queror of the gratification which he had proposed to himself in dragging along the great enchantress in his triumphal procession. She had learnedly studied the nature of various poisons, in order to ascertain which produced the easiest death. "The true euthanasia,' says Merivale," she discovered, it is said, in the bite of the asp, which suffused the brain with languor and forgetfulness, and extinguished the faculties without any sense of suffering."

دو

The bite of the asp of Egypt, according to the ancients, is followed by a desire of sleep, and a death without pain. An asp was brought into the queen's apartment, concealed in a basket of figs. The sight of her deliverer filled her with joy. Cleopatra died in a manner characteristic of her elegant tastes; and the Roman writers, hired to load her memory with execration, are unable to speak of her last moments without admiration. She adorned herself in her richest robes, and had the dead body of Antony placed beside her on a golden couch. She anointed herself with perfumes, while her maids placed the royal diadem of

Egypt on her head. She then applied the asp to her veins, and slept into death.

The anointing of the body with perfumes was an ancient mode of preparing for death. Frenshemius, in a note on the passage in Florus, in which the historian notices the death of Cleopatra, remarks that the practice is not condemned by our Saviour. The reference of the commentator is to that pathetic and beautiful passage in the Gospel where, when the disciples murmured against the woman who poured the alabaster-box of precious ointment on his head, our Lord says, "Why trouble ye the woman? for she hath wrought a good work upon me. For in that she hath poured this ointment on my head, she did it for my burial. Verily I say unto you, wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this which this woman hath done be told for a memorial of her."

The scene after Cleopatra's death is described by Plutarch with great picturesque beauty. When the officers of Augustus burst into the apartment, Cleopatra was dead, and

her maid Iras had also expired at her feet. Charmion, the other maid, half-fainting, was placing the diadem aright on the queen's brow. "Was this well done ?" said one of the officers. "Perfectly well," said Charmion ;" and worthy the daughter of the King of Egypt,” and Charmion then fell down dead.

There were no discolorations or spots, the usual indications of poison, to be found on the body of Cleopatra. The marks of two small punctures were, it is said, discovered on her arm; and Octavius employed the Egyptian serpent-charmers in the vain attempt to bring her to life again.

In the triumphal procession of the conqueror, the image of Cleopatra had two serpents twined about the arms: A golden statue of her was placed in the temple of Venus, round the walls of which several ornaments, which belonged to her, were suspended.

Mrs. Jameson, in describing the Cleopatra of Shakespere, has described the real Cleopatra. "Her mental accomplishments, her unequalled graces, her woman's wit and woman's wiles, her

irresistible allurements, her starts of irregular grandeur, her bursts of ungovernable temper, her vivacity of imagination, her petulant caprice, her fickleness and her falsehood, her tenderness and her truth, her childish susceptibility to flattery, her magnificent spirit, her royal pride, the gorgeous Eastern colouring of her character; all these contradictory elements has Shakespere seized, mingled them in their extremes, and fused them into one brilliant impersonation of classical elegance, oriental voluptuousness, and gipsey sorcery."*

* "Characteristics of Women," vol. 11, p. 123.

JULIUS CÆSAR.

WE have, fortunately, a complete-enough portrait of Julius Cæsar, and we know a good deal, though not nearly so much as it would be desirable that we knew, of his habits and mode of life. He was a tall, slender, well-made man, with a long pale face; his brow was high but not broad; he had dark sparkling eyes, and his mouth was rather large. "A slight puffing of the under lip," says Merivale, "which may be traced in some of his best busts, must undoubtedly have detracted from the admirable contour of his countenance." Yet he was still reckoned handsome, and in his moments of