Elated with success, and dazzled with the pomp and consequence of his exalted station, Antony sought for the gratification of his vanity from a variety of sources. At Athens he courted the society of the philosophers, and assisted at their conversations and debates. In Asia he travelled from one state to an other, receiving homage, exacting contributions, con ferring favours, and distributing crowns, with insolent and capricious liberality. To Sysenes he gave the kingdom of Cappadocia, in consequence of the beauty of his mother Glaphyra. He settled Herod in the kingdom of Judea, and on Cleopatra he showered down the greatest favours.
As this celebrated queen had given succours to the conspirators, Antony commanded her to clear herself in person from this imputation of infidelity. She ac cordingly resolved to appear before him at Tarsus in Cilicia, which was situated at the mouth of the river Cydnus. Cleopatra made the most magnificent pre parations for the visit. IIer galley, equipped with sails of purple, shone with burnished gold, and the silver ears which impelled it kept time to the soft music of flutes and cymbals. Cleopatra herself lay reclined on a couch, adorned with stars of gold, and decked with all the emblems of the queen of love.— Two boys, in the costume of Cupids, fanned her by turns, while the most beautiful women, in the charac ter of Nereids and Graces, were placed in groups around her. Perfumes were burnt on the banks of the river, while the galley descended the Cydnus, and ar rived, in the midst of thousands of spectators, in the palace of Antony. Charmed, as might have been an ticipated, with the loveliness of the Egyptian queen, Antony forgot to decide upon her cause, and neglect ing all his affairs, abandoned himself to the licentious ness of love, and soon afterwards followed her into Egy pt.
Octavianus having undertaken to conduct his vete ran soldiers into Italy, and to settle them in the lands which he had promised as a recompense for their ser vices, it was found upon their arrival that there was not a sufficient number of new grants, and that the old inhabitants must make room for the soldiers. Crowds of husbandmen and shepherds were thus driven from their habitations; and it was with difficulty that the immortal Virgil retained possession of his patrimonial farm.
The maritime sovereignty which Sextus Pompey exercised over the Mediterranean, had cut off the Ro mans from their usual supply of corn, and this general calamity was greatly increased by the insolence of the settled soldiers, and by the commencement of another civil war, which had been excited by the folly of Fulvia the wife of Antony. Jealous of Cleopatra,
she considered a quarrel with Octavianus as the most likely means to withdraw her husband from Egypt.— Her brother-in-law Lucius, who was the consul, aided her in this scheme, and insisted that Antony should have the same share as Octavianus in the distribution of the lands. Octavianus offered to refer this question to the decision of the army. But Lucius declining this arbitration, placed himself at the head of six legions, consisting chiefly of the ejected peasantry. Octavianus however hemmed him in between two armies, and forcing him to return to Perusia in Etru ria, he reduced him to such distress by famine, that he surrendered to the conqueror. Octavianus gener ously pardoned the aggressors, and returned to Rome in triumph.
Roused by the intelligence of his brother's defeat, Antony sailed in a considerable fleet from Alexandria to Tyre, and from thence to Cyprus and Rhodes. Leaving his wife Fulvia on her death-bed at Sicyon, he hastened to oppose Octavianus. The triumvirs met at Brundusium. A reconciliation took place, and was cemented by the marriage of Antony with Octavia, the sister of Octavianus. To the former was assigned the eastern division of the empire, and to the latter the west; while Lepidus was allowed the African provinces, and Sextus Pompey those Mediterranean islands which were already in his power.
Though the Roman people now expected a general tranquillity, yet the mutual jealousies of so many tyrants speedily involved the empire in fresh conten tions. Antony and Pompey having quarrelled respect ing the evacuation of the Peloponnesus, the latter re newed his piratical enterprises, and seized the corn which was consigned to Italy. _ Octavianus now saw the necessity of putting down the naval power of Pompey. 1Vith a fleet which he had built at Ravenna, and another which Menodor us, who had separated from Pompey, had brought to his assistance, he invaded Sicily, but receivinga check from Pompey, and being afterwards disabled by a storm, he was obliged to postpone his designs. Rein forced, however with one hundred and twenty ships from Antony, he again invaded Sicily, but being again shattered by a storm, he refitted his ships, and placed them under his friend Agrippa. Alter different battles Agrippa gave a final blow to the power of Pompey, who surrendered himself to Antony, by whom he was put to death.