Lydia Farmer - The Girls' Book of Famous Queens

Once more Æneas met Queen Dido when he was permitted by the gods to descend into the land of shadows, where dwelt the shades of the dead.

When Æneas and the Sibyl, who conducted him thither, came to the river Styx, then was the Boatman Charon persuaded to ferry them over, for the Sibyl showed him the marvellous bough of gold, a gift intended for the Queen of Hades; and the huge, terrible watch-dog Cerberus, which guards the portals to the Land of Shadows, was tamed by eating of the cake the Sibyl gave, made of honey and poppy-seed, causing sleep.

Thus did they come within the Mourning Fields, where dwell the souls of those who have died of love. Among these shades was Dido, fresh from the wound wherewith she slew herself. And when Æneas saw her darkly through the shadows, he wept and cried: “O Dido! it was truth, then, that they told me, – that thou hadst slain thyself with the sword? Loath was I, O Queen, – I swear it, – to leave thy land. But the gods constrained me; nor did I think that thou wouldst take such sorrow from my departure. But stay! depart not; for never again may I speak to thee, but this time only.”

But Dido cast her eyes upon the ground, and her heart was hard against him, even as a rock. His tears and groans and sighs and friendly words moved not her spirit, nor could appease her wrath. Silent and scornful she departed to the grove that was hard by, where dwelt her first husband, Sichæus, who gave her love, even as he was loved by her.

Thus was the love of Dido, which Æneas had slighted, avenged. And herewith endeth the poet’s story of the famous Queen Dido, in which he telleth of her fame and beauty and unhappy love and direful death.

THE river shone like burnished silver, resplendent in the rays of the midday sun, as Osiris drove his shining chariot of day across high heaven’s arch. The city lay along its banks in calm repose and beauty. Its palaces and villas were shaded with palms and groves of olives and clusters of stately pomegranate-trees, while flowers and fountains adorned its many stately avenues.

In his costly palace the great Roman Triumvir gave public audience to some important tribunal of state.

But now, above the noise of city sounds, arose the strains of distant music. So faint and yet so sweet it was wafted on the air, that all who heard must needs, perforce, be led to seek its source, as though directed by some secret spell which could not be resisted. The notes seemed floating o’er the river’s shining waves; and all the people crowded on its banks, with wistful curiosity, striving to catch the first glimpse of the mysterious cause of such unwonted melody.

Then flashes, with sudden glory, before their eyes a wondrous sight, which holds them spellbound in o’erwhelming admiration. From round a curve in the undulating bank, glides swiftly before their vision a gorgeous barge, the poop of which was beaten gold. The silken sails were royal purple, embroidered with silver lotus-blossoms; and as they swelled in the light breeze, a fragrance floated from their perfumed folds so exquisitely delicious, that the winds seemed love-sick with their odorous sweetness. The silver oars, gleaming in the sunshine, kept stroke with tune of flutes and lyres and cymbals; and the limpid water, parted by their glistening blades, followed each stroke with amorous touch and sweet caressing, as though loath to break away in rainbow-tinted showers of shining drops.

But how describe the matchless vision of womanly and goddess-like perfection which entranced the eyes of all beholders, as the gorgeous barge drew nearer to the city, moving with stately gliding motion, harmonious with the ear-enchanting melodies played by seeming sirens, nymphs, and mermaids, on silver lutes and jewelled flutes and shining cymbals.

Under a pavilion of cloth of gold and priceless tissues, upon a couch, gorgeous with costliest draperies, in picturesque repose, yet studied attitude of queenliest grace and goddess-like abandon, appeared a form and face most radiantly fair and bountifully beautiful; though orientally voluptuous yet exquisitely attractive; seemingly divine, like some heavenly goddess; and yet, in truth, so like a human woman, with warm, soft flesh and tender eyes, and deep, rich heart’s blood thrilling through every vein, e’en to the end of her fair, tapering finger-tips. This radiant being was attired as Venus, Goddess of Beauty; and around her stood young pretty boys, decked out as Cupids, rosy-tinted, and with soft white wings expanded; and they gently fanned her glowing cheeks with feathers, odorous with most intoxicating perfumes; while lovely maidens, costumed as mermaids, plied the silver oars in unison with the notes struck from the lyres of gayly decorated nymphs; while charming muses and bewitching graces with rosy lips caressed the silver flutes, or clasped with jewelled fingers the golden cymbals.

It was indeed a vision of enchantment. Whence came these radiant beings? Had the great goddess, in truth, descended from high Olympus, attended by her heavenly train? or did fair Isis, the queen of Egypt, – worshipped both as deity and nature, – thus clothe herself with mortal likeness, and deign to become visible to mortal eyes?

Thus questioned the people, and pondered of the meaning of this o’erwhelming scene of gorgeous majesty and irresistible loveliness, according as their beliefs partook of Grecian mythology or Egyptian lore.

Such was the scene of Cleopatra’s sail in her magnificent barge, up the river Cydnus to the city of Tarsus. That we may understand more clearly the life of this famous queen, we must turn back the pages of Egyptian history. Nor can we stop there. To clearly define her origin, the fair land of Greece must also be visited; and the gorgeous pageants of Rome, at the time of her greatest glory, have a place in the story of this illustrious Queen of Egypt, Daughter of Greece, Magic Sorceress of the Nile.

Would that we could think of the fascinating Cleopatra only as this vision of perfect loveliness which she presents in this enchanting scene upon the river Cydnus; but there are dark and bloody deeds and savage barbarities and revolting vices, which loom up in the background of this fair picture, with huge and horrid forms, and make the telling of Cleopatra’s story, fascinating as it is in some respects, often an unpleasant recital of vice and crime, even though we endeavor to touch these dark shadows ever so lightly. For as we write of history, not of fiction, we cannot always avoid these hideous facts.

Why is Cleopatra so fair of skin, though an Egyptian by birth? Her attendant maidens on this fairy-like barge stand round her like dusky figures cut from bronze; but her fair face and limbs gleam with pale ivory-tints, and the sunshine even glimmers in her dark tresses, now coiled in the Grecian knot behind her shell-like ears.

Though Egypt was her birthplace, Grecian blood flows through her veins, and whitens her skin, and lightens the dusky shadows in her hair, and gives the brown shadings to her lustrous eyes; and Grecian culture gives her voice its oft-narrated magic charm of melting sweetness; and a spark of Grecian genius quickens her powers of mind, and gives her the enchanting fascination of brilliant wit, and a native aptitude of acquiring knowledge, and all the polite arts and sciences; and her Grecian free-born grace lends to her form its perfect pose of queenly stateliness, together with an irresistible charm in every easy motion of rounded limb, and unstudied naturalness of action. The agile litheness of the Greek is combined with the oriental voluptuous indolence of the Egyptian; which combination explains the otherwise unaccountable, weird, and subtle allurements of face and form which history, romance, and poetry have acceded to her. Shakespeare calls her “the serpent of old Nile,” “this great fairy,” “great Egypt”; and Horace gives to her the name of “fatal prodigy.” Leigh Hunt describes her as