Antonius had parted from Octavian at Tarentum in the early summer of B.C. 37. Leaving his wife, Octavia, under the care of her brother, he had repaired to Athens, where the most flattering reports of the successes won by his lieutenants continued to reach him. Sosius had already driven the Parthians from Syria. Canidius had carried his standards to the Caucasus, while Ventidius had routed the enemy in Cilicia and slain the Parthian general, Pacorus. When, therefore, Antonius quitted Athens in the spring of the following year to conduct the war in person, he felt that he had little to fear from the ambitions of a colleague who was about to engage in a hazardous campaign against his slippery foe, Sextus Pompeius. But Antonius was his own worst enemy. No sooner had he turned his face towards Syria than his passion for Cleopatra again awakened. He sent forward Fonteius Capito to Alexandria to bid Cleopatra rejoin him at Laodicea. The Egyptian Queen willingly obeyed the summons, and strengthened her hold upon her Roman admirer, whose infatuation knew no bounds. He publicly acknowledged the twins she had borne him and gave to them the Oriental titles of the Sun and Moon, while he lavished Roman provinces upon his royal mistress, adding to her kingdom of Egypt Phoenicia, Coele-Syria, Cyprus, parts of Judea and Arabia, and the whole of Cilicia Trachaea.
Then, in the midsummer of 36, he led an army of 30 legions, 10,000 horse, and 30,000 auxiliaries furnished by his ally, the King of Armenia, to attack Artavasdes, the King of Media Atropatene — a tributary of the Parthian Monarch — whose realm was bounded by Armenia on the north, the Caspian on the east, Media on the south, and Mesopotamia on the west. Warned by the disaster which seventeen years before had overwhelmed Crassus, who had chosen to march through the great plains of Mesopotamia, Antonius took the longer but easier route through the south of Armenia and reached in safety the capital of Artavasdes. But he had rashly left behind him the siege train which was indispensable for the successful assault of a walled city, and the enemy cleverly cut into his lines of communication and destroyed the detachments which he had stationed for their protection. He was compelled to retreat. His ally withdrew his auxiliaries in the hour of peril, and only after a desperate march of twenty-seven days, during which he fought eighteen actions and lost twenty-four thousand men, did Antonius succeed in reaching Artaxata, the capital of his treacherous ally, on the river Araxes. Even then, instead of wintering in Armenia, he pushed on to Syria at a further cost of eight thousand legionaries and returned with Cleopatra to Alexandria. The expedition had completely failed, and had only been redeemed from irreparable disaster by the masterly skill with which Antonius had conducted the retreat. He did not scruple, however, to send couriers to Rome with lying tidings of victory, and Octavian himself, while taking good care that the real truth should be known, publicly congratulated his colleague upon his reported successes. At the magnificent games which he provided for the Roman people to celebrate his own conquests in Sicily, the chariot of the absent Antonius appeared bedecked with triumphal pomp, and his statue was given a place in the Temple of Concord.
Meanwhile, amid the dissipations of Alexandria, Antonius steadily degenerated. Though still in the prime of manhood, the hard life which he had led during the last twenty years began to tell upon him. Throughout his many campaigns he had amazed his soldiers by the cheerfulness with which he had endured privations. Whatever he asked his men to do he had done himself. They were proud to follow a leader who grumbled neither at extreme heat nor extreme cold, who was content with the rudest and scantiest fare, and spared himself no more than he spared them. During his forced march over the Alps after the Battle of Mutina and again during his hazardous retreat towards the Araxes, Antonius had displayed the finest qualities of a great general. But he passed from excessive privation to excessive luxury, and as often as he came within reach of plenty and pleasure he abandoned himself to the gratification of his sensual appetites. He seemed to lose all self control and live in a chronic state of debauch. No doubt his faults were much exaggerated by the reckless imagination of the scandalmongers and by the deliberate malignity of his foes. His character has been drawn for us mainly by unfriendly hands, by Cicero, his archenemy, and by the partisans of his victorious rival, Octavian. Yet there is little doubt that their picture is, in the main, correct, and it is easy to believe that during the last five years of his life he degenerated both in body and mind under the baneful influence of the Egyptian Queen. The East — not for the first or the last time in history — ruined the soldier of the West.
Yet he still revolved schemes of conquest, and made spasmodic preparations for war with the kings of Armenia, Media, and Parthia. During the year 35, he accomplished nothing, though he had equipped an army in Syria to punish the treachery of the Armenian in his last campaign. Cleopatra kept him by her side and the troops were not set in motion. This year, however, is important, because it marked the beginning of the final rupture between himself and Octavian. His wife made one more effort to rescue him from the toils which Cleopatra had woven around him. She left Rome to rejoin her husband in Syria, bringing with her a magnificent bodyguard of two thousand picked troops as a present for her lord, in addition to vast stores of clothes and comforts for his legionaries. But, when she reached Athens, she found a letter directing her to come no farther. Antonius refused to see her, yet was base enough to accept her presents. Cleopatra, who feared that her ascendency over Antonius would be imperilled if he saw his wife, triumphed once more. Octavia, therefore, returned to Rome, while Antonius, more infatuated than ever, went back to Egypt with his paramour. The next year (34), he roused himself to make a brilliant dash upon Armenia. City after city surrendered, the king fell a captive into his hands and he returned, after a short campaign, to celebrate a Roman triumph for the first time on the banks of the Nile. Rome heard with indignation of the brilliant scenes which accompanied his entry into Alexandria, of the two golden thrones which had been set upon a silver tribunal, and of the captive King of Armenia, once the ally of the Republic, being led in chains to do obeisance before the Queen of Egypt. The Roman people heard with amazement, and Octavian with bitter anger, that Antonius had acknowledged the legitimacy of the bastard Caesarion, the child whom Cleopatra had borne to Julius, and had associated him with the Queen herself in the sovereignty of Egypt, Cyprus, and Coele-Syria. To his own twin sons, Alexander and Ptolemy, the Sun and Moon of the Egyptian firmament, he assigned Roman provinces and the still unconquered thrones of the East, and to his infant daughter the sovereignty of Cyrene. Antonius himself assumed the diadem and the golden scepter, masqueraded as the god Osiris, and degraded his legionaries in Roman eyes by compelling them to act as bodyguard to the Egyptian Queen and bear her monogram upon their shields. The pride of Cleopatra knew no bounds. We have, it is true, only the authority of her enemies for the ambitions which occupied her mind, but there seems some reason to suppose that she looked confidently forward to returning to Rome — which she had last visited as the mistress of Julius — in the triumph of victory by the side of her consort Antonius. She had suffered insults in the city on the Tiber. The haughty Roman aristocrats had poured scorn on her pride. The bitter-tongued populace had vented upon her their sarcasms as she passed among them in the narrow streets. She now vowed that she would dictate her decrees from the Capitol itself and, as Propertius says, give law to the Roman world amid the statues and trophies of Marius. And so, in the year 33, the schemes of Antonius, under her direction, began to take a new turn. He dreamed of alliance with the Eastern Powers and of leading their armies with his own to the conquest of the West. Once more, therefore, he penetrated to the Araxes, but, instead of fighting with the Median King, he betrothed his son Alexander to a Median princess, gave him a share of the kingdom of Armenia, and, obtaining in return a large contingent of Median cavalry, marshalled his mighty forces on the coast line of Asia Minor, and spent the winter in Samos, with Cleopatra once more at his side. Nor did he make any secret of his intentions. The whole world knew that its two masters were about to engage in mortal conflict.
During these three years, Octavian had been steadily consolidating his strength and winning golden opinions in Rome. He had given Italy peace and security. Even the turbulent provinces of Spain and Gaul had been reduced to tranquillity. The legions had been kept employed not in shedding the blood of their fellow — Romans but in subduing the warlike tribes of Illyria and Dalmatia, and Octavian himself had gained honorable wounds among the fastnesses of the Illyrian Alps. We do not know what communications passed between him and his absent colleague. Probably they were few and formal. But while outwardly they remained good friends and allies, if either sought the excuse for a rupture there was no lack of suitable pretext. The climax was reached at the beginning of the year 32, when, in accordance with the terms of their compact at Tarentum, the consulship was to be held by two nominees of Antonius, Sosius and Domitius. Acting, no doubt, upon instructions from their chief, the two consuls signalized their entry into office by a violent attack upon Octavian. They denounced him for having despoiled Lepidus of his share in the Triumvirate and for seizing control of his provinces and legions to the detriment of Antonius. They complained that the legions of the East had not received their fair proportion of rewards, and that the warships which Antonius had lent to Octavian had never been returned. Octavian, who had been absent from the city when the attack was hurried back and convened the Senate. Attending the meeting with an armed escort, and taking his usual place between the consuls of the year, he replied with a fierce counterattack and denounced Antonius as unsparingly as he himself had been denounced by Antonius's partisans. And then, when the consuls declared that their position was no longer safe in Rome, and quitted the city to rejoin their patron, Octavian, so far from hindering their going, publicly announced that all who desired to join Antonius were free to do so.
By this time, Antonius and Cleopatra had left their winter retreat at Samos and betaken themselves to Athens, which they made their headquarters, and while Cleopatra courted the fickle favor of the Athenians, Antonius pressed on his military preparations. It was from that city that he sent to his deeply injured wife, Octavia, a bill of divorce. This was the crowning insult which he could offer to the first lady of the Roman world, who had done even more than her duty to her infatuated and unworthy husband. When Antonius had curtly bidden her to return to Rome from Athens and leave him with his paramour, Octavian had desired his sister to quit Antonius' roof and take up her abode with him. But she had refused, and had still continued to care not only for her own children by Antonius, but for the children of Antonius and Fulva. If any clients of her husband visited Rome, they found in her house the hospitality they required, and thus, despite the indignities which had been heaped upon her, she maintained a brave front before the world. Antonius was now brutal enough not merely to send formal notification that he repudiated her, but to despatch agents to Rome to turn her out of his house.
Rome sympathized with and pitied the deeply wronged lady. Her brother Octavian took a speedy revenge. Titius and Plancus, the former one of Antonius' best lieutenants, the latter the notorious traitor who had first proved false to the Republic and to Cicero, and now deserted his patron, Antonius, had changed their camps and thrown themselves upon the protection of Octavian. It was from them he learned that Antonius had deposited his will — which they themselves had attested — in the custody of the Vestal Virgins. They urged him to secure the document and publish its contents. Octavian listened to their advice, and though the impiety rather than the dishonorable character of the act caused murmurs of disapproval, the contents of the will were made public. It was found that Antonius had left instructions that if he died in Rome his body should be carried in funeral procession through the Forum and then be transported to Alexandria for burial in the tomb of Cleopatra. But what touched Octavian far more closely was the fact that in this testament Antonius acknowledged the lawfulness of the union of Julius and Cleopatra, that he recognized Caesarion as Julius's legitimate son, and by implication, therefore, declared Octavian to be a usurper of the titles which belonged to another. The will was read before both Senate and people, and two of Antonius's old supporters, C. Calvisius Sabinus and C. Furnius, affirmed that it was Antonius' intention, if he proved victorious in the struggle, to abandon Rome and make Alexandria the new capital of the world. To what extent these accusations were well founded, or even to what extent the document read before the Senate was genuine, it is impossible to say. Octavian was not above falsifying evidence for use against, his foes. Knowing that war was certain and unavoidable, he availed himself of every means whereby to inflame public opinion against his rival. It was his deliberate policy to array upon his side the pride and jealousy of the Roman people, to exaggerate and paint in the darkest colors the influence and ambition of Cleopatra, to represent that the Roman religion and the Roman civilization were threatened by the alien gods and the alien civilization of the Nile. Octavian never showed his astuteness and cunning more convincingly than by his conduct in these critical moments. At last, when he felt the hour had come, the Senate, at his instigation, deprived Antonius of the consulship for the year 31 — though Antonius had already designated Lucius Cluvius to hold office for him — and formally annulled his triumviral powers. But Octavian carefully refrained from declaring Antonius a public enemy. The war which he proclaimed in the Temple of Bellona with all the ancient solemn ceremonial was proclaimed against Cleopatra alone, on the pretext that she had usurped sovereign rights over territories which belonged to the Roman Republic.
To obtain the necessary money for the campaign about to open Octavian imposed a special war tax of twenty-five percent, upon all holders of land, and mulcted freedmen who possessed a fortune of more than 200,000 sesterces, of an eighth of their total possessions. These taxes were most unpopular and if Antonius had been well advised he would have made a great effort to land an army in Italy during the autumn of 32. But, though this was threatened by his presence at Corcyra, he let the months slip by and withdrew to Patras to spend the winter. He had been kept fully informed of what was passing in Rome, and, on hearing that the Senate had deposed him from the Triumvirate, he sent back a haughty message declaring that he would listen to no negotiations for peace, but that six months after he had decisively crushed his enemies he would lay down his special powers and restore the ancient constitution. At the opening of the new year, 31 B.C., when the term of the Triumvirate had expired, Octavian took possession of the consulship, choosing as his colleague Marcus Valerius Messala. The first few months passed without decisive action. Antonius had collected a huge army of 100,000 foot and 12,000 horse, and he was followed into the field by the kings of Mauretania, Commagene, Cappadocia, and Paphlagonia, vassals who owed to him the thrones on which they sat. In his host, too, were ranged auxiliaries from Pontus. Media, and Armenia, while a powerful squadron from Egypt held an important place in his enormous fleet of 500 ships of war. Octavian's forces were smaller in number but were far more coherent and trustworthy. He had 80,000 legionaries, 12,000 horsemen, and a fleet of 250 ships of much lighter caliber than those of the enemy, but possessing the inestimable advantage that their officers and crews had been trained in the art of naval warfare during the campaign against Sextus Pompeius. Antonius had ships in abundance but they were inadequately manned. This, however, did not trouble him, for when their unreadiness to put to sea was pointed out to him he carelessly replied: "What does it matter about sailors? As long as there are oars on board and men in Greece we shall not lack for rowers." Yet he soon found it necessary to burn many of his vessels in order to make up full equipments for the remainder.
The offensive was taken by Octavian and Agrippa. The latter, with a true perception of naval strategy, led a powerful squadron to seize Methone in the Peloponnese, and this port he utilized as a base where his ships might intercept the supplies coming from Egypt and Asia to Antonius, whose chief difficulty was that of finding sustenance for his army and his fleet in the impoverished districts of Greece. Octavian, meanwhile, threw an army across the Adriatic and seized Corcyra, and then gradually concentrated his forces on the coast of Epirus facing the Antonian camp at Actium. The narrow channel which forms the entrance to the Ambracian Gulf alone separated the combatants, and many weeks passed in desultory skirmishing. Antonius at length sent his cavalry around the head of the gulf to attack the Octavian positions in flank. They were unsuccessful, however, in this enterprise, and one of his naval squadrons, under Nasidicus, was cut off and captured by the active Agrippa. Defections daily took place in the Antonian camp. The kings of Pisidia, Paphlagonia, and Galatia deserted their patron, and, more important still, Domitius Ahenobarbus and his personal friend and adviser, Quintus Dellius, also made terms with Octavian. Antonius, whose fleets were cooped up in the Ambracian Gulf, found his commissariat difficulties almost insuperable. His lieutenants strongly urged him to strike his camp and choose another battleground. He himself is said to have sent wild challenges to Octavian to meet him in personal combat or to fight out their quarrel on the historic ground of Pharsalus. Octavian waited, as he could well afford to do, and eventually Antonius resolved to stake all upon the issue of a naval battle. It is said that he was urged thereto by the fears of Cleopatra, whose one anxiety was to get away from the perils of the camp at Actium and return to her own country, while the repeated successes of Agrippa, who held the seas and was, by this time, blockading the entrance to the Ambracian Gulf, increased her alarm for her personal safety.
Antonius has been blamed by some historians for risking a naval action. The probabilities are that he was compelled either to fight or lose his entire fleet. He had allowed the Octavians, with far fewer ships than his own, to obtain the command of the sea. His vessels remained idle in port, while Agrippa's light galleys were intercepting his supply ships. Yet Antonius' whole plan of campaign depended upon his transports. None knew better than he how arduous it was to maintain a large army in Greece, and that it was incumbent upon him to try conclusions with Octavian's navy. If he proved victorious, the position of Octavian's land forces in Epirus would be desperate, for they were obliged to draw all their supplies across the Adriatic. While, even if he were beaten, he would still be able to withdraw his army across the mainland into Macedonia and Thrace. Antonius, therefore, is not to be censured for deciding to fight on sea. The indelible stain upon his military reputation is that he had secretly determined, if he were worsted in the encounter, to abandon his land army to its fate and share the flight of his paramour. Certainly his soldiers heard with dismay the order that twenty thousand picked legionaries were to be sent on shipboard. "Imperator," exclaimed one of his centurions, a veteran whose body was covered with honorable wounds gained in many a campaign, "why do you mistrust these wounds, or this sword, and rest your hopes upon miserable logs of wood? Let Egyptians and Phoenicians fight on sea, but give us the land, on which we are wont to conquer or die." Their dismay was intensified when they saw that the ships were being laden with treasure, and that, contrary to the usual practice, the sails were being stowed on board instead of being left on shore. It was, therefore, with a gloomy foreboding of defeat that the Antonians challenged the enemy on September 2nd, 31 B.C., and the two fleets faced one another at last. But scarcely had they manoeuvred into position and the battle been joined when, from the galley of Cleopatra, there flew the signal of retreat. Crowding on all sail, the Egyptian squadron of sixty ships turned and ran, and Antonius, leaping into a swift galley, hastened to overtake his mistress. When he had boarded her vessel, the shame of his conduct scorched him like a flame. For three whole days, he sate at the prow with his head buried in his hands, overcome with ineffectual remorse. At length, when Cape Taenaron was reached, Cleopatra's women led him to their mistress' cabin, and, continuing their flight, her captains shaped their course for the Libyan coast.
Antonius' crews, whom he had thus basely abandoned, fought strenuously until far into the day, when the rumor that their commander had deserted them spread through the fleet and could no longer be denied. Many vessels had been sunk or shattered, the remaining three hundred surrendered. The victory of Octavian was complete, and his triumph was crowned by the surrender of the land army of Antonius without striking a blow. For seven days, the Antonian legions turned a deaf ear to the agents of Octavian, but when their general, Canidius, also fled, they hesitated no longer and passed over to the camp of Octavian. The conqueror could now afford to be generous to the partisans of a rival who was not only beaten but disgraced. A few of his captives, against whom he bore a special grudge, were put to death, but he spared the lives of most, and the legionaries of Antonius willingly took the oath of loyalty. To reduce the numbers of the enormous host under his command was his first care. Those who had served their time with the eagles were dismissed and sent back to Italy, which he placed under the care of his friend Agrippa, while, with a picked army, he himself set out to undertake the conquest of Egypt. As before, his soldiers clamored for their pay, and betrayed a mutinous spirit when the money was not forthcoming. The shores of Actium furnished no booty. The camp of Antonius had been despoiled by Antonius himself. But Octavian quelled the mutiny, and, after laying the foundations of the city of Nicopolis upon the site where he had pitched his camp, he moved slowly through Greece and Asia Minor to receive the submission of the East. Then, deeming it advisable to pay a flying visit to Italy before making his descent upon Egypt, Octavian suddenly appeared at Brundisium, where he received deputations from the capital congratulating him upon his triumph, and offering him the consulship for the year 30. The main reason, however, which had brought him to Italy was to overawe the discontented and disbanded soldiery, who were again clamoring for their rewards, and he partially succeeded in this at the expense of the unfortunate Italians of the south by a wholesale eviction of all who had favored the cause of Antonius. As after Philippi, a number of Italian cities were handed over to the legionaries, and the original possessors were transplanted to Greece and Asia. To prove at once his desire and his inability to pay his soldiers, he put up his own estates at auction in order to obtain a supply of ready cash. But no one was reckless enough to make a bid for such dangerous property, and the soldiers had perforce to wait. In twenty-seven days, Octavian had completed his plans and again set sail for Asia, intending to invade Egypt by the Syrian route.
Antonius knew that he need expect no mercy. He had sent repeated messengers to Octavian, asking that he might be allowed to spend the remainder of his days in the obscurity of private life, but had received a stern refusal. Cleopatra too had begged that the throne of Egypt might be secured to her children, but her emissaries had returned with the evasive reply that she might expect every favor if she would either put Antonius to death or banish him from her dominions. The Egyptian Queen, who had decked her galleys with the laurels and garlands of victory when she appeared off the port of Alexandria in her flight from Actium, in order to obtain an unopposed entry, had signalized her arrival by a massacre of all from whom she feared danger. Antonius was left without a single legion in the whole of Asia. His vassal kings had all made their peace with Octavian. Even Herod of Judea deserted him in his extremity. Canidius, fleeing from Greece, brought him the news that his powerful land army had gone over to the enemy, and when he made his way to Alexandria from Libya to rejoin Cleopatra he found her planning a wild and romantic scheme of quitting Egypt, dragging her galleys overland to the Red Sea, and setting out, like a second Dido, to found another kingdom beyond the reach of Octavian's vengeance. But this mad project was speedily abandoned and the lovers determined to remain where they were and await the course of events. Antonius gave way to moody despair. He withdrew from the court, buried himself in a little house, near Pharos, and affected to live like Timon, cursing the ingratitude of mankind. But soon, wearying of his hermitage, he returned to Cleopatra's side and again plunged into debauchery. The lovers had in happier days founded a society which they called the "Inimitable Livers". They now instituted another to which they gave the title of "The Companions in Death." But their gaieties were hollow. Cleopatra experimented with poisons to discover the least painful mode of death, but she still hoped to live. In the intervals of their feastings, Antonius sometimes remembered that he had once been a great captain of men, and made fitful preparations for the defense of Egypt, and when at length Octavian's army marched up to the gates of Alexandria and encamped before the city, Antonius placed himself at the head of his cavalry, made a brisk sally, and returned in triumph from this trifling skirmish. But treachery was at work. A few days later, when the Egyptian fleet left the harbor to give battle, while he was to attack the Octavians by land, Antonius saw to his dismay the rowers salute, instead of fighting, the enemy, while his own cavalry deserted in a body. His infantry were routed and driven back in confusion into the city, and Antonius was informed that Cleopatra had taken her own life.
It was time, therefore, he thought, that he should take his, and he bade his faithful servant, Eros, strike the fatal blow. Eros drew his sword but turned the point upon himself and fell dead at his master's feet. "This, Eros, was nobly done," cried Antonius, "thy heart would not permit thee to kill thy master, but thou hast taught him what to do by thy example." Seizing the sword, he plunged it into his bowels and fell back upon a couch. While he lay in his agony, a messenger came to him from Cleopatra, whom he believed to be dead, bidding him come to her. Rallying for a moment at the news that his mistress was still alive, he ordered his servants to carry him in their arms to the foot of the monument in which Cleopatra had taken refuge. Not daring to undo the bolts and open the door, the Egyptian Queen and her woman attendants let down a rope from the window and the dying man was with difficulty hoisted up. There are many moving stories in the pages of Plutarch, but none more tragic than that in which he describes Cleopatra straining at the rope, with every feature distorted by the violence of the effort, and the agonized endeavor of the dying Antonius to stretch out his arms to his beloved Queen, as he hung suspended in mid-air. "When she had drawn him up and laid him on a bed, she stood over him, and rent her clothes, beat and wounded her breast, and, wiping the blood from his disfigured countenance, she called him her lord, her emperor, her husband. Her soul was in his misfortune, and she seemed totally to have forgotten that she had any miseries of her own." With his last breath, Antonius tried to soothe her grief and implored her to consult her own safety, but even before he expired, Proculeius arrived from Octavian with orders to take Cleopatra alive. The doors of the mausoleum were still fast. Octavian's officer, however, contrived to obtain a ladder and enter by the window, while his friend, Gallus, held Cleopatra's attendants in conversation below. A warning cry apprised the Egyptian Queen of her danger and she drew a dagger to stab herself, but her uplifted arm was seized by Proculeius, who removed the weapon and bade her trust confidently to the chivalry and clemency of her conqueror.
Octavian entered the city without opposition, not as a conqueror in the panoply of war, but in close converse with the Alexandrian philosopher, Arius. Mounting the tribunal prepared for him in the Gymnasium, he assured the people, who prostrated themselves before him, that he would do their city no harm. The memory of its founder, Alexander, the beauty of its streets, and his friendship for Arius alike, he said, combined to dispose him to be lenient. Antyllus, the eldest son of Antonius by Fulvia, was put to death. His dead rival's other children were spared and were brought up by the virtuous Octavia as her own. Caesarion, the son of Cleopatra by Julius, had been sent for safety by his mother into Ethiopia, but the wretched youth was persuaded to turn back and, while Octavian was hesitating how to deal with him, Arius whispered in his ear that there ought not to be too many Caesars. The hint was enough.
Meanwhile, Octavian had permitted Cleopatra to bury Antonius in the tomb she had prepared for him, and sought to allay her fears. She had abandoned herself to the luxury of frenzied grief at the loss of her lover and, after performing the funeral rites with great magnificence — Plutarch tells us that she was allowed to expend what she thought proper on the occasion — she threatened to starve herself to death. Octavian, however, prevailed upon her to return to the palace, and, when she had recovered from the fever into which she had been thrown, he himself visited her in person. The accounts of what took place at this celebrated interview vary considerably in points of detail. According to Cassius Dio, Cleopatra decked herself in her most sumptuous robes and set herself once more to play the courtesan, hoping that the charms which had ensnared Julius Caesar and Antonius would still prove potent and alluring enough to captivate her youthful conqueror. Pictures and busts of the murdered dictator adorned the apartment, while letters which she had received from him were placed in her bosom, ready for instant reference, whereby to melt the heart of the dead man's adopted son. Plutarch, on the other hand, declares that the queen was lying on a couch, clad only in a single bedgown, when Octavian appeared, and that she threw herself at his feet as he entered the room, her hair in disorder, her voice trembling, her eyes sunk, and her breast still bearing the marks of her self-inflicted injuries. Roman authors were only too ready to blacken the character of the Queen, and seem to have accepted the story that Cleopatra was perfectly willing to take Octavian as her new lover, though her tears for Antonius were hardly dry upon her cheeks. Whether this is a gross libel upon one whose amazing fascinations have passed into a proverb, and whose career it seems incongruous to judge by the frigid standard of Western morality, it is impossible to say. But, whatever Cleopatra's hopes may have been before this interview, they were rudely shattered at its close. Octavian was proof against tears and entreaties. He remained cold to her pleading. Though not insensible to woman's beauty, he was on this occasion made of stone, remembering that it was against this queen, now lying at his feet, that he, as the head of the Roman State, had drawn the sword. He listened in silence as she attempted to justify her policy and pleaded that she had been constrained against her will to fight against Rome, but held out no hope that he would continue her upon the throne of Egypt. Then she begged for life, placed in his hands an inventory of the royal treasures, and when Seleucus, one of her treasurers, accused her of suppressing some articles in the account, she blazed up in sudden fury and caught the offending Egyptian by the hair. Octavian smiled at the outburst and courteously accepted her assurance that she had merely reserved a few trinkets to offer as personal gifts to Octavia and Livia. Congratulating himself that the queen had abandoned all thought of suicide, he solemnly promised that she might expect the most honorable treatment at his hands, and quitted her presence well satisfied, for he had already made up his mind to send Cleopatra to Rome to grace the triumph which there awaited him.
His purpose was known to Cornelius Dolabella, one of the younger officers of his staff, who had been smitten with Cleopatra's charms. Dolabella sent her warning of his chief's intentions. On learning the humiliating fate in store for her, the Queen begged permission from Octavian to make her last oblations to Antonius. The request was granted, and Cleopatra resolved to die. The closing scene is one of the best known in ancient history. After kneeling at the tomb of the lover whom she was so soon to rejoin, after crowning it with flowers and kissing the cold marble, she ordered the table to be spread for a last magnificent feast. The basket of figs, which hid the poisonous asp, was brought in at the close and then Cleopatra dictated a letter to Octavian and ordered all her attendants to leave the mausoleum excepting her two trusted women, Iris and Charmion. The letter contained a passionate request that she might be buried in the tomb of Antonius, and Octavian hurriedly despatched messengers to prevent the queen from taking her life. They arrived too late. When they broke open the doors Cleopatra lay dead upon the golden couch, clad in all her royal ornaments. At her feet lay Iris, dead like her mistress, while Charmion, hardly able to support herself, was adjusting with trembling fingers the diadem upon the dead Queen's brow. "Charmion, was this well done?" exclaimed the messenger. "Perfectly well," was the proud reply, "and worthy a descendant of the kings of Egypt."