1Cicero to Atticus.—In this letter, dated from Brundusium, June 14, 706 A.U.C., Cicero speaks of the long sojourn of CÆsar at Alexandria. There is thought to be much trouble there, “valde esse impedimentum.” This “impedimentum,” of which CÆsar makes no complaint, was Cleopatra.

2If this were true, Cleopatra would have been as fatal to CÆsar as she afterwards became to Antony.

3We must not judge Antony wholly by the passionate attacks of Cicero. Plutarch quotes a number of clever retorts of this brave and excellent soldier; and, in another order of ideas, his letter to Octavius and Hirtius, from which we find long extracts in the “Third Philippic,” is the work of a skillful politician as well as a model of wit.

4A curious inscription, discovered in Alexandria by M.C. Vescher, is as follows: “Antony the Great, the Inimitable.”

5Pliny, IX. 35. The legend is not so much of a myth as it appears. Pliny relates that Octavius, having found the second pearl in the treasury of Cleopatra, had it cut in two, and with it adorned the ears of the Pantheon Venus.

6Another incident, also related by Plutarch, says that Antony sometimes sought relaxation from the excesses of the “Life Inimitable” in more tranquil pleasures, such as angling. Vain even in trifles, and mortified if he caught nothing, he had fishes attached to his hook by a diver. The trick did not escape Cleopatra. The next day she had a salted fish fastened to his hook, which the triumvir drew gravely from the water amid shouts of laughter. From this time Antony renounced angling.

7Appian says positively that Antony was in love with Octavia.

8Like all the Ptolemies, the last of the LagidÆ was a great builder.

9Antony also made a gift to Cleopatra of the 300,000 manuscripts of the library of Pergamos, to replace a part of the volumes burned at Alexandria.

10Thirty-five drachmÆ were given to each legionary, and a less sum to every soldier.

11The Egyptian, says Florus forcibly, demanded as the price of her favors, the Roman Empire from a drunken emperor: “Mulier Ægyptia ab ebrio imperatore pretium libidinum Romanum Imperium petit.”

12These verses were written after the battle of Actium, 31 B.C., but they no less indicate the sentiments of the Romans at the commencement of the war. If this indignation and hatred obtained with such violence after the victory, what must they have been in the very hour of danger? Lucan says: “This woman, the reproach of Egypt, the fatal Erinys of Latium, incestuous daughter of the Ptolemies; who made the Capitol tremble with her sistra.”

13It therefore seems probable that it was in the autumn of 32 B.C. that Antony must have married Cleopatra.

14Dion says that Cleopatra betrayed Antony at Alexandria, as at Pelusium, and that she sent him word of her death that he might be urged to commit suicide, and his body given up to Octavius. Once for all, we take for authority Plutarch, who seems much more worthy of credit. The taking of Alexandria was on August 1, 30 B.C.

15The peculiar force of this verb in the passive form cannot be fitly rendered in a translation. It is, word for word, “I will not be triumphed.”

16Cleopatra died the 15th of August, 30 B.C.