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$Title{History Of Cleopatra, Queen Of Egypt
Chapter XI: The Battle Of Actium}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Abbott, Jacob}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{antony
cleopatra
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octavius
octavia
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$Date{1900}
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Title:       History Of Cleopatra, Queen Of Egypt
Book:        Cleopatra
Author:      Abbott, Jacob
Date:        1900

Chapter XI: The Battle Of Actium

     Cleopatra, in parting with Antony as described in the last chapter, lost
him for two or three years.  During this time Antony himself was involved in a
great variety of difficulties and dangers, and passed through many eventful
scenes, which, however, can not here be described in detail.  His life, during
this period, was full of vicissitude and excitement, and was spent probably in
alternations of remorse for the past and anxiety for the future. On landing at
Tyre, he was at first extremely perplexed whether to go to Asia Minor or to
Rome.  His presence was imperiously demanded in both places.  The war which
Fulvia had fomented was caused, in part, by the rivalry of Octavius, and the
collision of his interests with those of her husband. Antony was very angry
with her for having managed his affairs in such a way as to bring about a war.
After a time Antony and Fulvia met at Athens. Fulvia had retreated to that
city, and was very seriously sick there, either from bodily disease, or from
the influence of long-continued anxiety, vexation, and distress.  They had a
stormy meeting.  Neither party was disposed to exercise any mercy toward the
other.  Antony left his wife rudely and roughly, after loading her with
reproaches.  A short time afterward, she sank down in sorrow to the grave.

     The death of Fulvia was an event which proved to be of advantage to
Antony.  It opened the way to a reconciliation between him and Octavius.
Fulvia had been extremely active in opposing Octavius's designs, and in
organizing plans for resisting him.  He felt, therefore, a special hostility
against her, and, through her, against Antony.  Now, however, that she was
dead, the way seemed to be in some sense opened for a reconciliation.

     Octavius had a sister, Octavia, who had been the wife of a Roman general
named Marcellus.  She was a very beautiful and a very accomplished woman, and
of a spirit very different from that of Fulvia.  She was gentle, affectionate,
and kind, a lover of peace and harmony, and not at all disposed, like Fulvia,
to assert and maintain her influence over others by an overbearing and violent
demeanor.  Octavia's husband died about this time, and, in the course of the
movements and negotiations between Antony and Octavius, the plan was proposed
of a marriage between Antony and Octavia, which, it was thought, would ratify
and confirm the reconciliation.  This proposal was finally agreed upon.
Antony was glad to find so easy a mode of settling his difficulties.  The
people of Rome, too, and the authorities there, knowing that the peace of the
world depended upon the terms on which these two men stood with regard to each
other, were extremely desirous that this arrangement should be carried into
effect.  There was a law of the commonwealth forbidding the marriage of a
widow within a specified period after the death of her husband.  That period
had not, in Octavia's case, yet expired.  There was, however, so strong a
desire that no obstacle should be allowed to prevent this proposed union, or
even to occasion delay, that the law was altered expressly for this case, and
Antony and Octavia were married.  The empire was divided between Octavius and
Antony, Octavius receiving the western portion as his share, while the eastern
was assigned to Antony.

     It is not probable that Antony felt any very strong affection for his new
wife, beautiful and gentle as she was.  A man, in fact, who had led such a
life as his had been, must have be come by this time incapable of any strong
and pure attachment.  He, however, was pleased with the novelty of his
acquisition, and seemed to forget for a time the loss of Cleopatra.  He
remained with Octavia a year.  After that he went away on certain military
enterprises which kept him some time from her.  He returned again, and again
he went away.  All this time Octavia's influence over him and over her brother
was of the most salutary and excellent character.  She soothed their
animosities, quieted their suspicions and jealousies, and at one time, when
they were on the brink of open war, she effected a reconciliation between them
by the most courageous and energetic, and at the same time, gentle and
unassuming efforts.  At the time of this danger she was with her husband in
Greece; but she persuaded him to send her to her brother at Rome, saying that
she was confident that she could arrange a settlement of the difficulties
impending.  Antony allowed her to go.  She proceeded to Rome, and procured an
interview with her brother in the presence of his two principal officers of
state.  Here she pleaded her husband's cause with tears in her eyes: she
defended his conduct, explained what seemed to be against him, and entreated
her brother not to take such a course as should cast her down from being the
happiest of women to being the most miserable.  "Consider the circumstances of
my case," said she.  "The eyes of the world are upon me.  Of the two most
powerful men in the world, I am the wife of one and the sister of another. If
you allow rash counsels to go on and war to ensue, I am hopelessly ruined;
for, whichever is conquered, my husband or my brother, my own happiness will
be for ever gone."

     Octavius sincerely loved his sister, and he was so far softened by her
entreaties that he consented to appoint an interview with Antony in order to
see if their difficulties could be settled.  This interview was accordingly
held.  The two generals came to a river, where, at the opposite banks, each
embarked in a boat, and, being rowed out toward each other, they met in the
middle of the stream.  A conference ensued, at which all the questions at
issue were, for a time at least, very happily arranged.

     Antony, however, after a time, began to become tired of his wife, and to
sigh for Cleopatra once more.  He left Octavia at Rome and proceeded to the
eastward, under pretense of attending to the affairs of that portion of the
empire; but, instead of doing this, he went to Alexandria, and there renewed
again his former intimacy with the Egyptian queen.

     Octavius was very indignant at this.  His former hostility to Antony,
which had been in a measure appeased by the kind influence of Octavia, now
broke forth anew, and was heightened by the feeling of resentment naturally
awakened by his sister's wrongs.  Public sentiment in Rome, too, was setting
very strongly against Antony.  Lampoons were written against him to ridicule
him and Cleopatra, and the most decided censures were passed upon his conduct.
Octavia was universally beloved, and the sympathy which was every where felt
for her increased and heightened very much the popular indignation which was
felt against the man who could wrong so deeply such sweetness, and gentleness,
and affectionate fidelity as hers.

     After remaining for some time in Alexandria, and renewing his connection
and intimacy with Cleopatra, Antony went away again, crossing the sea into
Asia, with the intention of prosecuting certain military undertakings there
which imperiously demanded his attention.  His plan was to return as soon as
possible to Egypt after the object of his expedition should be accomplished.
He found, however, that he could not bear even a temporary absence from
Cleopatra.  His mind dwelled so much upon her, and upon the pleasures which he
had enjoyed with her in Egypt, and he longed so much to see her again, that he
was wholly unfit for the discharge of his duties in the camp.  He became
timid, inefficient, and remiss, and almost every thing that he undertook ended
disastrously.  The army, who understood perfectly well the reason of their
commander's remissness and consequent ill fortune, were extremely indignant at
his conduct, and the camp was filled with suppressed murmurs and complaints.
Antony, however, like other persons in his situation, was blind to all these
indications of dissatisfaction; probably he would have disregarded them if he
had observed them.  At length, finding that he could bear his absence from his
mistress no longer, he set out to march across the country, in the depth of
the winter, to the sea-shore, to a point where he had sent for Cleopatra to
come to join him.  The army endured incredible hardships and exposures in this
march.  When Antony had once commenced the journey, he was so impatient to get
forward that he compelled his troops to advance with a rapidity greater than
their strength would bear. They were, besides, not provided with proper tents
or with proper supplies of provision.  They were often obliged, therefore,
after a long and fatiguing march during the day, to bivouac at night in the
open air among the mountains, with scanty means of appeasing their hunger, and
very little shelter from the cold rain, or from the storms of driving snow
Eight thousand men died on this march, from cold, fatigue, and exposure; a
greater sacrifice, perhaps, than had ever been made before to the mere ardor
and impatience of a lover.

     When Antony reached the shore, he advanced to a certain sea-port, near
Sidon, where Cleopatra was to land.  At the time of his arrival but a small
part of his army was left, and the few men that survived were in a miserably
destitute condition.  Antony's eagerness to see Cleopatra became more and more
excited as the time drew nigh.  She did not come so soon as he had expected,
and during the delay he seemed to pine away under the influence of love and
sorrow.  He was silent, absent-minded, and sad.  He had no thoughts for any
thing but the coming of Cleopatra, and felt no interest in any other plans.
He watched for her incessantly and would sometimes leave his place at the
table, in the midst of the supper, and go down alone to the shore, where he
would stand gazing out upon the sea, and saying mournfully to himself, "Why
does not she come?" The animosity and the ridicule which these things awakened
against him, on the part of the army, were extreme; but he was so utterly
infatuated that he disregarded all the manifestations of public sentiment
around him, and continued to allow his mind to be wholly engrossed with the
single idea of Cleopatra's coming.

     She arrived at last.  She brought a great supply of clothes and other
necessaries for the use of Antony's army, so that her coming not only
gratified his love, but afforded him, also, a very essential relief, in
respect to the military difficulties in which he was involved.

     After some time spent in the enjoyment of the pleasure which being thus
reunited to Cleopatra afforded him, Antony began again to think of the affairs
of his government, which every month more and more imperiously demanded his
attention.  He began to receive urgent calls from various quarters, urging him
to action.  In the mean time, Octavia - who had been all this while waiting in
distress and anxiety at Rome, hearing continually the most gloomy accounts of
her husband's affairs, and the most humiliating tidings in respect to his
infatuated devotion to Cleopatra - resolved to make one more effort to save
him.  She interceded with her brother to allow her to raise troops and to
collect supplies, and then proceed to the eastward to re-enforce him.
Octavius consented to this.  He, in fact, assisted Octavia in making her
preparations.  It is said, however, that he was influenced in this plan by his
confident belief that this noble attempt of his sister to reclaim her husband
would fail, and that, by the failure of it, Antony would be put in the wrong,
in the estimation of the Roman people, more absolutely and hopelessly than
over, and that the way would thus be prepared for his complete and final
destruction.

     Octavia was rejoiced to obtain her brother's aid to her undertaking,
whatever the motive might be which induced him to afford it.  She accordingly
levied a considerable body of troops, raised a large sum of money, provided
clothes, and tents, and military stores for the army; and when all was ready,
she left Italy and put to sea, having previously dispatched a messenger to her
husband to inform him that she was coming.

     Cleopatra began now to be afraid that she was to lose Antony again, and
she at once began to resort to the usual artifices employed in such cases, in
order to retain her power over him.  She said nothing, but assumed the
appearance of one pining under the influence of some secret suffering or
sorrow.  She contrived to be often surprised in tears.  In such cases she
would hastily brush her tears away, and assume a countenance of smiles and
good humor, as if making every effort to be happy, though really oppressed
with a heavy burden of anxiety and grief.  When Antony was near her she would
seem overjoyed at his presence, and gaze upon him with an expression of the
most devoted fondness.  When absent from him, she spent her time alone, always
silent and dejected, and often in tears; and she took care that the secret
sorrows and sufferings that she endured should be duly made known to Antony,
and that he should understand that they were all occasioned by her love for
him, and by the danger which she apprehended that he was about to leave her.

     The friends and secret agents of Cleopatra, who reported these things to
Antony, made, moreover, direct representations to him, for the purpose of
inclining his mind in her favor.  They had, in fact, the astonishing audacity
to argue that Cleopatra's claims upon Antony for a continuance of his love
were paramount to those of Octavia.  She, that is, Octavia, had been his wife,
they said, only for a very short time.  Cleopatra had been most devotedly
attached to him for many years.  Octavia was married to him, they alleged, not
under the impulse of love, but from political considerations alone, to please
her brother, and to ratify and confirm a political league made with him.
Cleopatra, on the other hand, had given herself up to him in the most absolute
and unconditional manner, under the influence solely of a personal affection
which she could not control.  She had surrendered and sacrificed every thing
to him.  For him she had lost her good name, alienated the affections of her
subjects, made herself the object of reproach and censure to all mankind, and
now she had left her native land to come and join him in his adverse fortunes.
Considering how much she had done, and suffered, and sacrificed for his sake,
it would be extreme and unjustifiable cruelty in him to forsake her now.  She
never would survive such an abandonment.  Her whole soul was so wrapped up in
him, that she would pine away and die if he were now to forsake her.

     Antony was distressed and agitated beyond measure by the entanglements in
which he found that he was involved.  His duty, his inclination perhaps,
certainly his ambition, and every dictate of prudence and policy, required
that he should break away from these shares at once and go to meet Octavia.
But the spell that bound him was too mighty to be dissolved.  He yielded to
Cleopatra's sorrows and tears.  He dispatched a messenger to Octavia, who had
by this time reached Athens, in Greece, directing her not to come any farther.
Octavia, who seemed incapable of resentment or anger against her husband, sent
back to ask what she should do with the troops, and money, and the military
stores which she was bringing.  Antony directed her to leave them in Greece.
Octavia did so, and mournfully returned to her home.

     As soon as she arrived at Rome, Octavius, her brother, whose indignation
was now thoroughly aroused at the baseness of Antony, sent to his sister to
say that she must leave Antony's house and come to him.  A proper
self-respect, he said, forbade her remaining any longer under the roof of such
a man.  Octavia replied that she would not leave her husband's house. That
house was her post of duty, whatever her husband might do, and there she would
remain.  She accordingly retired within the precincts of her old home, and
devoted herself in patient and uncomplaining sorrow to the care of the family
and the children.  Among these children was one young son of Antony's, born
during his marriage with her predecessor Fulvia.  In the mean time, while
Octavia was thus faithfully though mournfully fulfilling her duties as wife
and mother, in her husband's house at Rome, Antony himself had gone with
Cleopatra to Alexandria, and was abandoning himself once more to a life of
guilty pleasure there.  The greatness of mind which this beautiful and devoted
wife thus displayed, attracted the admiration of all mankind.  It produced,
however, one other effect, which Octavia must have greatly deprecated.  It
aroused a strong and universal feeling of indignation against the unworthy
object toward whom this extraordinary magnanimity was displayed.

     In the mean time, Antony gave himself up wholly to Cleopatra's influence
and control, and managed all the affairs of the Roman empire in the East in
the way best fitted to promote her aggrandizement and honor.  He made
Alexandria his capital, celebrated triumphs there, arranged ostentatious
expeditions into Asia and Syria with Cleopatra and her train, gave her whole
provinces as presents, and exalted her two sons, Alexander and Ptolemy,
children born during the period of his first acquaintance with her, to
positions of the highest rank and station, as his own acknowledged sons.  The
consequences of these and similar measures at Rome were fatal to Antony's
character and standing Octavius reported every thing to the Roman senate and
people, and made Antony's misgovernment and his various misdemeanors the
ground of the heaviest accusations against him.  Antony, hearing of these
things, sent his agents to Rome and made accusations against Octavius; but
these counter accusations were of no avail.  Public sentiment was very strong
and decided against him at the capital, and Octavius began to prepare for war.

     Antony perceived that he must prepare to defend himself.  Cleopatra
entered into the plans which he formed for this purpose with great ardor.
Antony began to levy troops, and collect and equip galleys and ships of war,
and to make requisitions of money and military stores from all the eastern
provinces and kingdoms.  Cleopatra put all the resources of Egypt at his
disposal.  She furnished him with immense sums of money, and with an
inexhaustible supply of corn, which she procured for this purpose from her
dominions in the valley of the Nile.  The various divisions of the immense
armament which was thus provided for were ordered to rendezvous at Ephesus,
where Antony and Cleopatra were awaiting to receive them, having proceeded
there when their arrangements in Egypt were completed, and they were ready to
commence the campaign.

     When all was ready for the expedition to set sail from Ephesus, it was
Antony's judgment that it would be best for Cleopatra to return to Egypt, and
leave him to go forth with the fleet to meet Octavius alone.  Cleopatra was,
however, determined not to go away.  She did not dare to leave Antony at all
to himself, for fear that in some way or other a peace would be effected
between himself and Octavius, which would result in his returning to Octavia
and abandoning her.  She accordingly contrived to persuade Antony to retain
her with him, by bribing his chief counselor to advise him to do so.  His
counselor's name was Canidius.  Canidius, having received Cleopatra's money,
while yet he pretended to be wholly disinterested in his advice, represented
to Antony that it would not be reasonable to send Cleopatra away, and deprive
her of all participation in the glory of the war, when she was defraying so
large a part of the expense of it.  Besides, a large portion of the army
consisted of Egyptian troops, who would feel discouraged and disheartened if
Cleopatra were to leave them, and would probably act far less efficiently in
the conflict than they would do if animated by the presence of their queen.
Then, moreover, such a woman as Cleopatra was not to be considered, as many
women would be, an embarrassment and a source of care to a military expedition
which she might join, but a very efficient counselor and aid to it.  She was,
he said, a very sagacious, energetic, and powerful queen, accustomed to the
command of armies and to the management of affairs of state, and her aid in
the conduct of the expedition might be expected to conduce very materially to
its success.

     Antony was easily won by such persuasions as these, and it was at length
decided that Cleopatra should accompany him.

     Antony then ordered the fleet to move forward to the island of Samos.
Here it was brought to anchor and remained for some time, waiting for the
coming in of new re-enforcements, and for the completion of the other
arrangements.  Antony, as if becoming more and more infatuated as he
approached the brink of his ruin, spent his time while the expedition remained
at Samos, not in maturing his plans and perfecting his arrangements for the
tremendous conflict which was approaching, but in festivities, games,
revelings, and every species of riot and dissolute excess.  This, however, is
not surprising.  Men almost always, when in a situation analogous to his, fly
to similar means of protecting themselves, in some small degree, from the
pangs of remorse, and from the forebodings which stand ready to terrify and
torment them at every instant in which these gloomy specters are not driven
away by intoxication and revelry.  At least Antony found it so.  Accordingly,
an immense company of players, tumblers, fools, jesters, and mountebanks were
ordered to assemble at Samos, and to devote themselves with all zeal to the
amusement of Antony's court.  The island was one universal scene of riot and
revelry.  People were astonished at such celebrations and displays, wholly
unsuitable, as they considered them, to the occasion.  If such are the
rejoicings, said they, which Antony celebrates before going into the battle,
what festivities will he contrive on his return, joyous enough to express his
pleasure if he shall gain the victory?

     After a time, Antony and Cleopatra, with a magnificent train of
attendants, left Samos, and, passing across the Aegean Sea, landed in Greece,
and advanced to Athens; while the fleet, proceeding westward from Samos,
passed around Taenarus, the southern promontory of Greece, and then moved
northward along the western coast of the peninsula.  Cleopatra wished to go to
Athens for a special reason.  It was there that Octavia had stopped on her
journey toward her husband with re-enforcements and aid; and while she was
there, the people of Athens, pitying her sad condition, and admiring the noble
spirit of mind which she displayed in her misfortunes, had paid her great
attention, and during her stay among them had bestowed upon her many honors.
Cleopatra now wished to go to the same place, and to triumph over her rival
there, by making so great a display of her wealth and magnificence, and of her
ascendency over the mind of Antony, as should entirely transcend and outshine
the more unassuming pretensions of Octavia.  She was not willing, it seems, to
leave to the unhappy wife whom she had so cruelly wronged even the possession
of a place in the hearts of the people of this foreign city, but must go and
enviously strive to efface the impression which injured innocence had made, by
an ostentatious exhibition of the triumphant prosperity of her own shameless
wickedness.  She succeeded well in her plans. The people of Athens were amazed
and bewildered at the immense magnificence that Cleopatra exhibited before
them.  She distributed vast sums of money among the people.  The city, in
return, decreed to her the most exalted honors.  They sent a solemn embassy to
her to present her with these decrees. Antony himself, in the character of a
citizen of Athens, was one of the embassadors.  Cleopatra received the
deputation at her palace.  The reception was attended with the most splendid
and imposing ceremonies.

     One would have supposed that Cleopatra's cruel and unnatural hostility to
Octavia might now have been satisfied; but it was not.  Antony, while he was
at Athens, and doubtless at Cleopatra's instigation, sent a messenger to Rome
with a notice of divorcement to Octavia, and with an order that she should
leave his house.  Octavia obeyed.  She went forth from her home, taking the
children with her, and bitterly lamenting her cruel destiny.

     In the mean time, while all these events had been transpiring in the
East, Octavius had been making his preparations for the coming crisis, and was
now advancing with a powerful fleet across the sea.  He was armed with
authority from the Roman senate and people, for he had obtained from them a
decree deposing Antony from his power.  The charges made against him all
related to misdemeanors and offenses arising out of his connection with
Cleopatra.  Octavius contrived to get possession of a will which Antony had
written before leaving Rome, and which he had placed there in what he supposed
a very sacred place of deposit.  The custodians who had it in charge replied
to Octavius, when he demanded it, that they would not give it to him, but if
he wished to take it they would not hinder him.  Octavius then took the will,
and read it to the Roman senate.  It provided, among other things, that at his
death, if his death should happen at Rome, his body should be sent to
Alexandria to be given to Cleopatra; and it evinced in other ways a degree of
subserviency and devotedness to the Egyptian queen which was considered wholly
unworthy of a Roman chief magistrate.  Antony was accused, too, of having
plundered cities and provinces to make presents to Cleopatra; of having sent a
library of two hundred thousand volumes to her from Pergamus, to replace the
one which Julius Caesar had accidentally burned; of having raised her sons,
ignoble as their birth was, to high places of trust and power in the Roman
government, and of having in many ways compromised the dignity of a Roman
officer by his unworthy conduct in reference to her.  He used, for example,
when presiding at a judicial tribunal, to receive love-letters sent him from
Cleopatra, and then at once turn off his attention from the proceedings going
forward before him to read the letters. ^* Sometimes he did this when sitting
in the chair of state, giving audience to embassadors and princes.  Cleopatra
probably sent these letters in at such times under the influence of a wanton
disposition to show her power.  At one time, as Octavius said in his arguments
before the Roman senate, Antony was hearing a cause of the greatest
importance, and during a time in the progress of the cause when one of the
principal orators of the city was addressing him, Cleopatra came passing by,
when Antony suddenly arose, and, leaving the court without any ceremony, ran
out to follow her.  These and a thousand similar tales exhibited Antony in so
odious a light, that his friends forsook his cause, and his enemies gained a
complete triumph.  The decree was passed against him, and Octavius was
authorized to carry it into effect; and accordingly, while Antony, with his
fleet and army, was moving westward from Samos and the Aegean Sea, Octavius
was coming eastward and southward down the Adriatic to meet him.

[Footnote *: These letters, in accordance with the scale of expense and
extravagance on which Cleopatra determined that everything relating to herself
and Antony should be done, were engraved on tablets made of onyx, or crystal,
or other hard and precious stones.]

     In process of time, after various maneuvers and delays, the two armaments
came into the vicinity of each other at a place called Actium, which will be
found on the western coast of Epirus, north of Greece.  Both of the commanders
had powerful fleets at sea, and both had great armies upon the land.  Antony
was strongest in land troops, but his fleet was inferior to that of Octavius,
and he was himself inclined to remain on the land and fight the principal
battle there.  But Cleopatra would not consent to this.  She urged him to give
Octavius battle at sea.  The motive which induced her to do this has been
supposed to be her wish to provide a more sure way of escape in case of an
unfavorable issue to the conflict.  She thought that in her galleys she could
make sail at once across the sea to Alexandria in case of defeat, whereas she
knew not what would become of her if beaten at the head of an army on the
land.  The ablest counselors and chief officers in the army urged Antony very
strongly not to trust himself to the sea.  To all their arguments and
remonstrances, however, Antony turned a deaf ear.  Cleopatra must be allowed
to have her way.

     On the morning of the battle, when the ships were drawn up in array,
Cleopatra held the command of a division of fifty or sixty Egyptian vessels,
which were all completely manned, and well equipped with masts and sails. She
took good care to have every thing in perfect order for flight, in case flight
should prove to be necessary.  With these ships she took a station in reserve,
and for a time remained there a quiet witness of the battle.  The ships of
Octavius advanced to the attack of those of Antony, and the men fought from
deck to deck with spears, boarding-pikes, flaming darts, and every other
destructive missile which the military art had then devised. Antony's ships
had to contend against great disadvantages.  They were not only outnumbered by
those of Octavius, but were far surpassed by them in the efficiency with which
they were manned and armed.  Still, it was a very obstinate conflict.
Cleopatra, however, did not wait to see how it was to be finally decided.  As
Antony's forces did not immediately gain the victory, she soon began to yield
to her fears in respect to the result, and, finally, fell into a panic and
resolved to fly.  She ordered the oars to be manned and the sails to be
hoisted, and then forcing her way through a portion of the fleet that was
engaged in the contest, and throwing the vessels into confusion as she passed,
she succeeded in getting to sea, and then pressed on, under full sail, down
the coast to the southward.  Antony, as soon as he perceived that she was
going, abandoning every other thought, and impelled by his insane devotedness
to her, hastily called up a galley of five banks of oars, and, leaping on
board of it, ordered the oarsmen to pull with all their force after
Cleopatra's flying squadron.

     Cleopatra, looking back from the deck of her vessel, saw this swift
galley pressing on toward her.  She raised a signal at the stern of the vessel
which she was in, that Antony might know for which of the fifty flying ships
he was to steer.  Guided by the signal, Antony came up to the vessel, and the
sailors hoisted him up the side and helped him in.  Cleopatra had however,
disappeared.  Overcome with shame and confusion, she did not dare, it seems,
to meet the look of the wretched victim of her arts whom she had now
irretrievably ruined.  Antony did not seek her.  He did not speak a word. He
went forward to the prow of the ship, and, throwing himself down there alone,
pressed his head between his hands, and seemed stunned and stupefied, and
utterly overwhelmed with horror and despair.

     He was, however, soon aroused from his stupor by an alarm raised on board
his galley that they were pursued.  He rose from his seat, seized a spear,
and, on ascending to the quarter deck, saw that there were a number of small
light boats, full of men and of arms, coming up behind them, and gaining
rapidly upon his galley.  Antony, now free for a moment from his enchantress's
sway, and acting under the impulse of his own indomitable boldness and
decision, instead of urging the oarsmen to press forward more rapidly in order
to make good their escape, ordered the helm to be put about, and thus, turning
the galley around, he faced his pursuers, and drove his ship into the midst of
them.  A violent conflict ensued, the din and confusion of which was increased
by the shocks and collisions between the boats and the galley.  In the end,
the boats were beaten off, all excepting one: that one kept still hovering
near, and the commander of it, who stood upon the deck, poising his spear with
an aim at Antony, and seeking eagerly an opportunity to throw it, seemed by
his attitude and the expression of his countenance to be animated by some
peculiarly bitter feeling of hostility and hate.  Antony asked him who he was,
that dared so fiercely to threaten him. The man replied by giving his name,
and saying that he came to avenge the death of his father.  It proved that he
was the son of a man whom Antony had at a previous time, on some account or
other, caused to be beheaded.

     There followed an obstinate contest between Antony and this fierce
assailant, in the end of which the latter was beaten off.  The boats then,
having succeeded in making some prizes from Antony's fleet, though they had
failed in capturing Antony himself, gave up the pursuit and returned.  Antony
then went back to his place, sat down in the prow, buried his face in his
hands, and sank into the same condition of hopeless distress and anguish as
before.

     When husband and wife are overwhelmed with misfortune and suffering, each
instinctively seeks a refuge in the sympathy and support of the other. It is,
however, far otherwise with such connections as that of Antony and Cleopatra.
Conscience, which remains calm and quiet in prosperity and sunshine, rises up
with sudden and unexpected violence as soon as the hour of calamity comes; and
thus, instead of mutual comfort and help, each finds in the thoughts of the
other only the means of adding the horrors of remorse to the anguish of
disappointment and despair.  So extreme was Antony's distress, that for three
days he and Cleopatra neither saw nor spoke to each other. She was overwhelmed
with confusion and chagrin, and he was in such a condition of mental
excitement that she did not dare to approach him.  In a word, reason seemed to
have wholly lost its sway - his mind, in the alternations of his insanity,
rising sometimes to fearful excitement, in paroxysms of uncontrollable rage,
and then sinking again for a time into the stupor of despair.

     In the mean time, the ships were passing down as rapidly as possible on
the western coast of Greece.  When they reached Taenarus, the southern
promontory of the peninsula, it was necessary to pause and consider what was
to be done.  Cleopatra's women went to Antony and attempted to quiet and calm
him.  They brought him food.  They persuaded him to see Cleopatra.  A great
number of merchant ships from the ports along the coast gathered around
Antony's little fleet and offered their services.  His cause, they said, was
by no means desperate.  The army on the land had not been beaten.  It was not
even certain that his fleet had been conquered.  They endeavored thus to
revive the ruined commander's sinking courage, and to urge him to make a new
effort to retrieve his fortunes.  But all was in vain.  Antony was sunk in a
hopeless despondency.  Cleopatra was determined on going to Egypt, and he must
go too.  He distributed what treasure remained at his disposal among his
immediate followers and friends, and gave them advice about the means of
concealing themselves until they could make peace with Octavius.  Then, giving
up all as lost, he followed Cleopatra across the sea to Alexandria.