Cleopatra - Jacob Abbott (top books of all time txt) 📗

and he wore his hair and beard very long -- as long, in fact, as he could make them grow. These peculiarities imparted to his countenance a very wild and ferocious expression. He adopted a style of dress, too, which, judged of with reference to the prevailing fashions of the time, gave to his whole appearance a rough, savage, and reckless air. His manner and demeanor corresponded with his dress and appearance. He lived in habits of the most unreserved familiarity with his soldiers. He associated freely with them, ate and drank with them in the open air, and joined in their noisy mirth and rude and boisterous hilarity. His commanding powers of mind, and the desperate recklessness of his courage, enabled him to do all this without danger. These qualities inspired in the minds of the soldiers a feeling of profound respect for their commander; and this good opinion he was enabled to retain, notwithstanding such habits of familiarity with his inferiors as would have been fatal to the influence of an ordinary man.

In the most prosperous portion of Antony's career -- for example, during the period immediately preceding the death of Caesar -- he addicted himself to vicious indulgences of the most open, public, and shameless character. He had around him a sort of court, formed of jesters, tumblers, mountebanks, play-actors, and other similar characters of the lowest and most disreputable class. Many of these companions were singing and dancing girls, very beautiful, and very highly accomplished in the arts of their respective professions, but all totally corrupt and depraved. Public sentiment, even in that age and nation, strongly condemned this conduct. The people were pagans, it is true, but it is a mistake to suppose that the formation of a moral sentiment in the community against such vices as these is a work which Christianity alone can perform. There is a law of nature, in the form of an instinct universal in the race, imperiously enjoining that the connection of the sexes shall consist of the union of one man with one woman, and that woman his wife, and very sternly prohibiting every other. So that there has probably never been a community in the world so corrupt, that a man could practice in it such vices as those of Antony, without not only violating his own sense of right and wrong, but also bringing upon himself the general condemnation of those around him.

Still, the world is prone to be very tolerant in respect to the vices of the great. Such exalted personages as Antony seem to be judged by a different standard from common men. Even in the countries where those who occupy high stations of trust or of power are actually selected, for the purpose of being placed there, by the voices of their fellow-men, all inquiry into the personal character of a candidate is often suppressed, such inquiry being condemned as wholly irrelevant and improper, and they who succeed in attaining to power enjoy immunities in their elevation which are denied to common men.

But, notwithstanding the influence of Antony's rank and power in shielding him from public censure, he carried his excesses to such an extreme that his conduct was very loudly and very generally condemned. He would spend all the night in carousals, and then, the next day, would appear in public, staggering in the streets. Sometimes he would enter the tribunals for the transaction of business when he was so intoxicated that it would be necessary for friends to come to his assistance to conduct him away. In some of his journeys in the neighborhood of Rome, he would take a troop of companions with him of the worst possible character, and travel with them openly and without shame. There was a certain actress, named Cytheride, whom he made his companion on one such occasion. She was borne upon a litter in his train, and he carried about with him a vast collection of gold and silver plate, and of splendid table furniture, together with an endless supply of luxurious articles of food and of wine, to provide for the entertainments and banquets which he was to celebrate with her on the journey. He would sometimes stop by the road side, pitch his tents, establish his kitchens, set his cooks at work to prepare a feast, spread his tables, and make a sumptuous banquet of the most costly, complete, and ceremonious character -- all to make men wonder at the abundance and perfection of the means of luxury which he could carry with him wherever he might go. In fact, he always seemed to feel a special pleasure in doing strange and extraordinary things in order to excite surprise. Once on a journey he had lions harnessed to his carts to draw his baggage, in order to create a sensation.

Notwithstanding the heedlessness with which Antony abandoned himself to these luxurious pleasures when at Rome, no man could endure exposure and hardship better when in camp or on the field. In fact, he rushed with as much headlong precipitation into difficulty and danger when abroad, as into expense and dissipation when at home. During his contests with Octavius and Lepidus, after Caesar's death, he once had occasion to pass the Alps, which, with his customary recklessness, he attempted to traverse without any proper supplies of stores or means of transportation. He was reduced, on the passage, together with the troops under his command, to the most extreme destitution and distress. They had to feed on roots and herbs, and finally on the bark of trees; and they barely preserved themselves, by these means, from actual starvation. Antony seemed, however, to care nothing for all this, but pressed on through the difficulty and danger, manifesting the same daring and determined unconcern to the end. In the same campaign he found himself at one time reduced to extreme destitution in respect to men. His troops had been gradually wasted away until his situation had become very desperate. He conceived, under these circumstances, the most extraordinary idea of going over alone to the camp of Lepidus and enticing away his rival's troops from under the very eyes of their commander. This bold design was successfully executed. Antony advanced alone, clothed in wretched garments, and with his matted hair and beard hanging about his breast and shoulders, up to Lepidus's lines. The men, who knew him well, received him with acclamations; and pitying the sad condition to which they saw that he was reduced, began to listen to what he had to say. Lepidus, who could not attack him, since he and Antony were not at that time in open hostility to each other, but were only rival commanders in the same army, ordered the trumpeters to sound in order to make a noise which should prevent the words of Antony from being heard. This interrupted the negotiation; but the men immediately disguised two of their number in female apparel, and sent them to Antony to make arrangements with him for putting themselves under his command, and offering, at the same time, to murder Lepidus, if he would but speak the word. Antony charged them to do Lepidus no injury. He, however, went over and took possession of the camp, and assumed the command of the army. He treated Lepidus himself, personally, with extreme politeness, and retained him as a subordinate under his command.

Not far from the time of Caesar's death, Antony was married. The name of the lady was Fulvia. She was a widow at the time of her marriage with Antony, and was a woman of very marked and decided character. She had led a wild and irregular life previous to that time, but she conceived a very strong attachment to her new husband and devoted herself to him from the time of her marriage with the most constant fidelity. She soon acquired a very great ascendency over him, and was the means of effecting a very considerable reform in his conduct and character. She was an ambitious and aspiring woman, and made many very efficient and successful efforts to promote the elevation and aggrandizement of her husband. She appeared, also, to take a great pride and pleasure in exercising over him, herself, a great personal control. She succeeded in these attempts in a manner that surprised every body. It seemed astonishing to all mankind that such a tiger as he had been could be subdued by any human power. Nor was it by gentleness and mildness that Fulvia gained such power over her husband. She was of a very stern and masculine character, and she seems to have mastered Antony by surpassing him in the use of his own weapons. In fact, instead of attempting to soothe and mollify him, she reduced him, it seems, to the necessity of resorting to various contrivances to soften and propitiate her. Once, for example, on his return from a campaign in which he had been exposed to great dangers, he disguised himself and came home at night in the garb of a courier bearing dispatches. He caused himself to be ushered, muffled and disguised as he was, into Fulvia's apartments, where he handed her some pretended letters, which, he said, were from her husband; and while Fulvia was opening them in great excitement and trepidation, he threw off his disguise, and revealed himself to her by clasping her in his arms and kissing her in the midst of her amazement.

Antony's marriage with Fulvia, besides being the means of reforming his morals in some degree, softened and civilized him in respect to his manners. His dress and appearance now assumed a different character. In fact, his political elevation after Caesar's death soon became very exalted, and the various democratic arts by which he had sought to raise himself to it, being now no longer necessary, were, as usual in such cases, gradually discarded. He lived in great style and splendor when at Rome, and when absent from home, on his military campaigns, he began to exhibit the same pomp and parade in his equipage and in his arrangements as were usual in the camps of other Roman generals.

After the battle of Philippi, described in the last chapter, Antony -- who, with all his faults, was sometimes a very generous foe -- as soon as the tidings of Brutus's death were brought to him, repaired immediately to the spot, and appeared to be quite shocked and concerned at the sight of the body. He took off his own military cloak or mantle -- which was a very magnificent and costly garment, being enriched with many expensive ornaments -- and spread it over the corpse. He then gave directions to one of the officers of his household to make arrangements for funeral ceremonies of a very imposing character, as a testimony of his respect for the memory of the deceased. In these ceremonies it was the duty of the officer to have burned the military cloak which Antony had appropriated to the purpose of a pall, with the body. He did not, however, do so. The cloak being very valuable, he reserved it; and he withheld, also, a considerable part of the money which had been given him for the expenses of the funeral. He supposed that Antony would probably not inquire very closely into the details of the arrangements made for the funeral of his most inveterate enemy. Antony, however, did inquire into them, and when he learned what the officer had done, he ordered him to be killed.

The various political changes which occurred, and the movements which took place among the several armies after the battle of Philippi, can not be here detailed. It is sufficient to say that Antony proceeded to the eastward through Asia Minor, and in the course of the following year came into Cilicia. From this place he