The Historians' History of the World 05

Chivalrous as he was, he was ready to credit others with a similar disposition; and his confidence was seldom misplaced. At the head of five ships he defied the warnings of those about him and sailed against the whole fleet of Domitius Ahenobarbus with chivalrous recklessness; he accepted an invitation from Sextus Pompeius the admiral to eat with him on board his vessel; a word would have sufficed to effect his imprisonment or his murder; but this word was never spoken, for his unquestioning reliance on the pledged honour of his foe had disarmed that foe. Where he was deceived, however, as for example later on by that same Domitius Ahenobarbus who went over to the enemy before the battle of Actium, Antony had enough generosity of mind to send over to him into the enemy’s camp his possessions and his slaves. To Sextus Pompeius later on he showed admirable forbearance in Asia Minor and shrank as long as it was possible from believing in the treachery of a man who had stood by his side first as ally and then as supplicant for protection. Even when fate was against him, he assumed the same chivalrous spirit in his foe that he himself would have manifested had the circumstances been reversed. So for instance after the battle of Actium he challenged Cæsar to personal combat although the acceptance of the challenge by his opponent, who was everything rather than chivalrous, was on the face of it very improbable.

As the knight for his lady so Antony in an official despatch declared his constant readiness to die for Cleopatra, and on receiving news of her death he said again that now his last reason for living had fallen away. Even in death he was consoled with the thought that it was as a Roman of Romans that he had been subdued.

In conclusion “chivalrous” is the term that I would apply to that exaggerated sensibility of honour which could not reconcile itself to giving the command for an absolutely indispensable retreat after the Median campaign and so charged a field officer under him with the burden of issuing that command.

To talk of the personal bravery of Antony, which his foes too recognised, were superfluous; like his Herculean frame, it was part of his birthright, not a thing acquired with years through the steady energy of his will. He was equally at home with his men whether on the field of battle or in the young men’s wrestling ring. He was most in his element however at the head of his trusty horsemen, when after a mad ride he could flash unexpected upon the enemy like lightning, reduce them to nothing or take them captive. As an instance of this, take the brilliant cavalry engagement with Servilius in lower Italy and the last victory he won over Cæsar’s horsemen at the hippodrome before Alexandria. His pride was then at the height of its ascension when he could come before Cleopatra as the knight before his lady to demand as the reward of victory, a kiss for himself, for the bravest of his horsemen a golden suit of armour.

Perhaps the foreign trait of faithlessness in him was just a symptom of that sultanic nature which very quickly developed itself in Antony as in many other Romans who ruled the East. Bountiful he had always been even before he possessed anything to give away, but in the East this bounty soon acquired a far more splendid play. In public he felt himself king of kings, bestowing on Monæses the Parthian refugee as the king of the Persians once bestowed on Themistocles, three towns, constantly making a new map of the East and giving provinces to his Egyptian queen, granting Polemon little Armenia as the reward for an embassy, giving his actors the town of Priene, in return for a good luncheon, making his cook as rich as a wealthy Magnesian. We can best see what sort of task he set his cook from a story that was whispered in Plutarch’s circle. At every time in the day the cook had to be in a position to serve a complete luncheon immediately. Eight wild boars were turning on the spit at the same time, because at a given moment one had to be ready roasted to be set instantly upon the table, and in this way all the preparations necessary for a luncheon for not more than twelve persons were conducted. Plutarch’s characteristic anecdote is a proof at once of the costliness of Antony’s court and the irregularity of his mode of life. If the preparation of one daily meal involved such expenditure we hardly need to reckon the crazy wagers with Cleopatra to arrive at an explanation of the immense sums raised and squandered by Antony in the East. His example set the standard for his own people; his eldest son Antyllus was yet a boy when he gave a doctor such a sum for a paradox in medical language that the man did not believe his ears.