the lustre of the crown and the
elation of power, teach him to enjoy that other happiness, which--how
long ago it is!--your father unfolded to his mother."

Archibius kissed her robe, and Charmian her hands; but Cleopatra, drawing
a long breath, said: "The mother has already taken too much time from the
Queen. I have ordered the news of my arrival to be kept from Caesarion.
This was well. The most important matters will be settled before our
meeting. Everything relating to me and to the state must be decided
within an hour. But, first, I am something more than mother and Queen.
The woman also asserts her claim. I will find time for you, my friend,
to-morrow!-To my chamber first, Charmian. But you need rest still more
than I. Go with your brother. Send Iras to me. She will be glad to use
her skilful fingers again in her mistress's service."

CHAPTER XI.

The Queen had left her bath. Iras had arranged the still abundant waves
of her hair, now dark-brown in hue, and robed her magnificently to
receive the dignitaries whom, spite of the late hour of the night, she
expected.

How wonderfully she had retained her beauty! It seemed as if Time had not
ventured to touch this masterpiece of feminine loveliness; yet the
Greek's keen eye detected here and there some token of the vanishing
spell of youth. She loved her mistress, yet her inmost soul rejoiced
whenever she detected in her the same changes which began to appear in
herself, the woman of seven-and-twenty, so many years her sovereign's
junior. She would gladly have given Cleopatra everything at her command,
yet she felt as if she must praise Nature for an act of justice, when she
perceived that even her royal favourite was not wholly relieved from the
law which applied to all.

"Cease your flattery," said Cleopatra, smiling mournfully. "They say that
the works of the Pharaohs here on the Nile flout Time. The inexorable
destroyer is less willing to permit this from the Queen of Egypt. These
are grey hairs, and they came from this head, however eagerly you may
deny it. Whose save my own are these lines around the corners of the eyes
and on the brow? What say you to the tooth which my lips do not hide so
kindly as you assert? It was injured the night before the luckless
battle. My dear, faithful, skilful Olympus, the prince of leeches, is the
only one who can conceal such things. But it would not do to take the old
man to the war, and Glaucus is far less adroit. How