Sardou's Cleopatra — page 230: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SARDOU’S CLEOPATRA. 215 she impatiently drove away the idea. Had she become so blind to all else that the form of an idle stroller should take on the semblance of Antony ? She turned half angrily away from the window, and said, to Serapion: “Come! It is time to proceed to the temple.” But the queen’s intuition had not played her false. ‘The man in the dark mantle was indeed . Antony. In obedience to his commands of the night before, Ventidius with a small, but trusty band of men, had early in the morning gained access to the city in disguise. ‘There they had learned of the ceremony that was to take place that day, and Ventidius had succeeded in bribing one of the servants of the palace to entrust him with the key of a small gate that opened into the palace gardens. He hoped, by this means, to admit his followers, seize the queen as she went to or returned from the temple, and in the midst of the confusion bear her away before she could be rescued by her guards. The plan might pos- sibly have succeeded, had it not been for Antony himself, who, unable to bear the suspense, and perhaps impelled by a longing to hasten the time _ when he should look once more upon the haunt- EComicbooks 3