BRITANNUS. You are Caesar’s prisoners, all of you.
CAESAR (benevolently). Oh no, no, no. By no means. Caesar’s guests, gentlemen.
CLEOPATRA. Won’t you cut their heads off?
CAESAR. What! Cut off your brother’s head?
CLEOPATRA. Why not? He would cut off mine, if he got the chance. Wouldn’t you, Ptolemy?
PTOLEMY (pale and obstinate). I would. I will, too, when I grow up.
Cleopatra is rent by a struggle between her newly-acquired dignity as a queen, and a strong impulse to put out her tongue at him. She takes no part in the scene which follows, but watches it with curiosity and wonder, fidgeting with the restlessness of a child, and sitting down on Caesar’s tripod when he rises.
POTHINUS. Caesar: if you attempt to detain us——
RUFIO. He will succeed, Egyptian: make up your mind to that. We hold the palace, the beach, and the eastern harbor. The road to Rome is open; and you shall travel it if Caesar chooses.
CAESAR (courteously). I could do no less, Pothinus, to secure the retreat of my own soldiers. I am accountable for every life among them. But you are free to go. So are all here, and in the palace.