kely to arouse his pity, and so came secretly by night
to visit him."

If she indeed arrived secretly and was carried into the palace by one
faithful follower as a bale of carpet, it was from fear of assassination
by the party of Pothinos. She knew that as soon as she had reached
Caesar's sentries she was safe; as the event proved, she was more than
safe, for in the brief interval of peace, and perhaps even of apparent
jollity, while the royal dispute was under discussion, she gained an
influence over Caesar which she retained till his death. Caesar
adjudicated the throne according to the will of Auletes; he even
restored Cyprus to Egypt, and proposed to send the younger brother and
his sister Arsinoe to govern it; but he also insisted on a repayment, in
part at least, of the enormous outstanding debt of Auletes to him and
his party.

A few months after Caesar's departure from Egypt Cleopatra gave birth to
a son, whom she alleged, without any immediate contradiction, to be the
dictator's. The Alexandrians called him Caesarion, and she never swerved
from asserting for him royal privileges. We hear of no other lover,
though it is impossible to imagine Cleopatra arriving at the age of
twenty without providing herself with this luxury. She was, however,
afraid to let Caesar live far from her influence, and some time before
his assassination--that is to say, some time between B.C. 48 and 44--she
came with the young King her brother to Rome, where she was received in
Caesar's palace beyond the Tiber, causing by her residence there
considerable scandal among the stricter Romans. Cicero confesses that he
went to see her, but protests that his reasons for doing so were
absolutely nonpolitical. Cicero found her haughty; he does not say she
was beautiful and fascinating. We do not hear of any political activity
on her part, though Cicero evidently suspects it; it is well-nigh
impossible that she can have preferred her very doubtful position at
Rome to her brilliant life in the East. She was suspected of urging
Caesar to move eastward the capital of his new empire, to desert Rome,
and choose either Ilium, the imaginary cradle of his race, or
Alexandria, as his residence. She is likely to have encouraged at all
events his expedition against the Parthians, which would bring him to
Syria, whence she hoped to gain new territory for her son. The whole
situation is eloquently, perhaps too eloquently, described by Merivale,
for he weave