Others preferred to watch this futile battle rather than give themselves up to the anxiety which filled their minds.  The Regent was gazing mutely at the ground; Iras, pale and absent-minded, was listening to Zeno’s statements; and Archibius had gone out of doors, and, unheeding the storm, was looking across the tossing waves of the harbour for the expected ships.

In a wooden shed, whose roof was supported by gaily painted pillars, through which the wind whistled, the servants, from the porters to the litter-bearers, had gathered in groups under the flickering light of the lanterns.  The Greeks sat on wooden stools, the Egyptians upon mats on the floor.  The largest circle contained the parties who attended to the Queen’s luggage and the upper servants, among whom were several maids.

They had been told that the Queen was expected that night, because it was possible that the strong north wind would bear her ship home with unexpected speed after the victory.  But they were better informed:  palaces have chinks in doors and curtains, and are pervaded by a very peculiar echo which bears even a whisper distinctly from ear to ear.

The body-slave of the commander-in-chief Seleukus was the principal spokesman.  His master had reached Alexandria but a few hours ago from the frontier fortress of Pelusium, which he commanded.  A mysterious order from Lucilius, Antony’s most faithful friend, brought from Taenarum by a swift galley, had summoned him hither.

The freedman Beryllus, a loquacious Sicilian, who, as an actor, had seen better days ere pirates robbed him of his liberty, had heard many new things, and his hearers listened eagerly; for ships coming from the north, which touched at Pelusium, had confirmed and completed the evil tidings that had penetrated the Sebasteum.

According to his story, he was as well informed as if he had been an eye-witness of the naval battle; for he had been present during his master’s conversation with many ship-captains and messengers from Greece.  He even assumed the air of a loyal, strictly silent servant, who would only venture to confirm and deny what the Alexandrians had already learned.  Yet his knowledge consisted merely of a confused medley of false and true occurrences.  While the Egyptian fleet had been defeated at Actium, and Antony, flying with Cleopatra, had gone first to Taenarum at the end of the Peloponnesian coast, he asserted that the army and fleet had met on the Peloponnesian coast and Octavianus was pursuing Antony, who had turned towards Athens, while Cleopatra was on her way to Alexandria.

His “trustworthy intelligence” had been patched together from a few words caught from Seleukus at table, or while receiving and dismissing messengers.  In other matters his information was more accurate.

While for several days the harbour of Alexandria had been closed, vessels were permitted to enter Pelusium, and all captains of newly arrived ships and caravans were compelled to report to Beryllus’s master, the commandant of the important frontier fortress.