ied by absolute violence to bathe, or have his body anointed, he
used to trace geometrical figures in the ashes of the fire, and diagrams
in the oil on his body, being in a state of entire preoccupation, and,
in the truest sense, divinely possessed with his love and delight in
science. His discoveries were numerous and admirable; and he is said
to have requested his friends and relations that when he was dead, they
would place over his tomb a cylinder containing a sphere, inscribing it
with the ratio of three to two which the containing solid bears to the
contained.

DESCRIPTION OF CLEOPATRA FROM THE LIFE OF ANTONY

When Antony was making preparation for the Parthian war, he sent to
command Cleopatra to make her personal appearance in Cilicia, to answer
the accusation, that she had given great assistance, in the late wars,
to Cassius. Dellius, who was sent on this message, had no sooner seen
her face, and remarked her adroitness and subtlety in speech, than he
felt convinced that Antony would not so much as think of giving any
molestation to a woman like this; on the contrary, she would be the
first in favor with him. So he set himself at once to pay his court to
the Egyptia, and gave her his advice, "to go," in the Homeric style, to
Cilicia, "in her best attire," and bade her fear nothing from Antony,
the gentlest and the kindest of soldiers. She had some faith in the
words of Dellius, but more in her own attractions, which, having
formerly recommended her to Caesar and the young Gnaeus Pompey, she
did not doubt might prove yet more successful with Antony. Their
acquaintance was with her when a girl, young, and ignorant of the world,
but she was to meet Antony in the time of life when women's beauty is
most splendid, and their intellects are in full maturity, for she was
now about twenty-eight years of age. She made great preparation for her
journey, of money, gifts, and ornaments of value, such as so wealthy a
kingdom might afford, but she brought with her her surest hopes in her
own magic arts and charms.

She received several letters, both from Antony and from his friends, to
summon her, but she paid no attention to these orders; and at last, as
if in mockery of them, she came sailing up the river Cydnus, in a barge
with gilded stern and outspread sails of purple, while oars of silver
beat time to the music of flutes and fifes and harps. She herself lay
stretched along under a canopy of cloth of gold, dresse