Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/192

 184 ANTONY. agreement was made, that every one in their turn, as they thought fit, should make their friends consuls, when they did not choose to take the offices themselves. These terms were well approved of, but yet it was tliought some closer tie would be desirable ; and for this, fortune offered occasion. Cgesar had an elder sister, not of the whole blood, for Attia was his mother's name, hers Ancharia. This sister, Octavia,he was extremely attached to, as, indeed, she was, it is said, quite a wonder of a woman. Her husband, Caius Marcellus, had died not long before, and Antony was now a widower by the death of Fulvia; for, though he did not disavow the passion he had for Cleopatra, yet he disowned any thing of marriage, reason, as yet, upon this point, stiU maintaining the debate against the charms of the Egyptian. Everybody con- curred in promoting this new alliance, fully expecting that with the beauty, honor, and prudence of Octavia, when her company should, as it was certain it would, have engaged his affections, all would be kept in the safe and happy course of friendship. So, both parties being agreed, they went to Rome to celebrate the nuptials, the senate dispensing with the law by which a widow was not per- mitted to marry tiU ten months after the death of her husband. Sextus Pompeius was in possession of Sicily, and with his ships, under the command of Menas, the pirate, and Mene- crates, so infested the Italian coast, that no vessels durst venture into those seas. Sextus had behaved with much humanity towards Antony, having received his mother when she fled with Fulvia, and it was therefore judged fit that he also should be received into the peace. They met near the promontory of Misenum, by the mole of the port, Pompey having his fleet at anchor close by, and Antony and Caesar their troops drawn up all along the sliore. There it was concluded that Sextus should quietly