surface wears a transparent robe, what have you to say against it, Cleopatra?  The Ptolemaic princes must protect the import trade of Alexandria, that fact was patent even to the great son of Lagus; and what would become of our commerce with Cos if I did not purchase the finest bombyx stuffs, since those who sell it make no profits out of you, the queen—­and you cover yourself, like a vestal virgin, in garments of tapestry.  Give me a wreath for my head—­aye and another to that, and new wine in the cup!  To the glory of Rome and to your health, Publius Cornelius Scipio, and to our last critical conjecture, my Aristarchus—­to subtle thinking and deep drinking!”

“To deep thinking and subtle drinking!” retorted the person thus addressed, while he raised the cup, looked into the wine with his twinkling eyes and lifted it slowly to his nose—­a long, well-formed and slightly aquiline nose—­and to his thin lips.

“Oh!  Aristarchus,” exclaimed Euergetes, and he frowned.  “You please me better when you clear up the meaning of your poets and historians than when you criticise the drinking-maxims of a king.  Subtle drinking is mere sipping, and sipping I leave to the bitterns and other birds that live content among the reeds.  Do you understand me?  Among reeds, I say—­whether cut for writing, or no.”

“By subtle drinking,” replied the great critic with perfect indifference, as he pushed the thin, gray hair from his high brow with his slender hand.  “By subtle drinking I mean the drinking of choice wine, and did you ever taste anything more delicate than this juice of the vines of Anthylla that your illustrious brother has set before us?  Your paradoxical axiom commends you at once as a powerful thinker and as the benevolent giver of the best of drinks.”

“Happily turned,” exclaimed Cleopatra, clapping her hands, “you here see, Publius, a proof of the promptness of an Alexandrian tongue.”

“Yes!” said Euergetes, “if men could go forth to battle with words instead of spears the masters of the Museum in Alexander’s city, with Aristarchus at their head, they might rout the united armies of Rome and Carthage in a couple of hours.”

“But we are not now in the battle-field but at a peaceful meal,” said the king, with suave amiability.  “You did in fact overhear our secret Euergetes, and mocked at my faithful Egyptians, in whose place I would gladly set fair Greeks if only Alexandria still belonged to me instead of to you.—­However, a splendid procession shall not be wanting at your birthday festival.”

“And do you really still take pleasure in these eternal goose-step performances?” asked Euergetes, stretching himself out on his couch, and folding his hands to support the back of his head.  “Sooner could I accustom myself to the delicate drinking of Aristarchus than sit for hours watching these empty pageants.  On two conditions only can I declare myself ready and willing to remain quiet, and patiently