“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.”

“You see how thankless a thing it is for me to let my heart speak for once, like other people.  I am like the boy in the fable when the wolf came!  I have so often behaved in an unbrotherly fashion that when I show the aspect of a brother you think I have put on a mask.  If I had had anything special to ask of you I should have waited till to-morrow, for in this part of the country even a blind beggar does not like to refuse his lame comrade anything on his birthday.”

“If only we knew what you wish for!  Philometor and I would do it more than gladly, although you always want something monstrous.  Our performance to-morrow will—­at any rate—­but—­Zoe, pray be good enough to retire with the maids; I have a few words to say to my brother alone.”

As soon as the queen’s ladies had withdrawn, she went on: 

“It is a real grief to use, but the best part of the festival in honor of your birthday will not be particularly successful, for the priests of Serapis spitefully refuse us the Hebe about whom Lysias has made us so curious.  Asclepiodorus, it would seem, keeps her in concealment, and carries his audacity so far as to tell us that someone has carried her off from the temple.  He insinuates that we have stolen her, and demands her restitution in the name of all his associates.”