The herald., 1894-07-15
fBY L. BEHYMER.

BY LIE BEN nlhh
CLEOPATRA, A Romance, by GEoRG EBE.s
Translated by Mary J. 5errano. Published
by d. Appleton 6 Co.. New York City
For sale by the stoll Thayer Co.
Not as the serpent of the Nile, nor as
the siren who held Caesar away from
Rome and duty; not as the unscrupu-
lous woman who poisoned the brother
that shared her throne and not as the
mistress of Antony, masquerading as
Isis, does Eoers picture to US Cleopatra,
that wonderful daughter of Ptolemies,
whose name is yet enough to stir the
brain and quicken the heart ofthe nine
teenth century historian.
She appears as the disciple OF the
Epicurean philosophy. the winning.
gentle girl, the ambitious but loving
woman, the tender, faithful mother and
as one who considered herself, by
Egypt's laws, to be Antony's wife and
Octavia the usurper of her husbands
heart and name. Marvellous must have
been the fascination OF this woman,
who, being after all these CENTRES dust
and aehee. vet can, even as a memory,
kindle an Egyptologst like Ebers, man
iOhd VI 0ANiuB ihbo hih'sJ ASboAN1 theS
enthusiastic admiration until the
woman whom history has condemned
stands justified in her glorious beauty
OF mind, heart and body.
To he sure, he passes lightly over the
liaison with Cesar, which kept the con.
queror OF the world at the feet of the
worlds sorceress and gave her a SON
CR3ariOn-the image Of his imperial
father. Rather does Eber strive to show
Antony as the one love OF the life OF this
passionate, impulsive woman, to whom
she WAS true and for hom she was will
ing to sacrifice Egypt rather than deliver
him into the hands OF his Roman kius-
man, Octavianus, the Cesar. To show
the beautiful. bewitching creature in all
the phases OF her enhancing woman
hood, the historian places her as the
center of group of friends, servants and
courtisrs, go that every light may be
thrown upon her many-sded character,
and that seeing her mother, wife, friend
and queen we fall, as we read. under the
glamor of her spell and own her charm
ourselves. Following Plutarch as the
most Just Of her historians, and Horace,
who in an ode dedicated to Octavlsnus,
called her "a woman capable of no base
ness," Ebers has for years eeached every
record that included anything which
could touch upon the personality OF the
queen, and says in his preface
"lf, during his creative work,
the author learned to love his
heroine, it was because, the more dis
tinctly he perceived how fully she mer-
tied not only sympathy and admiration,
but, in spita of her many sins and weak
nesses, the sslf-sacrifcng affection
which she inspired in 80 many hearts,"
AS examples of the lifelong devotion
which was rendered her by the many
who were brought within the radius OF
her magic fascination, the writer inter
weaves the life stories of CHAIRMAN
and Iras, the two waiting women who
gave up marriage and love for her
sake and who died with her rather
than live without her. Archibius. the
brother of CHAIRMAN, was yet another.
who, blest with her compan ionship as
young maiden, measured all other
women by Cleopatra's measure and
found none sweet or wise or worth
possessing for the comparison.
1t WAS in the house of Arehibius'
father that Cleopatra and her sister Ar.
since were placed by the exiled Ptolemy,
the flute. player, the unkinglv king, hut
the far-eighted father who saw in his
older daughter the promise OF the future
which was to make her famous among
all queens, either good or bad. 1t was
as pupil OF the father OF Archibius and
CHAIRMAN that the royal maiden, with
her remarkable intellect and the in
herited uncomfortable blood OF degen.
crate ancestors, first adopted that mia
understood motto of Epicurus-"here is
the chief good, pleasure" and it was
not until years of pleasure and pain bad
filled up the challce of life to the brim
that she learned also that Epicurus
defined true pleasure to be found only
''in peace of mind and absence OF pain"
Ambition ard longing for love DOM
mated the soul of the woman; for am
bition she gave herself to the all-con
quering Cesar; for love she gave herself
and Egypt to Ca,ar's friend. Mark An
tony. But as the mother of Antony's
children she seems different creature
altogether. No virtuous Roman matron.
no chaste Hellenic mother could display
more tenderness, more lofty ideals than
the Cleopatra who was Aphrodite, Isis
and every other goddess of love and
pleasure cont bined in the human guise
OF woman.
A nature OF strange contradictions,
riddle in female form, we see. her torn
by passionate jealousy because Antony
has given beautiful singer a. bracelet
and looked with favor upon her. Ready
to acduiesce in the plot OF the other
woman'5 enemies to send her to the
mines for life or to torture her to death,
the Nile queen seems tiend almost in
her hesrtiess. brainless rage. Again,
In her remorse and eslf-torture for leav
Ing her lover at Actium, we behold tie
loving, conscience stricken woman, and
in her terror lest the years leave marks
OF time upon her fair face there
shows forth the weakest attributes OF
beausy-vanity. Again we see her,
though scorned by Antony after Actium,
ready to make the fret advances toward
q reconciliation in order to arouse the
discouraged general and WOO him from
his walled-in hermitage to the fateful
issues of the times. There appeals the
spirit Of the wie-and what wife could
have done more than this untamed,
fiery daughter OF the Ptoemies did to
awaken the dormant warlike soul OF her
pleasure-loying, eulky lord?
But it was not as the siren, the queen
or the wife that Cleopatra made ready
Tor the final act of this great eastern
tragedy toward which which the eyes OF
Rome and Greece and civilized Africa had
long been turned. 1t was the woman of
matchleee intellect who had drnined