symptom of death.-Perfumes had been liberally sprinkled upon the crisp auburn locks, censers were steaming with the smoke of musk and ambergris, and garlands of the freshest flowers were cast, like fragrant fetters, over the cold limbs of the sleeper. But what were all these to a single tear-drop from the mourner who sat beside his bed, gazing with a fixed and meaningless gaze, upon the features of him, whom she had loved so mightily, whom she had betrayed so madly? Her hair, the uncurled raven hair of Æthiopia,-fell to her very feet in strange profusion, not in the undulating flow of ringlets freed from restraint, but in straight shadowy masses, such as we have sometimes seen, and known not whether to praise or censure, in some sacred painting of the Italian school. Her lineaments, of the Coptic cast, chiselled in their flowing lines of blended majesty and softness, were such as men are constrained to admire, even despite their judgment,—but her form, her limbs, her swan-like neck, her swelling bust, the rounded outlines, the wavy motion, were of a loveliness which, while they baffled every attempt at description, explained at once and justified the passionate adoration of Julius, and the frantic devotion of the Triumvir. It was Cleopatra who sat there, mourning, in desolate and speechless wo, over the wreck of him whom she had loved alone! Strange as it may seem, she had loved him for himself,--for himself only. No delusion of vanity-no pride of boasting a second ruler of the universe her slave--had mingled with her deep disinterested passion. The conqueror had been merged in the man, the warrior in the lover. In peace or war, in triumph or defeat, absent or at her side, in the flush of health, or in the frail humility of sickness, he had been ever the chosen idol of her heart; and never perhaps had she loved him more entirely, or more fervently, than at the very moment of that desertion of his cause, in the hour of his utmost need, which had resulted in the downfall of his honor and of her happiness. Dark indeed, and incomprehensible, are the mysteries of a woman's heart,-impenetrable the motives, unfathomable the sources, of her hatred or affection-often most tender in the heart when coolest in appearance-most passionate when most unmoved-most faithful when most insincere. It might have been from mere womanish caprice; from a desire of probing the depth of her lover's feelings; from curiosity to learn and look upon the conduct of a baffled conqueror; or more likely yet from jealousy-jealousy that his love of honor and of empire should interfere with his devotion to her beauty,-that she had so fatally betrayed him. She might have overlooked, in the moment of action, the consequences of her flight,—she might have fancied the victory already gained, and her desertion a matter of no moment-a desertion that would wring the soul, without affecting the cause, of him whom she adored the most, when she most wantonly trifled with his tortured heart. She might have fancied that the defeat, if defeat should ensue, would not be irreparable; that the empire, lost to-day, might be regained to-morrow; that the proud Triumvir might be taught by this reverse, when the government of the universe should in after times be won by their united forces, to consider that universe as the gift of Cleopatra. It might have been one of these motives singly, it might have been all united-felt, perhaps, but not

comprehended even by herself--that had spurred her on, till escape was impossible, and hope desperate. Still it was love that caused her to betray him, as it was love that led her now to curse the day when she was born---born to be the fate of Antony. Her beautiful bosom was exposed to the light, which lingered, in a pensile of mellowed lustre, upon its soft yet sculptured loveliness,---the delicate veil of gauzy muslin which should have veiled those secret beauties, had been violently rent asunder, and hung in natural folds below her jewelled cincture; and on either voluptuous globe, that hardly heaved under the influence of the chill despair that had frozen up the very sources of her grief, there was a small gout of clotted gore, a speck, such as covers the orifice of the slightest punctured wound, but beyond these tiny witnesses, there was no stain upon her snowy kerchief, no trace of blood which had flowed freely, and been wiped away. Her hands were folded in her lap, the fingers unconsciously playing with a chain of mingled strands of golden thread and hair of a dark auburn hue. Her face was very pale, and cold, almost stern in its passionless rigidity-the eye was cast downwards, immoveably riveted upon the countenance of the mighty dead; but from the long dark lashes there hung no tear-all was composed, silent, self-restrained grief-an occasional shiver crept, as it were, electrically through her entire frame, and now and then her lips moved, as though she were communing with some viewless form, but beyond this there was no motion and no sound. At a distance from the miserable mistress sat a group of women attired, as has been said, most gorgeously, but their sad and clouded aspects offering a fearful contrast to their sumptuous garments; near them, and on a table of the richest porphyry, negligently strewn with instruments of music,-the Grecian lute, the wild Egyptian systrum, and the Italian pipe,-with jewelled tiaras, perfumes and cosmetics, and all the luxuries of a regal toilet, drinking cups of agate, and flasks of crystal, there stood a plain and country-looking basket, woven of the slender reeds that grow beside the lake of Moris, filled with the dark glossy leaves and purple fruits of the fig-tree. To a casual glance it might have seemed that there was nothing in the position or contents of that basket but the simple offering of some grateful rustic to the palate of his queen; but on a nearer view, there might be seen upon the foliage long slimy trails, twining hither and thither, as if left by the passage of some loathsome reptile. At times, too, there was a slight rustling sound, a motion of the leaves, not waving regularly as if shaken by the breeze, but heaving up at intervals from the life-like struggles of something lurking beneath;—and now a scaly back, -a small black head, with eyes glowing like sparks of fire, and an arrowy tongue quivering and darting about like a lambent flame-it was the deadly aspic of the Nile, the most fatal, the most desperately venomous of all the serpents of Africa. Deeply, fearfully skilled, in the dark secrets of poisoning and incantation, the wife and sister of the Ptolemies had chosen this abhorred mode of avenging the wrongs of Antony; of baffling the cool malignant hate of the little-minded man whom Rome's adulation had even then begun to style the AUGUST; of freeing herself from the chains, not emblematic, of Roman servitude; from the humiliation of being led along

in gilded fetters behind the chariot wheels of the perpetual consul; from the dungeon, the scaffold, and the axe, which closed alike the triumph of the victor, and the misery of the vanquished. Already had the news been conveyed to her-the stunning news that, save in name, she was no more a queen, but the rumor had fallen on a deaf or unregarding ear. An earthquake, it is written, shook the earth unnoticed by them who fought at Thrasymene—an empire crumbled into ruins, unmarked by her who had lost, who had destroyed, an Antony. After the first burst of agony was over-when the self-immolated victim was borne to her in place of the burning, feeling, living lover-she had caused those hated reptiles to be brought to the tomb, which she had entered, while yet alive, in the very recklessness of dissimulation and caprice; she had applied them to her delicate bosom, and a thrill of triumphant ecstasy had rushed through her frame, as she felt the keen pang of their venomed fangs piercing her flesh, and imbuing the very sources of life with the ingredients of death. And now she sat in patient expectation, brooding over the ruin she had wrought, calmly awaiting the agony that she well knew must convulse her limbs, and distort her features from their calm serenity; while her attendant maidens, with strange and unaccountable devotion, had needlessly and almost unmeaningly followed the example of her, whom they were determined to accompany faithfully, not merely to the portals of the tomb, but into the dark regions of futurity. Now, however, when the step was taken from which there is no returning, the courage, that had buoyed them up for a moment and impelled them to the fatal measure, had deserted them. In the aspect of each, remorse, and pain, and terror, were engraved in fearful variety. One gazed, with straining eyes, over the glowing landscape, gloriously bathed in the radiance of that setting luminary, which would arise, indeed, in renewed splendor, but not for her. She saw the distant hills on which she had sported in the uncontaminated freshness of her youth, ere she had been acquainted with the sin and sorrow of courts-the nearer palaces, in whose vaulted halls she had so often led the dance in happy, because thoughtless, merriment, and her whole spirit was absorbed in that long wistful view of scenes never to be viewed again. Another stood, as motionless as the marble column that supported her, staring upon her beloved mistress and the lifeless body; but it was evident that the images which were painted on her eye, were not reflected on her mind; at intervals a large bright tear stole slowly down her cheeks, and literally plashed on the mosaic pavement as it fell; a third, already sensible of the physical agonies that accompany the action of poison on the human system, rocked her body to and fro, every separate nerve writhing and quivering in the extremity of pain, yet still retained so much of consciousness and even of mastery over her tortures, as enabled her to repress all further symptoms of her approaching dissolution, than an occasional choking sob, a fearful and indefinite murmur between a hiccough and a groan. It was a scene of horribly exciting interest; a scene on which a spectator feels that it is agony to gaze, while he can not for invaluable treasures withdraw his gloating eye from the fearful spectacle;

a scene, from which, so strangely were terror and compassion mingled, and

interwoven with curiosity, no human being could turn away ere he had looked upon the end. The pale haughty features of the senseless clay that wielded and weaponed, but a few short hours ago, the energies of a gigantic soul, the deeply-seated despair of the silent mourner, still full of life and spirit,-the wretched girls, repenting of their rashness, yet repressing their own anguish, lest its expression should augment that of her, for whom they had cast life away, and for whom even now-while the love of earth was uppermost in all their feelings, they felt that they should but cast it away again, could it be again redeemed-the stillness of that gorgeous room,-the hateful reptiles crawling and hissing among the beautiful fruits,-the sunshine without, and the gloom within-all uniting to form a combination of incidents, as a painter would term them, that no painter's imagination, how vivid soever it might be, could have created. It was, however, a scene that was rapidly drawing to its conclusion; the girl, on whose frame the venom of the aspic had taken the strongest effect, had already sunk upon the floor, and it seemed by the long and gasping efforts with which she caught her breath, that her minutes were already numbered. Notwithstanding the miserable plight in which she rolled over and over in her great agony, so callous had the feelings of her companions been rendered by the immediate pressure of their own calamities, that,-tender and delicate beings as they were, with hearts ever melting at the slightest indication of sorrow,-each one retained her station, wholly absorbed by her own heavy thoughts, and careless of all besides.

It was at this crisis that a shrill and prolonged flourish of trumpets rose almost painfully upon the ear-it was a Roman trumpet. There was a pause, a brief but awful pause, such as is often felt between the first peal of a thunder storm and the bursting deluge of the shower.—Again it rang -nearer and nearer yet-and now beneath the very windows of the mausoleum.

As the first note sank into silence, the queen had arisen breathlessly to her feet; and there she stood motionless as a statue, her eyes still fixed upon the brow of Antony, but her lips slightly severed, her head and her whole frame expressing the earnestness, with which she listened for a repetition of the sounds-but, as the second flourish smote her ear, she threw her arm aloft in triumph; a flash of exultation kindled that glorious brow like a sunburst, and her eyes danced in their sockets with the highly-wrought ecstasy of the moment; but, while her brow and eyes were radiant with delight, the wide expansion of the nostril and the curl of the chiselled lip spoke volumes of defiance and contempt.

"It is too late!"-she cried in accents still clear and musical, though strained far above the natural pitch of her voice-"It is too late!-ye Roman robbers. He whom your sacrilegious trumpets would have but now aroused to vengeance,-from the lightning of whose eye ye would have fled, like howling wolves before the bolts of Jove-whose voice would have stunned you, like the thunders of the Omnipotent-the conqueror of the universe has sunk to sleep, nor can your senseless clamors wake him, to the annihilation of your audacious frenzy!"—

Even as she spoke, the rattle of the ladders, by which the cohorts of the victor were scaling the porticoes of that fortress tomb, the shouts of the rude veterans, and the clang of their brazen harness, were distinctly audible; and, ere her words were ended, the same wild sounds were heard echoing along the vaulted passages and spacious halls of the story next beneath. In another instant, their steps were heard mounting the long sloping passages, which in Egyptian architecture, affording access to the upper chambers, supplied the want of stairs. The door, formed like the walls of the apartment of polished alabaster, and invisible when closed, was violently forced, and a group of men, whose Italian complexions, and features, prominent and strongly-marked, denoted them to be the victors of the world, the iron men of Rome, stood on the threshold. All sheathed in complete armor, not decked, like that of the soft orientals, with golden sculptures or precious stones, but of brass so brightly polished that it reflected every object; perfect in the exactness with which it was adapted to their frames, in the facility of motion it left to all their limbs, and in its exquisite finish, with crested casques and crimson tunics, it would have been impossible to conceive more martial figures. Foremost of all, the laurelled conqueror of Actium entered the arena of his triumph; and, in truth, although he could not have sustained a moment's comparison with the superb person of his less fortunate rival, he looked at least, if he was not, the hero. No flush of exultation tinged his complexion, no insolence of victory sparkled in his eye; but not the less did exultation, insolence, and cruelty live within his breast, that he was sufficiently versed in dissimulation to conceal his odious character beneath a veil of stoical indifference and mock magnanimity.

"Hail, Emperor!" cried the dying sovereign, fronting him with a demeanor a thousand times more lofty than his own-" Hail, conqueror !"Her countenance alone would have expressed the scorn she felt, even had not her very tones been such, that the cold-blooded despot writhed beneath their lash.

"Comest thou hither, puissant lord, noble successor of the mighty Julius, -comest thou hither to violate the ashes of the dead, or to prove thy maiden valor on a weak woman?-MACTE TUA VIRTUTE! On-on in the path of glory!-Why, the dead Cæsar was to thee, a tyro to a Hercules! We are no Amazons to check thine impetuous valor!-Out with thy falchion, Cæsar-THE AUGUST!"-and she laughed in bitter scorn.

"Nay, by the faith of Jove, but we would have the lovely Cleopatra amongst our friends," replied the imperial dissembler; "thou art still free -still queen of Egypt!"

"By the great Gods, I am!-nor is it in the power of all Rome to make me other. Free was I born and royal-free will I die and royal! Cæsar, I scorn your mercies, as I defy your menaces!-My fathers left me a crown, and crowned will I go to my fathers. What-think you Cleopatra is a slave-a base and cringing slave-that she would reign by your permission, or live at your bidding? Go, trample on the abject necks of Romans-the Egyptian spits at your proud clemency. Why cling you not to your vaunting motto?-it was the wont of Rome