soul in peerless bliss.

So, with a hasty movement, he took one step towards her couch, resolved
to grasp her hands and raise them to his lips. His ardent gaze answered
hers; but surprised by the power which, though so heavily burdened with
physical and mental suffering, she still possessed over the strongest and
coldest of men, she perceived what was passing in his soul, and a smile
of triumph, blended with the most bitter contempt, hovered around her
beautiful lips. Should she dupe him into granting her wishes by feigning
love for the first time? Should she yield to the man who had insulted
her, in order to induce him to accord the children their rights? Should
she, to gratify her lover's foe, relinquish the sacred grief which was
drawing her after him, give posterity and her children the right to call
her, instead of the most loyal of the loyal, a dishonoured woman, who
sold herself for power?

To all these questions came a prompt denial. The single stride which
Octavianus had made towards her, his eyes aflame with love, gave her the
right to feel that she had vanquished the victor, and the proud delight
of triumph was too plainly reflected in her mobile features to escape the
penetrating, distrustful gaze of the subjugated Caesar.

But he had scarcely perceived what threatened him, and remembered her
words concerning his famous uncle's surrender only to her and to death,
when he succeeded in conquering his quickly kindled senses. Blushing at
his own weakness, he averted his eyes from the Queen, and when he met
those of Proculejus and the other witnesses of the scene, he realized the
abyss on whose verge he stood. He had half succumbed to the danger of
losing, by a moment's weakness, the fruit of great sacrifices and severe
exertions.

His expressive eyes, which had just rested rapturously upon a beautiful
woman, now scanned the spectators with the stern glance of a monarch and,
apparently wishing to moderate an excess of flattering recognition which
might be misinterpreted, he said in an almost pedagogical tone:

"Yet we would rather see the noble lioness in the majestic repose which
best suits all sovereigns. It is difficult for a calm, deliberate nature
like mine to understand an ardent, quickly kindling heart."

Cleopatra had watched this sudden transition with more surprise than
disappointment. Octavianus had half surrendered to her, but recovered his
self-command in time, and a man of his temperament does