of the soul and of our lot in the next
world, we are glad to read through what the most estimable of human
thinkers has said concerning such things. Begin here, Zoe."

Cleopatra's companion, thus addressed, signed to the unoccupied
waiting-women to withdraw, seated herself on a low cushion opposite the
queen, and began to read with an intelligent and practised intonation;
the reading went on for some time uninterrupted by any sound but the
clink of metal ornaments, the rustle of rich stuffs, the trickle of oils
or perfumes as they were dropped into the crystal bowls, the short
and whispered questions of the women who were attiring the queen, or
Cleopatra's no less low and rapid answers.

All the waiting-women not immediately occupied about the queen's
person--perhaps twenty in all, young and old-ranged themselves along the
sides of the great tent, either standing or sitting on the ground or
on cushions, and awaiting the moment when it should be their turn to
perform some service, as motionless as though spellbound by the mystical
words of a magician. They only made signs to each other with their eyes
and fingers, for they knew that the queen did not choose to be disturbed
when she was being read to, and that she never hesitated to cast aside
anything or anybody that crossed her wishes or inclinations, like a
tight shoe or a broken lutestring.

Her features were irregular and sharp, her cheekbones too strongly
developed, and the lips, behind which her teeth gleamed pearly
white-though too widely set--were too full; still, so long as she
exerted her great powers of concentration, and listened with flashing
eyes, like those of a prophetess, and parted lips to the words of Plato,
her face had worn an indescribable glow of feeling, which seemed to have
come upon her from a higher and better world, and she had looked far
more beautiful than now when she was fully dressed, and when her women
crowded round leer--Zoe having laid aside the Plato--with loud and
unmeasured flattery.

Cleopatra delighted in being thus feted, and, in order to enjoy the
adulation of a throng, she would always when dressing have a great
number of women to attend her toilet; mirrors were held up to her on
every side, a fold set right, and the jewelled straps of her sandals
adjusted.

One praised the abundance of her hair, another the slenderness of her
form, the slimness of her ankles, and the smallness of her tiny
hands and feet. One maiden rema