“Oh, you were there, then, also?”
“No, sir; I was then in Egypt. I had been employed by Queen Cleopatra to restore the library at Alexandria—an office for which I was better qualified than any one else, from having personally known the best authors of antiquity.”
“And you have seen Queen Cleopatra?” said Madame Dubarry.
“As I now see you, madame.”
“Was she as pretty as they say?”
“Madame, you know beauty is only comparative; a charming queen in Egypt, in Paris she would only have been a pretty grisette.”
“Say no harm of grisettes, count.”
“God forbid!”
“Then Cleopatra was——”
“Little, slender, lively, and intelligent; with large almond-shaped eyes, a Grecian nose, teeth like pearls, and a hand like your own, countess—a fit hand to hold a scepter. See, here is a diamond which she gave me, and which she had had from her brother Ptolemy; she wore it on her thumb.”