CHAPTER VII.
In the very midst of the white wall with its bastions and ramparts,which formed the fortifications of Memphis, stood the old palace of thekings, a stately structure built of bricks, recently plastered, and withcourts, corridors, chambers and halls without number, and veranda-likeout-buildings of gayly-painted wood, and a magnificent pillaredbanqueting-hall in the Greek style. It was surrounded by verdurousgardens, and a whole host of laborers tended the flower-beds and shadyalleys, the shrubs and the trees; kept the tanks clean and fed the fishin them; guarded the beast-garden, in which quadrupeds of every kind,from the heavy-treading elephant to the light-footed antelope, were tobe seen, associated with birds innumerable of every country and climate.
A light white vapor rose from the splendidly fitted bath-house, loudbarkings resounded from the dog-kennels, and from the long array of openstables came the neighing of horses with the clatter and stamp of hoofs,and the rattle of harness and chains. A semicircular building of newconstruction adjoining the old palace was the theatre, and many largetents for the bodyguard, for ambassadors and scribes, as well as others,serving as banqueting-halls for the various court-officials, stood bothwithin the garden and outside its enclosing walls. A large space leadingfrom the city itself to the royal citadel was given up to the soldiers,and there, by the side of the shady court-yards, were the houses of thepolice-guard and the prisons. Other soldiers were quartered in tentsclose to the walls of the palace itself. The clatter of their arms andthe words of command, given in Greek, by their captain, sounded out atthis particular instant, and up into the part of the buildings occupiedby the queen; and her apartments were high up, for in summer timeCleopatra preferred to live in airy tents, which stood among thebroad-leaved trees of the south and whole groves of flowering shrubs,on the level roof of the palace, which was also lavishly decorated withmarble statues. There was only one way of access to this retreat,which was fitted up with regal splendor; day and night it was fanned bycurrents of soft air, and no one could penetrate uninvited to disturbthe queen's retirement, for veteran guards watched at the foot of thebroad stair that led to the roof, chosen from the Macedonian "Gardenoble," and owing as implicit obedience to Cleopatra as to the kinghimself. This select corps was now, at sunset, relieving guard, and thequeen could hear the words spoken by the officers in command andthe clatter of the shields against the swords as they rattled on thepavement, for she had come out of her tent into the open air, and stoodgazing towards the west, where the glorious hues of the sinking sunflooded the bare, yellow limestone range of the Libyan hills, withtheir innumerable tombs and the separate groups of pyramids; while thewonderful coloring gradually tinged with rose-color the light silveryclouds that hovered in the clear sky over the valley of Memphis, andedged them as with a rile of living gold.
The queen stepped out of her tent, accompanied by a young Greekgirl--the fair Zoe, daughter of her master of the hunt Zenodotus, andCleopatra's favorite lady-in-waiting--but though she looked towards thewest, she stood unmoved by the magic of the glorious scene before her;she screened her eyes with her hand to shade them from the blindingrays, and said:
"Where can Cornelius be staying! When we mounted our chariots before thetemple he had vanished, and as far as I can see the road in the quartersof Sokari and Serapis I cannot discover his vehicle, nor that of Eulaeuswho was to accompany him. It is not very polite of him to go off in thisway without taking leave; nay, I could call it ungrateful, since I hadproposed to tell him on our way home all about my brother Euergetes, whohas arrived to-day with his friends. They are not yet acquainted, forEuergetes was living in Cyrene when Publius Cornelius Scipio landed inAlexandria. Stay! do you see a black shadow out there by the vineyardat Kakem; That is very likely he; but no--you are right, it is only somebirds, flying in a close mass above the road. Can you see nothing more?No!--and yet we both have sharp young eyes. I am very curious to knowwhether Publius Scipio will like Euergetes. There can hardly be twobeings more unlike, and yet they have some very essential points incommon."
"They are both men," interrupted Zoe, looking at the queen as if sheexpected cordial assent to this proposition.
"So they are," said Cleopatra proudly. "My brother is still so youngthat, if he were not a king's son, he would hardly have outgrown thestage of boyhood, and would be a lad among other Epheboi,--[Youths above18 were so called]--and yet among the oldest there is hardly a man whois his superior in strength of will and determined energy. Already,before I married Philometor, he had clutched Alexandria and Cyrene,which by right should belong to my husband, who is the eldest of usthree, and that was not very brotherly conduct--and indeed we had othergrounds for being angry with him; but when I saw him again for the firsttime after nine months of separation I was obliged to forget them all,and welcome him as though he had done nothing but good to me and hisbrother--who is my husband, as is the custom of the families of Pharaohsand the usage of our race. He is a young Titan, and no one would beastonished if he one day succeeded in piling Pelion upon Ossa. I knowwell enough how wild he can often be, how unbridled and recalcitrantbeyond all bounds; but I can easily pardon him, for the same bold bloodflows in my own veins, and at the root of all his excesses lies power,genuine and vigorous power. And this innate pith and power are just thevery thing we most admire in men, for it is the one gift which the godshave dealt out to us with a less liberal hand than to men. Life indeedgenerally dams its overflowing current, but I doubt whether this will bethe case with the stormy torrent of his energy; at any rate men such ashe is rush swiftly onwards, and are strong to the end, which sooneror later is sure to overtake them; and I infinitely prefer such a wildtorrent to a shallow brook flowing over a plain, which hurts no one, andwhich in order to prolong its life loses itself in a misty bog. He, ifany one, may be forgiven for his tumultuous career; for when he pleasesmy brother's great qualities charm old and young alike, and are asconspicuous and as remarkable as his faults--nay, I will frankly say hiscrimes. And who in Greece or Egypt surpasses him in grasp and elevationof mind?"
"You may well be proud of him," replied Zoe. "Not even Publius Scipiohimself can soar to the height reached by Euergetes."
"But, on the other hand, Euergetes is not gifted with the steady, calmself-reliance of Cornelius. The man who should unite in one person thegood qualities of those two, need yield the palm, as it seems to me, noteven to a god!"
"Among us imperfect mortals he would indeed be the only perfect one,"replied Zoe. "But the gods could not endure the existence of a perfectman, for then they would have to undertake the undignified task ofcompeting with one of their own creatures."
"Here, however, comes one whom no one can accuse!" cried the youngqueen, as she hastened to meet a richly dressed woman, older thanherself, who came towards her leading her son, a pale child of twoyears old. She bent down to the little one, tenderly but with impetuouseagerness, and was about to clasp him in her arms, but the fragilechild, which at first had smiled at her, was startled; he turned awayfrom her and tried to hide his little face in the dress of his nurse--alady of rank-to whom he clung with both hands. The queen threw herselfon her knees before him, took hold of his shoulder, and partly bycoaxing and partly by insistence strove to induce him to quit thesheltering gown and to turn to her; but although the lady, hiswet-nurse, seconded her with kind words of encouragement, the terrifiedchild began to cry, and resisted his mother's caresses with more andmore vehemence the more passionately she tried to attract and conciliatehim. At last the nurse lifted him up, and was about to hand him to hismother, but the wilful little boy cried more than before, and throwinghis arms convulsively round his nurse's neck he broke into loud cries.
In the midst of this rather unbecoming struggle of the mother againstthe child's obstinacy, the clatter of wheels and of horses' hoofs rangthrough the court-yard of the palace, and hardly had the sound reachedthe queen's ears than she turned away from the screaming child, hurriedto the parapet of the roof, and called out to Zoe:
"Publiu
s Scipio is here; it is high time that I should dress for thebanquet. Will that naughty child not listen to me at all? Take him away,Praxinoa, and understand distinctly that I am much dissatisfied withyou. You estrange my own child from me to curry favor with the futureking. That is base, or else it proves that you have no tact, and areincompetent for the office entrusted to you. The office of wet-nurse youduly fulfilled, but I shall now look out for another attendant for theboy. Do not answer me! no tears! I have had enough of that with thechild's screaming." With these words, spoken loudly and passionately,she turned her back on Praxinoa--the wife of a distinguished Macedoniannoble, who stood as if petrified--and retired into her tent, wherebranched lamps had just been placed on little tables of elegantworkmanship. Like all the other furniture in the queen's dressing-tentthese were made of gleaming ivory, standing out in fine relief from thetent-cloth which was sky-blue woven with silver lilies and ears of corn,and from the tiger-skins which covered all the cushions, while whitewoollen carpets, bordered with a waving scroll in blue, were spread onthe ground.
The queen threw herself on a seat in front of her dressing-table, andsat staring at herself in a mirror, as if she now saw her face and herabundant, reddish-fair hair for the first time; then she said, halfturning to Zoe and half to her favorite Athenian waiting-maid, who stoodbehind her with her other women:
"It was folly to dye my dark hair light; but now it may remain so, forPublius Scipio, who has no suspicion of our arts, thought this colorpretty and uncommon, and never will know its origin. That Egyptianheaddress with the vulture's head which the king likes best to see mein, the young Greek Lysias and the Roman too, call barbaric, and soevery one must call it who is not interested in the Egyptians. Butto-night we are only ourselves, so I will wear the chaplet of goldencorn with sapphire grapes. Do you think, Zoe, that with that I couldwear the dress of transparent bombyx silk that came yesterday from Cos?But no, I will not wear that, for it is too slight a tissue, it hidesnothing and I am now too thin for it to become me. All the lines inmy throat show, and my elbows are quite sharp--altogether I am muchthinner. That comes of incessant worry, annoyance, and anxiety. Howangry I was yesterday at the council, because my husband will alwaysgive way and agree and try to be pleasant; whenever a refusal isnecessary I have to interfere, unwilling as I am to do it, and odiousas it is to me always to have to stir up discontent, disappointment, anddisaffection, to take things on myself and to be regarded as hardand heartless in order that my husband may preserve undiminished thedoubtful glory of being the gentlest and kindest of men and princes. Myson's having a will of his own leads to agitating scenes, but even thatis better than that Philopator should rush into everybody's arms. Thefirst thing in bringing up a boy should be to teach him to say 'no.' Ioften say 'yes' myself when I should not, but I am a woman, and yieldingbecomes us better than refusal--and what is there of greater importanceto a woman than to do what becomes her best, and to seem beautiful?
"I will decide on this pale dress, and put over it the net-work of goldthread with sapphire knots; that will go well with the head-dress. Takecare with your comb, Thais, you are hurting me! Now--I must not chatterany more. Zoe, give me the roll yonder; I must collect my thoughts alittle before I go down to talk among men at the banquet. When we havejust come from visiting the realm of death and of Serapis, and havebeen reminded of the immortality of the soul and of our lot in the nextworld, we are glad to read through what the most estimable of humanthinkers has said concerning such things. Begin here, Zoe."
Cleopatra's companion, thus addressed, signed to the unoccupiedwaiting-women to withdraw, seated herself on a low cushion opposite thequeen, and began to read with an intelligent and practised intonation;the reading went on for some time uninterrupted by any sound but theclink of metal ornaments, the rustle of rich stuffs, the trickle of oilsor perfumes as they were dropped into the crystal bowls, the shortand whispered questions of the women who were attiring the queen, orCleopatra's no less low and rapid answers.
All the waiting-women not immediately occupied about the queen'sperson--perhaps twenty in all, young and old-ranged themselves along thesides of the great tent, either standing or sitting on the ground oron cushions, and awaiting the moment when it should be their turn toperform some service, as motionless as though spellbound by the mysticalwords of a magician. They only made signs to each other with their eyesand fingers, for they knew that the queen did not choose to be disturbedwhen she was being read to, and that she never hesitated to cast asideanything or anybody that crossed her wishes or inclinations, like atight shoe or a broken lutestring.
Her features were irregular and sharp, her cheekbones too stronglydeveloped, and the lips, behind which her teeth gleamed pearlywhite-though too widely set--were too full; still, so long as sheexerted her great powers of concentration, and listened with flashingeyes, like those of a prophetess, and parted lips to the words of Plato,her face had worn an indescribable glow of feeling, which seemed to havecome upon her from a higher and better world, and she had looked farmore beautiful than now when she was fully dressed, and when her womencrowded round leer--Zoe having laid aside the Plato--with loud andunmeasured flattery.
Cleopatra delighted in being thus feted, and, in order to enjoy theadulation of a throng, she would always when dressing have a greatnumber of women to attend her toilet; mirrors were held up to her onevery side, a fold set right, and the jewelled straps of her sandalsadjusted.
One praised the abundance of her hair, another the slenderness of herform, the slimness of her ankles, and the smallness of her tinyhands and feet. One maiden remarked to another--but loud enough tobe heard--on the brightness of her eyes which were clearer than thesapphires on her brow, while the Athenian waiting-woman, Thais, declaredthat Cleopatra had grown fatter, for her golden belt was less easy toclasp than it had been ten days previously.
The queen presently signed to Zoe, who threw a little silver ball into abowl of the same metal, elaborately wrought and decorated, and in a fewminutes the tramp of the body-guard was audible outside the door of thetent.
Cleopatra went out, casting a rapid glance over the roof--now brightlyilluminated with cressets and torches--and the white marble statuesthat gleamed out in relief against the dark clumps of shrubs; and then,without even looking at the tent where her children were asleep, sheapproached the litter, which had been brought up to the roof for her bythe young Macedonian nobles. Zoe and Thais assisted her to mount intoit, and her ladies, waiting-women, and others who had hurried out ofthe other tents, formed a row on each side of the way, and hailed theirmistress with loud cries of admiration and delight as she passed by,lifted high above them all on the shoulders of her bearers. The diamondsin the handle of her feather-fan sparkled brightly as Cleopatra waved agracious adieu to her women, an adieu which did not fail to remind themhow infinitely beneath her were those she greeted. Every movement ofher hand was full of regal pride, and her eyes, unveiled and untempered,were radiant with a young woman's pleasure in a perfect toilet, withsatisfaction in her own person, and with the anticipation of the festivehours before her.
The litter disappeared behind the door of the broad steps that led up tothe roof, and Thais, sighing softly, said to herself, "If only for onceI could ride through the air in just such a pretty shell of colored andshining mother-of-pearl, like a goddess! carried aloft by young men, andhailed and admired by all around me! High up there the growing Selenefloats calmly and silently by the tiny stars, and just so did sheride past in her purple robe with her torch-bearers and flamesand lights-past us humble creatures, and between the tents to thebanquet--and to what a banquet, and what guests! Everything up heregreets her with rejoicing, and I could almost fancy that among thosestill marble statues even the stern face of Zeno had parted its lips,and spoken flattering words to her. And yet poor little Zoe, and thefair-haired Lysippa, and the black-haired daughter of Demetrius, andeven I, poor wretch, should be handsomer, far handsomer than she, if wecould dress ourselves with fine clothes and jewels
for which kings wouldsell their kingdoms; if we could play Aphrodite as she does, and rideoff in a shell borne aloft on emerald-green glass to look as if it werefloating on the waves; if dolphins set with pearls and turquoises servedus for a footstool, and white ostrich-plumes floated over our heads,like the silvery clouds that float over Athens in the sky of a finespring day. The transparent tissue that she dared not put on would wellbecome me! If only that were true which Zoe was reading yesterday, thatthe souls of men were destined to visit the earth again and again in newforms! Then perhaps mine might some day come into the world in that ofa king's child. I should not care to be a prince, so much is expected ofhim, but a princess indeed! That would be lovely!"
These and such like were Thais' dreams, while Zoe stood outside the tentof the royal children with her cousin, the chief-attendant of princePhilopator, carrying on an eager conversation in a low tone. The child'snurse from time to time dried her eyes and sobbed bitterly as she said:"My own baby, my other children, my husband and our beautiful housein Alexandria--I left them all to suckle and rear a prince. I havesacrificed happiness, freedom, and my nights'-sleep for the sake of thequeen and of this child, and how am I repaid for all this? As if I werea lowborn wench instead of the daughter and wife of noble men; thiswoman, half a child still, scarcely yet nineteen, dismisses me from herservice before you and all her ladies every ten days! And why? Becausethe ungoverned blood of her race flows in her son's veins, and becausehe does not rush into the arms of a mother who for days does not ask forhim at all, and never troubles herself about him but in some idle momentwhen she has gratified every other whim. Princes distribute favor ordisgrace with justice only so long as they are children. The little oneunderstands very well what I am to him, and sees what Cleopatra is. If Icould find it in my heart to ill-use him in secret, this mother--who isnot fit to be a mother--would soon have her way. Hard as it would be tome so soon to leave the poor feeble little child, who has grown asdear to my soul as my own--aye and closer, even closer, as I may wellsay--this time I will do it, even at the risk of Cleopatra's plunging usinto ruin, my husband and me, as she has done to so many who have daredto contravene her will."
The wet-nurse wept aloud, but Zoe laid her hand on the distressedwoman's shoulder, and said soothingly: "I know you have more to submitto from Cleopatra's humors than any of us all, but do not be overhasty.Tomorrow she will send you a handsome present, as she so often has doneafter being unkind; and though she vexes and hurts you again and again,she will try to make up for it again and again till, when this year isover, your attendance on the prince will be at an end, and you can gohome again to your own family. We all have to practise patience; welive like people dwelling in a ruinous house with to-day a stone andto-morrow a beam threatening to fall upon our heads. If we each takecalmly whatever befalls us our masters try to heal our wounds, but ifwe resist may the gods have mercy on us! for Cleopatra is like a strungbow, which sets the arrow flying as soon as a child, a mouse, a breathof air even touches it--like an over-full cup which brims over if aleaf, another drop, a single tear falls into it. We should, any one ofus, soon be worn out by such a life, but she needs excitement, turmoiland amusement at every hour. She comes home late from a feast, spendsbarely six hours in disturbed slumber, and has hardly rested so long asit takes a pebble to fall to the ground from a crane's claw before wehave to dress her again for another meal. From the council-board shegoes to hear some learned discourse, from her books in the temple tosacrifice and prayer, from the sanctuary to the workshops of artists,from pictures and statues to the audience-chamber, from a receptionof her subjects and of foreigners to her writing-room, from answeringletters to a procession and worship once more, from the sacred servicesback again to her dressing-tent, and there, while she is being attiredshe listens to me while I read the most profound works--and how shelistens! not a word escapes her, and her memory retains whole sentences.Amid all this hurry and scurry her spirit must need be like a limb thatis sore from violent exertion, and that is painfully tender to everyrough touch. We are to her neither more nor less than the wretched flieswhich we hit at when they trouble us, and may the gods be merciful tothose on whom this queen's hand may fall! Euergetes cleaves with thesword all that comes in his way. Cleopatra stabs with the dagger, andher hand wields the united power of her own might and of her yieldinghusband's. Do not provoke her. Submit to what you cannot avert; just asI never complain when, if I make a mistake in reading, she snatches thebook from my hand, or flings it at my feet. But I, of course, have onlymyself to fear for, and you have your husband and children as well."
Praxinoa bowed her head at these words in sad assent, and said:
"Thank you for those words! I always think only from my heart, and youmostly from your head. You are right, this time again there is nothingfor me to do but to be patient; but when I have fulfilled the dutieshere, which I undertook, and am at home again, I will offer a greatsacrifice to Asclepias and Hygiea, like a person recovered from a severeillness; and one thing I know: that I would rather be a poor girl,grinding at a mill, than change with this rich and adored queen who, inorder to enjoy her life to the utmost, carelessly and restlessly hurriespast all that our mortal lot has best to offer. Terrible, hideous to meseems such an existence with no rest in it! and the heart of a motherwhich is so much occupied with other things that she cannot win the loveof her child, which blossoms for every hired nurse, must be as waste asthe desert! Rather would I endure anything--everything--with patiencethan be such a queen!"