When it was unrolled, and Cleopatra came out to view, Caesar was perfectly charmed with the spectacle.  In fact, the various conflicting emotions which she could not but feel under such circumstances as these, imparted a double interest to her beautiful and expressive face, and to her naturally bewitching manners.  She was excited by the adventure through which she had passed, and yet pleased with her narrow escape from its dangers.  The curiosity and interest which she felt on the one hand, in respect to the great personage into whose presence she had been thus strangely ushered, was very strong; but then, on the other hand, it was chastened and subdued by that feeling of timidity which, in new and unexpected situations like these, and under a consciousness of being the object of eager observation to the other sex, is inseparable from the nature of woman.

The conversation which Caesar held with Cleopatra deepened the impression which her first appearance had made upon him.  Her intelligence and animation, the originality of her ideas, and the point and pertinency of her mode of expressing them, made her, independently of her personal charms, an exceedingly entertaining and agreeable companion.  She, in fact, completely won the great conqueror’s heart; and, through the strong attachment to her which he immediately formed, he became wholly disqualified to act impartially between her and her brother in regard to their respective rights to the crown.  We call Ptolemy Cleopatra’s brother; for, though he was also, in fact, her husband, still, as he was only ten or twelve years of age at the time of Cleopatra’s expulsion from Alexandria, the marriage had been probably regarded, thus far, only as a mere matter of form.  Caesar was now about fifty-two.  He had a wife, named Calpurnia, to whom he had been married about ten years.  She was living, at this time in an unostentatious and quiet manner at Rome.  She was a lady of an amiable and gentle character, devotedly attached to her husband, patient and forbearing in respect to his faults, and often anxious and unhappy at the thought of the difficulties and dangers in which his ardent and unbounded ambition so often involved him.

Caesar immediately began to take a very strong interest in Cleopatra’s cause.  He treated her personally with the fondest attention, and it was impossible for her not to reciprocate in some degree the kind feeling with which he regarded her.  It was, in fact, something altogether new to her to have a warm and devoted friend, espousing her cause, tendering her protection, and seeking in every way to promote her happiness.  Her father had all his life neglected her.  Her brother, of years and understanding totally inferior to hers, whom she had been compelled to make her husband, had become her mortal enemy.  It is true that, in depriving her of her inheritance and expelling her from her native land, he had been only the tool and instrument of more designing men.