see, is weighing
+on your heart."
+
+"O my mistress!" cried the girl.  "After these tempests of the soul,
+these harassing months, you are turning night into day and assuming fresh
+labours and anxieties.  If the leech Olympus--"
+
+"It must be," interrupted Cleopatra kindly.  "The last two weeks seemed
+like a single long and gloomy night, during which I sometimes left my
+couch for a few hours.  One who seeks to drag what is dearest from the
+river does not consider whether the cold bath is agreeable.  If we
+succumb, it does not matter whether we are well or ill; if, on the
+contrary, we succeed in gathering another army and saving Egypt, let it
+cost health and life.  The minutes I intend to grant to the woman will be
+thrown into the bargain.  Whatever may come, I shall be ready to meet my
+fate.  I am at one of life's great turning points.  At such a time we
+fulfil our obligations and demands, both great and small."
+
+A few minutes later Cleopatra entered the throne-room and saluted the men
+whom she had roused from their slumber in order to lay before them a bold
+plan which, in the lowest depths of misfortune, her yearning to offer
+fresh resistance to the victorious foe had caused her vigorous, restless
+mind to evoke.
+
+When, many years before, the boy with whom, according to her father's
+will, she shared the throne, and his guardian Pothinus, had compelled her
+to fly from Alexandria, she had found in the eastern frontier of the
+Delta, on the isthmus which united Egypt to Asia, the remains of the
+canal which the energetic Pharaohs of former times had constructed to
+connect the Mediterranean with the Red Sea.
+
+Even at that period she had deemed this ruinous work worthy of notice,
+had questioned the AEnites who dwelt there about the remains, and even
+visited some of them herself during the leisure hours of waiting.
+
+From this survey it had seemed possible, by a great expenditure of
+labour, to again render navigable the canal which the Pharaohs had used
+to reach both seas in the same galleys, and by which, less than five
+hundred years before, Darius, the founder of the Persian Empire, had
+brought his fleet to his support.
+
+With the tireless desire for knowledge characteristic of her, Cleopatra
+had sought information concerning all these matters, and in quiet hours
+had more than once pondered over plans for again uniting the Grecian and
+Arabian seas.
+
+Clearly, plainly, fully, with more thorough knowledge of many details
+than even the superintendent of the water works, she explained her design
+to the assembled professionals.  If it proved practicable, the rescued
+ships of the fleet, with others lying in the roadstead of Alexandria,
+could be conveyed across the isthmus into the Red Sea, and thus saved to
+Egypt and withdrawn from the foe.  Supported by this force, many things
+might be attempted, resistance might be considerably prolonged, and the
+time thus gained used in gathering fresh aid and allies.
+
+If the opportunity to make an attack arrived, a powerful fleet would be
+at her disposal, for which smaller ships also should now be built at
+Klysma, on the basis of the experience gained at Actium.  The men who had
+been robbed of their night's rest listened in amazement to the melodious
+words of this woman who, in the deepest disaster, had devised a plan of
+escape so daring in its grandeur, and understood how to explain it better
+than any one of their number could have done.  They followed every
+sentence with the keenest attention, and Cleopatra's language grew more
+impassioned, gained greater power and depth, the more plainly she
+perceived the unfeigned, enthusiastic admiration paid her by her
+listeners.
+
+Even the oldest and most experienced men did not consider the surprising
+proposal utterly impossible and impracticable.  Some, among them Gorgias,
+who during the restoration of the Serapeum had helped his father on the
+eastern frontier of the Delta, and thus became familiar with the
+neighbourhood of Heroonopolis, feared the difficulties which an elevation
+of the earth in the centre of the isthmus would place in the way of the
+enterprise.  Yet, why should an undertaking which was successful in the
+days of Sesostris appear unattainable?
+
+The shortness of the time at their disposal was a still greater source of
+anxiety, and to this was added the information that one hundred and
+twenty thousand workmen had perished during the restoration of the canal
+which Pharaoh Necho nearly completed.  The water way was not finished at
+that period, because an oracle had asserted that it would benefit only
+the foreigners, the Phoenicians.
+
+All these points were duly considered, but could not shake the opinion
+that, under specially favourable conditions, the Queen's plan would be
+practicable; though, to execute it, obstacles mountain-high were to be
+conquered.  All the labourers in the fields, who had not been pressed
+into the army, must be summoned to the work.
+
+Not an hour's delay was permitted.  Where there was no water to bear the
+ships, an attempt must be made to convey them across the land.  There was
+no lack of means.  The mechanics who had understood how to move the
+obelisks and colossi from the cataract to Alexandria, could here again
+find opportunity to test their brains and former skill.
+
+Never had Cleopatra's kindling spirit roused more eager, nay, more
+passionate sympathy, in any counsellors gathered around her than during
+this nocturnal meeting, and when at last she paused, the loud
+acclamations of excited men greeted her.  The Queen's return, and the
+tidings of the lost battle which she had communicated, were to be kept
+secret.
+
+Gorgias had been appointed one of the directors of the enterprise, and
+the intellect, voice, and winning charm of Cleopatra had so enraptured
+him that he already fancied he saw the commencement of a new love which
+would be fatal to his regard for Helena.
+
+It was foolish to raise his wishes so high, but he told himself that he
+had never beheld a woman more to be desired.  Yet he cherished a very
+warm memory of the philosopher's grand-daughter, and lamented that he
+would scarcely find it possible to bid her farewell.
+
+Zeno, the Keeper of the Seal, Dion's uncle, had questioned him about his
+nephew in a very mysterious manner as soon as he entered the council
+chamber, and received the reply that the wound in the shoulder, which
+Caesarion had dealt with a short Roman sword, though severe, was--so the
+physicians assured them-not fatal.
+
+This seemed to satisfy Zeno, and ere Gorgias could urge him to extend a
+protecting hand over his nephew, he excused himself and, with a message
+to the wounded man, turned his back upon him.
+
+The courtier had not yet learned what view the Queen would take of this
+unfortunate affair, and besides, he was overloaded with business.  The
+new enterprise required the issue of a large number of documents
+conferring authority, which all passed through his hands.
+
+Cleopatra addressed a few kind, encouraging words to each one of the
+experts who had been entrusted with the execution of her plan.  Gorgias,
+too, was permitted to kiss her robe, which stirred his blood afresh.  He
+would fain have flung himself at the feet of this marvellous woman and,
+with his services, place his life at her disposal.  And Cleopatra noticed
+the enthusiastic ardour of his glance.
+
+He, too, had been mentioned in the list of Barine's admirers.  There must
+be something unusual about this woman!  But could she have fired a body
+of grave men in behalf of a great, almost impossible deed, roused them to
+such enthusiastic admiration as she, the vanquished, menaced Queen?
+Certainly not.
+
+She felt in the right mood to confront Barine as judge and rival.
+
+In the midst of the deepest misery she had spent one happy hour.  She had
+again felt, with joyous pride, that her intellect, fresh and unclouded,
+would be capable of outstripping the best powers, and in truth she needed
+no magic goblet to win hearts.
+
+
+
+
+ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
+
+Aspect obnoxious to the gaze will pour water on the fire
+Everything that exists moves onward to destruction  and decay
+Trouble does not enhance beauty
+
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLEOPATRA, BY GEORG EBERS, V4 ***
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