friend. Thou wast
angered with me at the feast to-night because I mocked thee with yonder
wreath--was it not so? Nay, it was but a jest. Didst thou know how heavy
is the task of monarchs and how wearisome are their hours, thou wouldst
not be wroth because I lit my dulness with a jest. Oh, they weary me,
those princes and those nobles, and those stiff-necked pompous Romans.
To my face they vow themselves my slaves, and behind my back they mock
me and proclaim me the servant of their Triumvirate, or their Empire,
or their Republic, as the wheel of Fortune turns, and each rises on its
round! There is never a man among them--nothing but fools, parasites,
and puppets--never a man since with their coward daggers they slew that
Caesar whom all the world in arms was not strong enough to tame. And I
must play off one against the other, if maybe, by so doing, I can
keep Egypt from their grip. And for reward, what? Why, this is my
reward--that all men speak ill of me--and, I know it, my subjects hate
me! Yes, I believe that, woman though I am, they would murder me could
they find a means!"

She paused, covering her eyes with her hand, and it was well, for her
words pierced me so that I shrank upon the seat beside her.

"They think ill of me, I know it; and call me wanton, who have never
stepped aside save once, when I loved the greatest man of all the world,
and at the touch of love my passion flamed indeed, but burnt a hallowed
flame. These ribald Alexandrians swear that I poisoned Ptolemy, my
brother--whom the Roman Senate would, most unnaturally, have forced on
me, his sister, as a husband! But it is false: he sickened and died of
fever. And even so they say that I would slay Arsinoe, my sister--who,
indeed, would slay me!--but that, too, is false! Though she will have
none of me, I love my sister. Yes, they all think ill of me without a
cause; even thou dost think ill of me, Harmachis.

"O Harmachis, before thou judgest, remember what a thing is envy!--that
foul sickness of the mind which makes the jaundiced eye of pettiness
to see all things distraught--to read Evil written on the open face of
Good, and find impurity in the whitest virgin's soul! Think what a thing
it is, Harmachis, to be set on high above the gaping crowd of knaves who
hate thee for thy fortune and thy wit; who gnash their teeth and shoot
the arrows of their lies from the cover of their own obscureness, whence
they have no wings to soar; and whose hearts'