“Give it me, Physician.  Desperate men are brave men.  There!——­Why, what is this?  Yours is a magic draught!  My sorrows seem to roll away like thunder-clouds before the southern gale, and the spring of Hope blooms fresh upon the desert of my heart.  Once more I am Antony, and once again I see my legions’ spears asparkle in the sun, and hear the thunderous shout of welcome as Antony—­beloved Antony—­rides in pomp of war along his deep-formed lines!  There’s hope! there’s hope!  I may yet see the cold brows of Caesar—­that Caesar who never errs except from policy—­robbed of their victor bays and crowned with shameful dust!”

“Ay,” cried Charmion, “there still is hope, if thou wilt but play the man!  O my Lord! come back with us; come back to the loving arms of Cleopatra!  All night she lies upon her golden bed, and fills the hollow darkness with her groans for ‘Antony!’ who, enamoured now of Grief, forgets his duty and his love!”

“I come!  I come!  Shame upon me, that I dared to doubt her!  Slave, bring water, and a purple robe:  not thus can I be seen of Cleopatra.  Even now I come.”

In this fashion, then, did we draw Antony back to Cleopatra, that the ruin of the twain might be made sure.

We led him up the Alabaster Hall and into Cleopatra’s chamber, where she lay, her cloudy hair about her face and breast, and tears flowing from her deep eyes.

“O Egypt!” he cried, “behold me at thy feet!”

She sprang from the couch.  “And art thou here, my love?” she murmured; “then once again are all things well.  Come near, and in these arms forget thy sorrows and turn my grief to joy.  Oh, Antony, while love is left to us, still have we all!”

And she fell upon his breast and kissed him wildly.

That same day, Charmion came to me and bade me prepare a poison of the most deadly power.  And this at first I would not do, fearing that Cleopatra would therewith make an end of Antony before his time.  But Charmion showed me that this was not so, and told me also for what purpose was the poison.  Therefore I summoned Atoua, the skilled in simples, and all that afternoon we laboured at the deadly work.  And when it was done, Charmion came once more, bearing with her a chaplet of fresh roses, that she bade me steep in the poison.

This then I did.

That night at the great feast of Cleopatra, I sat near Antony, who was at her side, and wore the poisoned wreath.  Now as the feast went on, the wine flowed fast, till Antony and the Queen grew merry.  And she told him of her plans, and of how even now her galleys were being drawn by the canal that leads from Bubastis on the Pelusiac branch of the Nile, to Clysma at the head of the Bay of Heroopolis.  For it was her design, should Caesar prove stubborn, to fly with Antony and her treasure down the Arabian Gulf, where Caesar had no fleet, and seek some new home in India, whither her foes might not follow.  But, indeed, this plan came to nothing, for the Arabs of Petra burnt the galleys, incited thereto by a message sent by the Jews of Alexandria, who hated Cleopatra and were hated of her.  For I caused the Jews to be warned of what was being done.