their mother, and finally drowned her, in order to remove her out of
their way. Lysimachus, though he might justly have considered himself
as in some sense the cause of this catastrophe, since, by deserting
his wife and withdrawing his protection from her, he compelled her to
return to Sicily and put herself in the power of her unnatural sons,
was still very indignant at the event, and, fitting out an expedition,
he went to Sicily, captured the city, took the sons of Amastris
prisoners, and put them to death without mercy, in retribution for
their atrocious crime.

[Footnote M: See map.]

At the time when Lysimachus put away his wife, Amastris, he married
Arsinoe, an Egyptian princess, the daughter, in fact, of Ptolemy, the
son of Lagus, who was at this time the king of Egypt. How far
Lysimachus was governed, in his repudiation of Amastris, by the
influence of Arsinoe's personal attractions in winning his heart away
from his fidelity to his legitimate wife, and how far, on the other
hand, he was alienated from her by her own misconduct or the violence
of her temper, is not now known. At any rate, the Sicilian wife, as
has been stated, was dismissed and sent home, and the Egyptian
princess came into her place.

The small degree of domestic peace and comfort which Lysimachus had
hitherto enjoyed was far from being improved by this change. The
family of Ptolemy was distracted by a deadly feud, and, by means of
the marriage of Arsinoe with Lysimachus, and of another marriage which
subsequently occurred, and which will be spoken of presently, the
quarrel was transferred, in all its bitterness, to the family of
Lysimachus, where it produced the most dreadful results.

The origin of the quarrel in the household of Ptolemy was this:
Ptolemy married, for his first wife, Eurydice, the daughter of
Antipater. When Eurydice, at the time of her marriage, went with her
husband into Egypt, she was accompanied by her cousin Berenice, a
young and beautiful widow, whom she invited to go with her as her
companion and friend. A great change, however, soon took place in the
relations which they sustained to each other. From being very
affectionate and confidential friends, they became, as often happens
in similar cases, on far less conspicuous theatres of action, rivals
and enemies. Berenice gained the affections of Ptolemy, and at length
he married her. Arsinoe, whom Lysimachus married, was the daughter of
Ptolemy and Berenice. They