wear 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 hides nothing and I am now too thin for it to become me.  All the lines in my throat show, and my elbows are quite sharp—­altogether I am much thinner.  That comes of incessant worry, annoyance, and anxiety.  How angry I was yesterday at the council, because my husband will always give way and agree and try to be pleasant; whenever a refusal is necessary I have to interfere, unwilling as I am to do it, and odious as it is to me always to have to stir up discontent, disappointment, and disaffection, to take things on myself and to be regarded as hard and heartless in order that my husband may preserve undiminished the doubtful glory of being the gentlest and kindest of men and princes.  My son’s having a will of his own leads to agitating scenes, but even that is better than that Philopator should rush into everybody’s arms.  The first thing in bringing up a boy should be to teach him to say ‘no.’  I often say ‘yes’ myself when I should not, but I am a woman, and yielding becomes us better than refusal—­and what is there of greater importance to 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 gold thread with sapphire knots; that will go well with the head-dress.  Take care with your comb, Thais, you are hurting me!  Now—­I must not chatter any more.  Zoe, give me the roll yonder; I must collect my thoughts a little before I go down to talk among men at the banquet.  When we have just come from visiting the realm of death and of Serapis, and have been reminded of the immortality of the soul and of our lot in the next world, we are glad to read through what the most estimable of human thinkers has said concerning such things.  Begin here, Zoe.”

Cleopatra’s companion, thus addressed, signed to the unoccupied waiting-women to withdraw, seated herself on a low cushion opposite the queen, and began to read with an intelligent and practised intonation; the reading went on for some time uninterrupted by any sound but the clink of metal ornaments, the rustle of rich stuffs, the trickle of oils or perfumes as they were dropped into the crystal bowls, the short and whispered questions of the women who were attiring the queen, or Cleopatra’s no less low and rapid answers.

All the waiting-women not immediately occupied about the queen’s person—­ perhaps twenty in all, young and old-ranged themselves along the sides of the great tent, either standing or sitting on the ground or on cushions, and awaiting the moment when it should be their turn to perform some service, as motionless as though spellbound by the mystical words of a magician.  They only made signs to each other with their eyes and fingers, for they knew that the queen did not choose to be disturbed when she was being read to, and that she never hesitated to cast aside anything or anybody that crossed her wishes or inclinations, like a tight shoe or a broken lutestring.