saluted him with much respect, but made no direct reply to his demand. Popilius went straight up to him, and tracing a circle around the king in the sand, “Prince,” said he, “I must have an answer to the will of the Roman people before you leave that circle.” Astonished at this noble pride, Antiochus replied that he was ready to obey. Thus Egypt was delivered from war. Respect for the Roman name alone gave it, for this once, peace, and preserved it its sovereigns. After having defeated Pompey, Cæsar entered Alexandria, to endeavour to regulate the affairs of Egypt, then embroiled by the ambition of Cleopatra. During his abode there, Achilles, minister of King Ptolemy, disgusted at his proceedings, raised an army of twenty thousand disciplined Egyptian troops, and offered battle to the great dictator. Cæsar had only three thousand foot and eight thousand horse. Without giving a moment’s consideration to his weakness, and relying entirely on his constant good fortune, he made a sortie from Alexandria, where the Egyptians besieged him, and drove them to a distance from the walls. He fought several battles with the same results, but, weakened in the end by his own successes,--for, though victorious, he in each conflict necessarily lost some men,--he ceased to be the conqueror. It was in the course of this war that the celebrated Alexandrian library was burnt, the collecting of which had been the work of many kings, and consisted of more than four hundred thousand volumes. It was likewise after a contest in which he had been worsted, that he had to swim for his life, which he did with one hand, holding, it is said, his “Commentaries” in the other. Cæsar did not escape the fascinations of Cleopatra: as she did by all who came within the circle of her machinations, she made him subservient to her ambitious views: she had one son by him, named Cæsarion, afterwards sacrificed to the jealousy of Augustus. After passing through many dangers, he received succour, and was triumphant; he defeated the Egyptians, under their king Ptolemy Bacchus, who drowned himself in the Nile. SECOND SIEGE, A.D. 260. Under Gallus, Alexandria, whose population amounted to three hundred thousand freemen, and as many slaves, became the theatre of a frightful civil war, which lasted twelve years. All communication was cut off between the different parts of that unfortunate city; every street was inundated with blood; the major part of the better sort of houses were converted into citadels, and these horrible disorders were not appeased till after most of the inhabitants had perished by the sword, pestilence, or famine. THIRD SIEGE, A.D. 611.