s with what other men call fear I should have ample
reason to be afraid; for in the quail-fight we have gone in for I have
wagered a crown-aye, and more than that even. To-morrow only will decide
whether the game is lost or won, but I know already to-day that I would
rather see my enterprise against Philometor fail, with all my hopes of
the double crown, than our plot against the life of the Roman; for I
was a man before I was a king, and a man I should remain, if my throne,
which now indeed stands on only two legs, were to crash under my weight.

"My sovereign dignity is but a robe, though the costliest, to be sure,
of all garments. If forgiveness were any part of my nature I might
easily forgive the man who should soil or injure that--but he who comes
too near to Euergetes the man, who dares to touch this body, and the
spirit it contains, or to cross it in its desires and purposes--him I
will crush unhesitatingly to the earth, I will see him torn in pieces.
Sentence is passed on the Roman, and if your ruffians do their duty, and
if the gods accept the holocaust that I had slain before them at sunset
for the success of my project, in a couple of hours Publius Cornelius
Scipio will have bled to death.

"He is in a position to laugh at me--as a man--but I therefore--as a
man--have the right, and--as a king--have the power, to make sure that
that laugh shall be his last. If I could murder Rome as I can him how
glad should I be! for Rome alone hinders me from being the greatest of
all the great kings of our time; and yet I shall rejoice to-morrow when
they tell me Publius Cornelius Scipio has been torn by wild beasts, and
his body is so mutilated that his own mother could not recognize it more
than if a messenger were to bring me the news that Carthage had broken
the power of Rome."

Euergetes had spoken the last words in a voice that sounded like the
roll of thunder as it growls in a rapidly approaching storm, louder,
deeper, and more furious each instant. When at last he was silent
Eulaeus said: "The immortals, my lord, will not deny you this happiness.
The brave fellows whom you condescended to see and to talk to strike as
certainly as the bolt of our father Zeus, and as we have learned from
the Roman's horse-keeper where he has hidden Irene, she will no more
elude your grasp than the crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt.--Now, allow
me to put on your mantle, and then to call the body-guard that they may
escort you as you