“But I,” interrupted Cleopatra, “I can admire all that is great; and does it not seem a bold and grand thing even to you, that the mighty idea that it is one single power that moves and fills the world, should be freely and openly declared in the sacred writings of the Jews—­an idea which the Egyptians carefully wrap up and conceal, which the priests of the Nile only venture to divulge to the most privileged of those who are initiated into their mysteries, and which—­though the Greek philosophers indeed have fearlessly uttered it—­has never been introduced by any Hellene into the religion of the people?  If you were not so averse to the Hebrew nation, and if you, like my husband and myself, had diligently occupied yourself with their concerns and their belief you would be juster to them and to their scriptures, and to the great creating and preserving spirit, their god—­”

“You are confounding this jealous and most unamiable and ill-tempered tyrant of the universe with the Absolute of Aristotle!” cried Euergetes; “he stigmatises most of what you and I and all rational Greeks require for the enjoyment of life as sin—­sin upon sin.  And yet if my easily persuadable brother governed at Alexandria, I believe the shrewd priests might succeed in stamping him as a worshipper of that magnified schoolmaster, who punishes his untutored brood with fire and torment.”

“I cannot deny,” replied Cleopatra, “that even to me the doctrine of the Jews has something very fearful in it, and that to adopt it seems to me tantamount to confiscating all the pleasures of life.—­But enough of such things, which I should no more relish as a daily food than you do.  Let us rejoice in that we are Hellenes, and let us now go to the banquet.  I fear you have found a very unsatisfactory substitute for what you sought in coming up here.”

“No—­no.  I feel strangely excited to-day, and my work with Aristarchus would have led to no issue.  It is a pity that we should have begun to talk of that barbarian rubbish; there are so many other subjects more pleasing and more cheering to the mind.  Do you remember how we used to read the great tragedians and Plato together?”

“And how you would often interrupt our tutor Agatharchides in his lectures on geography, to point out some mistake!  Did you prosecute those studies in Cyrene?”

“Of course.  It really is a pity, Cleopatra, that we should no longer live together as we did formerly.  There is no one, not even Aristarchus, with whom I find it more pleasant and profitable to converse and discuss than with you.  If only you had lived at Athens in the time of Pericles, who knows if you might not have been his friend instead of the immortal Aspasia.  This Memphis is certainly not the right place for you; for a few months in the year you ought to come to Alexandria, which has now risen to be superior to Athens.”

“I do not know you to-day!” exclaimed Cleopatra, gazing at her brother in astonishment.  “I have never heard you speak so kindly and brotherly since the death of my mother.  You must have some great request to make of us.”