596 WIVES OF THIS C.ESAHS. 



sanguinary vengeance ; yet, attentive to the object of supreme autho- 

 rity, his legions were rewarded with a liberal gratuity, and thus be- 

 came the willing instruments of his ulterior ambition. The servile 

 senate was profuse of homage and concession ; yet of all their tenders 

 to Octavius, he availed himself of two alone ; the privilege bestowed 

 on Livia and Octavia of disposing of their property by will, and of 

 that decree, by which their persons were assigned the same inviola- 

 ble honour as that conferred upon the tribunes of the people. Octa- 

 via had now obtained permission from her brother to depart for Greece 

 to join Mark Antony. When she arrived at Athens, this amiable and 

 lovely woman found letters from her husband, commanding her to 

 stay her progress ; on pretence of his immediate departure on his Par- 

 thian expedition. The generous Octavia both knew the cause and felt 

 the cruelty of Antony's abrupt injunction; and responded but by 

 asking how and where she should bestow the presents she had 

 brought him ; for she came provided with considerable sums, with 

 military stores, and a reinforcement of 2000 men in full equipment for 

 his cohort.* Cleopatra could appreciate the noble character and 

 beauty of Octavia, and dreaded their effect upon the fickle heart of 

 Antony. He was therefore watchfully beset by all the artful creatures 

 of her pleasures, who governed him alternately by pictures of her 

 tenderness and grief, of her abandonment and love. The enchanting 

 queen herself employed the most effectual wiles of womanhood for his 

 detention, and equally prevailed by her dissembled tears and rap- 

 turous caresses. On Octavia's return from Athens, the unfeeling inso- 

 lence of Antony Was canvassed and condemned. Caesar felt for the 

 dishonour of his sister; such at least was the pretence on which he 

 menaced Antony with his resentment. Octavia's elevated soul re- 

 garded but her husband's welfare and the peace of the republic ; she 

 conjured Octavius to behold her wrongs, as she endured them, with 

 the patient hope of Antony's reform ; but Caesar saw and seized the 

 crisis of his destiny. The despicable Lepidusf had sunk into obscu- 

 rity ; he had sought and gained the pardon of Octavius ; degraded 

 from political importance and shorn of his enormous wealth, he lan- 

 guished with the empty forms of the pontificate. Caesar had tried 

 the strength and popularity of Antony in Rome, by the discussions of 

 the senate, which professed the love and service of the former with 

 unqualified servility. The decisive fight at Actium shortly followed, 

 and Caes: r now was sovereign of the world. 



In the fight at Actium, Cleopatra has been charged with treachery 

 to Antony ; it is more apparent she was urged by momentary fear ; 

 but if her nature yielded to the terror of the conflict, she endeavoured 



* Plutarch, in Anton. 



t Appian records the scorn or clemency of Caesar, and the gross servility of 

 Lepidus, who approached Octavius, in an altered garb, and would have knelt 

 before him as a suppliant. But this humiliation Caesar spared him, though he 

 was dismissed to Rome in mean attire, divested of the powers of ' Imperator,' 

 and retaining but his station in the priesthood. " Mutatoque ad Caesarem ha- 

 bitu procurrit, caeteris veluti ad spectaculum quoddam insequeyitibus. Caesar 

 advenienti assurexit et ad gluna procumbere volentem prohibuit, verutn eo 

 habitu quo venerat indutum Romam misit, privatum imperatoris loco ; nee 

 aliud quam sacerdotii quod habuerat pontificem." BELL. Civilib. 1. 5. 



