ittle
Ptolemy a long cloak and slippers, with a bonnet encircled by a diadem,
like the successors of Alexander. Antony himself wore an Eastern
scimetar by his side, and a royal diadem round Ins head, as being not
less a sovereign than Cleopatra. To Cleopatra he then gave the whole of
his Parthian booty, and his prisoner Tigranes.

[Illustration: 346.jpg COIN OF CLEOPATRA AND ANTHONY]

But notwithstanding Antony's love for Cleopatra, her falsehood and
cruelty were such that when his power in Rome fell he could no longer
trust her. He even feared that she might have him poisoned, and would
not eat or drink in her palace without having the food first tasted
herself. But she had no such thoughts, and only laughed at him for his
distrust. One day to prove her power, and at the same time her good
faith, she had the flowers with which he was to be crowned, as he
reclined at her dinner-table, dipped in deadly poison. Antony dined with
these round his head, while she wore a crown of fresh flowers. During
the dinner Cleopatra playfully took off her garland and dipped it in
her cup to flavour the wine, and Antony did the same with his poisoned
flowers, steeping them in his own cup of wine. He even raised it to his
lips to drink, when she hastily caught hold of his hand. "Now," said
she, "I am the enemy against whom you have latterly been so careful. If
I could have endured to live without you, that draught would have given
me the opportunity." She then ordered the wine to be taken to one of
the condemned criminals, and sent Antony out to see that the man died on
drinking it.

On the early coins of Cleopatra we see her head on the one side and
the eagle or the cornucopia on the other side, with the name of "_Queen
Cleopatra_." After she had borne Antony children, we find the words
round their heads, "_Of Antony, on the conquest of Armenia;" "Of
Cleopatra the queen, and of the kings the children of kings_." On the
later coins we find the head of Antony joined with hers, as king and
queen, and he is styled "_the emperor_" and she "_the young goddess_."
Cleopatra was perhaps the last Greek sovereign that bore the title of
god. Nor did it seem unsuitable to her, so common had the Greeks of Asia
and Egypt made that epithet, by giving it to their kings, and even to
their kings' families and favourites. But the use of the word made no
change in their religious opinions; they never for a moment supposed
that the persons whom they so sty