Here Gabinius, when on his way to Syria, met him, and invited him to join his army rather than to remain where he was in idleness and destitution.  Antony, who was as proud and lofty in spirit as he was degraded in morals and condition, refused to do this unless Gabinius would give him a command.  Gabinius saw in the daring and reckless energy which Antony manifested the indications of the class of qualities which in those days made a successful soldier, and acceded to his terms.  He gave him the command of his cavalry.  Antony distinguished himself in the Syrian campaigns that followed, and was now full of eagerness to engage in this Egyptian enterprise.  In fact, it was mainly his zeal and enthusiasm to embark in the undertaking which was the means of deciding Gabinius to consent to Ptolemy’s proposals.

The danger and difficulty which they considered as most to be apprehended in the whole expedition was the getting across the desert to Pelusium.  In fact, the great protection of Egypt had always been her isolation.  The trackless and desolate sands, being wholly destitute of water, and utterly void, could be traversed, even by a caravan of peaceful travelers, only with great difficulty and danger.  For an army to attempt to cross them, exposed, as the troops would necessarily be, to the assaults of enemies who might advance to meet them on the way, and sure of encountering a terrible opposition from fresh and vigorous bands when they should arrive—­wayworn and exhausted by the physical hardships of the way—­at the borders of the inhabited country, was a desperate undertaking.  Many instances occurred in ancient times in which vast bodies of troops, in attempting marches over the deserts by which Egypt was surrounded, were wholly destroyed by famine or thirst, or overwhelmed by storms of sand.

These difficulties and dangers, however, did not at all intimidate Mark Antony.  The anticipation, in fact, of the glory of surmounting them was one of the main inducements which led him to embark in the enterprise.  The perils of the desert constituted one of the charms which made the expedition so attractive.  He placed himself, therefore, at the head of his troop of cavalry, and set off across the sands in advance of Gabinius, to take Pelusium, in order thus to open a way for the main body of the army into Egypt.  Ptolemy accompanied Antony.  Gabinius was to follow.

With all his faults, to call them by no severer name, Mark Antony possessed certain great excellences of character.  He was ardent, but then he was cool, collected, and sagacious; and there was a certain frank and manly generosity continually evincing itself in his conduct and character which made him a great favorite among his men.  He was at this time about twenty-eight years old, of a tall and manly form, and of an expressive and intellectual cast of countenance.  His forehead was high, his nose aquiline, and his eyes full of vivacity and life.  He was accustomed