ds to Cleopatra, and she straining every nerve and
every feature of her face with the effort she was making. He was at last
lifted in at the window, but died soon afterwards. By this time the city
was in the power of Octavianus; he had not found it necessary to storm
the walls, for Antony's troops had all joined him, and he sent in Gallus
to endeavour to take Cleopatra alive. This he succeeded in doing by
drawing her into conversation at the door of her monument, while three
men scaled the window and snatched out of her hand the dagger with which
she would have stabbed herself.

Octavianus, henceforth called Augustus, began by promising his soldiers
two hundred and fifty drachmas each as prize money, for not being
allowed to plunder Alexandria. He soon afterwards entered the city, not
on horseback armed at the head of his victorious legions, but on foot,
leaning on the arm of the philosopher Arius; and, as he wished to be
thought as great a lover of learning as of mercy, he gave out that he
spared the place to the prayers of his Alexandrian friend. He called the
Greek citizens together in the gymnasium, and, mounting the tribunal,
promised that they should not be hurt. Cleopatra's three children by
Antony, who had not the misfortune to be of the same blood with the
conqueror, were kindly treated and taken care of; while Caesarion, her
son by Julius Caesar, who was betrayed by his tutor Rhodon while flying
towards Ethiopia, was put to death as a rival. The flatterers of the
conqueror would of course say that Caesarion was not the son of
Julius, but of Ptolemy, the elder of the two boys who had been called
Cleopatra's husbands. The feelings of humanity might have answered
that, if he was not the only son of the uncle to whom Octavianus owed
everything, he was at least helpless and friendless, and that he never
could trouble the undisputed master of the world; but Augustus, with
the heartless cruelty which murdered Cicero, and the cold caution which
marked his character through life, listening to the remark of Arius,
that there ought not to be two Caesars, had him at once put to death.

Augustus gave orders that Cleopatra should be carefully guarded lest she
should put an end to her own life; he wished to carry her with him to
Rome as the ornament of his triumph. He paid her a visit of condolence
and consolation. He promised her she should receive honourable
treatment. He allowed her to bury Antony. He threatened that her