Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/216

 208 ANTONY. Roman people in a civil war, the one out of passion for, the other out of resentment about, a woman. And her behavior proved her words to be sincere. She remained in Antony's house as if he were at home in it, and took the noblest and most generous care, not only of his chil- dren by her, but of those by Fulvia also. She received all the friends of Antony that came to Rome to seek office or upon any business, and did her utmost to prefer their requests to Caesar; yet this her honorable deport- ment did but, without her meaning it, damage the repu- tation of Antony ; the wrong he did to such a woman made him hated. Nor was the division he made among his sons at Alexandria less unpopular ; it seemed a the- atrical piece of insolence and contempt of his country. For, assembling the 23eople in the exercise grovmd, and causing two golden thrones to be placed on a platform of silver, the one for him and the other for Cleopatra, and at their feet lower thrones for their children, he proclaimed Cleopatra queen of Egypt, Cyprus, Libya, and Coele- Syria, and with her conjointly Csesarion, the reputed son of the former Caesar, who left Cleopatra with child. His own sons by Cleopatra were to have the style of kings of kings ; to Alexander he gave Armenia and Media, with Parthia, so soon as it should be overcome ; to Ptolemy, Phoenicia, Syria, and Cilicia. Alexander was brought out before the people in the Median costume, the tiara and upright peak, and Ptolemy, in boots and mantle and Macedonian cap done about with the diadem ; for this was the habit of the successors of Alexander, as the other was of the Medes and Armenians. And, as soon as they had saluted their parents, the one was received by a guard of Macedonians, the other by one of Armenians. Cleo- patra was then, as at other times when she appeared in public, dressed in the habit of the goddess Isis, and gave audience to the people under the name of the New Isis.