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THE EMPEROR 
 
 A ROMANCE. 
 
 BY GEORGE EBERS. 
 
 SERAPIS 
 
 AN HISTORICAL NOVEL. 
 
 BY GEOEGE EBERS. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 JOHN AV. LOVELL COMPANY 
 
 142 'I'o ITiO WoiiTii Stkeet. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the years 1881 and 1888, by 
 
 GEORGE MUNRO, 
 
 in th» Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D. C. 
 
 GIF! 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 FouKTEEK years ago I had planned the story contained in 
 tliis vohime to follow a series of lectures on the Eoman 
 dominion in Egypt. But scientific labors kept back for a 
 time this desire for poetic creation, and when its wings began 
 again to flutter I felt obliged to take up other material. This 
 exjDlains why the reign of Hadrian becomes the background of 
 a romance, following one laid at the earlier epoch of the 
 Anchorite movement. 
 
 After finishing that romance, my old wish to bring together, 
 in the style of fiction, the most imjDortant jjeriods in the his- 
 tory of that venerable race, to the study of which I have conse- 
 crated a quarter of a century, found its realization. 
 
 The brilhant epoch of the times of the Pharaohs I have tried 
 to depict in " Uarda;" the subjection of Egypt to the youth- 
 ful sovereignty of Persia in the " Egyptian Princess;^' the 
 epoch of Hellenic control under the reign of the Lagides 
 (Ptolemies), in " The Sisters;" the Roman dominion, and the 
 early ups}^ ringing of Christianity in " The Emjjeror;" and 
 the Anchorite movement through the deserts and rocky regions 
 in the neighborhood of Egypt, in " Homo Sum." 
 
 So " The Emperor " is the last of which the scene will be 
 laid in ancient Egypt. This series of romances will not only 
 have made my readers acquainted with the history of civiliza- 
 tion among the Egyptians, but ought to facilitate their under- 
 standing of a few specially mighty ideas that moved antiquity. 
 How well I have succeeded in representing these epochs in 
 their true colors, and giving an air of reality to the pictures, I 
 may not venture to judge. For since present things appear 
 differently to different minds, the same must be more strik- 
 ingly true of those long past and half forgotten. 
 
 How often I was obliged, when denied the means of certify- 
 ing something of remote date, and claiming counsel and assist- 
 ance from imagination, to remember the remark, that the 
 poet is only a prophet looking backward. I have dared to 
 
VIM PREFACE. 
 
 jilldw Fancy quietly to unfold her wings, for I was her master, 
 and knew the limits beyond which her flight coidd not be per- 
 mitted. And while maintaining the right to use my inventive 
 jiowers, I have introduced nothing which would have been im- 
 possible at the epoch represented. Considerations of proba- 
 bility have everywhere fixed the limits of imagination. Where 
 the existing sources were full and reliable, I have not exceeded 
 them; and this ray fellow-students in Germany, England, 
 France, and Holland have more than once testified. I scarcely 
 need to state that fictitious verity is quite another thing than 
 historic verity; for the one must remain unafl'ected by the 
 subjectivity of its discoverer, while the other can only exist by 
 the use of the artist's imaginative power. I leave " The Em- 
 peror,'' as I have my two later romances, without notes. I do 
 this in the happy consciousness of having won, through other 
 and more profound works, a right to the confidence of my 
 readers. Nothing has more inspired me to undertake fresh 
 works of imagination than the fact that, through their read- 
 ing, some young minds have been drawn to a study of the 
 profounder works, whose names are already mentioned with 
 honor among Egj'ptologists. 
 
 Those familiar with the time of Hadrian will recognize by 
 minute indications from which author, inscription, or monu- 
 ment my details have been gathered; and 1 need not disturb 
 the course of the story among the larger circle of my readers. 
 
 It Avould make me unhapj^y should tliis romance deserve the 
 name of a genuine work of art, whose chief object must ever 
 be to jjlease and elevate; and he who receives, at the same 
 time, any enlargement of knowledge will scarcely notice that 
 he has been instructed. 
 
 Those familiar with the history of Alexandria under the 
 Romans will be surprised that I make no mention of the 
 Therapeutic, on Lake Mareotis. I had originally intended to 
 have a chapter on this subject, but the latest researches of 
 Lucii decided me to leave it unwritten. 
 
 J have devoted years of study to the infancy of Christianity, 
 esi)ecially in Egypt, and it gives me especial satisfaction to 
 testify that in the time of Hadrian the 23ure doctrines of the 
 Recdemer, with few human additions, had taken possession of 
 the hearts of moi, as they could not fail to do. 
 
 Beside this triumiihant faith I have set that noble blossom 
 of (I rock development — art — which, in later centuries of 
 Cliristianity, became so closely associated with it, in order to 
 enrich herself witli its beautiful forms. The busts and statues 
 of Antinous, which date from the time of my story, prove that 
 
PREFACE. ix 
 
 uucler Hadrian the withering plant was destined to send out 
 fresh shoots. 
 
 The romantic attributes I ascribe to my world-wandering 
 herO;, who ascended the mountains to rejoice in the rising sun, 
 are true to fact. 
 
 One of the most difficult tasks I have ever attempted was 
 that of constructing a character from so many contradictory 
 statements, which I could m3^self believe to be true; but how 
 gladly I have attempted it! 
 
 In the surroundings of this fiction there was much to be- 
 considered, but it has been written out of the very heart of its 
 author. 
 
 May it also find its way into the hearts of my readers! 
 
 Geoege Ebees. 
 
 Leipsic, Nov. 2, 1880. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 
 
 PART L 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 The morning twilight had passed; the sun of the first day 
 of December, a. d. 129, had risen, though veiled in a white sea 
 fog. It was cold. 
 
 The Kasius, a mountain of medium height, rose from a 
 tongue of coast-land between Southern Palestine and Egypt, 
 and was washed on its northern side by the sea. To-day it 
 did not shimmer and gleam in ultramarine light. The distant 
 waves were dark, but as they rolled nearer, changed into a 
 greenish-gray color, which looked against the horizon like 
 dusty sod on a dark lava surface. 
 
 The north-east wind which had sprung up since sunrise was 
 steadily increasing in violence, and milk-white foam tipped the 
 waves, though as yet they did not dash strongly against the 
 foot of the mountain, but rather rose in long, heavy swells, as 
 if made of molten lead. Yet clear drops spirted upward when 
 the sea-gulls, flying in restless troops backward and forward, 
 uttering their shrill cry, touched the water with their wings. 
 
 Three men came slowly along the mountain jiath that led 
 from the summit to the plain below, but only the oldest of 
 them — who walked in advance of the others — looked at the 
 sky, the sea, the gulls in flight, and the desolate surface of 
 the wilderness. Now he stood still, and both his companions 
 did likewise, with a mechanical motion. 
 
 The landscape, spreading out below, seemed to chain his 
 gaze, and a slight inclination of his head gave expression to 
 his interest. 
 
 A narrow strip of desert, divided by two bodies of water, 
 stretched westward as far as the eye could reach. Upon this 
 natural dike a caravan was moving. The feet of the camels 
 fell silently upon the yielding sand. The riders in their white 
 mantles seemed to sleep, and the drivers to dream. The gray 
 eagles beside the jDath were not disturbed by their presence. 
 To the right of the low ground, along which the road from 
 Syria to Egypt ran, lay tlie lusterless sea, enveloped in gray 
 
12 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 clouds; on the left was that strange expanse, whose end toward 
 east and west tlie eye could not discover, and which seemed 
 sometimes a snow-lield, sometimes a pool, or from some other 
 point a thicket of reeds and rushes. 
 
 The oldest of the three travelers kept his attention con- 
 stantly directed to the heavens and into the distance; the 
 second, a slave, who bore the wraps and the packages, did not 
 turn his glance away from his master; while the third, a free 
 youth, walked with eyes upon the ground as if in a dream. 
 
 A broad road, crossing that from the mountain summit to the 
 coast, led toward a stately temple, and into this the bearded 
 traveler turned. 
 
 But he had proceeded only a few steps when he stopped, 
 turned his head involuntarily, murmured a few unintelligible 
 words, and rapidly retraced his steps to the narrow path lead- 
 ing into the valley. 
 
 His young companion followed without raising his eyes, or 
 seeming to disturb his dreams, as though he were a mere 
 shadow. 
 
 But the slave lifted his closely shorn head, and a smile 
 curled his liji when he saw an old shepherd-wife bending over 
 the dead body of a Idd beside the path, who hastily drew the 
 blue-black veil over her wrinkled face at the approach of the 
 strangers. 
 
 " That exj^lains it,'^ murmured the slave to himself, throw- 
 ing a kiss to a black-haired maiden who crouched beside the 
 old woman. But the child did not notice his dumb salute, for 
 her eyes followed his superior's, esjoecially the younger man. 
 As soon as the three had passed, so far that her voice could 
 not be heard, the maiden asked, in repi-essed voice, and trem- 
 bling as if touched by a sjiirit from the wilderness: 
 
 " Grandmother, who was that?" 
 
 The old woman laid her finger on the lips of the child, and 
 whispered timidly, as she lifted the veil from her face: " It is 
 he." 
 
 " The emperor?" 
 
 iSlie answered by an emphatic nod; but the maiden pressed 
 with ijassionate eagerness against her grandmother, and 
 stretching her head forward for a better view, asked: 
 
 " The younger?" 
 
 " Fool! The first one, the gray-beard.'* 
 
 " He? I would rather the younger were the emperor. " 
 
 It was in truth the Homau Emperor Hadrian who walked 
 silently in advance of his conipanions, and his coming seemed 
 to animate the desert, for at his aj)]) roach the ^jlovers Hew up- 
 
THE EMPEEOK. 13 
 
 ward out of the reeds with their shrill cry; and from behind a 
 sand-hill on the broader road where Hadrian turned appeared 
 two men in priestly garments. They belonged to the Temple 
 of Baal, of Mount Casius, a small structure of stone which the 
 emperor had visited on the previous day. 
 
 " Has he mistaken the path?^"* asked one priest of the other, 
 in the Phoenician dialect. 
 
 " Scarcely/" was the reply. " Mastor tells me he can find 
 any path over which he has once passed, even in the darkness. " 
 
 " And yet he looks more into the clouds than upon the 
 earth.'' 
 
 " But he promised us yesterday — " 
 
 " He did not speak positively," interrupted the other. 
 
 " I think he did. In taking leave, I distinctly heard him 
 say: ' Perhaps I shall come again, to consult your oracle.' " 
 
 *' Perhaps — " 
 
 " I think he said, ' i3robably. ' " 
 
 " Who knows what token he may have seen in the sky that 
 directs him onward. He is going toward the encampment by 
 the sea." 
 
 " But in our banqueting-hall the meal stands ready for 
 him." 
 
 " He will also find m the camp what he needs. Come, it is 
 a disagreeable morning. I am very cold." 
 
 "Wait a little— look." 
 
 "For what?" 
 
 " He wears no hat over his gray hair.'" 
 
 " No one ever saw him traveling with covered head." 
 
 " And his gray mantle is not imperial." 
 
 " At a banquet he always wears the pm'iDle." 
 
 " Do you know of whom his gait and his general aj)pearance 
 remind me?" 
 
 " Of whom, then?" 
 
 " Of our late high-priest Abibaal; he walked with the same 
 majesty and thoughtf ulness, and wore his hair like the em- 
 peror." 
 
 " Yes, and the deep, searching eye." 
 
 " He also looked often upward. They have the same broad 
 forehead; but Abibaal's nose was more bowed, and his hair less 
 curly." 
 
 " Our master's mouth was grave and earnest, while the lip 
 of Hadrian curls as if he were always on the point of exjoress- 
 ing ridicule. " 
 
 " Look now, he turns to liis favorite." 
 
 " Antonius, I believe they call the handsome fellow?" 
 
14 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 '' Antiuous, not iVntomus. He loickcd him up in Bithynia, 
 I have been told.''' 
 
 " He is handsome/' 
 
 "Yes, without a paralleh What jiroportions! What a 
 countenance! Yet I woidd not like him for my son." 
 
 " The emperor's favorite?" 
 
 " Even the same. He looks as if ho had tasted every j^leas- 
 
 ure, and could find no more joy." 
 
 ******* 
 
 Several tents occupied a level sjaace directly on the shore of 
 the sea, protected by the broken cliffs from the east wind. A 
 fire burned m the middle of the inclosure, and around it were 
 gathered Koman soldiers and servants of the emperor. 
 
 Half-naked boys, children of the fishermen and camel drivers 
 ran busily back and forth, feeding the llame with dry reeds 
 and desert shrubs; but in spite of all their efforts, the wind 
 blew it sideward m little clouds near the ground. It was as if 
 the flames feared to ventm-e into the gray, dam]?, unfriendly 
 sky. 
 
 The largest of the tents, before which four Roman soldiers 
 kept guard, alternatmg in pairs, stood wide open toward the 
 sea. 
 
 The slaves, who came out, bearing upon their shorn heads 
 trays containing gold and silver vessels, plates, wine-tankards 
 and goblets, with the remnants of av feast, were forced to hold 
 them fast with both hands, to guard them from its violence. 
 
 The interior of the tent was without ornament. Ui^on a 
 cushion near the storm-shaken canvas wall reclined the em- 
 peror. His bloodless lips were compressed, his arms crossed 
 over the breast, and his eyes half closed. 
 
 But he was not sleejiing, and often moved his lips, as though 
 tasting food. Sometimes he opened wide the blue-veined and 
 deeply lined lids, glancing upward, or looking downward to- 
 ward the middle of the tent, where Antinous was stretched on 
 a bear-skin. 
 
 The head of a bear had been artistically arranged to serve 
 as a pillow, and on this rested the handsome head of the 
 youth. His right leg played freely in the air, supported by 
 the left, and his hands Avere busied with the Molossian dog of 
 the emj^eror, which now rested his head on the luiked breast 
 of tlie youth, now stretched it toward his mouth, to testify his 
 affection by a canine caress. But when he attempted the 
 latt(!r, Anthious playfully ])inc]ied his snout or wrapi)ed him 
 in tlie white pallium that fell from his own shoulder. 
 
 The dog seemed to enjoy the sport; but once, in fading to 
 
THE EMPEROR. 15 
 
 free himself from tlie pallinm, he howled, which attracted the 
 attention of the emj^eror, who cast an annoyed look downward 
 toward the bear-skin — only a look — not a word of fault-find- 
 ing. But the expression of his eye changed as it rested on the 
 beautiful figure of the youth. It was as if he contemplated a 
 noble work of art. And truly it was godlike — wonderfully 
 soft, and yet vigorous was every muscle of neck, breast, limTjs. 
 The features of a human face were never more regularly 
 chiseled. 
 
 Antinous saw that the attention of his master was attracted 
 by his sport with the d^og. So he gave him his freedom, and 
 turned his large languid eyes to the emperor. 
 
 " What are you doing?" asked Hadrian. 
 
 " Nothing/' was the answer. 
 
 " No one does nothing. Whoever believes he is unoccupied 
 thinks, and thinking is much.'' 
 
 " I can not think." 
 
 " Every one thinks, and if you were not doing it then, it 
 was because you were at play. " 
 
 " Yes, with the dog." 
 
 And with these words Antinous let his legs fall to the 
 ground, drove the dog away, and placed both hands under liis 
 curly head. 
 
 " Are you tired?" asked the emperor. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " We have watched the same portion of the night, and I, 
 who am so much older, feel myself fresh." 
 I " You said yesterday old soldiers were worth more for night 
 service. " 
 
 The emperor nodded, and said : 
 
 " At your age, one lives three times as fast as at mine, and 
 needs a double amount of sleep. You have reason to be tired. 
 It was three o'clocJc when we climbed the mountain, but 
 how often a banquet continues later than that." 
 
 " It was cold and disagreeable up there." 
 
 " Only after sunrise." 
 
 " You did not notice it before, because you were busy with 
 the stars. " 
 
 " And you only with yourself, that is plain." 
 
 " 1 thought also of your health when the air grew so cold 
 before the coming of Hehos." 
 
 " I must await his appearance." 
 
 " Do you learn of the future from the manner of the sun- 
 
 rise 
 
 Hadrian glanced strangely at the questioner, shook his head 
 
10 THE EirrEROR. 
 
 as in denial, looked ujward at the tent roof, and, after a long 
 pause, said, in rather disconnected sentences: "The day is 
 sim])ly present time, and future things come forth out of dark- 
 ness. Out of the clod comes the grain, and rain from the 
 black cloud ; from the womb spring new races — the freshness 
 of the members is renewed in sleep. Who knows, then, what 
 may follow the darkness of death?^' 
 
 When the emperor had been some time silent the youth 
 asked : 
 
 " If the sunrise teach you nothing of the future, why do you 
 so often deny your nightly rest, and climb the mountain to see 
 it?" 
 
 "Wherefore? Wherefore?" said Hadrian, slowly, in reply, 
 thoughtfully stroking his gray beard, and adding, as if speak- 
 ing only to himself: " There is no answer to such a question, 
 and, if I could express it, who would xmderstand me? One 
 comes nearest to it through a figure. We are all actors on the 
 stage of the world. Now he that will be tall in the theater 
 Avears a certain style of boot. And is not a mountain the 
 highest uplift a man can put under the soles of his feet? The 
 Casius yonder is a mere hill, but I have stood on higher points 
 and looked upon the clouds far below, as Jupiter from his 
 Olymjjus.'^ 
 
 " You need not ascend a mountain to feel yourself a god," 
 cried Antinous. 
 
 " Men call you the godlike. You command, and the world 
 must obey. One is always nearer heaven on the top of a 
 mountain, but — " 
 
 " Well?" 
 
 " I can not trust myself to utter the thought. " 
 
 "Speak." 
 
 " There was a little maiden; when I lifted her upon my 
 shoulder she would stretch her arm upward, and say: 'I am so 
 great !' She thought herself then taller than I was, and yet 
 she was only the little Panthea. " 
 
 " But, according to your illustration, she was great, and that 
 is the point, since for each, all things are only what he believes 
 them. It is true they call me godhke, but I feel a hundred 
 times every day the limitations of humanity, beyond which I 
 can not pass. On the top of a mountain I am less con- 
 scious of them. Then it seems to me that I am great, for 
 nothing earthly rises above me. And when, standing there, 
 tlic night fiies away, and the dawn of a new day breaks upon 
 tlie woi-ld, my breast heaves, and my lungs joyfully inhale the 
 pure and rarified atmosphere. Alone, hi the deep silence, dis- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 17 
 
 turbed by nothing that goes on below, I feel myself one with 
 broad nature. The waves of the sea swell and break; the trees 
 of the forest bend their crowns, vapor and clouds roll beneath 
 and scatter themselves hither and thither, and I am so dis- 
 solved into the creation without that it often seems to be my 
 own breath which moves them. I soar through the distance 
 with the crane and the swallow, and get a glimpse of that un- 
 attainable limit which the soul seeks to win. My whole being 
 expands, and that longing disappears which oppresses me in 
 the tumult of life and among the cares of the state. But you 
 do not understand it, my boy; these are things I can share 
 with no other mortal. " 
 
 " Do not scorn to show them to me," cried Antinous, who 
 had turned himself fully toward the emperor, and with wide- 
 open eyes, had lost none of his words. 
 
 " To you?" asked Hadrian, and a smile not free from ridi- 
 cule flew to his lips; " I have no more secrets from you than 
 from the Venus of Praxitiles, in my library at Rome. " 
 
 The blood flooded the cheeks of the youth until they were 
 purple. The emperor saw this, and added, in kindly tone: 
 "You are more to me than any artistes work. The marble 
 can not blush. Beauty governed life in the time of the 
 Athenian; but you have proved to me that the gods are still 
 pleased to incorjjorate it. Your coimtenauce reconciles me to 
 the discords of being, and blesses me, but how can I expect 
 you to understand me? Your brow was not made for pro- 
 found thought. But did you comiDrehend any of my words?' ^ 
 
 Antinous half rose, supporting himself upon his left arm. 
 He raised the right, and uttered a decisive " Yes." 
 
 " Which of them?" asked the emperor. 
 
 " I know the longing.^' 
 
 "After what?" 
 
 " After many things." 
 
 " Name to me one." 
 
 '' Enjoyment which no disappointment will follow. I know 
 none. ' ' 
 
 " This desire you share with all Eoman youth; they enjoy 
 themselves without any regard to the consequences.'" 
 
 "I dare not." 
 
 " Who has forbidden your speaking frankly to me?'' 
 " You yourself." 
 "I?" 
 
 " Yes, you; for you forbade me to speak to you of my home, 
 my mother, my kindred." 
 
IH THE EMPEROR. 
 
 The emperor's brow darkened, and ho replied, sternly: 
 
 " I am your father, and your whole soul belongs to me." 
 
 "It is your own,^' answered the youtli, as he let himself 
 sink back upon the bear-skin and drew the pallium closer 
 about his shoulders; for a gust blew cold through the open 
 door of the tent, as Phlegon, the private secretary of the em- 
 2)eror, entered, followed by a slave bearing many sealed rolls 
 under the arm. 
 
 ** Is it agreeable to you, Caesar, that we deliver the letters 
 and dispatches which have just arrived?'* asked the officer, 
 whose carefully arranged hair had been disturbed by the sea- 
 breeze. 
 
 " Yes; and then we will learn what is to be observed in the 
 heavens to-night. Have you the tablets at hand?" 
 
 '' They are spread out in your working tent, Csesar.'' 
 
 " Has the storm become heavy?" 
 
 " It seems to come from both north and east. The sea runs 
 very high. The empress will have a rough passage. " 
 
 " When did she embark?" 
 
 " The anchor was raised about midnight. The ship which 
 carries her to Alexandria is a handsome vessel, but she rolls 
 disagreeably from side to side. ' ' 
 
 Hadrian laughed aloud at these words, and said: 
 
 " That will turn both heart and stomach upside down. I 
 could wish I were there! But no; by all the gods, no, I would 
 not. To-day she will certainly forget to paint. And who 
 will build up her hair, since the same calamity will overtake 
 her women? We will remain here to-day, for should I meet 
 her soon after her arrival in Alexandria, she would be truly 
 vinegar and gall. " 
 
 Hadrian rose with these words, and went out with the sec- 
 retary, giving a parting salute to Antinous. 
 
 A third person had been present during the conversation 
 between the emperor and his favorite. Tin's was Master, a 
 native of Jazyes, and a slave; so no more recognized than the 
 Molossian dog or the cushion upon which the emperor reclined. 
 
 For some time he tried by various motions to attract the 
 attention of Antinous, who, having covered his face with his 
 hands, had buried both in the bear's-head pillow. He did not 
 venture to speak, because the youth was unequal in his manner 
 toward him. Sometimes he listened with evident pleasure, 
 and spoke as a friend, but at others he repulsed him with more 
 harsliness than the veriest upstart manifests to his lowest 
 servant. 
 
 At last the slave gathered courage — for it seemed less pain- 
 
THE EMPEROE. 19 
 
 ful to receive the rebuke than to shut withm himself the sym- 
 pathetic thought — and called him by name. 
 
 Antinous raised his head, and asked: " What do you wisli?^" 
 
 ' ' I only want to say that I know what maiden you sj^oke 
 of. It was the little sister of whom you told me. " 
 
 Antinous nodded, buried his face again in his hands, and 
 the movement of his shoulders told that he wept. 
 
 Mastor was silent a few moments, but then he stepped 
 nearer to Antinous, saying: *' I have a son and a pet daughter 
 at home, and I love to hear of little maidens. We are now 
 alone, and if it would lighten your heart — " 
 
 " Why, man, I have told you ten times already of my 
 mother and the little Panthea,'' replied Antinous, trying to 
 seem undisturbed. 
 
 "■ So do it then for the eleventh," begged the slave. " I 
 can sj^eak of my own as often as I please in the tents and in 
 the kitchen. But you — What did you call the little dog for 
 whom Panthea made' the red cap?'^ 
 
 " We called him Kalliste," said Antinous, wiping his eyes 
 with the back of his hand, " My father had no patience with 
 him; but we won over the mother. I was her favorite, and 
 when I hung about her with imploring glances, she always 
 said ' yes ' to all I asked. " 
 
 A happier light gleamed in the eyes of the youth, for he had 
 been recalled to the memory of joys, after which followed no 
 satiety. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 One of the palaces built by the Ptolemaic princes in Alex- 
 andria stood on a land-spit called Lochias, which ran out to- 
 ward the north like a white finger pointing over the blue sea. 
 This formed the eastern boundary of the large harbor. Al- 
 M'ays filled with sea-craft, it was to-day especially jDopulous, 
 and the stone-joaved quay which led from the sea-washed 
 quarter of the city — the so-called Bruchiom — to the land-spit 
 was crowded with carriages and foot-jDassengers pressing to- 
 ward the i^rivate landing-place for vessels belonging to the 
 emperor. All were curious to see the magnificent triremes, 
 galleys, and ships of burden which had brought the wife of 
 Hadrian, with a crowd of nobles and attendants, to Alexan- 
 dria. One large vessel, with a very high cabin on the rear 
 deck, and the head of a she- wolf at the beak-head, excited the 
 greatest attention. It was made of cedar, elaborately orna- 
 mented with ivory and bronze, and named "Sabina." A 
 
20 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 young citizen, pointing to tho gilded letters on the stern, 
 ]iudged his comi^anion, saying, with a laugh, *' * Sabina ' has 
 the head of a she-Avolf/' 
 
 "' A peacock's would have been more fitting. Did you see 
 Ikt as slie rode into the (/aisareum yesterday?'' was the reply. 
 
 "Unfortunately — " began the first siJeaker, but became 
 suddenly silent when he noticed a Eoman lictor standmg close 
 behind with a bundle of elm-rods on his shoulder — his fasces — 
 who, with his companions, were trying to divide the crowd and 
 make room for the chariot of the Imi^erial Prefect Titianus, 
 which was slowly advancing. This high officer noticed the 
 tmguarded speech of the citizen, and, pulling the toga of his 
 neighbor with a raj^id motion, said: 
 
 A strange peoi^le this. I can not show myself displeased 
 with them, but I would rather ride on a knife-blade from here 
 to Cajiojnis than on an Alexandrian tongue. " 
 
 " Did you hear what the stout fellow here said of Varus?" 
 
 " The lictor would have seized him, but one gains nothing 
 by severity. If they had to pay one sesterce for every jwison- 
 ous word, I assure you, Pontius, the city would be beggared, 
 and our treasury as full as that of the old G3rges of Sardis." 
 
 " Let them keep their money," rephed the other, the chief 
 architect of the city, a man of about tliirt}^, with deej^-set, 
 searching eyes and a bass voice, as he gathered up the roll in 
 his hand more firmly; " they know how to M'ork, and sweating 
 is briny. Active hi labor, in their i)lay time they bite one an- 
 other like high-spirited horses harnessed together. The wolf 
 is a splendid beast, but if you break out liis teeth he is only a 
 filthy dog." 
 
 '' You speak my very soul," answered the prefect. '' But 
 here we are. Eternal gods! I did not think that thing could 
 be so shabby. From a distance it ai)2'»eared magnificent I" 
 
 Titianus and the architect left the chariot, the former order- 
 ing a lictor to call the overseer of the jialace, and then turning 
 with his companion to ins23ect the gate. At a distance its ap- 
 pearance, with the double row of columns and high arched 
 gable, was quite imposing; but the stucco had fallen from the 
 wall, the capitals of the marble jaillars were mutilated, and the 
 bronzed doors hung awry. 
 
 1'he sharp eye of Pontius marked all these tilings, as he fol- 
 lowed the prefect into the outer court, where, during the reign 
 of the Ptolemies, had stood tents for the ministers, scribes, and 
 active officers of the king. Here they met an imexpected ob- 
 stacle in lines of rope stretched diagonally from the house of 
 the gate-keeper across the old i)avement, where now the grass 
 
THE EMPEROK. 21 
 
 ^vas growing and thistles were in bloom. These lines were 
 covered with newly washed garments of every size and shape. 
 
 " A nice location for the emperor," sighed Titianus, shrug- 
 ging his shoulders and restraining the lictor from striking 
 down the clothes-line with his fasces. 
 
 " It is not so had as it looks," said the architect. " Door- 
 keeper! Hey, door-keeper! Where has the good-for-nothing 
 fellow hidden himself?" 
 
 While he called, and the lictor hastened within the palace, 
 Pontius picked his way among the wet clothes to the little 
 house of the gate-keeper. His countenance expressed impa- 
 tience and vexation since he had crossed the threshold of the 
 gate, but now he began to laugh, and with a whisper he called 
 to the prefect. 
 
 " Titianus, take the trouble to come here!" 
 
 The elder dignitary, who was a whole head taller than the 
 architect, did not find it quite so easy to bend under the ropes. 
 But he maintained- his good humor, carefully avoided the wet 
 clothing, and cried to Pontius: 
 
 ''■ I begin to respect the childish garments. Under them 
 one can pass without breaking his spine. Ah, this is charm- 
 ing!" 
 
 The front of the gate-keeper's house was overgrown with ivy, 
 even to door and windows. Among the leaves hung cages 
 containing starhngs, thrushes, and other singing birds. The 
 door stood wide open, giving sight of a roomy, gayly painted 
 apartment. In the background one might see the clay model 
 of an Apollo, of excellent workmanship. On the walls, near 
 to it, hung lutes and lyres of varied form and size. 
 
 A large bird-cage containing nests full of young goldfinches 
 stood on a table near the door. Here, also, was a wine-tankard 
 and cups of carved ivory. The arm of an elderly woman, who 
 had fallen asleep hi her chair, rested on the marble surface. 
 In spite of an upper lip bearded with gray hair, her face was 
 kindly and agreeable, and its expression suggested pleasant 
 dreams. A gray cat was sleeping in her lap, and close beside 
 it, as if to prove that harmony reigned in this apartment, lay 
 a little shaggy dog, whose fleecy white hair showed the best of 
 care. Two others of the same sort lay stretched on the stone 
 floor. 
 
 The architect pointed to this picture of still life as soon as 
 the prefect reached him, whispering: " A rare scene for an 
 artist!" 
 
 " Inimitable," replied Titianus, " only it is natural to asso- 
 
33 THE EMPEKOIl. 
 
 ciate the deep carnation of the old woman^s face with her close 
 proximity to the wine-tankard/' 
 
 " But did you ever see a kinder, more serene countenance?" 
 
 " So might Baucis have slept during the absence of Pliile- 
 mou, or was this dependent husband always at home?" 
 
 " Probably. But now the peace is broken,'" 
 
 The approach of the strangers had wakened one of the dogs, 
 wliose barking roused the others to competitive effort. 
 
 The pet of the mistress sprung from her lap, but the old 
 woman and the cat slejat on, undisturbed. 
 
 " She ought to be a good watcher," laughed the architect. 
 
 " And this phalanx of dogs, which guard the palace of an 
 emperor,'' added Titianus, " might easily be killed at a blow. 
 But take care. The worthy matron is weakening. " 
 
 She had been, in fact, jsartially roused by the barking of the 
 dogs, had raised her head, and began a sentence, half singing, 
 half sj^eaking, but sunk bade again into her easy-chair. 
 
 " That is charming," exclaimed the prefect. " If she cries 
 out ' always cheery ' from her sleep, what must she be when 
 awake!" 
 
 " I should be sorry to drive this old woman out of her nest," 
 said the architect, opening his roll. 
 
 *' Do not touch this little house," exclaimed Titianus, with 
 zeal. " I know Hadrian. He is fond of peculiar things and 
 pcojile, and I'll Avager will like this old woman. There comes 
 at last the overseer of this palace." 
 
 As he approached one could hear him striking down to the 
 ground the clothes-lines, with their wet contents, before Tit- 
 ianus could hinder the action. After the curtain had fallen ho 
 bowed as low before this representative of the emperor and 
 his comjDanion as the excessive size of his body i^ermitted; but 
 surjirise and embarrassment made all expression difficult. 
 Titianus left him a little time to recover; then after expressing 
 regret for the fate of the wash, he introduced Pontius, and 
 made known to him the wish of the emperor to dwell in this 
 palace. Also, tliat knowing it to be greatly in need of repair, 
 lie had come with his friend, the architect, to confer with him 
 as to what might be done in the few days before the emperor's 
 arrival to make the building habitable, and finally requested 
 him to conduct them through the apartments. 
 
 " Immediately— instantly," replied the Greek, whose many 
 years of inaction had made him immensely corpulent; " I will 
 run and fett;li the keys. " 
 
 As he witlidrew, bowing, he hastily curled over his finger the 
 right side of his locks. Pontius, noticing this, said; 
 
THE EMPEROR. 46 
 
 '' Call him back, Titianus, he was summoned while curling 
 his hair. I wager my head he will curl the other side before 
 lie returns. I know my Greeks!" 
 
 " Let him alone/' answered Titianus. " How can you ex- 
 pect him to answer questions correctly if his hair be only half 
 arranged? I know the Greeks also — " 
 
 " Better than I do, that is plain/' said the architect, in a 
 tone of conviction. " A statesman works with men as I with 
 my lifeless materials. Did you notice how that fat fellow grew 
 pale when you spoke of the emperor's intention to come here 
 in a few days? This old building must be fine! Every horn- 
 now is valuable, and we have already delayed too long." 
 
 The prefect motioned the architect forward, and followed 
 him into the interior of the palace. 
 
 How vast, how harmonious the pleasure-grounds of this im- 
 mense structui-e, through which the no longer half-curled over- 
 seer Keraunus led the Romans ! The palace stood upon an 
 artificial elevation in the midst of the tongue of land called 
 Lochias; and from its many windows and balconies overlooked 
 the streets and squares, the houses, palaces, and open struct- 
 ures of this great cosmopolitan city, and its harbor, crowded 
 with vessels. Eich, varied and brilhant was the outlook to- 
 ward the west and south; from the balconies on the east and 
 north one could see only the vaulted sky and the boundless 
 sea. 
 
 When Hadrian had sent a messenger to Titianus from Mount 
 Casius directing him to sujjerintend the preparations for his 
 reception in this neglected palace — unoccupied since the fall of 
 Cleopatra — he knew very well what its location offered. Eight 
 or nine days was the utmost time allowed— scarcely more than 
 a week — and the perspiration ran down the cheeks of both 
 Titianus and Pontius as they reckoned uj) all that was neces- 
 sary to do in restoring this neglected and despoiled building to 
 splendor. 
 
 The columns and staircases of the interior were in tolerable 
 condition, but the rain had fallen into the uncovered feast and 
 council halls, and the lordly mosaic pavement was warped 
 asunder in some places; in others weeds were growing. The 
 finest of these had been carried away by Octavius Augustus, 
 Tiberius, Vesioasian, Titus, and a long row of prefects, to 
 Rome, or into the provinces, to ornament their city houses or 
 their country villas. 
 
 The handsomest statues, with which the art-loving Lagides 
 had adorned this and a larger palace on the Bruchiom, a few 
 hundred years before, were also missing. 
 
24 THE EMPEROTl. 
 
 In the midst of one broad marble hall was a fountain con- 
 nected with the admirable city aqueduct. The wind, in stormy 
 days, had driven the water over the mutilated floor, and now 
 wherever the foot was j^laced it came in contact witli a thin, 
 dark-,s:rccn and slijipcry coating of mold. 
 
 In this hall Keraunus leaned, gasping, against the wall, wiping 
 the pers])iration from his forehead, struggling with the words: 
 " Here we are at the end!" 
 
 These words sounded more as if he were thinking of liis own 
 end than that of the jialace, and there was a certain contempt 
 in the tone with which the architect rejjlied: 
 
 " Very well; then we will begin our explorations anew from 
 this jjoint. " 
 
 Keraunus did not object, but as he thought of the repeated 
 flights of stairs to be climbed, looked as one might who had 
 received sentence of death. 
 
 " Is it necessary that I remain with you during the work?" 
 asked the prefect. 
 
 " No," answered the architect, " provided 3'ou give me full 
 authority over the men, and the means, after examining my 
 plan." 
 
 " Agreed," said Titian us. " I am sure Pontius will employ 
 no more of either than the case demands. " The architect 
 bowed silently, but Titianus went on: 
 
 " Above all things, can you accomi^lish the work in eight 
 days and nights?" 
 
 " That which is absolutely necessar}^, perhaps; but we ought 
 to have four days more for the finishing touches. " 
 
 '' It would be well to delay Hadrian's coming four times 
 twenty-four hours." 
 
 " Send people to meet him at Pelusium who know how to 
 persuade; such, for instance, as the astronomer Ptolemseus, 
 and Favorinus, the sophist, who are here waiting for him. 
 They will detain him." 
 
 " That is not a bad idea — we will see. But who can calcu- 
 late the mood of the empress? In any case, do not expect 
 more than eight days." 
 
 " Good." 
 
 " Where do you projiose to arrange Hadrian's quarters?" 
 
 " There is really but a small part of the old building that 
 can bo made habitable." 
 
 "Unfortunately, I see that for myself," said the prefect, 
 with emphasis; then turning to the overseer, not sharply, but 
 in a tone of regret, said: " It seems to me, Keraunus, that it 
 
THE EMPEROR. 25 
 
 was your duty to let me know earlier the coudition of this 
 Ijalace." 
 
 " I presented my complaint," returned the overseer, "but 
 only received for answer that there were no means for its 
 restoration/' 
 
 " I knew nothing of this/' said Titianus. " When did you 
 send to the prefecture?" 
 
 " Under the rule of Haterius Nepos, your predecessor.'' 
 
 " So " — answered the prefect, relaxing. " That was long 
 ago. If in your place, I should have presented my petition 
 again with the coming in of a new prefect. But we have not 
 time now to talk of this. During the presence of the emperor, 
 perhajDS, I will send an officer to your assistance." 
 
 Turning his back upon the overseer, he asked: 
 
 " Now, my Pontius, what part of the palace do you propose 
 to put in order?" 
 
 " The inner rooms are in best condition." 
 
 " But those are not to be thought of. The emjjeror is easily 
 satisfied in camp; but where it is possible to gain space and a 
 free look into the distance, he must have them." 
 
 " Then we will choose the western suite. Hold the diagram, 
 my stately friend." 
 
 The overseer did as he was requested; the architect seized 
 his joencil, and, making a vigorous flourish over the left side of 
 the draught, said: 
 
 " This is the west front of the palace, which one sees from 
 the harbor. From the south one comes directly into the lofty 
 jDcristyle, which is the joroper place for the sentinels. It is 
 suiTOuncled by rooms for the slaves and body-guard. The 
 smaller halls near the main entrance are for the officers and 
 scribes. In the spacious hypasthral hall — that of the muses — 
 Hadrian can hold audience, and assemble the guests he invites 
 to his table. The small, well-preserved rooms on the right of 
 the long passage leading to the overseer's dwelling, will be 
 devoted to pages, secretaries, and other personal attendants of 
 the Caesar; the large hall, wainscoted with porphyry and green 
 marble, with the handsome bronze frieze, I think Hadrian will 
 choose for work and rest. " 
 
 " Excellent!" said Titianus; " I must show yom- plan to the 
 empress. " 
 
 "In that case, I need, eight weeks instead of days," an- 
 swered Pontius. 
 
 " You arc right," said the prefect, laugliing. '' But tell 
 me, Keraunus, where are the doors belonging to these best 
 
26 THE EMPETIOH. 
 
 " They were built of costly tliyinc-wood — and were wanted 
 in Eonio. " 
 
 " I think I have seen one or two of them there/' murmured 
 the prefect. " Your joiners must bestir themselves, Pontius.'^ 
 
 '' Say, rather, the tapestry merchants can rejoice. Where 
 there is a draught Ave must hang heavy curtains." 
 
 " What shall we do about the frogs, who, if I am not mis- 
 taken, will throng in this damjo dining-room?" 
 
 " Arrange a garden with growing plants." 
 
 " That will do. But the broken statues?" 
 
 " The worst must be taken away." 
 
 " Are not Apollo and the nine muses in the room designed 
 for an audience-hall?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " I think they are in a state of tolerable preservation." 
 
 "So, so." 
 
 " The Urania is missing," remarked the overseer, still hold- 
 ing the diagram. 
 
 " What has become of it?" asked Titianus, not without irri- 
 tation. 
 
 " Your predecessor, Haterius Nepos, liked it especially, and 
 took it to Eome." 
 
 " W^hy must it have been the Urania?" cried Titanus, in a 
 vexed tone. " That must not be wanting in the audience- 
 room of this astronomical emperor. What shall we do now?" 
 
 " It would be difficult to find another of exactly that size, 
 and we have no time to search. Another must be placed 
 there." 
 
 " In eight days?" 
 
 " And the same number of nights." 
 
 " But I beg you to consider. Before the marble — " 
 
 " Who would think of marble? Papias will make us one 
 out of straw, and canvas, and gy]')sum. I know his magic; 
 and that the others need not ai)i)i,':ir so different from this new- 
 born sister, they must all be white-washed. ' * 
 
 " Excellent; but why choose Papias, when we have a Har- 
 modius?" 
 
 " Harmodius is too serious an artist, and before he had even 
 finished his designs the emperor would be here. Papias has 
 thirty assistants, and docs Avhatever is ordered, if it only bring 
 him the gold. His last work, especially the Hygcia, for the 
 Jew iJositheos, and his bust of Plutarch for the Ca^sareum, 
 surprised me, they were so graceful and vigorous. No one can 
 tell whether the work is his own or that of his assistants. But 
 that is no matter, he knows how it is done, and if well jiaid, 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 37 
 
 could fm-nisli a whole mariue battle in marble within five 
 days.-" 
 
 ** Then give Papias the commission. But the pooi^ muti- 
 lated pavement — what can they do with that?'^ 
 
 " Gypsum and lydint must heal those wounds," answered 
 Pontius. AVhere that will not answer we must sjaread a carpet, 
 after the fashion of the Orient. But how dark it is here! Give 
 me the diagram, Keraunus, and j^rovide lamps and torches, 
 for the coming eight days will have each twenty-four full 
 hours. I beg you also, Titianus, for half a dozen reliable 
 slaves to serve as messengers. But why do you stand there, 
 man? I called for light. You have had half a life-time in 
 which to rest, and you can devote as many years again to the 
 same purpose, after the departure of the emperor. " 
 
 AVith these words the overseer slowly withdrew, but the 
 Pontius called after him: 
 
 " If you do not get lost in your own obesity. Is it blood or 
 Nile mud that flows in the veins of that monster?" 
 
 "' I care little," answered the prefect, "'if that restless fire 
 glow in yours to the end of the work. Be careful of doing too 
 much in the beginning, and do not attempt impossible things, 
 for Eome and the jvorld expect still greater things from you. 
 I shall write now to the emperor, quite satisfied that all will be 
 ready for him, upon the Lochias. And in takmg leave, I say, 
 faint-heartedness were folly when Pontius is at hand. " 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 The prefect commanded one of the lictors in waiting near 
 his chariot to hasten to his own house and conduct to the 
 architect certain trusty slaves whom he specified, also to bring 
 food and wine for his nourishment. Then he ascended the 
 chariot and drove through the Bruchiom, along the sea front, 
 to the magnificent building known as the Cffisareum. His 
 progress was slow, for the further he went the denser became 
 the crowd. Upon the high towers of the gates of the Csesa- 
 reum, opening toward the sea, were pans of burning pitch, 
 Avhich threw a clear light far over the water. To the left and 
 right of these gates rose two stately obelisks, upon the tojjs and 
 sides of which lamps had also been hung. " In honor of 
 Sabina," thought the prefect. "Whatever Pontius under- 
 takes is thoroughly done, and there could be no more super- 
 fluous work than to oversee his arrangements." 
 
 Occupied with such thoughts, he approached the illuminated 
 gate which led into the Temple of Julius Ca,'sar, founded by 
 
28 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Octavius, and ordered the charioteer to halt at the Egyptian 
 
 {wrtal leading to the imperial i^ala-ce. This palace had been 
 )uilt for Tiberius by the Alexandrians, and during later reigns 
 had been much enlarged and ornamented. A sacred hedge 
 separated it from the Temple of Cttsar, with which it was con- 
 nected by a colonnade. Many chariots stood before the en- 
 trance, and a host of black and white slaves waited near the 
 litters of their masters. Lictors pressed back the eager crowd 
 of sightseers. Officers leaned against the jDillars, and the 
 Eoman guard gathered close behind, with much rattling of 
 weapons and clang of trumpets, waiting release at the end of 
 their watch. All drew back resi^ectfully from the chariot of 
 the prefect, and as he walked through the lighted colonnade to 
 the Cffisareum, glancing at the countless masterpieces of sculj)t- 
 iire and mural painting, and passed the librar}^, he recalled 
 the months of labor and anxiety spent with the assistance of 
 Pontius in ^^reparing this palace, unused since the departure of 
 Titus for Judca, for the residence of Hadrian. 
 
 The empress was now occupying the apartments designed 
 for him and adorned with the choicest artistic collections, and 
 Titianus said to himself with regret that Sabina would allow 
 their removal most unwillingly to the j)alace u23on the Lochias. 
 Before reaching the sjDlendid hall, designed as an audience- 
 room for the emjjeror, he met the chamberlain of Sabina, who 
 conducted him at once to liis mistress. 
 
 This hall was uncovered in the summer, but now, during 
 the rainy season, and because Sabina always complained of the 
 cold, even in the warmer parts of the year, w^as jDrotected by a 
 coi^per roof shaped like an umbrella. As Titianus entered, he 
 l^erceived an atmosphere of agreeable warmth and fragrance. 
 The warmth came from stoves of most peculiar construction 
 Avhich had been placed in the middle of the apartment. One 
 of these rei^resented the forge of Vulcan — glowing coals were 
 laid before the bellows, which moved automatically. The god 
 and his companions surrounded the fire, holding tongs and 
 hammers. 
 
 : The other stove was a great silver bird's nest, in which char- 
 coal was also burning. Over the flame was suspended a bronze 
 bird, much like an eagle, which represented the soaring i^ho- 
 nix. Besides these, countless lamps of artistic design were 
 burning, and the ajoartment contained lounges and tables, 
 vases and statues, but the space was altogether disjjrojiortioned 
 to the number of persons assembled. Tlie prefect and Pontius 
 had arranged a room of smaller dimensions for the ordinary 
 receptions, but tlie empress had givcji this the ])reference. 
 
THE EMPEROE. 29 
 
 Tliis liigli-born and dignified statesman felt disijleased and 
 chagrinerl when he saw the Httle scattered grouj^s and heard 
 the repressed sentences and the unintelhgible murmur of 
 ■voices., but not one hearty and natural outburst. Loud talk- 
 ing hurt the empress^, a clear tone was her abhorrence; and yet 
 few men possessed a more vigorous voice than her husband, or 
 were less accustomed to constraint. 
 
 Sabina was in a reclining posture. Her feet were buried in 
 the woolly skin of a meadow-ox, and her limbs protected by a 
 do^^i coverlet. 
 
 Her head was stiffly erect. It was difficult to conceive how 
 such a thin neck could support the lofty fabric of reddish 
 blonde hair, with its strings of jjearl and chains of precious 
 stone. Her meager face appeared still more meager under 
 this mass of natural and artificial ornament, covering crown 
 and forehead. 
 
 Even in youth she could not have been beautiful; but the 
 features were regular, and the prefect said to himself as he 
 looked at the finely wrinkled, but red and white-j)ainted face, 
 that the artist who had received the commission a few years 
 before to sketch her as Venus Victrix had opportunity to pre- 
 serve a certain likeness to the original. 
 
 Titianus seized, wliile bowing profoundly, the ring-encum- 
 laered right hand which she extended to him, but drew back 
 quickly and thrust beneath her drapery, as if she feared this 
 carefully nursed plaything — this mere toy — might suffer harm. 
 She had returned the greeting of the prefect with all the 
 warmth at her command, for in former times he had been a 
 daily visitor at her house in Eome, and she was now meeting 
 him for the first time in Alexandria. For yesterday, exhaust- 
 ed by the voyage, she had been brought from the ship in a 
 closed litter to the Csesareum, and this morning, busy with 
 physicians, bathing-women, and hair-dressers, had declined re- 
 ceiving his visit. 
 
 " How do you endure this country ?^^ she asked, in faint, 
 exhausted voice, as if conversation were a burdensome and 
 quite fruitless occupation. " At noon the sun scorches, but in 
 the evening it is intolerably cold. "• 
 
 And she drew the drapery closer about her person, but 
 Titianus, pointing to the stoves, said: 
 
 " I thought we had broken the never-mighty sinews of the 
 Egyptian winter's bow. ' ' 
 
 " Still young and imaginative, still the poet,'' answered the 
 empress, wearily. " I met your wife two hours ago. Africa 
 
so THE EMPEnon. 
 
 docs not seem to agree with her. I was shocked to sec the 
 handsome matron Julia so changed. She docs not look well. '^ 
 
 " Years are the enemies of beauty.'' 
 
 " Certainly; but genuine beauty sometimes resists their 
 power." 
 
 " You are the living proof of your own assertion." 
 
 " That means I have grown old." 
 
 " No, but that you understand how to preserve beauty." 
 
 " Romancer/' murmured the empress, and her thin under 
 lip contracted. 
 
 ''The muses do not show favor to business of state." 
 
 " But he who sees things fairer than they really are, or gives 
 them more striking names than they deserve, I call him a poet, 
 a fanatic, a flatterer, as best befits." 
 
 Modesty always finds fitting words to turn off well-deserved 
 admiration." 
 
 "What means this foohsh skirmish with words," sighed 
 Sabina, sinking back into her chair; " you have been learning 
 that here, in the Museum; I have not. Yonder sits Favorinus, 
 the sophist. He is, perhaps, proving to the astronomer Ptole- 
 masus that the stars we think in the heavens are oulv flecks of 
 blood upon the eyeball. Florus, the historian, is discussing 
 the lofty theme; the poet Pancrates versifies the great thoughts 
 of the philosophers, and what weighty subject absorbs the 
 grammarian of the party you probably know better than I. 
 What is his name?" 
 
 " Apollonius." 
 
 " Hadrian calls him the mystic. The harder it is to under- 
 stand his words, the higher he ranks." 
 
 " One must dive for that which lies in the depths: what 
 floats on the surface every wave carries forward, and the chil- 
 dren use it for a plaything. Apollonius is very learned. " 
 
 "Then my husband should leave him with his books and his 
 pupils. He wished me to invite these people as guests. I 
 like Florus and Pancrates well enough — but the others I" 
 
 " I can show you how to be rid of Favorinus and Ptolema?us; 
 send them to the emperor. " 
 
 " For what purpose?" 
 
 " To entertain him." 
 
 " He has his i3laythings already," said Sabina, her lip ex- 
 pressing bitter scorn. 
 
 " His artistic eye rejoices in the wonderful beauty of An- 
 tinous, whom I have not yet had the pleasure of seeing." 
 
 " You are eager to behold this wonder?" 
 
 "Twill not deny it." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 31 
 
 " And yet you are seeking to put off the meeting Avith the 
 emperor/' asked Sabina, while a searching, distrustful exjjres- 
 sion gleamed in her small eyes. '*' Why do you wish to delay 
 the arrival of my husband?'^ 
 
 " Do I need to say," answered Titiauus, " how much I long 
 to see again, after four years' separation, my master, and the 
 friend of my youth, the best and wisest of men? What would 
 I give were he already here! Nevertheless, I wish, that in- 
 stead of eight, he would delay fifteen days." 
 
 " What is the matter?" 
 
 " A messenger has brought to-day a letter in which the em- 
 peror expresses the wish to reside, not here in the Ca^sareum, 
 but in the old palace on the Lochias." 
 
 At sound of these words, the brow of Sabina contracted, her 
 eyes fell, and drawing the under lip between her teeth, she 
 
 " Because / am here." 
 
 Titianus did not appear to notice her words, and went on, in 
 a light tone : 
 
 " Yonder there is a wide outlook, which from youth ujd he 
 has loved to find. But the old structure is mutilated, and 
 though I have already begun rejiairs, with the help of our effi- 
 cient architect Pontius, which will make a part of it habitable, 
 still the time is too short to arrange things properly." 
 
 " I wish to, see my husband here, the sooner the better," 
 broke in the empress, emphatically. Then she turned toward 
 the right side of the hall, and called: " Verus!" But her 
 voice was so weak it was not possible for him to hear, and 
 turning to the prefect, she asked: "I pray you, call to me 
 Verus, the Pretor Lucius Aurelius Verus. " 
 
 Titianus instantly obeyed her request. He had already 
 exchanged a friendly salute with this man on entering, but 
 had received no further notice. Titianus found Verus the cen- 
 ter of a group of men and women, who were all listening to 
 him. That which he was saying must have been very amus- 
 ing, for one could see that all his auditors were shaking with 
 laughter, yet dared not utter a sound which was so annoying 
 to the empress. As the prefect reached the group, a young 
 woman whose handsome head was crowned by a very moimtain 
 of little curls, touched Verus on the arm, saying: 
 
 " That is too much. If you go on after that fashion I shall 
 close my ears, as surely as my name is Balbilla. " 
 
 " And a descendant of King Antiochus," added Verus, with 
 a profound bow. 
 
33 THE EilPEIlOIl. 
 
 "Always the same," laughed the prefect, nodding to the 
 story-teller. " Sabiiia wishes to speak with you/' 
 
 '' Instantly/' answered Verus. " My story is true, and you 
 should all be thankful for it, since it has delivered us from the 
 tedious gramniariau, who is fastened upon my worthy fi-iend, 
 Favorinus, yonder. Your Alexandria i)leases me, Titiaiuis, 
 but it is not a great city like Kome. The peo2)le have not yet 
 forgotten how to wonder. They stand in astonishment. As I 
 have been out driving — " 
 
 " Your footmen should go before you with roses in their 
 liair and wings on then- shoulders, heralding you as the God 
 of Love." 
 
 " In honor of the Alexandrian ladies." 
 
 " As of the Eoman ladies in Eome, and the Attic women in 
 Athens," interrupted Balbilla. 
 
 " The footmen of the pretor are swifter than Parthian 
 steeds," cried the chamberlain of the empress. "He calls 
 them the winds." 
 
 "Which they deserve," added Verus. " Come now, Tit- 
 ian us." 
 
 He laid his arm confidentially in that of the prefect, who 
 was a kinsman, and wliispered in his ear, as they approached 
 the emi^ress: 
 
 " In the interest of the emperor I let them remain." 
 
 The sophist, Favorinus, who, on the other side of the room, 
 was conversing with Ptoleniii^us, the astronomer, Apollonius, 
 the grammarian, and Pancrates, the jioet, looked after the two 
 men, exclaiming: 
 
 " A handsome pair! One the very personification of sov- 
 ereign, majestic Eome, the other with the figure of Mercury — " 
 
 " The other," broke in the grammarian, " is the image of 
 haughtiness, and carries extravagance and luxury to madness, 
 and to the shameful ruin of the city. This foolish A\'om.an- 
 hero— " 
 
 " I do notAvish to judge his conduct," interrupted Favorinus 
 with a loud voice, and a fine accentuation of the Greek 'which 
 charmed the ear of the grammarian. "' His actions are dis- 
 graceful, but you must allow that he bears the charm of true 
 Hellenic beauty, that the Charities kissed him at his birth, and 
 that, though he may be condemned by the strictest laws of 
 virtue, his beauty deserved laudation." 
 
 " For the artist who needs a model he would be a toothsome 
 morsel. " 
 
 • " The Athenian judges made Phryue free because she was 
 beautiful." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 33 
 
 " In that they did wrong," 
 
 " Not in the estimation of the gods, whose most perfect 
 works deserve respect. " 
 
 "' One may find j)oison in the costhest vessels." 
 
 " But body and soul correspond to a certain extent.^' 
 
 " Would you venture to call the handsome Verus, also, the 
 excellent?" 
 
 " No; but the dissolute Lucius Aurelius Verus is also the 
 most cheerful and gracious of all the Romans, and far from 
 any malice, though unrestrained by severe virtue, expects to 
 gain whatever he desires, and at the same time succeeds in 
 making every one pleased Avith him.'^ 
 
 ' ' He might have saved himself the effort so far as I am con- 
 cerned." 
 
 " I give him the credit he deserves." 
 
 This conversation was carried- on in a louder tone than was 
 usual in presence of the empress. Sabina, who had just'been 
 telling the pretor of her hnsband's desire, shrugged her shonl- 
 ders and moved her lips as if in pain; but as Verus turned his 
 face toward the speakers, his eyes met the hostile expression ia 
 those of x\i3ollonius. Personal dislike was intolerable to Verus, 
 and instead of answering the question of Sabina as to his opin- 
 ion of the emperor's residence while in Alexandria, he said: 
 
 '' This logomachist is a very disagreeable fellow, and has an 
 eye that threatens us all, and his trumpet-toned voice is as un- 
 pleasant to you as to me. Must we have him at the table 
 daily?" 
 
 '• Hadrian wishes it." 
 
 " Then I shall return to Eome. My wife has been wanting 
 to return to the children without me, and as pretor, I am bet- 
 ter off beside the Tiber than the Nile."' 
 
 These words were spoken as lightly as though having refer- 
 ence simply to the meal of the present evening, but they seemed 
 to excite the emj)ress, for the shook her head — which had been 
 motionless during all her conversation with the jDrefect — so posi- 
 tively that the pearls and gems rattled in her head-gear. 
 Then she stared for a few seconds into her lap. While Verus 
 bowed to jDick up a diamond which had fallen from her hair, 
 she said quickly: 
 
 " You are right. Apollonius is quite unendurable. We 
 will send him to meet the emperor.^' 
 
 '•' Then I shall sta}'^," said Verus, satisfied as a pleased child 
 who has gained his jjoint. 
 
 " Whirlwind!" ejaculated Sabina, and threatened liim play- 
 fully with the finger. 
 
34 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 ** 8I10W mc the gtone: it is one of the largest and i^urest. 
 You may keeij it/' 
 
 When Verus left the hall in the comimny of the prefect, an 
 hour later, he said: 
 
 " You have unconsciously done me a service, cousin. Can 
 you not arrange to send Ptolema^us and Favorinus with Apol- 
 lonius to Pelusium?" 
 
 " Xothiug could be easier, '^ Avas the answer. 
 
 On the same evening, the steward of the prefect brought 
 M'ord to the arcliitect Pontius, that instead of eight or nine 
 days, he might count upon fourteen for his work. 
 
 CHAPTEK IV. 
 
 One light after another had been extinguished in the 
 CaBsareum, the residence of the empress; but in the palace on 
 the Lochias they burned brighter and brighter. It was the 
 custom, on all festal illuminations of the harbor, to burn joans 
 of pitch on the roof, and light long rows of lamps, arranged 
 'with arcliitectonical skill; but since one could remember, no 
 such light had been seen in the interior. The harbor watch- 
 men looked anxiously toward tbe Lochias, fearing a fire had 
 broken out in the old palace. But they were soon relieved 
 by a lictor of the jjrefect, who brought an order to allow all in 
 the employ of the head architect Pontius ingress and egress 
 through the gates on this and every following night until the 
 arrival of the emperor. And not a single quarter hour passed 
 Hntil long after midnight, in which those whom Pontius had 
 summoned or sent out were not passing through the gates, 
 which, though not closed, were well guarded. 
 
 Lights were also burning in the little house of the gate- 
 keeper. The birds and the cat belonging to the old M'oman 
 whom the jarefect and his companion had foiuid fast asleep near 
 the wine-cup were again asleeij, but the little dogs i^lmigcd 
 barking into the court with every new arrival. 
 
 " But, Aglaia, what will they think of j'ou? Loveliest 
 Thalia, do behave yourself like a good little beast I Come 
 here, Eujihrosyne, and be reasonable!" cried the old woman, 
 who, now fully awake, had been folding her clothes fi-om the 
 wash, and stood behind her table, with kindly but authoritative 
 manner. The barking dogs, who bore the names of the Graces, 
 gave little heed to the friendly call; to their own disadvantage, 
 certainly, for each of them had more than once occasion — 
 when they met the foot of a new-comer into the court — to i-un 
 crying and ^vhiuillg into the house, and nestle up to their mis- 
 
THE EMrEKOR. 35 
 
 tress for comfort. She took them up every time, and quieted 
 them with caresses and coaxing words. 
 
 The old woman was no longer alone, for stretched on a 
 lounge behind the Apollo lay a tall, lank man, dressed in a red 
 chiton. A hanging lamp cast a feeble light upon him and the 
 lute he was playing. He hummed an accompaniment, repeat- 
 ing the same strain, two, three, four times. Sometimes he 
 sung in loud and not unpleasant voice a few sentences, with 
 artistic expression and execution. Sometimes, when the dogs 
 barked too loudly, he would spring up and rush into the court 
 with lute in one hand and a long pliant reed in the other, 
 screeching the names of the dogs, and with apparently mur- 
 derous designs; but skillfully avoiding their bodies, he let his 
 blows fall on the pavement. When he returned to his resting- 
 place, the old woman w^ould cry, pointing to the lamp which 
 his head had disturbed in the mad rush: 
 
 " Euphorion — the oil!'" 
 
 He invariably answered, with the same threatening motion of 
 the hand and a rolling of the eyeballs: 
 
 " Wretched little beasts!'" 
 
 The zealous musician might have been devoted perhaps an 
 hour to his instrument, when the dogs again rushed into the 
 court, not barking, but with expressions of delight. The old 
 woman laid down her work and listened attentively, but the 
 lute-player said: 
 
 " The emperor sends as many birds in advance as gulls be- 
 fore a storm; if they would only leave us in peace!" 
 
 " Take care, that is Pollux; I know the dogs,"' exclaimed 
 the woman, hastening over the threshold. 
 
 There stood the expected one, lifting each of the four-footed 
 Graces by the hair of its back, and giving each nose a tweak. 
 When he saw the old woman he seized her head with both 
 hands, and kissed her forehead. 
 
 "Good-evening, little mother."' Then he waved his hand 
 to the singer, and cried, " Be saluted, great father!" 
 
 " Not much smaller than I am," answered the man, draw- 
 ing the youth toward himself, and laying the palm of his hand, 
 first on his own gray hair, and then on the brown locks of his 
 first-born. 
 
 " Made after the same pattern," cried the youth. And in 
 truth he strongly resembled his father; but it was as a noble 
 steed can resemble a poor horse, as marble the rough limestone, 
 or a fir-tree, the cedar. Both were of stately figure, had dark 
 eyes and thick hair, and noses of similar shape; but the cheer- 
 fulness which irradiated the face of the youth he had not in- 
 
36 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 herited from his father, but from the little woman who looked 
 up into his face while she caressed his arm. 
 
 But whence came that air of nobility,, that indescribable 
 something in his eyes, and the noble arch' of his forehcadj 
 
 " I knev yon were coming," said his mother. " I dreamed 
 it this af tc i-noon, and M'ill prove that you did not take me by 
 surprise. Yoiider, on the chafing-dish, is the stewed cabbage 
 and sausage waiting for you.'^ 
 
 " I can not stay now; truly I can not, in spite of your smil- 
 ing face and favorite dish. My master Papias has gone on- 
 ward, and wonders are to be accomjDlishcd in the palace within 
 a very short time. " 
 
 " Then I will take the cabbage to 5'ou into the castle/' said 
 Doris, holding a sausage to the mouth of her son. 
 
 Pollux eat vigorously, and said, while chewing: 
 
 "Excellent! I wish the thing I have to shape up there 
 would as surely be a good statue as this soft cylinder, which 
 has just disappeared, made a good sausage.'' 
 
 " Will you have another?" asked Doris. 
 
 *' No, mother; and you need not briiig anything to me in 
 the palace; a moment must not be lost until after midnight; 
 and even if I can stop then, you will have been long dreaming 
 all sorts of things." 
 
 " I will bring the cabbage," said his father, " for it will be 
 long before I can go to rest. The hymn to Sabina, which 
 Mesomedes has written, is to be sung by the choir the first 
 time she visits the theater, and I have to take the highest part 
 among the old men. The rehearsal comes to-morrow, and I 
 do not yet know it. Every note of the old tune sticks m my 
 throat, but the new, the new — " 
 
 " That will come later," laughed Pollux. 
 
 " IC you coidd only put your father's guitar-plajing and 
 his ' Theseus ' on exhibition," cried Doris. 
 
 " Wait a little, and I will recommend him to the emperor, 
 when — as the Phidias of his time — he will be proud to call me 
 friend. Then he will ask: 'Who brought you u])?' and I 
 shall say: ' It was Euphorion, the godlike poet and musician; 
 my mother also is a worthy matron. She is Doris, who keeps 
 the palace gate and bleaches the linen.' " These words the 
 young artist sung in a fine, vigorous voice, after the style of 
 his father. 
 
 " If you had only been a singer!" cried Euphorion. 
 
 " Then I woidd have the prospect of spending the evening 
 of my days in this little house as your successor. 
 
THE EMPEROH. 37 
 
 " Now you are planting, for a petty reward, the laurels with 
 which Papias adorns himself/' answered the old man. 
 
 " But his hour will come, and he will be recognized/' broke 
 in Doris. " I saw him in my dream, with a great wreath over 
 his locks. " 
 
 " Patience, father, patience," said the youth, seizing his 
 father's hand. " I am young and vigorous, and whatever I 
 am doing, here, behind my forehead, swarm the good ideas. 
 What I have ventured to bring out have at least made others 
 famous; and although all is yet very far below the inward 
 ideal, yet I look forward to a time when I shall be something 
 more than the pitiably jDaid right hand of PajDias, who, up 
 there now without nie, does not know what to do." 
 
 " Only be always cheerful and diligent," cried Doris. 
 
 " That will help little, without luck," murmured Euphorion, 
 shrugging his shoulders. 
 
 The young sculptor said farewell to his parents, and was 
 hastening away; but his mother detained him to look at the 
 tiny goldfinch which had burst its shell only the day before. 
 Pollux delayed wilhngly, not alone to gratify her, but because 
 he felt pleasure in looking at the pretty bird which guarded 
 and warmed its young. Near the cage stood the wine-tankard 
 and the cup which he had himself adorned for his mother. 
 His look fell on these vessels, which he silently moved back 
 and forth. At last, gathering courage, he said, laughingly: 
 
 " The emperor will often pass here, mother. Give up the 
 celebration of your Dionysian revel. What if you limit your- 
 self to one part wine and three parts water? It is very palat- 
 able thus." 
 
 " It is a shame to neglect the good gifts," answered the old 
 woman. 
 
 " One quarter wine, to please me," begged Pollux, seizing 
 the shoulders of his mother and kissing her forehead. 
 
 " To please you, great boy?" asked Doris. " Yes, to please 
 you, I will drink only miserable water! Euphorion, you can 
 have the rest of this wine!" 
 
 The architect Pontius had begun his active labors, 
 at first only by those who had followed him on foot. Measur- 
 ing, planning, sending out orders, making estimates, jotting 
 down his calculations on wax tablets. Not one moment was 
 lost. 
 
 He was often interrupted by the agents of factories, whose 
 activity he had claimed. They came at a very late hour, 
 having been summoned in the name of the jDrefect, Among 
 
38 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the latest came the sculptor Papias, althongb Pontius had writ- 
 ten with his own hand that he had a remunerative work for 
 him in the interest of the emperor, which needed instant atten- 
 tion, and might perhaps be commenced that very night. 
 
 Tliis was a statue of Urania, to be finished in ten days, after 
 the style of one he had prepared at the late feast of Adonis, 
 but of a size that he, Pontius, would prescribe, and that must 
 be done on the Lochias. Also, there were other restorations 
 which must be as quickly done, and the price was to be agreed 
 upon between them. 
 
 The sculptor was a circumspect man, and brought with him 
 his best assistant, Pollux, the son of the gate-keeper, and many 
 slaves, who transported upon wagons and carts the tools, 
 boards, clay, gypsum, and other materials. Upon their way 
 to the Lochias, Papias had described the affair to Pollux, and 
 proposed, in a condescending tone, that he should have oppor- 
 tunity to display his skill ill the restoration of Urania. At 
 the palace gate he suggested a call upon his i^arents, while he 
 should go on alone to make the arrangements with Pontius. 
 The apprentice understood his master. He knew that he would 
 lay upon him the burden of the work, and then, after a few 
 unimportant changes, claim it as his own. The same experi- 
 ence had been gone through more than once within the last two 
 years, and he accepted it to-day without opposition, for with 
 his master there was no other way; and besides, this creative 
 work was to him the highest of all enjoyment. 
 
 Papias, to whom he had gone for instruction, and to whom 
 he owed all he had learned, Avas no niggard; and Pollux need- 
 ed the wages — not only for himself, but to sujoport a widowed 
 sister and her cliildren. He enjoyed, too, making the home 
 comfortable for his parents, and helping his brother Teuker, 
 who was learning the art of gem-cutting, through his ap- 
 prenticeship. Sometimes he thought seriously of saying to his 
 employer that he would stand on his own feet and earn his 
 own laurels; but the fear of what might become of those de- 
 pendent on liim, in case of failure, always deterrred him from 
 relinquishing his present stipend. 
 
 Of what use his ability and his honest purpose, if no oppor- 
 tunity should offer to begin with costly materials, which he 
 could not procure out of his own means? 
 
 While he chatted with his parents, Papias was negotiating 
 with the architect. Pontius pointed out what must he done. 
 Papias listened attentively, stroking u beard and face already 
 as smooth as a wax mask, and laying the folds of his costly 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 39 
 
 toga — which he wore after the style of a Eoman senator — in 
 new folds. 
 
 When Pontius came to the last— a statue which needed a 
 new arm — Papias said, decisively: 
 
 " It can not be done. " 
 
 " That is a rash conclusion/' said the architect. " Do you 
 not know the maxim, uttered by more than one shrewd man, 
 ' that it is as unwise to call a thing impossible as to boast of 
 being able to accomplish what is probably beyond our skill?' " 
 
 Papias laughed, stared at his gold shoe buckles, and said: 
 
 " It is more difficult for sculptors, who always handle im- 
 wieldy masses, to enter into a Titanic conflict with the impos- 
 sible. I do not yet see the means which might give me cour- 
 age to undertake this work." 
 
 " I will enumerate them," said Pontius, quickly and firmly. 
 " On your side, good will, many assistants and vigils; on ours, 
 the approbation of the emperor and plenty of gold." 
 
 After these words, the negotiation took a more successful 
 course, and Pontius was compelled in . most cases to assent to 
 the clever plans of Papias. 
 
 '* I am now going home," concluded the sculptor. " My 
 assistant will begin the work immediately. It must go on 
 within an inclosure, to avoid disturbance and comments which 
 would delay us. " 
 
 Half an hour later a frame- work had been erected, within 
 which the Urania was to stand. This was covered with strong- 
 linen, through wliich one could not look, and behind it Pollux 
 was already busy forming a model in wax, while his master 
 went home to hasten preparations for the work of the next day. 
 
 It wanted only an hour of midnight, and still the meal sent 
 to Pontius from the house of the prefect stood untouched. 
 Pontius was hungry; but before allowing himself to partake of 
 the tempting provision, felt it his duty to make another round 
 of the apartments, to see if the slaves occupied in cleaning the 
 rooms were properly directed and had everything needful for 
 their work. More light was everywhere requisite, and while 
 those cleaning the floor of the hall of the Muses were complain- 
 ing of this need, a head appeared above the frame-work sur- 
 rounding the Urania, and a voice cried : 
 
 " My muse, with her celestial globe, stands beside the star- 
 gazer, and would sing her best in the night-time, but not until 
 she is finished. In order to do this, one must have light, 
 much light." 
 
 " And if it were brighter here, the noise of those below 
 
40 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 would not be so disagreeable. Create light, oh man, for my 
 goddess and for thy needy fellow-beings I" 
 
 Pontius was amused, and answered: 
 
 " Your demand is just, my friend. But do you really think 
 light would have power to deaden sound?" 
 
 " Where light fails," replied Pollux, " i. e., in the darkness, 
 every sound seems doubled." 
 
 " That is true, but I think we must seek some other ground 
 of explanation. In the morning we will talk it over at some 
 leisure moment. Now I must seek the lamps and candles." 
 
 " For that will Urania, who watches over the fine arts, thank 
 you," cried Pollux after the architect. He went on his way 
 to ask the head workman if he had carried his orders to the 
 overseer for an abundant suj^ply of light. 
 
 " Three times," was the repl)% ''' 1 have been to him, but 
 he only puffed out like a frog and said notliing, leaving me to 
 his daughter — whom you ought to see, for she is charming — 
 and a miserable negro slave led me into a little room, where I 
 found the few lamps which are burning." 
 
 " Did you give him my order to come?" 
 
 '' Three hours ago, for the second time, while you were talk- 
 ing with Papias. " The architect turned, and unrolling the 
 plan of the palace, found easily the dwelHng of the overseer, 
 seized one of the small lamps of red clay, and made his way in 
 that direction. Through a door that was not locked he en- 
 tered a dark vestibule, which led into a small apartment, and 
 through that into one larger and well furnished. From thi!>, 
 evidently the sitting- and dining-room of the establishmer.t, 
 passages without doors and protected only by curtains, led i;i 
 different directions, Pontius could overlook the table withoi t 
 being observed, and on Avhich stood a few dishes and a three- 
 armed bronze lamp. A corpulent man Avith a flushed face ?iit 
 facing the entrance, through which the indignant architect 
 would have entered with little ceremony had he not been ar- 
 rested by the sound of sobbing. This evidently came from a 
 girl of slender figure, who entered by an opposite door, bearing 
 a plate of bread, which she placed on the table near the over- 
 seer, 
 
 " Don't cry, Selene," said he, breaking the bread slowly, 
 
 " Why should I not weep?" answered the girl, " Please 
 let me buy a piece of meat only for you. The physician for- 
 bade you to eat bread alone." 
 
 ' (Jne must satisfy his hunger. Meat is costly, I have 
 nine mouths to fill without counting the slaves. Where shall 
 I get the means to feed them all with meat?" 
 
THE EMPEROR. 41 
 
 " We do not need it, but you must have it." 
 
 " It will not do, child. The butcher will give no more on 
 trust, the other creditors threaten, and by the end of the month 
 we will have no more than ten drachmas left.'" 
 
 The girl turned pale, and said, anxiously: " But, father, you 
 showed me three gold pieces this morning as your share of a 
 gift the empress had made the citizens.'^ 
 
 The overseer chewed a piece of bread in an embarrassed 
 manner, and replied: 
 
 _ " With that I bought this buckle with the carved onyx — 
 ridiculously cheap it was, too. When the emperor comes he 
 must see who I am; and if I should die, any one will give 
 twice as much for it as I paid. I assure you the gift of the em- 
 press has been well invested." 
 
 Selene did not answer, but she drew a heavy sigh, and her 
 thoughts ran over many useless things which he had bought be- 
 cause they were "cheap," while she and her seven brothers 
 and sisters were wanting absolute necessities. 
 
 " Father,^' said the girl, after a short silence, " I do not like 
 to speak of it again, but I must, even though you may be 
 angry. The chief architect who directs the work in the palace 
 has already sent twice for you." 
 
 "Be silent," said he, striking his fist on the table. " Who 
 is this Pontius, and who am I?" 
 
 " You are of noble Macedonian origin, perhaps even con- 
 nected with the kingly house of Ptolemy, and have a seat in 
 the assembly of citizens — but for this time, please be conde- 
 scending and gracious. The man has his hands full and is 
 tired — " 
 
 " Neither have I been able to sit still to-day. It is as hard 
 for me as for him. I am Keramius, son of Ptolemteus, whose 
 father came into Egypt with the great Alexander, and helped 
 found the city; that everybody knows. Our patrimony has 
 diminished, but for that very reason I insist all the more that 
 our noble blood shall be acknowledged. Pontius summons 
 Keraunus! If it were not revolting, it would be ridiculous, 
 for, who is this man? Who? I have told you already. His 
 grandfather was a freedman of the late Prefect Claudius Bal- 
 billus, and through the favor of the Romans his father came 
 here and grew rich. He descended from slaves; and do you 
 think that I shall act the part of an obedient servant whenever 
 he chooses to call?" 
 
 " But, father, father, he did not summon the son of Ptole- 
 mtvus, but the overseer of this palace." 
 
 " All subterfuge. Be silent — I will not take one step toward 
 
42 THE EMPEIJOR. 
 
 him." The girl hiil her fjice in her hands, sobbing piteously. 
 Keniunus visibly shrunk, and cried out: 
 
 " By the great Serapis, I can not bear this. What is the use 
 of whimpering?'^ Then the girl took heart, and coming 
 nearer, said, her words more than once interrupted by tears: 
 
 " You must go, father, indeed you must. I sj)oke with the 
 head workman, and he said in a cold, decided way, that Pon- 
 tius was here in the name of the emperor, and if you did not 
 yield to him, he would put you out of office. And if that 
 should happen! Oh, father, think of the blind Helios and the 
 poor Berenice. Arsinoe and I can earn our bread, but the 
 children!'" With these words, she fell on her knees and raised 
 her hands to the stubborn man. 
 
 The blood had risen to his head and eyes, and with fingers 
 rambling over his forehead, he sunk into his chair as if under 
 a stroke of paralysis. His daughter sprung up and gave him 
 the cup of wine and water that stood on the table, but Ke- 
 raunus waved her off, and exclaimed, with a visible effort in 
 breathing: 
 
 " Put me out of my office! Drive me away from the palace! 
 Yonder in the ebony chest lies the written testimony of Euer- 
 getes that this ofRce was a hereditary dignity in the family of 
 my ancestor Philip. The wife of this Philip had the honor of 
 being the mistress — some said she was the daughter of the 
 king. The document is on yellow parchment, written in red 
 and black ink, and bears the seal and autograjjh of the second 
 Euergetes. All the j^rinces of the house of Lagus have con- 
 firmed it; it has been honored by all the Eoman prefects; and 
 now, now — " 
 
 " But, father,'' broke in the girl, addressing the man, who 
 was wringing his hands in despair, '* you are still in office, and 
 if you only accommodate yourself — ' ' 
 
 " Accommodate myself!" shaking his fat hands over his 
 flushed face. '' I will accommodate myself. I will not plunge 
 you into misfortune. I Avill go at once, and for the sake of 
 my children let myself be trodden upon and abused. Like the 
 pelican, I will nourish my children with the blood of my own 
 heart. But you ought to know what it costs me thus to 
 humiliate myself. It is unbearable, and my heart will burst, 
 for this architect has reviled me as if I were his servant — he 
 has uttered the villainous wish that I might be drown(;d in my 
 own fat — me, wliom the physician threatens with ajioplexy. 
 Let me alone — let me alone. I know that all is possible to 
 the Komans. Well, bring my crocus-colored pallium that I 
 
THE EMPEEOE. 43 
 
 wear in the council^, and my golden fillefc. I will adorn myself 
 like an offering for sacrifice, and show him — " 
 
 Not a word of this conversation had escaped Pontius, which 
 had vexed, amused, and stirred him to pity. His own vigor- 
 ous nature resented the drawling and indolent existence of the 
 man whose tardy indifference had excited the utterance of 
 words which he now regretted having spoken. The foolish 
 and beggarly pride had made him angry; and who ever likes 
 to hear boast of an origin to which the sj^eaker adds no glory? 
 
 But the wail of this wretched man's daughter had touched 
 his heart. He knew that a single word from his lips would dis- 
 place the 230or simpleton, and bring him lower than ever. But 
 he chose to follow the kindly impulse of his better nature, and 
 spare the unfortunate family. 
 
 So he knocked vigorously on the door-post, coughed loud, 
 and said, as he stepped over the threshold: 
 
 " I came, noble Keraimus, to pay my respects, as is becom- 
 ing. Forgive the lateness of the hour, but you scarcely know 
 how busy I have been since we parted. " 
 
 Keraunus was at first frightened, then bewildered. And 
 then stepping nearer, and stretching out both hands, as if freed 
 from an Alpine weight, such a shimmer of hearty enjoyment 
 spread over his face, Pontius wondered at its really good ex- 
 pression. 
 
 " Take a place at our modest table,'' he begged. " Go, 
 Selene, and call the slaves. Perhaps we can find a pheasant in 
 the larder, a roast fowl, or some tiling of the sort; though the 
 hour be late. " 
 
 " I thank you," said the architect smiling; '' my supper 
 waits in the Hall of the Muses, and I must go back to the 
 workmen. I should be glad to have you accompany me, as I 
 want to consult you about the lighting of the palace, and we 
 can better discuss the subject over a juicy roast and a swallow 
 of wine. " 
 
 " I am entirely at your service," said Keraunus, bowing. 
 
 " I will go in advance," said Pontius. "Please have the 
 goodness to give all you possess of lamps, candles, and cressets 
 to the slave who will wait your order in a few moments." 
 
 As Pontius left, Selene said, drawing a deeja breath: 
 
 " Oh, this anxiety! I will go and find the lamps. How 
 frightfully all this might have ended!" 
 
 It is well that things have so happened," murmured 
 Keraunus; " tliis architect is really a fine fellow, considering 
 his origin." 
 
44 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 Pontius had sought the dwelling of the overseer with a 
 frown upon his brow, but returned smiling. To the foreman, 
 M'ho met him with an inquiring look, he said: " The overseer 
 was a little sensitive, naturally; but now we are friendly, and 
 he will do what he can to light the building/' 
 
 In the Hall of the Muses he stopped before the 2)artition, 
 and cried: '' Friend sculptor, listen to me; it is high time for 
 supper. " 
 
 " Certainly," answered Pollux, " else we must call it break- 
 fast. '^ 
 
 " Then, quarter of an hour hence, lay aside your tools, and 
 help me, in company with the overseer of this j)alace, to an- 
 nihilate the provisions sent me from the house of the prefect. ■" 
 
 " You will nefed no other assistance, if Keraunus is there. 
 All food disappears before him as ice before the sun.'" 
 
 "Then deliver him from the temjDtation to overload liis 
 stomach. " 
 
 " Impossible; for I have just made a merciless attack on a 
 dish of cabbage with sausage. My mother has prej^ared this 
 food fit for the gods, and my father brought it to his eldest 
 son.'' 
 
 " Cabbage with sausage," exclaimed Pontius, in a tone that 
 suggested how gladly his hungry stomach would come into 
 closer relations with such a dish. 
 
 " Come in," cried Pollux, " and be my guest. The cab- 
 bage foreshadows what impends in this palace. It has been 
 warmed over." 
 
 " Warmed-over cabbage tastes better than fresh; but the fire 
 at which we seek to make this palace habitable is too hot, and 
 must be poked too vigorously. The best things have been car- 
 ried away, and can not be recovered." 
 
 " Just like the sausage, which I have fished out of the cab- 
 bage," laughed the sculptor. 
 
 * I can not honestly invite you to be my guest, without flat- 
 tering the provision when I call it cabbage with sausage. I 
 have ti-eated it as if mining, and since the sausage digging has 
 nearly exhausted it, there only remains the ground stull", in 
 wliich two or three harmless fragments remain, to remind one 
 of tlie former riches — another- time my mother will cook the 
 dish for you; she prepares it with inimitable skill." 
 
 " That is a good thought, but to-day you must be my guest." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 45 
 
 " I am already surfeited." 
 
 " Then you shall season our meal with your good nature." 
 
 " Forgive me, sir, and allow me to remain in my cupboard. 
 In the first place, I am in excellent condition to press forward 
 with the work to-night — " 
 
 " And to-morrow also. " 
 
 " Hear me through." 
 
 "Very well." 
 
 " You would render your second guest a poor service by in- 
 viting me." 
 
 " Do you know the overseer?" 
 
 " From a child; I am a son of the gate-keeper of this pal- 
 ace." 
 
 " So, then, you are from the pretty little house with the ivy, 
 and the birds and the cheery old woman?" 
 
 " She is my mother, and so soon as her favorite butcher pre- 
 pares another sausage, will cook us another dish of cabbage." 
 
 " That is a pleasant prospect." 
 
 " There comes the mill-horse, or, on nearer view, the over- 
 seer Keraunus. " 
 
 " Are you at loggerheads with him?" 
 
 " I with him, no; but he with me, yes. It is a stupid story. 
 Do not ask for it at our anticipated feast, if you want a jolly 
 companion. Do not tell Keraunus that I am here — it will lead 
 to nothing good." 
 
 " As you wish; but here come our lamps. ^^ 
 
 " There are enough to illuminate the under world," cried 
 Pollux, making a joarting salute to the architect as he disap- 
 peared behind the screen, to work with renewed diligence on 
 his model. 
 
 :i: ***** * 
 
 It was long after midnight when the slaves, having finished 
 their work in the Hall of the Muses, were at liberty to sleep on 
 straw spread for that purpose in another part of the palace. 
 The architect also wished to refresh himself by a short nap for 
 the duties of the following day; but between this wish and its 
 fulfillment stood the corpulent figure of his guest. 
 
 He had invited this man, whom he found eating bread to 
 spare the meat, to dii:ic with him, in order to satisfy his appe- 
 tite, and had found him entirely responsive to the opportunity. 
 After the last dish had been removed, he sought to impress 
 upon his host the honor conferred by his own presence. The 
 good wine of the j^refect loosened his tongue and made him 
 speak too freely of personal matters. Pontius, seeking to 
 divert conversation to other topics, inadvertently mentioned 
 
46 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the council of citizens. This turned the stream of his elo- 
 quence, and, while he emjitied cup after cup, he expatiated on 
 a measure attemjjted among his own particular friends to take 
 away the rights of citizenship from the Jews of Alexandria, 
 and drive them from the city. His zeal was so intense that, 
 quite forgetting the \vell-knovvn origin of his host, he declared 
 it necessary to include all descendants of slaves in this edict. 
 Pontius knew, from his glowing cheeks and e3'es, that the wine 
 was sjieaking through him, and made no answer. But he de- 
 termined not to curtail any longer the sleep he so much need- 
 ed. So, excusing himself, he left the table and sought the 
 apartment in which a bed had been j)repared for him. After 
 he was ready for sleep, he sent his slaves to look after Kerau- 
 nus, and they reported him as fast asleep and snoring. 
 
 " Listen," said one of them; " you can hear it from here. 
 I put a cusliion under his head, for so fat a man might hm-t 
 himself.'' 
 
 Love is a plant that grows for the use of many who have 
 neither sowed or nurtured it, and for whom it becomes a shady 
 tree. 
 
 How little had Keraunus done to win the heart of his daugh- 
 ter — and how much that could not fad to make her young life 
 unhappy! 
 
 Selene sat by the three-armed lamp, watchful and anxious 
 over the prolonged absence of her father, though her nmeteen- 
 year-old body needed sleep to refresh her for the cares and 
 burdens of another day. One week before, her father had sud- 
 denly lost consciousness; and though it was only for a few mo- 
 ments, the physician had told her it was necessary that he fol- 
 low strictly his directions, and that he must avoid all excesses. 
 A single imprudence, he had assured her, might snap the 
 thread of life. After her father went out with the architect, 
 Selene had seated herself to mend the clothing of the younger 
 children. Arsinoe, the sister two years her jiuiior, was fully 
 able to share this task, but had gone early to rest, to watch 
 over the little ones through the night. The old slave, who 
 had served her family since the day of her grandparents, would 
 have assisted gladly, but her feeble eyes could no longer see 
 the stitches; so Selene sent her to rest, and undertook the work 
 alone. For an hour she served without looking up, calculating 
 the chances of making the few drachmas on which she could 
 depend last to the end of the month. As it became later she 
 grew more and more tired, and though her head often sunk 
 upon lier breast, she still tried to keep on with the work. She 
 
THE EMPEROR. , 47 
 
 must wait her father's return to give liim the drink prescribed 
 by the physician^, or he would surely forget it. At the end of 
 the second hour sleep overcame her, and it seemed to her that 
 the chair on which she sat fell apart, and she began to sink, 
 slowly at first, but then faster and faster, into a deep chasm. 
 Seeking help, she looked upward, but could see only the face 
 of her father, gazing indifferently upon her. In the course of 
 her dream she called him again and again, but for a long 
 time he did not seem to hear. Finally, he looked down, and 
 laughed when he saw her; but instead of helping her up, gath- 
 ered stones and bits of sod from the side of the chasm and 
 threw them down upon the fingers with which she was clasp- 
 ing the blackberry vines and the roots growing in the clefts of 
 the rock. 
 
 She begged him to give up the sport; she implored him to 
 help her, but not a muscle of his face moved. The features 
 seemed stiffened into that empty smile; truly his fatherly heart 
 was dead, for he continued pelting her pitilessly with pebbles 
 and bits of earth, until her hands lost their grasp, and she was 
 smking into the abyss. Her own cry roused her, but she did 
 not at once waken fully. As she came out of the dream, she 
 seemed to see clouds parting behind a soft meadow, covered 
 with high grass and starred with flowers, on which she was 
 lying; and near it shimmered a sea, and beyond this rose 
 mountains with red-tinted rocks and green forests in the clear 
 sunshine. A fair sky, over which floated silvery clouds, was 
 above all. It was but for a moment, and the picture vanished, 
 which was utterly unlike anything she had ever seen. She had 
 slept but a short time, but as she rubbed her eyes it seemed 
 that the dream had lasted for hours. One flame of her lamp 
 had well-nigh gone out. She trimmed it, put in fresh oil, 
 then ran to her father's room. He had not yet returned. 
 Now she was really distressed. Had the wine of the architect 
 destroyed his senses? Had he been seized with dizziness on the 
 way home? In fancy she saw the corpulent man unable to 
 rise, and perhaps dying on the ground. There was no choice. 
 She must go to the Hall of the Muses, and see what was the 
 matter; help him up if he had fallen; or if still at the banquet, 
 persuade him to return home. The interests of all hung in 
 the balance — the life of her father, support and protection for 
 eight helpless beings. 
 
 The December night was raw. The air in the poorly protect- 
 ed passages was bitterly cold; but Selene tied a scarf over her 
 head, and wrapped a mantle which had belonged to her dead 
 mother about her shoulders. She held the lamp in one trem- 
 
48 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 bling hand, and with the other guarded the flame from the 
 strong draught. The heavy sandals bound under her feet woke 
 loud echoes in the empty spaces, and excited her timidity, 
 especially under the cupola where Ptolemy Euergetes, "the 
 Fat,'' was supposed to have murdered his own son, many years 
 before. Still she did not forget to look on all sides for her 
 father, and she breathed more freely when she saw light stream 
 through the cracks of a side door opening into the hall, and. 
 falling brokenly on the pavements and the walls of the last 
 space she must pass before reaching it. Now she entered the 
 hall, which was dimly lighted by the lamps within the sculptor's 
 inclosure, and a few well-nigh exjoiring candles, which stood on 
 sawing trestles and the boards of the table behind which her 
 father was asleep. The deeply sonorous notes from the chest 
 of the sleeper echoed through the empty spaces, and made her 
 still more anxious; and the long shadows of the columns which 
 her path must cross seemed strangely weird. She stopped in 
 the midst of the hall to listen, and, recognizing the familiar 
 snore, hastened onward toward the sleeping man. She shook 
 him, she called him, she sprinkled water on his forehead, she 
 addressed to him the most endearing epithets, such as she had 
 heard from the lips of Arsinoe when caressing and flattering 
 her father. As, in spite of all, he did not move, she threw the 
 lamp-light into his face, and fancied a blue shimmer spread 
 over his bloated countenance. Then she broke into that jjiti- 
 ful sobbing which had so touched the heart of Pontius a few 
 hours before. Xow there was motion behind the sculptor's 
 screen. Pollux had worked diligently for a long time, but at 
 length the snoring of Keraunus disturbed him. The body of 
 his muse had already taken shape, but he needed daylight to 
 form the head. So he let liis arms drop, and drawing his 
 bench near to a chest filled with gypsum, leaned his head upon 
 it. But he was too much excited to sleejD easily, and when he 
 heard Selene's footfall he rose and looked out. When he saw 
 the tall figure, with a lamp in its trembling hand, move 
 through the hall and stop suddenly, curiosity led him to notice 
 carefully. As Selene looked around, and the lamp-light re- 
 vealed her face, he recognized the daughter of the overseer, 
 and understood at once what she sought. 
 
 There was something touching in her efforts to waken the 
 sleeper, but at the same time irresistibly ludicrous. Pollux 
 was tempted to laugh. But when Selene broke into sobbing, 
 he burst asunder a part of his frame-work, and called her by 
 name as he approached. He begged her not to fear, as he was 
 no ghost, but very decidedly a mortal, and, as she could see, 
 
THE EMPEROR. 49 
 
 only the good-for-nothing but now improving son of Eupho- 
 rion, the gate-keeper. 
 
 '' You Pollux?" asked the girl, surprised. 
 
 " I myself. But you? Can I give you help?" 
 
 " My poor father!" cried Selene. " He will not stir. He 
 is quite stiff, and his face — oh, ye everlasting gods!" 
 
 " He who snores is not dead," answered the sculptor. 
 
 "But the physician said — " 
 
 "He is not at all sick. Pontius has given him stronger 
 wine than he is accustomed to use. Let him be. He sleeps, 
 with the cushion under his head, as soundly as a child. When 
 he began to snore I whistled as loud as a plover, for that will 
 sometimes bring a snorer to silence; but I could as easily make 
 the stone muses dance as waken him." 
 
 " If we could only get him into his bed." 
 
 " Had you four horses at hand — " 
 
 " You are just as bad as ever." 
 
 " A little less so, Selene.- You must only get used to my 
 way of speakiug. This time I only meant that both of us to- 
 gether are not strong enough to carry him. " 
 
 "But what am I to do? The physician said — " 
 
 " Don^t speak of the physician. I know the disease which 
 has attacked your father. It will all be gone in the morning. 
 Only let him sleep. " 
 
 " It is cold here." 
 
 *' Then cover him with my mantle." 
 
 " You will freeze without it." 
 
 " I am used to it. How long since Keraunus had anything 
 to do with the physician?" 
 
 Selene told him of her father's accident, and what reason 
 she had to be anxious. Pollux listened silently, and said, in a 
 changed tone: 
 
 " I am heartily sorry. We will put cold water on his fore- 
 head. There is a basin, and here is a cloth. Good ! That is 
 settled. I will change it every quarter of an hour, until the 
 slaves return. Perhaps this may waken him, but if not, they 
 can carry him home." 
 
 " That will be disgraceful," sighed the girl. 
 
 " Not in the least. Even the high-priest of Serapis can be 
 unwell. Let me do it." 
 
 " It would irritate him again should he wake. He is so 
 very angry with you — " 
 
 "Powerful Jupiter, what great injury have I done? The 
 gods themselves forgive the sins of the wise, and shall not a 
 man forgive the foUies of a stupid youth?" 
 
50 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 '' You mocked liira." 
 
 " I put iu the place of the broken head of Silenus, near the 
 gate, a head of clay which resembled him. It Avas my first in- 
 dependent work." 
 
 YoM made it to insult my father." 
 
 " Truly not, Selene; I did it for sport, and nothing else." 
 
 " But you know how sensitive he is." 
 
 ** Is it, fair to hold over a boy of fifteen the consequences of 
 his wanton mirth? Had he only taken the cudgel tome, his 
 rage would have passed off in thunder and lightning, and the 
 air would have been clear again. But no I he cut the face 
 from my image with his knife and crushed it slowly to pieces 
 on the ground. He gave me one single snap of his thumb, 
 which I honestly feel to this day, and then lie scorned me, and 
 has treated me and my parents with coldness and hardness and 
 bitter contemjot from that day to this." 
 
 " He is never violent, but I have seldom seen him so con- 
 sumed with auger as on that occasion." 
 
 " Had he only reckoned with me alone, but my father was 
 present, and that roused sharp words; then my mother added 
 hers, and after that the hostility was complete between the lit- 
 tle house and yours. It hurt me most that you and your sister 
 were forbidden to come to the house and play with me. " 
 
 " That also spoiled maiiy pleasant hours for me." 
 
 " It was nice when we dressed ourselves in father's old thea- 
 ter rubbish and mantles. " 
 
 " And when you made us dolls of clay." 
 
 " Or when we had the Olympic games. " 
 
 " I was always teacher when we played school with the chil- 
 dren." 
 
 " Arsinoe gave you most to do." 
 
 " And the fun when we went fishing!" 
 
 " When we brought home the fish my mother gave us flour 
 and raisins to cook with them. Do you remember the feast of 
 Adonis, and how I thrust back the plunging horse of the 
 Numidian knight?" 
 
 " That horse had already thrown Arsinoe over; and as we 
 came home, mother gave you almond cakes." 
 
 " But your ungrateful sister took a large bite of it, leaving 
 me only a fragment." 
 
 " Is Arsinoe as pretty as she then promised to become? It 
 is two years since I have seen her. We are never discharged 
 from work until dark. I had a job for the nuister in Ptolemais, 
 which lasted eight months, anil I frequently saw my parents 
 but once in a month. " 
 
THE EMPEROR. 51 
 
 "We go out very little, and never dare enter your house. 
 My sister — " 
 
 " Is she very pretty?" 
 
 " I think so. When she gets a new ribbon she braids it in 
 her hair, and then the men on the street stare at her. She is 
 sixteen now." 
 
 " The little Arsinoe sixteen years old! How long is it since 
 your mother died?" 
 
 " Four years and eight months." 
 
 " You remember the time well. It is hard to forget such a 
 mother. She was a good woman, and I never met a kindlier. 
 I know that she tried to soften your father, but did not suc- 
 ceed, and then she must die." 
 
 "Yes," said Selene, sadly. "How could the gods take 
 her? They are often more cruel than the hardest of men." 
 
 " Your poor little brothers and sisters?" 
 
 The girl nodded sadly. Pollux, too, looked for awhile sadly 
 on the ground; then he raised his head and said, cheerily: 
 
 " I have something that will make you happy!" 
 
 " Nothing can make me happy since she died." 
 
 "I know," said Pollux, "how that is. I have never for- 
 gotten the good woman ; and once in a leisure hour made a 
 bust of her from memory. I will bring it to you to-morrow. " 
 
 " Oh!" exclaimed Selene; and a glance of real joy lighted 
 her large, earnest eyes. 
 
 " That makes you happy, does it not?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed, very happy. But if my father should know 
 that you have given it to me — " 
 
 " Do you think he would break it to pieces?" 
 
 " Though he might not break it, he would not suffer it to 
 be in the house, when he knew it to be your work." 
 
 Pollux took the compress from the head of Keraunus, wet 
 it, and said, as he laid it back: 
 
 " I have an idea. It is not certain that my bust would re- 
 mind you of your mother. And it does not need to stand in 
 your house. Upon the bastion which your balcony overlooks 
 are the busts of the Ptolemaic women. Some of them are in- 
 jured, and are to be put in repair. I will undertake that of 
 Berenice, and put this head there. Then whenever you go out 
 you can see it. Would that please you?" 
 
 " Oh, Pollux, you are a good man!" 
 
 " I tokl you so. I have already begun to improve. But 
 time is flying. If I undertake the IBerenice, I must put every 
 moment to use. " 
 
52 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " Go back to your work now. I understand wetting the 
 compresses. " 
 
 With these words, Selene drew the mantle closer to gain 
 freer play for her hands. As she stood there, with her slender 
 figure and pale face, and the folds of rich stuff falling about 
 her shoulders, opposite Pollux, he cried out, so suddenly as to 
 startle her: " Stand still— exactly as you are. That drapery 
 is wonderful. In the name of all the^gods, do not disturb it! 
 Let me copy it, and I shall gain in a few moments a whole 
 day's time for our Berenice. 1 can attend to the compresses 
 at the same time. " 
 
 Without waiting her answer, he hastened behind the screen, 
 and returned ^\•ith a lamp in each hand, the tools in his mouth; 
 then back again for the wax model, which was placed on the 
 further corner of the table behind which Keraunus lay. The 
 candles were put out, the lamps lighted and regulated to give 
 the proper light. Pollux threw himself on a bench, put his 
 legs forward, and stretched his neck, and elevated his head, 
 throwing his crooked nose forward like a vulture which seeks 
 its prey far in the distance, dropped his eyes, and then raised 
 them repeatedly, as if seeking inspiration, his nails and finger- 
 tips meanwhile playing over the surface of the wax, or buried 
 in the pliant stuff, changing what seemed already finished, and 
 adding new points with amazing rapidity. His hands seemed 
 to act convulsively, but deep, serene eyes, full of intense ear- 
 nestness, looked out from under his heavy brows. 
 
 Selene had not in words given her permission to stand as his 
 model ; but, as if fully sharing liis zeal, she remained motion- 
 less, and, when meeting his gaze, seemed to understand the 
 earnestness of her former gay companion. For a long time 
 neither of them moved their lips. At last, Pollux stepped 
 backward, scanning his work with a sharp scrutiny, and said, 
 while he rubbed the wax from his fingers: 
 
 " So it must be. Now I will put on another compress, and 
 we will go on. If you are tired, you may rest. " 
 
 She did not accept this permission, and the Avork was re- 
 sumed. As he carefully laid again a few folds that had be- 
 come disarranged, she raised her foot to step back, but he said, 
 earnestly : 
 
 " Stay where you are," and she obeyed. 
 
 Pollux worked now less intently, and began to talk. 
 
 " You are very pale. Is it the effect of the lamp-light and 
 the night without slee]!?'' 
 
 *' I always look jmle, but I am not sick." 
 
 " I thought Arsinoe would look more like your mother, but 
 
THE EMPEROK. 53 
 
 I find many of your features are like hers. Your faces have 
 the same oval; the connecting lines of forehead and nose are 
 exactly alike; your great eyes and the shape of the brows as 
 if taken from her face. But your mouth is smaller and more 
 finely chiseled, and she could hardly have bound so heavy a 
 knot of hair on the back of her head. I think, too, yours is of 
 a lighter shade.'" 
 
 " When a girl, she jjrobably had fuller hair, and I know it 
 was as light as mine in her childhood. '^ 
 
 " They are alike in this, too, that, while not curly, it lies in 
 soft waves over your head.^' 
 
 " That makes it easy to take care of. " 
 
 " Are you not taller than she was?" 
 
 " I think so; but since she was fuller, she seemed shorter. 
 Are you almost through?" 
 
 " You are tired of standing?" 
 
 " Not very.'' 
 
 " Then have a little more patience. Your face reminds me 
 more and more of past years. It seems to me Time has taken 
 a long step backward. 'Have you the same sensibilities?" 
 
 Selene shook her head. 
 
 " You are not happy?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " I know well that you have heavy duties for one of your 
 age." 
 
 " I let things go as they will." 
 
 " No. I know that you do not. You care for the brothers 
 and sisters like a mother. " 
 
 " Like a mother!" repeated Selene, her lips parting in a 
 bitter smile. 
 
 " Of course maternal love is different from all others; but I 
 know the father and the children have every reason to be con- 
 tented. " 
 
 " Perhaps the little ones and our blind Helios; but Arsinoe 
 does what she pleases. " 
 
 " You are certainly not happy, I see, and you were formerly 
 fresh and cheerful, if not merry, like your sister." 
 
 " Formerly?" 
 
 " How sad that sounds! And yet you are young and fair, 
 and life lies before you!" 
 
 " What a life!" 
 
 " What do you mean?" asked Pollux; and added, in a hearty 
 tone, as he turned from his work to look on the fair, pale face: 
 " A life that ought to be all full of love and prosperity." 
 
 The girl shook her head, and answered, rather sadly: 
 
54 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 *' * Love is joy/ says the Christian -woman who oversees our 
 work in the papyrus mill. And since my mother died I have 
 never been joyful. I had everything in childhood. Now I 
 come nearest to being happy when we escape dire misfortune. 
 Whatever comes I accept, because I can not help it. My 
 heart is empty, except when occupied by fear. I have long 
 ceased to expect anything good in the future. " 
 
 " Girl,"' cried Pollux, " what has happened to you? I 
 comprehend only a part of what you say. How do you come 
 m the papyrus mill?" 
 
 " Do not betray me,'* said Selene. "If my father should 
 hear — " 
 
 " He is asleep, and what you have said to me no one shall 
 know." 
 
 " But why should I conceal it? I go every day with Arsmoe 
 to the pajjyrus mill to earn a little money." 
 
 " Without the knowledge of 3'our father?" 
 
 " Yes. He would rather see us starve than allow it. It is 
 hard to practice this jiious fraud, but I can not heljD it. Ar- 
 sinoe thinks only of herself. She jalays at draughts Avith father, 
 and curls his hair, and dandles the children as if they were 
 dolls, but it comes entirely ujDon me to provide for the neces- 
 sities of all." 
 
 " And yet you say you are without love. Fortunately no 
 one will believe it, and I last of all. My mother was teUing 
 me of you lately, and I thought then you were just the girl to 
 make an excellent wife. " 
 
 " And to-day?" 
 
 "To-day I know it.'; 
 
 " Perhaps you are mistaken. " 
 
 " No, no, you are called Selene, and are mild and gentle, 
 like moonlight. Names have their significance. " 
 
 " But my little brother, who has never seen the light, is 
 called Helios." 
 
 Pollux had spoken with great warmth, but the last words of 
 Selene had frightened him and repressed his rising sensibility. 
 When he did not answer her bitter outcry she said, at first 
 coolly, but with increasing emotion: " You begin to believe 
 what I said, and are right in doing so; for what I do for the 
 children is not out of love or goodness, or because I prefer 
 their welfare to my own. I hiherit pride from my father, and 
 it would be hard for me to see my brothers and sisters in rags, 
 and to have people think us as poor as we really are. That 
 which 1 most dread is sickness in the house — for then comes 
 anxiety, which never leaves me, and which uses the last sea- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 55 
 
 terce — for the children must not starve. I do not want to 
 represent myself worse than I am, for it does pain me to see 
 them suffer. But what I do for them does not bring joy —the 
 liighest emotion is fear. Do you ask what I fear? That which 
 is possible to befall us, and I never expect good. If there 
 is a knock at the door I think it may be a creditor. When 
 people stare at Arsinoe on the street, I fancy dishonor is slink- 
 ing stealthily behind. When my father disregards the order 
 of the physician, I imagine we are already standing on the 
 open street, without protection. How much I might do had I 
 only a joyful heart! Surely I am not indolent, but I envy 
 every woman who sits with her hands folded in her lap and is 
 waited on by slaves; and if a fortune were to fall into my 
 hands I would never lift a finger, but sleep until the sun was 
 high, and let the slaves care for father and the children. My 
 life is simply misery. And if there comes now and then a 
 brighter hour it has passed by before I have recovered from 
 the surprise of it.'^ 
 
 Pollux felt chilled, and the heart which had opened wide to 
 his fair playmate closed again. Before he could think of the 
 right words in which to reply, a trumpet-note rang through 
 the hall adjoining to awaken the slumbering slaves and the 
 workmen. Selene was frightened, and drew her mantle 
 closer. Then begging Pollux to take care of her father and 
 to hide the wine-jar, she hastened toward the door through 
 which she had entered, forgetting her lamp. Pollux hastened 
 after to light her through the passage, and begged her with 
 words whose warmth and earnestness touched her heart, to 
 stand once more as his model. Fifteen minutes later the over- 
 seer was lying asleep in his own bed; but Pollux, who was 
 stretched on a cushion within his working spac^e, could not 
 banish from his thoughts the image of the pale girl with her 
 benumbed soul. 
 
 Finally, however, sleep overcame him, and a friendly dream 
 brought a vision of the jjretty little Arsinoe, who, but for him, 
 would have been trodden under the hoofs of the Numidian 
 horse at the feast of Adonis. She seemed to offer him an 
 almond cake that she had taken from her sister, who let it go 
 quietly with an emotionless smile. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Alexandkia was greatly excited. 
 
 The approaching visit of the emperor turned the thoughts of 
 the busy throngs of citizen from the monotonous paths of daily 
 
66 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 toil after the means of support toward hours of fi-eedom and 
 enjoyment. 
 
 In many factories, workshops, auditoriums and magazines 
 the busy wheel of industry turned without cessatioii; for all 
 classes and conditions were animated by the desire to make 
 this visit of Hadrian a time of unexampled brilliancy. What- 
 ever of inventive genius, or wealth, or beauty was to be found 
 among them v. as claimed to aid in the plays and processions 
 which were to occupy several days. The richest heathen citi- 
 zens had undertaken the arrangement of the theatrical per- 
 formances, a mock sea-fight, and the bloody games in the 
 amjihitheater; but the number of these was so great it was 
 quite imjjossible to manage them all. And the sums re- 
 quired for the indispensable parts, such as the performances in 
 the hippodrome, the ornamentiug of the streets, and the enter- 
 tainment of the Roman guests, was so large that even Titianus, 
 who was accustomed to see his Roman associates play with 
 millions, was dismayed. As viceroy, it was his duty to lend 
 eye and ear to all. In general lie gave free hand to the 
 citizens; but more than once was forced to remonstrate against 
 extravagance. The greatest trouble, not only to him, but to 
 those chosen by the citizens as leaders in these demonstrations, 
 was in harmonizing discords between heathen and Jewish 
 citizens. 
 
 From an assembly, in which all these questions were at last 
 definitely settled through his vigorous exertions, Titianus be- 
 took himself to the Cgesareum for the daily visit which the 
 empress expected. 
 
 He felt rejoiced to have these preliminaries arranged, for 
 six days had already passed since work had been commenced 
 on the Lochias, and the time of the emperor's arrival was 
 hastening on. 
 
 He found Sabina, as usual, on her lounge, but she sat more 
 nearly erect to-day. 
 
 She seemed to have recovered from the effects of her sea 
 voyage, for there was more red (paint) on her hps and cheeks, 
 and since she had promised to receive visits from the sculptors 
 Papias and Aristeas, had her hair arranged as in the statue of 
 Verus Victrix made five years before. 
 
 As a copy of this statue was set up in Alexandria, some wag 
 had scattered these words among the citizens: 
 
 " This Aphrodite is certainly victorious, for whoever sees her 
 gets out of the way. She ought to be called the Flight-inspir- 
 ing Cypris." 
 
 Titianus had scarcely recovered from the excitement of the 
 
THE EMPEROR. 57 
 
 recent assembly when he entered the presence of the empress, 
 whom he found in a small apartment with only her chamber- 
 lain and a few serving women. 
 
 To the respectful inquiry of the prefect as to how she found 
 herself, she replied, with a shrug of the shoulders: 
 
 " How shall I answer? If I say well I should be telling an 
 untruth; if I say ill I shall be surrouded by long faces, which 
 are never agreeable. One must endure life. But just look at 
 the doors in these rooms! It would be the end of nie to stay 
 here long." Titianus looked at the doors in surprise, and 
 was about to express regret that she felt annoyance, but Sabina 
 prevented him, saying : 
 
 " Vou men never understand what hurts us women. Our 
 Yerus is the only one who ever appreciates and sympathizes; 
 he feels intuitively, I may say. There are thirty-five doors in 
 my apartments; I had them counted! Thirty-five! If they 
 were not old and of costly wood I should think some one 
 meant to play me a trick. ^' 
 
 " A few of them might be replaced by curtains." 
 
 " Let them alone. It is only a few plagues more or less, all 
 through my life. Are the Alexandrians almost through with 
 their preparations?" 
 
 " I hope so," answered Titianus, sighing. " All are trying 
 to do their best; but in the strife to be foremost each jostles 
 the other, and I, who stand between the opposing parties, still 
 feel the efiect of the disputes I have been forced to hear and to 
 settle." 
 
 " So?" answered Sabina, her lips twitching as if she heard 
 something agreeable. " Tel] me about this assembly. I want 
 amusement; for Verus, Balbilla, and the others have begged 
 permission to go and see the works on the Lochias. I am ac- 
 customed to have people find it pleasanter anywhere else than 
 in my company. My fugitives are gone a long time; %iQ\e 
 must be much to interest them. " 
 
 The prefect suppressed the annoyance he felt in thinking of 
 the disturbance their presence would be to the workmen, and 
 began, in a mock-tragic tone: "The first dispute arose over 
 the arrangements for the procession." 
 
 " Step a little further back," begged Sabina, pressing a 
 heavily ringed hand over her ear, as if in pain. The cheeks of 
 the prefect reddened slightly, but he lowered his tone, and re- 
 peated : 
 
 " Harmony was first disturbed over the procession." 
 
 " I heard that," answered Sabina, yawning. " I am very 
 fond of processions." 
 
68 THE EMPEROK. 
 
 " But," said the prefect, a man just entering his sixtieth 
 year, with a sh'ght touch of irritation in his tone, " it is hero 
 as at Rome and everywhere else; wlien such arrangements are 
 not under the absohite control of one person, one quarrel be- 
 gets anotlier, even over the celebration of a peaceful festival." 
 
 " It seems to vex you that they seek iu this way to honor 
 Hadrian.", 
 
 " You must be jesting. I have sought to make it as success- 
 ful as possible; I have troubled myself personally, even with 
 the details, and have had the satisfaction of harmonizing the 
 discord. This scarcely belonged to my office." 
 
 " I thought you not only served the state, but were a friend 
 of my husband." 
 
 " That I am j^roud to call myself." 
 
 " Yes, Hadrian has many, very many friends, since he wore 
 the purple. Have you got over your ill-humor? Y'ou must 
 have grown very irritable, Titiauus; the poor Julia has an un- 
 comfortable husband." 
 
 " She is less to be pitied than you think," answered Titianus, 
 with dignity, " for my office occupies me so closely that she 
 seldom has oj^portunity to see me disturbed. If I have failed 
 to hide my annoyance from you, I beg you to consider that it 
 has risen from zeal to render Hadrian a worthy reception." 
 
 " As if I were angry with you! But to return to your wife. 
 Her destiny, I hear, is like my own. We poor women have 
 nothing to expect from our husbands but the fragments after 
 all others are served. But to your description!" 
 
 " The worst difference was over the unfortunate relations of 
 the Jews to their fellow-citizens. " 
 
 " I hate these atrocious sects — Jew, Christian, or whatever 
 they may be called. Do they hesitate to take their share in 
 the reception of the emperor?" 
 
 "Quite the contrary. Alabarchos, their wealthy chief, 
 ordered them to bear the entire cost of the naumachy, and his 
 fellow in the faith, Artemion — " 
 
 " What? Will any one accept their money?" 
 
 " The heathen citizens are fully able to bear all the expense, 
 which will amount to many millions of sestej-ces, and only wish 
 to prevent the Jews from taking part in the processions and 
 games. " 
 
 "They are right." 
 
 " Allow me to ask if it be fair to forbid half the Alexan- 
 drians to show honor to their emperor?" 
 
 '' Hadrian will be glad to escape lliat lioiior. To be called 
 ' African/ ' German, ' Dacian,' adds glory to our conquests, 
 
THE EMPEROR. 59 
 
 but after LLe destruction of Jerusalem, Titus forbade any one 
 to call him ' Judean. ' " 
 
 " That was because he wished to blot out all memory of the 
 frightful slaughter consequent upon their steady resistance. 
 The conquered peoi^le let finger from finger, limb from hmb 
 be hacked away before they would yield." 
 
 " You sjieak again like a romancer. Or have these people 
 made you their advocate?" 
 
 " I know them, and seek to do them, as well as all other 
 citizens of tliis land, justice. They pay their taxes as promptly 
 as the other citizens, and the amount is greater, for there are 
 many rich men among them, and they are distinguished in all 
 the trades and professions, in science, and in the arts. I 
 measure them by the same rule as the others, and their super- 
 stition affects me no more than that of the Egyptians. " 
 
 " But they have overstepped that rule. They refused to 
 sacrifice to Jupiter and Hera in ^lia Capitolina, the city 
 which Hadrian built. That means they refuse loyalty to me 
 and to my husband." 
 
 " It is forbidden them to worship any other than their own 
 God. ^lia was built on the site of their destroyed Jerusalem, 
 and the statues of which you sjDeak stand in their holiest 
 places. " 
 
 "What is that tons?'* 
 
 " You kuow even Caius could not force them to set up his 
 statue in their Holy of Holies. The governor, Tetronius, con- 
 fessed that to constrain was to exterminate them." 
 
 ' ' 80 let hajjpen to them what they deserve, which is an- 
 nihilation," cried Sabina. 
 
 " Annihilate?" asked the prefect. " In Alexandria alone, 
 almost half the citizens — that is, several hundred thousand of 
 obedient subjects — annihilate?" 
 
 " So many!" exclaimed the empress, frightened. " That is 
 horrible — great gods, if this man should rise against us!" 
 
 " No one has told me of this danger." 
 
 " In Cyrenia and Salamis, on the Island of Cyprus, they 
 have murdered ten thousand of their fellow-citizens. " 
 
 " They were tej-ribly incensed, and were more powerful than 
 their oppressors. " 
 
 " In their own land, there has been sedition after sedition. ■* 
 
 " On account of the sacrifices of which we were speaking." 
 
 " Tianius Rufus is now legate in Palestine, and ho is not a 
 man to be trilled with. He will know how to tame this 
 dangerous brood. " 
 
 " Perhaps so," answered Titianus; " but I fear he will never 
 
60 TUK EMPEROR. 
 
 reach liis end through brutality, and if he should, the lorovlnce 
 will have been depopulated/' 
 
 " That only j^roves there are too many subjects in a prov- 
 ince." 
 
 " But never enough useful citizens.'' 
 
 " Seditious despisers of the gods, and useful citizens!" 
 
 " Here in Alexandria, where many of them have adopted 
 the customs and manner of thought of the Greeks, and use 
 their language, they are among the most loyal subjects of the 
 emperor. " 
 
 Do they share in the festivities?" 
 
 " So far as the Greek citizens permit." 
 
 " And the naumachy?" 
 
 " It will not devolve upon them; but Artemion was allowed 
 to provide wild animals for the amphitheater." 
 And he is not avaricious?" 
 
 " You would be astonished to learn how little. The man 
 must have the art of Midas to change stones into gold. " 
 
 " Are there many such among your Jews?" 
 
 " A goodly number." 
 
 " Then I wish they might revolt, and the people themselves 
 be destroyed, while the gold would remain." 
 
 " Meanwhile, I seek to preserve their lives, as good tax- 
 payers. " 
 
 " Does Hadrian share this wish?" 
 
 " Without doubt. " 
 
 " Your successor may perhaps teach him other ideas." 
 
 '' He acts always according to his own judgment, and I am 
 still in office," said Titianus, proudly. 
 
 " May the God of the Jews long preserve you there," re- 
 torted Sabina, with scorn. 
 
 CHAPTEE Vri. 
 
 Before Titianus could reply the door of the apartment 
 opened, and the Pretor Lucius Aurelius Verus, his wife 
 Domitia Lucilla, the young Balbilla, and Florus the historian 
 entered. The four were much excited, and wished to tell the 
 empress at once Avhat they had seen, but she waved them off 
 with her hand, whispering: 
 
 " No, no, not yet; I am exhausted — this long absence, and 
 then — give me tlie smelling salts, Verus. Leukippe, a goblet 
 of water with fruit syrup, but not so sweet as usual." 
 
 The Greek slave hastened to^obey her order, and while the 
 empress held the carved onyx vial to her nose, she said: 
 
THE EMPEROR. 61 
 
 " Is it not a small eternity, Titianus, that we have been dis- 
 cussing state affairs? You all know that I am outspoken, 
 and can not be silent when I hear preposterous views. While 
 you were absent I have been obliged to speak and to hear very 
 much which has robbed me of streugth. I only wonder you 
 do not find me in worse condition. Since what can be more 
 exhausting to a woman than to maintain herself with firmness 
 against a man who advocates opposite opinions. Give me the 
 drink, Leukippe.^' 
 
 While the empress was sipping the contents of her glass 
 Verus apjDroached the prefect, and asked in a whisper: 
 
 " Have you been long alone with Sabina, my cousin?" 
 
 " Yes,^^ answered Titianus, biting his lip and grinding his 
 teeth, and doubling his fist in a manner the pretor could not 
 fail to understand, who said in a low tone : 
 
 " It is a great pity; and just now she has hours — " 
 
 " What are you saying of hours?" asked Sabina, taking the 
 cup from her lips. 
 
 "Those," answered Verus, "in which I am not troubled 
 by any business of senate or of state. Who but you can I 
 thank for this?" 
 
 With these words he came nearer, took the empty cup from 
 her hand and passed it to the Greek, with the manner of an 
 affectionately devoted son toward a suffering mother. The 
 empress nodded to him several times, in token of her grati- 
 tude, and asked, with an influx of cheerfulness in her tone: 
 
 " Well, what did you find on the Lochias?" 
 
 " Wonderful things," exclaimed Balbilla, clapping her 
 hands. " The old palace is a veritable swarm of bees, or an 
 ant heap. White, brown, and black arms — more than we 
 could count, vied with each other in activity. The hundreds 
 of workmen nowhere seemed to be in each other's way. And 
 as the stars, guided in their course by the wisdom of the gods, 
 have their paths through the ' gracious night ' without inter- 
 ference, so all this host was guided by one small man." 
 
 " I must interpose in behalf of the architect, Pontius. He 
 is certainly a man of ordinary stature." 
 
 "Then, we will say, to satisfy your sense of justice," re- 
 turned Balbilla, " this host was guided by an ordinary sized 
 man with a papyrus roll in his right hand, and a pencil in the 
 left. Does that description suit you better?" 
 
 " You can never fail to please me," answered the pretor. 
 
 " Let Balbilla go on," commanded the empress. 
 
 *' We have seen chaos," said Balbilla; "but there are 
 
62 THE EMPEROU. 
 
 glimpses of an orderly creation discernible through the present 
 confusion. It is visible to the e5'es.'^ 
 
 " And occasionally manifested to the feet/' added Verus, 
 laughing. " Had it been dark, and the workmen worms, we 
 might have crushed half of them, they so swarmed over the 
 pavement." 
 
 " All sorts of things," said Balbilla, quickly. " Some were 
 polishing spots that had become damaged; others laid new 
 pieces of mosaic in the empty beds, out of which the originals 
 had been stolen; and skillful artists painted bright figures on 
 plaster surfaces. Every statue and column was surrounded 
 by a scaffolding that reached to the roof, and on them all men 
 were climbing, who jostled each other, hke the sailors who 
 climb the hostile ship in a sham fight on the water. " 
 
 The cheeks of the handsome ghl were flushed with memory 
 of the lively scene, and while she spoke and gesticulated the 
 lofty structure upon her head trembled. 
 
 " Your descrii^tion begins to be poetic," broke in the em- 
 press. " Perhaj)s the muse will inspire you to put it into 
 rhyme." 
 
 " All the nine are on the Lochias," said the j^retor. " We 
 saw eight; but the ninth — she M'ho protects star-gazers and 
 the fine arts — the lofty Urania — had in place of a head — per- 
 mit me to ask you to guess what — godlike Sabina?" 
 
 " Well?" 
 
 *' A wisp of straw." 
 
 " Alas," sighed the empress. " Do you think, Florus, any 
 of the learned men, or the versifiers, have ever resembled this 
 Urania?" 
 
 "At any rate," answered Florus, "we are more careful 
 than the gods to hide the contents of our heads with a thick 
 skull, and with more or less hair." 
 
 " That sounds almost," said Balbilla, pointuig to her own 
 thick curls, "as if I had special need to cover what is hidden 
 beneath my hair." 
 
 " Tlie Lesbian swan was also called * she of the beautiful 
 locks,' " answered Florus. 
 
 " And you are our Sappho," said the pretor's wife, pressing 
 the arm of the girl to her breast. 
 
 " Honestly, will you put into verse what you have seen to- 
 day?" asked the empress. 
 
 Balbilla looked at the floor, and then answered brightly: 
 
 " It is natural for me to express all the peculiar things I 
 meet in rhyme. It would delight me to do this.^' 
 
 " But follow the coimsel of the grammarian Apollonius. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 63 
 
 Since you are the Sappho of our time 5^ou ought to write, not 
 in the Attic-Greek, but in the old iEolian dialect." 
 
 Verus laughed. The empress, whose diaphragm did not act 
 vigorously, tittered, but Balbilla answered in a lively manner: 
 
 " Do you believe I should not succeed in such an attempt? 
 To-morrow I will begin to study the ^olian dialect." 
 
 " Let that go. Your simpler songs have always been the 
 best," said Domitia Lucilla. 
 
 " You shall not laugh at me," said Balbilla, willfully. " In 
 a few weeks I shall know how to use that dialect, for I can do 
 all I attempt — yes, all." 
 
 "What a stubijorn head is hidden under those curling 
 locks," exclaimed the empress, graciously threatening with 
 uplifted finger. 
 
 " And what power of comprehension," added Floras. 
 " Your teacher in grammar and meter told me that his best 
 pupil was a woman of noble descent, and a poetess besides — in 
 fact, Balbilla." 
 
 The girl blushed at these words, and asked, in a transport 
 of joy: 
 
 " Do you flatter, or has Hephastion really said that?" 
 
 " Alas," cried the pretor, '* Hephastion was also my tutor, 
 and I must take my place beloM' Balbilla. But it is nothing 
 new to me, for the Alexandrian said the same thing; and I am 
 not vain enough of my verses to dispute his verdict." 
 
 " You follow different models," said Floras. " Ovid is 
 your pattern, Sappho hers. Your style is Latin, hers is Greek. 
 Do you always carry the love songs of Ovid." 
 
 " Always," answered Verus, " as Alexander his Homer." 
 
 " And out of respect to the master your husband tries to 
 adapt himself to those precepts, under the protection of 
 Venus," added the empress, turning toward Domitia Lucilla. 
 
 The slender and elegant woman answered only by a hght 
 shrug of the shoulders this not very friendly remark, but 
 Verus said, as he stooped to gather up the sliken cover and 
 spread it again over her limbs. 
 
 "My best fortune is in the favor of the ' Verus Victrix. •* 
 But we are not yet at the end of our story; our Lesbian swan 
 met another bird on the Lochias, in the person of a pastio 
 artist." 
 
 " How long since birds have been reckoned among the 
 sculptors?" asked Sabina. " At the highest they might be 
 likened to woodpeckers. " 
 
 " When they work in wood," laughed Verus; *' but our 
 artist is an assistant of Papias, and handles noble stuff in good 
 
64 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 style. This time certainly he has gathered remarkable ma- 
 terials for his statue." 
 
 " Verus has certainly given a good name to our new ac- 
 quaintance/' broke in Balbilla, " because he was whistling a 
 song so loud and clear as we ai^proached the inclosure behind 
 which he was at work that the sound ran through the wide, 
 empty hall. A nightingale could not have done better. We 
 stood still and listened until the merry fellow, who was utterly 
 unconscious of our presence, had finished; and when he heard 
 the architect's voice he called out, ' Now Urania must have 
 her head; I had an idea of it, and with three dozen strokes 
 could have finished it, but Papias said he had one at the shop. 
 I am curious about the honey-sweet face he may please to set 
 upon my Torso by the day after to-morrow. Send me a good 
 model for the bust of Sappho, which I have undertaken to re- 
 place. I am haunted by a thousand gobhns of ideas, and am 
 so excited. What will become of my work?' " 
 
 Balbilla had attempted to imitate the deep voice of a man 
 in repeating these words, and when she saw that the empress 
 was amused, went on in her lively way: 
 
 " All this came so fresh and so merry right out of his heart 
 that it did me good. We all went up to the screen and tried 
 to persuade the sculptor to show us his work. " 
 
 " And you found — ?" asked Sabina. 
 
 " He positively refused to break through his hedge, ^' an- 
 swered the prefect; " but Balbilla coaxed it out of him. And 
 really the tall fellow does know something. The drapery was 
 wonderfully expressive, rich, and of remarkable delicacy. 
 Urania holds the mantle firmly about herself as if really using 
 it for protection against the cool night air, while gazing at the 
 stars. When he has finished this muse he has some other 
 statues to repair. We saw a head he was to place to-day on a 
 Berenice; and for the SaiDjDho I suggested Balbilla as a 
 model." 
 
 " A good idea," said Sabina. " If the bust prove to be a 
 success, we will take it to Rome." 
 
 " I will gladly sit to him," said Balbilla; " the hearty fellow 
 pleases me. " 
 
 " And Balbilla pleases him," added the pretor's wife. " He 
 gazed at her in astonishment, and she promised to sit three 
 hours for him to-morrow, if you would allow it." 
 
 " He begins with the head," broke in Verus. " What a 
 fortunate fellow is an artisti She let him turn her head, and 
 arrange the folds of her ]K'i)lum, and scarcely guarded her 
 own garments from the splashes of gypsum and colored paint. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 66 
 
 while I, who would so gladly have assisted, was never once 
 allowed to lift her over the very worst places." 
 
 Balbilla blushed, and said, a little irritated, " Eeally, Verus, 
 I can not allow you to speak so with me, and that you must 
 understand once for all, it is not difficult for me to avoid 
 muddy spots without any assistance." 
 
 " You are too strict," interrupted the empress, with an un- 
 pleasant laugh. " Ought she not, Domitia Lucilla, to give 
 your husband the right to be serviceable?" 
 
 " If the empress considers it consistent with propriety," an- 
 swered the lady addressed, shrugging her shoulders and with 
 a significant motion of the hands. Sabina understood her 
 meaning and said, while suppressing a yawn : 
 
 " In our day one must be indulgent toward a husband who 
 has chosen the love songs of Ovid for his intimate companion." 
 
 " What has happened, Titianus?" 
 
 While Balbilla was relating her interview with the sculptor 
 Pollux, a letter requiring immediate attention had been brought 
 by a chamberlain to the prefect. He retired to another part 
 of the room, broke the seal, and had just finished reading it, 
 when met by the question of the empress. Sabina^'s small eyes 
 saw everything that hajpeued in her neighborhood, and she 
 had noticed that while reading the prefect moved uneasily. 
 Therefore it contained something important. 
 
 " A pressing letter," he answered, " calls me back to the 
 prefecture. I must say farewell, and hope soon to be able to 
 bring you agreeable tidings. " 
 
 " What is in your letter?" 
 
 " Important news from the province." 
 
 " May I ask particularly?" 
 
 " I am sorry that I can not answer your question. The 
 emperor expressly commands me to keep the matter secret. 
 His dispatch requires immediate attention, and I am forced to 
 take my leave at once. " 
 
 Sabina returned his parting salutation with icy coldness, and 
 had herself at once conducted to an inner apartment to be 
 dressed for the evening meal. Balbilla accompanied her. 
 Florus betook himself to the " Olympian table," the excellent 
 eating-house of Lykortas, of whom the Koman epicure had re- 
 lated marvels. 
 
 When Verus was left alone with his wife he approached her, 
 asking in a friendly manner: 
 
 " Shall I escort you to your dwelling?" 
 
 Domitia had flung herself upon a cushion, and, with her 
 face covered by both hands, gave no answer. 
 
66 THE EMPKROR. 
 
 " Will you go now?" repeated the pretor. As she still 
 maintained silence he stepped nearer, laid his hand upon her 
 shapely fingers, and said: 
 
 * I believe you are angry with m.e." 
 
 She pushed his hand lightly away, saying: 
 
 " Let me alone." 
 
 " I am sorry that I must do that," sighed Verus. " Business 
 calls me into the city, and I shall — " 
 
 '' And you will go to search for new beauties among the 
 Alexandrians, Avho so bewitched you last evening. I knew 
 that." 
 
 *' There are here w^omen of unusual grace," answered Verus, 
 composedly: " white, brown, copper-colored, black — all charm- 
 ing in their own way. One is never weary of admiring them." 
 
 " And your wife?" asked Lucilla, taking a jjosition opposite 
 to him. 
 
 " My wife? Truly, my fairest, wife is an honorable title, 
 and has nothing to do with the frivolities of life. How could 
 I pronounce your name in the same hour with that of these 
 poor children, who only serve to amuse an idle hour?" 
 
 Domitia Lucilla was accustomed to hear such words, but 
 this time they seemed to hurt her. But she concealed the 
 pain, and, crossing her arms, spoke with decision and dignity. 
 
 " Go on to the end with Ovid and the love-gods if you 
 choose, but do not attempt to crush another innocent under 
 your wheels." 
 
 '' L>o you mean Balbilla?" asked Verus, laughing. " She 
 knows very well how to take care of herself, and has quite too 
 much spirit to be caught in the toils of Eros. That little son 
 of Venus does not interfere with such good friendship as ours. " 
 
 " Dare I believe you?" 
 
 " My word upon it. I want nothing from her but pleasant 
 words," said he, extending. his hand toward his wife. Lucilla 
 only touched it lightly, and then said: 
 
 " Send me back to Rome. I long more than I can tell you 
 in words after my children, especially our boj. " 
 
 " It can not he," said Verus, earnestly. " Not now, but, 
 I hope, in a few weeks." 
 
 " Why not earlier?" 
 
 " Do not ask me." 
 
 " A mother has the right to know why she is separated from 
 her son in his cradle." 
 
 " That cradle stands in the house of your mother, and she 
 cares for our little one. Have patience then, for that I am 
 
THE EMPEROR. 67 
 
 seeking to gain for you and for myself, and no less for oiir son, 
 is so great that it might silence years of longing. " 
 
 The last words were spoken lightly, yet with a dignity seen 
 in him only at rare moments. Lucilla seized his right hand, 
 before he was through speaking, in both hers, and asked, 
 anxiously: 
 
 " Do you seek the purple?'* 
 
 He nodded affirmatively. 
 
 " Is it for that reason?"' 
 
 "What?"' 
 
 " Sabina and you — " 
 
 " Not alone for that. She is hard and sharp toward others, 
 but even as a boy she only showed me kindness.'' 
 
 " She hates me." 
 
 " Patience, Lucilla; have patience. There will come a day 
 when the daughter of Nigrinus will be wife of the Caesar, and 
 the former em23ress — But I will not say that aloud. I am, 
 as you know, under great obligations to Sabina, and honestly 
 wish the emperor a long life. " 
 
 " And the adoption?'" 
 
 '' Hush! He is tliinking of it, and his wife desires it." 
 
 *' Can it perhaps come soon?" 
 
 ■' Who can tell at this moment what the emj)eror may do 
 within an hour; but perhaps the decision may be made on the 
 thirtieth of December. ' ' 
 
 " On your birthday?" 
 
 " He asked for that day, and is casting my horoscope." 
 
 " Then will the stars decide our fate?" 
 
 " Not the stars alone. Hadrian must also be persuaded to 
 interpret it in my favor." 
 
 " How can I help you?" 
 
 " Show yourself exactly as you are in all intercourse with 
 the emperor." 
 
 " Thank you for these words, and I will not ask to leave 
 you. Might it be more than a mere post of honor to be the 
 wife of Verus, I would not wish for the added dignity of wife 
 to a Caesar. " 
 
 " I will not go to the city this evening, but stay with you. 
 Are you contented?" 
 
 " Yes, yes," she cried, and raised her arms to throw them 
 about the neck of her handsome husband, but he held them 
 back, and said: 
 
 " Let that pass. To play lover will help nothing toward 
 gaining the purple. " 
 
"68 THE I'MPKROR. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 TiTiANUS commanded his charioteer to drive to the Lochias. 
 As the road thither jiassed his own palace he ordered a halt; 
 for the letter hidden in the folds of his toga contained news 
 which would probably prevent his return home before the fol- 
 lowing morning. "Witliout delaying to listen to the various 
 persons waiting for him with messages or petitions, or to re- 
 ceive orders, he passed quickly through the crowd toward the 
 apartments of his wife. She met him on the way, for she had 
 heard his footstep, and hastened toward him. 
 
 " I was not deceived," she said, with hearty accent. " How 
 delightful that you could get away earlier than usual! I did 
 not expect you before the end of the evening meal."' 
 
 " I have come only to go again," answered Titianus, enter- 
 ing the room. " Please send for a piece of bread and a cup of 
 mixed wine. But there stands already Mhat I need. Yes, you 
 are right; I was not so long as usual with Sabina, but she con- 
 trived to put as many disagreeable words into the interview as 
 if we had been half a day together. In five minutes I must 
 leave you to return — only the gods know when. It is hard to 
 say it, but all our trouble, and pains, and haste, and the care- 
 ful labor of the jDoor Pontius, are in vain." 
 
 With these words the prefect threw himself upon a cushion, 
 and his wife brought the refreshment for which he had asked, 
 saying, as she passed her hand over his hair: 
 
 "Poor man! Has Hadrian concluded, after all, to go to 
 the Capsareum?" 
 
 " No. Leave us, Syra. You shall see. Please let me hear 
 again this letter from the emperor." 
 
 Julia, the wife of Titianus, unrolled the papyrus and read : 
 
 " Hadrian, to his friend Titianus, Governor of Egypt. Pro- 
 found secrecy: — Hadrian greets Titianus, as he for years has so 
 often done, at the beginning of a business dispatch, with only 
 half a lieart. But to-morrow he hopes to greet this dear 
 friend of his youth, and his present wise deputy, not only with 
 "whole soul, but also with hand and mouth. 
 
 " But to speak plainer: I shall be in Alexandria to-morrow, 
 the 15th December, with only Antinous, my slave-master, and 
 Phlegon. the private secretary. AVe shall fand in a little har- 
 bor on the Lochias, toward evening, and my vessel will be 
 known by a great silver star on the beak. Should, "it be dark 
 
THE EMPEROR. G9 
 
 before we arrive you will know by tbe three red lanterns at 
 the top of the mast what friend is approaching. 
 
 " The learned men you sent to entertain me, and get more 
 time to put the old nest in order, where I have been longing 
 to roost with the birds of Minerva, and who I hope are not 
 yet all driven away, 1 have sent home, that Sabina may not 
 fail of entertainment, or these distinguished men be not too 
 long interrupted in their work. 
 
 " I do not need them. If, perchance, you are not the per- 
 son who sent them, 1 beg pardon. An error in such cases 
 carries something of humiliation; but it is easier to explain 
 what has already happened than to represent adequately what 
 is expected in the future. 
 
 " I will gladly compensate these clever men for their useless 
 journey, and dispute this question with them and their asso- 
 ciates in the museum. The grammarian, whose learning 
 stands out at the tip of every hair, and who sits still much 
 more than is good for him, will have had his life lengthened 
 by the trip. 
 
 " We shall come in jDlain clothes, and will sleep on the 
 Lochias. You know that I have rested more than once on 
 the bare ground, and when it is necessary can sleep as well on 
 a mat as a bolster. I bring my pillow. This is my great 
 Molossian, whom you already know. There will be some little 
 room, where I can make observations for the coming year 
 without disturbance. I trust you to guard my secret; and 
 beg, as only friend and emperor may, that literally no one 
 shall know my plans. Also, not the slightest prejDaration shall 
 disclose whom you expect. I can not command my dear 
 Titianus, but appeal to his heart to fulfill my wish. I rejoice 
 in the thought of seeing you again, and amuse myself with the 
 confusion I shall find on the Lochias. You shall introduce me 
 to the artists (of whom there are doubtless a swarm at present) 
 as the architect Claudius Venator, from Eome, come to assist 
 Pontius by his counsel. This Pontius, who planned such fine 
 buildings for Herodes Atticus, I have met at the dwelling of 
 the wealthy sophist, and he will certainly recognize me. 
 Share your knowledge of my plans with him. He is a reliable 
 man, no gossip or any simpleton, who will forget himself. 
 Let him into the secret, but not until my ship is in sight. 
 May all go well with you. ^' 
 
 " Now, what do you say to that?" asked Titianus, as he took 
 the letter from her hand. "Is it not more than vexatious? 
 Our work was progressing so finely.^' 
 
70 TlIK I:MI'KK01{. 
 
 " ]^nt." answcml Julia, Avith a shrewd smile, " it niiglit 
 not have been liuished. As things now stand, that is no mat- 
 ter, Hadrian will ai)i)reciate the good-will. I am rather glad 
 of it, for it lifts a heavy responsibility from already over- 
 burdened shoulders. " 
 
 " You always see the right,'' cried the jjrefect; " I am glad 
 I came in, for now I shall expect the emperor with much 
 lighter heart. Let me lock up this letter, and then good-bye. 
 This absence may cost you more hours of loneliness, and me 
 many a day's rest." 
 
 Titianus extended his hand, which his wife held fast in both 
 her own, saying: 
 
 " Before you go, I want to say that I feel very proud.'' 
 
 " That is your right. " 
 
 " You have not bound me to silence by a single word. " 
 
 " Because you have been tested. Still you are a woman, 
 and a handsome one. " 
 
 " An old grandmother, with whitening hair." 
 
 " And yet, statelier and more graceful than many yonnger 
 who are much admired. " 
 
 " You will constrain me in my old age to exchange pride 
 for vanity." 
 
 " Xotni the least. I have been looking at you with crit- 
 ical eyes, and thinking of Sabina's lament over the handsome 
 Julia.' But where is there another woman of j'our age with a 
 prouder bearing or more faultless features. So clear a fore- 
 head, such deej?, kind e3'es, such well-shaped arms — " 
 
 " Hush!" cried Juha, " you make me blush." 
 
 " May I not rejoice that this grandmother from Eome, who 
 is my wife, can blush so easily? You are quite different from 
 the other women. " 
 
 " Because you are so unlike ordinary men." 
 
 " Flatterer! Since the children are all gone we seem again 
 just married." 
 
 " There is no apple of discord in this house." 
 
 " For the dearest, it is above all things most natural to be 
 zealous. But once more I must say good-bye." 
 
 Titianus kissed the forehead of his wife and hastened to the 
 door; but Julia called him back to say: 
 
 " I send daily a meal to Pontius. Tliis evening the supply 
 shall be threefold. I can do so much for the emperor. " 
 
 " An excellent idea." 
 
 " Then good-bye." 
 
 *'A\'e shall meet again, when the gods and the emperor 
 2)ermit. " 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 71 
 
 ******* 
 
 When the prefect arrived at the spot indicated by the let- 
 ter, there was no vessel in sight with a silver star on the beak- 
 head. The sun went down, and still nothing was to be seen 
 of the three red lanterns. The harbor master in whose 
 house Titianus was waiting for the famous architect from 
 Eome coming to assist Pontius by his counsel, saw noth- 
 ing uncalled for in tliis attention. The whole city knew that 
 the old Ptolemian palace was being put in order for the em- 
 peror, with unexampled haste and with large outlay of money. 
 
 While waiting, Titianus thought of the young sculptor, Pol- 
 lux, and of liis mother in the little house at the gate. 
 
 Considerate as he always was, a messenger was dispatched 
 to ask Doris to wait his coming to the palace, even to a late 
 hour. " xVdvise her on your own account, and not as coming 
 from me, to have her house lighted and in good order, for 
 perhaps I may go in." 
 
 No one on the Lochias had any suspicion of the honor 
 awaiting the old palace. After Verus, his wife, and Balbilla 
 had left, Pollux worked diligently for some time, then coming 
 out of his cage to stretch his limbs, he called to Pontius, who 
 stood near a scaffolding. 
 
 " I must either rest or undertake a new job. One is just 
 as good as the other. Do you find it so?" 
 
 '^ Always," answered Pontius, and went on with the direc- 
 tions he was giving to some slaves, who were placing a new 
 capital on a Corinthian pillar. 
 
 " Do not disturb yourself," said Pollux. " But I want to 
 ask you to say to my master, Papias, if he come in with 
 Gabinius, the dealer in relics, that he will find me on the 
 round bastion, which we insjDected together yesterday. I am 
 going to i^lace a new head on the Berenice. My apprentice 
 must have finished the preliminaries some time ago; but the 
 fellow came into the world with two left hands, and since that 
 throws one eye out of place, all straight things appear crooked, 
 and, according to the laws of optics, all crooked things straight. 
 He has, perhaps, placed the wooden support for the new head 
 obliquely. Since no historian has told us that Berenice carried 
 her head to one side, like the old color-grinder yonder, I must 
 look after its standing straight. In half an • hour I think the 
 clever queen can no longer rank among the headless women." 
 
 " Where did you get the new head?" asked Pontius. 
 
 "Out of the secret archives of memory," answered Pollux; 
 " have you seen it?" 
 
 "Yes.'' 
 
72 THE EMPEROE. 
 
 " Does it please you?'* 
 
 " Very much." 
 
 " Then it is worthy to live," sung Pollux. As he left the 
 hall he nodded to the architect, and stuck a pink behind his 
 ear, which he had picked that morning from his mother's 
 garden plot. 
 
 He found that the apprentice had done his work on the 
 bastion better than he feared, but Pollux did not feel satisfied 
 with his own arrangement. As the busts now stood, their 
 backs were toward the balcony of the overseer, and the only 
 reason why he had been willing to resign possession of this be- 
 loved head was to give pleasure to liis old playmate. But he 
 found that it was only their own weight which held the busts 
 on their pedestals, and resolved so to alter the arrangement of 
 all that his favorite might occupy the desired position. 
 
 To accomiDlish this he called a few slaves to assist in the 
 exchange. 
 
 The unusual echoes waked in this lonely place excited the 
 curiosity of one pair of inquisitive eyes, that had already 
 peeped out to watch the work of the apprentice, but retreated 
 again upon seeing the bedaubed workman. 
 
 This time their owner stood still, observing the movements 
 of the slaves directed by Pollux. He stood, at first, with his 
 back toward her, but in j^laciug the bust ujDon its pedestal, 
 faced the balcony. Immediately a clear voice cried out: 
 "Surely that is the tall Pollux! Oh, how glad I am!" With 
 these words the girl on the balcony clapped her hands, and as 
 the sculptor nodded in re23ly, exclaiming: " And you are the 
 little Arsinoe? Everlasting gods! can that be the child?" 
 raised herself on tiptoe to appear as tall as possible, and said, 
 as she returned his nod: " I am not yet fully grown, but you 
 are wonderfully dignified with the beard on your cliin, and 
 your eagle nose. Selene told me yesterday you were working 
 here with the others." 
 
 The eye of the artist was struck by the appearance of the 
 girl. 1'here are poetic natures whose imagination incorporates 
 instantly all unusual experiences into a story or a poem. So 
 Pollux connected every beautiful face or figure he chanced to 
 meet Avith his special art. 
 
 " A Galatea, a perfect Galatea!" thought he. '* One might 
 fancy her just risen out of the sea, so fresh, so jo^-ous, so full 
 of life. The little curls on her forehead seem still lloating on 
 the water. Now she beiids over for the greeting. How per- 
 fect is every motion! It is as if the very daughter of Nereus 
 rose and sunk witli eaiOi wave. She is like both Selene and 
 
THE EMPEROR. 73 
 
 her mother in the shape of her head and the Grecian cut of 
 her features; but the elder sister is hke the statue of Prome- 
 theus before it was possessed of a soul. And Arsinoe is the 
 same masterjiiece after the heavenly fire was flowing in her 
 veins. " 
 
 During the few seconds occupied by these thoughts the girl 
 became impatient of his silence, and cried out : 
 
 "' You scarcely answer my greeting. What are you doing 
 there?" 
 
 '' Look!"' he replied, drawing the cover from the bust. 
 
 After a moment of silence she cried loudly, " My mother! 
 my mother!" and hastened back into the chamber. 
 
 " Now she will call her father and spoil all Selene's jjleas- 
 ure, " thought Pollux, while he moved the heavy marble into 
 exact position. "But let him come, /command here now, 
 and Keraunus will not dare disturb that which belongs to the 
 emperor. " He stood with crossed arms before the bust, and 
 said to himself: " Patchwork, pitiable patchwork; we seem to 
 be making a garment for the emperor of rags and shreds; to 
 be upholsterers and not artists. Were it not for Hadrian, and 
 for Domitia, with her children, I would never again lift a 
 finger for this kind of work." 
 
 The way from the overseer's dwelling led through passages 
 and over some flights of stairs; but it was scarcely a moment 
 after Arsinoe disappeared from the balcony before she stood 
 beside Pollux. With flushed cheeks, she pressed him away 
 from his position, and placed herself on the same spot, to gaze 
 at the beloved features. Tears ran down over her cheeks. 
 She paid no heed to Pollux, or to the workmen and slaves, 
 who had stared as she hastened past them like a spirit. 
 Pollux did not disturb her. His heart was touched by her 
 emotion; and he thought it was well worth while to have such 
 warm and enduring love as had this poor dead woman on the 
 pedestal. After gazing long on the beloved features, Arsinoe 
 had become quiet, and turning to Pollux, she asked: 
 
 " Have you made it?" 
 
 " Yes," answered he, casting down his eyes. 
 
 " And all from memory?" 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " Do you know what I am thinking?" 
 
 ''Please tell me." 
 
 " The prophetess at the feast of Adonis was right in saying 
 that half the work of a sculptor is from the gods." 
 
 "Arsinoe!" exclaimed Pollux, inspired to courage by her 
 words, as if a fresh spring had gushed up in his heart, and 
 
74 THE EilTEROR. 
 
 gratefully seized her hand ; but she drew it away, for lier sister 
 Selene had come out on the balcony, and called her. Pollux 
 had placed the bust here for the sake of his old iiUwfellow, 
 and not for Arsinoc; and now her look seemed to chill the 
 emotions of his soul. 
 
 " Here is the bust of your mother,'^ he cried in a tone of 
 explanation, pointing toward it. 
 
 I see it,'' she answered, with coolness. " By and by I Avill 
 look at it nearer. Come back, Arsinoe; father wishes to speak 
 with you. ' ' 
 
 As Selene went into the chamber she shook her head, mur- 
 muring: 
 
 ** Pollux said it was to be mine; for once I was to have 
 sr,*iething, but even this joy has been spoiled. " 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 The overseer of the palace, to whom Selene called her 
 younger sister, had just returned from the assembly of citi- 
 zens, and the old black who always followed him took the 
 crocus-colored pallium from his shoulders and the golden 
 fillet from his head. Keraunus scorned heated, and his eyes 
 to be starting from their sockets, while beads of perspiration 
 stood on his forehead. He scarcely answered the pleasant 
 greeting of Arsinoe, and walked uji and down the room for 
 some time before opening the important matters for which he 
 had summoned his daughters. He puffed out his cheeks and 
 crossed his arms, and Selene had become anxious, and Arsinoe 
 impatient, when at last he began : 
 
 " Have you heard of the festival to be celebrated in honor 
 of the emperor?" 
 
 Selene nodded affirmatively, and her sister cried out: "Of 
 course we have! Have you engaged places for us upon the 
 benches of the council?" 
 
 " Do not interrupt me," said the overseer in a surly tone. 
 ** The question is not one of looking on. All citizens have 
 been called on to let their daughters take part in the festivities, 
 and the number of all such has been asked." 
 
 " Shall we then have a share in the fun?" asked Arsinoe, 
 clapping her hands with joy. 
 
 " I wished to retire before this call came, but the ship- 
 wright, Tryphon, who has his Avorkshop near the king's har- 
 bor, lu'id me back, and cried out in the assembly that his sons 
 told liini 1 had two handsome daughters. How did they know 
 that?" 
 
THE EMPEROE. 75 
 
 With these words Keraunus elevated' his gray eyes, and his 
 face flushed to the roots of his hair. Selene shrugged her 
 shoulders, but Arsinoe said: 
 
 " We often pass the workshop of Tryphon, but we do not 
 know him or his sons. Have you ever seen them, Selene? It 
 is very polite of liim to call us handsome. " 
 
 " No one has a right to trouble himself about your looks 
 unless he comes to ask you of me in marriage," answered 
 Keraunus, surly as ever. 
 
 " What did you answer Tryphon?'^ asked Selene. 
 
 " I did what was incumbent on me. Your father governs a 
 palace, which now belongs to Rome, and its Emperor Hadrian 
 will also be my guest in this dwelling of my fathers; and can 
 I therefore do less than share with other citizens in whatever 
 festivities the council decide to celebrate in his honor?" 
 
 " So then we may do it?'^ asked Arsinoe, going toward her 
 father in a caressing manner. 
 
 Keraunus was in no humor for caresses, and pushed her back 
 with a cross " let me alone, '^ and went on to say: 
 
 "If Hadrian should ask: 'Keraunus, where were your 
 daughters during my days of honor?^ and I should be forced 
 to answer: ' They were not among the daughters of the noble 
 citizens,' it would be an insult to the Ca3sar, toward whom I 
 am, in the main, well disposed. I thought over all these things 
 before giving your names, with the promise that you would be 
 at the assembly of women in the little theater. You will meet 
 there the noblest women of the city, and the first artists will 
 decide in what 23art of the celebration you had best take parf 
 
 " But, father, '' cried Selene, " how can we show ourselves 
 there is our sim23le garments, and Whence will come money to 
 buy others?" 
 
 " We can dress in clean white woolen robes, and make them 
 pretty enough with fresh ribbons to compare with any of the 
 other girls," asserted Arsinoe, pressing in between her father 
 and sister. 
 
 " It is not that which troubles me," answered the overseer, 
 " but the costumes, the costumes. Only the expense of dress- 
 ing the poorer class will be borne by the council, and we do 
 not want to be counted among them. You understand me, 
 my children." 
 
 " I shall take no share in the j^rocession, " said Selene, de- 
 cidedl}^, but Arsinoe fell in with the word: 
 
 " To be poor is certainly inconvenient and disagreeable, but 
 not disgraceful. The noblest Komans of the aiicient time 
 counted it an honor to die poor. We can always boast of our 
 
76 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Macedonian origin, even though the city pay for our cos- 
 tumes." 
 
 *' Ilushl" cried the overseer. " This is not the first time I 
 have heard you express such low sentiments. The disad- 
 vantage of poverty can be endured by tlie noble, but the only 
 real ])rofit it brings is after he himself has ceased to be con- 
 scious of it." It cost the overseer much effort to bring out 
 ideas so foreign to his own sentiments; and which he did not 
 remember to have heard expressed by another person, and at 
 the close he let himself sink, with every sign of exhaustion, 
 upon the cushion of a divan which occupied a corner recess of 
 the spacious apartment. 
 
 Cleopatra had probably reclined upon this at her feasts with 
 Antony, for this very spot had been the dining-room of the 
 distinguished lovers. The floor of the whole room had an 
 elaborate pattern wrought "into the paving; but in this recess 
 stones of various colors were so arranged to make a painting 
 of such exceeding beauty and fineness of execution that 
 Keraunus had forbidden his children to walk over it. 
 
 This was less from any appreciation of the artistic work 
 than because his father, and his grandfather before him, had 
 each made the same prohibition. 
 
 The scene represented in this mosaic was the marriage of 
 Peleus and Thetis, and the divan covered only a row of lovely 
 cupids, which made an outside border to this noble picture. 
 
 Keraunus ordered his daughter to bring him a glass of wine, 
 but she diluted it with fruit syrup. After drinking half of it 
 with many expressions of disgust at the mixture, he asked : 
 
 '* Would you like to know the cost of a single costume if we 
 do not fall far below the others?" 
 
 " Please tell us," answered Arsinoe, anxiously. 
 
 " Philinus, the tailor, who works for the theater, says it is 
 impossible to furnish one under seven hundred drachmas."* 
 
 " ^ou can not think seriously of such an outlay!" cried 
 Selene. " We have nothing, and I am sure no one will lend 
 to us." 
 
 The younger daughter stared blankly at her finger-tips, and 
 said nothing; but the tears swimming in her e3^es betrayed her 
 feelings. Keraunus was pleased with this dumb evidence of 
 her sympathy with his own desire to have a share in the fes- 
 tivities at any price. He forgot liis late c iticism upon her 
 low sentiments, and said: 
 
 " The little one has always a sense of what is suitable. As 
 
 * One drachma is worth about fifteen cents. 
 
THE EMPEROE. 77 
 
 to you, Selene, I wish to remiud you that I am your father, 
 and that I can not endure your admonitory tone. You have 
 acquired it through intercourse with the children, and toward 
 them it is quite j)roper. Fourteen hundred drachmas seem at 
 first thought a large sum, but if one purchases the stuff and 
 the ornaments wisely, it can be returned to the merchant, 
 after the festival, perhaps with a profit. " 
 
 '' With a profit!" cried Selene, bitterly. " Not the half, or 
 even a quarter will be paid for the old things! And if you 
 should turn me out of the house for it I will not help plunge 
 the family into deeper misery. I will have nothing to do with 
 the sport." 
 
 This time the face of Keramius did not flush; he was not 
 violent. But he looked np composedly, and not without an 
 expression of contentment, comj^aring one daughter with the 
 other. He was accustomed to regard Selene as the practical, 
 Arsinoe as the pretty one; but since only through the satisfac- 
 tion of her vanity could he reach his own end, he said: 
 
 " Then you can stay with the children. We will excuse you 
 on the ground of poor health; and really, girl, you do look 
 pale enough to frighten one. I shall only provide the means 
 for Arsinoe.^' 
 
 The dimples became visible once more in her cheeks, while 
 the lips of Selene were colorless, as she exclaimed: 
 
 " But, father, neither the baker nor the butcher have re- 
 ceived one sesterce for two months, and yet you will throw 
 away seven hundred drachmas!" 
 
 " Throw away!" repeated Keraumus, disturbed, but not in 
 a passion. ' ' I have already forbidden you to speak in that 
 manner to me. The wealthiest young men of the city will 
 take part in these festivities. Arsinoe is handsome, and joer- 
 haps some one of them may choose her as a wife. Do you call 
 it throwing away when a father is seeking a worthy husband 
 for his child? Besides, what do you really know of my 
 means?" 
 
 " We have nothing, therefore I can know nothing of them,'* 
 cried the girl, quite beside herself. 
 
 "No!" exclaimed Keraunus, stretching himself, and with a 
 supercilious smile, " is that nothing which lies in the cupboard 
 yonder, and also on the window-sill? Out of love to you I am 
 willing to relinquish all. The onyx clasj), the ring, the golden 
 fillet, and the girdle, certainly — " 
 
 " They are only plated silver," broke in Selene, without 
 mercy. " You sold the genuine after mother's death." 
 
 '' It was necessary that she should be cremated according to 
 
78 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 our rank/' answered Keraunus. " I do not like to recall those 
 sorrowful days.'' 
 
 " Do thiuk of them, father!" 
 
 *' Hush! That which belongs to my personal adornment I 
 ought not to relinquisli; for I must meet the emperor as he 
 whom I am. But the vahie of that bronze Cupid, tlie carved 
 ivory cup of Plutarch, and especially the painting yonder, 
 which the former owner assured me was done by Aj^elles here 
 in Alexandria, can be used for this purpose. We shall soon 
 learn what they are worth, for, as if the gods ordered it, I met 
 on way home Gabinius, the dealer in relics, from IS'icaa. He 
 promised, after finishing his business with the architect, to 
 come in here and look at my treasures; and he will pay ready 
 money for anything he takes. My AjDclles is well worth ten 
 talents; but if he gives me only a half, or a quarter of that 
 sum, I shall be satisfied. Then, for once, Selene, I shall insist 
 on your enjoying a pleasure." 
 
 '' We will see," answered the j)ale girl, shrugging her 
 shoulders; and Arsinoe cried: 
 
 " Show him also the sword, which you always say once be- 
 longed to Antony, and if he gives much for it, you can buy me 
 a bracelet." 
 
 *' Selene shall have one, too. But I expect little from the 
 sword; it will hardly be considered genuine. Yet there are 
 many other things. Hark! that must be his knock. Quick, 
 Selene, help me on with the chiton! My band, Arsinoe. 
 They always give a higher price to one Mdio appears in good 
 circumstances than to a jooor man. I ordered the slave to 
 detain him in the front apartment. That is done in all the 
 best houses." 
 
 The dealer in relics was a small and meager man, who had 
 gained distinction and wealth through his own shrewdness and 
 diligence. He was regarded as the highest authority in dis- 
 criminating between false and genuine articles. No man had 
 better eyes than he, but he was rough in intercourse with those 
 from whom he had nothing to expect, though polite, even to 
 fawning, where he had the prospect of gain, and he possessed 
 an immense fund of i:»atience. He constrained himself to an air 
 of conviction as the overseer assured him he was rather tired of 
 guarding these small treasures; he did not propose to part 
 with them for the sake of the money; still, he would like to 
 show them to an expert, and was willing to let them go should 
 a sufficient sum be ofl'ered. One jnece after another passed 
 through the fine fingers of Gabinius, and were laid aside. The 
 man was very silent^ and shook his head each time he put 
 
THE EMPEROR. 'i9 
 
 down an article. As Keraimus related when this or that had 
 originated, he replied only by a faint "So?" or " Do you think 
 so?'' or "Indeed!" 
 
 After the last article had been scrutinized Kerauiius asked: 
 
 " Well, what do you think?" 
 
 The beginning of the sentence rang confidently, but the end 
 expressed anxiety; for the dealer smiled and shook his head 
 once more before he said: 
 
 " All very j^retty, but nothing of any special value. I ad- 
 vise you to keep them, since they are precious in your eyes, 
 while I have little occasion for such." 
 
 Keraunus avoided meeting the eye of Selene, who had 
 anxiously watched the dealer; but Arsinoe, who had also been 
 attentive to his every movement, pointing to her father's 
 Apelles, cried out: 
 
 " And is tliis painting of no value?" 
 
 " I am sorry that I can not assure such a beautiful young 
 lady that it is a treasure of inestimable worth," answered the 
 dealer, stroking his whiskers. " But, unfortunately, it is only 
 a weak imitation. The original is in the Cothurnus, a villa of 
 Pliny, on the Lake of Como. I have no call for such articles. " 
 
 " And this carved goblet," asked Keraunus. " It belonged 
 to Plutarch, as I can prove, and was probably a gift from the 
 Emperor Trajan." 
 
 " Certainly it is the prettiest tiling in your collection," an- 
 swered Gabinius; " but four hundred drachmas is really more 
 than it is worth." 
 
 " And this Cyprian cylinder with the fine engraving?" 
 
 The overseer put out his hand, trembling with excitement, 
 to take u]) the polished crystal, but j)uslied it to the floor. It 
 rolled noisily over the stone floor and the smooth mosaic to the 
 divan. Keraunus was stooping to pick it up, but both daugh- 
 ters held him back, while Selene cried : 
 
 " Father, you must not; the physician has strictly forbidden 
 it." 
 
 While the grumbling overseer tried to push aside the girls 
 the relic dealer had already dropped upon one knee to reach it. 
 But the man was much longer in rising than he had been in 
 stooping down, for it was some moments before he stood on 
 his feet. Meanwliile his features had taken on a strained 
 expression. Once more he seized the tablet describing the 
 Apelles, and seated himself on the divan, ajDparently ab- 
 sorbed in the painting, whi('li he held so as to hide his face 
 from the three persons who were watching him. But he was 
 not studying the picture. His thoughts were occupied with 
 
80 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the marriage scene on the mosaic at liis feet, in wliidi lie had 
 discovered a rare treasure. 
 
 MeaiiAvliile the features of Keraunus grew more cheerful in 
 their ex])res.sion. Selene no longer held her breath, and Ar- 
 sinoe trijiped to the side of her father, and pulling his arm, 
 whispered: "Don't give him the Apelles cheap, and re- 
 member my bracelet." 
 
 Now Gabinius rose, glanced again at the articles on the 
 table, and said: 
 
 " For all these together, I can offer — let me see — twenty, 
 fifty, four hundred, four hiuidred and fifty. I can olfer six 
 hundred and fifty drachmas — not one sesterce more. " 
 
 *' You are joking,'" exclaimed Keraunus. 
 
 "Not a sesterce more," repeated the dealer, coolly. "I 
 shall make no profit, but, as a sensible man, you understand 
 that I can not purchase at a positive loss. As to the Apelles 
 — well— imder certain conditions, it might have a value for 
 me. The case is a little jjeculiar. You young ladies know 
 that my trade has taught me to estimate things according to 
 their real worth; yet I must ask you to leave me for a little 
 while alone with yom* father. I want to talk with him about 
 this rare picture," 
 
 Keraunus nodded to his daughters, who left the room at 
 once. Before the door was closed, Gabinius called after them : 
 
 " May I ask you to send your slave with a bright fight? It 
 is already twilight. " 
 
 " What is the matter with the painting?" asked Keramius. 
 
 " Let us speak of other tilings until the lamp comes," an- 
 swered Gabinius. 
 
 *' Then take a seat on this divan. You will thus be giving 
 me, as well as yourself, a pleasure." 
 
 When they were seated, Gabinius began: 
 
 " One gives up these things, with their j^leasant associations, 
 unwillingly. I know this from experience. Many people, 
 after selling such, have offered ten times the amount I paid to 
 get them back again — very often in vain — they are gone be- 
 yond recall. What is true of others is doubtless true of you. 
 If you were not needing money, you would not oM'er these 
 things to me." 
 
 " I must assure you — " broke in Keraunus, but the dealer 
 did not allow him to go on. 
 
 " Ready money fails sometimes with the richest, even when 
 they have abundance in large possessions. It is in just suck 
 cases of embarrassment that my help is wanted." 
 
THE ilMPEROll. 81 
 
 " There is my Apelles/^ broke in Keraimus, once more. 
 *' It wiJl belong to you, if your offer pleases me." 
 
 *' Here comes the light/ ^ cried Gabinius, taking the three- 
 armed lamp (into which Selene had quickly put a new wick 
 and fresh oil) from the hand of the slave, and setting it in the 
 very middle of the mosaic painting, turning to Keraunus as he 
 did so with a faint, " By yom* permission." 
 
 The overseer looked inquisitively at this singular proceeding, 
 but Gabinius scarcely noticed him, and dropping again on his 
 knees, passed liis fingers over the lines of the painting. 
 
 " Have you lost something?" asked Keraunus. 
 
 *' No, nothing at all. There — in the corner. Now I know 
 enough. May 1 place the lamp on the table? There — and 
 now to return to our business. I will say beforehand, that 
 my offer will no longer be in drachmas, but in genuine Attic 
 talents.* You know the difference. I shall offer you five; 
 wliich is enough to buy a good house in some parts of the 
 city." 
 
 Again the blood rushed to the head of the overseer, and his 
 heart beat so violently that for a few moments he could not 
 speak; but at length, so far recovering that he determined 
 this time to seize fortune by the hair and not to be over- 
 reached in the bargain, answered : 
 
 " Five talents are not enough; offer me more." 
 
 " Then we will say six." 
 
 " If you double that sum I will agree to it.'" 
 
 " I can not offer above ten. For that sum one could build 
 a small palace. " 
 
 " I stand by twelve." 
 
 " Then let it be so, but not a sesterce more." 
 
 " I shall part unwillingly from the noble work; but as a 
 favor to you, I will give up my Apelles. " 
 
 " 1 am not talking about that, which is of so little value 
 that you can continue to enjoy it. There is another thing in 
 this room which I want, which perhaps you scarcely consider 
 worth noticing. A wealthy lover of art has asked me to pro- 
 cm-e for him just such an article." 
 
 " I know not what you mean." 
 
 *' Does all the furniture of this room belong to you?" 
 
 " To whom else should it belong?" 
 
 " Then you are at liberty to dispose of anything here?" 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 * One Attic talent is about $1,180. 
 
82 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " Well, then, the twelve talents I offered are for the jjicture 
 under our feet. " 
 
 " The mosaic? Why, that belongs to the palace." 
 
 " It belongs to the dwelUng, where, as I heard from your 
 own mouth, your ancestors have dwelt more than a hundred 
 years. I know the law, and that declares whatever has been 
 in undisputed possession of a family for a hundred years to be 
 inalienable." 
 
 " The mosaic belongs to the palace." 
 
 " Xo, certainly not. It is yours. To-morrow I will send 
 you twelve talents, in gold, and a little later this evening I 
 will take up the painting, with my son's help, pack it, and 
 carry it away after dark. You must look out for a carpet to 
 cover the empty place. And it is even more important for me 
 to keep the transaction a secret than for you." 
 
 " The mosaic belongs to the palace," repeated the overseer, 
 this time in a louder voice. Do you hear? It belongs to 
 the palace, and I will break the bones of any one who touches 
 it." 
 
 With these words Keraunus rose, bending his gigantic body, 
 while the blood rushed to his face as he threatened the dealer 
 with his doubled list. Gabinius stepped backward frightened. 
 
 Do you not then want my twelve talents?" 
 "I want — I want" — stammered Keraunus, "I want to 
 show you how I treat those who take me for a thief. Get out, 
 rascal, and don't let me hear another word of the mosaic, and 
 the theft under cover of the darkness, or I will have the lictors 
 of the prefect at your throat, and see you put into irons, you 
 detestable robber." 
 
 Gabinius hurried to the door, but turned again toward the 
 snorting and panting Colossus, crying out, as he crossed the 
 threshold: 
 
 " Keep your wares; w^e wall talk it over another time!" 
 When Selene and Arsinoe came back to the room they found 
 their father sitting on the divan, his head hanging over his 
 breast, and breathing with great difficulty. Terrified, they 
 came toward him, but he cried out, brokenly: 
 
 " Water, a swallow of water — the thief — the scoundrel!" 
 Without the slightest hesitation he had thrust back the 
 proposition which would have brought a competence for him- 
 self and his family; yet he would have as unhesitatingly bor- 
 rowed the same, or double the amount, from either a rich or 
 a poor man, well knowing he could never restore it. lie was 
 not at all proud of his deed; he thought it only natui'al for a, 
 
THE EMPEEOE. 83 
 
 Macedonian nobleman. To accept the offer of the rehc dealer 
 would have been to him among the imjDossible things. 
 
 But where now was he to find money to procure the costume 
 for Arsinoe? — how could he kee]) the promise given in the as- 
 sembly? He lay for an hour on the divan thinking it over. 
 Then he took a wax tablet from the chest, and began a letter 
 to the prefect, offering to sell him the mosaic for the emperor's 
 use in the palace, but he soon became entangled in high- 
 sounding phrases. 
 
 At last, despairing of success, he threw the unfinished letter 
 into the chest, and laid himself down to sleep. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 While heavy clouds of care, anxiety and disappointment 
 darkened the souls of those in the dwelling of the palace over- 
 seer, feasting and jollity reigned in the Hall of the Muses. 
 Julia, wife of the prefect, had sent to the Lochias a richly pre- 
 pared meal sufficient for six hungry men; and the slave of 
 Pontius, who had received, unpacked, and arranged it on the 
 rudest of tables, hastened to show his master these wonders in 
 the art of cooking. The architect shook his head at the sight, 
 and said to himself: 
 
 '' Titianus must take me for a crocodile; or rather, for two 
 crocodiles. " 
 
 Then he went to the inclosure behind which Pollux was at 
 work, and finding Papias with liim, invited both men to share 
 his meal. To these guests he added two painters, and the 
 most famous worker in mosaics of the city, who had all the 
 day been busy in rej^airing pavements or frescoed ceilings. 
 With the heljD of the good wine and the merry talk, the dishes 
 were soon emjotied. 
 
 Whoever works steadily with either hands or brains will be- 
 come hungry; and for several days all these artisans called to- 
 gether by Pontius had labored to the extent of their powers. 
 Each did his best, not alone to satisfy Pontius, whom they all 
 respected, but also to give the emperor a proof of what the 
 Alexandrians were capable. 
 
 After the dishes had been removed, and the satisfied guests 
 had washed and dried their hands, the goblets were filled from 
 a tankard of a size corresponding to the abundant provision of 
 food. One of the painters suggested speeches, and the sculptor, 
 Papias, who was as famous for happy expression of thought as 
 for sculpture, was unanimously chosen toast-master. But he 
 declined the honor in favor of one more worthy — the man who 
 
84 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 had, only a few days before, come into this empty palace and, 
 as a second Deucalion, called out of nothing, instead of out of 
 stone, this busy host of workmen and artists. While assuring 
 them that he understood using hammer and nails much bet- 
 ter than the tongue, and had never learned to make a speech, 
 lie begged them to choose Pontius for the place. I^ut he had 
 not finisiied his suggestions, when the gate-keeper, Euphorion, 
 came with great haste into the hall, bringing a letter for the 
 architect. 
 
 *' To be read instantly," he declared, bowing in a theatrical 
 manner before Pontius. ''A lictor of the prefect brought 
 this, which I trust contains good tidings. Hush your barking, 
 you wretched beggars, or I shall strike you down." 
 
 The last remark, whose tone was scarcely meant for the ears 
 of the artistic company, was addressed to the three four-footed 
 Graces of his wife, who, against his will, had followed him into 
 the hall, and sprung barking ujjon the tables where stood the 
 remnants of the feast. Pontius, who loved animals, and was 
 a special friend of these little dogs at the gate-keeper^ s, said, 
 while opening the letter of the prefect: " I invite the three 
 little ones to finish our feast. Give them what you think best, 
 Euphorion, and if there be anything suitable for your own 
 stomach, take it, and welcome." 
 
 While Pontius glanced hastily at the letter, and then read it 
 through more attentively, the musician had gathered many 
 nice bits together for the pets of his wife, and finally raised the 
 last pasty, on the plate to which it belonged, to liis own nose. 
 " For dogs, or men?" he asked of his son, toucMng it with his 
 outstretched finger. 
 
 ''For gods," answered Pollux. "Take it to mother; she 
 will like for once to eat ambrosia." 
 
 " A joyful evening to you all," cried Euphorion, bowing to 
 the men busy with their cups, and left the hall with the pasty 
 and the three dogs. While he was retreating slowly, Papias, 
 ■whose speech had been interrupted by his entrance, rose, and 
 lifting his cup, began once more: 
 
 " Deucalion, our more than Deucalion — " 
 
 " Excuse me," broke in Pontius, *' if I interrupt a speech 
 so felicitously begun. This letter contains important tidings. 
 The banquet is over for to-day. We must postpone our sym- 
 posium and your toast. " 
 
 " It was no toast, for when a modest man — " began Papias. 
 
 Pontius prevented his progress, saying: " Titianus is coming 
 to the Lochias this evening. He nuiy be here any moment, 
 and he will not be alone. He brings one of my feilow-urchi- 
 
THE EMPEEOK. 85 
 
 tects, Claudius Venator, from Rome. The man comes to as- 
 sist me with his counsel."' 
 
 " I have never heard that name/' said Papias, who was as 
 familiar with the persons as the works of fellow-artists. 
 
 •' That surprises me/' answered Pontius, folding up the let- 
 ter which had brought him word of the emperor's arrival. 
 
 " Does he know anything?" asked Pollux. 
 
 " More than all of us together," answered Pontius. " He 
 is a great man." 
 
 " That is good," cried Pollux. " I love to meet great men. 
 When they look one in the eye it is as if something of their 
 greatness passes into us. Involuntarily one stretches himself 
 upward and thinks how fine it would be to some day reach Ms 
 chin—" 
 
 " Do not follow a sickly ambition," said Papias, interrupting 
 his pupil in admonitory tone. " Not he who stands on tiptoe, 
 but the man who is faithful in performance of duty may look 
 to attain greatness." 
 
 " This man does honest work," said Pontius, rising and 
 placing his hand on the shoulder of Pollux. " And that is 
 true of us all. Let each one be at his post by sunrise to-mor- 
 row. For the sake of my colleague it will be well to have all 
 here promptly." 
 
 The artists rose, expressing their thanks and regrets. 
 
 "You can not continue yom- speech this evening," cried 
 one of the painters to Papias, who, in taking leave of Pontius, 
 remarked : 
 
 " When we come together again, I shall explain what I un- 
 derstand by a toast. It may perhaps interest your Roman 
 guest. I am curious to know what he will say to the Urania. 
 Pollux has done his share of the work well — I must devote a 
 few hours more to its completion. The poorer our material, 
 the more shall I rejoice if it please the emperor; he is himself 
 something of a sculptor. " 
 
 " If Hadrian were to hear that!" broke in one of the paint- 
 ers. " He wishes to be considered a great sculptor, the first of 
 our time. They say he was to blame for the death of the 
 great architect Apollodorus, who did such noble work in the 
 time of Trajan. And why? Because the worthy man regard- 
 ed the emperor as a bungler, and did not ajjprove his design 
 for the Temple of Venus at Rome." 
 
 *' I'liat was only a rumor," said Pontius, in rejily to this 
 charge. " Apollodorus died in prison, but his confinement 
 there had little to do with his criticism of the emperor's work. 
 
8G THE EMPEROR. 
 
 But I must beg you to excuse me, gentlemen. I must look 
 over tlie drauglits and plans. ^' 
 
 The architect walked out, but Pollux sought to-continue the 
 conversation, saying: 
 
 *' I can not comprehend how Hadrian, with the cares of 
 government and state affairs, at the same time a devoted 
 hunter — interested also in all sorts of learned tittle-tattle — can 
 call back his fine senses from their flight in these directio)is to 
 the jiractice of any artistic work. The inside of his head must 
 look like the salad-dish we just enii^tied, in which Papias had 
 discovered three sorts of fish, black meat, white meat, oysters, 
 and at least five other ingredients. " 
 
 " And who," added PajDias, " will deny that if talent be the 
 mother, and diligence the father, of all artistic skill, steady 
 practice must be called the tutor? Since Hadrian paints and 
 works in stone, it has become the fashion, here as everywhere, 
 to dabble in it. Among the wealthy young men who frequent 
 my workshop, there are many well endowed by nature, but 
 none of them bring much to pass, because the gymnasium, 
 the baths, the combats, the banquets, and I know not what 
 else, take so much time from their practice." 
 
 " Yes," added one of the painters, " without the constraint 
 and the annoyaance of the apprenticeship, one can not attain 
 to a free and happy power of creation. In the schools of 
 rhetoric, upon a hunting expedition, and in war, one can have 
 no rogidar lessons. It is only when a pupil devotes six hours 
 a day to his practice that I begin to think he will accomplish 
 something. Have any of you seen a specimen of the em- 
 l^eror's work.^" 
 
 " I have," answered the worker in mosaic. " A few years 
 ago Hadrian sent me one of his pictures as the pattern for a 
 mosaic I was to make. It was a fruit piece, contahiing melons, 
 gourds, apples, and green leaves. The drawing was so-so, the 
 coloring vivid, and the composition pleased me for its romid- 
 ness and fullness. It is more agreeable to see a painting too 
 rich than too poor. The large fruit, under the almost too 
 exuberant foliage, looked as if it might have grown in the gar- 
 den of luxury; but the tvhole expression was pleasing. In my 
 mosaic, I softened the coloring a little. A copy of this picture 
 I liave yet. It hangs in the hall of my designers. The rich 
 Kealkes used it as a pattern for a piece of tapestry, M-hich 
 Pontius has purchased for the wall of the emperor's private 
 room, and I added a handsome border for him." 
 
 " >S&y rather for the original designer." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 87 
 
 " Or better still, against his possible visit to your work- 
 shop/' broke in the most loquacious of the jjainters. 
 
 " Do you suppose the emperor will visit us? I should like 
 to sell liim my ' Salutation of Alexander in the Temple of 
 Jupiter Ammon/ " 
 
 '"' I hope, when it comes to fixing the price, you will not for- 
 get your colleagues," added another, with a smirk. 
 
 '^ I will be guided by your example," answered the first 
 speaker. 
 
 " Then you will scarcely come too short," cried Papias, 
 " for Eustorgius knows how to put a high value on his own 
 work. If Hadrian should leave an order with all the masters 
 in whose work he dabbles, he will need a special fleet to carry 
 all his purchases to Eome. " 
 
 " They say," said the painter Eustorgius, " he is a j^ainter 
 among poets, a sculptor among painters, an astronomer witli 
 the musicians, a sophist with the sculptors; i. e., he pursues 
 each of the arts or sciences as a secondary occupation, with 
 hajjpy success. " 
 
 Just here Pontius returned to the table, and hearing the 
 last words, he interrupted the speaker to say: 
 
 " You forget, my friend, that he stands among the Eegents, 
 in the full significance of that word. Each of you can exe- 
 cute in his own department certainly more carefully and min- 
 utely, but how great is the man, who, with no lazy interest, 
 but with earnestness and skill, attempts what only a fine 
 spirit and a cultivated thought could accomiolish. I know 
 him, and am sure that he loves cajiable workers, and seeks to 
 encourage them with princely generosity. But he has his ears 
 everywhere, and will prove an implacable enemy to all who 
 irritate his sensibilities. Guard your Alexandrian tongues; 
 and let me tell you that the colleague I am exjjecting from 
 Eome stands very near to Hadrian. He is an old associate, 
 he looks like him, and never keejis back from him anything 
 he hears. Do not criticise the emperor, or be more severe to- 
 ward the amateur in purj)le than you are with your wealthy 
 pupils for whom ' charming,^ or ' wonderfully pretty,' or ' ex- 
 traordinarily nice,' slips so easily over the lips. Do not take 
 my warning amiss. You know how I mean it." 
 
 These words were spoken with that manly heartiness which 
 always won the confidence and obedience even of those who 
 held opposite views. 
 
 Adieus and hand-shakings were exchanged; the company 
 left the hall; a slave carried out the wine-taukard, and cleai-ed 
 
88 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the table upon wliicli Poutius spread out his j^lans and dia- 
 grams. 
 
 But he was not long alone, for Pollux came to his side, and 
 said, with comical i^athos, placing one finger against his nose: 
 
 " I have sprung from my cage to say something to you/' 
 
 "AYell?*' 
 
 " The hour approaches in which I can seek to requite the 
 benefits you have at various times bestowed ujion my stomach. 
 My mother will to-morrow set before you the dish of cabbage. 
 She could not do it sooner, as the only sausage-maker, ^\■ho is 
 king of his art, prepares the little moist cylinders only once in 
 a week. A few hours ago the sausages were ready, and to- 
 morrow, for breakfast, my mother will heat over the noble 
 dish; for, as I have told you before, only as warmed over does 
 it reach our ideal. The sweet dishes that will come with it 
 will also bear evidence of my mother's skill; but for the re- 
 freshing drink — the dull-care-dispersing wine, we shall be in- 
 debted to my sister. " 
 
 " I will come," answered Pontius, '* if our guest gives me a 
 free hour; and shall heartily relish your good cheer. But 
 what does such a merry bird as you know of ' dull care?' " 
 
 " That Avord smts the meter," answered Pollux, " and I 
 have inherited from my father, wdio sings and jDoetizes when 
 he is not busy at the gate, the troublesome necessity of express- 
 ing in rhyme whatever moves my soul. " 
 
 " You have been more silent than usual to-day, and yet 
 you look very happy. Not alone your face, but your whole 
 long body from crown to foot, seems a vessel filled to the brim 
 with joy." 
 
 "It is good to be in the world," cried Pollux, stretching 
 himself upward, and lifting his arms toward the heavens. 
 
 " Has anything especially agreeable happened to you?" 
 
 " That is not at all necessary! I live here in noble com- 
 pany — the work progresses — and why should I conceal it? 
 There was something special to-day. I met an old acquaint- 
 ance. " 
 
 *' A very old one?" 
 
 " It is sixteen years since I have kno■v\^l her; but I saw her 
 first in baby-clothes. " 
 
 " More than sixteen ! Then this venerable friend must be 
 at least seventeen! • Was it Eros, or did the happiness follow 
 in his train?" 
 
 The architect spoke meditatively, and Pollux listened with 
 attention. Then he said: 
 
 ** What is going on outside at tliis houi'? Did you not hear 
 
THE EMPEROE. 89 
 
 the deep baying of a dog between the shrill yelping of the 
 three Graces?" 
 
 " Titianus brings the Roman architect/^ said Pontius, ex- 
 cited. " I will go to meet them. But one word more, my 
 friend. You, too, have an Alexandrian tongue. Be careful, 
 in the jDresence of this Roman, not to ridicule the emperor. I 
 repeat what I said before. The man who comes is superior to 
 us all; and nothing can be more repugnant than for one to put 
 on airs because some weakness has been discovei-ed in a great 
 man of which the complainer happens to be free. The artist 
 I expect is a great man, but Hadrian is far greater. Now re- 
 treat behind your frame- work, and to-morrow I will be your 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 Pontius threw his pallium over the chiton he was accus- 
 tomed to wear while at work, and went to meet the monarch 
 of the world, whose coming the letter of the prefect had an- 
 nounced. He was outwardly calm, and if his heart beat faster 
 than usual, it was with joy in the expectation of meeting again 
 the wonderful man whose personality had so deeply impressed 
 him on a former occasion. In the consciousness of having 
 done all he could to prepare the jjalace for its master, he 
 stepped into the court, where many slaves were busied in lay- 
 ing down new flag-stones by torch-light. Neither they nor their 
 overseer had heard the deep baying of the dog and the loud 
 voices which rang through the court, so absorbed were all in 
 their work. Pontius had offered a reward if a certain amount 
 of this flagging were laid witliin a specified time. 
 
 The emperor had been delayed by adverse winds, and it was 
 almost midnight when the ship reached the haven. 
 
 He greeted Titianus with the hearty warmth of an old 
 friend, and entered, with him and Antinous, the chariot of the 
 former; while Phlegon, the private secretary, and Hermogenes, 
 the physician, and the slave, Mastor, followed upon another 
 vehicle with the luggage, which included camp-beds. The 
 harbor guards at first opposed the progress of these chariots, 
 driving noisily through the streets, disturbing the quiet of the 
 night; but seeing Titianus they stepped respectfully aside. The 
 gate-keejier and his wife had remained awake, in accordance 
 with the suggestion of the jorefect; and so soon as Euphorion 
 heard the approaching chariot-wheels, the gates flew open for 
 the emjDeror's admission. 
 
 The state of the pavements and the crowd of laborers made 
 
.90 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 it necessary to desceiul from the chariot at the gate-keeper*s 
 house. Hadrian, whom notliing escaped which was worth 
 seeing, ste]iped before the open door and looked into the 
 pleasant room, with its birds and flowers and statue of Apollo, 
 and Doris, in her newest gown, awaiting Titianus on the thresh- 
 old. 
 
 The prefect saluted her heartil)^, for he was accustomed, 
 whenever he came to the Lochias, to exchange a few ,Avords 
 with the cheerful and sensible woman. 
 
 The little dogs had long ago crept into their basket for the 
 night, but as soon as they scented a stranger, j^lunged with 
 loud yel])iug past their mistress into the court, so that while 
 Doris was answering the friendly greeting of the prefect, she 
 was obliged to call more than once the names Euphrosyne, 
 Aglaia, and Thalia. 
 
 " That is charming,'' cried Hadrian, looking into the little 
 house. " A perfect idyl. Who would have exjaected to find 
 such a ludicrous corner of peace in this most unquiet and 
 busiest of cities?" 
 
 " Pontius and I were surprised in the same way by this little 
 nest, and resolved to leave it untouched," said the jirefect. 
 
 '' Sensible people understand one another, and I owe 5^ou 
 gratitude for sparing this house," answered the emjaeror. 
 ' What a good omen it is for me! The Graces receive me on 
 entering these old walls." 
 
 " Joy be with you," cried Doris, in greeting. 
 
 " We come late," said Hadrian. 
 
 " That is no matter," answered the old woman, laughing. 
 " For the last week we have learned to make no diti'erence be- 
 tween day and night on the Lochias; and blessings are never 
 too late." 
 
 " I brinw an excellent guest," said Titianus — " the great 
 Roman arcliitect, Claudius Venator. He has just left the 
 ship." 
 
 " Then a swallow of wine will do him good. We have 
 Mareotish wine in the house, from the garden of my daughter 
 directly on the sea. If your friend will so honor humble peo- 
 ple, I beg you to enter. It is neat here, sir, and the cup I can 
 offer you woidd not disgrace the emperor. Who knows what 
 you may find in the frightful whirl yonder?" 
 
 " I will gladly accept your invitation, little mother," replied 
 Hadrian. "' It is easy to see that you will entertain us ghully, 
 and one might envy your little home." 
 
 ** It will be i)rettier when the climbmg roses and the honey- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 91 
 
 suckles are in bloom," answered Doris, as slie filled the cuj). 
 " And here is water to mix with it." 
 
 The emperor took the cup and admired it, saying, before he 
 touched it to his lips: " This is a masterpiece, mother, what 
 may the emperor expect, if the gate-keeper be so served? 
 Who has done this work?" 
 
 " My son cut it in his idle hours." 
 
 "He is an excellent sculptor," remarked Titian us. After 
 the emperor had partly emptied the cup with great satisfac- 
 tion, he jilaced it on the table, saying: " A most refreshing 
 drink. 1 thank you, mother. " 
 
 "And I thank you for calling me mother. There is no 
 fairer title for a woman who has brought up good children, 
 and I have three of whom I need not be ashamed." 
 
 " I wish you joy of them all, little mother," answered the 
 emperor. " We shall meet again, for I may stay some time 
 on the Lochias. " 
 
 " JSTow, in this confusion?" asked Doris. 
 
 "This famous architect," said Titianus, "will assist our 
 excellent Pontius. " 
 
 " He needs no help," exclaimed the woman. "He is a 
 man of the very best sort. My son tells me that his thought- 
 fulness and activity are imparalleled. I have seen him myself 
 when giving his orders; and I know my people." 
 
 " What specially pleases you in Pontius?" asked Hadrian, 
 who enjoyed the unrestrained manner of this woman. 
 
 " He never loses his self-possession in all this whirl, speaks 
 neither a word too much or too little, can be severe when it is 
 necessary, and is kind toward the lowest. What he does in 
 his profession, I am unable to judge, but I know him to be 
 honest and reliable. " 
 
 " You describe him correctly,^' replied the emperor, " only 
 I had thought him more severe." 
 
 "Everyman must be harsh sometimes, but he is so only 
 where it is needful; and every day he shows us how kind he 
 can be. I have always noticed that a man who holds himself 
 apart from and is rude toward his inferiors is not great in him- 
 self, and seems afraid of being classed with them. But he 
 who is truly great, does not hesitate to treat us as equals. It 
 is so with Pontius, and the noble Governor Titianus, and with 
 you also, I dare say, since you are his friend. You are heartily 
 welcome, but, as I said before, Pontius needs no help." 
 
 " You do not comprehend me very highly, and for that I 
 am sorry, because you seem to have lived with open eyes, and 
 to understand human nature." 
 
92 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Doris looked at tlie cmi^eror witli searching yet friendly eyes, 
 and answered in a cautious tone: 
 
 " You — you arc certainly great, and it may be will perceive 
 something that has escaped the notice of Pontius. There are 
 a few whom the muses have especially endowed, and you may 
 be one of them." 
 
 " Wliy do you think that?" 
 
 " I know from the glance of your eye, and from your fore- 
 head." 
 
 " Perhaps you have the gift of divination?" 
 
 " No, notliing of that sort; but I have two sons to whom 
 the heavenly powers have given something which I am not able 
 to describe, and those in whom I recognize the same are always 
 first among their own circle. And I am willing to swear that 
 you outrank all with whom you associate. " 
 
 " Don't handle the oaths so lightly," replied the emperor, 
 laughing. " We shall speak together again; and when I leave 
 the Lochias I should like to ask if you have not been disap- 
 pointed in me. Come now, Telemachus, you seem greatly 
 charmed with the birds of this good woman." 
 
 Antinous, to whom these last words were addressed, had 
 been contemplating the feathered pets of Doris, going from 
 one cage to another, with great satisfaction. 
 
 " Is that your son?" asked Doris. 
 
 *' No, he is only my pupil, but I love him as if he were my 
 own child." 
 
 " A handsome fellow." 
 
 " Look to it; our old friend has her eye on the yoimg men 
 still." 
 
 " We shall not give that up before the end of a century, or 
 until the Parcce cuts the thread of our life." 
 
 " What a confession!" 
 
 " Let me say one thing more. We women never cease to 
 rejoice in u handsome youth, but only Avhile we are young do 
 we ask what they think of us; in our old age we are quite sat- 
 isfied with showing them kindness. Listen, young man: you 
 will always find me here, and ready to do anything in my 
 power for your comfort. I am like a snail, and seldom leave 
 my house." 
 
 " no})ing to meet again," cried Iladrian, as he crossed the 
 court with his companions. Titianus walked in advance of 
 Hadrian and Antinous, and but a few words were exchanged 
 betwft'M tliem. The emperor Avas smiling to himself. The 
 opinii)ii of this clever woman, out of tlie common jicoplc, had 
 given hini far greater pleasure than the bombastic compli- 
 
THE EMPEROH. 93 
 
 ments of Mesomedes and the other lyric poets, and the flatter- 
 ing words he was accustomed to hear from sophists and rheto- 
 ricians. Doris took him for a simple architect. She could 
 not know who he was, or — had Titianus been careless of his 
 secret? Did the woman know, or even guess, with whom she 
 was talking? The suspicions of Hadrian were easily roused, 
 and he begaTi to think the words of the woman were jjreparcd 
 beforehand, and her welcome only a recitation. 
 
 He stopped suddenly, bidding Titianus and Aiitinous await 
 his return with the dog, and went back to the little house, 
 creeping along in a manner quite unusual for princely feet. 
 He stopped before the still open door, and listened to the con- 
 versation within between Doris and her husband. 
 
 " A stately man," said Euphorion. " He looks a little like 
 the emperor.'' 
 
 " Not much," answered Doris, " Think of that statue in 
 the Paneum Garden. That has an expression of discontent, 
 and of sarcasm. This architect has a thoughtful brow, but 
 real kind-heartedness shines through his features. It is only 
 about the beard that they resemble each other. Hadrian 
 might be glad to look as well as this guest of the prefect. " 
 
 '' Yes., he is much handsomer — has — has — shall I express it? 
 —much more that is godlike than that cold marble statue," 
 declaimed Euj^horion. "A great gentleman, certainly, but 
 still a sculptor. I wonder if he might not be persuaded 
 through Pontius, Papias, Aristeas, or some one of the great 
 painters to take the joart of Calchas in our festival. He 
 would represent the character much better than that withered 
 ivory-cutter, Philemon. Eeach me my lute. I have forgotten 
 again the beginning of that last verse. Oh, my memory! 
 Thank you. " 
 
 Euphorion touched the strings vigorously, and sung with 
 still good and well-trained voice: 
 
 " Sabina! hail to thee, Sabina! Hail to the victorious and 
 mighty goddess, Sabina! If Pollux were only here he would 
 help me to remember the right words. ' Hail to the hundred- 
 times victorious Sabina!' That is not right. ' Hail to the 
 godlike and far-famed victorious Sabina!' It is not that, 
 either. If a crocodile would only swallow this Sabina I would 
 gladly give him that j)late of fresh cakes yonder for a dessert. 
 Now! believe I have it. ' Hail, a hundred times hail, to the 
 mighty goddess, Sabina!' " 
 
 Hadrian had heard enough. While Euphorion was trying 
 to fix the right words in his rebellious memory, he turned his 
 back on the gate-keeper's house, and, with his companions. 
 
04 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 made a way — not without some difficulty — through the crowd 
 of hiborers on the i^avement. More than once he tapjied 
 Titianus on the shoulder, and, as they received the greeting of 
 Pontius, cried out: 
 
 " I am more glad than ever that I determmed to come now. 
 It has been a good evening; a most excellent evening." 
 
 For years the emijeror had not seemed so cheerful and free 
 from care; and as, in spite of the late hour, he found every- 
 where the workmen still busy, and saw Avhat they were plan- 
 ning to do in the old palace, the restless man gave exjiression 
 to his satisfaction, saying to Antinous: 
 
 ' ' Here is a good lesson as to what wonders can be accom- 
 
 f)lished through good-will, industry and skill. Explain to me, 
 'ontius, how you constructed this giant scaffolding. '' 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Only a part of the night hours remained after this cheerful 
 entrance of the emperor into the half-finished dwelling. 
 
 Pontius directed a suite of rooms to be put in order, which 
 he had designed for the use of the nobles in Hadrian^s suite, 
 from one window of which was a fine view of the harbor and 
 the island of Antirrhodus. 
 
 The good bed whichihe prefect had sent to Lochias for his 
 own use was carried into the sleeping-room of the emperor; 
 while in others the field-beds were spread for the use of An- 
 tinous and the rest of the j^arty. Tables, cushions, and other 
 furniture which had been already delivered from the Alexan- 
 drian factories for the furnishing of the palace, and which 
 stood unopened in boxes and bales within the gi-eat middle 
 court, were quickly unpacked, and such as were apjaropriate 
 placed in the emperor's apartments. Before Hadrian, con- 
 ducted by the jirefect, had been through the rooms Avhere re- 
 pairs were going on, Pontius had completed his arrangements, 
 and informed his guests that he had done the best possible for 
 this night, but promised on the next day a more properly 
 furnished apartment. 
 
 "Excellent, excellent!" exclaimed the monarch, as he en- 
 tered the one appropriated to himself; ''one would believe 
 you had the demons of industry under call. Pour water over 
 mv hands, master, and then to supper! I am hungry as the 
 dog of a beggar. " 
 
 I think we shall find something to satisfy you," answered 
 Titianus. " Have you eaten all sent you to-day, Pontius?" 
 
 '* Unfortunately, I have," answered Pontius, sighing. 
 
THE EMPEROE. 95 
 
 " But I ordered a meal for five." 
 
 " It has filled six hungry artisans/' returned Pontius. " Had 
 I only surmised for whom so much food was provided! But 
 what shall we do now? There is bread and wine in the Hall 
 of the Muses — meanwhile — " 
 
 " That must answer," said the emperor, as he wiped his face. 
 " In the Dacian war, in Numidia, and often while hunting, I 
 have been glad to find either one of these 23 revisions." 
 
 Antinous, who was very tired and hungry, looked troubled. 
 AVhen Hadrian saw this, he said, laughingly: 
 
 " The youth needs something more than bread and wine. 
 You showed me while we were looking about, an entrance to 
 the dwelling of the palace overseer. Would it be jDossible to 
 find there a bit of meat, or cheese, or something of the sort?" 
 
 " Scarcely," answered Pontius; " for the man fills his own 
 immense stomach and the mouths of eight children with bread 
 and porridge. However, we can but try. " 
 
 " Then send, but lead us directly to the hall where the 
 muses are guarding our bread and wine. This they do not 
 always furnish their disciples." 
 
 On their way to the hall, Hadrian asked of Pontius: 
 
 " Is the overseer of this palace so poorly paid that he is 
 forced to such a meager diet?" 
 
 '' He has a dwelling without rent, and two hundred drachmas 
 a month. " 
 
 " That is not so small. Who is the man, and what sort of 
 person is he?" 
 
 "His name is Keraunus, and he comes of old Macedonian 
 stock. His ancestors have held the same office — no one knows 
 how long — and he boasts of relationshij) to the Lagides, 
 through a mistress of some one of the dead kings. Keraunus 
 has a seat in the council, and never goes out without his slaves, 
 who come from that class the dealers throw in to their cus- 
 tomers when making a bargain. He is fat as a marmot; 
 dresses like a senator — is very fond of relics and varieties — for 
 which he would spend his last penny. He bears poverty with 
 more haughtiness than dignity; but is, after all, an honest 
 man, who can be made useful, if managed rightly." 
 
 ''So he is another odd fellow! You say he is fat. Is he 
 jolly?" 
 
 " Nothing less than that." 
 
 " Fat and surly people are my abhorrence. But what sort 
 of structure have you here?" 
 
 *' Behind this "frame-work is one of the best pupils of 
 
96 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Papias. His name is Pollux, and he is a son of the gate- 
 keeper. You will like him." 
 Call him/' said the emperor. 
 
 But before Pontius could do this, the head of Pollux ap- 
 peared above the frame-work. His attention liad been at- 
 tracted by the voices and footsteps, and after having saluted 
 the prefect, and satisfied his curiosity, he was about to spring 
 back from the high stool upon which he had mounted, when 
 Pontius called, saying that the Roman architect wished to 
 make his acquaintance. 
 
 " That is kind of him,"' answered Pollux, '' and more espe- 
 cially kind of you, for only through you could he learn that 
 such a being walks under the moon, and has learned to use 
 hammer and chisel. Let me descend from my four-legged 
 cothurn, for now you are obliged to look up at me, but after 
 that the order will be inverted." 
 
 " Stay where you are," answered Hadrian. " There is no 
 formality among fellow-artists. What are you doing in there?" 
 
 *' I will push back my covering to show you our Urania. 
 It will be good to hear an opinion from one who understands 
 such work." 
 
 " Afterward, my friend, afterward; first let me have a bit of 
 bread, lest the fierceness of my hunger should influence my 
 criticism. " 
 
 During these words Pontius had brought to the emperor a 
 salver containing bread, salt, and a cuj) of wine. As Pollux 
 noticed the meager meal, he cried out: 
 
 " That is prison fare, Pontius; have we nothing better in 
 the house?" 
 
 " I susj^ect that you had a share in annihilating the excel- 
 lent dishes I sent to Pontius," said the prefect, threatening 
 Pollux with his finger. 
 
 *' You spoil a delightful memory," sighed the sculptor, with 
 comical woe. 
 
 " By Hercules, I did have a share in that work of annihila- 
 tion. Had we only — But stop! An idea comes to me which 
 would be worthy of Aristotle. The breakfast, Pontius, to 
 which I have invited you stands all ready in my mother's cup- 
 board, and can be warmed over in a very few moments. Do 
 not be frightened, sir. I refer to a dish of cabbage and 
 sausages, Avhich, like the soul of an Egyptian, possesses in its 
 resurrection nobler (jualities than when it first saw the light." 
 
 " ExcellentI" cried Hadrian, with a smile; but he laughed 
 aloud as he heard an exclamation of joy from the lips of An- 
 tinous, who now a])proaclied. 
 
THE EMPEROK. 97 
 
 " Another palate revels in hajDj^y anticij)ation," said the 
 emperor to the prefect, pointing to his favorite. 
 
 But he had misunderstood the sense of that exclamation; 
 for the name of this homely dish, which Antinous had often 
 seen upon the table of his mother's poor house in Bithynia, 
 carried him back to the home of his childhood, and into the 
 midst of his kindred. 
 
 A quick movement of the heart, more than delight of the 
 palate, had pressed the " Ah!" from his lips. Yet he rejoiced 
 in the prospect of sharing this provision, and would not have 
 exchanged it for the costliest banquet. 
 
 Pollux had come out of his inclosure, and said: " In a quar- 
 ter of an hour I shall be here with my breakfast tvn-ned into a 
 supper. Do but stay your hunger witli the bread and salt, for 
 tbis food my mother has prepared will not only satisfy hunger 
 but furnish enjoyment. " 
 
 " Salute Mother Doris," cried Hadrian, as he left the hall, 
 and then turning to Titianus and Pontius said: 
 
 " A fine fellow. I am curious to see what he can do as a 
 sculptor. " 
 
 " Then follow me," said Pontius, leading Hadrian behind 
 the screen. 
 
 " What do you say to this Urania? The head is the work 
 of Pa|)ias, but the body of the figure and the drapery Pollux 
 has done independently within a very few days." The im- 
 perial critic stood looking at the statue for some time silently, 
 with folded arms. Then he nodded approvingly, and said, in 
 an earnest tone: 
 
 "A deeply thoughtful and wonderfully free work. This 
 drapery over the bust would not disgrace Phidias. All is 
 great, original, and true! Had the young master a model 
 here, on the Lochias?" 
 
 " I have seen no one, and think he modeled the figure en- 
 tirely out of his own head," answered Pontius. 
 
 " That is impossible," cried the emperor, in the tone of a 
 connoisseur. " Even Praxiteles could not have invented such 
 lines — such folds. It must have been formed after a living 
 model. We will ask him. What is to be made out of this 
 newly jDrepared mass of clay?" 
 
 " Perhaps the bust of a princess from the Lagides. To- 
 morrow you shall see a head of Berenice made by our young 
 friend, which seems to me among the best ever done in Alex- 
 andria." 
 
 '' Does the fellow practice magic?" asked Hadrian. " It is 
 simply impossible that lie can liave made this Urania, and a 
 
98 THE "FirPEROR. 
 
 complete female head, within these few days/' Pontius ex- 
 plained to the emperor that ho had only jilaccd the head upon 
 a bust, already in position, and went on to make known to 
 him, while answering without hesitation all his questions, the 
 varied devices by which alone they could give this dilapidated 
 building an appearance of respectability within so short a time. 
 And he spoke as freely with Hadrian of all these matters as 
 he would have done with any intelligent fellow-workman. 
 
 The prefect, meanwhile, was listening to the details of their 
 traveling experience from Plilegon, the private secretary of 
 the emperor. 
 
 Both these conversations were interrupted by the appearance 
 of Pollux in the hall, accompanied by his father. 
 
 The musician bore a streaming dish, fresh cakes, and the 
 pasty which he had carried home to his wife a few hours be- 
 fore. Pollux brought a large two-handled tankard, filled with 
 Mareotish wine, around which he had twined hastily branches 
 of green ivy. 
 
 A few minutes later the emperor was reclining upon a cush- 
 ion that had been placed for him, and busily at work upon the 
 savory dish. He was in his happiest mood; called Antinous, 
 the physician, and Phlegon to his side, and laid jjortions of 
 food ujion the j^lates, which he insisted they should pass to 
 him, lest, as he said, they should fish out the best sausages. 
 He also made a valiant attack upon the contents of the tank- 
 ard. 
 
 When it came time to open the pasty his face took on a 
 different exjiression. 
 
 His brow contracted, and turning to the prefect he asked, in 
 a severe tone: 
 
 " How come these peojjle by such food?" 
 
 " Where did you get this pasty, Euphorion?" asked Titi- 
 anus. 
 
 " It came from the banquet Pontius gave this evening to the 
 artisans. The three Graces disjjosed of the bones, and this 
 pasty, which had been left untouched, was given to me for my 
 wife. She gladly devotes it to the guest of Pontius.'' 
 
 Titianus laughed. 
 
 " This explains the disappearance of the rich meal we sent 
 to the architect. This pasty — allow me to look at it — was 
 prepared after a recipe of Verus, He invited himself yester- 
 day to breakfast with us, and instructed my cook how to pre- 
 pare it." 
 
 " No discijilc of Plato proclaims more diligently the doc- 
 trines of his master than Verus the excellence of this dish," ex- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 99 
 
 claimed the emperor, who had recovered his cheerfulness so 
 soon as he saw there was no contrivance to deceive him. 
 "What folhes occupy this spoiled child of fortune! Does 
 he cook now entirely with his own hands?" 
 
 " Not at all/' answered the prefect. " A couch was carried 
 into the kitchen, upon which he reclined while directing my 
 cook how to prej)are this, which is reported to be your — I 
 mean is reported to be a favorite dish of the emperor. It 
 is composed of pheasant, ham, udder, and flaky pie-cru^. " 
 
 " I agree with Hadrian's taste," said the emperor, laugh- 
 ing, and" proceeding to do honor to it. "You entertain me 
 bountifully, my friend, and make me your debtor. What is 
 your name, young man?" 
 
 " I am called Pollux." 
 
 " Yom- Urania, Pollux, is a good work. Pontius says you 
 have arranged the drapery without any model; but I say 
 again, as I did to him, that is impossible." 
 
 " You said right. A young maiden stood for it." 
 
 Hadrian looked at the architect, as much as to say, " I told 
 you so. " 
 
 Pontius asked in surprise: " But when? I have never seen 
 a female here." 
 
 "Quite lately." 
 
 " But I have not left the Lochias even for a moment, and 
 have not been to rest before midnight, and am always on my 
 legs again long before sunrise." 
 
 " Still there lie a few hours between your sleeping and your 
 waking," answered Pollux. 
 
 "Ah, these young people!"- cried the emperor, while a 
 satirical smile played about his lips. 
 
 " Separate Damon and Pythias by iron gates, and they would 
 contrive to meet through the key-hole!" 
 
 Euphorion looked questioningly at his son, and the architect 
 made some further inquiries; but Hadrian rose from his couch, 
 giving Antinous and Phlegon permission to retire, begged 
 Titian us with friendly tone to return to his home, and asked 
 Pollux to take him into his working inclosure, since he did 
 ■^ not feel weary, and was accustomed to only a few hours of 
 sleep. 
 
 Pollux was greatly attracted to this man. He had not 
 failed to notice how much the gray-haired stranger resembled 
 the emperor; but Pontius had prepared him for this, and 
 there was in the eyes and about the mouth of the Koman 
 architect something he had not seen in any portrait of the 
 emperor. His respect mcreased as they stood together beside 
 
100 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the scarcely finished statue; for he pointed out to him a few 
 faults, while praising its general correctness; and he gave in a 
 few terse sentences his own conception of Urania. Then he 
 developed concisely his own theories of the relation between 
 the artist and his work. 
 
 The heart of the young man beat faster, and the blood 
 leaped tlirough his veins, as he heard from those bearded 
 lips thoughts and feelings of which he had often been dumbly 
 conscious, but had never sought to express. 
 
 And how kindly the great man received his timid sugges- 
 tions, and how striking were his answers I He had never be- 
 fore met such a man — never before so recognized the superi- 
 ority of another spirit. 
 
 Two hours after midnight had already struck, when Hadrian 
 stop})t'd before the roughly outlined bust of fresh clay, and 
 asked of Pollux: 
 
 " AVhat are you going to do with this?" 
 
 " Make the image of a woman." 
 
 " Probably your courageous model, who ventures ujDon the 
 Lochias in the night-time?" 
 
 " ]S'o, a lady of rank will sit to me." 
 
 '' From Alexandria?" 
 
 '' Oh, no. A beauty from the retinue of the empress." 
 
 " AVhat is her name? I know all the Eoman women." 
 
 *'Balbilla." 
 
 '' Balbilla? There are several of that name. Can you tell 
 me how she looks?" asked Hadrian, with a mischievous smile. 
 
 " That is more easily asked than answered," replied Pollux, 
 who had recovered his liveliness with the emjjeror's smile. 
 " But wait! Have you seen peacocks spread their tails like a 
 wheel? Think, then, if each eye in the tail of that bird of 
 Hera were a little round curl, and under the wheel was a 
 charming and clever girFs face, with a jolly little nose, and 
 rather too high a forehead, then you will have a picture of the 
 noble lady who has jjersuaded me to make a bast of herself." 
 
 Hadrian laughed aloud, threw oif his pallium, and cried: 
 
 *' Stand back. I think I know the girl. If I am mistaken, 
 you shall tell me. " 
 
 While speaking, he had seized the pliant clay with his nerv- 
 ous hands, and knetiding it like a well-trained sculptor, cutting 
 off here and adding there, he shaped a woman's face with a 
 mighty structure of curls above, that looked like Balbilla, but 
 with every peculiarity of feature so ridiculously distorted that 
 Pollux could not restrain his amusement. 
 
THE EMPEROTl. 101 
 
 As Hadrian stepped back from his completed caricature, 
 aud asked if that v/ere the Roman lady, Pollux cried: 
 
 " So surely as you are a great architect and a master of 
 sculpture. " 
 
 The emperor seemed greatly to relish his own joke, for he 
 looked at the image, and laughed over and over. 
 
 It affected Pontius quite differently. He had followed with 
 appreciative interest the conversation of Hadriau with the 
 sculptor, and had watched the commencement of the image. 
 Afterward, he had turned away, for he hated that distortion 
 of beautiful forms so common in Egypt. It was to him 
 literally painful to see the image of a richly gifted and defense- 
 less creature, to whom also he was bound by ties of gratitude, 
 put to shame by such a man as the emperor. He had met 
 Balbilla for the first time that day, but through Titiauus had 
 learned of her residence at the Caesareum, among the fol- 
 lowers of the empress, and also that she was the granddaugh- 
 ter of the governor, Claudius Balbillus, who had given freedom 
 to his grandfather, a learned Greek slave. 
 
 He had met her with feelings of gratitude and of devotion; 
 her cheerful nature had greatly pleased liim; and with every 
 word from her lips he felt himself drawn toward her, as if 
 through ties of blood or long-established friendship. The 
 familiar mauuer of the wanton Verus toward her had annoyed 
 him, aud after the royal party left the Lochias his thoughts 
 had often recurred to it, and he resolved to have an eye on 
 this grandchild of his benefactor whenever it was possible. 
 It seemed a sacred duty to defend her, as he would have de- 
 fended a beautiful and unj^rotected singing bird. The em- 
 peror's caricature seemed to him like the desecration of some- 
 thiug holy; and as he stood amused with his own hateful 
 performance, Pontius felt hurt, as do all noble natures in dis- 
 covering that which is petty and mean in a being they have 
 honored. As a sculptor, if not as a man, the emperor had 
 dared to insult the undefended beauty. 
 
 A shade of aversion rose in the soul of Pontius toward one 
 for whom he had before felt only warmest admiration, and he 
 was glad when Hadrian at last proposed retiring to rest. 
 
 The emperor found all the provision for comfort in his slsep- 
 ing-room to which he was accustomed ; and as his slave Mastor 
 removed his garments, lighted his night-lamp, and shook up 
 the pillows, he said: 
 
 " This is the best evening I have spent in years. Is An- 
 tinous well provided?'' 
 
 " As in Rome." 
 
102 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " And the Molossian?" 
 
 *' I will i)lace his mat in the passage before your door.'' 
 
 " Has he been fed?" 
 
 *' Yes, with bones, bread and water." 
 
 " I trust you have had supper?" 
 
 ** I was not hungry; the bread and wine were enough." 
 
 " To-morrow all will be better arranged. Be careful of 
 your words not to betray me. A few days here, without in- 
 terruption, would be worth very much to me. Now, good- 
 night." 
 
 \Vith these words the emperor laid liimself upon his bed, 
 and was soon asleep. 
 
 The slave also laid himself down for the night, after spread- 
 ing a mat for the dog just outside the emperor's door. 
 
 His pillow was a tough leathern shield supported by a sword. 
 This was a poor bed, but for years Master had kuown notliing 
 better, and he usually enjoyed there the dreamless sleep of a 
 child; but to-night his eyes could not close, and with his baud 
 he wiped away the salt tears that repeatedly gathered in them. 
 He had bravely held them back until now; for the emperor 
 wanted only cheerful faces among his attendants. He had 
 once said to Master that he had chosen him for the sake of his 
 mirthful eyes. 
 
 The poor, light-hearted Mastor! He was only a slave, but 
 he had also a heart which stood open to sorrow and joy, mirth 
 and woe, to hatred and to love. While a child his native vil- 
 lage fell into the hands of enemies to his race; he and his - 
 brother were taken as slaves, first to Asia Minor, and then, be- 
 cause they were pretty, fair-haired boys, to Eome. There they 
 were bought for the emperor. Mastor became his body-sei-v- 
 ftnt; his brother worked in the gardens. Nothing was wanting 
 to their comfort except freedom — their only unsatisfied want, 
 the longing for home. 
 
 Even this disappeared after Mastor had married the pretty 
 daughter of the head-gardener, with bright eyes that peered 
 everywhere. His service as a slave allowed little time for the 
 company of his wife and the two children she had borne him; 
 but the consciousness of possessing them made him happy 
 when absent with the emperor upon hunting expeditions, or 
 traveling through the empire. For seven months he had heard 
 nothing of his family, but at Pelusium a letter reached hnn 
 that had come with the emperor's dispatches from Ostia. 
 
 He could not read, and owing to the hasty departure of 
 Hadrian, it was only after reaching the Lochias tluit the oj)- 
 portunity came to learn its contents. Antiuous had read it 
 
THE EMPEROR. 103 
 
 aloud, after returning from his supper in the Hall of the 
 Muses. It was from his brother, and had been written by a 
 public scribe. But the letter was enough to break his heart. 
 His pretty little wife was wandering about the world with a 
 Greek ship-captain, with whom she had left his house and the 
 service of the emperor. His oldest — his boy, the darling of 
 his heart — was dead, and the fair-haired, delicate little Tullia, 
 with the white teeth and plumjD arms, and the dainty little 
 fingers, which so often had i>retended to pull his shorn locks, 
 or stroked them gently, had been carried to the miserable house 
 for the orjihans of deceased slaves. Two hours ago he had 
 been picturing to himself his home, and the dear circle there. 
 Now all that was gone, and though the deepest grief beat on 
 his soul with merciless fist, he dared not sob or groan, or even 
 toss from side to side, driven by the tempest within, for his 
 master was a light sleeper, and was roused by the slightest 
 sound. And at sunrise he must wear a cheerful face again; 
 yet it seemed to him now that he too would be crushed in the 
 wreck of his home and of all his heart held dear. The paiji 
 tore his heart, but he did not groan or make any outward sign. 
 
 CHAPTER Xni. 
 
 This night had been as sleepless for Selene, the palace over- 
 seer's daughter, as for the poor slave. Her father's idle wish 
 to have Arsinoe take part in the aj^proaching festival with the 
 daughters of the wealthy citizens filled her heart with a new 
 anxiety. This was the final blow which must plunge the 
 already weakened structure of their domestic life into disgrace 
 and poverty. If the last piece of value were to be sold, and 
 the creditors should have no more patience, but seize upon her 
 father and send him to the debtors' 2:)rison, during the presence 
 of the emperor, was it not certain that another overseer would 
 be put into his place, and she, with her brothers and sisters, 
 plunged into hoi^eless misery? 
 
 There lay Arsinoe at her side, sleeping as sweetly and quietly 
 as the blind Helios and the other little ones. Before going to 
 bed she had spoken earnestly to the thoughtless girl and tried 
 to persuade her, yea, had urged and pleaded with her to re- 
 fuse, as she herself had done, to take any share in this festiv- 
 ity; but Arsinoe had at first refused to listen, and then had 
 wept, but at last comforted herself with the hope that some 
 way might be found— at any rate, what her father allowed, 
 Selene had no right to forbid or trouble herself about. Selene 
 might have gained more iuflnencc over lier sister had she not 
 
104 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 repelled her by an air of superiority and a sobriety that had 
 come from riper age and a life of care. Scarcely a day passed 
 without unpleasant words and tears between these two. Arsinoe 
 was always the first to offer the hand of reconciliation, but 
 Selene seldom uttered, as her kindhest word, more than: 
 " Let it pass now," or, '* I know that already." Their inter- 
 course bore the stamp of unkindncss, which might easily grow 
 into hostility. Many times they went to bed without a " Good- 
 night," and still oftener omitted the morning salutation. 
 Arsinoe, Avho loved to talk, was usually silent in the presence 
 of Selene, who had little pleasure in those things Avhieh gen- 
 erally interest the young; while Arsinoe found joy in all. 
 
 In the care of the younger children, the same difference was 
 apparent. The elder looked after the clothing, the food, and 
 the absolute necessities of life. She watched over their con- 
 duct with strictness, seeking to eradicate the germs of future 
 evil. Arsinoe dressed their dolls and shared their play. Her 
 invariable good humor, her kisses and pleasant words gained 
 what Selene often failed to secure by severity and fault find- 
 ing. Arsinoe won their hearts, and they would run to meet 
 her whenever she appeared, while Selene must call every time 
 she desired their presence. To her, it seemed bitter and un- 
 just that Arsinoe should secure, through merely idle play, a 
 sweeter reward than she could attain by all her hours of care, 
 and anxiety, and labor, which often lasted far into the night. 
 
 But in Ithis children are not far from right. They are 
 guided more by the heart than the head, and Avhoever gives 
 them sincere love is sure to receive the same in return. 
 
 Certainly to-night Selene looked on her slumbering compan- 
 ion with little sisterly feeling, for the words which had passed 
 between them sounded very unkind. Still they did love each 
 other; and whoever should have thought to speak hiu>hly of 
 one in the presence of the other would have quickly learned 
 that a strong inward bond held their hearts together. 
 
 No nineteen-year-old girl spends a whole night without sleep, 
 however restless and troubled. 
 
 In her short snatches Selene dreamed of her sister. Once 
 she saw her dressed as a queen, and followed by a crowd of 
 beggar-children with insulting words; then she saw her on 
 the bastion, beating the bust of their mother to pieces, while 
 she jested with Pollux. Again she herself seemed to be play- 
 ing in the garden of the gate-keei)er, as she had often done in 
 her childhood. She was making cakes of sand with Pollux, 
 and as soon as they were finished, Arsinoe sprimg upon tliem 
 and trampled them to pieces. 
 
THE EMPEROE. 105 
 
 Selene always dreamed now. It was long since she had 
 known truly refreshing sleejj. And the dreams were generally 
 of a sorrowful sort, and often so terrifying that she was 
 wakened by her own groans, or by the frightened cry of 
 Arsinoe. The sounds never disturbed the father; for he began 
 to snore as soon as he fell asleep, and did not leave off until he 
 woke in the morning. 
 
 Selene was the first one up in the house. To-day the dawn 
 was hailed as a deliverance. It was still dark when she rose, 
 but the December day was short; and without disturbing the 
 other sleepers, she lighted her lamp, washed her face, and ar- 
 ranged her hair; then knocked on the door to waken the old 
 slaves. After they had sleepily answered her call, she took a 
 pitcher and went out to bring fresh water for her father. 
 
 The best supjDly of w^ater for the palace was to be found on 
 a little terrace upon the western side. It was from the works 
 of the city, and was brought by pipes emptying their contents 
 through figures of curious composite design, which carried a 
 mussel shell at the end of their long twisted fishy tails: in each 
 shell lay a bearded river god. The heads of the figures resem- 
 bled horses, and they spirted water into a basin, which in the 
 course of a century had become filled with a green, slimy vege- 
 tation. To reach this, it was necessary to pass through the 
 corridor on which opened the apartments of the emperor and 
 his companions. Selene only knew that an architect from 
 Home had come late to the Lochias, for she had been solicited 
 after midnight to supj^ly him with meat, but in what part of 
 the palace the strangers were lodged no one told her. 
 
 But as she to-day went, along her accustomed route, a feel- 
 ing of anxiety took possession of her. There was a sense of 
 something unusual, and when she set her foot on the steps 
 leading up to the passage a rustling sound caused her to raise 
 the lamp above her head, in order to ascertain its source, 
 when suddenly there came plunging toward her something 
 huge, frightful: in the dim light it seemed much larger than a 
 dog. 
 
 Her blood was congealed by terror. She stood riveted to the 
 spot, but conscious that the growling and gnashing threatened 
 her with evil. At last she found strength to turn for flight, 
 but in the same instant a frightful roar sounded behind, and 
 she heard the quick leap of the monster on the stone pave- 
 ment. Then she was violently thrown down. The pitcher 
 flew from her hand, and was broken into a thousand pieces. 
 
 Her scream of terror was echoed from the hard, naked walls 
 of the passageway, and awoke the sleepers on each side. 
 
106 THE EMPEBOR. 
 
 " See what it is!'' cried Hadrian to his slave, who had 
 already sjirung up, seizing shield and sword. 
 
 ** The Molossian has attacked a woman whowidied to pass/' 
 answered Mastor. 
 
 " Call him back, hut do not strike him," cried the emperor 
 as he went out. " Argus has only done his duty. " 
 
 The slave hastened as iast as possible along the passage, call- 
 ing the dog by name. But Antinous had already interfered to 
 rescue his victim. He had rushed out of his room on hearing 
 Selene's cry of distress, to find the savage creature snarling 
 and gnashing his teeth over the prostrate form of a swooning 
 maiden, on whom the dawning hght of day fell faintly through 
 a broad window ojieniug. 
 
 _ As Antinous knelt down beside her, the dog, reduced to 
 silence by the sound of his familiar voice, stood with sunken 
 head not far off. The youth gazed anxiously into the pale face 
 of the swooning girl, raised her lifeless arms, and searched her 
 garments for marks of blood, but in vain. After he was con- 
 vinced that she still breathed, he called to Mastor: 
 
 " Argus seems to have only thrown her down. I discover 
 no mark of a wound. But she is unconscious. Go quickly 
 into my room and bring the blue vial from my case of salves, 
 with a cujD of water." 
 
 Meanwhile Antinous ventured to raise her head, with its full 
 rich hair, and contemplate the nobly cut features, now white 
 as marble. He was touched by the painful twitching about 
 her mouth, and was most glad to render these unsought offices 
 of kindness — he, the favorite of the emperor, to whom Love 
 itself pressed forward whenever he showed himself. 
 
 "Wake up, oh, wake up!" he cried to Selene, and as she 
 did not move, he cried the more earnestly: "Oh, wake up!" 
 But she heard nothing, and still lay motionless, while he, 
 blushi]]g, spread the peplum over her bare shoulders, wliich 
 the dog had torn off. Now Mastor came with the water and 
 the vial, placing both in the hand of the Bithynian. While 
 Antinous laid the head of the unconscious girl upon his knees, 
 the slave left, saying: 
 
 "The emperor calls," and Antmous bathed her forehead 
 with the reviving fluid, and held the vial to her nostrils, still 
 begging her to wake. 
 
 At last she opened her colorless lips, reveahng her white 
 teeth, and slowly lifted her eyelids. Antinous placed the cup 
 and vial upon the ground that his hands might be free to as- 
 sist her in rising; but scarcely had he turn*^! his face aside to 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 107 
 
 do this, when she fluug her arms passionately about liis neck, 
 screaming: 
 
 " Help, Pollux, help! The monster will devour me!" 
 
 Frightened, Antinous seized her arm to loosen the grasp on 
 his throat, but already she had sunk back. A violent shiver 
 ran through her frame in the next moment. 
 
 Then she raised her hands, pressed them upon her eyebrows, 
 and looked in perplexity upon his face. 
 
 " What is this? Who are you?'' she asked. 
 
 He rose quickly, and while assisting her attempt to rise, ex- 
 claimed: 
 
 " The gods be praised that you are alive! Our great Molos- 
 sian threw you to the ground, and he has such frightful 
 teeth." 
 
 Selene now stood erect, but the last words of the youth made 
 her shiver once more. 
 
 " Are you in pain?" he asked, anxiously. 
 
 " Yes," she answered, stolidly. 
 
 " Has he bitten you?" 
 
 " I think not. Pick up the clasp yonder, it fell from my 
 peplum. " 
 
 The Bithynian obeyed; and while the girl fastened the gar- 
 ment upon her shoulders, she asked again: 
 
 " Who are you? How comes this Molossian in om* palace?" 
 
 " He belongs — he belongs — tons— We arrived last even- 
 ing quite late, and Pontius — " 
 
 " Then 3'ou came with the Eoman architect?" 
 
 " Yes; but who are you?" 
 
 " I am Selene, daughter of the palace overseer, Keraunus." 
 
 " And who is Pollux, on whom you called for help as you 
 woke to consciousness?" 
 
 " What is that to you?" 
 
 Antinous blushed and replied, in an embarrassed manner: 
 
 " I was frightened to hear you call his name so passionately 
 after I had restored you with water and this essence." 
 
 " Since I am restored I can go. Whoever brings savage 
 dogs into a strange house ought to guard them better. Bind 
 the creature fast, for the cliildren — my little brothers and sis- 
 ters — come this way whenever they go out. I thank you for 
 your help. And now, my pitcher. " 
 
 With these words she looked around for the pretty vessel 
 which had been a special favorite of her mother. 
 
 When she saw it lying in fragments, she cried out with in- 
 dignant sobs: 
 
 " It is good for nothing.'' 
 
108 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 "With these words she turned her back upon Antinous and 
 went linniL'W'iird, stepping very carefully upon the lel't foot. 
 Tlu! youth longed to follow her and say how deeply he re- 
 
 f retted the accident, and that the dog did not belong to him; 
 ut he dared not venture. 
 
 He stood on the same spot until long after she had vanished 
 from sight. 
 
 Then he returned to his room, but sat down on the bed, 
 staring dreamily at the floor until the voice of the emperor 
 startled him. 
 
 Selene had scarcely bestowed a glance upon Antinous. She 
 was in pain, not alone in the ankle, but from a wound in the 
 back of her head, where the thick hair had absorbed the blood. 
 She felt exhausted, and the loss of her pitcher, which must 
 now be replaced, caused her more vexation than the beauty of 
 Antinous could have furnished pleasure. 
 
 Slowly and wearily she entered the common room where her 
 father was waiting for the water. He was accustomed to have 
 it at a certain time. As Selene was gone so much longer than 
 usual this morning, he found nothing better to do than to oc- 
 cupy the time with grumbling and fault finding. 
 
 As she at last stejoped over the threshold he saw that she 
 had no pitcher, and asked, peevishly: 
 
 " Am I to have no water to-day?" 
 
 Selene shook her head, dropped into a chair, and began to 
 weep. 
 
 " What is the matter?" asked Keraunus. 
 
 " The ijitcher is broken," she answered, sadly. 
 
 " You should be more careful of those costly things," said 
 Keraunus, crossly, " You are always complaining when the 
 money fails, and jet you destroy half the household goods." 
 
 " I was thrown to the ground, " said Selene, wiping her eyes. 
 
 " Thrown? By whom?" asked the overseer, slowly rising. 
 
 " By the savage dog of the Roman architect who came last 
 evening, for whom we furnished bread and salt after mid- 
 night. He slept on the Lochias." 
 
 " And he sets liis dog on my child!" cried Keramms with 
 rolling eyes. 
 
 " The Molossian was alone in the passage as I went out." 
 
 " Has he bitten you?" 
 
 " No; but he threw me down, and stood over me, gnashing 
 his teeth. Oh, it was horrible I" 
 
 "Cursed vagabond!" exciaini(Ml the overseer, angrily, "I 
 will teach him how to conduct himseli in a strange house." 
 
 '' Let it pass," begged Selene, as she saw her father seize his 
 
THE EMPEROR. 109 
 
 crocus-colored pallium. " One can not help what is past; and 
 if you should have an angry quarrel, it would hurt you.'^ 
 
 " Vagrants, impudent folk that spread themselves, with 
 their dangerous beasts, through my palace, " grumbled Kerau- 
 nus to himself, without noticing his daughter; and as he ar- 
 ranged the folds of his pallium growled out rather than called: 
 " Arsiuoe! will the girl never come?" 
 
 As she approached, he ordered her to heat the iron and curl 
 his hair. 
 
 '^ It is already in the fire,'^ answered she. " Come with me 
 to the kitchen." 
 
 Keraunus followed. The younger children were standing 
 about, waiting for the porridge Selene was iu the habit of giv- 
 ing them at this time. Keraunus answered their morning 
 salute with only such a nod as Arsinoe's curling-iron permitted. 
 
 The blind Helios alone received a kiss on the cheek. He 
 loved this always cheerful though so sorely afflicted child with 
 peculiar tenderness; and really laughed aloud when the boy, 
 pressing against his sister while she handled the hot iron, 
 asked : 
 
 " Do you know, father, why I am most sorry that I can not 
 see?' 
 
 " Why?" returned the overseer. 
 
 " Because ] should so much like to see you wiih the pretty 
 curls Arsinoe makes. " 
 
 But the cheerfulness of the overseer disappeared, when 
 Arsinoe interrupted her work to ask half earnestly and half 
 playfully: 
 
 " Have you thought any more about the emperor's reception, 
 father? I make you look so nicely every day, that for this- 
 once you ought to do it for me. " 
 
 " We shall see," answered Keraunus, mildly. 
 
 " Do you know," Arsinoe went on after a little pause, while 
 she held the last curl in the heated tongs: " I thought it all 
 over last night. If we can not afford to use the money for my 
 costume, we can very well — " 
 
 " What do you mean?" 
 
 " Even Selene can have no objection.'" 
 
 " Against what?" 
 
 '* You will be angry again." 
 
 "Goon." 
 
 *' You pay taxes with the other citizens." 
 
 ''What of that?" 
 
 " That it would be quite right for us to receive something 
 from the city. " 
 
110 rHE EMPEROR. 
 
 '* For what purpose?'* 
 
 " To buy my costume for the festival, which is not private, 
 but given by all the citizens to the emperor. "We would not 
 accept alms, but it would be foolish to refuse what the rich 
 city offers — as a gift. " 
 
 " Be silent,'' cried Kcraunus, excited, and vainly endeavor- 
 ing to recall the sentiments with which he had rebuked her the 
 day before. " Be silent, and say nothing more about the mat- 
 ter until I give you jiermission. " 
 
 Arsinoe threw down her curling-tongs so hastily that they 
 rang ujion the stone hearth; but her father returned to the 
 common room, where he found 8elene stretched upon a 
 couch, and the old slave woman binding one wet cloth on her 
 head and another on the left foot. 
 
 " Were you hurt?" cried Keraimus, his eyes rolling slowly 
 from right to left, and from left to right. 
 
 " Look at that swelling!" screeched the slave in broken 
 Greek, while she raised the fair foot of .Selene upon her black 
 hand. " Thousands of rich ladies have not a hand so small as 
 this foot. Poor, poor little foot!" And she pressed it to her 
 lips. Selene pushed her away, and turning to her father, said: 
 
 " The wound on my head is slight, but the flesh over the 
 ankle is a good deal swollen. It hurts me to step. When the 
 dog threw me down I must have struck against the stone step. " 
 
 '^' It is monstrous!" exclaimed Keraunus, the blood rising 
 to his face. " But wait; I will show him what I think of such 
 conduct." 
 
 " No, no," begged Selene. " Only ask him politely to shut 
 up or chain the dog, that he may not hurt the children. " 
 Her tone was anxious, for the fear that her father would lose 
 his place was more vivid than usual; she could not tell why. 
 
 Would you have me say only pleasant words about this 
 affair?" asked Keraunus, turning away, as if something very 
 imreasonable were asked of him. 
 
 "No, no, only tell liim what you think," screeched the 
 slave. 
 
 " Had this happened to your father, the strange stone-cutter 
 would have received a blow across the back. " 
 
 *' His son Keraunus will bestow nothing less," asserted the 
 overseer, leaving the room without any further notice of Selene. 
 
 In the vestibule he found the old slave, and commanded him 
 to take a stick, and go on to announce his coming to the guest 
 of Pontius. 
 
 This would be more imposing, and would also bring the 
 slave first into contact with the dog, whom he regarded as an 
 
THE EMPEEOR. Ill 
 
 abominable beast. As he approached his destination, he found 
 himself in proper mood to speak the truth to the stranger who 
 had allowed one of his family to be thrown down by a fierce 
 
 CHAPTEE XIV. 
 
 Hadrian" had slept well; only a few hours certainly, but 
 enough to refresh his sjDirit. He stood at the window of his 
 sitting-room, which occupied more than half the western wall, 
 and opened toward the sea. 
 
 Two high jiillars, with shafts of reddish-brown jiorphyry, 
 sprinkled with white, and gilded Corinthian capitals, stood on 
 either side of the recess. The emperor leaned against one of 
 these porphyry shafts, stroking the Molossian, whose ready 
 vigilance had pleased him. What cared he for the poor girl's 
 fright? Beside the opposite pillar stood Antinous, with one 
 foot on the bow-window sill, lus chin resting on his hand and 
 one elbow supported by his knee. 
 
 " This Pontius is really an accomplished man," said 
 Hadrian, touching with one hand a tapestry on the wall; 
 " the pattern of this fabric was from a fruit jjicture I painted 
 and sent here to be copied m mosaic. Yesterday this room 
 was not destined for my use, so that the tapestry must have 
 been hung after our arrival. And how many other good things 
 he managed to collect! It is very comfortable, and besides, 
 there are many articles to admire. " 
 
 " Have you tried the luxurious couch yonder?" asked An- 
 tinous. " And the bronze figures in the corners are not at all 
 bad.'' 
 
 " It is excellent work," replied the emperor, " but I would 
 rather have the windows free. Which is bluer here, the sea 
 or the sky? What a real spring-breath is wafted across, even 
 in December! One hardly knows which to admire most, the 
 countless vessels in the harbor, the rich and charming country 
 seats, or the fine buildings everywhere visible in their stately 
 grandeur, and the harmonious beauty of their forms. " 
 
 " What is that long embankment, connecting the island with 
 the mainland? Only look, there comes a great trireme under 
 an immense arch which seems to rest upon it. And there is 
 another!" 
 
 " That is the dike, which the Alexandrians call with pride 
 their He23tastadion, because it is seven stadia in length. Along 
 the upper part is a stone channel— concealed as an elder-tret 
 
112 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 does its pith — through which the Island of Pharos is supplied 
 with water. " 
 
 " It is a pity we can not see from here the buildings, and 
 the people, and the carriages, which swarm like busy ants, be- 
 hind our backs," said Antiuous. " The little island yonder, 
 and the narrow point of land with its high buildings, liide it 
 all. " 
 
 " But these serve to give life to the picture," answered the 
 emperor. " That little castle on the island was often occupied 
 by Cleopatra, and the high tower on the northern point, where 
 now the blue waves sparkle, and the gulls and pigeons are de- 
 scribing then- merry circles, held Antony after the battle of 
 Actium. " 
 
 " In order to forget his disgrace,*' cried Antinous. 
 
 " He called it his Timonium, because he wished, hke the 
 wise man-hater of Athens, to live undisturbed by his fellow- 
 men. What if I should call the Lochias my Timonium?" 
 
 " One needs not to hide greatness and distinction." 
 
 " Who told you that Antony came here to hide his disgrace? 
 He had often enough proved himself a brave soldier at the 
 head of his troops, and when he turned his ship before Actium, 
 it was not through fear of swords and lances, but because fate 
 compelled him to submit to the wishes of his wife, on whose 
 destiny his own hung. " 
 
 " Then do you excuse his conduct?" 
 
 " I only seek to understand it, and am unwilling to beheve 
 that shame prompted any of Antony's movements. Do you 
 think I could blush? One is not subject to shame after he 
 has learned to despise the world." 
 
 " But why did Marc Antony shut himself into this sea-girt 
 prison?" 
 
 " Because, for any man, who has been surrounded by 
 women, and jesters, and flatterers, there comes a moment 
 ■when he is overtaken by disgust. At such times, there is only 
 one among all the crowd whose company he can endure. It 
 •was so with Antony after the battle of Actium, and he left 
 men to enjoy good society. " 
 
 " Is that what sometimes drives you into sohtude?" 
 
 " Perhaps so; but you can always go with me." 
 
 *' Then you hold me far better than the others," cried An- 
 tinous, delighted. 
 
 " In any case, far handsomer," returned the emperor, in a 
 friendly tone. 
 
 " Go on with your questions." 
 [ Antinous needed a few moments before accepting this invita- 
 
THE EiAIPEROR. 113 
 
 tion. At last, recovering himself, he asked Hadrian to exi^lain 
 why most of the ships lying at anchor on the other side of the 
 Heptastadion came in through the Eunostus. This entrance 
 was less dangerous than that which led to the eastern landing, 
 between the Isle of Pharos and the Lochias. 
 
 Hadrian answered all the questions of Antinous respecting 
 the different buildings of the city. After pointing out the 
 Soma, where rested the body of Alexander the Great, he grew 
 thoughtful, and said to himself: 
 
 " The Great! One might envy the Macedonian youth, not 
 on account of this honorable title, which many of less worth 
 have borne, but because he really deserved it." 
 
 Antinous was astonished that Hadrian could tell him so 
 much about all these points, and exclaimed: 
 
 " You know everything about this city, and yet you have 
 never before seen it.'* 
 
 " That is one of the greatest pleasures of travel," answered 
 Hadrian, " that we can identify so many places and objects 
 with which we have become familiar through books and de- 
 scriptions. We compare the reality with an idea previously 
 formed. To be surprised with new and unexpected objects is, 
 to me*, far less satisfactory than to learn more about those 
 whose existence has been long familiar. Do you understand 
 what 1 mean?" 
 
 " I think so. One hears about a thing, and when he comes 
 to look at it, inquires if it be what he had imagined. I always 
 think jjeopleand places I have heard praised will be better than 
 I find them." 
 
 " That experience, which now contributes to the prejudice 
 of existing things, will diminish with the cultivation of your 
 iAiaginative powers," rejolied Hadrian. " I — I " — looking far 
 into the distance, while he stroked his beard, " find, the older 
 I grow, that it becomes possible so to represent to myself men 
 and things that, when I see them for the first time, they seem 
 familiar objects. Here I look on nothing new. I recognize 
 old acquaintances. But in this case it is natural; for I knew 
 my Strabo, and have heard, or read a hundred descriptions of 
 this city. Still many things which I never heard do not seem 
 strange." 
 
 " I have experienced something of the same sort," said An- 
 tinous. " Have our souls really lived in other bodies, and do 
 they retain some memory of a former life? Favorinus once 
 told me that a great philosopher — I think it was Plato — has 
 asserted that our souls float about in the sky before we ar« 
 
114 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 born, looking at the earth on which they are appointed to live. 
 Besides that he said — " 
 
 " Favorinus!" cried Hadrian, turning away, "this fine 
 talker possesses the skill to give a great thought an attractive 
 form, but he does not understand the secrets of his own soul 
 he talks too much, and never withdraws from the confusion of 
 hfe. " 
 
 " You recognize the fact, but disapprove of his explana- 
 tion. " 
 
 " Yes; for I meet men and things as old acquaintances, which 
 had their origin, or first saw this world, long after my birth. 
 Perhaps my experience is not like others, but I am sure that 
 there lives and works within me a secret something that is in- 
 dependent of me, and which goes and comes according to its 
 own choice. Call this my familiar spirit, or my genius; the 
 name is of no consequence. This something does not always 
 come at my call, and it frequently works within me when I 
 least expect it. But whenever it is present, I am conscious of 
 an experience and a power that are not my own. What that 
 knows I know also. Alexandria is not strange to me, because 
 the wings of my genius have visited it. Much has it taught 
 me, and worked through me. Many times I have asked be- 
 fore the work of my own hands: ' Is it possible that you, 
 Hadrian, the son of your mother, can have accomplished this?' 
 What shall I call the foreign vigor which assisted me in the 
 task? I recognize the same inspiration in other people, and 
 notice that such always outrank their fellows. This is espe- 
 cially true of artists. Or do common people become artists 
 where genius chooses them for its own habitation? Uo you 
 understand me?" 
 
 " Only in part," answered Antinous, whose great eyes, that 
 were so full of life and sparkle while looking out on the land- 
 scape, were now turned— heavy and weary — to the ground. 
 
 " Do not be angry, sire. Such things I can never under- 
 stand fully, for no one living has less of what you call genius 
 than I. I have no thoughts of my own, and it is hard to fol- 
 low those of others. What have I ever done that has been 
 worthy of notice? If I make an attempt, no genius comes to 
 the assistance of my soul. She is helpless, and falls into dream- 
 ing. And if I do finish anything, I must acknowledge that it 
 might have been done very much better." 
 
 "Self-knowledge," said Hadrian, "is the highest ultain- 
 ment of wisdom. Each one thinks he has gained it, after em- 
 bellishing the representation of some friend. What others 
 
THE EMPEROE. 115 
 
 attain through their -works, you accomplish by your simple 
 existence. Be quiet, Argus!" 
 
 During these last words, the Molossian had gone growling 
 toward the door, and, in sj)ite of his master's command, barked 
 loudl}', as a vigorous knock was heard upon the outside. 
 Hadrian asked in surprise: " Where is Master?" 
 
 Antinous opened a door into the next room, calling his 
 name, but received no answer. 
 
 " What has become of the fellow?" asked the emperor. 
 " He is usually close at hand, and fresh as a lark, but to-day 
 he seems to be dreaming; and while assisting at my toilet let 
 first a shoe, and then a shoulder-clasp fall out of his hand. " 
 
 " Yesterday I read him a letter that had just come from 
 Rome. His young wife has run away with a ship-captain. " 
 
 " We will congratulate him on his freedom." 
 
 '* He seemed very fond of her. " 
 
 " A nice fellow like him, and my body-slave, will easily find 
 a comj^ensation. " 
 
 " But not just yet. At first he must mourn his loss. " 
 
 " So it seems. But there is the knocking again. AVe must 
 see, who dares — But of course any one has the right to knock 
 here, since I am on the Lochias, not the emperor, but an 
 architect from Rome. Lie down, Argus; arc you possessed, 
 old fellow? The dog seems more careful of my dignity than I 
 am myself — and the jilay of being architect does not seem to 
 please him. " 
 
 Antinous had already his hand on the door, when it opened 
 from the outside, and the slave of Keraunus stepped over the 
 threshold. The old negro j^resented a pitiable aspect. 
 
 The impo-^ing figure of the emperor, and the handsome at- 
 tire of his favorite, threw him into embarrassment; but the 
 threatening growl of the Molossian caused him such anxiety 
 that his meager legs knocked together under his threadbare 
 coat. 
 
 Hadrian looked at this jMcture of woe in surj^rise, and asked : 
 
 " What do you want, fellow?" 
 
 The slave attcmj^ted to take another step forward, but ou 
 Hadrian's authoritative command to remain where he was, 
 stopped, casthig his eyes down upon his flat feet, and scratched 
 his shorn head. 
 
 " Well?" ask.d Hadrian again, in a tone not less encourag- 
 ing, and loosened liis own grip of the dog's collar in a suspi- 
 cious manner. 
 
 The bowing k.iees of the slave began to tremble again, and 
 stretching out his broad palms toward the gray-bearded man. 
 
116 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 who appeared to him no less terrible than the clog, began, in 
 cruelly mutilated Greek, the address his master had repeated 
 to liim oAcr and over, which was to the efTect that he appeared 
 before the architect Claudius Venator, of Eome, to announce 
 his master, Keraunus, a member of the city comicil, a Mace- 
 donian and Roman citizen, son of Ptolema^us, overseer of the 
 former kingly, now imperial, j^alace on the Locliias. 
 
 Hadrian pitilessly suffered the poor fellow, from whose fore- 
 head the hot perspiration started, to go on to the end, while 
 he only rubbed his hands together in delighted amusement, 
 and, to prolong the sport, carefully refrained from giving the 
 slightest assistance when his stammering tongue met an ap- 
 parently insurmountable liinderance. 
 
 When the negro at last brought his bombastic sentence to 
 an end, Hadrian said, kindly: 
 
 " Say to your master he can come in. Tliis is capital sport," 
 added Hadrian to Antinous, as the slave went out. " If tliis 
 is the Eagle, what must be the Juj^iter?" 
 
 Keraunus did not keej) him long Avaiting. While walking 
 up and down the passage before the door, his evil temper had 
 risen steadily, for he was determined to regard as an insult the 
 fact that lie, whose dignity and birth the slave must have 
 already made known to the architect, should be allowed to re- 
 main so long alone. He had expected the Roman woidd come 
 out himself to conduct him in, and could scarcely believe the 
 short message of the slave. 
 
 " Did he simply say ' I could enter;' not ' at his pleasure;' 
 or ' if he will have the kindness to do so 7" asked the over- 
 seer. 
 
 " He said: ' He can come in/ '' answered the slave. 
 
 Keraunus uttered a curt *' So!" straightened the golden 
 fillet over liis locks, threw back his head, crossed his arms 
 above his broad breast, and ordered the negro to, 
 
 '" Open the door." 
 
 With immense pomposity he crossed the threshold, and not 
 to be deficient in jioliteness, bowed, looking toward the sky, 
 and would at once have opened upon his com])laint in sharp 
 language had not a glance at the emi^eror and an eti'eet from 
 the sudden adornment of the room, as well as from the un- 
 friendly growl of the dog, persuaded him to strike a milder 
 key. The slave, who followed him, took a secure position be- 
 tween the wall and a couch, but Keraunus advanced further. 
 The emperor had seated himself on tlie window-sill, with one 
 foot laid lightly upon the neck of the Molossian, and examined 
 Keraunus as he would a notable rarity. When the overseer 
 
THE EMPEROE. 117 
 
 met his glance he perceived that he had to do with a greater 
 man than he had expected. There was something very im- 
 pressive in the appearance of the emi)eror; but it only served 
 to prick on his pride, and though not in so sharp a way as he 
 had intended, he asked, with great show of dignity: 
 
 " Do I stand before the new guest of the Lochias, the archi- 
 tect Claudius Venator, from Rome?" 
 
 " You stand," answered Hadrian, with a mischievous glance 
 toward Antinous. 
 
 " You have met a friendly reception in this palace. As did 
 my ancestors, who have rided here for a century, so do I 
 understand the exercise of hospitality." 
 
 " I am overwhelmed by the venerable dignity of your race, 
 and bow myself before your filial jiiety," answered Hadrian, 
 using the very tone of the overseer. 
 
 '' I did not come here to tell stories," said Keraunns, whose 
 gall was excited by a fancied sarcastic smile about the mouth 
 of the stranger — " not to tell stories, but to complain that you, 
 in return for my hospitality, have taken so little pains to guard 
 your host from injury." 
 
 " What does this mean?" asked Hadrian, rising from his 
 seat, and beckoning Antinous to hold the dog — for Argus 
 manifested a special hostility toward the overseer. He had an 
 instinctive percej^tion that the man had come with no friendly 
 intentions toward his master. 
 
 " Does this dangerous beast, with the gnashing teeth, belong 
 to you?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " He threw my daughter to the ground this morning, and a 
 costly pitcher in her hand was broken to pieces." 
 
 " I heard of this accident, and would have given much to 
 jirevent it. You shall be fully comjiensated for the jjitcber." 
 
 " I beg you not to add insult to the injury we have already 
 suffered. A father whose daughter has been thrown down and 
 wounded — " 
 
 " Then did Argus bite her?" broke in Antinous, frightened. 
 
 " No," answered Keraunns, " but both head and foot were 
 injured by the fall, and she suffers much pain." 
 
 " That is sad; and since I have had some experience in the 
 art of healing, will gladly help her," rejalied Hadrian. 
 
 " I pay the salary of a professional practitioner for services 
 
 rendered to my family," answered Keraunus, in a bluff tone, 
 
 " and I came here to request, or more frankly, to demand — " 
 
 " What?" asked Hadrian. 
 
 " First, that I receive an apology." 
 
118 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 ''The arcliitect, Claudius Venator, is always ready to do 
 that, if any person has suffered through him or through his 
 fault. I repeat that I sincerely regret what has liappened, 
 and beg you to say to the young woman who has met with the 
 accident, that her pain is also mine. What more do you 
 wish?'' 
 
 The features of Keraunus had become quite softened during 
 these words, and he replied, less excited than before: 
 
 " I must beg you to chain your dog, or lock him up, or in 
 some other way insure our safety. " 
 
 '* That is too much," cried the emperor. 
 
 " It is only a reasonable demand, upon which I shall insist,'"' 
 answered Keraunus, with decision. " Neither I nor my chil- 
 dren can be sure of our lives so long as this savage beast wan- 
 ders about. " 
 
 Hadrian had erected monuments to favorite deceased dogs 
 and horses, and the faithful Argus was dear to him, as only 
 four-footed companions can be to childless men; therefore the 
 demand seemed bold and unreasonable, and he answered, in- 
 voluntarily: 
 
 " Foolishness! The dog shall be watched; and now let me 
 hear notliing more." 
 
 " You will either put him in chains," returned Keraimus, 
 with rolling e3^es, " or some way will be found to make him 
 forever harmless." 
 
 " The cowardly murderer would find himself in trouble," 
 cried Hadrian. " What do you think, Argus?" 
 
 The dog raised himself with these words, and would have 
 sprung at the throat of Keraunus, had not both his master and 
 Antinous held him back. 
 
 Keraunus knew he was threatened, but at that moment he 
 would have allowed himself to be torn in pieces witliout flinch- 
 ing, so completely was he mastered by rage and wounded pride. 
 
 " Will he also set his dog upon me in this house?" he cried, 
 assumhig a challenging attitude, with the left fist against his 
 side. " Everything has its limits, and so has my patience with 
 the guest, who in spite of his ripe years, forgets every con- 
 sideration of jn-opriety. I shall report to the Prefect Titianus 
 how you conduct yourself; and when the emperor arrives, he 
 shall learn — " 
 
 " AVhat?" asked Hadrian, laughing. 
 
 " What hberties you take with me.^' 
 
 "Till then the dog stays where he is, and, I assure yo1i, 
 ui?der good control. But man, let me tell you that Hadrian is 
 as fond of dogs as 1 am, and he is still more fond of me." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 119 
 
 " We shall see/' grumbled Keraunus. " I or the dog." 
 
 " I think we shall say the dog. " 
 
 " And with that Eome would undertake a new stretch of 
 power/' cried Keraunus, his eyes rolling in their sockets. 
 " You have taken Egyjjt from the Ptolemies. " 
 
 " With good reason; but that is an old story." 
 
 " Eight does not die out like a bad debt." 
 
 " But it loses its jDower with the death of the claimant. 
 How long since the Lagides became extinct?" 
 
 " You assert that only because it is for your hiterest to be- 
 lieve it. In the man now standing before you flows the blood 
 of the Macedonian princes of this land. My oldest son bears 
 the name of Helios Ptoleniffius, with whom, as you suppose, 
 the Lagides became extinct." 
 
 " The dear, little, blind Helios/' broke in here the old slave, 
 who was accustomed to use the name of this child as a shield 
 against the bad humor of Keraunus. 
 
 " Then the latest scion of the Lagieds is blind?" exclaimed 
 the emperor, laughing. " Rome can bide his claim. But I must 
 inform the emperor what a dangerous pretender this house 
 contains." 
 
 " Denounce me, report, calmuniate me," cried the overseer, 
 scornfully; " but I will not be trampled on. Patience! Pa- 
 tience! You will come to know me!" 
 
 " And you, the Molossian," answered Hadrian, " if youdo 
 not instantly take yourself out of this place with your pilfermg 
 crow yonder." 
 
 Keraunus nodded to the slave, and turned his back to the 
 enemy without a word of leave-taking. He lingered for an 
 instant on the threshold, and cried to Hadrian : 
 
 " You may depend on this: I sball make known in the 
 council, and to the emperor, how you have dared to treat a 
 Macedonian citizen in this place." 
 
 Hadrian released the dog, who plunged fiercely against the 
 door, now closed between him and the object of his rage. 
 Hadrian commanded him to be quiet, and said to Antiuous: 
 
 " A monster of a man! Not only ridiculous, but repugnant 
 to the last degree. How the wrath worked within, yet without 
 coming to any genuine outburst. I am always on my guard 
 against such fellows. Look out for Argus, and do not forget 
 that we are in a land, which, as Homer once said, is full of 
 poison. Maxtor must keep his eyes open; there he comes at 
 last." 
 
1^0 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 When the body-slave of Hadrian sprung to the rescue of the 
 threatened Selene, he had already passed through a scene that 
 would never leave his memory. He had received an inefface- 
 able imjjression, his ear had caught words destined to echo for- 
 ever ill his soul, and which so migiitily moved his whole being, 
 that he had rendered the ordinary services at his master's 
 morning toilet in a dreamy and abseiit-mindned manner. It 
 was his custom to leave the sleeping-room of his master at a 
 very early hour, to make all ready which he would require on 
 rising. There was the polishing of the gold-work on the close- 
 ly fitting greaves, and the straps of the military boots, the 
 clothes to be aired and sj^rinkled with the delicate jDcrfumery 
 of Hadrian's choice. But time was esj)ecially needed to pre- 
 pare the bath. On the Lochias there was as yet nothing cor- 
 responding to the complete arrangements for bathing in the 
 imperial palace at Eome, but the slave knew he would require 
 an abundant sujDply of water. 
 
 He had been histructed to ai)ply to Pontius whenever any- 
 thing was needed. And he found him without much search, 
 busied in preparing a comfortable sitting-room for the em- 
 peror, on his waking. 
 
 Pontius authorized Mastor to call on any of the slaves busied 
 in laying the pavement for carrying the water. It was not the 
 business of the emperor's body-slave to perform especially 
 menial service; but ujjon a journey, or a hunting expedition, 
 he took pleasure in looking after all matters connected with 
 his master's jaersonal comfort. The sun had not risen when 
 he stepped into the court, and some of the slaves were still 
 sleeping on their mats; others were gathered in groups about 
 a fire waiting for the soup, which an old man and a boy were 
 stirring with wooden sticks. Mastor did not like to disturb 
 either of these, and so went on toward another group, who 
 seemed to bo talking together. As he came nearer, he per- 
 ceived that only one was speaking, and the others were listeners. 
 
 The heart of tlie poor Mastor was very heary, and he had 
 no disposition to hear stories or jests. Life was wholly imbit- 
 tered for him, and the duties to the emperor, which usually 
 occupied all his energies, had to-day lost their interest. It 
 seemed to him that grief li.id loosoiud the bands of service, and 
 that he stood a lonely and in-esponsible man. 
 
 He was thinking of gatlicring together all the gold pieces 
 
THE EMPEROR. 121 
 
 which had been given him, either by Hadrian, or by rich peo- 
 ple who had sohcited his help in securing an early audience 
 with his master, and going away to the city, where, with wine- 
 drinking and sensual indulgence, he might forget himself and 
 his troubles. What should follow, he did not care. If found, 
 he might be scourged to death; he had known kicks and blows 
 before he became a slave of the emperor — once, even, while 
 being dragged to Eome, had been set upon by dogs. And if 
 they should kill him, what matter would it be? All would 
 then be over at a blow, and life seemed to offer nothing beyond 
 weariness in the service of a restless master, heartache, and 
 scorn. He was at heart a good fellow, who harmed no one, 
 and never interfered with the pleasure of others. Least of all 
 would he do that to-day, for he whose own heart is heavy with 
 sorrow is especially careful not to disturb others. So, as he 
 came nearer to the group, he determined to delay the proffer 
 of his request until the speaker had finished. This was an old 
 workman — but from his long hair one could tell that he was a 
 freedman — and since he wore also a long white beard, Mastor 
 sujiposed him either a Jew or a Phoenician. The flame from 
 under the soui^-kettle lighted his face, revealing nothing un- 
 usual, except the steady elevation of his eyes toward heaven, 
 while liis head rested upon his raised hands. 
 
 " And now, brethren," he said, letting his hands fall to his 
 side, " we will return to our work. ' In the sweat of thy face, 
 shalt thou eat bread ' — so it is written. We, who are old, find 
 it pretty hard to carry the stones, and to bend the stiff back so 
 long; but then we are nearer the beautiful time than the rest 
 of you. Life is not easy to any of us, but the Lord has invit- 
 ed, first of all, as His guests, those who carry trouble and bur- 
 dens; and the slaves among us are certainly not the least of 
 such." 
 
 " ' Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, 
 and I will give you rest;' " broke in a younger man, repeating 
 these words of Christ. 
 
 "Yes, those are the words of our Saviour," said the old 
 man in a tone of hearty assent, " and I think He had us in 
 mind. As I said before, life is not so easy for any of us; but 
 how much heavier was the burden He took upon Himself to 
 deliver us from suffering. All must work, even the emperor. 
 But He, who might have lived in the glory of His Father, let 
 Himself be scorned and derided and spit upon — let thorns be 
 thrust into His forehead, and before the heavy cross, whose 
 weight crushed Him, and suffered the most painful death with- 
 out a murruur, for our sakes. But He did not suffer in vain, 
 
192 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 for the Father accepted the offering of His son, and said: 
 ' Wliosoever believeth in Him shall not perif^h, but have ever- 
 lasting life. ' Let then another hard day begin, and a hundred 
 more follow; let death cut us off from life: we believe in our 
 Redeemer, we have the promise of God to receive us out of all 
 pain and sorrow into His heaven, there to exchange the short 
 period of misery for unending centuries of joy. Go now to the 
 ■work. My Knakias, the stout Krates will gladly take your 
 work until your finger is healed. And when the bread is dis- 
 tributed let us all remember the children of our dear departed 
 Philammon. The work will be hard for you to-day, my poor 
 Gibbius. My dear brethren, the master of this man sold yes- 
 terday his daughters to the ti-ader from Smyrna, But com- 
 fort yourself, brother, with the thought that though you do 
 not find them again in Egyjit, or any other laud, you will cer- 
 tainly see them in the house of your Heavenly Father. Our 
 path lies through this world, but heaven is its goal, and the 
 Leader who will never fail us is our Redeemer. And we shall 
 all bear the labor, and sorrow, and anxiety easier for remem- 
 bering that when the festal evening comes the King of Kings 
 will open His doors, and bid us each enter as His guests, with 
 all that we have loved here." 
 
 " ' Come unto Me all ye that are weary and heavy laden, 
 and I will give you rest,' " repeated another voice out of the 
 group. 
 
 The old man rose and nodded to a boy, who 2:)assed the 
 bread, cut into pieces of equal size, while he poured wine into 
 a wooden cup from a large pitcher. 
 
 Master had not lost a w^ord of this speech, and the words, 
 twice repeated: "Come unto Me all ye that are weary and 
 heavy laden, and I will give you rest," sounded in his ears like 
 a kindly invitation to beautiful days of joy and freedom. In 
 this night-time of liis sorrows it seemed a distant gleam which 
 promised a )iew morning. 
 
 He approached the old man to ask if he were the overseer 
 of this band of workmen. 
 
 " I am so," answered the old man; and on learning that 
 Mastor had come in the name of Pontius, pointed out a few of 
 the younger slaves, who quickly carried the needful water to 
 the palace. 
 
 Pontius met them on the way, and remarked to Pollux, who 
 accompanied him: 
 
 " The slave of the Roman architect has called on the Chris- 
 tians to serve his master. They are an orderly and temperate 
 Bet, and always faithful to their dutiea " 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 133 
 
 While Master assisted at the toilet of the emperor, his serv- 
 ice was -unusually remiss, for the words he had so latel}' heard 
 occupied his thoughts. He had not understood all, but he 
 did comprehend that there was a friendly God, who had suf- 
 fered torment in His own person, and who was specially kind 
 to the poor and miserable, and who had promised to gather 
 together again those who had loved each other here. 
 
 The " Come unto Me " rang so comfortingly in his heart, as 
 to remind him of the mother who had often called him to her 
 side, and opened both arms to receive and press him to her 
 heart, and as he had loved to clasp his own dear son. The 
 thought that some Being loved him in this way — he, the poor, 
 lonely, forsaken man — who could release him from his bur- 
 dens, and would at last restore to him father, mother, and the 
 dear ones of his own broken home, took away half the bitter- 
 ness of his sorrow. He always heard conversation that was 
 carried on in the emperor's presence, and as the years went 
 on, had learned to miderstand it more and more. There he 
 had heard of the Christians, but they were always spoken of 
 as erratic and dangerous, though there were, at that time, a 
 few thoughtful men who sometimes — and so had Hadrian 
 himself — taken their part. He had also heard some of his fel- 
 low-slaves spoken of as Christian fools. But now, for the first 
 time. Master knew from their own mouths what they believed 
 and hoped, and he could scarcely wait to finish his duties be- 
 fore seeking the old man again, among the workers on the 
 pavement, to hear once more those words of hope and comfort. 
 
 So soon as Hadrian and Autinous had entered their sitting- 
 room, Master hastened to the Christian in the court and sought 
 to engage him in conversation. But the old man answered 
 that all things must have their time. At present the work 
 could not be interrupted, but after sunset released them from 
 toil, he would speak again of Him who had invited the heavy 
 laden. 
 
 Master thought no more of running away, and when he re- 
 turned to the emperor, such a sunny glance was in his blue 
 eyes, that the words of rebuke Hadrian had intended for his 
 ear were unspoken; and turning to Antinous, said: 
 
 " I tliink the fellow has already comforted himself with a 
 new love. Let us, as far as we may, follow the advice of Hor- 
 ace, and enjoy the present. Though the poet may let the fut- 
 ure go as it will, I can not quite do that, for unfortunately I 
 am emperor. 
 
 " Eome knows how to thank the gods that you are so/' an- 
 swered Antinous. 
 
134 THE EMPEROE. 
 
 " "^Vhat happy cxpressioTis this fellow does sometimes find," 
 said nadriaii, smiling, and stroking the brown locks of his 
 favorite. " Now I must work until noon, with Plilegou and 
 Titianus, whom I exj^ect immediately; and after that we may 
 find some amusement together. Ask the tall sculj^tor behind 
 the screen at what hour he expects Balbilla for her sitting. 
 We must examine the work of the architect and the Alex- 
 andrian artists by daylight; their zeal deserves this attention.'" 
 
 Hadrian went to the a2:)artment where his private secretary 
 had the letters and disjjatches from Rome and the provinces 
 ready for his perusal. 
 
 Antinous stood for some time where he left him, watching 
 the ships as they cast their anchors, or left the roadstead, and 
 the little boats that swarmed about the large vessels, as wasps 
 around ripe fruit. He heard, too, the song of the sailors, 
 and the flute jjlayers, with which the oar-strokes of the great 
 triremes were keeping time. He rejoiced in the clear blue sky, 
 and the fresh, sweet air of morning, and speculated a little as 
 to whether the odor of tan, wafted across the harbor, Avas agree- 
 able or not. But as the sun rose higher the brilliance dazzled 
 him. Yawning, he retired from the window, and threw him- 
 self upon a couch and stared with very little interest at the 
 faded ceiling. 
 
 Idleness had become the occupation of his life, but he found 
 its gray shadow, ennui, detracting from every pleasure. These 
 lonely hours were usually sjient in lazy dreaming of his kindred 
 in Bithynia, of whom he dared not speak to the emperor, or of 
 the hunting matches he had undertaken with Hadrian, of the 
 wild game, or the fish which, as a skillful angler, he had 
 caught, or of kindred toj^ics. But he had no concern for the 
 future — no love of work, no ambition, no passionate eagerness 
 in any direction. He cared nothing for the admiration his 
 beauty excited, and often had scarcely mterest enough in life 
 to move a limb or draw a breath. 
 
 He was inditferent to almost everything, except the words of 
 the emperor, who seemed to him greater than all other beings 
 together. Him he feared as fate, and to him he felt himself 
 united as in the flower to its stem — that would die if the stem, 
 on which it hung as a gracefid ornament, were to be destroyed. 
 
 But to-day, as he lay stretched on the divan, his thoughts 
 took a new direction. He could not forget the jDale maiden he 
 had rescued from the teeth of the Molossian — he felt again the 
 cold white hand upon his neck, and heard the cool words with 
 which she had left him. Antinous began to long for Selene, 
 the same Antinous who, in every citv he visited with the cm- 
 
THE EMPEROE. 125 
 
 peror, especially in Eome — received letters and bunches of flow- 
 ers from the most celebrated beauties — and since he had left 
 his mother's home had cared for no woman as he did for the 
 horse Hadrian had given him, or for the great Molossian dog. 
 
 This girl seemed to him like breathing marble. Perhaps 
 whoever she should clasp to her breast must lose his life; but 
 that slow congealing of the blood seemed to him a more at- 
 tractive death than one caused by a too rapid beating of the 
 heart. 
 
 " Selene," he murmured, with a slight tremor of the lips. 
 That strange, silent presence had taken possession of his whole 
 being, and he who formerly would lie stretched dreamily on 
 his couch, without counting the hours, now sprung from the 
 reclining j^osture, and walked the apartment with long strides. 
 A passionate longing drove him up and down, and the wish to 
 see her led him to devise some means by which he might ac- 
 complish the purjoose. It seemed impossible to press himself 
 into the dwelling of her enraged father without some ex- 
 cuse, and yet he knew she must be there, for the injury to her 
 foot would prevent her leaving the house. Could he go again 
 to ask the overseer for bread and salt? 
 
 After the scene so lately enacted he dared ask nothing of 
 Keraunus in the name of Hadrian. What if he were to take 
 a pitcher, to replace the one broken? That might only irritate 
 still more the haughty man. 
 
 After dismissing various projects, he remembered that he 
 possessed a few rare essences, which had been given him by the 
 emperor. From these he would select something that might 
 be useful for her injured foot. This act of compassion would 
 certainly not displease his master, who had offered assistance 
 of that sort in his conversation with Keraunus. He called 
 Mastor to watch the dog, who had closely followed his prome- 
 nading of the apartment; then going to his bedroom he took 
 a costly flask, which had been a gift of Hadrian on his last 
 birthday, and which had once belonged to Plotina, the wife of 
 Trajan. Then he went out to seek the overseer's dwelling. 
 On the steps where he had found Selene sat the old negro, 
 who, in fear of the dog, dared venture no further. Antinous 
 requested the slave to lead him to his master's dwelling. The 
 negro went forward, and throwing ojoen the door of the outer 
 room, pointed toward the common room, saying: " Yonder; 
 but Keraunus is not at homo." Without troubling himself 
 further the negro returned to the children, while the Bithynian 
 stood in doubt as to what he ought to do, with the vial in his 
 hand. He could hear voices in conversation with Selene, and 
 
126 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 one of them was that of a man ; and still hesitating, the voice 
 of Arsinoe crying out: " Who is there?" made further progress 
 necessary. 
 
 Selene stood in the room, dressed in a white garment, and 
 with a veil about her head, as if prepared to go out, while 
 Arsinoe was perched upon the edge of a table covered with an 
 array of old-fashioned articles. A Phoenician, who stood be- 
 side the table with a handsomely carved cup in his hand, 
 seemed to be bargaining with her. 
 
 Kerauuus had gone that morning to a relic dealer, but not 
 finding him at home, had left an order for him to call and ex- 
 amine various articles. 
 
 The Phoenician had arrived before the return of Keraunus 
 from the council, and Arsinoe was exhibiting the articles, ex- 
 patiating upon their value in the meantime \vitli much en- 
 thusiasm. 
 
 Unfortunately, Hiram did not count them of any higher 
 worth than had Gabinius. Selene, expecting only failure, 
 wished to bring the affair to an end, for the time Avas near at 
 hand when the sisters must be in the papyrus mill. The re- 
 fusal of Arsinoe to accompany her, and the prayer of the old 
 slave that she would at least to-day sjjare her foot, only elicited 
 the firm rejaly: 
 
 '■'I shall go.'' 
 
 The appearance of Antinous disturbed her. 
 
 Arsinoe thought him handsome but awkward; the relic 
 dealer looked at him in admiration, and was the first to offer 
 a greeting. Antinous returned it, bowed to the sisters, and 
 said, addressing Selene: 
 
 "We have heard that you received an injury to both head 
 and foot; and since we were the cause of your suft'ering, per- 
 mit me to offer this vial, which contains an excellent remedy.'' 
 
 "I thank you," answered the young woman; "but I feel 
 so much better that I shall try to go out. " 
 
 " You ought not to do that," replied Antinous, very ear- 
 nestly. 
 
 " I must go," said Selene. 
 
 ' ' At least, keep the vial, that you may make an application 
 after your return. Ten drops in a vessel of water, like that 
 one yonder." 
 
 " J can do it, then." 
 
 " You will soon learn how healing it is. I hope you are no 
 longer angry with us?" 
 
 '^No." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 127 
 
 *' That makes me glad," cried he, looking upon her with his 
 great dreamy eyes full of silent passion. 
 
 Selene misunderstood their expression, and asked, in a cooler 
 tone than before: 
 
 " To whom shall I return the vial after using its contents?" 
 
 " Please keep it," begged Antinous. " It is handsome, and 
 would have double worth for me if I knew it to be in your 
 iwssession." 
 
 " It is very pretty; but I never accept gifts." 
 
 " Then break it after you have used it. You have not yet 
 forgiven the savage trick of our dog, and we are heartily 
 sorry." 
 
 " I am not angry. Arsinoe, pour the medicine into a vase.'^ 
 
 Arsinoe did as she was requested; but in doing so, she no- 
 ticed the beautiful play of colors in the glass, and said, frankly: 
 
 " If my sister will not have it, please give it to me. How 
 can you make such an ado about nothing, Selene?" 
 
 "■ Then take it," said Antinous, looking down at the floor, 
 with a sudden memory of the high value Hadrian placed on 
 the little vessel, and a fear that it might be called for. 
 
 Selene shrugged her shoulders as she wound the veil about 
 her head, and said, with a reproachful look at her sister: 
 
 " It is high time." 
 
 " I do not want to go to-day," said Arsinoe, stubbornly; 
 ' ' and it is madness for you to walk a quarter of an hour with 
 that swollen foot." 
 
 " It were much better to spare yourself," said the trader, 
 respectfully; and Antinous added: 
 
 " I+' you make yourself worse, it will be sharpening our self- 
 reproach." 
 
 " I must go," answered Selene, decidedly; '' and you ought 
 to go with me, sister." 
 
 This was certainly not a decision of obstinacy, but one forced 
 upon her by harsh necessity. If she failed to be at the papy- 
 rus mill on that day she would lose the wages of not only the 
 week past, but also of that to come — both her own and Arsi- 
 noe ^s. The emperor had promised the rich owner of the mill 
 to pay him a visit, and since some repairs were to be made in 
 the old structure, and it was to be adorned in honor of that 
 event, leave of absence had been given to all the work-peoi3le, 
 without deduction of wages — which were to be paid to-day, in 
 advance. And Selene needed this money for the support of 
 the family, and she summoned her will for the effort. Seeing 
 that Arsinoe gave no sign of following, she asked again, with 
 severe earnestness: 
 
128 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " Will you come? Yes or no?'' 
 
 *' No/' cried Arsinoe, sitting more firmly on the table. 
 
 *' Then must I go alone?" 
 
 " You ought to stay at home. " 
 
 Selene stepped nearer and looked her sister reproachfully 
 in the face. But Arsinoe insisted on having her own way. 
 She pouted and pounded three times on the table, crying out: 
 
 " No — no — no!" 
 
 Selene beckoned to the old slave woman and commanded 
 her to stay in the room until her father should return; then 
 saluted the trader politely, and with only an indifferent nod to 
 Antinous, left the room. The youth followed and overtook 
 her when she stopped to speak with the children. She straight- 
 ened their garments and charged them to keep away from the 
 passage, where they might meet the dog. 
 
 Antinous stroked the curling locks of the blind boy and 
 asked Selene, when she turned to climb the steps: 
 
 " Will you permit me to heljj 3-011?" 
 
 " Yes," she answered, for her first effort to walk had caused 
 sharp pain. She extended her elbow that he might support 
 her by placing his hand beneath. 
 
 Even then she would certainly have declined his offer of as- 
 sistance had she cared at all for this favorite of Hadrian, but 
 she carried the image of another man in her heart, and did not 
 even perceive the beauty of Antinous. 
 
 Never before had his heart beat so violently as during the 
 few moments in which he M'as jjermitted to touch the arm of 
 Selene. He was intoxicated with emotion, yet he did not fail 
 to perceive her pain while climbing. 
 
 " Oh, stay at home to-day and spare yourself," he begged, 
 more than once, with trembling voice. 
 
 " You weary me," she replied in displeasure; " I must go, 
 and it is not very far." 
 
 " Will you allow me to accompany you?" 
 
 She laughed aloud, and answered, with a little scorn : 
 
 " Certainly not. Lead me through the passage, that the 
 dog may not again attack me. Then you can go where you 
 please, except with me." 
 
 He obeyed, and, at the point where the passage entered a 
 wider hall, she said: "Good-bye," and expressed her thanks 
 in a few friendly words. 
 
 Tliere were two ways leading out. One passed over the 
 bastion and the ten-ace, having numy ascents ,and descents; 
 the other was through the ])alace. She was forced to choose 
 the latter, for it was quite impossible to go u]) and down the 
 
THE EMPEROR. 129 
 
 stairs without help; but she shrunk from meeting so manj* 
 men as were now gathered in the building. 
 
 She thought of asking her old playmate, Pollux, to lead her 
 through the crowd as far as to the house of his father. 
 
 But this did not seem easy, for since the hour when he had 
 first shown the bust of her mother to Arsinoe, instead of her- 
 self, she had felt piqued and angry. To him she had opened 
 wide her weary and desolate heart during the frequent con- 
 versations they had held within a few days past. Twice she 
 had served him as a model, and she had jDromised to go again 
 for that purpose on the coming evening. They had talked 
 together on many things, and even of love, fie had waxed 
 eloquent in assuring her that a good husband was all she wanted 
 to make her sad heart happy and hght. She had blushed, and 
 he had looked down on his own great hands; but she had 
 thought she could enjoy life at his side. It seemed to her 
 that they had been created for each other. Then why had he 
 first shown the bust to Arsinoe? She would ask him, and let 
 him know that it had troubled her. At any rate, she must go 
 and tell him that, on account of her injured foot, she could 
 not stand as a model this evening. 
 
 With steadily increasing pain she entered the Hall of the 
 Muses, and approached the screen which hid her old playfel- 
 low. But he was not alone; for she heard voices, and the 
 merry laugh of a woman. Just as she was about to call the 
 name of Pollux, the voice exclaimed, louder and merrier: 
 
 " Ah, that is too bold! Are you my dressing-maid? "What 
 liberties an artist presumes to take!'^ 
 
 " Say yes,^^ he begged in the saane voice which more than 
 once had persuaded her own action. " You are very beauti- 
 ful, Balbilla; but if you allow me this, it would make you still 
 more so." 
 
 Again the merry laugh echoed behind the screen. The tone 
 must have hurt the poor Selene, for she shrugged her shoul- 
 ders, and her features woi'ked as though suft'ering pain. 
 
 She pressed both hands to her side as she turned from the 
 place and limped into the court. 
 
 What tortured the poor girl so keenly? Was it the need of 
 the family? Was it the bodily pain, which grew at every step, 
 or was it the chilled, wounded heart, deceived in its last opened 
 and fairest hope. 
 
130 THE EMTEROB. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 When Selene went out, she usually met admiration from 
 the passers-by — but to-day, a coujile of street urchins followed, 
 crying as they kept pace with her halting step: " Click — 
 clack — '' 
 
 The mirth of the thoughtless creatures was excited by the 
 steady fall of her unbuckled shoe on the pavement. 
 
 But while she, under an accumulation of miseries, ap- 
 proached the papyrus mill, joy and delight visited Arsinoe — 
 for scarcely had her sister and Antinous left the dwelling when 
 Hiram, the relic dealer, begged permission to look at the glass 
 vessel which the handsome youth had given lier. He examined 
 it carefully, turning it on all sides in the sunlight; testing its 
 quality through contact with the stone in his finger-riiig, and 
 murmured hghtly to himself: " Vasa murrhina." 
 
 The sharp ears of Arsinoe caught these word's, for she had 
 learned from her father that the most costly vases with which 
 the wealthy Romans adorned their apartments were of " vasa 
 murrhina. " So she told him she knew what great sums were 
 paid for that ware, and she must have a very good price 
 if she were to sell her late gift. He made an ofler, but she 
 laughingly increased it tenfold; and after a half-playful and 
 half-earnest bargaining, the Phoenician said, decidedly: 
 
 " Two thousand drachmas; not a sesterce more.*' 
 
 *' That is certainly not enough; but you can have it." 
 
 " I should not give half that sum to a less pretty customer. '' 
 
 " And I only let you have it because you are such a nice 
 man." 
 
 " 1 will send you the money before sunset." 
 
 These words made the girl thoughtful — who had been at 
 lirst so overcome by delight and surprise, that she would in- 
 stinctively have thrown her arms around the neck of either the 
 trader or the slave woman; or, better still, have taken the 
 whole world into her embrace — for her father Avould soon 
 come, and she was afraid he might disapprove her bargain, and 
 return the vase to the young man and the money to "the mer- 
 chant. She would never have asked for it, had she had any 
 conception of its value. But now it certainly belonged to her, 
 and if it were to be restored, no one would be satisfied; for the 
 stranger would feel insulted, and she 'would lose the greatest 
 pleasure of all her life. What was to be done? She still sat 
 on the table's edge, holding one foot in her hand, and in this 
 
THE EMPEROR. 131 
 
 saucy attitude studied tlie floor as earnestly as though provis- 
 ion for the future were to be read among the figures described 
 there. The trader amused himself with the embarrassment 
 which made her charming, and wished, in that moment, that 
 his son, a young painter, were standing in his place. But at 
 length he broke his silence, saying: 
 
 *' You fear that your father will not like our bargaining in 
 his absence; and yet it is for him that you wish to make the 
 money." 
 
 " Who said that?" 
 
 " Would he have offered me his treasures if he had not need- 
 ed the money?" 
 
 "It is only — I can but — " stammered Arsinoe, who was 
 little jDracticed in deception. "If I do not confess to him — " 
 
 " I have seen how innocently you came by this vase," an- 
 swered the dealer, " and Keraunus need know nothing of the 
 matter. You can suppose it to be broken, and its fragments 
 lying in the sea yonder. Which of these things does your 
 father consider of the least value?" 
 
 " This old sword of Marc Antony," said the girl, her face 
 growing brighter. ' ' He says it is too long and narrow for 
 that which it pretends to be. For my part, I think it was 
 never meant for a sword, but for a roasting-spit. " 
 
 " I will send it to my kitchen for that purpose," replied the 
 dealer; " but I offer two thousand drachmas for it; I will take 
 it with me, and send you the amount in a few hours. Will 
 that be agreeable?" 
 
 Arsinoe dropped her foot, slid down from her seat, and 
 clapped her hands joyfully for an answer. 
 
 "Tell him," went on the dealer, "I can afford to pay 
 more for such things now, because the emperor will certainly 
 be looking after what Julius Cfesar, Marc Antony, Octavius 
 Augustus, and other great Eomans have used while in Egypt, 
 I would like to have the old woman carry out the roasting-spit. 
 My slave is waiting outside, and will take it under his chiton 
 to my kitchen door. Otherwise, he might meet those who 
 would envy him the costly treasure. It is always well to be 
 protected from envious glances. " 
 
 The dealer laughed, hid the vial of Antinous in his robe, 
 gave the sword to the old woman, and took leave of Arsinoe. 
 
 80 soon as left alone, she put on her shoes and veil to run to 
 the papyrus mill. Selene must hear of this unexpected good 
 fortune, and then she would bring the poor girl home in a 
 sedan chair, which one could always find near the harbor. 
 
 Though there was more of apparent discord than harmony 
 
132 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 in the intercourse of these sisters, yet whatever Arsinoe met, 
 of either good or bad, she wished at once to share with Selene. 
 
 "Everlasting gods, what luck!" Now she would be able 
 to go among the daughters of the rich citizens as well dressed 
 as auy of them, and take her full share in the festiv^ity; and 
 besides, a nice sum would be left for the family, and the work 
 in the mill, which disgusted her, she hoped would now be for- 
 ever unnecessary. 
 
 The old slave still sat with the children near the steps. 
 Arsinoe lifted each one to bestow a kiss, and whispered: 
 
 " You shall have cakes this evening!" 
 
 She pressed her lips on both eyes of the blmd boy, and said: 
 
 " You may go with me, dear little fellow. I shall have a 
 litter for Selene, and you can be put in with her, and be brought 
 home like a rich gentleman. " 
 
 The little fellow threw up his hands, exclaiming joyfully: 
 
 " Through the air, through the air, and not a fall!"" 
 
 While still holding him in her arms, Keraunus, excited, and 
 with dripping foreliead and panting for breath, came up the 
 steps from the bastion, and exclaimed as soon as he sufficiently 
 recovered breath: 
 
 " I have just met Hiram, with the sword of Marc Antony. 
 You were a fool to sell it for two thousand draclimas!'' 
 
 *'But, father," said Arsinoe, laughing, " 30U would have 
 given it for a pasty and a swallow of wine. " 
 
 "I," exclaimed Keraunus, ''should probably have got 
 three times as much in exchange for this venerable relic, which 
 the emperor might have paid talents to possess — but sold is 
 sold. I did not expose your ignorance to the dealer, and can 
 not blame you. Still, the thought of no longer owning the 
 sword of Marc Antony will give me sleepless nights." 
 
 " If we set a nice piece of meat before you this evening, I 
 think the slumber will' follow," answered Arsinoe, taking the 
 handkerchief from his hand, and wiping his face in a caressing 
 manner. " We are rich people now, father, and will show the 
 daughters of the other citizens what we are able to do. " 
 
 " You must both take part in the festivity," said the over- 
 seer, with decision. " The emperor shall sec that I do not 
 shrink from a sacrifice in his honor, and when he sees my 
 daughters, and I bring my charges against the architect—" - 
 
 " You can let that drop, father, if Selene's foot is well 
 again. " 
 
 " Where is she?" 
 "Gone out." ^ 
 
THE EMPEROR. 133 
 
 " Then her foot is not so very bad. I hope she will soon 
 come home/' 
 
 " Perhaps so. I was going just now to fetch her in a lit- 
 ter." 
 
 " A htter?'' asked Keraunus, astonished. " The two thou- 
 sand drachmas have turned the girFs head. " 
 
 " On account of her foot. It was very painful when she 
 went out. " 
 
 " Why, then, did she not stay at home? As usual, there 
 will be a whole hour of haggling over one sesterce, and neither 
 of you have any time to lose.'' 
 
 " I will seek her at once." 
 
 " No, no, you at least must stay here, for in two hours the 
 women and girls will assemble in the theater." 
 
 " In two hours! But, Great Serapis, what shall we wear?" 
 
 *' It is your business to arrange that," answered Keraunus. 
 " I will order for myself the litter of which you spoke, and be 
 carried to Tryjohon's house and back again. Is there any 
 money in Selene's box?" 
 
 Arsinoe went to her sleej)ing-room, and returned, saying: 
 
 " Six double drachmas, that is all." 
 
 "Four will be enough," answered Keraunus; but after 
 thinking a moment, took it all. 
 
 " What do you want of the shipwright?" asked Arsinoe. 
 
 "I was plagued again on your account in the council. I 
 said one of my daughters was sick, and the other was needed 
 to nurse her. But that did not satisfy them — they still wanted 
 the one who was not sick. Then I said you had no mother — 
 that we lived by ourselves, and I did not feel willing to have 
 my child go alone into the assembly. And Tryphon replied 
 that it would be a pleasure for his wife to take you into the 
 theater with her own daughter. That I answered, half in 
 play, half in earnest, saying I did not suppose you would be 
 willing to go without your sister. I did not positively refuse, 
 and you know the reason. " 
 
 " Oh, the brave Antony and his royal roasting-spit!" cried 
 Arsinoe. " Now all is possible, and you can announce us to 
 the ship-master. Our wliite dresses are still quite good ; but, on 
 the way, you must buy of Abibaal the Phoenician a few yards 
 of blue ribbon for me, and of red for Selene." 
 
 " Very well — " 
 
 *' I will get both dresses in order, but, seriously, when must 
 we be ready?" 
 
 " In two hours." 
 
 " Do you know how it is, little father?" 
 
134 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " Well then?" 
 
 " Our old slave is half blind, and does everything wrong. 
 Will 3'ou allow me to ask Mother Doris from the gate-keeper's 
 house to help me? She is so kind and so skillful, and she irons 
 so nicely." 
 
 " Hush/' interrupted Keraunus; " those jseople shall never 
 cross my threshold." 
 
 " But my hair; just look at it!" cried Arsinoe, running her 
 fingers through the rich, full tresses. " To put that up, to 
 weave in the ribbons, to iron the two dresses, and sew on the 
 ornaments — even the dressing-maid of the empress could not 
 do all that." 
 
 " Doris shall never cross my threshold," replied Keraunus, 
 again and again. 
 
 " Then I must ask Hippias the tailor to send some one; but 
 that would cost something." 
 
 " We have enough, and can do it," answered Keraunus with 
 pride, repeating over his commissions, not to forget any: 
 
 Hippias the tailor— blue ribbon— red ribbon — shjpwi'ight 
 Tryphon — " 
 
 The woman sent by the tailor assisted Arsinoe to put the 
 dresses in order, and was unceasing in outspoken admiration 
 of the soft and shining hair, which she built up very high, 
 weaving ribbons through and through; then twisting it above 
 the comb, again to fall in long ringlets over her neck. 
 
 Keraunus looked with pride upon his lovely daughter. He 
 was also delighted with the money just brought by the servant 
 of the relic dealer, and fairly chuckled as he counted and piled 
 up the gold jDieces. 
 
 Arsinoe whispered while he was thus occupied : 
 
 "Did Hiram take any advantage of me?" but Keraunus 
 begged her not to disturb him, and answered : 
 
 Think of the great Antony's weapon, perhaps tlie very 
 one he plunged into his own breast. Why does Selene stay 
 out so long?" 
 
 An hour and a half had passed, and as she still delayed, the 
 overseer declared they must go; for it would not do to keep 
 Tryphon's wife waiting. 
 
 Arsinoe was really sorry to go without her sister. She had 
 taken much pains to jjut lier dress in order, and laid it across 
 the divan near the mosaic painting. Never hiid Arsinoe been 
 alone upon the street, and it seemed to her she should enjoy 
 nothing without the company and jirntcetion of Srlcne. 
 
 But the confident assurance of Keraunus that they would 
 be glad to assign her a place somewhat later reassured her 
 
THE EMPEROR. 135 
 
 spirits. As a final 'preparation, she had sprinkled upon her 
 garments a few drops of the perfumery her father used before 
 going into the council; and charged him with ordering the 
 servant to buy the promised cakes for the children. The little 
 ones had gathered about, and admired her with an "Ah!" 
 and an " Oh!" as an awe-inspiring presence which they dared 
 not approach or touch. On account of the arrangement of her 
 hair, she could not bend down to them as usual; but she 
 stroked the curis of the little Helios, and said: 
 
 " To-morrow we will ride through the air; and perhaps 
 afterward Selene will tell you a pretty story." 
 
 Her heart beat faster than usual when she stepped into the 
 sedan which waited for her before the dwellhig of the gate- 
 keeper. Mother Doris admired her without showing herself; 
 but as Keraunus stejoped into the street to order another sedan 
 for himself, she cut quickly her two handsomest roses, and run- 
 ning out, with a finger on her laughing lips, put them into the 
 hand of the girl. 
 
 As in a dream, Arsinoe reached the house of Tryphon and 
 the theater; and for the first time in her life learned that joy 
 and anxiety can reign in the same heart, and that one will not 
 exclude the other. These two emotions j)revented her from 
 seeing and hearmg what passed about her. Only once she be- 
 came conscious, as she met two young men walking arm in 
 arm, and crowned with wreaths, that they cried after her: 
 
 " Long live beauty!" 
 
 After this she looked down into her lap, and upon the roses 
 Doris had given her. The flowers reminded her of the son of 
 this friendly old lady, and she wondered if he had seen her in 
 her fine array. That thought was pleasant, and not at all im- 
 possible, for Pollux would naturally be there often while at 
 work on the Lochias. Perhaps he had even plucked the roses 
 for her, and dared not venture to bring them himself, seeing 
 her father so near. 
 
 CHAPTEE XVIL 
 
 The young sculptor was not in the gate-keeper's house when 
 Arsinoe passed by. He had thought of her often enough since 
 their meeting before the bust of her mother; but on this par- 
 ticular afternoon his time and attention were occupied by 
 another young woman. 
 
 Balbilla had gone to the Lochias about noon, accompanied 
 by the worthy Olaudia, the widow of a poor senator, who iov 
 
136 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 many years had lived as lady of honor and companion with the 
 rich but fatherless and motherless orphan. 
 
 In Rome she presided over the house of Balbilla with as 
 much efficiency as pleasure. There was only one element of 
 discontent in her lot, and this came from Iklbilla's love of 
 travel — which forced her too often to leave the chief city — and 
 outside of Kome no place seemed a desirable residence. Going 
 to the baths at Baiae, or to the Ligurian coast during the cold 
 months of January and February, was not unpleasant, because, 
 though not in Jiome, she was sure of IJoman society. But the 
 mad desire of Balbilla to visit Africa, the country she imagined 
 to be a glowing furnace, and to go in a reeling vessel, had 
 been a sore trial to the worthy woman. But she was con- 
 strained to make the best of the necessit}^, for the emj^ress had 
 expressed so strong a wish for the company of Balbilla on her 
 trip up the Kile, that the refusal of Claudia would have been 
 an act of disobedience. Moreover, she was forced to acknowl- 
 edge to herself that her self-willed foster-child — as she was in 
 the habit of calling Balbilla — would have insisted on making 
 the journey without the urgency of Sabina. 
 
 Balbilla had gone to the palace on the Lochias to sit for her 
 bust. When Selene passed by the screen which hid her old 
 playfellow and his work from her sight, the worthy matron 
 Claudia had fallen asleej^ upon her couch, and the sculptor 
 was trymg to prove to Balbilla that the height and elaboration 
 of her hair-dressing injured the expression of her features. 
 
 He begged her to remember how simply the great Athenian 
 masters of sculi^ture in the most flourishing days of the plastic 
 art had rejiresented the hair in their statues, and proposed to 
 arrange hers in the same manner, if she Avould come to him 
 the next day, before the maid should have used the hot iron 
 upon it, for to-day the curls would act like the spring of a 
 clasp which one bends out of its place. Balbilla retorted in 
 a lively manner, i:)rotesting against his ideas, and maintaining 
 her preference for the prevailing mode. 
 
 *' But this fashion is not beautiful; it is monstrous, and 
 offends the eye. The idle Eoman women invented it, not as 
 any addition to beauty, but simply to attract attention," as- 
 serted Pollux. 
 
 " To attract attention by any outward effect is unpleasant 
 to me,'' answered Balbilla. '* But one is less consi^icuous 
 who follows the prevailing fashion in dress — providing that it 
 does not change too often — even though he adojit something 
 in itself more graceful and modest. Which do you consider 
 the more idle, the stylish young man on the Cano23ic way, or 
 
THE EMPEKOE. 137 
 
 the cynical jDhilosophers with their tousled hair, the torn felt 
 blanket over their shoulder, and the rough stick in their dirty 
 hands ?'^ 
 
 " The latter/' answered Pollux; " but they sin against the 
 laws of taste, toward which I wish to win you, and which will 
 as surely survive every changing shade of conventionalism as 
 Home|-'s Iliad is destined to outlive the drawling rhymes of the 
 street singers, who yesterday filled our streets with descriptions 
 of a murder. Am I the first to attempt a bust of yourself?' ' 
 
 *' No," laughed Balbilla; " five Roman artists have already 
 done the same thing." 
 
 " Has any one of them succeeded to your satisfaction?" 
 
 " Every one proved a failure." 
 
 " Then will your handsome face go down to future genera- 
 tions in fivefold distortion?" 
 
 " Oh, no; I had them all broken to pieces." 
 
 " That was good for them," cried Pollux, and turning natu- 
 rally toward his prospective work, apostroj)hized it thus: 
 
 " Poor clay, if the fair lady to whom you may bear a certain 
 resemblance does not dispense with the chaos of her curls, 
 you are sure to share the fate of your five predecessors," 
 
 The matron, awakened by these words, asked: 
 
 " Were you speaking of Balbilla's broken busts?" 
 
 " Yes," answered the j^oetess. 
 
 " Perhaps this may follow the others," sighed Claudia. 
 " Do you know what impends over you in this attempt?" 
 
 " What is it?" 
 
 " This young woman has some knowledge of your art." 
 
 " I have learned to bungle a little from Aristeas," broke in 
 Balbilla. 
 
 ''Aha! Since the emperor introduced it, one would be 
 quite out of fashion in Eome who did not busy himself with 
 sculpture." 
 
 " Perhaps so." 
 
 " Finding something to displease her in each bust, she has 
 tried to improve it." 
 
 " I only prepare the work for the slaves," again broke in 
 Balbilla. '' My people have gradually attained to skill in the 
 work of destruction." 
 
 " My work has at least the prospect of a speedy end," sighed 
 Pollux. " Verily, all things come into this world under sen- 
 tence of death." 
 
 " Would such a destruction of your labor displease you?" 
 asked Balbilla. 
 
 " Yes, if it should be successful; no, in case of failure." 
 
138 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " ""Whoever preserves a poor bust,'* said Balbilla, "brings 
 upon himself a more unfavorable verdicb from posterity than 
 he deserves. " 
 
 " Certainly; but how can you have courage to risk for the 
 sixth time such an act of destruction?" 
 
 " Because 1 can destroy whatever I i)lease/' said the spoiled 
 girl, laughing. " Sitting still is not my vocation." 
 
 " Certainly it is not/' sighed Claudia. " But from you we 
 expect something good. " 
 
 ^' I thank you/' returned Pollux, " and will spare no pains 
 to answer your expectations and make something worthy of 
 preservation in marble." 
 
 " What do you mean by our expectations?" 
 [ Pollux meditated for a moment before replying: 
 
 " It is not easy for me to exjDress that which I feel as an 
 artist. 'A plastic image that can satisfy its creator must ful- 
 fill two conditions : it should carry to future generations a like- 
 ness of the person represented, and also give some evidence of 
 the state of the art in the time of its construction." 
 
 " That sounds well; but you are forgetting yourself." 
 
 " Do you mean my own fame?" 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 " I work for Papias, and serve art in general; that is enough. 
 Meanwhile, Fame neither asks for me nor I for Fame." 
 
 " Yet you will not omit to place your name on my bust?" 
 
 " Why should I not?" 
 
 " Wise Cicero!" 
 
 " Cicero?" 
 
 " You do not seem familiar with the clever remark of the 
 old Tullius about the j^hilosophers who write on the worthless- 
 ness of fame, yet always put their own names on the books?" 
 
 "I do not despise the laurel, but will not run after that 
 whose only worth is that it comes unsought and because I de- 
 serve it." 
 
 " Good. But in order to fulfill your first-named condition 
 you need to be acquainted with my thoughts and feelings — my 
 entire inner life." 
 
 " I look at you, and speak with you/' answered Pollux. 
 
 Claudia laughed aloud, and said: 
 
 " If instead of two interviews of two hours each, you had 
 known her as many years, there would still be more to dis- 
 cover. Not a week passes in which she does not exhibit some- 
 thing to puzzle Rome. This restless head is never still, though 
 the golden heart be always and everywhere the same." 
 
 " And do you suppose that is new to me?" asked Pollux. 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 139 
 
 *' I read the restless spirit of my model upon her forehead and 
 her mouth, and the eyes betray her disposition/^ 
 
 " And my pug-nose?'' asked Balbilla. 
 
 " That bears witness to the wonderfully odd and merry 
 ideas which astonish Rome." 
 
 " Perhaps you are not yet working for the hammer of the 
 slaves/' returned Balbilla, laughing. 
 
 " And if I were, the memory of this pleasant hour could not 
 be destroyed," returned Pollux. 
 
 Pontius now appeared, begging Balbilla to forgive his inter- 
 ruption of the sitting. The opinion of Pollux was needed in 
 an important matter, which would call for his absence only 
 about ten minutes. 
 
 So soon as the two women were left alone, Balbilla rose and 
 looked curiously around the narrow' workshop, while her com- 
 panion remarked: 
 
 " A fine young man, this Pollux; but rather too free and 
 lively." 
 
 "He is an artist," answered Balbilla, turning over every 
 picture and tablet and study of the sculptor, lifted the cover 
 from the Urania, touched the lute which hung on the wall, 
 ran from one thing to another, and at last stopped before a 
 great mass of clay covered with a cloth wliich occupied one 
 corner. 
 
 " What can that be?" asked Claudia. 
 
 " A partly finished model, without doubt.'* 
 
 Balbilla touched it with the tips of her fingers, and said: 
 
 " It seems to be a head. Perhaps something unusual. The 
 choicest food comes often under the covered dishes. Let us 
 unveil this statue. '' 
 
 " Who knows what it may be?" said Claudia, loosening a 
 cord at one end of the covering. " One often finds choice 
 things in these workshojDS. " 
 
 "It is only a human head," cried Balbilla. " I can feel 
 it." 
 
 " But one can not be sure," said the matron, loosening a 
 knot. " These artists are such lawless, unaccountable peo- 
 ple." 
 
 " Take that end, I will lift from here," proposed Balbilla; 
 and a moment later the poetess stood before the distorted 
 caricature of a Roman woman which Hadrian had made. 
 
 She recognized it instantly, and at first laughed aloud, but 
 the longer she looked the more vexed and angry did she be- 
 come. Knowing her own features, she saw that this made 
 prominent whatever was least agreeable in bold exaggeration. 
 
140 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 The result was a licad ugly ouougli to frighten one, and yet 
 bearing a resemblance to herself. While looking at it, she re- 
 membered what Pollux had lately said about reading her char- 
 acter in her face, and a deep indignation rose Avithin her soul. 
 The great wealth which made her able to gratify every whim, 
 and turned even her follies into subject for admiration, had 
 not protected her from a disillusion which girls in a more 
 modest sphere of life were spared. Her kindness and gener- 
 osity were often made occasion of trespass, even by artists; but 
 it was certain that whoever had made this caricature had acted 
 from a different motive than the gaining of a high price for a 
 flattering likeness. 
 
 She had found jileasure ui the fresh and healthy natme of 
 this young sculptor and his respectful address. Still, no one 
 here was so likely to have perceived the peculiarities of hernot 
 strictly handsome face, which, though really leading it a 
 charm, still were to be recognized in this caricature. She was 
 indignant, and. felt herself insulted. Always accustomed to 
 express her displeasure, she cried in a vehement manner and 
 with moist eyes: 
 
 " That is disgraceful, that is mean. Give me the mantle, 
 Claudia. I will not remain another moment as a target for 
 his coarse and malicious jesting.^' 
 
 "It is most unworthy of him to insult a woman in your 
 position. I hope the sedan waits outside the gate."' 
 
 Pontius, coming in, heard the last words. Pollux was still 
 detained by the prefect. As the architect came nearer, he said 
 to Balbilla: 
 
 " You have reason to be indignant. The thing is an insult 
 in clay, ugly in every feature, but Pollux did not make it. ^' 
 
 " You apologize for your friend. " 
 
 " I would not utter an untruth, even for my brother.'' 
 
 *' As the other in jest, so do you in earnest seek to give it 
 an appearance of honorable intention. " 
 
 "You are irritated, and not accustomed to bridle your 
 tongue," answered the architect. " Pollux, I repeat it, has 
 not made this caricature, but a sculptor from Rome." 
 
 " AVho is it? We know them all." 
 
 " I am not at liberty to mention his name." 
 
 " There it is again. We will go, Claudia." 
 
 " Stay where you are," said Pontius, firmly. "Were you 
 not she whom you are, I should let you go wherever you wish 
 with the wrath" and the double guilt upon your soul of injus- 
 tice toward two upright men. lint as the granddaughter of 
 Claudius Jialbillus 1 consider it my duty to say this to you — 
 
THE EMPEROR. 141 
 
 had Pollux made this caricature he would no longer be in this 
 jialace, for I should have thrust him out, and thrown his 
 wretched performance after him. You look surprised, for 
 you know not who I am to speak thus to you.^^ 
 
 " That is not true," answered Balbilla, quietly; for she was 
 convinced that the man who stood before her like a bronze 
 statue, and with eyebrows drawn together, told the truth, and 
 for some reason had the right to sj^eak so decidedly to her. 
 " I know you to be the head architect of this city, of whom 
 Titianus has related great things to us; but how can I explain 
 your sjiecial interest in me?" 
 
 "It is my duty to serve you, even with my hfe, should that 
 be necessary.'-' 
 
 " You?" asked Balbilla, bewildered. " I saw you for the 
 first time yesterday. " 
 
 " Nevertheless, you have a right to dispose of all I am or 
 have, for my grandfather was the slave of yours. " 
 
 " I do not understand," answered Balbilla, with increasing 
 embarrassment. 
 
 " Can it be that the tutor of your noble grandfather, and 
 your own father, the old Sophinus, to whom Claudius Balbillus 
 gave his freedom, is entirely forgotten among you?" 
 
 " Certainly, most certainly not," cried Balbilla. " He must 
 have been a noble man and a fine scholar." 
 
 " He was my father's father," said Pontius. 
 
 " Then you belong to our family," exclaimed Balbilla, ex- 
 tending her hand joj^full}^ 
 
 '' Thank you for this word," returned Pontius; " and now 
 let me say once more, Pollux had nothing to do with this 
 caricature." 
 
 " Take away my mantle, Claudia; I shall continue the sit- 
 ting." 
 
 " Not to-day; it would only injm-e the work. I pray you, 
 let the indignation, to which you gave such vehement expres- 
 sion, wear off in some other direction. The sculptor ought 
 not to know that you have seen the caricature; it would de- 
 stroy his freedom. When you come to-morrow, with a refreshed 
 soul and a more cheerful humor, Pollux will be able to make 
 an image of you that should satisfy the granddaughter of 
 Claudius Balbillus." 
 
 " And I ho23e also the grandson of his wise tutor," said the 
 girl, kindly saluting Pontius as she went with her companion 
 toward the door of the hall, where some slaves awaited them. 
 
 Pojitius accompanied them in silence to their escort, and 
 then, returning to the worlvshop, carefully covered again the 
 
143 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 caricature. As he returned to the hull, Pollux hastened to- 
 ward him, saj'ing: 
 
 " The architect from Rome Avishes to s^ieak with you — a 
 grand man he is.'' 
 
 " Balbilla was called away, and left her greeting for you. 
 Take that thing yonder out of the way, that she may not see 
 it. It is rough and detestable. " 
 
 In a few moments he stood before the emjieror, who made 
 known his wish to watch the sitting of Balbilla. 
 
 As Pontius related to him' what had occurred behind the 
 screen, begging him not to mention the matter to Pollux, 
 and told him of her indignation at sight of the insulting 
 caricature, Hadrian rubbed his hands together, laughing aloud 
 in delight. Pontius ground his teeth and said: 
 
 " Balbilla seemed to me a mirth-loving but noble-hearted 
 woman. I can see no reason for laughing at her.'' 
 
 Hadrian looked sharj^ly into the serious eyes of the bold 
 arcliitect, let his hand rest vq)o\\ his shoulder, and said, with a 
 shade of threatening in his voice : 
 
 " To do that in my presence would certainly bring you or 
 any other persons into trouble. The old sometimes venture 
 to amuse themselves with things which the children are not 
 permitted to touch. " 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Selene reached the entrance-gate through the immense wall 
 of sunburned bricks which inclosed the buildings, reservoirs, 
 and courts belonging to the papyrus mill of Plutarch, in which 
 she and her sister worked daily. Usually she reached this 
 point in a quarter of an hour; but to-day it had taken four 
 times as long, and she had scarcely been able, on account of 
 the excruciating pain, to keep herself upright and to move on- 
 ward, limping and staggering. 
 
 _ She longed to cling to every person going in the same direc- 
 tion, or attach herself to some vehicle; but i)itiless and un- 
 heeding, men and animals alike had passed on. Some, wnu 
 were i]i haste, knocked against her and scarcely turned as 
 she shrunk more closely into herself with a groan, or sunk 
 down upon the nearest curbstone to wipe hcr eyes or press the 
 swollen foot, by a naw pain to divert for a moment the steady, 
 unendurable agonv. The street boys who had cried after her 
 gave up (heir sport when they saw she svas determiiied not to 
 notice their persecution. 
 
 Once as she was sitting upon a doorstep, a Avoman with a 
 
tHE EMPEROR. 143 
 
 cliild in her arms asked what was the matter, but went on 
 when Selene only shook her head in reply. And she was very 
 near to giving up, when the street became suddenly filled with a 
 curious throng to watch the passage of Verus in his chariot — 
 and what a chariot! 
 
 The Alexandrians were accustomed to see much that was 
 striking and peculiar in their populous city, but this vehicle 
 never failed to attract all eyes, whether in surprise, admira- 
 tion, or bitter sarcasm. 
 
 In the midst of a gilded chariot stood the handsome Roman, 
 guiding the four white horses harnessed abreast with his own 
 hand. On his head was a wreath, and across his breast a gar- 
 land of roses. On the foot-board sat two charming children 
 dressed as cupids. Their limbs were swinging freely, and 
 white doves, fastened to their hands by long golden wires, flut- 
 tered before Verus. The hurrying crowd pressed Selene 
 agamst the wall, who, instead of looking after this striking 
 equipage, only (Covered her face in agony. Still, the sliining 
 chariot, the golden harness, and the figure of Verus had passed 
 before her as a dream picture. And the dim glance had 
 wakened in her soul — half paralyzed by pain and anxiety — 
 only the thought that the mere bridle of this spendthrift had 
 cost enough to keep their family from Avant a whole year. As 
 the chariot turned into the next street, and the crowd rushed 
 after it, she was almost thrown to the ground. She could not 
 go any further, and only looked about for a litter — but not 
 one was in sight. It was but a few hundred steps further to 
 reach the mill, but it seemed to her a distance of many stadia. 
 
 Then a few workmen came out, laughing and showing their 
 money to each other. So she knew the distribution of wages 
 had already commenced. And a glance at the position of the 
 sun reminded her how long she had been on the Avay, and of 
 her object in coming. With a mighty effort of will she limped 
 a few steps further, and, as her courage began again to yield, 
 there came along a little maiden who had some petty service 
 at the table where she and Arsinoe worked, but who now car- 
 ried a pitcher. She called to the little brown Egyptian: 
 
 " Please, Hathor, go back with me to the mill, for I have 
 such pain in my foot. Perhaps, leaning on your shoulder, I 
 may walk." 
 
 '' I can not," cried the child. " If I hurry back, I am to 
 get some dates!" and off she ran. 
 
 Selene looked after her with the question, not for the first 
 time rising in her heart, why she, who took so much trouble 
 
144 THE EMPEKOR. 
 
 for others, found so little help in return; and sighing, tried 
 again to go on. 
 
 After a few stej^s, and the pain obscuring the senses of sight 
 and hearing, a voice asked timidly but kindly what was the 
 matter. It was the voice of a leaf-paster, whose place in the 
 mill was near her own — a poor, deformed creature, who still 
 was cheerful and quiet and industrious, and had often rendered 
 little acts of kindness to Arsinoe and herself. Now she offered 
 her crooked shoulder for the support of Selene, and regulated 
 every step with a wonderful appreciation of her suffering. 
 They entered the mill without exchanging a word. In the 
 outer court the girl made Selene rest on a bundle of papyrus 
 stalks, which were in great piles near a water-tank, where they 
 were freshened for arrangement according to the location in 
 which they had grown. Beyond this court, the halls where 
 these three-sided stalks were examined and stripped of their 
 green coverings, and the pith cut into finger-lengths of varied 
 thickness, seemed to grow longer as they proceeded, and, in- 
 deed, to stretch on without end. 
 
 The pith-cleavers usually sat on both sides of a broad passage 
 used by the slaves wheii they carried the prepared sheets to the 
 drying-house — each at his own small table; but to-day the 
 greater part of these peoj^le had left their places, and stood 
 chatting, or packing the wooden screws, knives, and whet- 
 stones together. In the midst of this hall the hand of Selene 
 slipped from the shoulder of her companion, and, overtaken by 
 dizziness, she whispered: 
 
 " I can do no more. ^' 
 
 The hunchback held her up as well as she could, and although 
 not strong, succeeded in guitliug her to an empty bench. 
 
 A few work-2)eople gathered around and brought water, but 
 when she opened her eyes and was recognized by some who 
 worked in the same room with herself, they proposed to take 
 lier thither. Without asking her consent, they lifted the bench 
 upon which she was lying, "^riic injured foot, hanging down- 
 ward, caused such exquisite i)ain that she screamed and tried 
 to draw it back, extending her hand to grasp her ankle. But 
 her companion again lent her help, taking the suffering foot 
 into her own hand, and supporting it with tender carefulness. 
 
 In the large room where both men and women were fasten- 
 ing the dried strips of papyrus together into sheets, she was 
 able to draw the veil closer about her head. Arsinoe and she, 
 in order to remain unknown, had always drawn their veils 
 closely in passing here, and only laid them aside in the small 
 room where some twenty other women were at work. Now 
 
IHE EMPEROE. 145 
 
 all eyes rested inquisitively upon her, carried as if in triumph, 
 but she seemed to herself like a criminal borne through the 
 streets in disgrace before the eyes of the citizens. Certainly 
 the foot gave her much pain, and she was indeed wretched; 
 yet the beggarly pride inherited from her father, and the hu- 
 miliating consciousness of being classed with common people, 
 was one large element of her misery. In their own work-room 
 were only free women, but more than a thousand slaves were 
 occupied in this establishment, and she would as soon have 
 eaten from the same dish with animals as to be classed with 
 these people. 
 
 At one time, when almost everything was needed in their 
 house, her father had directed her attention to this factory, by 
 relating indignantly how the daughter of a citizen had hu- 
 miliated herself and her whole class by working there to earn 
 money. It was true she had been well paid, and in answer to 
 Selene's question, he had mentioned the amount she received 
 and the name of the manufacturer who had so bought her 
 honor with his gold. 
 
 Soon after this she went to the factory and made all the 
 necessary arrangements for herself and Arsinoe to go for a 
 few hours each day, and take their places among those who 
 gummed the finished strips of papyrus together. This was 
 two years ago, but how often had Arsinoe, at the beginning of 
 a new week or when special repugnance to the work gained 
 power over her soul, refused to go any more to the factory. 
 And how much jjersuasion she had been forced to use — how 
 many new ribbons she had bought, how often consented to 
 take share in some amusement which cost the half of a week's 
 wages to prevail on Arsinoe to remain, and to prevent her 
 making known to her father the occasion of their so-called 
 walk for pleasure. 
 
 As Salene once more sat on her stool before the long table 
 on which lay hundreds of the jjrepared leaves of jDapyrus wait- 
 ing to be fastened together, she felt scarcely able to lift the veil 
 from her face. She drew the upper sheets toward herself, 
 dipped her brush in the vessel of gum, and began to spread it 
 on the edge of the leaves, but in the midst of the task her 
 strength failed and the light imj)lement fell from her fingers. 
 She laid her hands on the table, and burying her face within 
 them, began to weep. 
 
 While the tears ran down through her fingers, and shiver 
 after shiver shook her frame, a woman who sat opposite had 
 called the hunchback to herself, and after whispering a few 
 
146 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 words, Ihid pressed her liand warmly, and looked with confi- 
 dence into her lusterless hut clear, friendly eyes. 
 
 Thereupon the girl seated herself silently heside Selene, in 
 the empt}' place of Arsinoe, and pushed the smaller part of the 
 papyrus toward the woman opposite, and both began to work 
 diligently at the gumming. 
 
 For some time they had continued, when Selene raised her 
 head and tried again to use the brush. Seeing the girl beside 
 her, for whose former assistance she had scarcely shown any 
 gratitude, diligently at work hi Arsinoe's place, she said, in a 
 tone that expressed rather surprise than friendliness: 
 
 '* That is my sister's place. You can keep it to-day, but 
 when the factory opens again she must sit by me. " 
 
 "1 know, I know,'' answered the girl, timidly; " I am only 
 finishing your portion, for I have nothing more to do, and you 
 are suffering." 
 
 Kindness was so strange a thing in Selene's experience that 
 she misunderstood her neighbor, and said, shrugging her 
 shoulders: 
 
 " Serve yourself on our account all you please to-day. I 
 can not do any thing. " 
 
 The deformed girl blushed, and looked at the woman oppo- 
 site hesitatingly, who laid down her own brush, and said, turn- 
 ing to Selene : 
 
 " Maria does not mean it so, dear child. She has under- 
 taken one half of your day's work, and I the other, that you 
 may not fail of the wages through your suffering." 
 
 " Do I look so very poor?" asked the daughter of Keraunus, 
 a flush coming into her pale face. 
 
 "Certainly not, child," answered the woman. "Un- 
 doubtedly you and your sister come from a good house, but 
 please allow us the jDleasure of helping you." 
 
 " I do not understand," stammered Selene. 
 
 " If you were to notice that it hurt me to bend over, and 
 the wind had blown these leaves from the table, would you 
 not gladly have gathered them up for me.^" asked the woman. 
 " AVhat we are doing for you is nothing more or less than 
 that. We shall be through in a few moments, and then can 
 follow the others who have already gone. As your overseer, 
 you know I must remain any way till you all leave the work- 
 room. " 
 
 Selene felt that she ought to be grateful to both these wom- 
 en for their kindness, ancl yet it would seem to her like accept- 
 ing a charity. Therefore she answered, her cheeks agam 
 flushhig: 
 
THE EMPEROR. 147 
 
 *' I am very grateful for your kindness — very grateful — but 
 here every one works for himself, and it would not be proper 
 for me to accept from you what you have earned. " 
 
 She had spoken these words with haughtiness and not frank 
 decision; but they did not disturb the quiet composure of the 
 woman, who was known among the work-people as '' Widow 
 Hannah/' and now, resting her large, friendly eyes on Selene, 
 answered : 
 
 '' We have gladly done the work for you, dear daughter, 
 and a Divine Teacher has taught us it is more blessed to give 
 than to receive. Do you understand the meaning of these 
 words? It certainly makes kind-hearted people much hapj^ier 
 to show themselves useful to others than to receive good gifts. 
 ■You have just said you are grateful to us. Will you then de- 
 stroy our i^leasure?" 
 
 " I do not quite comiDrehend, " answered Selene. 
 
 " Is that so?^" interru23ted Widow Hannah. " Then try for 
 once to show yourself willing to accejjt hearty good-will, and 
 you will learn how good it is, how it expands the breast, and 
 changes trouble into delight. Is it not true, Maria, that we 
 shall thank Selene for the opportunity of using our hands for 
 her?'' 
 
 " I have been glad to do it," answered the hunchback; 
 " and now all is finished, " 
 
 " And mine also," added the widow, pressing the last strip 
 with a cloth, and placing her own share beside that Maria had 
 prepared. 
 
 " I thank you much," murmured Selene, with downcast 
 eyes, and rose from her seat. But trying to step with the in- 
 jured foot caused such pain that with a cry she sunk back 
 again. The widow hastened to her side, and taking the 
 swollen foot with her small and handsome hands, looked at- 
 tentively at it, and exclaimed : 
 
 " Oh, my Saviour! Is it possible that she has come through 
 the streets with such a foot!" and turning to her face, said: 
 " Poor child! you are indeed suffering. How the rim of the 
 sandal presses into the swollen flesh! It is dreadful. Do you 
 live far from here?" 
 
 " I can re»/^i> i^— - ,-,, j-^^lf an hour." 
 
 "Impossiuie; Let ino fii'st learn from my tablets what is 
 due to you, and I will fetch it from the pay-master. Then we 
 will see what can be done for you. Meanwhile, dear daugh- 
 ter, stay where you are; and, Maria, place a stool under her 
 feet, and carefully loosen the straps from her ankle. Do Jt^*^ 
 
148 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 fear, dear child, she has soft hands that are accustomed to 
 
 nursing." 
 
 With these words she rose and kissed the forehead and eyes 
 of the sufferer; but Selene held her fast, and said, with moist 
 eves and a pathetic tremor in her voice, ' ' Hannah, dear Han- 
 nah!" 
 
 As the traveler, on a warm October day, is reminded of the 
 departed summer, so did the presence ancl the kindness of this 
 widow call up in the heart of Selene memories of lier dear lost 
 mother. Something sweet pervaded all the bitterness of her 
 pain. So she nodded thankfully and kept her scat, for it was 
 good to obey once more, and, like a child, feel herself the ob- 
 ject of kindness and care. 
 
 As the widow Avent away, Maria knelt down to loosen the 
 thongs of her sandals, which had become almost buried in the 
 swollen muscles. She did it with great care, but the mere 
 touch of her fingers caused Selene to groan and sink again into 
 a swoon. Maria brought water and bathed her forehead, and 
 cooled the wound, and when she again ojDcned her eyes and saw 
 the widow standing at her side, she asked, with a smile : 
 
 " Have I been asleep?" 
 
 " Your eyes were closed, dear child," was the answer. 
 " Here, I have the wages of twelve days, for yourself and 
 your sister. Do not move; I will put it in your pocket. The 
 l^hysician belonging to the factory will come directly, and he 
 will arrange for the comfort of your feet, and the chief over- 
 seer Avill order a litter to take you home. Where do vou 
 live?" 
 
 '' We?" asked Selene, frightened. "'No, no, I will Avalk 
 home." 
 
 " But, dear child^ you could not even reach the court iniless 
 we should both helj^ you. " 
 
 " Then let me call a sedan upon the street. My father — no 
 one must know — I am not able to tell you." 
 
 The widow motioned to Maria to go out; and after the door 
 was closed, took a seat beside Selene, saying : 
 
 " Xow, my dear girl, we are alone. I am not a babbler, 
 and certainly could not betray your confidence. Tell me with- 
 out agitating yourself where you belong. Do you not believe 
 that I mean well by you?" 
 
 " Yes," answered Selene, looking irp into a face that, in its 
 setting of soft brown hair, bore the stamp of hearty kindness 
 upon every feature. " Yes. You remind me very much of 
 my mother." 
 
 '' J might also be your mother," answered Hannah. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 149 
 
 " I am already nineteen years old." 
 
 " So old?'^ answered Hannah, smiling. " My life has been 
 twice as long as yours. I had one child, a son, who was taken 
 from me while he was very young. He would have been one 
 year older than you are. Have you a mother?" 
 
 " No," answered Selene, with the old bitterness in her 
 tone. "The gods have torn her from us. She would have 
 been like you, not yet forty; and she was beautiful and kind, 
 as you are. She left seven other children besides myself, and 
 one of them is blind. I am the eldest, and do what I can that 
 they may not come to want." 
 
 " God will help you in this good work." 
 
 " The gods!" cried Selene, bitterly. " They let them grow 
 up. I look out for all the rest. Oh, my foot! my foot!" 
 
 " We must think of that now first of all. Have you still a 
 father?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " And you are not willing he should know that you work 
 here?" 
 
 Selene shook her head for answer. 
 
 " Is he poor, but of noble origin?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " I think the physician is coming. Now, then, will you not 
 let me know the name of your father? It will be quite neces- 
 sary in sending you home." 
 
 " I am the daughter of the palace overseer, Keraunus, and 
 our dwelling is on the Lochias,'^ answered Selene, with sud- 
 den decision, but in a whisper that the old man coming in at 
 the door might not hear. " No one, and least of all my fa- 
 ther, must know what we do here." 
 
 The widow nodded quietly, and turned to greet the phys- 
 ician, who now entered with an assistant. Hannah led him to 
 the sick girl, whose forehead she cooled with a wet cloth, and 
 whom she supported on her own arm, kissing her cheek when 
 the pain threatened to overcome her strength again during 
 the examination of the foot and the cutting away of the 
 leather thong, which Maria had attemj^ted in vain to loosen. 
 Groans and sharp cries proved the severity of her pain. 
 
 As at last the foot was free from the bands, and the physician 
 had learned the extent of the injury, he exclaimed to his assist- 
 ant, " Look here, Hippolytes, the girl has come over the streets 
 on this thing! If any one else had told me so, I should have 
 told him to keep the lies to himself. The fibula is broken at 
 the joint, and with this broken limb the child has walked 
 further than I Avould ever trust myself without a litter. 
 
150 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Zounds! girl, if j'ou lire not lamed for life it will be a won- 
 der!" 
 
 Selene listened with closed eyes and in great weariness. 
 With the last words she writhed a little and drew up her lip 
 scornfully. 
 
 *' Do you care nothing for the limping?" asked the phys- 
 ician, whose sharp eyes saw everything. " That is your affair, 
 but it is mine to see that you do not go out of my hands a 
 cripple. Such an opportunity is not offered me every day; 
 and, happily, you have one excellent helper on your side; I 
 mean your fresh, youthful vigor. That hole in the head is 
 hotter than is desirable. Cool it faithfully with fresh water. 
 Where do you live, girl?" 
 
 '' Almost half an hour's distance," said Hannah, in her 
 name. 
 
 " She must not go so far, even in a litter," answered the 
 l^hysician. 
 
 '' I must go home," cried Selene, decidedly, trying to rise. 
 
 " Nonsense!" ejaculated the physician. " I forbid it. Lie 
 still, be patient and obedient, and this bad affair may end 
 happily. The fever has already set in, and it will increase 
 with the evening. That is not caused by the leg, but by the 
 wound in the head. Do you think we could arrange a bed 
 here," he continued, turning to Hannah, " where she might 
 lie still until work begins again hi the factory?" 
 
 " I woidd rather perish!" cried Selene, trying to draw her 
 foot away from the doctor. 
 
 " Only be quiet, dear child," begged the widow, soothingly. 
 *' I know what we can do. My house stands in the garden of 
 Paulina, the widow of Pudens, very near here, on the sea-shore 
 — scarcely a thousand steps away — and she can have a soft bed 
 and good nursing there. A comfortable litter stands ready, 
 and I ought — " 
 
 "That is quite a distance," answered the doctor. "But 
 really nowhere could one be better nursed. So we will try it, 
 and I will go with her to beat the cursed legs of the bearers if 
 they do not kee]) step. " 
 
 (Selene did not oppose this arrangement, and took the sooth- 
 ing drink the doctor had pri'pai-eil, but she shed some tears 
 when placed in the litter, with her foot suj)ported on pillows. 
 She was only half conscious of being borne through the streets, 
 for the voice of the physician exhorting her bearers to be care- 
 ful, and the passing by of people, horses, and vehicles, seemed 
 like the incidents of a dream. She also noticed that they car- 
 ried her through a garden, and was at last dimly conscious of 
 
ISE EMPESOR. 151 
 
 being laid on a bed. Beyond that all was a dream-like vague- 
 ness, but a twitching of the features and quick movement of 
 the hand toward tlie wound upon her head testified that con- 
 sciousness was not wholly obscured. 
 
 Hannah sat beside her bed, and followed strictly the orders 
 of the physician, who did not leave until fully satisfied with all 
 arrangements for Selene's comfort. Maria was near, assisting 
 the widow to moisten the comjiresses and prepare the band- 
 ages of old linen. 
 
 When Selene breathed more quietly, Hannah beckoned to 
 Maria, and asked, in a whisper: 
 
 " Can you stay here until morning? We must assist each 
 other, for there will be many nights of watching. How hot 
 the wound is!" 
 
 " Yes, if I go first to my mother, for she would else be anx- 
 ious.'' 
 
 " Good; and you will perhaps undertake another errand, 
 for I can not leave this j)Oor child at jjresent." 
 
 " Her family will be anxious." 
 
 " I want to have you go to them; but no one besides our- 
 selves must know who she is. Ask for Selene's sister, and tell 
 her what has hai^pened. If you should see the father tell him 
 I will nurse his daughter, for the p)hysician strictly forbade 
 her to go or to be carried home. He must not know that 
 Selene belongs to our work-people, and do not allude to the 
 factory in liis presence. If you find neither Arsinoe nor her 
 father at home, simply say to whoever opens the door that the 
 sick girl is with me, and that I will ghidly nurse her. Of our 
 workshojD, remember, nothing must be said. One thing more : 
 the poor girl certainly would not have gone there to-day un- 
 less the family had been in need of the wages. Give them 
 these drachmas, and say, which is true, that we found them 
 on her person." 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Plutaech, one of the richest citizens of Alexandria, and 
 who owned the papyrus mill in which Selene and Arsinoe were 
 emi^loyed, had oii'ered to provide a " suitable " reception for 
 the wives and daughters of his fellow-citizens in one of the 
 smallest theaters of the city. Whoever knew him, understood 
 that " suitable," according to his ideas, meant something 
 magnificent. 
 
 The daughter of the ship-builder had prepared Arsinoe to 
 see great things, but even at the entrance her expectation* 
 
153 THE EMPEROR, 
 
 were more than realized; for, as her father mentioned his 
 name and her own, one boy handed lier a beautiful bunch of 
 flowers out of a great basket of such; and another, seated on 
 a dolphin, init into her hand, as a card of admission, a tiny 
 plate of carved ivor}^, set m gold, arranged to be worn as a 
 clasp for the pephmi. At each door, all who entered received 
 similar gifts. The passages leading to the auditorium were 
 filled with fragrant perfimie, and Arsinoe, who had been here 
 before, scarcely recognized the place, so riclily was it orna- 
 mented with flowers and drajiery. 
 
 And who had ever seen women and girls seated in the best 
 places, as was the case to-day? Indeed, it was only on very 
 rare occasions that the daughters of citizens were permitted to 
 witness a spectacle. 
 
 Smiling, as to an old acquaintance one has outgrown, she 
 looked up to the highest and cheapest tier of benches in this 
 half-circular space, where alone she had been able to afl'ord a 
 place, and had known the emotions of mirth, fear, sympathy, 
 in spite of the wind that was never at rest up there under the 
 free, overarching sky. In the summer-time it was worse, for 
 then a sail was spread upon the side where the sun shone. 
 This was made of strong cloth, and when it was moved by 
 means of rings by which it hung the creaking Avas painful to 
 the ears, and sometimes one had to turn the head to avoid be- 
 ing struck by the heavy cords, or by the sail itself. 
 
 But Arsinoe recalled it all to-day, only as a butterfly remem- 
 bers the chrysalis case it has broken through and left behind. 
 Glowing with happy excitement, she and her companion were 
 led to their seats. She knew that many eyes followed her, 
 but that only increased her delight, for she Avas conscious of 
 looking well, and enjoyed attention. To-day at least! For 
 those Avho noticed her Avere the first people of the city. There 
 they stood upon the stage, and among them Avas her good 
 friend I'ollux, Avho AA'aved his hand toAvard her. She could not 
 keep her feet still, but crossed her arms, not to shoAv her ex- 
 citement. 
 
 The distribution of parts had already begmi, since, in wait- 
 ing for Selene, they Avere half an hour late. 
 
 As soon as she perceived that the eyes draAvn upon her as 
 she entered were turned hi other directions, she looked about. 
 She was surrounded by women and girls Avho Avere to have a 
 share in the represcjitation, and their place in the building Avas 
 separated from the stage only l^y the orchestra, which they 
 reuched by the help of a fcAV steps, usually devoted to the 
 choir. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 153 
 
 Behind Arsinoe, in wide-reaching circles, sat the fathers, 
 mothers and husbands of those who were to take part in the 
 proceedings; and among these was Keraunus, in his crocus- 
 colored pallium, and a goodly array of mirth-loving matrons 
 and elderly citizens, whom Plutarch had specially invited. 
 Among the girls, Arsinoe saw many whose beauty gave her 
 pleasure, but she had no feeling of envy, and did not think 
 of comparing herself with them. She knew very well that 
 she was j^retty, and had no need to hide herself; and that was 
 enough. There was something intoxicating in the continuous 
 murmur of voices and the fine fragrance rising from the altar 
 in the orchestra. There was nothing to disturb her observa- 
 tions, for her comijaniou had found friends with whom she was 
 chatting and laughing. 
 
 Arsinoe fixed her attention upon the stage, joartly perhaps 
 for the sake of Pollux, who, according to the wish of the Pre- 
 fect Titian us, and in sjDite of the remonstrance of his master 
 Papias, had been placed among the artists arranging the fes- 
 tival. More than once she had seen the afternoon sun shining 
 as brightly in this theater, and the blue heavens arching as 
 cloudlessly above the open space; but how different was the 
 high jolatform behind the orchestra! 
 
 The joillared front was of variegated marble, and the back- 
 ground represented the same gilded joalace as before; but to- 
 day garlands of fresh and fragrant flowers festooned the 
 columns. 
 
 The first artists of the city moved about with tablets and 
 jDencils in their hands among some fifty women and girls; 
 while Plutarch himself and the gentlemen surrounding him 
 rejiresented a stately choir, sometimes standing together, and 
 sometimes separated. 
 
 Upon the right side of the stage were three purple couches. 
 
 0]ie of them was occupied by the Prefect Titianus — who also 
 held tablet and pencil — and liis wife Julia. 
 
 Verus lay extended upon another, crowned, as usual, with 
 roses. The third was arranged for Plutarch. 
 
 The prefect spoke unrestrainedly with all, as if he were the 
 host, and often his remarks were applauded, or created uni- 
 versal laughter. 
 
 The figure of the wealthy Plutarch — which once seen was 
 never to be forgotten — was not new to Arsinoe, for a few days 
 before he had visited the factory in company with an architect 
 to consider how the building should be arranged for tlie re- 
 ception of the emperor. In their work-room he had stopped 
 to pinch the cheeks of Arsinoe with some flattering words. 
 
154 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 And there he waddled upon the stage! He was said to be an 
 old man of almost seventy; was lame, but his limbs were in 
 constant, involuntary motion, and his immensely corpulent 
 body was supported by two stately youths. 
 
 His well-sha]3ed head must have been unusually handsome 
 in younger days. Now he wore a wig of long brown curls; 
 his eyebrows and lashes were colored, his cheeks jjainted with 
 white and rose color, which gave his features the expression of 
 having been stiffened while smiling. He wore a wreath of 
 strange flowers upon liis head that resembled clusters of grapes. 
 
 Full-blown red and white roses peeped from the breast folds 
 of his ample toga, and were held by golden clasps in which 
 precious stones sparkled. The border of liis mantle was thickly 
 set with rosebuds, each one fastened watli an emerald gleam- 
 ing like so many beetles. The youths who sujiported him 
 seemed a joart of his own person. He treated them as if they 
 were crutches, and they appeared to need no directions to 
 know exactly what he wanted, when he Avished to stop, when 
 to move forward. From a distance his face looked like that 
 of a youth, but a nearer view made it seem like a head of 
 plaster with automatic eyes. 
 
 The sophist, Favorinus, declared one would weep over liim, 
 as a corpse moved automatically, if he were not forced to laugh 
 instead; and he himself had been heard to say that he strove 
 by every means to hold on to his faithless youth. 
 
 On account of his liviug crutches the Alexandrians called 
 him the six-legged Adonis. Hearing this nickname, he said : 
 
 " I should rather they would call me the six-handed;" and 
 in truth he was of exceedingly kind heart, very generous and 
 benevolent, cared for his work-jjeople like a father, _ kept his 
 slaves well, made his f reedmen rich, and from time to time 
 spent large sums in providing grain for the people. 
 
 Arsinoe looked compassionately upon the poor old man, 
 who, with all his skill and all his gold, could neither keep or 
 buy back his own lost youth. In tlie meager person who 
 spoke often with Plutarch, Arsinoe recognized the relic dealer, 
 Gabinius, to whom her father had shown the door when he 
 tried to buy the mosaic from their family room. 
 
 The conversation was interrupted, for the distribution of 
 parts in the group representing " Alexander's entrance into 
 Babylon " was complete. About fifty, women and girls were 
 dismissed from the stage, and descended to the orchestra. 
 
 The Exegete, the highest functionary of the city, came for- 
 ward to receive a new hst from the hand of Papias. After 
 
THE EMPEROR. 155 
 
 rapidly glancing over it, he passed it to the herald, who cried 
 in the ears of the assembly: 
 
 " In the name of the high Exegete, I beg the attention of 
 the wives and daughters of the Macedonian and Eoman citi- 
 zens. We now come to a new scene in our representation of 
 the important events in the life of the great Macedonian — 
 'Alexander's marriage with Eoxana/ and I request those 
 chosen to represent it to come forward to the stage.'' 
 
 And in a far-sounding voice he read a long list of names. 
 While thus occupied, every other sound in the great auditorium 
 suddenly ceased. 
 
 Also on the stage all were silent, except when Verus whis- 
 pered a few words to Titianus, or Gabinius sought nervously 
 to impress some long sentence into the ear of Plutarch, who 
 answered him with a nod or movement of the hands. 
 
 Arsinoe listened with repressed breath and loud beating of 
 the heart. But she blushed all over, and stared in embar- 
 rassment at the flowers in her hand, when she heard the words 
 ring clear and distinct from the mouth of the herald: 
 
 "Arsinoe, the second daughter of Keraunus, Macedonian 
 and Eoman citizen. " 
 
 The daughter of Tryphon, who had been called, left her 
 place instantly, but Arsinoe waited modestly until a few 
 matrons rose, whom she followed across the orchestra and up 
 the steps to the platform. 
 
 There the women and girls were placed in two rows, and re- 
 ceived respectful attention. Arsinoe soon perceived that she 
 was looked at more than the other girls, and was conscious 
 that she was a subject of discussion among the managers, and 
 that the eyes of many in the audience were fixed upon her. 
 She began to feel ashamed, as though fingers were pointing 
 her out, and yet it was pleasant, and when she cast her eyes to 
 the ground she was conscious that it was as much to liide her 
 own satisfaction as embarrassment. 
 
 And when the voice of Verus exclaimed: " Charming! 
 charming! A Eoxana who has just stepped out of the pict- 
 ure!" she had an intuitive perception that she herself was the 
 object of his remark. 
 
 Hearing her own name, she ventured to look up, thinking 
 it must be the voice of Pollux who had uttered it; but saw 
 only Plutarch on his living crutches, and the lank Gabinius 
 inspecting the group. • 
 
 As they approached her, and Plutarch with his unequal gait 
 shuffled past, he nudged Gabinius, saying— meanwhile kissing 
 his hand and nodding to Arsinoe: 
 
156 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " I know her I One does not easily forget such faces. Ivory 
 and red coral.'' 
 
 Arsinoe was frightened, and the blood left her cheeks and 
 all joy her heart, when the old man stopped before her and 
 said : 
 
 " See, here is a bud from our factory among the proud lilies 
 and roses. She has come from the workshop to my assembly. 
 But that is no matter. One rejoices in beauty everywhere. I 
 will not ask how you came, and am only glad that you are 
 here. " 
 
 Arsinoe partly covered her face, but he tapped on her white 
 arm with his finger and laughed. Gabinius asked, as they 
 passed on: 
 
 " Did I hear right? Is there one of your work-people among 
 our daughters?" 
 
 " Yes, certainly; one pair of active hands among all these 
 idle ones.'' 
 
 " Then she has pushed herself in, and we must remove 
 her.'' 
 
 " Do not disturb her; she is charming." 
 
 " It is an outrage, here in this assembly." 
 
 " An outrage?" broke in Plutarch; " not at all. One must 
 not be too particular, else how could we receive the child of a 
 mere dealer in antiquities?" and went on good-naturedly: 
 " Your own fine appreciation of beauty must be gratified with 
 this lovely being; or do you fear that she may be chosen for 
 the part of Eoxana instead of your charming daughter? Let 
 us listen to the gentlemen yonder and see what they are do • 
 ing. " 
 
 These words referred to a loud conversation in the immedi- 
 ate vicinity of the prefect and pretor. 
 
 Both these gentlemen, and most of the painters and sculpt- 
 ors, were of opinion that Arsinoe was remarkably adapted to 
 the part of Koxana, and that she was in face and figure much 
 like Action's painting of this gentle daughter of the Bactrian 
 prince, which had been adopted as the model for th(i represen- 
 tation. Ojily Papias and two of his brother sculptors were 
 opposed to this choice, and zealously insisted that Praxilla, the 
 dauglitei- of Gabinius, was the only pei\son in the assembly 
 qualified for the part of Alexander's bride. 
 
 I'he three men stood in close business relation to the father 
 of this slender and certainly handsome young woman. Their 
 zeal became vehement when Gabinius, in the company of 
 Plutarch, came so near as to recognize their voices. 
 
 " And who is the young woman?" asked Papias, turning to- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 157 
 
 ward Arsinoe, as the men came nearer. " There is nothing 
 to be said against her beauty; but her dress is less tlian simple; 
 she wears no ornaments worth speaking of; and I will bet a 
 thousand against one that her parents are not in condition to 
 furnish the outfit essential for a Eoxana on occasion of her 
 marriage to Alexander. An Asiatic should appear in silk, 
 gold and jewels. My friend here would so dress his Praxilla 
 that the brilliance of her costume would have surprised even 
 the great Macedonian; but who is the father of that pretty 
 child to whom the white dress and the blue ribbons in her hair, 
 and the two roses, are all very fitting?'^ 
 
 "Your estimate is correct,' ' said the dealer, with a dry 
 sharpness in his tone; " the girl of whom you were speaking 
 can come no more into question. I do not say this in the in- 
 terest of my daughter, but from a due sense of the fitness of 
 things. One can hardly conceive how the yoimg creature 
 could have had the audacity to push herself in here. Verily, 
 locks and bolts open to a pretty face. She is — and I beg you 
 not to be frightened — only one of the working peojjle from the 
 papyrus mill of our dear host Plutarch." 
 
 " That is not true," broke in Pollux, in contradiction of the 
 statement. 
 
 "Moderate your words, young man," answered the dealer 
 in relics; " I call you to witness, noble Plutarch." 
 
 " Let her be whoever she is," answered the old man, 
 angrily; " she certainly looks like one of my work-people, but 
 if she had come directly from the pasting- table, with such a 
 face and such a figure she is here and everywhere else ex- 
 cellently in place. That is my opinion." 
 
 " Bravo, my handsome friend!" cried Verus, bowing to the 
 old man. " The emperor cares far more for such charming 
 faces as that yonder than for all your old certificates of citizen- 
 shijj and your full purses. " 
 
 "That is so," added the prefect; "and I am wilhng to 
 swear she is a free maiden, and no slave. You appeared for 
 her defense, Pollux. What do you know of her?" 
 
 " That she is the daughter of the palace overseer Keraunus, 
 whom I have known from childhood," answered Pollux, aloud. 
 " He is a Roman citizen, and from an old Macedonian family 
 besides." 
 
 " Perhaps also allied to the kingly race," added Titianus, 
 laughing. 
 
 " I know the man," answered Gabinius, quickly. "He is 
 poor, and an arrogant fool." 
 
 " I should suppose," intcrjjosed Verus, " this were not the 
 
158 THE EMPEKOl!. 
 
 place to discuss tlie character of the parents of these women 
 and ^irls/' 
 
 " But he is poor/^ cried Gabinius, excited. " A few days 
 ago he offered to sell me his miserable rarities; but I could — " 
 
 " ^Ve give you our sympathy in the unsuccessful bargain," 
 broke in Verus again, and this time with exquisite politeness. 
 *' But we will first consider tlie persons, and afterward the 
 costume. The father of this girl is then a Roman citizen?" 
 
 " A member of the council, and, in his own way, a man of 
 prominence, " said Titianus. 
 
 " And I," added liis wife Julia, " am pleased with the ap- 
 pearance of this young lady, and if she be chosen, and her 
 father is poor, as you assert, my friend, I will undertake the 
 charge of her costume. The emperor will be charmed with 
 this Roxana. " 
 
 The advocates of Gabinius were silent, while he himself 
 trembled with rage and disappointment; but liis fury reached 
 its height when Plutarch, whose influence he had expected to 
 win for his daughter, bowed his corpulent body before Julia, 
 and with a pretty gesture of expostulation, said : 
 
 " This time my old eyes have deceived me. The child cer- 
 tainly looked like one of my work-people — very much; but 
 now I see there is a certain something in this face not found in 
 the other. I have done her wrong, and am her debtor. Will 
 you allow me, noble Julia, to add the ornaments to the cos- 
 tume of our Roxana? I may be fortunate in finding some- 
 thing pretty. I am going directly to beg her pardon, and ex- 
 press to her our wish. AVill you permit it, noble lady? Do 
 you authorize me, gentlemen?" 
 
 A few moments later it was known over the whole stage, 
 and throughout the audience that Arsinoe, daughter of 
 Keraunus, had been chosen to represent Roxana. 
 
 " Who was Keraunus?" 
 
 '' How dared they give the j^rominent part to any except a 
 child of the richest and best known families?" 
 
 " One might expect it, when such liberties are allowed the 
 artist population." 
 
 " Where will the poor thing find the talents to purchase the 
 costume fit for an Asiatic princess, the bride of Alexander?" 
 
 " The rich Plutarch and the wife of the prefect mil take 
 care of tliat. " 
 
 " ]?eggars!" 
 
 " Our daughters could have worn family jewels!' 
 
 " Are we only going to display pretty masks before the em- 
 peror, and iu>t our best jjossessions?" 
 
THE EMPEROR. ' 159 
 
 " Suppose Hadrian inquires about this Roxana, and some 
 one sliould tell him that a collection was taken up to buy her 
 costume?" 
 
 " Such things can only be done in Alexandria/' 
 
 *' People will find out if she has worked in Plutarch's fac- 
 tory. That may not be true, but the old painted good-for- 
 nothing is fond of pretty faces. He has blackened hers here! 
 Believe me, where you see smoke there is fire, and, without 
 doubt, she is in the pay of the old man." 
 
 " For what?" 
 
 " If you wish to know you must ask one of the priests of 
 Aphrodite. It is not a thing to be laughed at, for it is scan- 
 dalous, outrageous!" 
 
 Such were the comments with which the news of Arsinoe's 
 choice to the part of Roxana were received; and bitter resent- 
 ment was roused in the souls of Gabinius and his daughter. 
 
 Praxilla had been ajjijointed to the part of playmate of the 
 bride of Alexander, and accepted it without objection; but on 
 their way, she nodded silently in answer to her father's word: 
 " Let things go as they please now. A few hours before the 
 beginning of the play I shall report that you are sick." 
 
 But the choice of Arsinoe had also given joy. Keraunus 
 sat in one of the middle tiers of seats, with his legs spread wide 
 ajjart, his face in a glow, panting and wheezing in the excess 
 of liis delight, and too joroud even to draw back his feet, when 
 the brother of the archidikastes tried to jiass by him, although 
 he occupied two full places. 
 
 Arsinoe, whose quick ear had caught the accusation of 
 Gabinius, and the denial of it by Pollux, was, at first, ready to 
 sink under shame and anxiety; but now she felt herself wafted 
 as on the wiugs of fortune. She had never been so happy, 
 and when with her father she entered the first dark street, she 
 fell upon his neck, she kissed him on both cheeks, and told 
 him how gracious Julia, the wife of Titianus, had been, and 
 with what friendliness she had undertaken to provide her costly 
 costume. Keraunus did not object, and, strange to say, found 
 it quite consistent with his own dignity to allow Plutarch to 
 provide her with jewelry. " They saw," he said, pathetically, 
 " that we did not hesitate to do as much as the other citizens, 
 but it needs millions to provide a suitable costume for the 
 marriage of Roxana, and I am frank to confess I can not 
 furnish that. Whence it comes is all the same to me; and I 
 know you are to be first among the best of the city. I am 
 quite satisfied, my dear child. To-morrow there will be an- 
 other gathering, and perhaps Selene may also receive a promi- 
 
ICO THE EMPEROR. 
 
 nent 2)art. Fortunately, wo have enough to provide her cos- 
 tume. "When does the wife of the prefect receive you?" 
 
 " To-morrow, about noon." 
 
 *' Then to-morrow early we must buy you a good new 
 goAvn. " 
 
 '' Will there not also be enough for a better bracelet? This 
 is so small and poor," asked Arsinoe, coaxingly. 
 
 " You shall have one, for you deserve it," answered Kerau- 
 nus, with dignity. " But you must wait patiently another 
 day — the gold-workers sell notliing to-morrow on account of 
 the feast. ■" 
 
 Arsinoe had never known her father more cheerful or social, 
 and yet the way from the theater to the Lochias was long, and 
 it was already past the time when he was accustomed to sleej^. 
 The gathering in the theater had occuj)ied a long time, for 
 after Arsinoe had left the stage, lights were brought and three 
 more scenes were arranged, and after that the guests of 
 Plutarch were invited to jDartake of wine, fruit, syrup, sweet 
 cakes, oyster patties, and other dainties. The overseer had 
 eaten freely of the attractive dishes, but as there had not been 
 time for his usual greediness, he left in a better humor than 
 was usual after a feast. Toward the end of their walk he be- 
 came thoughtful, and said: 
 
 " To-morrow the council meet to make the final arrange- 
 ments for the festivities. Everybody will congratulate me, 
 look at me, ask my opinion, and the gilding of my fillet is 
 worn off, so that in some j^laces the silver has come into sight. 
 Your costume is provided for, and it seems to me necessary 
 that I go to a jeweler and exchange this unworthy article for 
 genuine gokl. What a man is, that he ought to appear. " 
 
 This sentiment j^leased him; and when Arsinoe begged him, 
 as they were passing through the gate, only to save enough for 
 Selene's costume, he rniiled, and said: 
 
 "We hardly need to be anxious any more. I ought to 
 know these Alexandrians, and I think they Avill now be trying 
 to Avin my Roxana for a wife. The only son of the rich Plu- 
 tarch is still unmarried. He is not very young, but is a tine 
 man, and has already a seat in tlie council." 
 
 The dreams of this happy fatlier were interrupted by Mother 
 Doris, who, as they passed the gate-house, called his name. 
 
 Keraunus stopped, but Mhcn Doris said: "I must sj^eak 
 with you," he answered: 
 
 " But I will not liear you to-day or any other time. " 
 
 ^Tor my own pleasure," said Doris, ''I certainly should 
 
THE EMPEROE. 161 
 
 not address you^ and only wish to tell you that Selene is not 
 at home.-" 
 
 "■ What did you say?" asked Keraunus. 
 
 " The poor cliild, with her maimed foot, became unable to 
 walk, and was taken into the house of a stranger, where she is 
 now cared for.'^ 
 
 " Selene!" cried Arsinoe, falling suddenly from her heaven 
 of joy into fright and distress. " Do you know where she is?" 
 
 Before Doris could answer, Keraunus blurted out: 
 
 " It is all the fault of that Roman architect and his savage 
 beast. All right! It is well, for uow the emperor will cei- 
 taiuly support my claim. He will put out of the way one who 
 has injured the sister of Roxana, and prevented her appearance 
 at the festive parade. But it is well, it is excellent!" 
 
 " That is sad enough to make one weep," answered the 
 gatc-keejDer's wife. " Is that all your gratitude for her care of 
 the little children? How is it possible for a father to speak 
 thus, whose best child is lying with a broken leg, in the house 
 of a stranger?" 
 
 " With a broken leg?" cried Arsinoe, piteously. 
 
 *' Is it broken!" asked Keraunus, slowly, and really anxious. 
 " Where can I find her?" 
 
 " She is with one Hannah, who has a Kttle house within the 
 garden of the widow of Pudens." 
 
 " Why did they not bring her here?" 
 
 " Because the physician forbade it. She has a fever, but 
 will be well nursed. Hannah belongs to the Christians. I can 
 not endure these people, but they do understand nursing bet- 
 ter than all others. ' ' 
 
 "'With the Christians! My child with the Christians!" 
 cried Keraunus, beside herself. " Quick, Arsinoe, come with 
 me directly. Selene shall not remain one moment longer than 
 is absolutely necessary among the cursed rabble. Everlasting 
 gods! To think such disgrace should be added to all my other 
 misfortunes!" 
 
 "It is not so bad as that," said Doris, good humoredly. 
 " There ai'e excellent people among the Christians — certainly 
 they are honest, for the poor hunchbacked thing who brought 
 the news gave me this money which Hannah found in Selene's 
 pocket. " 
 
 Keranus put out his hand for the poor wages of his daughter 
 as scornfully as if accustomed to gold and caring nothing for 
 miserable silver; but at sight of the drachmas, Arsinoe began 
 to weep, because she knew that for the sake of this petty suiji 
 
 6 
 
162 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Selene had left her home, and she felt intuitively what pain 
 she must have suffered on the way. 
 
 '"' A mere pretense of honor!" cried Keraunus, as he fastened 
 his purse. " I have heard of the shameful doings in the re- 
 ligious meetings of this set. Exchanging kisses with slaves is 
 not exactly the thing for my daughter. Come, Arsinoe, we 
 will find a litter immediately.^' 
 
 " No, no!" exclaimed Doris. " At first you must leave her 
 in peace. This is a hard thing to say to a father, but the 
 physician declared it might cost her life if she were not quiet. 
 With the inflamed wound on her head, the fever, and a broken 
 leg, she is not likely to attend their meetings. The poor, dear 
 child!" 
 
 Keraunus brooded silently, but Arsinoe said: 
 
 " I must go to her, I must see her, Doris!" 
 
 " That I would not think of preventing, my darling," said 
 the old woman. " I went myself to the Christian's house, but 
 they would not allow me to see her. AVith you it is different, 
 for you are a sister." 
 
 " Come, father," begged Arsinoe, " we will first look after 
 the children, and then you will accompany me to Selene. Oh, 
 why did I not go with her this morning? Alas, if she should 
 die!" 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Keraunus and Arsinoe went very carefully toward their 
 dwelling, for fear of an encounter with the Molossian, which, 
 however, was to-night in the sleeping apartment of Antinous. 
 They found the old slave woman in great excitement, for she 
 loved Selene, and was also anxious about the other children, 
 who did not seem well. Arsinoe went immediately to their 
 sleeping-room, but the old woman related to her master, while 
 he was exchanging his crocus-colored pallium and his sandals 
 for other articles of a poorer sort, that the darling of his 
 heart, the little Helios, was very sick, and that she had given 
 him some of the medicine Keraunus liimself was in the habit 
 of using. 
 
 " Idiotic animal," cried Keraunus, " to give ray medicine 
 to the child! If you were not so old I would have you 
 scourged." 
 
 " But you said the drops were good," stammered the slave. 
 
 *' Yes, for me," cried Keraunus, hastening, without stop- 
 ping to fasten his sandal straps, into the childreii's room. 
 There sat his blind favorite, his ''heir," as he loved to call 
 
THE EMtEEOR. 163 
 
 liim, nestling his pretty head against Arsiuoe^s breast. The 
 child knew his father's step, and moaned : 
 
 "' Selene was away, I was frightened, and I feel so bad, so 
 bad/' 
 
 Keraunus laid his hand on the boy's head. Finding it very 
 hot he strode restlessly up and down before the tiny bed, say- 
 ing : 
 
 *' So it goes. If one misfortune comes another is sure to 
 follow. Look at him, Arsinoe. Do you remember how the 
 fever began with poor Berenice? Nausea, restlessness, and a 
 hot head. Is your throat sore, my child?" 
 
 '■ No, but I feel so bad," answered Helios. 
 
 Keraunus pulled open his little shirt to see if there were any 
 spots on the breast, but Arsinoe said, as she bent over: 
 
 " 1 think it is only a fit of indigestion. The stupid old slave 
 gives him everything he asks for, and he has eaten half the 
 raisin-cakes we bade her bring home as we were going out." 
 
 " But his head is very hot," answered Keraimus. 
 
 " It will be all right in the morning. Poor Selene needs us 
 more than he does. Come, father, the old woman can stay 
 with him." 
 
 " Selene ought to come," whined the child. " Please, 
 please, do not leave me alone again." 
 
 "Father will stay with you," .said Keraunus, tenderly, for 
 the appeal moved his heart. " None of you realize what we 
 possess in this child." 
 
 " He will soon be asleep," persisted Arsinoe. " Let us go 
 at once, else it will be too late. " 
 
 " And leave the old woman to commit another act of 
 stupidity? It is my duty to stay with this child. You can 
 go to yo\ir sister, and take the old slave for company." 
 
 " Very well. I will return early in the morning." 
 
 " In the morning!" exclaimed Keraunus. " No, no, that 
 will not do. Doris says Selene will be well nursed among the 
 Christians. You can see how she is, carry my best wishes, 
 and then come back. " 
 
 " But, father—" 
 
 " Besides, you must not forget that the wife of the prefet3t 
 expects you to-morrow, to choose the stuff for your costume. 
 On that account you must not look tired or lose your sleep. " 
 
 " I can rest some in the morning." 
 
 " 111 the morning! Think of my curls! and your new gown! 
 and the poor Helios! The festivities begin early to-morrow, 
 and you know how it always is then. The old slave would bo 
 
164 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 of no use in tho crowd. You can only see how she is, and 5'OU 
 must not stay. " 
 
 " I will see—" 
 
 "Not a word of 'seeing/ Come back directly! I com- 
 mand it. Within two hours you must be in your bed. " 
 
 Arsinoe sln-ugged her shoulders, and a few minutes later 
 stood with the slave before the gate-keci^er's house. A broad 
 stream of light fell through the open door of the room so 
 cheerful with birds and flowers. She saw that both Euphorion 
 and Doris were there, and so the gate could be opened without 
 delay. The Graces barked, but recognized an old friend, 
 and did not leave their cushions. For many years iVrsinoe, in 
 obedience to her father's strict command, had not entered this 
 home-like retreat, and her heart beat more warmly as she 
 looked again on what had been so pleasant in her childhood 
 and never forgotten. There were the birds, the Httle dogs, 
 the lute hanging on the wall near the Apollo. And on the 
 table, as of old, a golden brown cake stood close beside the 
 wine jar. How often had she step23ed in there for some dainty 
 bit, or to find Pollux, whose clever inventions and ready in- 
 terest gave a fresh charm to all work and all play. And there 
 he sat at this moment, with liis long legs stretched out, telling 
 the story of her choice to the part of Eoxana, and applying 
 such adjectives to her name as made the blood rush to her 
 cheeks, for she was sure he had no suspicion that she was 
 listening. The boy had become a stately man, and a famous 
 sculptor — but still lie was the same good-natured and kind- 
 hearted Pollux. The bold leap with which he sprimg from 
 his seat toward her, the fresh laugh interrupting her words, 
 the tender, child-like caresses bestowed upon his mother, and 
 the hearty tone of his sympathy in the misfortunes of Selene — 
 all this so roused the dear old long-absent emotions \vithin her 
 that she clasped joyfully the great hands held out toward her, 
 and if in that moment he had. pressed her to liis heart, it would 
 have seemed only natural. 
 
 Arsinoe had gone into the house of Doris with a heavy 
 weight on her spirits, but something in this atmosphere so 
 softened and dispelled it that instead of the tormenting dread of 
 impending danger, she thought of her sister only as detained 
 by a lame foot, upon a comfortable bed. In place of anxiety 
 came tender and hearty sympathy, a7id her voice was almost 
 cheerful as she asked Euphorion to open the gate. Doris had 
 quieted her with the assurance that Selene would be carefully 
 nursed in the house of Hainiah — but thinking her wish to see 
 her sister only natural, had heartily seconded the offer of 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 165 
 
 Pollux to go with her, knowing as they did that the streets 
 would be filled with a noisy and wanton crowd soon after mid- 
 night, and that a bat would be as effectual in protecting 
 Arsinoe from the drunken slaves they were sure to meet, as 
 this old black scare-crow, who was only a wreck-before she had 
 come into tlie possession of Kcraunus. 
 
 They walked in silence side by side through the dimly lighted 
 streets, meetiug more people the further they went. At length 
 Pollux said: 
 
 " Lay your arm within mine, that you may feel more sure 
 of my protection, and that I may better realize that I have 
 found you again, and am permitted to be near you, you 
 wonderful creature/' 
 
 These words were not spoken in jest, but hearty earnest, 
 and the deep voice of the young sculptor trembled with excite- 
 ment, and his tone ex]3ressed sincere tenderness. To the 
 young maiden they were as the finger of love knocking upon 
 her heart, and without hesitation she laid her arm within his, 
 saying: 
 
 " 1 am sure you will protect me." 
 
 " Yes," he said, taking her little hand into his own. 
 
 She did not withdraw it, and after they had walked in 
 silence a few moments, he asked: 
 
 " Do you know how I feel?" 
 
 " How is it?" 
 
 " I can not quite express it, but I think as a victor in the 
 Olympian games, or one on whom the emjieror had bestowed 
 the purple. But wreath and robe are beggarly in comparison. 
 I have you hanging on my arm, and I hold your hand. If the 
 people were not all about, I — I might — I don't know what I 
 might do." 
 
 She looked into his face, and he raised her hand to his lips, 
 pressing it long and fervently. Then he released it, saying 
 with a deep sigh : 
 
 " Oh, Arsinoe, beautiful Arsinoe, how I love you!" 
 
 And she only drew his arm closer, laid her head on his 
 shoulder, and whisjoered: 
 
 " Oh, Pollux, I am so happy, and the world is so fair!" 
 
 " But I could hate it," returned Pollux. " To have an old 
 body close by, who hears and sees everything — and to be forced 
 to walk in this crowded street is quite unendurable. I can not 
 bear it much longer. Girl of girls, here it is dark." 
 
 Yes, for the moment they walked in the shadow of a few 
 large houses, though their hearts were in clear sunshine, 
 Pollux flung his arms about her in a quick embrace, pressing 
 
166 THE EMPEKOR. 
 
 the first kiss upon those pure lips. Arsinoe had clasped his 
 neck, and would have stayed there until the end of the day, 
 had not a train of noisy slaves approached, who were already 
 anticipating the feast day which would for a short space of 
 time release them from duty. Pollux well knew how un- 
 licensed they became in their mirth, and begged Arsinoe to 
 cling as closely as possible to the houses. 
 
 " How jolly they are!" exclaimed he, " for the best day of 
 their year is beginning; for us it is the opening of the fairest 
 in life. " 
 
 " Yes,'* answered Arsinoe, clinging closer to his arm. Then 
 they both laughed merrily, for Pollus had bid her notice that 
 their old slave had passed on, attaching herself to another 
 couple. 
 
 " I will call her," said Arsinoe. 
 
 " No, no," said Pollux; " let her be. That pair probably 
 need her protection more than we do. " 
 
 " How is it possible that she can mistake that little man for 
 you?" asked the girl, laughing. 
 
 " Were I only a little smaller!" answered Pollux, with a 
 sigh. " But only think what an excess of burning love and 
 longing such a long vessel can contain!" 
 
 She struck him playfully on the arm, and he touched his 
 lips to her forehead. She said reprovingly: 
 
 " Don't forget the people," and he returned: 
 
 " It is no misfortune to be envied. " 
 
 This was the end of the street, and they found themselves 
 before a garden which belonged to the "svidow of Pudens. 
 Pollux recognized it, for Paulina was a sister of Pontius, the 
 chief architect, and had also a fine house in the city. Was it 
 possible that they could hav5 reached the spot so soon, unless 
 Drought thither by invisible hands? 
 
 The gate of the inclosure was locked, but Pollux waked the 
 porter, who, on learning their names, said he had been in- 
 structed to admit any friends of the sick girl inside, and he 
 guided them to a point whence they could see a lighted window 
 in the sick-room. A crescent moon lighted the path strewn 
 with mussel shells, the trees and bushes threw shai'p shadows 
 upon the grassy sward, the waves sparkled in the soft beams. 
 As they passed under a shaded arbor, Pollux, opening wide 
 his arms, said: 
 
 *' Now, one more kiss, as a memento duiing your absence." 
 
 " Not now, " begged the maiden. "I can not be merry 
 any more for thinking of my poor Selene." 
 
 " 'J'here's nothing to say agauist that," replied Pollux, with 
 
THE EMPEROR. 167 
 
 resignation. " But when the waiting is over I shall claim my 
 reward. '^ 
 
 " That you can have now/' cried Arsinoe, throwing herself 
 upon his breast, and then hastened to the house. He followed, 
 and together they stopped before a lighted window on the 
 ground-floor, which looked into a high spacious room, with a 
 door opening into the uncovered space common in all houses. 
 The walls were of a light green tint, and the only pictured 
 decoration was above the door. 
 
 Selene was lying upon a bed in the back part of the room, 
 and near her sat the hunchbacked girl asleep. Hannah was 
 laying a wet cloth upon her forehead. 
 
 Pollux whispered:- 
 
 " There lies your sister, like the sleeping Ariadne, forsaken 
 of Dionysius. Alas, what grief awaits her awakening!" 
 
 " She does not seem to me as j)ale as usual. "" 
 
 " Look at the curve of her arm, and how graceful the 
 position of her head.'' 
 
 " Go now," whispered Arsinoe; " you should not listen." 
 
 " Yes, directly. If it were you lying there no god could 
 move me from the place." 
 
 " How carefully Hannah removes the bandage from the 
 poor sick ankle! No eye could be more tenderly treated than 
 this matron cares for Selene's foot." 
 
 " Step back, she is looking this way.'* 
 
 " A wonderful face; perhaps a Penelope; but her eye has 
 something peculiar. If I were again to represent Urania 
 gazing at" the stars, or a Sappho in her poetic frenzy, I would 
 like that face before me. It makes me think of a sky from 
 which the wind has driven all the clouds." 
 
 " Eeally, you must go," said Arsinoe, drawing back her 
 hand, which he instantly seized again. He noticed that she 
 was annoyed by hearing him praise another woman, and said, 
 good-naturedly, throwing his arm around her: "Be quiet, 
 child; there is not your equal in all Alexandria, or so far as 
 the Greek language is spoken. A perfectly clear sky is cer- 
 tainly not the most beautiful to me — mere light, mere blue, is 
 not enough for an artist. A few moving clouds, tinged by 
 golden and silver beams, give the firmament its truest charm, 
 and if I liken your face to the sky it would not be found want- 
 ing in those lovely varieties. This matron — ' ' 
 
 " See now," broke in Arsinoe, who had again nestled c-osely 
 to his side, " how tenderly Hannah bends over Selene and 
 her on the forehead. A mother could not be more 
 
168 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 gentle. I have known her a long time. She is so good that I 
 can hardly believe she is a Christian.'' 
 
 " The cross above the door yonder is the sign by which 
 these strange people recognize each other. " 
 
 " What is the meaning of the dove, and the fish, and the 
 anchor, which surround it?" 
 
 " Symbols of the Christian mysteries/' answered Pollux. 
 "1 do not understand them. The things are wretchedly 
 painted; the followers of the crucified God despise all the arts, 
 especially mine, and they hate all images of the gods. " 
 
 " And yet there are such good people among these blas- 
 phemers. I will go in immediately. Hannah is preparing 
 another compress." 
 
 " And how serene and friendly she looks! But there is 
 something in that great bare room foreign and imattractive. 
 I should not like to live there. " 
 
 *' Have you noticed the odor of lavender which comes 
 through the window?" 
 
 " Yes, for some time. Your sister is moving and opening 
 her eyes. Now they close again."' 
 
 " Go back into the garden and wait for me. I only want 
 to see how Selene is, and shall not stay long, for father wishes 
 me to come back soon, and no one can take better care of her 
 than Hannah." 
 
 The girl drew her hand out of that of her friend, and 
 knocked on the door. It was instantly opened, and the widow 
 led Arsinoe to the bed of her sister. Pollux at first sat down 
 upon a garden bench, but the joy within his heart made him 
 sjiring up and stride back and forth along the path he had 
 walked with Arsinoe. A stone table impeded his i^i'ogress, 
 and he leaped over it again and again. He was once more the 
 meriy boy, the lucky child. But while waiting he became 
 quieter and more serious. He said thankfully to himself that 
 he had now found the womanly image of which he had dreamed 
 in his best hours, and that it belonged to him alone. But who 
 was he? a poor rascal, with many mouths to feed. That must 
 be changed. He woukl not desert his sister, but he must 
 break with Papias and stand on his own feet. His courage 
 was high, and before Arsinoe returned he had resolved to open 
 a worjcshop of his own, with the bust of Balbilla, and then 
 model one of his beloved. These two heads could not fail of 
 Ijding ajipreciated. 
 
 Tlie emjieror would see them, and he already fancied him- 
 self refusing a crowd of applications, choosing only the most 
 desirable among them all. 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 169 
 
 Arsinoe was going home much relieved. Selene was not so 
 badly off as she had feared — she needed no one but Hannah to 
 nurse her — and though she had some fever, yet how could one 
 be very sick who asked after all the little affairs of the house- 
 keeping, and gave so many directions for the comfort of the 
 children? 
 
 So thought Arsinoe, as she walked back through the garden, 
 leaning on tlie arm of Pollux. 
 
 " It must do her good to know that her sister is to be 
 Eoxana,^' said Pollux; but his pretty companion shook her 
 head, replying: 
 
 " She is always so peculiar, and never cares about the things 
 which please me most. " 
 
 " Selene represents the moon, and you the sun/' 
 
 " And who are you?" 
 
 " I am the tall Pollux, and to-day it seems to me I can be 
 even greater." 
 
 " If you succeed I must grow with you.'* 
 
 " That will be your right, for it is only through you I can 
 hope to succeed." 
 
 " What can such an unskillful body do to help an artist?" 
 
 " By living and loving me,'' he cried, clasping her in his 
 arms. 
 
 Beside the garden gate sat the old slave asleep on a curb- 
 stone. She had learned from the porter that her young mis- 
 tress was within, but had not been allowed to enter. Arsinoe 
 did not waken her, and asked Pollux, with a roguish laugh: 
 
 " Do you think we can find the way by ourselves?" 
 
 " If Eros does not lead us astray,^' answered Pollux. And 
 they went on, jesting and exchanging tender words. 
 
 The nearer they came to the Lochias and the broad business 
 streets which cut the Canopus at right angles, the fuller be- 
 came the stream of people. But this was favorable to privacy; 
 for whoever wished to be unobserved had only to mix with 
 the throng. Carried onward toward the central point of the 
 festivities, Pollux and Arsinoe held each other in close em- 
 brace, that they might not be separated by the eager crowd of 
 Thracian women, who, faithful to their national traditions, 
 were going together to sacrifice a heifer on this night follow- 
 ing the shortest day of the year. 
 
 Scarcely one hundred steps from the Moon Street the eoimd 
 of wild, fantastic songs, accompanied by drums and flutes, the 
 ringing of bells, and loud chants, smote u])on their ears; and 
 just at the beginning of the Lochias, where the King Street 
 crosses the Bruchiom, there poured forth a merry crowd. 
 
170 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Foremost among man}' whom he knew was Teuker, a cutter 
 of gems, and 3'onngcr brotlier of the happy Pollux. Crowned 
 with ivy, and bearing a Thyrsus staff, he came forward danc- 
 ing, and behind him followed a crowd of men and women, 
 shouting and singing in frenzied excitement. Vijie, ivy, and 
 asphodel fluttered over a hundred heads; pojipy, lotus and 
 laurel wreaths trembled above heated brows; skins of panthei-, 
 deer, and stag hung loosely over naked shoulders, to be flung 
 into the air by the wind and the motions of their wearers. 
 Artists and rich young lords returning with their mistresses 
 from a feast led the procession with a band of music. And 
 whoever chanced to meet this jovial comi^any was at once 
 swept into their train. Eespectable citizens with their wives, 
 laborers, girls, slaves, soldiers, sailors, military officers, flute- 
 players, trades-jDeople, ship)-captains, a Avhole theater-choir, 
 whom a lover of their art had been entertaining as guests, a 
 company of excited M'omen tugging a he-goat to sacrifice — not 
 one of them all resisted the imj^ulse to follow the train. 
 Turning into the Moon Street they kept in the broad space 
 shaded by elm-trees and bounded on each side by a footpath, 
 not used at this time of the night. Shrilly sounded the double 
 flutes; vigorously were the calf -skin drum-heads beaten by 
 girlish hands; merrily played the wind with the loosened hair 
 of the women and the flame of the torches, and loud the 
 shouts of the wanton fellows, dressed to represent Pan and the 
 Satyrs. 
 
 Here, a girl was playing on a tambourine which she held 
 high in the air, as she ran shaking the shells on its rim as if 
 she meant to loosen the metallic balls and send them on their 
 own way through the air; there, a handsome young fellow, 
 excited to the very verge of madness, sprung in graceful 
 leaps, bearing the long tail of the heifer which had been 
 fastened to his person, with comical carefulness, over his arm, 
 and blowing lustily through the succession of reeds in his Pan- 
 pipe. Sometimes a bellowing roar came from the midst of 
 the throng that suggested jjain rather than pleasure. But it 
 was quickly followed by unrestrained laughter, wild song and 
 merry music. Old and yoimg, high and low, who came near 
 to this procession were by an irresistible impulse constrained 
 to follow it, with some noisy demonstration. Even Pollux 
 and Arsinoe found their feet involuntarily keej)hig time to the 
 music. 
 
 *' How merry it is!" cried Pollux; " I am wild with a desire 
 to dance with you. " 
 
 Jiefore she hiKl time to answer either " yes " or '*' uo, " he ut- 
 
THE EMPEKOK. 171 
 
 tered loud the ejaculation, " lo, lo, Dionysius/' and swung her 
 high into the air. She was seized by the same impulse, and 
 flinging her hands ujaward. Joined in his shout, and permitted 
 him to take her to a corner of the street where sat a woman 
 selling wreaths. There Pollux crowned her with vine leaves, 
 and she put a wreath of laurel on his head, wound ivy about 
 his neck and breast, and laughed aloud when he threw a piece 
 of silver into the lap of the woman, she meanwhile clinging 
 fast to his arm. All was done without reflection, as in a fit of 
 intoxication, in haste and with trembling fingers. They were 
 near the end of the train. As a group of six girls, crowned 
 with wreaths and arms twined together, passed, Pollux drew 
 Arsinoe in behind them, and with their arms joined, they 
 danced rapidly forward, swinging their free arms, throwing 
 back their heads with song and shout, and, forgetting all 
 around, they believed themselves girdled by siuibeams and 
 lifted by some god far upward among the stars, and into the 
 high ethereal spaces. 
 
 And so they went through the Moon Street to the Canopic 
 way, and back again to the Temple of Dionysius by the sea. 
 
 There they stopped quite out of breath, and suddenly re- 
 membered that he was Pollux, and she was Arsinoe, who must 
 return to her father and to the little brothers and sisters. 
 
 " Come home,"' she whispered, dropping her arms, and be- 
 ginning with shame to gather up her loosened hair. 
 
 " Yes, yes," answered Pollux, as in a dream. Then, 
 loosenmg her from his clasp, he beat upon his forehead, and 
 cried, turning to the open cella of the temple: 
 
 " That thou art mighty, Dionysius, that thou art beautiful. 
 Aphrodite, that thou art charming, Eros, have I long known; 
 but to-day do I learn for the first time how immeasurable are 
 thy gifts. '^ 
 
 "We have been entirely filled by the god," said Arsinoe; 
 " and it was wonderful; but another train is coming, and I 
 must go home.'' 
 
 " Then we will pass through the narrow street by the har- 
 bor," replied Pollux. 
 
 " Yes. I must pick the leaves out of my hair, and no one 
 can see us yonder." 
 
 " I will help you — " 
 
 " No, you must not touch me," said Arsinoe, with decision. 
 
 Then she gathered ujj her soft, shining tresses, shaking out 
 the leaves which were hidden there like beetles in the many- 
 leaved shrubs. Then she covered it with her veil, which had 
 
172 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 fortunately climg to the clasp of her peplum. Pollux looked 
 on, and cried: 
 
 " P^verlastiug gods, how I love you! My heart has been a 
 
 {■)la}'ful eliild, but to-day it seems changed into something 
 icroic. Only wait a little — it soon will use weapons!" 
 
 '' And I shall battle with it," said she, joyfully, laying 
 again her arm within his own, and they went on, more danc- 
 ing than walking, to the palace. 
 
 The cold gray light of the December sun had already tinted 
 the horizon when they reached the gate, already opened for 
 the entrance of the workmen. They kej^t on to the Hall of 
 the Muses, and as they were taking leave of each other at the 
 entrance of the passage leading to the overseer's house, the 
 glimmer of a lamp startled them asunder. Arsiuoe quickly 
 disappeared. Antinous came forward. He was waiting there 
 for the emperor, who was still in the watch-tower Pontius had 
 arranged for liis use, and had recognized PoIIujj: and Arsinoe. 
 Turning to Pollux, he said, pleasantly: 
 
 " I beg your pardon if I have disturbed an interview with 
 your mistress. " 
 
 ^' She is my bride," said Pollux, proudly. 
 
 " So much the better," said Antinous, with a sigh of ap- 
 parent relief in his tone. " So much the better. Can you 
 tell me of the sister of this beautiful Arsinoe?" 
 
 " Certainly," answered Pollux, and was gratified when 
 Antinous clung to his arm. 
 
 Withm the next hour he had comj^letely won the heart of 
 the emperor's favorite by the cheerful and inspiring words that 
 poured in full stream from his lips. 
 
 The girl found her father and her brother Helios, who had 
 no more the ai^pearance of sickness, fast asleep. The old slave 
 arrived within a few moments, and as Arsinoe at last threw 
 herself upon her bed, she slcjot immediately, and in her dream 
 was again at the side of Pollux, and together they were flying 
 like leaves driven before the wind, high above the dusty earth, 
 to the sound of trumpet and flute and shell. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 It was after sunrise when Keraunus woke. He had slept as 
 soundly in his arm-chair as he would have done in his bed, but 
 did not feel so much refreshed. 
 
 In the common room he found everything as it had been 
 left on the previous evening, and that vexed him, for he was 
 accustomed to find this ai)artment in complete order. Upon 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 173 
 
 the table stood the remains of the children's evening meal 
 swarming with flies, and among the dishes and bread-crusts 
 glittered the ornaments which he and Arsinoe had hastily laid 
 down. Wherever he looked were garments out of place, and 
 various other things which did not belong there. 
 
 The old slave woman came in yawning — her gray wool in 
 disorder, her eyes bleared, and her step unsteady. 
 
 " You are drunk,^' cried Keraunus, and this was certainly 
 true, for when she woke from her nap on the curbstone, and 
 learned, through the gate-keeper, that Arsinoe had left the 
 garden, she had been enticed by other slaves into a wine-shoj). 
 
 When her master seized her by the arm and shook her, she 
 said, with a stupid grin: 
 
 " This is a feast-day. All is free.^' 
 
 " Roman nonsense," broke in Keraunus; '' is my soup 
 ready?" 
 
 While the woman was murmuring some unintelligible words, 
 the other slave came in and asked: 
 
 " Everybody is merry to-day; can I go out?" 
 
 " That would suit me nicely," answered Keraunus; " this 
 creature drunk, Selene sick, and you on the street." 
 
 " But no one stays at home to-day," answered the black, 
 timidly. 
 
 " Then pack yourself off," screeched Keraunus. " Roam 
 around until midnight. Do what you please, but don't expect 
 me to take care of you any longer. You can turn a hand- 
 mill, and that is all you are good for — and there may be some 
 one stupid enough to pay a few drachmas for you. " 
 
 " Do not sell me," groaned the slave, lifting his hands im- 
 ploringly; but Keraunus did not listen, and went on scolding: 
 
 " Even a dog is faithful to his master; but you only eat him 
 poor, and when he needs your service you only think of rmi- 
 ning the streets. " 
 
 " I will stay at home," howled the old slave. 
 
 " Do what you please. You have been for a long time only 
 like a lame horse, which makes its rider a sport for the chil- 
 dren. When you go out with me j^eople look after us, as if 
 you were a spot on my pallium. And the scabby dog wishes 
 to keep the feast, and make himself great among the citizens!" 
 
 " I will stay at home, only do not sell me," whined the 
 anxious creature, and tried to seize his master's hand; but 
 Keraunus repulsed him, and bade him go to the kitchen and 
 light the fire, and pour water over the old woman to restore 
 her senses. 
 
174 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 The slave shoved liis companion through the door, and 
 Keraunus went to wake Arsinoe. 
 
 In lier room there was no light except that which fell 
 through an 02)eniug in the roof. The slanting beams of the 
 morning sun rested ui3on the bed as Keraunus entered. There 
 lay his daughter in a profound sleep, her lovely head resting 
 upon her right arm, the long, loose tresses of soft brown hair 
 falling over her shoulders and down the side of the bed. 
 ller loveliness touched his heart, reminding him of his de- 
 ceased wife; and it was not simi:)ly idle pride but a movement 
 of sincere fatherly love that deepened the wish of his soul into 
 a silent prayer for her continued life and happiness. He was 
 not accustomed to waken her, for she was usually up long be- 
 fore himself, and he felt unwilling to disturb her sweet sleep; 
 but it was necessary, so he called her by name, shook her, and 
 said, as she at last opened her eyes in surprise: 
 
 " It is I; get up — remember what is to come to-day!" 
 
 " Yes,^' she said, yawning, " but it is still too early." 
 
 " Early?" answered Keraunus, laugliing. " My stomach 
 asserts the contrary. The sun is already high, and I have not 
 yet had my soup. " 
 
 " Let the slave cook it. " 
 
 " No, no, child; you must get up. Have you forgotten 
 whom you are to personate? And my curls, and the prefect's 
 wife, and your new garments?" 
 
 *' Let them all go. I do not care in the least for the Roxana 
 and the whole jserf ormance. " 
 
 " Because you are only half awake," said Keraunus, laugh- 
 ing. " How came that ivy leaf in your hair?" 
 
 Arsinoe blushed, felt after it, and said, reluctantly: 
 
 " Caught from some tendril, probably. But now go, that I 
 may get up." 
 
 " Yes, in a moment. How did you find Selene?" 
 
 " Not so badly off as I feared, but I will tell you more after- 
 ward; now I want to be alone." 
 
 When half an hour later she brought the soup to her father, 
 he looked at her in surprise. A change seemed to have come 
 over liis daughter. There was a light in her eyes he had never 
 before remaj-ked, and in her expression something so striking 
 as almost to frighten him. 
 
 While Arsinoe stirred the soup, Koi-aunus, with the help of 
 the slave, had taken the children from their beds, and now 
 they sat at the breakfast-table. Among tiiem was the blind 
 boy, fresh and well. 
 
 Arsinoe told them of Selene and of the excellent nursing sh« 
 
THE EMPEROR. l'^5 
 
 received in the house of Hannah. While she spoke Keraunus 
 gazed at her fixedly, and she asked impatiently if there was 
 anything imusual in her appearance. And he answered, shak- 
 ing his head: 
 
 " How strange you girls are! The jDride and joy you felt in 
 your selection yesterday to act the part of Alexander's bride, 
 has changed your looks in one night, but it is certainly not 
 to your disadvantage." 
 
 " Nonsense!" exclaimed Arsinoe, blushing, and throwing 
 herself upon the divan. She was not exactly weary, but ex- 
 perienced a lassitude that was by no means disagreeable. She 
 seemed to have just come out of a tepid bath, and the merry 
 music of the night before was constantly ringing in her ears. 
 Sometimes she laughed, sometimes stared into vacancy, and 
 thought if her lover should call her to dance with him again 
 she would not have the will to resist. 
 
 After breakfast was over and the slave had taken the chil- 
 dren into the open air, and Arsinoe had begun to curl her 
 father's hair, Keraunus assumed an air of utmost dignity and 
 said: 
 
 "My child!" 
 
 The girl let the hot iron drop and asked, expecting one of 
 those extravagances which Selene was accustomed to oppose : 
 "Well?'^ 
 
 " Listen to me attentively. " 
 
 That which was about to be spoken had in reality occurred 
 to him only an hour before, while destroying the happiness of 
 his old slave, and, he said, knitting Ms brows with the air of a 
 sage pliilosopher : 
 
 " For a long time I have been thinking of something that I 
 have decided to tell you. We must have a new slave. " 
 
 "But, father, " cried Arsinoe, "think what it will cost to 
 2irovide for another man — " 
 
 " It is not a question of that sort," broke in Keraunus. " I 
 shall exchange the old one for a younger that will not be a 
 disgrace to us. I said to you yesterday that in the future we 
 must expect to attract more attention, and if we take this 
 black scarecrow with us on the street or wherever we ajjpcar — " 
 
 " Certainly we can not make any display with Sebek," 
 broke in Arsinoe, " but we can leave him at home." 
 
 "Child, child," returned Keraunus, reproachfully, "will 
 you then never consider who we are? How could we aj^pear 
 on the street without slaves?" 
 
 The girl shrugged her shoulders, and reminded her lather 
 that he was an old inmate, that the children doted on him. 
 
176 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 and that he was very careful of tliem, that a new slave would 
 cost much money, and without most uncomfortable use of 
 authority could not be constrained to perform many duties 
 which the old man did Avillingly and well. But she spoke to 
 deaf ears. Safe from the remonstrances of Selene, and im- 
 patient of opposition as a reckless boy, Kerauuus obstinately 
 persisted in his determination to exchange the faithful old 
 fellow for a more showy servant. He did not for a moment 
 think of the sad fate of the old slave who had grown gray in 
 his house. His only hesitation was about using the last money 
 in their possession for something not really necessary. Since 
 Arsinoe had been chosen to personate Koxaiia he expected to 
 be able to borrow once more, and he thought it his duty to 
 appear well, not to frighten away that son-in-law of his 
 dreams. In case of extremity he always expected to fall back 
 on his collection of rarities. If the false sword of Antony 
 brought in so much, what might not some lover of relics pay 
 for the genuine? It only remained to find the right purchaser. 
 
 Arsinoe turned from red to white as her father repeatedly 
 returned to her bargain, but she did not venture to tell him 
 the truth, and repented her deception the more sincerely as 
 her own native good sense showed her the more plainly that 
 the honor conferred upon her yesterday threatened to lead the 
 weaknesses of her father on to some fatal issue. 
 
 It was enough for her to-day to know that Pollux loved her, 
 and she would have yielded every claim to the part, which 
 yesterday seemed so valuable, wdthout a shadow of regret. 
 Tliis feeling she expressed, but her father did not believe her 
 in earnest, and laughed in her face, amused himself with ob- 
 scure allusions to the riches that would not fail to come to 
 them through her; and because dimly conscious that it would 
 be well for him to show that he was not actuated by idleness 
 and vanity, he declared himself willing to make a great per- 
 soiial sacrifice and wear for awhile longer the gilded fillet. 
 Through such an act of self-denial he thought himself fully 
 justified in spending a large sum to procure a better-looking 
 slave. Besides, he had fully persuaded himself that the outlay 
 was a necessity. 
 
 Arsinoe's prayers were imheeded, and when, through sym- 
 pathy for the jDoor old man she began to wee]), he forbade her 
 angrily to shed tears over such an insignificant affair. He 
 thought it childish; besides that, he did not wish to have her 
 go witli red eyes to the wife of the prefect. 
 
 During this conversation his curls M'ere all in order, and he 
 commanded Arsinoe to arrange her own haii", and then go with 
 
THE EMPEROR. 177 
 
 him to purchase the new gown and peplum, visit Selene, and 
 then meet her engagement with Julia, the wife of Titianus. . 
 
 Yesterday it had seemed to him a little extravagant to hire 
 a sedan, but to-day he suggested a more pretentious vehicle. 
 When left alone another thought occurred to him. The arro- 
 gant architect ought to know that he was not the man to let 
 himself be annoyed and insulted without calling down punish- 
 ment. Therefore he cut a strip of papyrus from a letter he 
 liad preserved in his chest, and wa-ote upon it the following 
 words : 
 
 " Keraunus, the Macedonian, to Claudius Venator, Roman 
 architect: My eldest daughter, Selene, has been, through your 
 fault, so seriously injured that she lies now in great pain and 
 danger. My other children are no longer safe in their father's 
 house. I insist upon your plachig the dog in chains. If you 
 decline this reasonable demand I shall put my case into the 
 hands of the emperor. I also make known to you that circum- 
 stances have arisen which will lead Hadrian to jjunish every 
 act of insolence toward me and my daughters. " 
 
 After sealing this letter, Keraunus called the slave, and said, 
 coldly: 
 
 " Take this to the Eoman architect, and then order two 
 sedans. Make haste; and while we are absent take good care 
 of the children. To-morrow or next day you will be sold. 
 Do you ask to whom? That will depend on your own conduct 
 during the last hours of your service here." 
 
 The black fellow uttered a heart-rending cry, and threw 
 himself down before the overseer. Truly the cry pierced his 
 soul, but he was determined not to show himself touched, and 
 also to send him away. But the slave clasped his knees, and, 
 as the children, drawn to the spot by his cries, wept aloud with 
 him, and the little Helios began to stroke his bald head, the 
 vain man felt himself moved, and to guard against his own 
 weakness, cried, vehemently: 
 
 " Out with you, and do what you are told, or I will have 
 you scourged!" 
 
 And he tore himself away from the unhappy creature, who, 
 with sunken head, left the room, going to the door of Hadrian 
 with the letter. Overawed by the emperor on the former oc- 
 casion, he dared not knock. 
 
 After waiting a long time, with tears in his eyes. Master ap- 
 
 {)eared, bearing an empty breakfast-tray. He held out the 
 etter, saying: 
 ** This is from Keraunus to your master." 
 
178 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 ''Place it upon the tray," replied the Jazygeau. "But 
 what has hurt you, my old friend? You seem to feel badly. 
 Have you been beaten?'' 
 
 ** Xo/' whined the slave. " Keraunus is going to sell me. " 
 
 " There are better masters than Keraunus. " 
 
 *' But Sebek is old, Sebek is weak; Sebek can no longer Uft 
 or drag; the heavy work will kill Sebek." 
 
 " Have you then had such light service and bountiful provis- 
 ion with the overseer?" 
 
 *' ISlo wine, no meat, much hunger," said the old man, 
 piteously. 
 
 " Then you ought to be glad to get away." 
 
 " No, no," groaned the slave. 
 
 *' You are an odd fellow," returned Mastor. " "Why do you 
 want to stay with the niggard?" 
 
 For some time Sebek was silent, then he sobbed, while his 
 sunken chest heaved with the violence of his emotion : 
 
 "It is the children — the children — our little ones. They 
 are so dear, and our Helios, our little blind boy, has stroked 
 my hair when he heard I must go — just there," and he jjoint- 
 ed to the spot, " I felt liis little hand. And now Sebek will 
 see them all no more than if they were dead. " 
 
 These words rolled down like heavy bodies, starting a flood 
 of tears. They touched the heart of Mastor, wakening in him 
 the memory of his own lost cliildren, and also a wish to com- 
 fort his fellow-slave. 
 
 " Poor fellow," he said, compassionately. " Yes, the chil- 
 dren. They are little, and the door into one's heart is nar- 
 row, and they skip through a hundred times easier than the 
 grown people. I have lost dear children, and they were my 
 own. I can teach any one wdiat pain is, but I know now where 
 there is comfort also." 
 
 And supporting the tray upon his hip and one hand, he laid 
 the other on the shoulder of the slave, whispering: 
 
 " Have you hoard of the Christians?" 
 
 Sebek nodded eagerly, as though something of which he had 
 already learned much and expected more, were mentioned; 
 but Mastor added: 
 
 " Come to-morrow morning before sunrise to the plasterers 
 in the court, and you will hear of one who comforts the weary 
 and heavy laden. " 
 
 Mastor lifted the tray and went on; but out of the eyes of 
 the old slave glimmered a faint beam of hope. He had no 
 large expectations, but thought there might perhaps be a 
 means of bearing tjie troubles of life more easily. 
 
THE EMPEKOK. 179 
 
 Master passed the tray to the kitchen slaves, and went back 
 to deliver the letter. 
 
 The time was unfavorable to Keraunus, for the emperor was 
 in a gloomy mood. He had been awake until day-break, and 
 took then only three hours of rest. Still he bent with knitted 
 brows over the astronomical tablets, comparing them with his 
 observations of the preceding night; but they did not satisfy 
 him, for he shook his head discontentedly. Once he leaned 
 back in his easy-chair, covering his eyes with both hands, and 
 went over the calculations again, with a result that pleased 
 him no better. The letter of Keraunus lay long unnoticed. 
 At length, for the sake of changing the current of thought, 
 Hadrian tore it open, read, and cast it disdainfully aside. At 
 another time he would have heard of Selene's suffering with 
 hearty sympathy, and laughed at the peculiarities of her father, 
 devising some reply that would tease or frighten him. But 
 this morning the threatening words only excited his anger and 
 increased his feeling of antipathy to Keraimus. Impatient of 
 the silence that reigned in the apartment, he called Antinous, 
 who stood looking out dreamily over the harbor. The favorite 
 came immediately to his side. Glancing at Antinous^s face, 
 he said: 
 
 " You, too, look as if threatened by misfortune. Is the sky 
 entirely clouded?'' 
 
 " No, sire. It is blue above the sea, but clouds are gather- 
 ing in the south. " 
 
 " In the south?" asked Hadrian, thoughtfully. '' From that 
 direction we scarcely anticipate evil. But it is coming fast, 
 and will be here before we tliink of it. " 
 
 " You were so long awake, and that has spoiled your mood. " 
 
 "The 'mood'? What is that?" murmured Hadrian to 
 himself. '* It is a condition wherein all the emotions of the 
 soul are taken possession of at the same time by the same 
 cause. To-day my heart is paralyzed with apprehension." 
 
 " Have you seen bad tokens in the sky?" 
 
 '*' The very worst possible." 
 
 ** You wise men beheve in the stars," said Antinous. " No 
 doubt you are right, but my weak head can not comprehend 
 what their regular course can have to do with my restless 
 going to and fro." 
 
 " Wait until you are gray," answered the emperor. " Learn 
 to comjDrehend all before you speak of these things, for then 
 only can you understand that every part of the creation — the 
 greatest and the smallest are inwardly knit together — work 
 through and are dependent upon each other. What is, and 
 
IgO THE EMPEROR. 
 
 what niav ho in nature, -whatever men feel, think, and do, is 
 conditioned uj^on lirmly established eternal causes, and spirits 
 standing between us and the godhead indicate them in golden 
 characteis upon the blue vault above. The stars are the let- 
 ters in this writing, whose paths are as immutable as the 
 causes of all which is and happens. " 
 
 " Are you sure never to mistake this writing?" asked An- 
 tinous. . . 
 
 " I am liable to error," answered Hadrian; " but this time 
 I am not deceived. A heavy misfortune threatens me. There 
 is a pecidiarly portentous and remarkable combination." 
 
 " What is it?" 
 
 " I have received the words of an oracle from that cursed 
 Antioch— whence nothing good ever came to me, which — 
 AVhy should I keep it secret from you? In the middle of this 
 coming year a heavy misfortune will smite me, as the light- 
 ning smites a traveler to the earth, and this very night — 
 Look with me at this tablet. Here is the house of death, 
 here are the planets — but what do you understand of such 
 things? To be brief, in this night, already preceded by one 
 shocking event, the stars have confirmed the oracle as unmis- 
 takably as if they had tongues and screeched the prophecy of 
 evil in my ears. Such a prospect is gloomy. And what may 
 the next year bring?" 
 
 Hadrian sighed, but Antinous approached nearer, dropped 
 on one knee, and said, in a child-like and modest tone: 
 
 " May I, poor foolish wight, teach the great, wise man how 
 to enrich his life with six good months?" 
 
 Hadrian. smiled as if he knew what was coming, but An- 
 tinous kept on, courageously: 
 
 " Let the future remain future, and what must come, let 
 come; for even the gods have no control over destiny. When 
 evil approaches, it casts a black shadow forward. This you 
 look at, and allow it to darken the present bright day; I go on 
 my way in careless dreaming, and only notice the misfortune 
 when we come into contact — when it strikes upon me. " 
 
 ''And so you are spared many dark days," broke in 
 Hadrian. 
 
 " That is what I wanted to say. " 
 
 " And the counsel is good for yom and all other pleasure 
 promenaders through the Fair of idle life," answered Hadrian; 
 "but he to wlioni it is appointed to guide millions over a 
 chasm must keej) his eye steadily fixed — looking both at the 
 near and the distant, and dares not close them even against 
 the horrors I was destined to see last night." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 181 
 
 During these last words Phlegon, the private secretary of 
 Hadrian, entered, bringing letters from Kome. He bowed 
 profoundly and asked: 
 
 " Do the stars disturb you, Caesar?" 
 
 " They teach me to be on my guard,'" returned the em- 
 peror. 
 
 " Let us hope that they lie," cried the Greek, with liveli- 
 ,ness. " Cicero was certainly not altogether wrong in distrust- 
 ing the science of astrology. " 
 
 " He was a mere babbler,'' answered Hadrian, with frown- 
 ing brow. 
 
 " But is it not then trne that a Cnieus, and a Cains, who 
 were accidentally born in the same hour, will have the same 
 disposition, and must meet the same fate?" 
 
 " Always the old commonplace, the same old nonsense!" 
 broke in Hadrian, excited almost to rage. " Speak when you 
 are spoken to, and do not trouble yourself about things you do 
 not understand and that do not concern you. Is there any- 
 thing important among the letters?" 
 
 Antinous looked in surprise at the emperor. Why was he 
 angered by Phlegon's objections, when he had given such 
 friendly answers to his own? 
 
 Hadrian paid no more attention to him at present, but read 
 his letters and dispatches with attention — wrote short notes on 
 the margins, signed a decree, and dismissed the Greek. 
 
 Scarcely had he left when the joyful shout of many voices 
 was heard through the open window. 
 
 " What does that mean?" he asked of Mastor, and learning 
 that the workmen and slaves had just been dismissed to share 
 in the pleasures of the feast-day, he said to liimself : 
 
 " The people are making merry, putting on crowns, and for- 
 getting themselves in intoxication — and I — whom they all 
 envy — I destroy the short period of life with insignificant 
 affairs, let myself be devoured by gnawing care — " 
 
 Here he stopped and cried out, in a changed tone : 
 
 " Antinous, you are wiser than I am. Let us leave the fut- 
 ure to itself. Let us also enjoy the feast. We, too, will use 
 the day of freedom. We will go well masked. I, as an old 
 satyr, you, as a young faun, or something of that sort, and 
 plunge into the festal whirlpool — empty our cups — wander 
 through the city, and enjoy all the merriment." 
 
 " Oh," cried Antinous, cla])ping his hands in joy. 
 
 " Evoe Bacche!" cried lladriun, "swinging a goblet that stood 
 on the table. " You are free until evening, Mastor; and you, 
 Antinous, must ask the tall sculptor Pollux to conduct us and 
 
1S2 THE EMPER0R. 
 
 provide our wreaths and finery. I want to see the drunkards 
 ami laugh with the jolly before I am emperor again. Hasten, 
 my friend, before new cares come to interrupt my sport!" 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Antinous and Mastor left the emperor at once. In the 
 jiassage he beckoned to Mastor, and said, in a low tone: 
 
 '* I know you can keep a secret. AVill you do me a favor?" 
 
 '' I Avould rather do three than one," answered the Jazygean. 
 
 " You are free for to-day. Are you going into the city?" 
 
 "I think so." 
 
 " You are not familiar here, but that makes no difference. 
 Take these gold pieces. With one of them buy the handsomest 
 bunch of flowers in the market. Make yourself merry with 
 the second, and take a few draclmias from the third to liire a 
 mule. Let the driver conduct you to the garden of the widow 
 of Pudens, in which is the house of one Hannah, a widow. 
 Have 3'ou got the name?" 
 
 " Hannah, widow of Pudens." 
 
 " In the little house — not the great one — you are to deliver 
 the flowers for the sick girl, Selene. " 
 
 '' The daughter of the fat overseer, vvhom our Molossian at- 
 tacked?" 
 
 "She, or another," broke in Antinous. "If you are 
 asked who sent the flowers, say: ' The friend on the Lochias/ 
 and nothing more. Do you understand?" 
 
 The slave nodded, saying, in a low tone: 
 
 " And you also? Oh, these women!" 
 
 Antinous motioned him to silence, repeated rapidly his direc- 
 tions, and went to the Hall of the Muses to find Pollux. 
 Through Pollux he had learned where Selene w^as lying sick, 
 of wliom he thought incessantly. 
 
 Pollux was not in his usual cage. 
 
 The desire to talk with his mother had led him to the gate- 
 house, and now he was standing before her, with liis long arms 
 in vivacious motion, relating the events of the previous night. 
 His story was like a song of joy, and Doris sprung up, clapping 
 her little fat hands and crying: 
 
 *' That was fun! Thirty years ago I had the same sport with 
 your father." 
 
 " Not only thirty years ago," answered Pollux. " I remem- 
 ber very well when you, at the great Dionysian feast, seized by 
 the j)()wer of the god, rushed nuidly through the streets, with 
 the deer-skin over your shoulders. " 
 
The emperoe. 1^3 
 
 _" Oh, yes, that was good, that was dehghtful,^' cried Dw-is, 
 with shining eyes. "But thirty years ago it was quite differ- 
 ent. I have already told you how I went with our maid 
 through the Canopic way to see the procession from the house 
 of my aimt Archidike. It was not far, for we lived near, the 
 theater. My father was stage-overseer, and yours one of the 
 chief singers in tlie choir. We went as fast as we could, but 
 the crowd kept us back, and some drimken fellows tried to 
 jest with me."' 
 
 " You also were as handsome as a rose,"' broke in her son. 
 
 "Only as a very little bud; not like your beautiful rose," 
 returned the old woman. ' ' I looked so well that the young 
 fellows, disguised as satyrs and fauns, and the cynical hypocrites, 
 under their ragged mantles, thought it worth their while to 
 look at me, and so brought upon themselves some rebuffs when 
 they tried to entice me out, or to steal a kiss. I was not at- 
 tracted by handsome fellows, for Euphorion had already wooed 
 me with his eyes, though I was kept very strictly, and up to 
 that time we had never exchanged a word. At the corner of 
 the Canopic way and Emporium Street we were forced to stop, 
 for there the yelling and hallooing crowd was packed about the 
 wild Klododen women, who, with other priestesses of Bacchus 
 in a sacred frenzy, were tearing a ram with their teeth. This 
 was a horrible sight, but I was forced to see it, and I shouted 
 and cried with the others. My maid, to whom I clung, was 
 seized by the frenzy and dragged me into the circle directly be- 
 fore the bloody offering. Then two frantic women sprung 
 upon us. One of them seized and tried to pull me down. It 
 was a frightful moment, but I held up bravely and was still 
 on my feet, when your father sprung forward and bore me 
 away. What further happened I can not relate. It was all a 
 blissful dream, in which one must press both hands on the 
 heart to keep it from bursting, or flying straight up toward 
 the heaven and into the midst of the sun. It was very late 
 when I reached home, and within a few weeks I became the 
 wife of Euphorion.'" 
 
 " We have only imitated you," cried Pollux, " and if Arsinoe 
 become like my old mother, I shall be well contented. ■" 
 
 "Be cheerful and hajjpy," returned Doris. "Keep your 
 health. Snap your fingers at trouble and care; be faithful in 
 all common duties; and on every feast-day drink a merry cuji 
 to the honor of the god, and all will go well. Who does what- 
 ever he can, and enjoys all that is possible, has put life to its 
 best uses, and needs feel no remorse in the last hour. By-gono 
 
184 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 is by-LTono, and wlicn Atropus cuts the thread, others will step 
 into our ])iacos, and the joy will begin again." 
 
 " You are right," said Pollux, embracing his mother; " and 
 is it not true that toil is hghter and life happier when two are 
 together?" 
 
 *' I think so, and that you have chosen the proper compan* 
 ion. As a sculptor jou have been accustomed to living simply. 
 You do not need riches, but the daily sight of beauty to refresh 
 your spirit, and that you have found." 
 
 " There is no fairer," broke in Pollux. 
 
 *' No, certainly not," continued Doris. " At first I had my 
 eye on Selene. She also is good looking, and is a model girl. 
 But of late, as I have seen Arsinoe pass here, I have said to 
 myself: ' She is growing up for my boy;' and now that you 
 have won lier, I seem to have gone back to her age. The old 
 heart within me is as merry as if Eros had touched it with his 
 wings and liis rosy fingers. And if my feet had not become so 
 heavy over the cooking hearth and the wash-tub, really I 
 should seize Euphorion by the arm and dance Avith him through 
 the streets. " 
 
 " Where is father?" 
 
 " He has gone out to sing." 
 
 " In the morning! Where then?" 
 
 " There is a sect which celebrates its mysteries to-day. 
 They pay him Avell, but he has to sing sad songs behind a cur- 
 tain, the wildest stuff, of wliich he understands not one word, 
 and I very little." 
 
 " I am sorry, for I want to speak with him." 
 
 " He will come back late." 
 
 " There will be time." 
 
 " So much the better; otherwise, I could repeat it to him 
 for you. ' ' 
 
 " Y^our counsel will be as good as his. I want to leave 
 Papias and set up for myself." 
 
 " That is right; the lloman architect assured me yesterday 
 that a briglit future opens before you." 
 
 " I hesitate only on account of my poor sister and her chil- 
 dren. If it should go poorly with me in the first few months — " 
 
 " We will pull them through. It is time for you to be reap- 
 ing what you have sown. ' ' 
 
 " I think so, both for my own sake and for Arsinoe's; if 
 only Keraunus — " 
 
 " Yes, there you will have a conflict. " 
 
 " And a heavy one," sighed Pollux. " The thought of that 
 disturbs my joy." 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 185 
 
 "That is foolish/' returned Doris, "and only a useless 
 anxiety, wliich is almost as ruinous as remorse. Get your own 
 workshop, and do something there with a cheerful heart 
 worthy to astonish the world, and I will warrant that the silly 
 old fellow will be sorry not to bring out your first work from 
 his collection of rarities — preserved there instead of having 
 been broken to pieces. Go right on and enjoy your good fort- 
 une, just as if he were not in the world."' 
 
 " I will follow your advice.'' 
 
 " One thing more, my boy." 
 
 " What is that?" 
 
 " Jle very careful of Arsinoe! She is young and inexperi- 
 en.Lil. and you must not ask her to do anything that you 
 would not advise if she were the bride of your brother." 
 
 Doris had scarcely finished when Antinous entered the gate- 
 house, with a request from Claudius Venator that he would 
 guide him about the city. 
 
 Pollux hesitated, for he had still so much to do in the pal- 
 ace, and he had hoped to see Arsinoe again in the course of 
 the day. What could an afternoon and evening without her 
 offer after such a morning? 
 
 Doris noticed the shrinking, and said : 
 
 " Go and enjoy the feast. The architect can give you good 
 counsel, and introduce you to some of his friends." 
 
 " Your mother is right," said Antinous. " Claudius Vena- 
 tor is appreciative, and can also be grateful. I wish you suc- 
 cess." 
 
 " I will go," answered Pollux, who was always powerfully 
 attracted toward Hadrian, and under all circumstances wished 
 a share in the festivity. "But I must first make knowTi to 
 Pontius that I propose to desert the battle-field for a few hours 
 to-day." 
 
 ' ' Leave that to Venator, ' ' answered Antinous. ' ' And please 
 provide for him, and for me, and also for yourself, if you like, 
 some merry costumes and masks. He will be a satyr, and I 
 want some other disguise." 
 
 " Good," replied Pollux. " I will bring what we need from 
 our workshop, where there is a mass of finery suitable to the 
 followers of Dionysius. I will be back again in half an hour. " 
 
 " Make all the haste possible," begged Antinous, " for my 
 master does not like to wait. And then — another thing " — 
 Antinous became embarrassed, and stepping close to Pollux, 
 with a hand on his shoulder, suid, in a low tone, and impress- 
 ively: " Venator is very intimate with the emperor. Be on 
 your guard as to what you say of Hadrian." 
 
186 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " Is your master a spy of the Ca3sar?'' asked Pollux, look- 
 inir suspiciously at the youth. *' Pontius has already uttered 
 a similar -warning; and if that be the case — " 
 
 ''No, no/' broke in Antinous, hastily; "nothing of that 
 sort: but they have no secrets from one another, and Venator 
 speaks very freely of what he sees and hears.'' 
 
 " Thank you. I will be on my guard." 
 
 " Do so; I mean it seriously," and the handsome features 
 of the Bithynian wore an expression of sensitive delicacy, and 
 the offering of his hand to Pollux was done with such an in- 
 describable grace that Doris seized the arm of her son, exclaim- 
 ing: 
 
 " Oh, what beauty! Pollux, my boy, one might believe that 
 a heavenly being was come down to the earth!" 
 
 " Look at my old mother!" cried Pollux, laughing. " But 
 honestly, my friend, she has reason to be enthusiastic, and I 
 sympathize with her." 
 
 " Hold him fast," added Doris. " If he will allow you to 
 make his bust, you would have something to show the world!" 
 
 " Will you?" broke in Pollux, turning to Antinous. 
 
 " I never could be still long enough to satisfy a sculptor," 
 answered Antinous; " but I will gladly do you a favor. Only 
 it vexes me that you join in the everlasting commonplace of 
 the others. But I must return to my master." 
 
 After he left the house, Doris said : 
 
 " I can not judge critically a Avork of art, but I know as well 
 as any other Alexandrian woman what is handsome. If this 
 boy will consent to become your model you can make somc- 
 tliing to charm all the men and turn the heads of the women. 
 Great gods! I feel as if I had been drinking wine. 8ucli 
 beauty is of the rarest ! Why is thei'e not some means of pre- 
 serving such a figure and such a face from old age and from 
 wrinkles?" 
 
 " I know one, mother, " returned Pollux, as he went through 
 tin; door-way, " and that is Art. That can give undying youth 
 to this mortal Adonis. " 
 
 The old woman looked after her son Avith an emotion of 
 pride, assenting to his remark with an emphatic nod. While 
 she fed her birds with many a caressing epithet, and let her 
 Bj)ccial favorites take crumbs of bread from her lips, the young 
 sculptor hasteiied with long strides through the street. Many 
 an " All!" or un " Oh!" edioing. behind testified to the vigor- 
 ous arm jiusliing its way among the crowd. But he lieard 
 them faintly, for his thoughts were absorbed with Arsinoe, or 
 
THE EMPEROE. 187 
 
 an occasional one of Antinons, and the position in which the 
 bust should represent him — whether as a hero or a god. 
 
 By the flower-market, close beside the Gymnasium, he was 
 recalled to a sense of his actual surroundings by a curious pict- 
 ure. Upon a very small black donkey sat a very large black 
 slave, well dressed, and carrying in his hand a great bunch of 
 handsome flowers. Beside him walked a profusely garlanded 
 and gayly attired man, wearing a comical mask, and followed 
 by two gigantic garden gods and four smartly dressed boys. 
 In the slave Pollux recognized the servant of Venator, and he 
 was quite sure of having before seen the masked gentleman, 
 but did not remember where, and took no trouble to find out; 
 for after a glance at the striking group he j^assed on, thinking 
 of the things that lay nearer to his heart. Perhaps the don- 
 • key -rider found himself forced to listen to something mipleas- 
 ant, for liis eye rested anxiously upon the flowers. And this 
 was a well-grounded anxiety, for the man walking beside him 
 was no less a person than the Roman Pretor Verus, whom the 
 Alexandrians called " the false Eros." 
 
 Having recognized Master immediately, whom he had often 
 seen with the emperor, he naturally leaped to the conclusion 
 that Hadrian was in Alexandria, and he was plying the slave 
 with adroit questions. As Master attempted stoutly to avoid 
 answering, Verus thought best to introduce himself; and be- 
 fore the great lord and special friend of the empress. Master 
 lost his caution. He becaue entangled in contradictions, and 
 though not actually confessing the fact, Verus became con- 
 vinced that Hadrian was not far oil. 
 
 And the flowers in the hand of this slave — naturally they did 
 not belong to him — where then was their destination? 
 
 Verus began again to put questions; but Master betrayed 
 nothing, until Verus, touching him lightly, first upon one and 
 then u23on the other cheek, said pleasantly: 
 
 " Good little Master, listen to me. I have some propositions 
 to make, and if any one of them pleases you, you have only to 
 bow your head in imison with that of the twice two-footed ani- 
 mal you are riding. "" 
 
 "Let me go on my way," begged the Jazygean, within- 
 creasing anxiety. 
 
 " Go on, if you wish, but I shall follow until I find out what 
 I want. There are many devices in tliis head, as you will 
 learn. As the first, I ask: Shall I seek out your master and 
 tell him that you have betrayed to me his presence in Alexan- 
 dria?" 
 ^ *' That you will not do, sir/' cried the slaye^ 
 
188 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 "Well, tlicn: Shall I liung about you with my followers 
 until ui^rlit coiu])!.'! you to return to your master? 
 
 " Tliat motion of the hand expresses your 02)imon on tills 
 j)oint, and you are right; for the carrying out of this projiosi- 
 tion would be as little pleasing to me as to yourself, and would 
 bring the special notice of the crowd niwn you. Whisper 
 then, in my ear, where the emperor is lodged, and from whom 
 and to whom you are carrying these flowers. As soon as you 
 accommodate yourself to this proposition I shall let you go, 
 and prove to you that I am as lavish of my gold in Africa as I 
 was in Italy." 
 
 " No gold — certainly, I will take no gold,'' cried Mastor. 
 
 "You are a brave fellow,'" answered Verus, in a different 
 tone, " and know well that I take good care of my servants, 
 and would rather show them kindness than severity. Satisfy 
 then my curiosity without fear, for I promise that no one, and 
 least of all your master, shall learn from me what vou will 
 tell." ^ 
 
 Mastor hesitated; but because he could not conceal from 
 himself the fact that he would at last be forced to yield to tliis 
 adroit questioner, and partly because he knew him to be one 
 of the kindest-hearted of gentlemen, he sighed, and whispered: 
 
 " I am sure you do not wish to destroy such a poor wight; 
 so then you may know. We dwell on the Lochias. " 
 
 ''On the Lochias!" exclaimed Verus. "And now about 
 the flowers?" 
 
 " That is mere pleasantry." 
 
 " Is Hadrian, then, in such a cheerful mood?" 
 
 " He was very cheerful until last night — " 
 
 " What about last night?" 
 
 " You know well how it is when he sees bad tokens in the 
 stars. " 
 
 " Bad tokens!" repeated Verus, earnestly. " And yet he 
 is sending flowers?" 
 
 " He did not send them. How could you imagine that?" 
 
 " Was it Antinous?" 
 
 Mastor nodded affirmatively. 
 
 " Then he begins to find admiration better than being so 
 much admired! What fair one has animated that sleeping 
 heart?" 
 
 " I promised not to gossip." 
 
 " Then I promise you the same thing. My power of keep- 
 ing a sp(Teet exceds my curiosity." 
 
 ^j Tiien content yourself with what you already know." 
 
 " Half knowledge is harder to bear than total ignorance." 
 
THE EMPEROE. 189 
 
 "I can not tell you." 
 
 " Shall I begin again with my propositions?'* 
 
 " Ah, sir, I beg you with all my heart — " 
 
 "Out with it, and I shall go on my way, and leave you to 
 go yours/' 
 
 " It concerns only a pale girl whom you would not look at."' 
 
 " So it is a girl?" 
 
 " Our Molossian dragged the poor thing down." 
 
 " On the street?" 
 
 " No, on the Locliias. Her father is the palace overseer, 
 Keraunus." 
 
 " And is her name Arsinoe?" asked Verus, who thought of 
 the pretty child chosen for the part of Eoxana with sincere 
 pity. 
 
 " No, she is called Selene; Arsinoe is her younger sister." 
 
 " Then you are carrying these flowers to the Lochias?" 
 
 " She was away from home, and could not get back, and 
 lies now in the house of a stranger." 
 
 " Where?" 
 
 " That can be nothing to you." 
 
 " No, nothing at all. I pray you, tell me the whole truth." 
 
 " Eternal gods! what is this poor creature to you?" 
 
 " Nothing at all; but I must know where you are going." 
 
 " Near the sea. I do not know the house, but the driver 
 behind there — " 
 
 " Does it lie far from here?" 
 
 " About half an hour," answered the driver. 
 
 " So then it is quite a distance. And does Hadrian wish to 
 remain unknown?" 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 " But you, his body-slave, whom many others besides me 
 may recognizp, intend to ride half through the city on a day 
 when everybody who has legs is out, with that great bunch of 
 flowers in your hand. Oh, Master, that is not wise!" 
 
 The slave was frightened, but perceiving that Verus was 
 right, he asked, anxiously: 
 
 " What, then, ought I to do?" 
 
 " Come down from that donkey; disguise yourself, and then 
 make merry with these gold pieces to your heart's content. " 
 
 " And these flowers?" 
 
 " Let me take care of them. " 
 
 " Will you do it honestly, and never let Antinous guess that 
 you forced me to it?" 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " There are the flowers, but I can not take the gold." 
 
190 TITF. ■EMPEROR. 
 
 " Then I will tlirow it among the crowd. Buy a wreath 
 and a mask, and us much wine as you can carry. Where is 
 the girl to be found?" 
 
 "With one Hannah. Slie lives in a little house within the 
 garden of the widow of Pudens. Whoever delivers the flowers 
 must say they were sent by her friend on the Lochias. " 
 
 " Good. Go now, and be careful that no one recognizes 
 yoiL Your secret is mine, and the * friend from the Lochias ' 
 will not be forgotten." 
 
 Mastor disappeared in the crowd, Verus gave the flowers 
 into the hand of one of th3 garden gods, swung himself mer- 
 rily upon the ass, and commanded the driver to point out the 
 way. At the corner of the next street he met two sedans. In 
 the first sat Keraimus in his crocus-colored mantle, and fat as 
 Silenus, the companion of Dionysius, but with a sunny face. 
 From the second peeped Arsinoe, so fresh and beautiful that 
 lier ai)pearance quickened the blood of the susceptible Eoman. 
 Following a quick impulse, he took the flowers destined for 
 Selene from the hand of his attendant, laid them into her 
 sedan, saying: " Alexander greets Roxana, the fairest of the 
 fair." Arsinoe blushed, but Verus commanded one of his 
 boys to follow and learn her destination, meeting him at the 
 flower-market. The messenger hastened, and he, turning his 
 ass, soon reached the half circular pillared hall, on the shaded 
 side of a large open space where the best gardeners and flower 
 dealers of the city offered their fragrant wares. Every stall 
 had been furnished more richly than usual to-day, but the de- 
 mand had been so steady that, though Verus ordered the best 
 flowers remaining, the result Avas not so handsome as Mastor 
 had secured earlier in the day. This vexed the Eoman. A 
 sense of justice to the sick girl led him to devise some way of 
 supplying the defect. The bunches were tied Math bright rib- 
 bons, and had long streaming ends. Verus took a brooch 
 from his own garment and fastened it within the bow boimd 
 about the flowers. Now he was satisfied, and pictured to him- 
 self the pleasure Avhich the object of the Bithynian's devotion 
 Avould experience in finding the pretty onyx in its gold setting, 
 on which Avas delicately carved the figure of Eros shai'pening 
 his arrows, lie commissioned one of the garden gods, a Brit- 
 ish shive, to deliver the flowers, and then return to Avait for 
 liim before the house of Titianus; for there, he had just heard, 
 Keraunus and his daughter had been carried. 
 
 Ilci-e he laid aside his mask, and in the same apartment 
 wliere Kei-aunus Avas Avaiting rearranged his hair and the dis- 
 oi-dered folds of his toga before being led into the reception- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 191 
 
 room of Julia^ where he hoped to see Arsinoe. But instead of 
 Arsinoe he found only his own wife and Balbilla. Lively and 
 graceful as ever^, he greeted these ladies, but without any at- 
 tempt at concealing liis disappointment, glanced about the 
 spacious apartment. 
 
 Balbilla approached him, asking, hghtly: 
 
 " Can you be honest, Verus?" 
 
 " If circumstances are favorable, yes. " 
 
 " And would that suit you to-day?'^ 
 
 " I ought to think so.'^ 
 
 " Then tell me honestly, was this call designed for Julia, 
 or did you expect to find the pretty Roxana?'^ 
 
 *'Eoxana?'' itnswered Verus, with a roguish smile on his 
 lips. " She was the wife of Alexander the Great, and died 
 long ago; but I associate with the living, and left that merry 
 crowd on the street simply and only — " 
 
 " You aggravate my curiosity.'^ 
 
 " Simply and only because my sensitive spirit foresaw the 
 prospect of meeting you, my fairest Balbilla. ' ' 
 
 *' And do you call that honest?" cried the poetess, striking 
 the pretor with the handle of her feather fan. " Just listen, 
 Lucilla; your husband dares assert that he came here to find 
 me." 
 
 Verus looked at her reproachfully as she whispered : 
 
 "So must dishonest men be punished." And turning to 
 Lucilla, in a louder voice said: " Do you know, Lucilla, if I 
 never marry it will be your husband^s fault?" 
 
 "Yes," broke m Verus, " unfortunately, I was born too 
 late for you." 
 
 " Do not misunderstand me,^^ cried Balbilla. " How could 
 I dare matrimony, through fear of finding a Verus for a hus- 
 band?" 
 
 " And what suitor would venture to woo Balbilla, could he 
 know how severe she can be toward the simple admirer of her 
 beauty?" 
 
 " A husband should not adore beauty in general, but only 
 the one fair being who is his wife." 
 
 " Vestal!" exclaimed Verus, with a laugh, " I shall punish 
 you by holding back a great secret, which concerns us all. 
 No, no, I shall not stay to gossip; but I beg you, wife, to teach 
 her the practice of forbearance, that her future husband may 
 not blame me too heavily." 
 
 "No wife can teach forbearance," returned Lucilla, "for 
 we only practice it when there is nothing else left for us to do 
 
192 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 and the sinner gives us a necessity for recogjiizing him in this 
 manner. ' ' 
 
 Verus bowed before his wife, kissed her arm, and asked: 
 
 " Where is Julia?" 
 
 '* She has rescued the lamb from the wolf/' answered Bal- 
 billa. 
 
 " That means?"' 
 
 " As soon as you were announced she hid the little Roxana/' 
 
 " No, no," broke in Lucilla. " The tailor was waiting to 
 arrange the costume for that charming child. Look at the 
 beautiful nosegay she brought to Jidia. Do you also deny my 
 right to share your secret?" 
 
 *' How could I?" returned Verus. 
 
 " He stands greatly in need of your recognition," said Bal- 
 billa, laughing; whife the pi-etor, w^hispering, related to his 
 wife what he had learned from Master. 
 
 As Lucilla threw up her hands in surprise, Verus said to 
 Balbilla: 
 
 " You see now what a pleasm'e you have lost through your 
 wicked words. " 
 
 " How can one be so revengeful, most excellent Verus?" 
 said the poetess, coaxingly; " I am dying of curiosity." 
 
 " Live but a few days, fair Balbilla, and the cause of your 
 early death will be removed. " 
 
 " Wait, and I will be revenged!" cried the girl, threatening 
 him with her finger; but Lucilla led her away, saying: 
 
 " Come, now, Julia will be needing our counsel." 
 
 "Do so," cried Verus. "I fear, besides, that no one is 
 quite at liberty to-day. Salute Julia from me." 
 
 As he went out he cast a look upon the nosegay Arsinoe had 
 given away so soon after its reception, and sighed, saymg: 
 
 " As one grows older he should learn humility." 
 
THE EMPEROK. 193 
 
 PART II. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Hankah watched with Selene until sunrise, cooling, at fre- 
 quent intervals, the injured foot, as well as the wounded head. 
 
 The old physician was not dissatisfied with the condition of 
 his patient, but commanded the widow to take a few hours of 
 rest, and commit the nursing to her young friend. As Maria, 
 now left alone with the patient, laid the first com]Dress on her 
 head, Selene said to her: 
 
 " You were yesterday on the Lochias. Please tell me how 
 you found all things there, who showed you the way to our 
 dwelhng, and did you see my little brothers and sisters?'^ 
 
 " You are not yet free from fever, and I know not if I ought 
 to talk much with you, though I would like to do so." 
 
 The words were friendly, and the eyes of the deformed girl 
 were beautiful in their frank sincerity. Their glances ex- 
 pressed not only sympathy and pity, but admiration; for 
 Selene was so beautiful, so very different from herself, that she 
 seemed to be nursing a princess. Her own back had never be- 
 fore seemed so crooked and her brown face so ugly as in con- 
 trast with the fair and regular features and delicately formed 
 figure of this girl. But Maria was not envious; she was only 
 happy to serve, to help, to look u23on Selene, although she 
 knew her to be a heathen. 
 
 She had been secretly praying during the night-time that the 
 Lord would convert this beautiful creature; would restore her 
 to health, and fill her soul with that love which made her own 
 so blessed. More than once she had been tempted to kiss her 
 as she lay, but dared not, for the sick girl seemed made of 
 some finer stufE. Selene was very much exhausted, and in the 
 intervals of pain experienced in this quiet atmosphere of kind- 
 ness a sensation of peace and rest which was both ncAV and 
 agreeable, though it was interrupted by her usual anxiety for 
 the family. 
 
 The presence of Hannah did no good, for she fancied in 
 
194 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 her voioo,a resemblance to that of her own mother, when she 
 had played with her children or embraced them with unusual 
 tenderness. 
 
 At the pasting-table in the papyrus mill the deformed girl 
 had been repulsive, but now she noticed her j^leasant eyes and 
 friendly voice; and the tenderness with wliich she handled her 
 wounds awoke her gratitude. 
 
 Her sister Arsinoe Avas an idle Alexandrian child, and had 
 given this girl the nickname of " Sister Thersites,^' after the 
 ugliest of the Greeks besieging Troy; and Selene herself had 
 sometimes used the same apj^ellation. 
 
 But she remembered no more the shameful word, and recog- 
 nized the thoughtful kindness of her nurse, while she said: 
 
 " The fever can not be very high. And, if you give me 
 something to think of, I shall forget the pain. I long for my 
 home. Did you see the children ?'' 
 
 " No, Selene, When I reached the palace, the friendly wife 
 of the gate-keeper told me at once that both your father and 
 sister were absent, and that the slave had gone to buy cakes 
 for the children.^' 
 
 " To buy cakes!" exclaimed Selene in surjDrise. 
 
 '"' She said also that the way to the dwelhng led through so 
 many spaces where the slaves were at work that her son should 
 go with me. He did so, and when we found your door locked 
 he told me I could trust his mother with a message. That I 
 did, for she looked both clever and kind. " 
 
 "She is so." 
 
 " And she loves you very much, for as I told her of your 
 suflCerings, the tears ran down her cheeks, and she spoke as 
 warmly and with as much sympathy as if she had been your 
 own mother. " 
 
 " I hope you said nothing of our working in the factory," 
 said Selene, anxiously. 
 
 " Certainly not, for you had asked me to be silent. The 
 old lady, too, sent you many friendly messages. " 
 
 " Did the son hear also of my misfortune?" 
 
 ** Yes. On the way through the jDalace he was fidl of 
 jokes; but when I told him that you went out and were unable 
 to return, and how anxious the physician felt about you, he 
 became angry and uttered blasphemous words. " 
 
 " Do you remember what he said?" 
 
 " Not all, but 1 can tell you one thing. He complained 
 bitterly that the gods created beautiful tilings only to damage 
 them, and he reviled — " 
 
 Maria cast down her eyes, as if uttering something unseem- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 195 
 
 ly; but Selene flushed with pleasure, and said zealously, as if 
 wishing to exceed the comj^laints of Pollux: 
 
 " He was right, for those above treat us as if — " 
 
 " It is not good to speak so/" exclaimed Maria, reproach- 
 fully. 
 
 "What do you mean?" asked the sick girl. " You live 
 here quietly, in j^eace and love. I remember many words that 
 Hannah dropjjed during our work-hours; and now I see that 
 she looked at things in the same light. You may well think 
 the gods to be kind.'" 
 
 "God is so to all." 
 
 " Are they kind to those whose every joy they ruin?" cried 
 Selene, with blazing eyes. " When they tear away the mother 
 from the house of eight children? When they daily threaten 
 the only one who is left to sup23ort them?" 
 
 " Even for such there is one good God," broke in Hannah, 
 who had returned to the room. ' ' I will some time point to you 
 the kind Father in heaven who cares for us all, as if we Avere 
 His own children — but not now. You ought to be quiet, and 
 neither hear nor speak what can excite your fevered blood. 
 Now I will rearrange the pillows under your head, and Maria 
 may lay on a new compress, and then you must try to sleep. " 
 
 " I can not," said Selene. " Tell me of your friendly God. " 
 
 " At another time, my dear girl. He can be fomid by all 
 who seek Him, and among all His children He is most tender 
 toward those who suffer." 
 
 " Those who suffer!" cried Selene, in astonishment. " What 
 cares any god — in the midst of Olympian delights — about those 
 who are endm-ing pain?" 
 
 "Hush, child," broke in Hannah, and with a soothing 
 caress; " you shall soon learn of God's care, and how another 
 loves you." 
 
 " Another?" murmured Selene to herself, and the flush on 
 her cheeks deepened. She thought of Pollux, asking in her 
 own mind whether he would have been so moved by tlie news 
 of her misfortune if he had not cared for her, and began to 
 concoct some reasonable explanation of the words she had 
 heard in passing his work-place in the Hall of the Muses. He 
 had never said in so many words that he loved her. And why 
 should not he, a sculptor, a fresh and merry-hearted fellow, 
 joke with the pretty girl, even though his heart belonged to 
 another? Xo, he was not indifferent to her, that she had per- 
 ceived on the night when slie served as his model, that she 
 plainly read in Maria's account. And the more she thought, 
 the more she longed for him — this friend of her childhood. 
 
19 G THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Ik'r heart had never beat for any other man, but since her in- 
 terview with liim in the Hall of the Muses, her whole soul had 
 been filled with his image, and slie Avas sure this must be love 
 — it could be nothing else. Half waking, half dreaming, she 
 fancied that he entered her silent room, sat down beside her 
 bed, and looked into her eyes. Ah, how could he help it? 
 She must rise and stretch out her arms toward him. 
 
 " Be quiet, child," said Hannah; " it is not good for you to 
 move so much.*' 
 
 Selene opened her eyes only to close them again and dream 
 on, until she was roused by the sound of voices in the garden. 
 
 Ilannah left the room, and soon they recognized her voice 
 among the others, and as she returned to the side of Selene, 
 her cheeks were flushed, and it was difficult for her to find fit- 
 ting words in which to relate the occurrence. 
 
 " A huge man in a fantastic dress," she said at last, " de- 
 sired admittance, and when refused by the gate-keeper he 
 simply put him to one side. He asked for you. " 
 
 " For me?" asked Selene, blushing. 
 
 " Yes, my cliild. He brought an immense and beautiful 
 nosegay and said it came with the greeting of youi- friend on 
 the Lochias. " 
 
 "■ My friend on the Lochias?" murmured Selene to herself, 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 Suddenly her eyes became bright with joy, and she asked: 
 
 " Did you say that the man who brought the flowers was 
 very tall?" 
 
 "That he was." 
 
 "Oh, please, Hannah," cried Selene, trying to rise, "let 
 me see the flowers!" 
 
 " Have you a bridegroom, child?" asked Hannah. 
 
 " A bridegroom? No, but there is a young man with 
 whom we played as children, a sculptor, and a good man, who 
 must have sent the flowers." 
 
 Hannah looked at her sympathetically, beckoned to Maria, 
 and said: 
 
 " The nosegay is very large. You can look at it, but it 
 will not do to keep it here; the odor of so many flowers 
 might do you injury." 
 
 Maria rose from her seat near the end of the bed, and whis- 
 pered to Selene: 
 
 " Is it the son of the gate-keeper?" 
 
 Selene nodded assent, with a smile, and as the two women 
 went together to bring the flowers, she was able to change her 
 own position in the bed; but after doing so, there was a sing- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 197 
 
 ing sound in her ears, and shining specks seemed floating in 
 the air before her eyes. It became liard to breathe, but the air 
 seemed to her filled with the fragrance of flowers. Hannah 
 and Maria brought in the gigantic bunch of flowers. Her e3^es 
 brightened, and she clasjjed her hands in admiration, and 
 begged her friends to turn it first on this side and then on that, 
 pressed the flowers against her face, and secretly kissed the 
 tender petals of a half-opened rose. She felt intoxicated with 
 joy, and tears coursed each other down her cheeks. Maria 
 first noticed the brooch within the bow of ribbon, and pointed 
 it out to Selene, who took it into her hand. Blushing, she 
 looked at the delicate carving of Eros sharjiening his arrows. 
 She felt no more pain; she was well and joyous, proud and 
 sui^remely happy. 
 
 Hannah was troubled to see her so much excited, and mo- 
 tioned to Maria, while she said: 
 
 '' That is enough, daughter; we will place it before the win- 
 dow, where you can see it." 
 
 " So soon?" asked Selene, sorry to have it taken away, and 
 breaking ofl" a few roses and violets to lay on the pillow beside 
 her, while she examined lovingly the carving on the brooch. 
 Without doubt, she thought, it had been cut by Teuker, the 
 brother of Pollux. How delicate the carving! How thought- 
 fully chosen the sentiment they conveyed! The heavy gold 
 setting troubled her a little, so long accustomed to look upon 
 money only as the means of supplying absolute necessities.' 
 She said to herself, Pollux ought not to have done it. Still it 
 was pleasant, and would she not gladly have done as much for 
 him? Later, she thought, she might give him some lessons in 
 economy. 
 
 The two women returned, after arranging with some diflfl- 
 culty the mass of flowers hi the window, and renewed the wet 
 applications without speaking. 
 
 She was content to be silent, for her heart was full of tender 
 whispers. And wherever she turned her eyes they met only 
 what was agreeable. 
 
 The flowers — the brooch — the kind face of Hannah — even 
 Maria's plain features were beautiful, for she was not quite a 
 stranger to Pollux, and to lier she might speak of him. 
 
 Selene knew herself no more — winter had reigned in her 
 soul, but now the spring-time had come — it had been night, 
 but day had dawned; her heart, formerly a parched garden, 
 was gay with tlowers and fresh with green leaves. 
 
 Often she had been unable to comprehend the cheerfulness 
 
108 TnE EMPEROR. 
 
 of Arsinoo, .iiid Ikv'" bec7i almost angry witli tlic mirth of the 
 cliildren; to-day .she would have been glad to share it. 
 
 There lay the poor creature gazing blissfully at the flowers, 
 without a suspicion that they had been sent by one for wliom 
 she cared as little as for the Christian walking up and down 
 ])efore her window in the garden of tlie widow of Pudens, and 
 fancving, in her rapture, tliat she possessed the love of a heart 
 •which liad never been liers, and which was at this moment 
 absolutely filled with the image of her sister. Poor Selene! 
 The dream was one of undisturbed felicity, but with every mo- 
 ment the waking drew nearer, and what a waking it would be! 
 
 Keraunus had not succeeded in visiting Selene with Arsinoe 
 before the hour of her appointment with Julia. The attempt 
 to have his child appear there in a dress worthy of her origin 
 had consumed much time, and had, moreover, been fruitless. 
 All the shoi:)s and magazines were closed, for merchants, work- 
 people and slaves shared together in the festivities of the day. 
 As the hour approached, Arsinoe still sat in the simple white 
 dress and 2je])lum, trimmed with blue ribbons, which looked 
 even worse to-day than on the preceding evening. The nose- 
 gay ])resented by Verus gave her much pleasure. All girls 
 Jove beautiful flowers, and there is a sort of kinship between 
 girls and flowers. 
 
 The vexation and ill-humor of Keraunus were not dimin- 
 ished by waiting two hours in the antechamber among those 
 who sought audience with the prefect while Julia, the wife of 
 Verus, and Balbilla were selecting the costume of his daughter 
 among the costly and most richly colored stulfs in fine wool, 
 silk, and delicate bombazine. 
 
 One peculiarity of this kind of labor is the fact that the 
 more time is consumed the greater the number of heljjers. 
 
 But at last Arsinoe apj)eared, glowing with dehght over the 
 beautiful things in jn-ejiaration. As Keraunus rose from his 
 couch to meet her, the door opened to admit Plutarch, gar- 
 landed and adorned with flowers as usual, and supported upon 
 his living crutches. 
 
 Every one rose at his entrance, and as Kerauniis saw that 
 the first lawyer of the city and tlie representative of an ancient 
 family bowed to him he did the same. 
 
 Plutarch's eyes were better than his legs, and proved them- 
 selves among tlie best where pretty women were concerned. 
 On the thresbold he noticed Arsinoe. and beckoned to her with 
 both hands as to a familiar ac(|uaintancc. 
 
 'J'he charming girl hiul greatly })k'ased him. lljul he been 
 younger, he might have striven for lier favor; now he was sat- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 199 
 
 Med to make himself agreeable to her. After his usual cus- 
 tom, he was led close to her side, and, jiatting her u^iou the 
 arm, asked: 
 
 '' Well, charming Koxaua, has Julia arranged the costume 
 to please you?" 
 
 "■ Oh, she has chosen such beautiful things!" answered the 
 girl. 
 
 The washed dress of Arsinoe caught the quick eye of the old 
 man, and since Gabinius had that morning paid him a visit to 
 find out whether Arsinoe did not after all work in the factory, 
 and to repeat what he had said of Keraunus, as a poor, puffed- 
 iip, gluttonous fellow, whose collection of rarities — out of 
 wdiich he scornfully specified a few — was of no value whatever. 
 I'lutarch instantly asked himself how he could preserve his 
 pretty favorite from the envious tongues of her rivals, whose 
 bitter expressions had already come to his ear. 
 
 " Whatever the worthy Julia undertakes will be excellently 
 done," he said, and added, in a whisijer: " Day after to-mor- 
 row, when the goldsmiths reopen their shops, I shall see what 
 I can find for you. I am sinking! Hold me up higher, Atlas 
 and Antti?us! That is better. Surely, my child, I see better 
 here than from below. Is the large man, standing beliind, 
 your father?" 
 
 "Yes.^^ 
 
 '^ Have you no mother?" 
 
 " 8he is dead." 
 
 " Oh!" answered Plutarch, in a tone of pity. Then turn- 
 ing to Keraunus, he said: 
 
 '' Allow me to congratulate you on having such a daughter. 
 I understand that you must also supjily the mother's place to 
 her. " 
 
 " That is unhapjDily true, my dear sir. She resembles my 
 poor wife. Since her death I have led a joyless life." 
 
 " But I hear that you amuse yourself with collecting rarities. 
 We share the same inclination. Are you willing to disi^ose of 
 the cu]? of my namesake Plutarch? Gabinius has told me of 
 its quality. It ought to be an article of genuine worth." 
 
 "It is so," answered Keraunus with jaride. " A gift from 
 the Emperor Trajan to the philoso2)her, and of handsomely 
 carved ivory. I should regret parting with such a pearl, 
 but" — and here he lowered his voice — "I am under obliga- 
 tions to you for kind offices to my daughter, and as a re- 
 turn — " 
 
 " There is no question of that sort," broke in Plutarch, 
 who understood human nature well enough to perceive from 
 
200 THE EMTEROR. 
 
 liis b()n»])a8ti(; spcccli that (Juiymius luul ivi^-esciited him in 
 tnie colors; " you only honor nie in allowing mc to assist in 
 furnishing the rostunR' ol' our Eoxana. I beg you to send me 
 the cu]), anil I consent beforehand to a]iy price you may set on 
 it." 
 
 This was a moment of conilict to Keraunus. Had he not 
 been in such jn-essing need of money, Mere not his desire for a 
 more showy slave so strong, he would have insisted on making 
 the cup a gift to Plutarch, but, as it was, he cleared his throat, 
 and staring at the floor, said, in an embarrassed manner, and 
 without a trace of his former assurance: 
 
 '' I shall then be forced to remain your debtor, as you seem 
 to wish this business transaction to be kept apart from our 
 
 fersonal relations. "Well, then, for a sword of Mark Antony 
 received two thousand drachmas — " 
 
 " Then," broke in the old gentleman, " this cup, the gift 
 of Trajan, is worth twice as much to me, who bear the name 
 of my illustrious ancestor. May I offer four thousand 
 drachmas for your treasure?" 
 
 " My desire to gratify you leads me to accept the offer," re- 
 plied Keraunus, with great dignity, j^ressiug, meanwhile, the 
 little fingers of Arsiuoe, who stood close beside him, and had 
 been trying to intimate by the touch of her hand her feeling 
 that he ought to abide by his first suggestion, and make it a 
 gift to Plutarch. As this unequally matched pair left the 
 antechamber, his eye followed them, and he said to himself 
 with a smile : 
 
 " For once I am pleased. IIow little of satisfaction I have 
 in my own riches; and how often, at the sight of some robust 
 bearer of burdens, do I wish I could exchange jilaces with him. 
 But to-day it was pleasant to have as much as I wanted. The 
 most pressing need of these people seems to be a new dress 
 for that charming child, though the old one does not diminish 
 her beauty. I am sure she belongs to me, and that I have 
 seen her at the gumming-table. " 
 
 As soon as Keraunus reached the street with Arsinoe, he 
 touched her shoulder and whispered : 
 
 '" I told you it would be so, my girl. We shall yet be rich, 
 and need in no respect stand behind our fellow-citizens." 
 
 " If you believed that, father, }ou sh;)uld have insisted on 
 presenting tlie cup to Plutarch." 
 
 " No," returned Keraunus. " lousiness is business; but 
 some time T will repay him tenfolil by the gift of my Apellesi 
 And to Julia I shall send the sandal straps of Cleopatra, set 
 with precious stones. " 
 
THE EMPEROK. 201 
 
 Arsiuoe dropped her eyes to the ground, knowing well how 
 much these things were worth, and said: " We will think of 
 tliat by and by. ■" 
 
 They mounted the sedans in waiting — Keraunus thinking that 
 in the future he should always employ one — and were taken 
 to the garden of the widow of Pudens. It was this visit wliich 
 dispelled the blissful dream of Selene. 
 
 Keraunus conducted himself toward Hannah with icy cold- 
 ness, for it pleased him to make her feel his contempt for 
 everything bearing the name of Christian. When he expressed 
 regret that Selene had been forced to remain in her house, the 
 widow had replied: 
 
 "It is better to be here than on the street.^' 
 
 And as he remarked that he should not accept her atten- 
 tions to his daughter as a gift, but pay her for the nursing, 
 Hannah rei^lied : 
 
 " We gladly do for your child what we can, and there is an- 
 other who will reward us. " 
 
 " That I shall never allow,'' cried Keraunus, indignantly. 
 
 " You misunderstand me,"' returned the Christian, kindly. 
 " I refer to no human being; and the reward we hope to gain 
 is neither in money nor in goods, but in the joyful conscious- 
 ness of having relieved the suffering.'' 
 
 Keraunus shrugged his shoulders and bade Selene ask her 
 physician how soon she might be carried home. 
 
 " I shall not leave you here one moment longer than is 
 necessary," he said, in the same tone he might have used with 
 reference to moving her from an infected house. Then he 
 kissed her forehead, and bidding adieu to Hannah, as care- 
 lessly as if flinging her an alms, went away without paying the 
 slightest heed to Selene's remark that she was very comforta- 
 ble and happy with the widow. The floor had for some time 
 been hot under his feet, and the gold burned his pocket, for 
 he had the means of buying an excellent slave. He thought, 
 jierhaps, if old Sebek were thrown in, he might be able to 
 obtain a good-looking Greek, who would teach his children to 
 read and write. In securing the fine outward appearance, the 
 point of cliief importance would be gained. If also capable of 
 teaching, he could justify himself in expending a large sum. 
 As he approached the slave-market he said to himself: " It is 
 all for the honor of the house: all and only for the chil- 
 dren!" 
 
 According to his direction, Arsinoe remained with Selene, 
 and he promised to call for her on the way home. 
 
 Hannah and Maria left the sisters together, that they might 
 
302 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 8pe;il< without restraint. So soon as they were alone Arsinoe 
 said: "You have red cheeks, Selene, and look very cheerful 
 —and I, too, am so happy — so haj^i^y — " 
 
 " Is it because you are to rei^resent lioxana?'^ 
 
 *' That is also very pleasant; and then, who would have 
 thought yesterday that another day Avould find us so rich? "We 
 really know not what to do with our money. " 
 
 "Wer' 
 
 " Yes; for the father has sold two pieces out of his collection 
 for four thousand drachmas." 
 
 "Oh!" cried Selene, clapping her hands lightly. "Then 
 the most jiressing debts wdll be jiaid. " 
 
 " Certahily; but that is not the best thing." 
 
 " What then?'' 
 
 " Where shall I begin? Oh, Selene, my heart is so full! I 
 am really tired, and j'ct I could dance, and sing, and whirl all 
 day and until to-morrow morning again for joy. When I 
 think of my good fortune my head fairly spins, and I feel that 
 I must catch at something not to stagger. Y^ou do not yet 
 know how one feels Mhom the arrow of Eros has wounded her. 
 Ah, I love Pollux and he loves me — so much!" 
 
 All the blood left Selene's cheeks as her pale lips whispered 
 faintly : 
 
 " Pollux, the son of Euphorion; the sculptor, Pollux!" 
 
 " Yes, our dear, good, tall Pollux. Sharpen your ears now, 
 and let me tell you all about it. Last night, on the Avay to see 
 you, he confessed liis love for me; and now you must counsel 
 me how soonest to win over the father. He is sure to consent 
 some time, for Pollux always succeeds, and one day he w^ill be- 
 come more famous than Papias and Aristcas and Nealkes to- 
 gether. That silly freak o*f liis youth — But how jjale you are, 
 Selene!" 
 
 "It is nothing, really nothing but the pain. Go on," said 
 Selene. 
 
 " Hannah said I must not let you talk too much." 
 
 "Tell mo all; I will be quiet." 
 
 " Y^ou saw the beautiful hejid of our mother which he 
 made," continued Arsinoe. ■"■' It was before that bust we met 
 and spoke together for the first time in nuuiy 3'ears, and I felt 
 at once that he was the detu-est man on the eartli. He fell in 
 love with me, i)oor stujjid thing, at the same time. Then 
 last evening he came here with me. As I went through the 
 streets, leaning on his arm — oh, Selene, it Avas beyond all 
 words! — you would not believe nie! Does the foot give sucb 
 pain, you poor dear? for I see the tears ui your eyes." 
 
THE EMPEROE. 203 
 
 " Go on, and tell me more. " 
 
 And Arsinoe did as she was bidden, sparing nothing which 
 could broaden and deepen the wound in that heart! Eeveling 
 in sweet memories, she described the very spot on the street 
 where Pollux had given her the first kiss, and the bushes in 
 the garden, under whose shade he had clasped her in his arms 
 — their blissful walk in the moonlight. She told her, too, of 
 the crowds gathered for the feast of Dionysius, and how they, 
 insj^ired by the god, had joined the train, and danced madly 
 through the streets — of the hard parting, at last, and, with a 
 laugh, how her father had found the ivy leaf in her hair. 
 
 She chattered on, intoxicated by her own words, and did not 
 see how it affected Selene. "What if she had known that it was 
 her words alone which caused that painful twitching about the 
 mouth of her sister? When she afterward described the rich 
 stuffs Julia had chosen for her costume, Selene listened with 
 only half an ear, but was quick to catch the sum Plutarch had 
 offered for the ivory cuj), and the fact that her father had de- 
 termined to exchange the old slave. 
 
 " Our good old black stork looks shabby, it is true," said 
 Arsinoe, "but I am very sorry to have him go away. Had 
 you been at home perhaps father would not have thought of 
 it." 
 
 Selene laughed dryly, and said, with some scorn in her tone: 
 
 " Two days before you are turned out into the street you will 
 be riding in a chariot. Biit go on with your story. ^' 
 
 " You take always the dark view," said Arsinoe, a little re- 
 pulsed. " But I assure you all will come out better than we 
 fear. So soon as we are rich enough we will buy Sebek back 
 again, and take care of him as long as he lives. " 
 
 Selene shrugged her shoulders, but Arsinoe sjH'ung ny), with 
 tears in her eyes. She had been so glad to share all these 
 pleasant things with her sister, and really believed they would 
 eidiven the tedium of her sick-room, and be like simshine in 
 her shadowed soul. And now she met nothing in response but 
 scornful words and gestures. 
 
 We are not less injured by the hesitation of a friend to sym- 
 pathize in our joy than to have him desert us in misfortune. 
 
 "If you woukl only leave one joy imimbittered," cried 
 Arsinoe. " 1 know well that you are never satisfied with 
 anything I do, but, nevertheless, we are sisters, and you need 
 ]K)t grind your teeth, and spare your words, and shrug your 
 slK)ul(k'r,s, wlion I tell you tilings in which even girls who were 
 strangers would sympathize. You are so cold and inifeeling, 
 and will perhaps even betray me to the father — " 
 
204 THJ^ EMPEROR. 
 
 Arsiiioo did not finish lier sentence, for Selene looked up 
 with eves so full of anguish, and said: 
 
 *' I c'lin not rejoice when it hurts so sorely." And the tears 
 ran down her cheeks. 
 
 New compassion sprung up in the heart of Arsinoe at hear- 
 ing these words, and bending over she kissed her once, twice, 
 thrice, but Selene onh^ pressed her back, and sobbed: 
 
 " Leave me, I beg you — leave me, and go away. I can not 
 bear it any longer,^' and turned her face to the wall. 
 
 Arsinoe tried again to win her with caressing words and lov- 
 ing touches, but the distressed girl only repulsed her, and cried 
 in desperation : 
 
 " I shall die if you do not leave me alone. " 
 
 And the girl, so favored of fortune, whose choicest gifts had 
 been scorned by her only sister and female friend, went weep- 
 ing out of the house, to wait there the return of her father. 
 
 When Hannah came back to the care of her imtient, she 
 noticed that she had been weeping, but asked no questions. 
 Toward evening the widow suggested her remaining alone for 
 half an hour, that she and Maria might join the brethren 
 and sisters at the evening prayer service, and promised that 
 they would pray for her also. 
 
 " Let tilings'^ stay as they are,'" said Selene. " They can 
 not be changed. There are no gods." 
 
 "It is true," returned Hannah, " that there are no gods. 
 But there is one good loving Father in heaven, as you have 
 alreiuly learned." 
 
 " As I have learned," murmured Selene, in a tone of biting 
 sarcasm. 
 
 When alone, she raised herself in the bed and flung the 
 roses and violets that had been lying beside her far into the 
 room, and bending back the fastening of the brooch until it 
 was broken, she let it slide down between the bed and the 
 wall, and then fell back, staring vacantly at the ceiling. With 
 the api)roach of evening the increased fragrance exhaling from 
 tlie lilies and honeysuckles before the window became un- 
 j)leasant to her fevered senses. They were remhiders of her 
 shattered joys and witnesses of her present misery. 
 
 She drew the covers over her face to shut out this fresh an- 
 noyance, but as Cjuickly flung them ofl', with a sense of suti^o- 
 cation. A strange restlessness took possession of her whole 
 being, which aggravated the pain in her ankle and set her 
 whole head tlirobbing. Lvery nerve was keenly alive, every 
 thouglit increased her distress; lier soul was at the mercy of 
 cruel powers, its emotions tossed back and forth, as a storm 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 205 
 
 beats the crowns of the jDahii-trees. Without the relief of 
 tears, unable to remain in one jiosition,, and yet jjunished by 
 new agony for every motion, incapable of reasoning or of con- 
 nected thought, 3^et persuaded that the odor of the flowers was 
 acting upon her like poison, she dragged her injured foot from 
 the bed, and sat down ujwn its edge, without heeding either 
 the i)ain or the warning of her physician. The long tresses of 
 her hair fell about her face and down over her shoulders and 
 arms. 
 
 In this position, her thoughts took a new direction. Out- 
 wardly, a statue of stone staruig vacantly at the floor, yet bit- 
 ter hostility against her sister, hatred toward Pollux, contempt 
 for the miserable weaknesses of her father and for her own 
 infatuation, made a wild temj^est within her soul. 
 
 The garden lay in peaceful silence, and the evening wind 
 brought snatches of the pious song from the praying circle in 
 the house of the widow of Pudens to her ear. Selene gave it 
 no heed, but as a stronger breath of the sickly fragrance 
 touched her senses, she clutched her own hair with a violence 
 that produced a cry of pain. Then the question whether this 
 were less rich and beautiful than that of her sister, came into 
 her mind, and with it a wish, sudden as lightning, that she 
 might so clutch her sister by the hair and hurl her to the 
 ground. 
 
 Again that odor, that imendurable fragrance! She would 
 not bear it any longer! She rose and with very halting steps 
 succeeded in reaching the window and dashing the flowers to 
 the ground, with the vase in which they stood, which, oidy a 
 short time before, had cost all Hannah's sjjare money. 
 
 Standing upon one foot, she leaned against the side of the 
 window for sujajoort, and heard more distinctly the plashing of 
 the waves upon the stony beach behind the little house of 
 Hannah. With fevered blood, and burning foot, and throb- 
 bing head, and her soul consuming Avith hatred, as by a slow 
 fire, every wave dashing among the j)ebbles seemed to cry out 
 to her: "Come to me. I can put out the flames; I can re- 
 fresh and cool your blood. ' ' What had life to offer but new 
 torment and misery? But the sea, that dark, blue sea, was 
 vast, and cold, and deep, and the waves wooed lier with flat- 
 tering promise to take away at once the glow of the fever and 
 the burden of life. Selene did not reflect, she weighed noth- 
 ing; she remembered neither the children to whom she stood 
 in place of the mother, 2ior the father whose guard and suj> 
 port she had been; and listened only to the gloomy roices which 
 
20G THE EMPEROR. 
 
 whispert'd tliut llu; world \v;is bad and cruel — a state where 
 grief and anxiety would never cease to gnaw the soul. 
 
 She fancied herself standing m a burning pool that reached 
 her tcm]>les; and as one whose garments are in llanies instinct- 
 ively rushes toward the water, so she ho])ed to lind in those 
 dejiths the goal of all her longings — that fair, cold death in 
 which all is over forever. Groaning and dizzy, she staggered 
 through the door into the garden; and with both hands jjressed 
 upon her temi^les, limjjed toward the sea. 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 The Alexandrians were stiff-necked. Only something very 
 remarkable in a city always full of strange sights could induce 
 them to turn their heads. To-day, es2)ecially, each one 
 thought of himself and his own i)leasure. Some especially 
 stately or fantastically attired figure might cause a momentary 
 smile or Avord of ap2)lause; but before one had really looked it 
 had jiassed on, and some new object attracted the eye. 
 
 So no one gave especial attention to Hadrian and his two 
 companions, who let themselves be borne with the tide of liv- 
 ing beings through the city streets. 
 
 Hadrian Avas dressed to rejiresent Silenus, Pollux as a faun. 
 Both wore masks, and the slender, suj)23le youth supported his 
 character quite as well as the vigorous man at his side. 
 
 Antinous rej)resented Eros, wearing a rose-colored mantle 
 and garlands of flowers, the silver quiver over his shoulder as 
 well as the bow in his hand indicating the god he jiersonated. 
 lie also wore a mask, but his figure often attracted attention, 
 and many a " Long live Eros!" or " Be gracious to me, beau- 
 tiful son of Aphrodite!'^ echoed after him. 
 
 Pollux had taken the costimies from the house of his master 
 Pa2)ias, who was absent when he went for them — but the ques- 
 tion of his consent seemed needless to the youth, for he, as 
 well as the other apprentices, had often, Avitli the knowledge 
 of Pajiias, used these things for a similar ])ur2)ose. He hesi- 
 tated a little over the quiver because it Avas of real silver, and 
 had been a gift to Papia,s from the Avife of a rich grain dealer, 
 Avhose image he had cut in marble representing lier as Artemis 
 hunting. 
 
 " The handsome friend of the architect," said Pollux to 
 himself, as he laid this article in the basket with the other 
 things, which a squint-eyed boy was to carry to Hadrian, 
 " Avill make a charming Eros, but he must have a (]uiver, and 
 before the -sun rises it Avill be hairging again on its hook.-" 
 
THE EMPEROR. 207 
 
 But Pollux found littlo opportunity to rejoice in tlio. bcnuty 
 of this god of love, for the Koman architect whom he guide(i 
 had such an insatiable desire to know everything, that thi^-: 
 young man, horn and brought up in Alexandria, was besieged 
 with questions. Not content with seeing the main streets and 
 public squares, he looked also at the private houses, and asked 
 after the names and position and wealth of their occupants. 
 The clear-headed manner in which he asked to be conducted 
 into this or that ]jart of the city testified to Pollux that he was 
 quite familiar with its plan, and the pleasure and admiration 
 he exj^ressed in the broad, clean streets, the charming oi^en 
 places, and the fine buildings, were most gratifying to the 
 patriotic young Alexandrian. 
 
 Hadrian asked first to be taken along the sea, and by way of 
 the Bruchiom to the temi^le of Poseidon, before which he per- 
 formed an act of devotion. He looked into the gardens of the 
 kingly palace and its neighboring museum. 
 
 The Ca^sareum, with its Egy^itian gate, excited his admira- 
 tion not less than the countless statues in the great theater, 
 surrounded by its many-storied arcade. From this they turned 
 to the left toward t]ie sea again, to visit the Emporeum, the 
 forest of masts in the harbor of Eunostus, and the handsome 
 quays. The Heptastadium was to the right, and the harbor 
 of Kibotus, swarming with merchant ships, held their attention 
 but a short time. Here they turned their backs upon the 
 sea, going through the quarter called Ehacotis, j)eopled entirely 
 by Egyjitians, and containing much that interested the 
 Romans. 
 
 They met first so formidable a procession of priests in the 
 service of the Nile gods, bearing chests of relics, holy vessels, 
 divhiities, and images of sacred animals to the 8erapeum as 
 to fill all the neighboring streets. Hadrian did not attempt to 
 reach the building, but lie looked at the vehicles going up an 
 inclined road toward the sacred temple, and also the ti-ain of 
 worshipers on foot who climbed by a long flight of stairs that 
 grew broader toward the toj^, and ended in a j^latform on which 
 four strong pillars sui^ported a skillfully vaulted cupola. The 
 eye could not at once take hi all the structures connected with 
 the temple and protected by this gigantic canopy. The 
 priests in their white robes, the lean, half-naked Egyptians 
 with their folded aprons and head-clotlis, the statues of ani- 
 mals, and the curiously painted houses in this quarter greatly 
 interested Hadrian and led him to ask many questions that 
 Pollux was unable to answer. 
 
 Their visit of observation extended to the southern extremity 
 
208 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 of the cit}', l.ving along the .sliores of Lake Mareotis. Nilo 
 shi]).s and boats of every shape and size Jay at anclior in this 
 deej) inhmd water. HerePoUux jiointcd out tlie canal tlirough 
 which incrcliandise brought u]) the river was conveyed to the 
 shi])s, and called attention to tlie charming country seats and 
 well-nursed vineyards on the shores of the lake. Hadrian re- 
 marked, thoughtfully: 
 
 " The body of this city ought to thrive, since it receives 
 nourishment through two mouths and two stomachs — I mean 
 the sea and the lake." 
 
 " And two harbors also/' added Pollux. 
 
 " You are right," answered Hadrian; "but it is time for 
 us to return. " 
 
 And, gohig again eastward, they j^assed through the silent 
 streets whei-e the Christians had their homes, also the Jews' 
 quarter. Here many houses were closed; and they found 
 nothing of the festal confusion which reigned among all the 
 heathen population; for the strict adherents of the Jewish 
 faith kept themselves apart from the celebration of heathen 
 festivities; while theyAvho lived among them gradually learned 
 to take their share. 
 
 For the third time that day, Hadrian and his companions 
 crossed the Canopic wa}' — that great mart of commerce which 
 divided the city into two j^arts — the northern and the southern; 
 for he wished to ascend the Panium hill and get a view of both 
 2)arts, and learn their relations to each other. 
 
 The carefully kept gardens surrounding this eminence 
 swarmed with living beings, and the winding path leading to 
 the toj) was crowded with women and children going wp to get 
 a view of the most striking spectacle of the day, to be followed 
 by performances in all the theaters. 
 
 Before the emperor and his companions reached the Panium, 
 the crowd had become dense, and the cry passed from one to 
 another: 
 
 "Here they come!" "To-day they begin earlier!" 
 "There they are!" 
 
 Lictors, with their fasces, cleared the broad streets leading 
 from the prefecture to the Panium, over the Bruchiom, giving 
 no heed to the mocking and jeering words elicited l)y their aj)- 
 jK-arance. One woman, whom a guard pressed back with his 
 fasces, cried in scorn : 
 
 " Better give me the reeds for my children than use them 
 against (juiet citizens." 
 
 " An ax is hidden within the bundle," added a scribe in 
 warning. 
 
THE EMPEROH. 209 
 
 " Then pass it along to me," said a butcher; " it will serve 
 in my slaughter-house." 
 
 The blood rose to the face of the Romans; but they remem- 
 bered the words of the prefect, who, knowing the Alexandrians, 
 had bid them be deaf — seeing, not hearing, all things. 
 
 Now there appeared a cohort from the twelfth legion sta- 
 tioned in Egyj)t, in j)arade uniform. Behind them walked a 
 double row of chosen hctors crowned with wreaths. Then 
 came many hundred wild animals, led by the dark-skinned 
 Egyptians — leopards, panthers, giraffes, gazelles, antelopes 
 and deer. After this a richly dressed and gayly wreathed 
 Dionysian choir, with tambourine, lyre, double flute, and 
 triangle-clang; and finally, drawn by ten elejihants and twenty 
 white horses, a great gilded ship fixed ujDon wheels, represent- 
 ing the vessel into which Tyrrhenian j^irates enticed the young 
 Dionysius, after they had discovered the black -haired youth in 
 his purple garments on the shore. But the evil-doers — so said 
 the myth — were not long permitted to rejoice in their crime, 
 for scarcely had they reached the open sea when the chains of 
 the god fell off, vine leaves grew with miraculous rapidity and 
 luxuriance over the sails, while the tough stalks and the 
 clinging ivy twined like serpents around mainmast and oars, 
 and immense bunches of grapes made the ro23es heavy and 
 covered all the sides and decks. Dionysius is equally powerful 
 on land or sea. He himself took the form of a lion, and the 
 frightened pirates, 23lnnging terrified into the sea, were changed 
 into dolphins, who followed their lost vessel. Titianus, who 
 had devised and adorned this to represent the Homeric poem 
 and feast the eyes of the Alexandrians, was, with his wife and 
 many Romans from the suite of the empress, carried in this 
 veliicle through the streets to enjoy the festal demonstrations. 
 Great and small, old and young, male and female, Greeks, 
 Romans, Jews, Egyptians, dark and light skinned strangers, 
 both smooth and woolly haired, pressed with equal zeal to the 
 borders of the streets to see the gilded ship. 
 
 Hadrian, with a better appreciation of the mirth than his 
 more sensitive companion, had pushed into the forward row, 
 and as Antinous tried to follow, a Greek boy whom he had 
 pushed to one side, tore the mask from his face, dropped to 
 the ground, and slipped nimbly away with his booty. As 
 Hadrian turned to look after the Bithynian, the ship on which 
 the prefect stood between the pictures of the emperor and the 
 empress, and Julia Balbilla, with her companion and other 
 Romans were seated, Avas close upon them. His sharp eye 
 had recognized their faces, and as he feared the uncovered face 
 
210 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 of Antiiious would betray his presence, lie cried to him: " Tuni 
 around, and step back into the crowd!" 
 
 Antinous obeyed the command instaiitly, and glad to bo free 
 from the press, which was in the liighest degree annoying to 
 him, sat down uj^on a bench near the Panium, and fell to 
 dreaming of Selene and the nosegay lie hud sent her, and 
 neitlicr saw nor heard wliat was jjassing around him. When 
 the gay ship left the Panium garden and turned into tlie Can- 
 opic way, the noisy crowd jiressed onward with it. 
 
 As a brook suddenly swollen by a cloud-burst rushes madly 
 along its channel carrying all before it, so were Hadrian and 
 Pollux forced to follow in its wake. An immensely long 
 colonnade bordered this famous street, which led from one end 
 of the city to the other. Hundreds of Corinthian columns 
 supported its covering, and by clinging to one of these they 
 succeeded in gaining a footing and recovering their spent 
 breath. 
 
 The first care of Hadrian was to find Antinous, and as he 
 shrunk from mixing again in the crowd, he begged Pollux to 
 search for him. 
 
 " Will you wait for me here?" asked Pollux. 
 
 " I have known more comfortable places," sighed Hadrian. 
 
 *' I also," answered Pollux. " The high poi^lar and ivy- 
 wreathed door yonder leads into a cook-shop, where even the 
 gods might be well entertained." 
 
 " I will wait for you there.'" 
 
 " But I warn you to exercise self-denial, for the ' Ol3'mi)ian 
 Table ' of the Corinthian Lykortas is the most expensive eat- 
 ing-house in the city. Only those carrying the heaviest purses 
 are his guests. " 
 
 " That is good news," said Hadrian, laughing. " Get a 
 new mask for my assistant and bring him back. It will not 
 make me a bankrupt to get a meal for three of us. On a 
 feast-day one expects to pay out something." 
 
 " May you not repeat the otter! Such a tall fellow as I can 
 keep liis host busy at tlie wine-tankard and behind the 
 dishes." 
 
 "■ We will see what you can do," cried the emperor after 
 him, as he was harrying away. " And besides, I owe you a 
 meal in return for your mother's supper of cabbage." 
 
 While Pollux sought the l>ith)niian, tlie emi)eror entered the 
 lirst eating-house of a city famous in culinary art. 
 
 The space where the greater part of tlie guests took their 
 meals was an open court, surrounded by pillared halls, three 
 
THE EMPEROR. 211 
 
 sides of which were only covered at tlie top, and one iucloscd 
 by AS'alls. 
 
 In this ojien sjiace were couches, on which the guests re- 
 clined, singly, in pairs, or in large groups, ordering the dishes 
 and drinks of their choice, Avhich the slaves — pretty boys with 
 curling hair and tasteful garments — served on small, low 
 tables. Here a party was merry and noisy — there sat some 
 epicure silently enjoying the delicate dainties — yonder a circle 
 of men were more eager to speak than to eat; while out from 
 some inclosed apartment came notes of music and mingled 
 laughter of men and women. 
 
 The emperor wished a separate room, but all were occupied, 
 and he was requested to wait a short time for one that would 
 soon be vacated. He had removed his mask, and although 
 there was little fear of his being recognized in that costume, 
 he chose a position behind one of the large pillars on the back 
 side of the hall, which the approach of evening already cast 
 into the shadow. There he ordered wine and oysters; and 
 while partaking of these, he called a head-waiter to arrange 
 with him for a meal, so soon as the two others should arrive. 
 During this conversation the host perceived that he had to do 
 with one accustomed to table luxuries, and politely communi- 
 cated to him the resources of the establishment. There was 
 much in this immense court to excite the curiosity of an in- 
 quisitive person like Hadrian. 
 
 Food was prepared before the eyes of the guests, that they 
 might make their own selection from the choicest articles 
 Avhich the market afforded. 
 
 Here every variety of vegetable which Egypt or Greece could 
 furnish was arranged in jjicturesque piles — there, fruits of every 
 form and size — in another place were the preparations in deli- 
 cate, gnldon-ln-own pastry. Those filled with meat, fish, or 
 Cuno])us mussels were prepared in Alexandria; others contain- 
 ing fruits and flower petals were brought from Arsinoe on Lake 
 Moeris, in whose neighborhood gardening and fruit raising 
 had been carried to the highest perfection. 
 
 Meats of every sort were hanging or lying in their ajjprojiri- 
 ate locations. There were juicy hams from Cyrene, Italian 
 sausages, and cuts of fresh meat, also game and poultry in 
 great variety; and one large space Avas occupied by a tank in 
 which the finest scaly inhabitants of the Nile and of the in- 
 land lakes of Upper Egypt, as well as the costly mursna and 
 other species of Italian fish, were seen swimming about. 
 Alexandria crabs, mussels, oysters, and varieties from Cano])us 
 and Klysma were kept fresh in rmiuiug water. The smokeci 
 
212 im; i;.mii;k()i;. 
 
 provisions from Meiulcs jind Luke Mooriswerc suspended from 
 metal hooks, ;ind in a covered but jiiry spot were freshly eiiuglit 
 iUh inim Mie Mediternineiui iind IJed Heas. Every guest of 
 the " Olymi)iau Table " chose for himself the meat, fruit, as- 
 paragus, lisli, or pastry which he wished to have prepared. 
 
 JiVkortas, the liost, pointed out to Hadrian an elderly man 
 who^ in this well-ordered court of still life, was choosing the 
 articles for an evening banquet. 
 
 "All fine, all excellent,'^ said Hadrian; "but the giuits 
 and flies, attracted by all this nuignificence down there are 
 quite intolerable. The odor of cooking also takes away my 
 a])])etite. " 
 
 " In the side apartments," said the host, " it will be better. 
 The party is already breaking up in the one you have engaged. 
 Just behind here the sophist Demetrius and Tancrates are en- 
 tertaining a few gentlemen from Eome, rhetoricians, phi- 
 losoi^hers, or something of that sort. They have been at table 
 discussing and contending since breakfast-time, and now lamps 
 are being carried in. There go the guests from the next room. 
 Will you have it?'' 
 
 " Yes,"' answered the emperor; " and when a tall young 
 man asks for the Roman architect, Claudius Venator, bring 
 him to me." 
 
 " So, then, you are an architect, and no sophist, or rhetori- 
 cian?" said the host, eying him attentively. 
 
 " Silenus — a 2:)hiloso2jlier?"' 
 
 " Oh, both the loud-talking men j^onder go orduiarily naked, 
 or with ragged mantles over their shoulders. To-day they are 
 being feasted by the rich Josejihus." 
 
 " Josephus! That is a Jewish name, but the man seems to 
 be bravely attacking the ham." 
 
 " There Avould be more swine iii Cyrene were there no 
 Israelites there! They are Greeks, like ourselves, and eat that 
 which suits their tastes." 
 
 Hadrian entered the vacated apartment, and after he had 
 seen the slaves drive away the flies which had gathered about 
 the table so lately used, he stretched himself upon a couch, 
 and listened to the conversation of Favorinus, Florus, imd their 
 Greek guests. He knew the two first, and his sharp ear fol- 
 lowed the whole conversation. Favorinus was praising the 
 Alexandrians in a loud tone, but in fluent and beautifully ac- 
 cented Greek. He was a native of Arelas, in (xaul, but the 
 language of Demosthenes never flowed more smoothly from 
 the lips of a Hellenic Greek. He aflihated much more natu- 
 rally with the self-i3oised, keen, and active inhabitants of the 
 
THE EMPEKOK. 213 
 
 cosmopolitan African city than with the Athenians. These 
 lived only in the jmst; the Alexandrians dared to rejoice in 
 the jiresent. Here he found indej^endent thought; but on the 
 Ilissus men were only servants, who made a trade of their 
 learning, as the Alexandrians trafficked in the merchandise of 
 Africa and the treasures of India. As he had once fallen into 
 disgrace with Hadrian, the Athenians had overthrown his 
 statue. The favor or the disfavor of princes seemed to them 
 of more consequence than spiritual strength, great deeds, or 
 high desert. Florus confirmed the ideas of Favorinus through- 
 out, and declared that lionie must free herself from the intel- 
 lectual influence of Athens. 
 
 But Favorinus did not yield his point, and insisting that 
 each of them, having passed the i:)eriod of youth when it is 
 hard to learn anything new, he alluded with mild sarcasm to 
 the famous work of his table companion, in which Florus had 
 attempted to distribute the history of Kome into four parts, 
 corresponding with the four ijeriods of human life, and had for- 
 gotten the old age — treating of Eome only in childhood . youth 
 and manhood. Favorinus retorted that, like his friend Florus, 
 he had placed too high a value on the flexibility of lioman 
 genius, and underrated that of the Greeks. 
 
 The answer of Florus was in a voice so deej), and with words 
 so bombastic, that the listening emperor felt disposed to assist 
 him, and to ask how many cuj^s had been taken by this very 
 excitable countryman since the hour of breakfast. 
 
 As Florus attempted to prove that Kome — under the govern- 
 ment of Hadrian — had attained the summit of its vigor, he 
 was interrupted by his friend Demetrius, with the request that 
 he should describe the personal apj^earance of Hadrian. 
 
 Florus did this willingly, and drew also a brilliant picture of 
 his skill in governing, his general knowledge and ability. 
 
 "There is only one thing I do not like," he cried, viva- 
 ciously. " He is too little in Eome — now the very heart of the 
 world. He wants to see everything, and travels restlessly 
 through the provinces. I would not like to exchange places 
 with him!" 
 
 " You have expressed that idea in verse," broke in Fa- 
 vorinus. 
 
 " Only a jest at a banquet. I make myself comfortable at 
 the ' Olympian Table ' of this excellent cook-shop every day 
 while M-aiting the arrival of Hadrian in Alexandria." 
 
 " How do the verses run?" asked Pancrates. 
 
 '' 1 have forgotten them, and they deserve no better fate/"' 
 answered Florus. 
 
211 THE EiirKUOU. 
 
 " Bui I ivmcmbcr the bcgiiiuiiig/' li.uightM.1 tiiu Caul. 
 "■ The lirst verse ruiis thus, I think: 
 
 " ' Cii'sar to be, I do not covet: 
 
 lu savage JJritaiu to wander round, 
 In bitter Scythia to be snow-bound, 
 Such life I leave to those who love it.' "* 
 
 J Icidriaii struck his fist into the left hand with these words, 
 tind -while the biincpieters were speculating as to why he re- 
 nuiiued so long away from Alexandria, lie took the folding 
 tablet he was in the habit of carrying in his purse, and 
 scratched rapidly the following verse in the wax: 
 
 " Florus to be, I do not covet- 
 Drinkiufr-shops to wander round 
 By tbe Garkoch life so bound, 
 Where fat barrack insects feed, 
 There to bury thought and deed, 
 Florus may — I do not love it." 
 
 Scarcely had he finished -writing, with evident internal 
 amusement, when the head-waiter brought in Pollux. He 
 luul not succeeded in finding Antinous, but expressed the 
 opinion that the young man had returned home; and he 
 begged the emjoeror to excuse him from a long attendance at 
 the meal, since he had just met his master, Pajiius, Avho had 
 exiiressed great displeasiu-e at his long absence. Hadrian no 
 longer enjoyed the society of Pollux as he had during the day. 
 
 The conversation in the next room was far more eiitertuin- 
 ing than that with the honest t]iongh uncultivated fellow. He- 
 sides, he was disturbed by the failure to find Antinous, and in- 
 clined to leave early on this account. Antinous could easily 
 find his way to the Lochias, but a remembrance of the evil 
 tokens, seen the night before, flitted, like bats in a banquet- 
 ing hall, through the air about him, which he tried in vain to 
 scatter. Neither was Pollux so light-hearted as before. He 
 was hungr}', and applied liimself to the excellent dishes so 
 vigorously and emi)tied the cujjs so rapidly that the em])eror 
 was astonished, but the more he thought the less he said. The 
 reproaches of Pa])ias had roused him to declare, shortly and 
 decisivel}^, his determination to quit the service of a master 
 and stand upon his own feet, and he Avas in haste to make this 
 fact known to his parents and to Arsinoe. 
 
 AVhile at the table, the advice of his mother, to seek the favor 
 
 * Verses of Hadrian and Antinous, preserved liy tfpartianus, trans 
 latcd by Mrs, C. B. CJhambcrs. 
 
THE EMrEROR. 215 
 
 and assistance of the Iioman areliitect, oocnrrcd toliis thoughts; 
 but he had neglected to do so, jiartly from an unwillingness 
 to be under obligation to any one, and partly because the long 
 hours of intercourse since morin"ng had only strengthened his 
 impression of the man's superiority to himself rather than in- 
 creased his familiarity. 
 
 He felt a strange shrinking from the restless, inquisitive 
 gray-beard who asked so many questions, and, even while 
 silent, looked so unapjiroachably profound that one would not 
 venture to disturb him. 
 
 The bold sculptor had nevertheless attempted to break 
 through this feeling of restraint, but retired each time with 
 the consciousness of having made an awkward failure. He 
 seemed, in comparison with Claudius Venator, like a dog play- 
 ing with a lion; a game that could lead to no good result for 
 the dog. So, for many reasons, both host and guest were glad 
 when the meal was over. 
 
 Before Pollux went out the emperor gave him the tablet 
 containing the verse, with the smiling request that he would 
 send it, through the gate-keeper of the Ca?sareum. to ATmanis 
 Florus, the Eoman. He begged him also to look for Antin- 
 ous, and, if he should find him on the Lochias, to say that he 
 would soon return thither. 
 
 Pollux went on his way. Hadrian, having listened for an- 
 other hour to the conversation near him, without hearing any 
 new mention of himself, jDaid his reckoning and went out into 
 the brilliantly illuminated streets, mixed with the jovial crowd, 
 but, depressed and uneasy about his favorite, made slow prog- 
 ress toward the Lochias. 
 
 CHAPTER m. 
 
 Antinous wandered among the crowd, seeking his master. 
 Whenever he saw two esjDecially tall men together, he followed, 
 only to find that he had pursued a false impression. Earnest 
 and jjersevering ofi'ort was not one of his natural qualities; so 
 when he became tired he sat down upon a bench in the Panium 
 garden. 
 
 Two cynical philosoj)hers, with unkempt hair, bristling 
 beards, and ragged l)lankets about their shivering bodies, sat 
 down near him, and began to utter loud invectives against that 
 devotion to outward thiiigs and low enjoyments which char- 
 acterized the present day, making sensual indulgence and dis- 
 play, iiistead of rngged virtue, the end of being. In order to 
 be heard as far as possible, they spoke m loud voices, and the 
 
216 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 elder of them swung a knotty staff witli all the vehemence 
 necessary to repel an attack of savages. 
 
 Antinoiis was disgusted by their ugly looks, rude manners, 
 and screeching voices; but he thought jierhaps Hadrian would 
 have been amused by their appearance. Their remarks were 
 evidently aimed at Antinous, for as he rose to leave they fol- 
 lowed him with reviling words, ridiculing his costume and his 
 anointed hair. 
 
 'I'he Bithyjiian made no reply, but sauntered onward, with 
 no special plan, only noticing that the street ran toward the 
 sea, and from thence he could easily find his way to the 
 Lochias. 
 
 It was growing dark when he reached the gate-keeper's 
 house, and learned from Doris that the emperor and x'ollux 
 had not returned. ^Yhat could he do alone in the wioe, deso- 
 late palace? Were not even the slaves free on this day? Why 
 should not he also, for once, roam unrestrained like the 
 others? Pleased with the thought of being liis own master, 
 and wandering where he would, he strolled backward until he 
 came upon the booth of one selling wreaths, which reminded 
 him vividly of Selene and the flowers which must long since 
 have reached her. He knew that she was being iiursed among 
 the Christians, in a little house near the sea. "Pollux had be- 
 come quite animated in describing his glimiDse into the litdited 
 room where she lay. 
 
 _" Always beautiful," he said; " but never more lovely than 
 lying in her pallor upon the couch.'' 
 
 Antinous determined to venture one more look upon the girl 
 whose image filled his heart and mind, and thinking he might 
 stand in the same place where Pollux had been on the previous 
 evening, he mounted the first sedan which appeared. 
 
 The black bearers were too slow for his eagerness, and more 
 than once he flung them as much gold as they ordinarily earned 
 in a week, to stimulate their progress. At last they reached 
 the gate, but seeing several white-robed figures in the garden 
 he ordered the bearers to go further. In a dark and narrow 
 street on the eastern side of the estate of the M'idow of Piidens, 
 he descended, and bid the sedan wait for him. Before the 
 garden gate he met two men in white robes, and one of the 
 cynics who had sat upon the same bench in the Panium gar- 
 den. Impatiently striding up and down while he waited for 
 t hese ])enple to disappear, he passed frequently the space lighted 
 l»y the lamps hanging at the i)ortal. The waiulering eyes of 
 the cynic remarked him, and Hinging u}) his long, bony arms, 
 and i)ointing toward the r.ithyiiiaii, he cried, partly to the 
 
THE EMPEROR. 217 
 
 Christians with whom he was talking, and partly to the youtli 
 himself: 
 
 " What does that coxcomb, that fine dandy, want here? I 
 know the fellow with the smooth face, and the silver quiver on 
 liis shoulder. One would suppose he thought himself to be 
 Cupid in earnest. Out of the wa}^, you rat! The ladies in 
 here know how to guard themselves from street loafers in 
 rose-colored rags. Out of the way, or you may make acquaint- 
 ance with the dogs and the slaves of the noble Paulina. Hey, 
 door-keeper! Look out for this fellow!" 
 
 Antinous made no re-plj, but walked slowly toward the jDlace 
 where he had left the sedan, saying to himself: " Perhaps to- 
 morrow, if I can not to-day;" thinking, as he went on, of no 
 scheme through which he might attain his Vv'ish. The sedan 
 was not where he had left it. Its bearers had gone into the 
 next street, where was a little house belonging to a fisherman, 
 whose wife sold a species of thin Felusian beer; and Antinous 
 Avent up to the little inclosure where the black women sat un- 
 der a cover of twisted fig-branches, and by the light of an oil 
 lamp, to call them. It was quite dark in the street, l^ut at 
 the end of it he saw the moonlight glancing on the water. 
 The plashing of the weaves enticed him toward the pebbly 
 shore. As he noticed there a boat tossing between the posts 
 to which it was fastened, the thought struck him that perhaps 
 he might see the house in which Selene was lying from the sea 
 itself. To loosen the boat from its moorings was the work of 
 a moment, and as he took his place within it he laid down 
 bow and quiver and, seizing the oars, rowed with reguJar 
 stroke along the shore toward the white striji, which seemed 
 also to bo the goal of the silver-tij^ped waves. There lay the 
 garden of the widow of Pudens, and the little white house he 
 could see from here must be the one where the fair, pale 
 Selene was lying; but he could not get sight of the window 
 Pollux had described. Would it not be possible to find some spot 
 where he could jDut in with his boat and succeed in entering 
 the garden? There lay two boats, but the walled canal in 
 which they rested was closed from the sea by a grated door. 
 
 A platform extending into the sea, and surroanded by a 
 columned balcony, made the place unapproachable. But as 
 he looked longer and more intently, he descried a narrow 
 flight of white marble steps parting the wall. Antinous 
 dropped one oar into the water, and was turning the boat to- 
 ward (liat spot, \d\on his attention was arrested by tlie appear- 
 ance of a white-robed figure, with streaming hair, iqwn the 
 platform. How strangely it moved! tottering a few steps, 
 
21 S THE EMPEROR. 
 
 iuid tlioii standinf( .still, with both hiuids raised to the head! 
 Antinous instijictivcly shuddered, and remembered the demons 
 of whieh Hadrian occasionally spoke — beings belonging partly 
 to the human race, and jiartly to the gods, and which some- 
 times a2)peared to the dying. Or was .Selene dead, and could 
 this be her Avaudering ghost? lie held his boat steadily and 
 gazed at the figure with suspended breath, which had now 
 reached tlie balustrade of the i)latform, whore he could see it 
 distinctly — with both hands pressed against the face, bending 
 over the parapet, and now — 
 
 As a star falls from the clear night sky, or in autumn the 
 rii)e fruit from the branch, so dropped this white-robed figure 
 from the iilatform. One loud cry broke the silence, and 
 Avithin the same moment he heard a plashing in the water, 
 and the spii-ting drops thrown uj)ward played and glanced in 
 the beams of the moon. 
 
 "Was it the dreamer Antinous who now instantly pnt liis oars 
 into the water, and with a few vigorous strokes brought it to 
 the sjiot where the drowning figure rose to the surface a 
 few seconds after its plunge, and then bending over the side 
 seized the garments of something, which, being neither demon 
 nor shadow, he drew out of the water? He succeeded in lift- 
 ing it, but in trying to pull it into the boat lost his balance, 
 the boat capsized, and Antinous slid into the sea. After him 
 jilunged the silver bow and quiver. The Bithynianwas a good 
 swimmer. Before the white figure again smik he had seized it 
 with one hand, and, swimming with his feet and the one free 
 arm, succeeded in reaching the marble steps he had Ijcfore 
 noticed. When his feet touched firm ground he lifted the 
 rescued body with both hands, and hastened up the jilatform 
 to a bench. The broad marble fiagging shone in the light of 
 the moon — seeming almost to shed an inde2)endent gleam. 
 As lie laid his wet, and, perhaps, lifeless burden upon the 
 bench, a faint groan gave him the lio})e that his labor had not 
 been in vain. 'Jlien, carefully sujijwrting the head upon one 
 arm, he parted the wet hair from the face, and as if struck by 
 lightning, sunk iqwn his knees before the fair 'paie face of 
 tSelene — for it was she that he had rescued! she before Avliom 
 he knelt! 
 
 Quite beside himself, and trendjling from head to foot, he 
 put his ear to her lips, to be sure he had not been deceived, 
 and to learn if any breath found its way through their motion- 
 less niar])Ie. 
 
 Yes, she breathed, she lived! 
 
 In a transport of joy he pressed his own cheek against hers. 
 
THE EMPEROK. 219 
 
 Oh, how cold, liow ic}', liow deatli-like! Tho si^irk ol" lil'c 
 glimmered but faintly, yet lie could not, would not, let it lie 
 extinguished — and, as thouglitfidly, as quickly, and decidedly 
 as the most vigorous of men, he raised her in his arms, as 
 though she were a mere child, and bore her to the house whose 
 white wall was revealed by the moonlight. 
 
 The lam}! in the room Selene had so lately left was still 
 burning, and before the window through which the light luul 
 shone to guide his steps, lay the flowers whose fragrance had 
 caused so much misery, together with the fragments of a jior- 
 celain vase. 
 
 Were these flowers his gift? Perhai^s so. And this room, 
 into which he looked, must be the one Pollux had described. 
 The house door stood oj^en, and that into the dej)artment he 
 entered to lay Selene on the bed. She looked like one dead, 
 and as he looked upon the face Avhicli bore such traces of 
 suffering his heart was touched by a compassion never before 
 experienced. And as a brother might bend over a slumbering 
 sister, so did he bend and kiss the forehead of Selene. She 
 stirred, and, opening her eyes, stared into liis face with such 
 terror and bewilderment — the look of her eyes was so glassy 
 and weird — that he stepj^ed back shuddering, and with lifted 
 hands, could only ejaculate: "Oh, Selene, do you not know 
 me?'' 
 
 She did not seem to hear his question, but her eyes wildly 
 followed his every motion. 
 
 " Selene!" he cried again, seizing her limp hand and jiress- 
 ing it fervently to his lips. Then she uttered a loud cry, a 
 shiver ran through her frame, and she broke into sighs and 
 groans. In the same moment a door ojoened and Maria en- 
 tered, Avho at sight of Antinous standing beside the bed of her 
 friend gave expression to a scream of terror; and he, like a 
 startled thief, rushed out of the house and through the garden 
 toward the gate. Here the porter op2)osed his progress; but 
 lie ])ut him aside with one vigorous effort, burst the gate, and 
 though the gray-haired gate-keeper clutched at his garments, 
 he fled, leaving a part of his chiton in his hand, and raced, like 
 a comjietitor in the gymnasium, through the streets initil be- 
 yond the reach of his pursuer. The cry of the porter, min- 
 gling with the pious songs, startled the Christians assembled 
 in the house of Paulina, a few of whom hastened out to arrest 
 the disturber of their worslii]i. 
 
 i^ut the young Bithynian was quicker thai 1 llu-y, and thought 
 liimself well hidden from pursuit in the midst of a festal train 
 which was moving from the city toward a lonely spot on the 
 
230 THE EMPEROK. 
 
 scii-slioro, fast of Necropolis, for the cclclinitioii of some dark 
 mysteries. 'J'he jwiiit toward which this singing, liowling liost 
 of drunken fanatics bore Antinous was between Alexandria 
 and C'anoi)Us, very far from the Lochias. 80 it happened 
 that it was long after midnight before Antinous, with torn 
 garments, covered with dirt, and quite breathless, was able to 
 reach Hadrian. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Hadrian had been exjjecting Antinous for several hours, 
 and his im})atience and displeasure were outwardly manifested 
 through a frowning brow^ and threatening glance. 
 
 *' Where have you been?" he asked, in an imperious tone. 
 
 " I tried first to find you, then I took a boat and rowed out 
 into the sea." 
 
 " You are telhng an untruth." 
 
 Antinous answered only by a shrug of the shoulders. 
 
 " Were vou alone?" asked Hadrian, more mildly. 
 
 ''Yes."" ^ 
 
 " "Where did you go?" 
 
 " I looked atlhe stars." 
 
 " You?" 
 
 " May I not follow your example?" 
 
 " Why not? They shine as well for fools as for the wise. 
 Even asses are born under good or evil stars. 80 one grows 
 gray in possession of a hungry gi-ammarian who feeds him on 
 old papyrus, while another, who happens to fall into the posses- 
 sion of an emperor, grows fat, and has time to stare at the 
 sky. How you look!" 
 
 " The boat captized with me and I fell into the sea." 
 
 Hadrian was startled, and as he noticed the tousled hair, 
 stiff with salt water, and his torn chiton, he said, anxiously: 
 
 " Go instantly, and let Master rub and anoint j'ou. " He 
 came back also looking like a whipped dog, and\vith red 
 eyes. All heads seem turned on this cursed evening. You 
 look like a slave Avho has been hunted by dogs. Drink a few 
 cu])s of wine aTid go to bed. " 
 
 '' As you command, great Ca^§ar. " 
 
 " Really? My ' ass ' has made you angry." 
 
 " "i'ou were wont to find kind words for me." 
 
 " And 1 shall find them again. But not to-night: go now 
 to bed. " ^ " 
 
 Antinous took himself away, but the emperor Avalked up 
 ^ud down the room with long strides and arms crossed over liis 
 
THE EMPEROE. 221 
 
 breast, and downcast eyes. His superstitious mind had been 
 made uneasy by a series of bad signs, which not only last night 
 on the sky, but during his return to the Lochias, had met him, 
 and seemed ah-eady to be finding fuifillment. 
 
 Leaving the eating-house in bad liumor, and annoyed by the 
 nnhicky signs, if he had done things which he ah'eady re- 
 gretted, they certainly should not have been attributed to the 
 influence of evil demons, but were simply due to his own 
 morose mood. It might j)0ssibly have been set down to some 
 outside influence that he was witness of the attack of an ex- 
 cited crowd on the house of a rich Jew, on which occasion he 
 was met and recognized by Verus. Bad spirits may have been 
 busy, but that Avhich hajipened later on the Lochias would 
 certainly not have occurred had Hadrian been in a hapjiier 
 mood. For that he alone was responsible, and no accident or 
 malicious demon. Certainly that would be an easy way of 
 shifting a burdensome duty, or making a jjast deed seem good; 
 but conscience is a tablet ujDon which a secret hand inscribes 
 all our deeds, and jsitilessly calls them by their right names. 
 Sometimes we may succeed for a longer or shorter time in 
 blotting or erasing the record, but the characters reappear, 
 dejjicted with a weird brilliancy which the inward eye is com- 
 pelled to notice. 
 
 Hadrian felt himself constrained tliis night to read the 
 record of his misdeeds, and though among them he found some 
 bloody wrongs — some frivolities unworthy even of an ordinary 
 man — yet the tablet preserved also the record of many sternly 
 fulfilled duties — of restless striving after great ends, and un- 
 wearied effort to stretch tlie sensitive threads of his sjjirit to 
 the utmost limits of human thought and sense. But in this 
 hour Hadrian thought of his evil and unworthy deeds, and he 
 made a vow to those gods he sometimes ridiculed with his jiliil- 
 osoiAical points, but toward whom he always turned when 
 strength or means failed — here to build a temple, there to otter 
 sacrifices for the expiation of his sins, and to ai^pcase their 
 wrath. He seemed to himself like some great man threatened 
 with disgrace, who seeks by gifts to win back the favor of liis 
 superior. 
 
 The courageous Roman shrunk. from imaginary danger, and 
 knew nothing of the healing smart of repentance. Scarcely 
 an hour before he had so far forgotten himself as to misuse 
 his power toward a weaker man, and the memory of it vexed 
 him; but the thought of humbling himself and of rendering sat- 
 isfaction to the person wronged never entered his mind. 
 
 Sometimes he deeply felt his human weakness — but again, it 
 
222 THE EMPEROn. 
 
 M'as quite possible to helievc in llio kiiisliip of liis own imperial 
 person to the gods. Tluit was easiest whvn any one ha<l dared 
 to vex ]iim or failed to recognize his superiority. JJid not 
 the heaviest 2)unishnients of the gods ever fall upon their de- 
 spisers? 
 
 To-day, this mortal Jupiter had again smitten with his 
 thunder-bolt a too bold son of earth, and this time the victim 
 had been the son of Euphorion. Pollux hiiA indeed been so 
 unfortunate as to touch rudely the weak point of Hadrian s 
 character; but one is not often so instantly changed from a 
 friendly well-wisher to a hostile adversary — never — unless, as 
 was true of the emperor, accustomed to spring from one mood 
 into its opposite, and is conscious of the power to carry out 
 his good or bad fechugs into deeds. The real ability of Pollux 
 had at first won the regard of Hadrian; his fresh, independent 
 nature had pleased and amused him, but during their inter- 
 course on the street, his confident manner of placing himself 
 ui)on the same level had become annoying. In the workshop 
 he had seen only the sculptor, and enjoyed his superabundant 
 overflow of vigor; outside, and among men of the ordinary 
 sort, in whom he generally inspired awe, his speech and bear- 
 ing seemed bold, unbecoming, and almost intolerable. At the 
 table, the vigorous eater and drinker, seeking to amuse b}'^ his 
 facetiousness, and careful not to make a gift to the landlord, 
 excited his repugnance. 
 
 And then Hadrian, out of humor, and filled with forebod- 
 ings of evil, had returned to the Lochias without Antinous, 
 and failing to find him there, walked restlessly up and down 
 the Hall of the Muses, disdaining all conversation with Pollux, 
 who was noisily at work behind his screen. 
 
 Pollux had been as unfortuiuite as Hadrian. In the first 
 place, going into the neighborhood of the overseer's house, 
 ho})ing to see Arsinoe, Keraunus had met and sent him away 
 with contemptuous words. Peturning to the Hall of the 
 Muses, he had a contest with Papias, who became angry on 
 hearing a renewed mention of his determination to be inde- 
 ])endent, and ordered him to pack u}) his tools and leave the 
 Lochias immediately, and to keep away also from his own 
 house. Unpleasant words had been exchanged, and as Pollux 
 sought Pontius to speak with him over future plans, he had 
 the additional misfortune to find that he had left the palace 
 and would not return that evening. So he determined to fol- 
 low the command of Papias. AVithout noticing the presence 
 of the em])eror in the hall, he ])egan the separation of his own 
 hammers, chisels and other tools, from those of Papias, throw- 
 
THE EM PEKOE. 223 
 
 ing them into two separate chests with as much violence as if 
 visiting punishment u^^on the innocent tools for that which 
 had befallen himself. 
 
 At length the bust of Balbilla, made by Hadrian, fell under 
 his eye. The hateful caricature, over which he had laughed 
 the day before, angered him ; and after looking at it for a mo- 
 ment, his blood boiled, and he suddenly tore a lath from the 
 wall of his inclosure, and struck upon the image so violently 
 that the dry clay was broken and scattered through the space. 
 
 The strange noise induced the em23eror to pause and learn 
 its cause. 
 
 Unnoticed by Pollux, he witnessed the work of destruction, 
 and became so much enraged that his brows contracted in 
 threatenhig folds, and a blue vein stood out prominently in 
 his forehead. This master of statecraft could more easily bear 
 complaint of his power to govern than to witness contempt 
 cast ujwn his artistic work. 
 
 He that knows his own w^ork to be worthy can laugh at 
 criticism, but if he be uncertain of its merit, and has reason 
 to fear comment, easily comes to hate the person who makes it. 
 
 Hadrian was trembling with wrath, and doubled his fist as 
 he aj^proached Pollux, asking: 
 
 " What docs this mean?" 
 
 Pollux looked at the emj^eror, and raising his arm for an- 
 other blow, exclaimed: 
 
 '* I am putting this caricature out of existence, because it 
 offends me." 
 
 " Come here,^' cried the emperor, and seizing with his 
 nervous hand the girdle of the chiton Pollux wore, dragged 
 him before the Urania, tore the lath out of his hand, struck 
 off the scarcely finished head, and cried, imitating the tone of 
 Pollux: 
 
 " I am putting this ijicce of bungling out of existence, be- 
 cause it offends me." 
 
 Pollux dropped his arms. Astonished, as well as irritated, 
 he stared at the destroyer of his work, crying in his face: 
 "' Mad man, that is enough. One stroke more, and you will 
 make acquaintance with my fist." 
 
 Hadrian laughed coolly and sarcastically — threw the lath at 
 the feet of Pollux, saying: 
 
 " Judgmoit against judgmeiit; that is only fair." 
 
 "Fair!" cried Pollux, beside himself. "Your miserable 
 dabble, which my squint-eyed apprentice could have made as 
 well as you; and only the creation of an idle hour. Fy upon 
 you! liut if you touch my Urania again you will learn — " 
 
224 THE EMPEKOK. 
 
 " AVhat?" 
 
 " Tliiit ill Ali'xaiulria gray-beards are spared only so long as 
 they (iL'scrvc it." 
 
 Hadrian folded his arms, and steppiiig nearer to Pollux said: 
 
 *' lie careful, fellow, if life be dear lo you." 
 
 Pollux retreated before the mighty man, and the scales fell 
 from his eyes. 
 
 This was exactly the position of the statue of the enijiei-or 
 in the Ogesareiini. The architect Claudius Venator was Had- 
 rian. 
 
 The young sculptor turned pale, and said, with drooping 
 head, and in a faint voice, as he turned away: 
 
 "Might always makes right. Let me go. I am only a 
 poor sculptor; you are something quite different. Now 1 am 
 sure you are the emperor. " 
 
 " I am he," replied Hadrian, grinding his teeth; ''and if 
 you think more of yourself as a sculptor than of me, I will 
 show you which of us is sparrow, and which eagle. " 
 
 "' You have the j'ower to annihilate me, and I will certain- 
 
 ly-" 
 
 " I am the only one here who has the right to wiU," cried 
 the ruler, " and I tcill that you do not again enter this palace 
 or come under my eyes. I shall consider the fate of your 
 kindred. Not one word more! Away with you, I say, and 
 you can thank the gods that I endure the outrage of an im- 
 mature creature more leniently than you deserve, in daring to 
 judge the work of one so much greater than yourself, althougli 
 you knew it to have been only the pastime of an idle hour. 
 Out with you, fellow, and my slaves shall finish the breaking 
 up of your work yonder, because it deserves no better fate, 
 and because — what did you say just now? Ah! I have it; and 
 because it offends me!" 
 
 A dry laugh echoed after the youth as he left the hall. 
 
 Standing in the shadow of the outside door he found Pa})ias 
 who had heard what passed between him and the em])er(»r. 
 As Pollux met Doris he cried out: " Oh, mother, mothei-! 
 What a morning, and what an evening! Fortune is nothing 
 but the threshold of misfortune." 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Whtlk Pollux, with his symi)athizing mother was waiting 
 Hie return of Eu])horion, I'apias seized the ojiportunity of in- 
 gratiating himself with Hadrian, though he pretended still to 
 
THE EMPEROK. 225 
 
 tliiiik him the architect Chiudius Venator. Aurelius Verus, 
 wliom the Alexandrians called " the falae Eros/^ had also 
 passed through a serious experience. 
 
 In the afternoon he had invited the empress to go out with 
 him and see the festal crowd — in disguise, if she should so 
 choose — but Sabina was in a bad humor, declared herself to be 
 suffering, and assured him that the noisy whirl would drive 
 her out of life. And what better re])orter could one liave, she 
 asked, than she had in Verus, and so be spared the dust and 
 the bad air of the city, and the confusion of the crowd. 
 
 No sooner had Lucilla begged her husband to consider her 
 dignity, and not mingle witli the excited populace, at least 
 after dark, than Sabina commissioned him to take observation 
 of all which the occasion offered worthy of attention, and, 
 above all, those things peculiar to Alexandria. 
 
 After sunset Verus visited first an eating-house, where he 
 gave a banquet to the veterans of the Twelfth Legion, who 
 had been with him on the battle-field fighting the Xumidians. 
 For an hour he drank with the brave old fellows, and left 
 them for a visit to the Canopic way, only a short distance 
 from tlie banquetiug-house. 
 
 This street was brilliantly illuminated, and all the great 
 houses behind the colonnade, with one exception, were adorned 
 in honor of the occasion. This house belonged to Apollodorus, 
 the Jew. 
 
 In previous years the handsomest carpets had been sus- 
 pended from his windows. It was as gayly decorated with 
 ilowers and lamjis as that beloi^ging to any other Jew on the 
 street, who shared in this festivity of their heathen fellow- 
 citizens with as much zeal as if they also rendered homage to 
 Dionysius. 
 
 Ajiollodorus had special reasons for holding himself aloof on 
 this occasion, and without a susj^icion of the danger this might 
 ejitail, he sat quietly in the midst of the j)rincely magnificence 
 of his dwelling, which seemed far more aijpi'opriate for a 
 Greek than for a Jew. This was S2)ecially striking in the 
 ajmrtments of the men Avhere Apollodorus was passing the 
 evening. The j^aintings on the walls, and the floor of the 
 handsome room, whose half-oiDcned covering was supported by 
 pillars of noble porphyry, portrayed the loves of Psyche and 
 Eros. Between the columns were busts of the most famous 
 heatlien philosophers, and at the further end was a statue of 
 Plato. Among the many portraits and busts there Avas only 
 one Israelite, and that was ]'hilo, whose clear-cut and striking 
 
22G THE EMrEROR. 
 
 features were among the most striking of his illustrious (Jrcck 
 companions. 
 
 In this liandsomc apartment, Apolloclorus, a well-preserved 
 nuin of fifty, reclined upon a luxui'ious couch, looking -witli 
 mild l)ut shrewd expression ujjon a stately old man of tlie 
 same faith, who walked up and down before him, in animated 
 speech, with his hands in constant motion — sometimes in gest- 
 ure, sometimes stroking his snowy beard. 
 
 A younger and slenderer man, with pale, well-formed, feat- 
 ures and raven locks and beard, sat opposite his host, with 
 dark brilliant eyes fastened on the floor, where he described 
 imaginary curves and circles with his cane; while his excited, 
 uncle, the old man, addressed Ajiollodorus in passionate and 
 flowing Avords, who frequently shook his head, and sometimes 
 mtule a short reply. 
 
 It was easy to see that he was painfully affected by what he 
 heard, and that these men of such different temperaments 
 were on the verge of a quarrel. 
 
 Though both spoke the Greek language and professed the 
 same religious faith, their views were as diverse as though they 
 had sprung from radically different sources. 
 
 A\'hen two contestants stand far apart the weapons may 
 clash, but they do not come to bloody wounds, to victory, or 
 surroider. It was for the sake of this old man and his nephew 
 that the house of Apollodorus M'as to-day left without decora- 
 tion, for the Ivabbi (jamaliel, who had yesterday arrived from 
 Palestine, at the house of this Alexandrian relative, condemned 
 all intercourse with the heathen, and would certainly have left 
 the dwelling of his guest had he ventured to adorn it for the 
 feast of a false god. 
 
 The nephew of CJamaliel, Eabbi Ben Jochai, enjoyed a dis- 
 tinction little below that of his father Ben Akiba. As he was 
 considered the wisest sage and cxjjounder of the law, so was 
 his first-born son the first astrologer and most skillful inter- 
 preter of the mystical significance of the jiosition of the 
 heavenly bodies among the people of his faith. Apollodorus 
 considered it a great honor to cjitertain under his own roof the 
 wise (Jamaliel and the distinguished son of ]?en Akiba, and he 
 had done all he could to nuikc their sojourn in his house 
 agreeable. A strictly Jewish cook had been bought and in- 
 stalled in the place of the Greek who usually served — wlio was 
 familiar with all the demands of the Jewish law — and in- 
 structed to prepare food oidy according to Levitioal rites. 
 
 'I'he children of A])ollodorus were forbidden to bring their 
 Greek friends into the house during the visit of these guests 
 
THE EMPEROR. 227 
 
 or to use the name of any heathen god in their conversation. 
 Apollodorus himself was the first to break this rule. 
 
 He, with all Alexandrian Jews, had received a Greek edu- 
 cation. They thought and felt as Greeks; indeed, they were 
 Jews but in name — for though they prayed to the one God of 
 their fathers, instead of the many Olympian divinities, it was 
 jio more the mighty and Avrathful Jehovah, ]jut the world- 
 animating spirit made known through Plato. 
 
 With each succeeding hour of this intercourse the chasm 
 separating host and guests yawned more widely, and the rela- 
 tions of the Alexandrian to the wise men from Palestine be- 
 came still more iincomfortable, after it became apparent that 
 the object of their visit to Egypt was to win the daughter of 
 Aijollodorus as a wife to Ben Jochai. But the fair Ismene was 
 not inclined to listen to the suit of the strict young rabbi. 
 The home of their race seemed to her a barbarous land, the 
 earnest young man excited her fear, and besides all else, her 
 heart was not free. It belonged to the son of Alabarchos, the 
 head of the .Tews in Egypt, and this youth owned the hand- 
 somest horses in the city, and had won with them many vic- 
 tories in the liippodrome, and he had chosen her out of all the 
 young women in the city. K to any one, she should give her 
 hand to him. 
 
 This she confided to her father wlien he told her of the woo- 
 ing of Ivabbi Ben Jochai; and Aijollodorus, who had many 
 years before lost his wife, had neither the skill nor the wish to 
 constrain his jjretty darling. 
 
 It would indeed be hard for the accommodating nature of 
 this man to return a decided negative to the proposition of his 
 worthy guest; but it must be done some time, and this even- 
 ing seemed a fitting time for the uni^leasant task. 
 
 He was entirely alone with his guests. Ismene had gone to 
 the house of a friend, where she could enjoy the display upon 
 the street; his three sons had gone out also; even the slaves 
 had permission to enjoy their liberty until midnight, and no 
 disturbance was exi^ected. So he found courage to decline the 
 suit of Ben Jochai with many warm expressions of regard and 
 deep appreciation of the honor proffered. His child, he said, 
 was too fond of Alexandria to leave it wiUingly, and his dis- 
 tinguished young friend could hardly be satisfied with a wife 
 who, accustomed to this freer mode of life, would be unhap2)y 
 ill a house where the stricter laws of the fathers were practiced. 
 
 Gamaliel allowed the Alexandrian to say all he wished; but 
 as his nephew was preparing to answer he cut him off, saying, 
 while his slightly bowed figure erected itself, and passing a 
 
228 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 hand over the bhie veins and fine wrinkles of his liigh fore- 
 head: 
 
 " Through war with the Romans our tribe has been much 
 depleted; and among those of the same blood lien Akiba 
 found no maiden who appeared to him worthy of a union with 
 his family. But titlings of the Alexandrian branch of our 
 liouse and of his prosjDcrity reached us in Judea; then Ben 
 Akiba thought to follow the example of Abraham, and send 
 me as an Eliezer into a strange land, to take a wife for his 
 Isaac. Who he is and what rank he holds among men — " 
 
 '' 1 know well," broke in Apollodorus; "and nothing has 
 brought greater honor to my house than your visit." 
 
 " Nevertheless," continued the rabbi, " we shall return as 
 we came, without carrying out the wish of him who sent me, 
 for after what I have heard from you within the last hour, we 
 shall be compelled to withdraw our suit. Do not interrupt 
 me. Your Ismene refuses to veil her face, and it is certainly 
 fair to look upon. You have trained her spirit as that of a 
 man, and she chooses her own path. This ma}'' be fitting for 
 a Greek, but in the house of J3en Akiba the wife must have no 
 will of her own, but be content to follow that of her husband, 
 as the ship obeys its rudder; and this is in strict accordance 
 with what the law commands, and you have allowed her to 
 despise. " 
 
 " We acknowledge its excellence,'' answered Apollodorus, 
 " but if the laws Moses received on Sinai are binding on all 
 mortals, those precejits so wisely given to regulate the outward 
 lives of our ancestors are not meant for the children of the 
 present day. At any rate, we can not follow them here, 
 where — though true to our ancient faith — we are Greeks 
 among the Greeks, with whom we live," 
 
 " That I perceive," returned Gamaliel. " You have ex- 
 changed the language itself — that garment of thought — the 
 words of our fathers, the writings, the law — all these you have 
 parted with." 
 
 " You and your nephew also speak Greek.'* 
 
 " We do that here, because you and yours no more under- 
 stand the language of Moses and the prophets." 
 
 " Wherever Alexander the Great carried his arms Greek is 
 spoken; therefore, that (J reek version of the Scriptures written 
 by seventy interisreters — the Septuagint — is not identical with 
 the orginal Hebrew text." 
 
 " Would you exchange the stone in your ring cut by Bryaxis, 
 which you showed me yesterday with so much pride, for a wax 
 impression of the same?" 
 
THE ETVfp-RROR. 229 
 
 " The language of Plato is no common stuff; but noble as 
 the costliest sapi^hire/' 
 
 "But ours came from the mouth of the Highest. What 
 would you think of the child, who, des2)isinng the siieech of 
 his father, listened only to his neighbor, and used an inter- 
 preter to understand the commands of his parents?" 
 
 " You speak of parents who have long ago left their native 
 land. The ancestor can not com^Dlain oi' his descendant, who 
 uses the language of liis adopted country, if he continue to act 
 according to its sense." 
 
 " We must live not alone by the meaning, but after the 
 words of the Most High, for no word has gone in vain out of 
 His mouth. The more elevated the thought of a sentence, so 
 much the more do we need accuracy in the words and sylla- 
 bles. A single letter often changes the meaning of the whole 
 sentence. But what a noise there is in the street! The tumult 
 presses even into this distant apartment; and your son finds 
 delight in this heathenish disorder. You do not restrain him 
 with authority from increasing the ranks of the frenzied serv- 
 ants of pleasure!" 
 
 " I was once young myself, and think it no sin to join the 
 universal gayety. " 
 
 " Say rather the shameful idolatry of the worshipers of 
 Dionysius. Only in name do you and yours belong to tbe 
 chosen people of the Lord; in reality you are heathens.^ 
 
 " No, father!" cried Apollodorus, with animation. " You 
 have transposed the relation. In heart we are Jews, though 
 we wear Grecian garments. " 
 
 " You are called Apollodorus; that means a gift from 
 Apollo." 
 
 " A name chosen simply to discriminate one person from 
 another. Whoever asks about a word that sounds pleasantly, 
 what it signifies?" 
 
 " You, he; every man who has not a dull mind!" cried the 
 rabbi. ''Is it necessary, you ask, that Zenodotos, or Iler- 
 mogenes, the Greek we meet at the bath, should know at once 
 that he with whom he is talking over the latest explana- 
 tion of some Hellenic mytli, is a Jew? And how agreeable 
 you consider the man wlio asks whether you are not a native 
 of Athens, because you use the language with such a purely 
 Attic enunciation. As we naturally pass over to our children 
 what we most value, so do we choose for them Jiames which 
 llatLcr our own vanity." 
 
 " By Hercules, father!" 
 
230 THE EMPEROK. 
 
 A supercilious and sarcastic smilo played over the lips of the 
 shrewd (Gamaliel, as iiiterrii])ting Aijollodorus, he asked: 
 
 " Is tliere any specially worthy man of our faith in Alexan- 
 dria l»y the name of Hercules? No one associates that oath 
 with the son of Alcmene; it has the sense of ' truly/ " 
 
 "' Indeed, you are not quite exact hi the use of words and 
 names; but where there is so much to see and to enjoy as ia 
 this city, one's thoughts can not always become connected. 
 That is easily comiirehended. They are so polite here, also, 
 that truth is easily glossed over. Will you allow me, the bar- 
 bai-ian from Judea, to speak very plamly with you?" 
 
 " Speak, I beg you." 
 
 " You are .Jews, though you would not be such, and look 
 upon your origin as upon an evil that can not be avoided. It 
 is only wliere you feel the mighty hand of the Most High that 
 you recognize Him, and claim your right to be numbered with 
 His chosen jjcojile. In the ordinary course of life you are 
 proud to be among His foes. Do not interrupt me, and an- 
 swer frankly what I ask. At w^hat moment of your life have 
 you felt the warmest gratitude toward the (Jod of your 
 fathers?'^ 
 
 " "Why should I conceal it? It was at the time when my 
 deceased wife presented me with our first-born son." 
 
 " And 3^ou named him?" 
 
 " Certainly, you are aware that his name is Benjamin.'^ 
 
 " After the favorite son of the patriarch Jacob, and in that 
 hour you were grateful to be j^ermitted to add another Jink to 
 the chain of your race. You were then a Jew, and our God 
 was your God. The birth of a second son did not move you 
 so deeply, and you called him Theophilus, But at the birth 
 of your youngest you thought no more on the God of your 
 fathers, for you gave him the name of the heathen idol, 
 He2)hastion. To sum u]) — you are a Jew when the Lord is 
 specially gracious, or when He threatens trial; but heathen at 
 every point where your path leads over other than the loftiest 
 heights, or through the deepest abysses. I can not change 
 you; but the wife of my brother's son, the daughter of Ben 
 Akiba, must feel herself the child of her race, at morning, 
 noon, and night. I seek for my Isaac a Rebecca, and not an 
 Isniene, " 
 
 " I did not invite you," returned Apollodorus. " and if you 
 leave us to-morrow our reverence will follow you. Do not 
 think worse of us because we do more, i)erliaps, than simply 
 (M)nsent to the thoughts and actions of the people among 
 wliom we have grown up and ]u-osi)ered. We know how high 
 
THK EMPEROR. 231 
 
 our faith towers above theirs. In lieart, we remain Jews. But 
 should we not seek to educate and stimulate our spirits wher- 
 ever we are jilaced? for the Lord has certainly made them of 
 not less finer stuff than the others. And in what school could 
 they be better trained than in our — T mean than in the Gre- 
 cian? The knowledge of the Most High — " 
 
 " That knowledge of the Most High," cried the old man, 
 gesturing vehemently, " and all which mere philosophy seeks 
 to fathom, which the mightiest and the purest of the thinkers 
 to whom you refer always expect to grasp by study and re- 
 search, has been made a gift to every child of our people. The 
 treasure your wise men are seeking so laboriously we possess in 
 our Scriptures, our commandments, our rules of hfe. AVe are 
 the people of jieoples, the first-born of the Lord, and when the 
 Messiah shall arise from among us — " 
 
 " Then," broke in Ajwllodorus, "will be fulfilled what. I 
 agree witla Philo in hoping; we shall become priests and 
 prophets, to call down the blessing of the Most High upon all 
 the nations." 
 
 " For us, for us alone, shall ajopear that messenger of G'od 
 to raise our people from the rank of servants^, to be a queen of 
 all the inhabitants of the earth. " 
 
 Apollodorus looked at the excited old man with surprise and 
 a smile of incredulity, saying: " The crucified Nazarene was a 
 false Messiah; but when will the true one appear?" 
 
 " When will He appear?'' cried the rabbi. " When? Am 
 I able to tell you? I know only one thing. The worm has 
 already turned to sting the heel of him who has trodden upon 
 it. Have you heard the name of Bar Cochba?" 
 
 " Uncle,'' cried Ben Jochai, interrupting the speech of the 
 old ra])bi, and rising from his pVdoe, " do not say what you 
 might rejient." 
 
 " Certainly not," answered Gamaliel, earnestly. 
 
 " These people draw that which is divine down to the human 
 level, but they are not traitors." 
 
 Then turning again to Apollodorus, he said: 
 
 " Those who have gained power over Israel have setup idols 
 in our holiest i)laces, and constrain the people to worship 
 them, but sooner shall we let them break our backs than bow 
 before such," 
 
 "Are you thinking of another mighty revolt?" asked the 
 Alexandrian, anxiously. 
 
 " Answer me; have you heard the name of Bar Cochba?" 
 
 " Yes, as the daring leader of an armed host. " 
 
 " He is a hero, and perhaps the Eedeemer." 
 
533 THE EMPKKOi;. 
 
 " And is it for iiim tliat yon liuvc commissioned me t)0 send, 
 in my next grtiin-sbi]) to Joj)pa, swords iind sliields and lance- 
 tips?'' 
 
 " Shall the Eoman alone be allowed to use iron?" 
 
 *' No; but it would ill become me to equi]) a friend with 
 weapons against an adversary whom I know would surely an- 
 nihilate him?" 
 
 " The Lord of Hosts is stronger than thousands of legions." 
 
 " Guard yourself, uncle!" again cried Ben Jochai;, in warn- 
 ing tones. 
 
 Gamaliel turned angrily toward his nejjhew, but before he 
 could reply he shrunk within himself, for a wild tumult and the 
 noise of violent blows against the brazen door of the house 
 penetrated to this apartment, shaking the marble w^alls. 
 
 " They are attacking my house,'' cried Ajwllodorus. 
 
 " The gratitude of those for whom you have broken faith 
 ■with the (iod of your fathers," said the old man, gloomily. 
 Then he raised his arms and cried: " Hear me, Adonai! My 
 years have been many, and J am ripe icTv the grave, but spare 
 this one, have mercy on him!" 
 
 Ben Jochai also lifted his arms upward imploringly, and his 
 black eyes glowed. The prayers of both were short, for the 
 danger pressed nearer and nearer. 
 
 A2)ollodorus wrung his hands and beat his forehead. His 
 motions were convulsive. Anxiety destroyed the fine bearing 
 and measured demeanor he was wont to maintain among his 
 fellow-citizens. He plunged hither and yon, mixing Greek 
 curses and oaths with cries ujDon the God of his fathers. He 
 sought in vain for the key to his subterranean ajjartments, but 
 it was in the keeping of his steward, who, with the other serv- 
 ants, were enjoying the evening on the streets or in the drink- 
 ing-shops. The Jewish cook, to whom the celebration of the 
 Dionysian feast was a sacrilege, plunged into the room screech- 
 ing, while he tore his hair and beard: " The Philisthies are 
 upon us! Deliver lis, rabbi, great rabbi! Entreat the Lord of 
 Hosts for us, oh man of God! They come with clubs and 
 spears, and will trample us down as the grass, and consume us 
 in this house, as locusts that are cast into the oven. ' ' 
 
 In agony the slave threw himself at the feet of Gamaliel, 
 seizing them with his hands; but Apollodorus cried: " Follow 
 me to the roof." 
 
 " Ko, no!" howled the slave, " Amalek has prepared fire- 
 brands to cast into our tent. The heathen Icaj) and rage, and 
 the flames which they cast will devoiu' us. Kabbi, rabbi, cry 
 
THE EMPEROR. 233 
 
 unto the Lord of Hosts! Righteous God, they are bursting 
 the gates. Lord! Lord! LordP' 
 
 The teeth of the agonized creature chattered, and Avith 
 groans and howls he covered his face with both hands. Ben 
 Jochai was perfectly collected though trembling with indigna- 
 tion. After his i)rayer he turned to Gamaliel, saying: 
 
 " I knew this would come, and did not withhold it from 
 you. We began our journey under evil stars, and must now 
 endure Avhat He has ordained for us. He will avenge us!" 
 
 " Vengeance is His,'" returned the old man, and veiled his 
 face with the white folds of his robe. 
 
 " Into the sleeping-room! Follow me! We will hide under 
 the beds!'' cried Apollodorus, pushing back the cook with his 
 foot, and seizing the shoulder of the rabbi to draw liim on- 
 ward. 
 
 But it was too late, for the doors of the adjoining apai'tment 
 were already open, and they heard the rattle of weapons. 
 
 " Lost! all is lost!" cried Apollodorus. " Adonai, help us, 
 Adonai!" murmured the old man, clinging to his nephew, 
 who was a head taller than himself, and protected him with 
 his right arm. The danger threatening the lives of Apollo- 
 dorus and his guests was imminent, and had arisen from the 
 indignation of the excited crowd when attention was called to 
 the fact that the house was without festal adornment. 
 
 One word was enough to inflame the hot blood of the Alex- 
 andrians, and lead them to break through the restraints of law 
 into acts of violence. Bloody dealing between the heathen and 
 the nearly equal jaojoulation of Jews was an every-day affair, 
 and they were equally at fault. Since the Israelites had fallen 
 upon their fellow-citizens with cruel rage in Cyrenaica and 
 Cyprus, the distrust and the animosity of those holding another 
 faith in Alexandria had beeii rekindled. 
 
 Besides this, the jsrosperity of many, and the great wealth 
 of a few individuals, filled the hearts of the poorer heathen 
 with envy, and the wish to strip the possessors, who, it can 
 not be denied, had many times treated their gods with a show 
 of contempt. Witliin the last few days especially, the dissen- 
 sions respecting the festival in honor of the emperor had re- 
 vived the old grudge; and so a sight of the closed and silent 
 house on the Oano2^ic way had excited the populace and sug- 
 gested the thought of an attack on the palatial residence of 
 Apollodorus. 
 
 It was but a single word that excited the frenzy. A tanner 
 named Melampus, an old tippler, passing through the street at 
 
234 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the head of a drunken comjmny, cried out, pointing at the 
 silent house with his Thyrsus staiJ: 
 
 '' See tlie naked barrack! What the Jew used to spend in 
 ornamenting is now hoarded in his chest." These words kin- 
 dled a ilanie that hghted others. 
 
 ''The rascal is defrauding our fatlier Dionysius!" cried a 
 second citizen. And still another screeched, raising a torch: 
 
 " Let us take the drachmas he is holding ba('k from tlie 
 god: we can use them!" 
 
 The sausage-maker, Glaucus, snatched the torch out of his 
 hand, aiid roared: 
 
 " Follow me; we will burn the house over his head." 
 
 '* Hold, hold!'^ cried a cobbler, who worked for the slaves 
 of Apollodorus, planting himself in the way of the nuid 
 butcher. " Perhaps they are mourning for the dead. The 
 Jew always illuminates his house." 
 
 " Not that," answered him a flute-jilayer, in a loud, irritat- 
 ed tone. " The son of the old miser just i-)assed through the 
 Bruchiom in a merry company, with a long i:)urple mantle 
 fluttering behind." 
 
 " We will see which is the redder, the Phoenician stuif ho 
 wears, or the glow of a house on fire. " 
 
 " Let us try it!" sounded first from one, and then from 
 many voices. 
 
 " Into the house!" 
 
 '' The beggarly extortioner shall remember this day!" 
 
 " Fetch him out!" 
 
 " Drag him into the street!" 
 
 Such were the cries among the crowd. 
 
 " Drag him out!" echoed an Egyptian slave bailiff; and a 
 woman screeched the same words after him. She pulled the 
 deer-skin from her shoulders, and swung it above her dis- 
 heveled black hair in a dizzying whirl, yelling: 
 
 " Tear him to pieces!" 
 
 '* Tear him with your teeth!" shrieked a Moonad, who, like 
 the most of the crowd, knew no reason whatever for the rage 
 against Ajiollodorus and his house. 
 
 They easily passed from words to deeds; with feet, fists, and 
 sticks, they beat upon the brazen portal; and a sailor-boy of 
 fourteen years old sprung ui^on the shoulders of a gigantic 
 negro slave trying to mount the roof of the coloimade and fling 
 the lighted torch the sausage-maker had passed to him into the 
 uncovered part of the threatened house. 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 235 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 The clashing of arms heard by AiDollodorus and his guests 
 came not from the enemies of the Israehtes, but from Roman 
 soldiers bringing help to the threatened house. 
 
 As Verus passed along the Canopic way, aecom2:)anied by a 
 tribune of the Twelfth Legion and his British slaves, they were 
 stopped by the dense crowd before the house of Ajjolloclorus. 
 The prefecti whom ho met here, informed the pretor that 
 Apollodorus was one of the richest and most resiaected Alexan- 
 drian citizens. But Verus would not have looked on quietly 
 had the atack been made upon the house of one of the jaoorest 
 and most despised among the Christians — for every act of law- 
 lessness and trespass upon established order was intolerable to 
 him. And though apj^arently reckless, and devoted to pleas- 
 ure, he was both in war or in (iommon life courageous and 
 reliable. 
 
 As soon as he perceived the design of the crowd, his fertile 
 brain devised means to iipset their i^lans. Already they had 
 beat upon the door of the Jew's house; already some had 
 mounted the roof of the colonnade with lighted torches. 
 Whatever was done must be done instantly, and fortunately 
 Verus had the power of thinking and acting quickly and effi- 
 ciently. He sent the military tribune, Lucius Albinus, to 
 sumTmon the veterans, and commanded his slaves, with their 
 vigorous muscles, to force a way for him to the door. 
 
 This was quickly done, and what was his astonishment to 
 meet here the emj^eror, in the very act of snatching the torch 
 out of the hand of the tailor, and ordering them in authori- 
 tative tones to leave off their mad pursuit. Unaccustomed to 
 imjjerial mandate, the Alexandrians only replied by sneering, 
 whistling, grunting. A few drunken Egyptians had already- 
 drawn near to lay their hands on this unwelcome guest, when 
 the pretor crossed their path. 
 
 Whispering to Hadrian that it was the place of Jupiter to 
 govern tlie world, and he miglit leave to inferior beings the de- 
 fense of the house of a single Jew, and that in a few moments 
 soldiers would arrive, he cried aloud: 
 
 " Av/ay with you, sopliist! You belong in the museum, or 
 Avith your books in the Temple of Si-rapis, l)at not among 
 sensible people. Am J riglit or am I wrong, Macedonian citi- 
 zens?" 
 
5>3n THE EM PEE OR. 
 
 A inunnur of assent rose among tlie orowd, changing into 
 lauglitcr, ami Vcrus went on as Hadrian left the place: 
 
 '* He lias a beard like the emperor, and carries himself as if 
 he really woi-e the purple. You did i-iglit to let him run 
 away, for no doubt his wife and children are waiting for him 
 with the soup.^' 
 
 Verus had mingled with the people in many mirthful ad- 
 ventures, and understood dealing with them. If he could OTily 
 succeed in diverting them until the arrival of the soldiers, his 
 end would be gained. Hadrian could be a hero, where it was 
 worth his wlnle, but in this case he gladly yielded to Verus 
 the task of quieting the people. 
 
 '^rhe pretor commanded lis slaves to lift him upon their 
 shoulders, and as his handsome, kindly face ajipeared, the 
 crowd recognized him, and cried out: 
 
 " The wild I?oman! The pretor! The false Eros!'* 
 
 "It is I, Macedonian citizens," answered Verus, " and I 
 will tell you a story." 
 
 " Hear, hear!" " Forward into the Jew's house!" " Wait 
 a little; give Verus the word!" " I'll break your teeth, 
 youngster, if you are not quiet!" were among the cries heard 
 in the crowd. 
 
 Curiosity to hear the speech of Verus and the really un- 
 founded rage of the people competed for the mastery, but as, 
 at last, the'former seemed to be victorious, the noise subsided, 
 and the pretor began: 
 
 " There was once a child who received the gift of ten little 
 cotton sheej), cheap articles, such as one can buy of the old 
 Avoman on the Emporeum — " 
 
 "Go 071 to the Jew — we don't want any baby stories." 
 " Hush, there!" " ]3etter look out, for the Komans change 
 suddenly from sheep to wolves." "It will be a she-wolf!" 
 (Such were the cries from the crowd. 
 
 " Don't call those shaggy fellows," said Verus, laugliing, 
 " and hear me further. This boy jalaced his pretty sheej? in a 
 row. He was the son of a weaver. Is there any weaver 
 among you here? You? And you? And you, too, in the 
 rear? Were I not the son of my father, I should like to have 
 been an Alexandrian weaver. You need not laugh. But to 
 go back to our sheep. These pretty little things were all 
 pure white, with one exception, and that had an ugly black 
 spot, which displeased the boy. So he went to the hearth and 
 pulled out a glowing coal, lie thought he Avould burn up the 
 bla('k shee]) and kee]) only the i)ure white ones. But as the 
 flame seized the wooden skeleton of his lamb there came a 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 237 
 
 strong draught of wind through the window, and drove it 
 along to the next, so that in one moment every one of them was 
 burned up. Then thought the youngster, ' Oh, had I only 
 left the ugly lamb alone! What can I now have to play with!' 
 And he began to weep. But that was not all, for while the 
 little fellow was rubbing his eyes, the flames had spread — they 
 caught the loom, the wool, the flax, the linen, the whole house 
 of liis father, the city in which he was born, and I think the 
 boy himself. Now, dear friends and Macedonian citizens, re- 
 flect a little. Those of you Avho own anything will understand 
 the meaning of my story.-" 
 
 " Away with the torch!'' screeched the wife of a coal dealer. 
 
 " He is right; for the sake of the Jew the whole city would 
 be in danger," cried the cobbler. " The madmen have 
 already flung their fire-brands. " 
 
 " If you throw any more I'll break your bones," was the 
 threat of the flax dealer, 
 
 " Give up the burning, then," commanded the tailor, " but 
 burst the door and drag out the Jew." 
 
 These words roused a fresh storm of applause, and the 
 crowd pressed closer toward the house of the Jew. No one 
 listened longer to Verus. He slij)]ied down from the shoulder 
 of his slave, placed himself directly before the door, and cried: 
 
 "■' In the name of the emperor, in the name of the law, let 
 this house alone!" 
 
 The words were very earnest, and the false Eros looked as if 
 it might be quite unsafe to jest with him. Still, only a few 
 of the crowd had heard him, and the hot-blooded tailor vent- 
 ured to lay a hand on his girdle to drag him away from the 
 door. But he was quickly j^aid for his audacity, when the fist 
 of the pretor smote his forehead, and he fell to the earth as by 
 a stroke of lightning. One of the British slaves struck down 
 the sausage-maker, and matters would soon have ripened into 
 a horrible hand-to-hand combat had not help come to the 
 lioman from two sides. The veterans, supported by many 
 lictors, appeared first, and soon afterward Benjamin, the son 
 of Apollodorus, with his merry comimnions, who, joassing 
 along thci. Cauoi^ic way, had seen the danger that threatened 
 his father's house. 
 
 As the wind scatters cloud, so the soldiers drove away the 
 thronging poiDulace, and the young Israelite, with his comjjan- 
 ions, pressed on so vigorously that they su-^-cecded in reaching 
 the house oidy a little later than the veterans. 
 
 The lictors knocked u])on the doors, but as no one came to 
 open, they burst them, with the help of the soldiers, that they 
 
338 THE EMTEROR. 
 
 might i)lant ;i guard inside against the frantic mob. The trib- 
 une anil Venis entered with tlie soldiers, and directly after, 
 ]V']ijaniin and his friends, young Greeks with whom he asso- 
 (;iated at the baths, or in the gymnasium. 
 
 Ajjollodorus and his guests warmly expressed their thanks 
 to Verus; and when the old housekeeper, who, from a hiding- 
 place under the roof, had seen all that hajjjieaed outside, now 
 entered the apartment of her master, and related all in detail, 
 the pretor was overwhelmed with their gratitude. The old 
 woman painted her story in glowing colors. Meanwhile, 
 Ismene returned, and after she had elas^jed her father's neck, 
 in tears of excitement and joy, the housekeejaer, seizing her 
 hand, led her to Verus, with the words: 
 
 "■ This noble lord — may the blessing of the Most High be 
 upon him I — has risked his own life to rescue us. This beauti- 
 ful garment was rent for our sakes, and every daughter of 
 Israel should, as I do, kiss it fervently.'' 
 
 So saying, she pressed it to her lijis, and would have con- 
 strained Ismene to follow her examjile, but Verus would not 
 permit it, and cried, laughing: 
 
 " How could I allow to my garment what I should scarce 
 deem myself worthy to receive from such lips?" 
 
 " Kiss him, kiss him," cried the old woman, but the jiretor 
 took the head of the blushing girl between his hands, pressed 
 a fatherly salutation upon her forehead, and turning to ApoUo- 
 dorus said: 
 
 " Now I am richly repaid for all I was permitted to do." 
 
 " We, "cried Gamaliel — " I and my brother's first-born son, 
 must leave the great God of our fathers reward you for what 
 you have done for us." 
 
 " Who are 5^ou?" asked Verus, whom the prophet-like fig- 
 ure of the old man and the pale spiritual face of his nephew 
 filled with admiration. 
 
 Apollodorus explained to him how high the rabbi stood 
 among his people in knowledge of the law and of the Cabala, 
 that tnulitioual love of the Hebrews, and how far Simeon Ben 
 Jochai had exceeded his contemporaries in knowledge of the 
 stars. He spoke of his renowned astrological work, " Sohar," 
 and emphasized the mention of his skill hi foretelling the posi- 
 tion of the stars. 
 
 Verus listened attentively and looked intently at the young 
 man, who interrupted the speech of his host with many modest 
 protestations. 
 
 He was thinking of the approach of his own birthday, and 
 knew ttat Hadrian woidd then consult the position of the 
 
THE EMPEROR. 239 
 
 planets, and that the futiire of liis own life would be decided 
 by what he would read there. Would this bring him to the 
 goal of his own ambition or remove him still further from it? 
 
 When Apollodorus ceased speaking, Verus extended his 
 hand to Ben Jochai, saying: 
 
 " I rejoice to meet a man of your distinction and your skill. 
 What would I not give to possess your knowledge for only a 
 few hours!'' 
 
 "It is at your service," answered the astrologer. " Make 
 use of all I am, or possess. My knowledge, time, efforts — ask 
 every question your wish. We stand so deeply in your debt — " 
 
 " You shall not look upon me as a creditor," broke in the 
 pretor, " and you owe me no thanks, for I only knew you 
 after the rescue, and did what I cDuld, not for the sake of any 
 particular person, but through love of order, and to oppose 
 the outrages of a mob. " 
 
 " But you were kind enough to deliver us," answered Ben 
 Jochai; " do not be so hard as to refuse our gratitude." 
 
 " It honors me, my learned friend; by all the gods, it hon- 
 ors me," returned Verus. 
 
 " And, indeed, it is quite possible— it may — will be — Will 
 you have the kindness to follow me toward the bust of Hip- 
 parchus? By the help of a science which owes so much to 
 him, you may perhaps render me an imjjortant service." 
 
 As the two men, separated from the rest of the party, stood 
 before the marble bust of the great astronomer, Verus asked: 
 
 " Do you know the manner in which the emperor is accus- 
 tomed to determine the destinies of men from the stars?" 
 
 "Exactly." 
 
 " Through whom?" 
 
 " Through Aquila, a pupil of my father." 
 
 " Can you reckon what the stars will teach him on the night 
 preceding the thirty-first of December, respecting tlie destiny 
 of a man born on that night, whose horoscope is in my posses- 
 sion?" 
 
 " I can only answer * yes ' to your question under certain 
 conditions." 
 
 " What prevents an unconditional ansAver?" 
 
 " Unexpected appearances in the heavens." 
 
 " Are such aj)pearances frequent?" 
 
 " No, they are quite unusual." 
 
 " Perhaps my fortune is extraordinary, but I beg you to reck- 
 on, after Hadrian's manner, what will be made knowii on 
 the night specified, of him Avhose horoscope I will send early 
 to-morrow by my slave." 
 
210 TllR EMPEROK. 
 
 "I will do this gladly." 
 
 '^ When can you bring the work to an end?" 
 
 " In four days at the latest, ijerhajos sooner." 
 
 *' Excellent! But one thing more. Do you hold me to be 
 a reasonable man?" 
 
 " Should I have had ground for gratitude had you been any 
 other?" 
 
 '" Well, tlien, conceal nothing from me, not even the most 
 rrnel and horrible fate, which might poison the life and destroy 
 the coiu-age of others. AVhatever you may read in the book of 
 the heavens, of small or great, of good or bad, I wish to hear 
 all." 
 
 " I will hide nothing from you." 
 
 The pretor offered his htind to Ben Jochai, jiressing heartily 
 the delicate and handsomely formed one of the Jew — arrang- 
 ing, as they left, the manner in which he should apprise him 
 of the finishing of his calculations. 
 
 Apollodorus, with his guests and children, excepting Benja- 
 min, who was entertaining his Greek friends in the banqueting- 
 hall, accompanied the pretor to the door. 
 
 As (iamaliel heard the sin;,iing and shouting, he said to 
 Aj)ollodoru.s, with a shrug of the shoulders: 
 
 " They praise the God of our fathers in Alexandrian fash- 
 ion. " 
 
 All was now silent about the house, except the steady tread 
 of the soldiers on guard. 
 
 In a neighboring street Vorus met the tailor whom he had 
 struck to the ground, the sausage-maker, and other instigators 
 of the riot, on their way to j^i'ison. Verus would gladly have 
 given them their freedom, but he knew the emjieror Vould 
 expect him to report on the next morning that they had re- 
 ceived justice. At another time they would have been sent 
 home unpunished, but just now he Avas mastered by a wish 
 stronger than liis kind-heartedness or his frivolity. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 At the Oajsareum, Verus found the chamberlain waiting to 
 conduct him to the empress, who, in spite of the late hour, 
 wished to see him. She was in a state of great excitemeiit, 
 and not, as usual, lying upon her couch, but striding M-iih ini- 
 Avomaidy steps uji and down tlie apartment. 
 
 "It is good that you have ciome," she said to the ])r('tor. 
 " Lentulus is sure that he has met Mastor, and Balbilla as- 
 serts — But it is not really i)ossible." 
 
THE EMPEROK. 241 
 
 "' Do they think the emperor is here?'' asked Verus. 
 
 " Have they said the same thing to you?" 
 
 " No. I do not stoj) when you call, and I have something 
 important to relate. A Httle while ago, also — But you need 
 not be frightened. " 
 
 " Let there be no useless words." 
 
 *' A little while ago there met me, in his o^vn person — " 
 
 " Who?" 
 
 "Hadrian." 
 
 " And are you not mistaken? Have you seen him?" 
 
 " With these eyes. " 
 
 "That is incredible, unworthy, shameful!" cried Sabina, 
 so loud and so passionately that she was frightened by her own 
 voice. Her dry, lank figure shook with excitement, and every- 
 thing in her appearance was without grace, without womanli- 
 ness, and absolutely repellent; but Verus, accustomed from 
 childhood to look upon her with kindness, was only pained by 
 the exhibition. 
 
 There are women who, like the drooping flowers, or fading 
 lights, or vanishing shadows, do not thereby lose their charms; 
 but the large-boned, stiff-necked Sabina had nothing of the 
 flexible tenderness of those lovely beings. The decay of her 
 j)owers made her less attractive. Esj)ecially when the dry 
 harshness of her imbittered soul Avas thus exposed. She was 
 enraged by the disgrace she fancied her husband had brought 
 upon her in not only having a separate residence put in order 
 for himself, but in coming to the city without acquainting her 
 with the fact. 
 
 Her hands trembled with jiassion, and it was with a stammer- 
 ing voice that she asked Verus toprejoare her c]uieting draught. 
 When ho brought it she was lying on the couch, her head 
 turned toward the wall, and she said, piteously: 
 
 " I am very cold. Sjjread the covering over me. I am a 
 miserable, abused bemg." 
 
 " You are sensitive, and take things too hard," replied the 
 pretor. But she was irritated, and went on cutting off his 
 words and in every w,ay treating liim as if he were a criminal 
 and she his judge. 
 
 She soon learned that Verus had met Mastor and ki\ew from 
 him that Hadrian was on the Lochias, that he had taken part 
 in the festival, under disguise, and been in serious danger be- 
 fore the house of the Jew. Also she became acquainted with 
 the manner in which the house of the Jew was saved, and 
 whom he had met within the dwelling; and Sabina had serious- 
 ly ]-eproved him for the frivolous and irresponsible manner in 
 
242 THE KMPEKOIl. 
 
 whicli lie liacl riskod a life destined to the liiglicst position. 
 Vorus liad not interrupted her ■\vords, but here he bent over, 
 kissing lier liand, and said: 
 
 '' \"our kind heart sees in my future Avliat you yourself de- 
 sire. There is a sliimmering light upon my horizon. Is it an 
 after-glow from the past, or the breaking cUnvn of a coming 
 day of splendor? AVho can tell? I am waiting patiently for 
 what time must soon decide. " 
 
 " That is true; this imcertainty will soon end," murmured 
 Sabina. 
 
 " Rest now, and try to sleep,'' said Verus, with a hearty 
 kindness in his tone. " It is past midnight, and the pliysician 
 has often forbidden these long watches. Good-bye; dream 
 sweetly, and remain to the man what you have always been to 
 tlie child and the youth. " 
 
 Sabina drew back the hand he had seized, and said : 
 
 *' You must not leave me; I need you; I can not spare your 
 presence." 
 
 " I will stay beside you luitil morning, and always, if you 
 allow me. '' 
 
 The pretor sighed as he again took her hand, and held it 
 long to his lips. 
 
 " You are my friend Verus, I am sure of it," she said, at 
 last breaking the silence. 
 
 " Oh, Sabina! my mother," he answered, heartily. " As a 
 boy you si^oiled" me by your kijidness. What can I do to 
 show my gratitude for it all?" 
 
 " liemain to me what j^ou are to-day. Will you do this, 
 whatever your destiny?" 
 
 " In sorrow or in joy, always the same friend, ready to give 
 up liis life for you." 
 
 '* Always in si)ite of my husband, and even when you think 
 yourself no njore in need of my favor?" 
 
 " Yes, always; for without you I am nothing. T am 
 wretched." 
 
 The empress drew a long breath, and raised herself liiglier 
 upon the cushions. At length, as if taking a resolution, slie 
 spoke, uttering each word slowly and im])ressively: 
 
 " If nothing unjirecedented should appear in the sky on 
 your birtli-niglit, you will be our son, and Hadrian's licir ami 
 successor. I swear this." 
 
 Her voice was solemn, and her small eyes stretched wide 
 open. 
 
 " Sabina, mother, guardian spirit of my life!" cried Verus, 
 falling on liis knee before lier. She looked with much emotion 
 
THE EMPEROR. 343 
 
 into his handsome face, laid her hand upon his brow, and 
 touched his dark hair with her hps. There was a dewy glim- 
 mer in eyes unused to tears, and in a soft, imploring tone, such 
 as one never heard before from her, she said : 
 
 " In fortunate days, after the adoption and when you wear 
 the purjDle, will all be the same between us? Tell me. Will 
 it be so?^' 
 
 '' Ever, ever,'' cried Verus, " and if our wish be fulfilled — " 
 
 " Then," broke in Sabuia, and a chill ran over her, "you 
 will be to me the same you are to-day — but truly, a temi:)le 
 would be empty if mortals had no more requests to make.'" 
 
 " Oh, no, they will then carry thank offerings to the gods*," 
 answered Verus, looking into her face, but Sabina avoided his 
 smiling gaze, and turning away, said, anxiously: 
 
 " No play with words — no more talking and jesting! Not 
 now, in the name of the gods! For this hour and this night 
 are to other hours and nights what a consecrated temple is to 
 ordinary houses, what the sun is to other lights. You can 
 not know my feeliiigs. I scarcely know them myself! No 
 empty words now!" 
 
 Verus looked at the empress with growing astonishment. 
 She had always shown herself more gracious toward him than 
 all others, and he was bound to her by gratitude and cliildish 
 associations. 
 
 As a boy he had been the only one among his playfellows 
 who, instead of being frightened away, had clung to Sabina. 
 But who had ever seen her as now? Could this be the harsh, 
 bitter woman whose heart seemed filled with gall, whose 
 tongue was like a dagger toward every one? 
 
 Could he be deceived? Genuine tears filled her eyes as she 
 went on: 
 
 " Here I lie, a j^oor, sickly woman, as senstive in both soul 
 and body as though covered with wounds. All contact with 
 most people, even the sound of their voices, hurt?5 me. I am 
 old, much older than you think, and more wretched than you 
 can understand. Neither as a child, nor in girlhood, have I 
 been happy; and as a wife — everlasting gods! — every gracious 
 word Hadrian ever bestowed upon me I have paid for by a 
 thousand humiliations.'" 
 
 " He treats you always with high respect," broke in Verus. 
 
 " Yes, before you, before other people! But what do I care 
 for respect! A little unselfish love is what I wa'.nt, and were I 
 only sure— flared I hope you would give me this, I should 
 thank you with all I have— this hour would be bles&ed above 
 every other of my life." 
 
244 THE ESirEKOR. 
 
 " IIow can you doubt mc, mother^ my truly loved mother?^' 
 
 ** That does nic good/' answered Sabina; " your voice is 
 never too loud, and I dare believe you. This hour makes you 
 my son, and me your mother." 
 
 Deep emotion stn-red the withered heart of Sabhia and light- 
 ed her eyes. 
 
 She was like a young mother whose heart sings as she looks 
 at her th'st-born child: " It lives — it is mine — I am a mother. " 
 
 Blissfidly she looked into the face of Verus, and cried: 
 
 " Give me your hand, my son; help me up, for I can no 
 more lie still. How happy I am ! Yes, this is the joy given 
 to other women, before they are gray-haired. But, child, my 
 dear, only one, you are to love me not alone as a mother. I 
 am too old for tender caresses, but I can not bear that you 
 look ujion me only with cliildish reverence. You must be also 
 my friend — whose heart understands my need — who can laugh 
 with me to-day, or mourn to-morrow — and whom I can be 
 sure rejoices to meet my look. You are now my son, and 
 soon you will be called such by others. For one evening this 
 is enough of good. Now not one word more! This hour is 
 like the perfected work of a jiainter. Every added stroke 
 miglit detract from its beauty. Kiss my forehead, I will kiss 
 thine; then I will go to rest, and when I wake in the morning 
 I shall say to myself that I i^ossess something worth living for 
 — a child! — a son!'' 
 
 When the emjDress was alone, she raised her hands to pray, 
 but found no words of gratitude. She had indeed enjoyed 
 one hour of pure jDleasure, but how many days, months, and 
 years of joylessness and suffering lay behind! So soon as 
 gratitude knocked uj^on the door of her heart, bitter defiance 
 awoke. AVhat was one good hour against a ruined existence? 
 
 Foolish woman! She had never sown love, but cried out 
 against the gods as cruel and unjust, because they forbade her 
 to reap it. -And upon what ground had the seeds of her 
 maternal love fallen! 
 
 Certainly Verus left her joyous and rich in hope, and the 
 interview with Sabina had moved his heart. He honestly 
 meant to be true to her after the adoption, still the glance of 
 his eye was not so much that of a happy son as the sparkle of 
 one confident of victory. 
 
 In spite of the late hour, his wife had not retired to rest. 
 She knew he had been called to the empress, and Avaited in 
 some anxiety, not accustomed to exj)eet anytliing very friendly 
 from Sabhia. His quick step echoing against the slumbering 
 walls announced his arrival, aiul she ran to meet him on tho 
 
THE EMPEROE. 345 
 
 threshold. She was so beautiful in the flowing white robe, 
 and his heart was so full, that he clas^Dcd her in his arms, Avith 
 all the warmth and enthusiasm of their early married days. 
 She also loved him not less than in former days, and rejoiced 
 when he returned to her imchangeably true heart as the 
 home-coming mariner to his welcome haven. 
 
 " Lucilla,^' he cried, freeing his neck from her clasping 
 arms, " such a night as this has been! I have estimated Sa- 
 bina differently from you, and from boyhood she was good to 
 me. But now all is clear between us. She has called me her 
 son, and herself my mother. The purple is ours, and I shall 
 owe it to her. You are the wife of a Cfesar, certainly, if no 
 strange tokens apjoear to frighten the emperor. " With nupid 
 words, out of which not only the joy of success, but real emo- 
 tion and gratitude were manifest, he described his interview 
 with Sabina. His fresh, confident joy jnit to silence her hesi- 
 tation and fear of such a destiny. She saw in imagination her 
 husband and her son upon the imperial throne, and the osten- 
 tatious diadem on her own brow of the woman she hated with 
 all the vigor of her nature. The friendly relations of the em- 
 peror toward Verus had never disturbed her; but a wife can 
 more easily forgive hatred and persecution than the love of 
 another woman toward her husband. There was another 
 thought, buried for years in her heart, that now forced itself 
 into expression. 
 
 Hadrian had been responsible for the death of her father, 
 though no one dared assert that he had killed the noble Nig- 
 rinus. Yet in this hour the old susj^icion awoke in her soul, 
 and raising her right hand as if for an oath, she cried: 
 
 " Oh, destiny! my husband the heir of my father's mur- 
 derer!" 
 
 " Lucilla," broke in Verus, "it is wrong to indulge such a 
 cruel susjiicion, and madness to give it expression. Do not 
 express it a second time, and least of all to-day. Whatever 
 may have occurred in the past, do not destroy the j3resent and 
 the future for ourselves and our children." 
 
 " Nigrinus was the grandfather of these cliildren," cried the 
 lioraan, with flashing eyes. 
 
 That means you wish to inspire the wish for vengeance in 
 their souls. •" 
 
 " I am the daughter of the strangled man.'" 
 
 " But you do not know the murderer, and the purple 
 weighs mucli more than one life, for with many thousand Hves 
 is that often paid. And then, Lucilla, you know I like cheer- 
 ful faces, and vengeance has a gloomy brow. Let us be 
 
SIG THE EMTEUOR. 
 
 happy, oh, wife of a C;\3sarl To-morrow I shall have inii<h to 
 tell you. Now I must go to a banquet given by the soji of the 
 rich Plutarch; I can not stay with you, truly 1 can not, for I 
 have been long exiJected there. If we returji to Home, you 
 are never to speak with the children of those dark old stories. 
 I do not wish it. " 
 
 As Verus with liis torch-bearers passed through the garden 
 of the CaBsareuni, he saw a light in the room of Balbilla, and 
 cried, cheerily: 
 
 " Good-evening, fair muse!" 
 
 " (jlood-night, false Eros!'' she returned. 
 
 " You adorn yourself in borrowed plumes," answered he, 
 laughing. " Xot you, but the malicious Alexandrians, in- 
 vented that title. " 
 
 " Oh, yes! and still better ones. It is hard to give credit to 
 all I have heard and seen to-day. " 
 
 '' And will you commemorate it all in your verse?" 
 
 " Only a small j)art, and that in a satirical song I think of 
 dedicating to you." 
 
 "I tremble." 
 
 " With joy, I trast. My jioem will carry your name down 
 to remote i^ostcrity. " 
 
 " That is true, and the more ill-natured your verses, the 
 more certainly will future ages believe Verus to be the Phaon 
 of Sappho Biilbilla, and that despised love filled the gentle 
 songstress with resentment." 
 
 - " Thanks for the warning. To-day, at least, you are safe, 
 for I am utterly tired out." 
 
 " Did. you venture ujion the street?" 
 
 " It was not dangerous, for I had a safe companion.*' 
 
 " May I ask who it was?" 
 
 " Why not? The architect Pontius went with us." 
 
 '• He knows the city. " 
 
 " And I would trust myself imder his guidance to descend 
 like Orjiheus into Hades." 
 
 " Happy Pontius!" 
 
 " Ha])pier Verus!" 
 
 '* How shall I understand this word, charming Balbilla?" 
 
 " The poor architect has the honor of being an excellent 
 guide, but to you belongs the whole heart of your fair wife 
 Lucilla. " 
 
 " And mine to her, so far as it is not occu])ied by Balbilla; 
 sleep Avell, coy muse." 
 
 " Sleep ill, you irreclaimable spirit of torment," cried the 
 girl, as she dj-ew the curtains over her window. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 247 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 To the sleepless, whom misfortune has visited, future life 
 apjjears to be a sea without limits, upon which he is drifting 
 like a wreck; but as the dawn breaks, the friendly light of a 
 new day reveals a rescuing boat at hand, and in the distance a 
 hospitable coast. 
 
 So Pollux watched throughout the night with sleepless eyes, 
 for his whole future seemed to have been destroyed on the 
 previous evening. 
 
 The workshop of his former master was closed to him, and 
 ho did not even possess the tools ijidispensable for practicing 
 his art. Only yesterday he had confidently hojjod to stand 
 upon his own feet; to-day it Avas imi^ossible. As he opened 
 the purse he was accustomed to lay under his pillow, he could 
 but smile in spite of his trouble, for his fingers could find 
 within its dejoths only two copper coins and the dried breast- 
 bone of a chicken he had placed there to carry to his little 
 niece. * 
 
 Where could he now find the money he was in the habit of 
 taking to his sister on the first of every month? 
 
 Pajoias, who had been a witness of the emperor's rage, and 
 who was of exactly the disposition to use this scene to his in- 
 jury, was socially connected with all the sculptors of the city, 
 and it was natural to suppose he would warn them all against 
 him, and make it very difficult to gain a new position. 
 
 Few feel sympathy for those in disgrace with the ruling 
 powers, least of all tlwse who are striving for their ^^atronage. 
 If Hadrian should throw ofi" his concealment, it would be very 
 easy to make him feel his power. 
 
 Would it not be wise for him to leave Alexandria, and seek 
 to earn a living in some other Grecian city? It was only a 
 thought of Arsinoe that made him unwilling to do this. He 
 loved with the passionate devotion of an artist, and his courage 
 would not have been so easily daunted had not the eve^its of 
 the last evening thrown the hojje of joosscssing her into a fur- 
 tlier distance. How dared ho venture to bind her to his uncer- 
 tain and threatened future? What reception could he expect, 
 should he now ask her hand? When these thoughts and ques- 
 tions overjiowered him, ho sprung from his bed, to walk up 
 and down the little bed]-oom, and press his forehead against 
 the wall. 
 
 The morning twilight was grateful, and as he eat the soup 
 
248 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 his mother set before him, with tearful eyes, lie (letcrmiiied 
 first of ;ill to visit Pontius. This was the friendly boat which 
 aiipearcd for his rescue! 
 
 JJoris shared the morning meal of her son, but quite ujdike 
 herself had little to say, and sometimes laid her hand caress- 
 ingly U2)on his hair. 
 
 Euphorion was measuring the room Avith long strides, trying 
 to compose an ode which he would sing before the emperor 
 and use as a pra3'er for his son's forgiveness. 
 
 After breakfast, Pollux slii^ped over to the terrace, among 
 the busts of the queens, hoi-»ing to get sight of Arsinoe. The 
 singing of a verse in a loud tone attracted her to the balcony, 
 where they exchanged greetings, and Pollux made a sign, ask- 
 ing her to come to him. This she would gladly have done, 
 but her father also recognized the voice and sent her back into 
 the chamber. Still the mere glance had done goad to Pollux. 
 
 Scarcely had he returned to the house when Antinous ap- 
 peared. 
 
 This was the hospitable coast toward which the eyes of the 
 young sculptor turned! Hojie came back to his soul, and 
 hope is the sun before which desjjair iiies away as the shadows 
 of night when the day-star a23i:)ears. 
 
 His artistic power was again called into play, and had a fair 
 field for exercise, as Antinous declared himself at his disjoosi- 
 tion until noon, because his master or the emperor, as he did 
 not now hesitate to call him, would be busy. Titianus had 
 arrived with such a mass of documents as would occupy not 
 only themselves but the private secretary. 
 
 Pollux conducted Antinous into a room on the north side of 
 his father's house, Avhere lay the wax and the smaller tools be- 
 loi]ging to him. His heart was heavy and his nerves unstrung 
 as he began to work. Strange thoughts disturbed his soul, 
 but he knew that only when he concentrated his attention upon 
 the work would he succeed. And he must succeed. Failure 
 to-day, with such a model before him, would be inexcusable. 
 
 It was not long before the Bithynian's beauty waked his 
 artistic nature to devotion, and seizing the pliant stulT he made 
 a model of striking likeness to the original. 
 
 For a whole hour not a word was spoken between llieiu; <>idy 
 a sad sigh heaved sometimes the bivast of Pollux. 
 
 Antinous at last broke silence, speaking of Scleiic, whose 
 image filled his soid; indeed, his only reason for coming to 
 Pollux was to be able to si)eak of her. While Polhix shaped 
 the pliant wax, Anthious related the events of the previous 
 evening. He expressed deep regret at having lost, through 
 
TSE EMPEROR. 249 
 
 his plunge into the water, tlie silver quiver — as well as the 
 injury to the rose-colored chiton, which was torn by his pur- 
 suer from the garden of the widow Hannah. 
 
 A single exclamation of surprise, another of symj)athy, a 
 momentary rest of the hand from labor, was the only notice 
 the sculptor seemed to give to the sad fate of Selene and the 
 loss of his master's costly possessions: for the creative work of 
 his hand seemed to absorb his whole attention. The further 
 it progressed, the higher rose his admiration. As under the 
 influence of noble wine, he seemed incorporating his highest 
 idea]. The artistic jjassion fired his blood, and drove out every 
 other thought and feeling. Nevertheless, he must have com- 
 prehended what was said, for some time after he exclaimed, 
 rather as if speaking to the work under his hand, than in reply 
 to Antinous: "Wonderful creature!" and a little later: 
 " There is something heroic in this unfortunate being." 
 
 For almost four hours he worked on incessantly; tlien draw- 
 ing a long breath he stepped back from the table, looking in- 
 tently at his work, and then at Antinous, asking: 
 
 " Will it be correct?" 
 
 The Bithynian gave lively expression to his satisfaction; and, 
 in truth, Pollux had accomplished wonders for so short a space 
 of time. The wax gave a very positive impression of the 
 whole form of the handsome youth. It rejjresented him as 
 Dionysius led away by the pirates, and bore a striking resem- 
 blance to the figure carried through the streets on the gilded 
 shij) of Titianns. Pollux had said to himself on the day be- 
 fore, in noticing the softly rounded yet vigorous outlines of 
 his youthful companion, tliat an artist could find no better 
 model for the Nyssen god. 
 
 While Pollux was thus giving definite shape and exact 
 measurement to his work, a sound of clashing arms was heard 
 at the palace gate, and immediately afterward the yeli^ing of 
 the Graces. 
 
 As Doris called back the dogs, another female voice was 
 heard speaking with her. 
 
 Antinous seemed to notice something unusual, for he sud- 
 denly left the position in which the sculptor had placed him, 
 going to the window. Then he said to Pollux, in a rei)ressed 
 voice : 
 
 " Surely, I was not mistaken; Sabina, Hadrian's wife, is 
 speaking with your mother." 
 
 This was true; the empress had come to tlie iiOchias. She 
 had left her chariot at the gate, for the ])av('m('iit of the court 
 was still unfinished. 
 
350 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 SiibiiKi luitcd tlie dogs, of which licr liiishantl was so fond, 
 and tlio clever little beasts instinctively re(]uited the aversion. 
 On tliat acconut, Doris found it unusually difficult to reduce 
 her jiets to submission, and Sabina, who was really terrified, 
 commanded her to call them oil in a most peremptory man- 
 ner. The chamberlain, who supj^orted her, kicked at the un- 
 ruly creatures, wliich only increased their excitement. But at 
 last they were sliut iqi in the house, and Doris turned to the 
 stranger quite out of breath, and Avithout any susi^icion of the 
 dignity of the person before her — for she had never seen the 
 empress, and had formed quite a different imju-ession of her 
 a])pearance — said: "Forgive me, my good woman; the little 
 rogues are good at heart, and would not bite even a beggar; 
 but they do not like old women. Wliom do you seek Iiere, 
 mother?" 
 
 " That you will soon learn," answered Sabina, harshly. 
 " What a commotion, Lentulus, the activity of I*ontius has 
 made liere! vVnd how it would look within if this shanty 
 should remain to disfigure the entrance? It must go, together 
 with its inhabitants. Oj-der this woman to lead us to the 
 ]{oman lord dwelling here." 
 
 The chamberlain did as commanded, and Doris began to 
 sus23ect with whom she had to do, and said, as she smoothed 
 out her garment and bowed profoundly: 
 
 "What great honor is this, your highness? Perhaps you 
 ^•e wife of the emperor. If that be the case — " 
 
 .Sabina made a gesture of impatience toward her chamber- 
 lain, wJio interruiited the speech of the old woman with the 
 Avords: 
 
 " Hush, and show us the way." 
 
 Doris was more sensitive than usual, and her eyes, still red 
 from weeijing over the misfortune of Pollux, again filled with 
 tears. IS'o one had ever spoken to her in such a tone, but for 
 her son's sake she restrained herself from making answer in 
 the same contemptuous coin. 
 
 She trudged on silently before the empress, leading her to 
 the Hall of the Muses, where she relinquished her charge to 
 JV)ntius. Tlie reverence he showed the stranger convinced 
 Doi'is that her suspicion Avas correct — this could be no other 
 than the empress. 
 
 " A perverse vixen!" said Sabina, as she Avent out, pointing 
 her finger at Doris. 
 
 That Avas too much. ^Phe i)Oor old wonuui tlircAv lierself 
 <l<)\vn u])on a seat, buried her face iji her hands, and Avept bit- 
 terly. 1'he earth seemed givhig way under her feet. The 
 
THE EMPEROK. 251 
 
 emperor had threatened her son, and now the most powerful 
 woman in the world had become the enemy of herself and- her 
 house. She saw the family cast into the street, and asked 
 what would become of them all should she lose her position. 
 Her husband's memory was growing weaker, his voice was less 
 satisfactory, and her own vigor was diminishing with the years. 
 The sum laid aside for a day of need was very small. The 
 fresh and cheery old woman was in despair. And it was not 
 alone the threatening need which so pained her. It was the 
 disgrace which would follow, it was the injury to her sensibili- 
 ties that she, who from youth every one had met with kindli- 
 ness, should have so excited the displeasure of the woman 
 whose favor she needed to gain. 
 
 Sabina's entrance had driven the good sjiirits from the 
 Lochias. 
 
 This Doris was learning, but she was not one of those who 
 yield to hostile powers without resistance. 
 
 For a few moments she gave way to sorrow, and sobbed like 
 a child, then she dried her eyes, and found in her lightened 
 heart the benefit of tears. Gradually she was able to think 
 more composedly, and said to herself: 
 
 " Only the emperor has authority here, and it is said that 
 he does not always agree with his ill-natured wife, or ask after 
 her wishes. He is angry with Pollux, yet he has .always 
 seemed friendly to me. My dogs and my birds pleased him, 
 and has he not also eaten of my food? If I can only get an 
 opportunity to speak with him alone, perhaps all will come 
 out right. " 
 
 With these thoughts she rose. As she reached the vestibule 
 she met Gabiuius, the relic-hunter, who had come to the 
 Lochias in accordance with the request of Pontius . 
 
 Since the previous evenmg a suspicion of the emperor's pres- 
 ence m Alexandria had been in circulation. Where it started, 
 and on what grounds it rested, no one could say. It was 
 simply there, spreading through all circles, and growing in 
 strength. There is no growth so rapid as that of a rumor, 
 and yet it is a poor foimdling that knows not its own parent- 
 age. 
 
 The rehc dealer looked at her in surprise, as ho passed on 
 into the palace, while she was considering whether to wait 
 here for the emperor or return to her own house. Before 
 reacliing a decision, Pontius appeared, who had always shown 
 himself so kind that she ventured to relate to him her son's 
 experience with the emperor. 
 
 This was not new to Pontius, but he advised her to yfait un- 
 
252 THE EMPEKOR. 
 
 til lliidrian slioiilil be in better mood, and promiscMl, in tiny 
 eveilt, to do what ho could for Polhix, wlio liad woji his love 
 and resj)eL't. At jn-esent he was compelled to go away from 
 the city on a commission for the emperor, who, in passing 
 Mount Casius, had seen a monument erected on the s^iot 
 whei-e the great Pomjiey had been murdered. This monu- 
 ment had fallen into decay, and he determined to set up a 
 jiew one in its place, and had commissioned Pontius to under- 
 take it, leaving the unfinished work u])on the Jjochias to his 
 own direction. Oabinius had been summoned to his aid. 
 
 While they were speaking, Hadrian and his wife ajiproached. 
 The instant Pontius recognized them, he said, in a lower tone: 
 
 " I will see you again, little mother. Step one side, the 
 emperor and empress are coming,'^ and quickly disappeared. 
 
 Doris shipped behind a curtain which hung aci-oss a tloor-way, 
 for she would as Avillingly have come into contact with a wild 
 animal as to meet agahi the jiroud woman from whom she 
 could expect only insult and injur}'. 
 
 The interview with Hadrian had lasted barely quarter of an 
 hour, and could not have been agreeable, for the face of the 
 emperor was hotly flushed, and the li^^s of Sabina were color- 
 less, while one might have seen a restless twitching of her 
 painted cheeks. 
 
 As they jmssed by Doris heard. Hadrian say: 
 
 " In smaller things I let you act as you please; the greater 
 decisions, as in this case, I make exclusively according to my 
 own judgment. " 
 
 These words were the fiat of destiny to the gate-house and 
 its iidiabitants, for among the "smaller things^' to which 
 Hadrian alluded was the removal of the gate-house and its in- 
 habitants. 
 
 Sabina had demanded this of her husband, because it was dis- 
 agreeable to every one visiting the I^ochias to be met by such a 
 threatening mcgan-a, and attacked l)y her dogs. Doris had so 
 little suspicion of the significance of the emj^eror's words that 
 tiiey actually gave her pleasure, for how could she inuigine 
 tliat the disjiosition of her house and the destiny of her 
 family could belong among the *' smaller things.'" 
 
 Sabina had now left with her chamberlain, and Hadrian 
 stood alone with Master. The old woman thought she would 
 not easily find a more favorable moment in wdiich to approach 
 and beg the emperor's generosity toward herself,, and his for- 
 giveness for her son. 
 
 He stood with his back toward lier. Could she have seen 
 the terrible look upon liis face she must have remembered the 
 
THE EMPEROR. 253 
 
 advice of the architect, and would have postponed her re- 
 quest. 
 
 How many destroy their own good cause by insisting upon 
 some immediate decision, because they have not strength 
 enough to wait a favorable moment! 
 
 Present uncertainty seems oftentimes harder to bear than 
 an adverse fate in the future. 
 
 As Doris stepped out of the side room the kind-hearted Mas- 
 tor, wishing to spare the good woman's humiliation, made her 
 a sign to go back and not disturb the emperor, but she was so 
 preoccupied by her anxiety and her wishes that she did not 
 notice it. 
 
 As Hadrian turned to leave she took heart, and placing her- 
 self before the door, attempted to fall upon her knee before 
 him. That was hard for the old bones, and Doris was forced 
 to support herself against the door-post not to lose her equi- 
 librium. Hadrian recognized the j^etitioner, but to-day he 
 had no friendly word, and the look he cast ujwn her was any- 
 thing but gracious. How had he ever seen any tiling agreeable 
 in this forlorn old creature? 
 
 Ah! the poor Doris was indeed quite another person, in her 
 own little house, among the flowers and birds and dogs, than 
 in the wide sjjace of a grand jialace. Thousands who com- 
 mand respect and awaken pleasure in their ajijoroj^riate sur- 
 roundings excite quite diiferent feelings when thrown into 
 those where they do not belong. Doris had never made so 
 unfavorable an impression upon Hadrian as on this day, in 
 this decisive hour of her life. 
 
 She had come directly from the kitchen hearth, at the sum- 
 mons of the emjoress, after her sleepless night, with her gray 
 hair hi disorder, and her good, clear eyes, the ornament of 
 her face, red from weejiing. The neat, wholesome, motherly 
 Doris was anythiug but herself to-day, and to the eyes of Had- 
 rian seemed oidy one of the old hags whose meeting in going 
 out of a place always foreboded ill-luck. 
 
 " Oh, Cwsar! great Csssr!" she cried, lifting her hands, 
 soiled from contact with the cooknig utensils; " my son, my 
 unfortunate Pollux!" 
 
 " Out of the way!" said Hadrian, roughly. 
 
 " He is a sculjitor, a good one, who already exceeds some of 
 the masters; and if the gods — " 
 
 " Out of tlie way, I say. I will liear nothing of the insolent 
 boy!" cried Hadrian, disdainfully. 
 
 " But, great Caisar, he is my son, and you knoM' a moth- 
 er — " 
 
254 THE EiMPEROR. 
 
 " Master," broke in the emperor, " remove the old woman, 
 and give me jicace. " 
 
 "Oil, sire! sire!" said the distracted woman, with stream- 
 ing tears, while the slave lifted her aside; " how can you be 
 so hard!-' Am I not the same old Doris with whom you jested, 
 and whose food you enjoyed?" 
 
 These words recalled to Hadrian the hour of his arrival on 
 the Lochias. He perceived that he was in the debt of the old 
 woman; and, accustomed to ai;t with generosity, he added: 
 
 " For your good dish you will receive a sum large enough to 
 buy a new house. An allowance shall be paid you, but within 
 three hours you must leave the Lochias." 
 
 The emperor spoke rapidly, as if wishing to hasten through 
 an unpleasant affair, and jjassed on by Doris, who was now 
 standing upon her feet, and leaning, half stunned, against the 
 door-post. Were he still present and waiting for her words, 
 she could not have qiokcn. 
 
 To the emperor belonged the attributes of Jupiter: and as 
 lightning hurled by the father of the gods, so had his fiat shat- 
 tered all the ha23i:>incss of one peaceful home. 
 
 Doris shed no more tears. The frightful shock which had 
 convulsed her soul took away also her iiliysieal strength. Her 
 knees trembled, and feeling herself unable to go home, she 
 sunk down U2)on a bench, staring helplessly, and yet trying to 
 think what she ought to do. 
 
 In one of the lately renovated halls stood Hadrian. He 
 luid begun to repent his harshness toward the Avoman who had 
 shown herself so friendly both to him and to his favorite. 
 
 " Where is Antinous!''" he asked of Mastor. 
 
 " He went to the little house of the gate-keeper." 
 
 " What is he doing there?" 
 
 " I believe he will — He had there, perhaps — " 
 
 "The truth, fellow." 
 
 " He is with the sculptor Pollux." 
 
 " Has he been there long?" 
 
 " I do not know exactly." 
 
 " How long, I ask?" 
 
 " He went out just after you shut yourself in with Titi- 
 an us." 
 
 " Three hours, three full hours, in the house of that brag- 
 gart whom I turned out of the palace!" 
 
 Hadrian's eyes Hashed with i-age Avhile he said this. The 
 vexation about his favorite, whosu coniijanionshi}) he felt un- 
 willing to shai-e with any one, and least of all with I'ollux, 
 choked every kind feeling, and with indignation bordering on 
 
THE EMTEROR. 255 
 
 rage, he commandefl Master to summon him at once^ aiul 
 then see to it that the gate-keeper's house was vacated. 
 
 " Take a dozen slaves to help," he cried. " For aught I 
 care, the j^eople can carry their goods to a new house, but I 
 will never again see the howling old woman or her idiotic hus- 
 band. I have given the sculptor to nnderstaud that the em- 
 peror has a firm tread, and easily tramples down the snakes 
 that creep across his path." 
 
 Mastor went away sad. Hadrian went to his work-room, 
 and said to his private secretary, Phlegon : 
 
 " Write! A new gate-keeper is to be appointed for this 
 palace. Continue the j)ay of Eui^horion, and let half a talent 
 be lYdid him by the ijrefect. Also, give to the man immedi- 
 ately what is necessary, for in one hour neither he nor his 
 family must be found on the Lochias. Hereafter let no one 
 speak to me, or write to me, of any one of them. We con- 
 sign the whole race to the company of the dead." 
 
 Phlegon bowed, and said: 
 
 " The relic dealer, Gabinius, is in waiting."' 
 
 "He comes at an opportune moment," cried the emperor. 
 " After all these vexations it will do me good to hear of beau- 
 tiful things." 
 
 CHAPTER IX„ 
 
 It was certainly true. The appearance of Sabina had driven 
 the good spirits from the palace on the Lochias. The com- 
 mand of the emperor fell upon the little house at the gate Mice 
 a whirlwind among a hea]) of withered leaves. Its inhabitants 
 had not time to fully realize their misfortune, for instead of 
 lamentation active work was necessary. The tables, chairs, 
 couches and musical instruments, the baskets, flower-pots, 
 bird-cages, the kitchen ntensils and chests of wearing apjiarel, 
 were hurried pell-mell into the court — and Doris gave direc- 
 tion to the slaves Mastor brought with as much clearness and 
 carefulness as though simply moving from one house into an- 
 other. A glance of sunny cheerfulness shone again in her eyes. 
 She said to herself that what had occurred belonged to the in- 
 evitable, and it was wiser to think of the future tlian of the 
 j)ast. She seemed to liave quite recovered her old self, and as 
 she- saw Euphorion sitting in a broken attitude, staring hope- 
 lessly at the floor, she called out to him: 
 
 " After the sad days come always the joyful ones agaiji! 
 Let them not succeed in making ns unhapjiy! We have done 
 nothing wrong, and so long as we do not believe ourselves 
 
256 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 misemblo we sluill not be so. Only hold up the heiKl! Up, 
 old man, up] (Jo to Diotima and ask her to encertain ns and 
 our jjoods for a few days." 
 
 " If only tiie enijieror should not carry out liis threat!" sug- 
 gested Euphorion, gloomily. " What is life?" 
 
 "A wretched allair, indeed, and therefore it is wise to en- 
 joy still what wc ])ossess. Pour out a cup of wine, Pollux, for 
 nie, and for your father. Put to-day it need not be mixed. '* 
 
 " I can not drink," sighed the musician. 
 
 '' 'J'hen 1 will take your share!" 
 
 " 1^0 not, mother," begged Pollux. 
 
 " Mix it, my boy, mix it a little, but do not carry such a 
 despairing face. Js it fitting for a fresh young fellow Avho 
 carries a trade in his vigorous hand and the fairest of girls in 
 his heart?" 
 
 '"' For my own sake, mother," returned the young sculptor, 
 " I am not anxious. But how can I go to Arsiuoe in the 
 palace, or deal with the mad Keraunus?^'' 
 
 "Ask that question of Time," answered Doris. "She is 
 able to give botli good and bad answers. The best always to 
 those who wait for her in the vestibule Patience — " 
 
 " A very poor waiting-place for such as I," sighed Pollux. 
 
 " Only sit still and knock on the door, "answered Doris, 
 " and before you can look round Time will call out ' Come 
 in V Now show the peojjle how to handle the statue of Apollo, 
 and be again my cheery -hearted boy!" 
 
 Pollux did as she bade him, but he thought: " She speaks 
 well, but there is for her no Arsinoe left behind. Had I at 
 least only arranged to meet Antinous agaui!" But after the 
 command of the emperor, the youth seemed like one who had 
 received a blow on the head, and he staggered in going out as 
 one on his way to the altar of sacrifice. 
 
 The confidence of Doris seemed to be not without groimds, 
 for Phlegon now came in to inform her of the regular stipend 
 and the half talent the emperor had ordered paid to Eu- 
 j)horion. 
 
 " Do you not see," she cried, as the messenger departed, 
 "that a good day is already dawning? A half talent! Such 
 rich i^eople as Ave are now have nothing to fear from want. 
 What do you think? Would it not be fitting that we pour out 
 half the cup of wine before the gods, while we drink the rest?" 
 She was cheery as if preparing for a wedding, and Pollux soon 
 caught her spirit, for he felt that a i)art of the burden was 
 lifted from his i>arents and his sister. T'he dro()])ing heart 
 needed but a few dro])s of friendly dew. He thought again of 
 
THE EMPEROR. 357 
 
 lii.s art, determining at once to finish the statue of Antinous so 
 well begun. 
 
 AVliile in the house sujicrintcnding the removal of his work, 
 Papias entered the court, on his way to put a few finishing 
 touches to the work in the ^lalace, and wished to make an- 
 other attempt to ingratiate himself in the emperor's favor. 
 He was anxious lest Pollux should now betray how little share 
 of the work which had brought him more praise than all his 
 former undertakings really belonged to himself. It would 
 have been to his advantage to set aside his pride, and by some 
 generous offer induce Pollux to return to his service; but he 
 had been so carried beyond himself on the previous evening, 
 in speaking of the young sculjjtor to the emperor as a 2)oor 
 ^vorkman, and had given such lively expression to his joy on 
 being freed from him that he could not retreat. 
 
 Now there remained to him the alternative of removmg 
 Pollux from Alexandria, or in some other way nuiking him 
 harmless. The thought occurred to him of hiring an assassin 
 to commit murder; but Papias was a peaceable citizen, and 
 unwilling to overstep the law, so he rejected that thought as 
 imworthy and abhorrent. He was not very scrupulous in the 
 employ of means, not hesitating to work in an underhand 
 manner, or to calumniate a fellow-being, and in such ways 
 had often gained a victory over some hostile fellow-artist. He 
 hated the son of the gate-keeper less than he feared him, and 
 did not hide from himself the fact that if his effoi'ts failed, and 
 Pollux should succeed in establishing himself, and showing 
 what he was capable of, he could not prevent his proclaiming 
 the assistance rendered to his master in these last years. His 
 attention was arrested by slaves carrying the household goods 
 of Euj)horion into the street. Soon learning what had hap- 
 peiied, and rejoicing in this exhibition of the omjocror's ill-will, 
 ho stood still, and asked some one to call Pollux. Master and 
 2)upil exchanged greetings with coolness, and the former said: 
 
 ' ' You have forgotten to return the things you took yester- 
 day without my jjermission. I want them to-day. " 
 
 " They were not borrowed for myself, but for the great lord 
 and Ms comisanion in the palace yonder. If anything be lost, 
 he is resj)onsible. I am sorry that I included the silver quiver, 
 for the comiDanion of the Iioman has lost it. So soon as I 
 have finished this work, I will bring all the articles to you, and 
 also remove whatever of my own is in your workshop. " 
 
 " Very well,'' aiiswered Papias, " I will expect you an hour 
 before siuiset, and then all things can be arranged." 
 
 Without a parting salute, he turned his back and entered 
 
258 TITK EMTRROR. 
 
 the i)alace. This coiifcs.sioii of Pollux that ho had taken some 
 of his pro])ert3' without pLTinisslon, and among them one 
 article of (.'onsiderable value, might furnish an opportunity for 
 putting him out of the way. 
 
 lie remained scarcely half an hour in the palace, and then 
 — while Pollux accompanied his parents to the residence of his 
 sister — he went to the general officer of the night police. 
 Papias was on intimate terms with this man, and since he luui 
 made a sarcophagus for hi*^ deceased Avife, and an altar 
 decorated with pictures in relief for his apartments at a rea- 
 sonable rate, he dared venture to rely on his kind offices. 
 
 When he came out he held an order for the arrest of Pollux 
 in his hand, on the charge of having stolen from him a quiver 
 of solid silver. The officer had also promised to send two of 
 his agents to convey the evil-doer to the prison. 
 
 Papias went home with a lightened heart. 
 
 Pollux returned to the j^alace, after having seen the house- 
 hold goods of his parents in order, and there to his joy he met 
 Mastor, who brought the articles borrowed by Hadrian and 
 Antinous. The .Jazygean also related, with tears in his eyes, 
 a sad story which deeply moved the young sculptor, and in 
 spite of every danger would have induced him to enter the 
 palace but for the appointment with Papias, the time for which 
 was close at hand. Wishing nothing else, and scarcely think- 
 ing of anything else than a speedy return to the Lochias, 
 where his jjresence was needed, and where the heart led him, 
 lie took the packet from the hand of the slave and hastened 
 onward, arriving at the house of Pai:)ias quite out of breath. 
 His old master had takenpains to send every other person from 
 the house, and received Pollux alone. He named the articles 
 piece by piece, with an icy coldness of manner, demanding 
 their restoration. 
 
 "I have already told j^ou,'' cried Pollux, " that the great 
 lord from Rome — you know very well who he is — is responsi- 
 ble for these articles, and will not fail to make reparation for 
 the torn chiton and the missuig quiver. '^ 
 
 Then he began to relate to him how Antinous had ordered 
 the masks and costumes in the name of his master. But Papias 
 cut him olf in the outset, vehemently claiming the bow and 
 quiver, whose value Pollux would not be able to earn wiiiu'n 
 two years. The youth, whose heart and thoughts were all on 
 the Locliias, and at no price wished to be detained longer 
 than necessity rcfjuired, begged at fir«t, politely, that l^vpias 
 would release him, [)romisiug to l)ring full Kalisi'ac.tion tlie 
 next day, after <-laimiiig a just xemune ration from tlie Koimui. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 259 
 
 But as Papias again and again interrupted, obstinately insist- 
 ing on the immediate replacement of his jjossessions, the ex- 
 citable blood of the young artist rose, and he made joassionate 
 re})ly to his attacks and questions. One word led on to an- 
 other. Papias at last spoke of peoj^le who laid hands on the 
 silver of others, and when Pollux retorted by refereiice to some 
 who claimed the work of other people as their own, Papias 
 struck heavily u2:)on the table with his fist, and going toward 
 the door, far eiiough to be safe from the vigorous arm of the 
 excited youtli, exclaimed : 
 
 " You thief, I will show you how such persons are treated 
 in Alexandria." 
 
 Pollux turned pale with rage and plunged after him, but 
 Papias had called to the bailiff hidden in the vestibule: 
 
 " Seize the thief, chain him, fetter him, drag him to prison. 
 He has stolen my silver, and lifted liis hand against his mas- 
 ter." 
 
 Pollux was too much astounded to understand the meaning 
 of this scene. Like a bear confronted by its hunters, he stood 
 at bay. Should he plunge upon his jDersecutor and tear him 
 to the ground? or should he inactively wait to see what would 
 happen? lie knew every stone in the house of his master. 
 The room they were in, like all the others, was on the ground- 
 floor. While the bailiff was coming nearer, and Papias handed 
 to the lictor his order for arrest, his eye fell upoji a window 
 opening on the street, and, filled with the one desire to gain 
 freedom and fly to the help of Arsinoe, he sprung through it. 
 
 " The thief! stoj) the thief!" rang after him as he plunged 
 forward. 
 
 The passionate cry within his heart: "To the Lochias! to 
 Arsinoe! Only keep free for her sake to help her!" was louder 
 than the voice of his jiursuers, and impelled him forward in 
 long leaps. The fresh salt air from the sea touched his glow- 
 ing cheeks, and he knew the narrow, empty streets would lead 
 him to the wharf, where among the high piles of wood lie 
 might lie concealed from his pursuers. Ikit turning into one 
 of these, an Egyptian cattle-driver thrust a goad between his 
 legs, over which he stumbled and fell to the ground. Instant- 
 ly one of the dogs in pursuit tore the chiton from his body, 
 and many men ])lunged upon him. One hour later he found 
 himself, bitten, bruised, bound, in prison, among vile fellows 
 and g(!nuine thieves. I'he night had fallen; his parents were 
 ex])('ctiug him, but lie did 7iot ap])e;u-. 
 
 Upon th(! Lodiias, which lie hail not succeeded in reaching, 
 were trouble and misery enough, and tlic only person who 
 
260 THE EMPET^OR. 
 
 might hava carried comfort lo (lie despairing Arsinoc was 
 missing. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 The recital of the slave Mastor, which liad so deeply moved 
 Pollux and occasioned his reckless lliglit, was one of events 
 occurring in tlie quarters of the j^alace overseer simultaneously 
 with the ]-cmoval of Euphorion and his household goods to the 
 narrow dwelling of Diotima. 
 
 Keraunus certainly could not he classed among the cheerful, 
 but on the morning of Sahina's visit to the Lochias he had tlie 
 appearance of inwai'd content. 
 
 Since his visit to Selene, on the i^revious day, he had no 
 more anxiety on her account. She was not dangerously sick, 
 was well nursed, and the children did not seem to miss her. 
 He did not quite like to confess it to himself, yet it was true 
 that he felt freer and lighter in the absence of this stern moni- 
 tress, and the thought would come that it was pleasant to live 
 in this easy way with Arsinoe and the children. 1 le frequent- 
 ly rubbed his hands together in a satisfied way antl smiled to 
 himself. 
 
 As the old slave brought in a large dish of cakes he had 
 ordered her to buy and place near the morning souji of the 
 children, they gave vent to such lively delight that his great 
 body shook with pleasure. 
 
 And he had good reason to be joyful. Plutarch had sent a 
 heavy purse of gold, in exchange for his ivory cup, and a mag- 
 nificent bmich of roses to Arsinoe. He could well alforcl to 
 give the children a pleasure, and to buy a fillet of real gold 
 for himself, and to dress Arsinoe as handsomely as though she 
 were the prefect's daughter. His vanity was satisfied in all 
 respects. 
 
 And tlien what a handsome fellow was the slave, who now 
 offered him the roast fowl with such a very respectful bow, and 
 would Avalk behind him, in the afternoon, to the council! Tlu^ 
 great Thessalian, who carried the documents of the archidi- 
 kastes into the judicial court, was scarcely more stately than 
 his body-servant. 
 
 He luid bought the fellow yesterday, and at what a cheap 
 price ! 
 
 The full-grown Samian Mas scarcely thirty years old. Ho 
 could read and write, tcadi the children, and i)lay the lute. 
 Jt is true there were some ugly s}iots on his past record, and 
 that was the reason he cost so little. He luid several times 
 
THE EMPEROE. 261 
 
 been detected in stealing, but the brands and the stripes "he 
 bore were all hidden by the new chiton, and Keraunus fancied 
 himself able to correct entirely this evil disjjosition. 
 
 After charging Arsinoe to leave nothing of value lying about, 
 since their new inmate might not be joerfectly reliable, he an- 
 swered the scruple of his daughter : 
 
 "'' It would, of course, be more satisfactory were he as 
 honorable as the old skeleton I threw into the bargain for this 
 one; but I reason in this way: if my body-servant does really 
 purloin a few drachmas I need not regret my purchase, since 
 it M'as on this very account I obtained him several thousand 
 drachmas under price; and a school -master for the children 
 would certainly have cost more than he can steal. I will lock 
 up our gold in the chest, with the pajDcrs. That is safe, and 
 one would need a crowbar to pry it open. Probably ho will 
 not steal anything for awhile, as his former master was not 
 mild, and he may have driven the evil trait out of him. It is 
 well that in the sale of such a fellow one must state the crimes 
 of which he has been guilty, and, if it be omitted, later 
 possessors can claim damage. Lykophron has certainly con- 
 cealed nothing, and, if one could overlook the thievish disposi- 
 tion, this Samian is in every other respect an excellent fellow. " 
 
 " But father," answered Arsinoe, "it is very unpleasant to 
 have a dishonest joerson in the house. " 
 
 " That you do not understand, child," returned Keraimus. 
 " For us, life and honesty are synonymous terms; but a slave! 
 King Antiochus is rejjorted to have said that he who wishes to 
 be well served must be served by a rogue." 
 
 When Arsinoe was attracted to the balcony by the song of 
 her lover, and called back by her father, Keraunus showed no 
 unfriendliness, but stroked her cheek and said, smilingly : 
 
 " I believe the gate-keeper's son. whom I once drove away, 
 is looking after you, since you have been chosen to the part of 
 Eoxana! Poor fellow! We have now quite other suitors in 
 view, my girl. What if the rich Plutarch sent these roses, not 
 on his own account but to greet you in the interest of his son? 
 I know he would gladly marry, but the fastidious fellow has 
 not yet found any Alexandrian girl handsome enough. ■" 
 
 " I do ]iot know him, and he cares nothing for such a jjoor 
 thing as I am," said Arsinoe. 
 
 " Do you believe that?" asked Keraunus, laughing. " We 
 arc as high in raid?, perhaps even higher than Plutarch, and 
 the fairest best fit the richest. How would you like a long 
 purple robe, a chariot with white horses, and runners in ad- 
 vance?" 
 
263 THE EMPE-ROK, 
 
 Kcraumis drank two cups of strong wine witli his breakfast, 
 in wliicli lie allowed Arsinoe io pour only a few drops of water. 
 
 AVliile she was curling his hair a swallow Hew into the 
 room. That was a lucky omen, and stimulated the courage 
 of Keraunus. 
 
 Well dressed, and with a full purse, he was just ready to 
 betake himself with his new body-servant to the council, when 
 the latter introduced the tailor Sophilus, with a female assist- 
 ant, who came to beg permission to try the costume ordered 
 by the wife of the prefect for Eoxana. 
 
 Keraunus received him with amazing condescension, and 
 allowed his slaves to bring in the great packet containing the 
 garments. Arsinoe, who was with the children, was called in. 
 She was constrained and anxious, and would gladly have re- 
 signed her part to another, but she was very curious about the 
 new clothes. 
 
 The tailor requested that she would allow her servant to 
 array her in the costume, suggesting that his assistant should 
 be present to explain the Asiatic style of arrangement. 
 
 " Your dressing-maid," he added, turning to Arsinoe, " will 
 learn to-day how she is to arrange the garments for the great 
 occasion." 
 
 " My daughter's maid,'' answered Keraunus, with a crafty 
 side glance at Arsinoe, " is not at home?" 
 
 '* Oh, I need no assistance,'' cried the seamstress; "lean 
 also well arrange the hair, and will gladly do it for such a 
 lovely young lady." 
 
 " It is a pleasure to work for her," added Sojihilus. " Some 
 are made handsome by their garments; your daughter will give 
 a charm to whatever she may wear. " 
 
 " You are very pohte," said Keraunus, as Arsinoe retired 
 with the seamstress. 
 
 "Intercourse with stylish people has taught me many 
 things," answered the tailor. " The ladies in high life who 
 honor me with their custom wish not only to see, but to hear, 
 that they look well. Unfortunately, some among them have 
 been poorly endowed by nature, and such especially desire 
 flattering words. You know it pleases the poor much more 
 than it docs the rich to be thought well oft". " 
 
 " That is well said," cried Keraunus. " I myself am not 
 overabundantly supplied with the wealth befitting my origin, 
 and I willingly live within my means. Meanwhile my daugh- 
 ter ought — " 
 
 " Julia has chosen the costliest stuiTs for her." 
 
 " As the occasion demands. Yet, when this festival is over, 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 263 
 
 my daughter ought to appear both at home and on tne street 
 in suitable and handsome, if not costly, garments. " 
 
 " I have already said that natural grace needs no external 
 adornment/' 
 
 " Would you be willing to work for her at a moderate 
 price?" 
 
 " With pleasure; I shall be under obligations to her; for 
 every one will admire Eoxana and inquire for her tailor." 
 
 " You are a reasonable man. What would you charge foi 
 a garment?" 
 
 " We will speak of that at another time." 
 
 " No, no, I beg you sincerely." 
 
 " Allow me first to consider your wishes. Simple garments 
 are more difficult to arrange, and become handsome women 
 much better than showy ones. But to make a woman believe 
 that, I can sing a song of their foolishness. Many a woman 
 rides in her chariot whose garments and jewels are the only 
 fui-niture of her house, as well as of her body." 
 
 Such was the conversation between Keraunus and the tailor, 
 while his assistant dressed the hair of Arsinoe with strings of 
 imitation pearls, which she had brought for the purpose of 
 trying their effect, and fitted on the rich blue and white silk 
 suitable for an Asiatic princess. Arsinoe was at first silent 
 and timid. She did not care to adorn herself for other eyes 
 than those of Pollux, but the garments purchased for her were 
 very beautiful — and how wonderfully the dress-maker under- 
 stood bringing out all her best points! 
 
 Many hearty words of admiration came from the lips of this 
 skillful woman, and soon Arsinoe shared her enthusiasm. As 
 the shrub which the breath of spring adorns with flowers seems 
 to rejoice, so did this simple child find j^leasure in her own 
 beauty and in the costly apparel provided for her. She clapped 
 her hands, she viewed herself in the mirror, and expressed her 
 feelings with the unrestrained freedom of a child. 
 
 " If Pollux could only see me!" she thought. '' After the 
 exhibition, perhaps I can show myself to Selene, and then she 
 will be reconciled to my pleasure in the occasion. It is nice 
 to be so pretty!" 
 
 The children stood about her while she was being dressed, 
 and gave loud expression to their delight with the addition of 
 each article. 
 
 The blind boy begged permission to feel her garment, and 
 she allowed his little hands to pass over the soft and shining 
 folds. She was now ready to show herself to her father and 
 the tailor. AValkiiig Vv'ith head erect like a veritable king's 
 
2(14 THE EMl'EKOR. 
 
 (liiuglitor,, and yet c.irryiiig tlio tlirobhino; lic.irt of n poor 
 iu;ii<k'n, accustomed only to the j^rotectioii of a father's house 
 — about to sliow herself to a thousand staring eyes — slie went 
 toward the common room. But slie drew back the lumd jDlaced 
 upon the hitch when she heard voices of men who must have 
 lately come in to her father. 
 
 '' Wait a little, there are visitors/' she said, and put her 
 car to the door. 
 
 At first she comprehended nothing of the conversation, but 
 at last it became so fearfully intelligible that to her dying day 
 she could never forget. 
 
 Keraunus had engaged Sophilus to make two new dresses for 
 Arsinoe, beating him down in price, and j)romising immediate 
 l)ayment, when the slave, Mastor, entered, announcing the 
 arrival of liis master and Gabinius, who wished to speak with 
 Keraunus. 
 
 " Your master, '^ he said, proudly, '' can come in. I think 
 he regrets his injustice to me; but Gabinius must never cross 
 my threshold: he is a knave.'' 
 
 " It would be well for you to request this man to leave," 
 continued the slave, pointing to the tailor. 
 
 " Whoever visits me must consent to meet any one I allow 
 to enter my house. " 
 
 " No," cried the slave, earnestly, "my master is higher 
 than you suppose. Please ask the man to leave." 
 
 " 1 know all that," said Keraunus, laughing. " He is an 
 intimate of the emjjeror. We shall see after the representa- 
 tion in his honor, for which we are all preparing, whether Had- 
 rian will justify liim or me. The tailor has still something 
 to do here, and will remain. Take a seat in the corner, my 
 friend. ' ' 
 
 " A tailor!" cried Mastor, incensed. " I tell you he must 
 go away. " 
 
 " He mnsf !" repeated l^eraunus, irritated. " A slave pre- 
 sume to give orders to me in my own dwelling? We shall see 
 about that. " 
 
 " I will go," broke in the sensible tradesman; " you shall 
 not get into trouble on my account. I will return in quarter 
 of an hour. ' ' 
 
 "You shall stay," reiterated Keraunus. " The impudent 
 Roman demeans himself as if the Lochias belonged to him. I 
 will show him who is in command here." 
 
 Mastor was not confused l)y these lofty words; but seizing 
 the hand of the tailor, he led him away, whispering: 
 
 " Follow me if you would escape an evil hour." 
 
THE EMPEROE. 2GJ 
 
 And Keraimus did not seek again to detain them, for the 
 thought had occurred to him that the presence of the tailoi 
 Avould bring him little credit. 
 
 He wished to show himself to the architect in his full dignity, 
 and remembered also that it would not be wise to irritate this 
 peculiar man with his savage dog. Excited, and not free 
 from anxiety, he wallved up and down the apartment. 
 
 To increase his courage, he twice filled and emptied a goblet 
 from the wine-jar upon the breakfast-table, and stood with 
 folded arms and flushed cheeks awaiting his visitors. 
 
 As the emperor entered, he passed by Keraimus without a 
 word, as though he were merely a pillar or a piece of furniture. 
 For a full minute, Keraunus sought languageto ex2:)ress his 
 sense of the outrage. Gabiuius followed the example of Had- 
 rian, passed directly to the mosaic for which he had offered so 
 high a sum a few days before, and said: 
 
 "' I beg you to examine this m^asteri^iece.^" 
 
 The emperor looked; but scarcely had he begun to inspect 
 the painting, whose exceeding beauty he well knew how to 
 value, when he heard behind him, in the thick speech of 
 Keraunus: 
 
 " In Alexandria, it is customary to greet the people one 
 visits.'' 
 
 Hadrian only half turned his head, saying, in a tone of 
 scorn : 
 
 " In Rome also, one salutes honest jjeople.'' 
 
 Then turning his attention to the mosaic, he said to Ga- 
 biuius: 
 
 " A rare work truly, and of inestimable value." 
 
 At this reply of the emperor, the eyes of Keraunus seemed 
 starting from their sockets. With deeply flushed face and 
 colorless lips, he stepped nearer to Hadrian, and as soon as ho 
 could gather breath enough to speak, he asked: 
 ■ " What have — what can your words mean?" 
 
 Hadrian turned quickly and squarely toward the overseer. 
 In his eyes was that annihilating glance few were able to bear, 
 and his deep voice filled the apartment, as he said to the un- 
 fortunate Keraunus: 
 
 ' ' My words signify that you have been an unfaithful 
 steward, that I know more than is agreeable to you of the 
 manner in which you have dealt with that committed to your 
 trust. " 
 
 " That I?'-* asked Keraunus, trembling, and going nearer 
 to the emperor. 
 
 " That you,'' continued Hadrian, lookhig into his face. 
 
266 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " have attempted to sell the mosaic painting from this floor to 
 Gabiuius; and, expresshig the thing in short sj)ace, that you 
 are a simpleton and a rascal I'^ 
 
 *' I — I — *' stammered the overseer, striking his breast. " I 
 a — a — you shall retract those words I" 
 
 Hadrian laughed coldly and scornfully, but Keraunus sprung 
 with a celerity scarcely to be expected from one of his weight 
 upon Gabinius, seizing him by the collar of his chiton, and 
 shaking the lank fellow as he woidd have shaken a slender 
 sapling, screeching, meanwhile: 
 
 *' I will make you swallow your own calumny, you serpent, 
 you malicious viper I" 
 
 " Madmanl'^ cried Hadrian, " let the Ligurian alone!'^ 
 
 " Repent I' ' stammered Keraunus. " You will be the one 
 to repent as soon as the emperor arrives. Then we shall have 
 a reckoning as to the slander, the insolence, the disturbance 
 of a household, the too easily credited charges — " 
 
 " Man — man," broke in Hadrian, sternly, but without pas- 
 sion, " you know not to whom you are speaking!" 
 
 " Oh, I know you only too well. But I — shall I tell you 
 who I am?" 
 
 " You are a blockhead," replied the monarch, with a scorn- 
 ful shrug of the shoulders. 
 
 Then he added, coldly, with the air of stately indifference 
 belonging to high rank: 
 
 " I am the emperor!" 
 
 For a few seconds Keraunus stared without a sound into the 
 face of Hadrian. Then he shrunk together as if seized by a 
 convulsion; and, as a rock moved by an earthquake loses its 
 equilibrium, so he fell backward upon the floor with a loud 
 gurgling in his throat. 
 
 Tlie building quaked with his fall. Hadrian was startled, 
 and as he saw him lying at his feet motionless, he bowed over 
 him, less perhaps through any feeling of compassion than to 
 test his own medical skill. 
 
 As he lifted his hand to fer^l the pulse, Arsinoe plunged into 
 the apartment. She had listened breathlessly to the latter part 
 of the conversation, and hearing her father's fall, rushed past 
 Hadrian to his side. When his distorted and bluish-colored 
 features revealed to her what had happened, she burst into a 
 passionate cry. The little brothers and sisters cried also, for 
 no better reason at first than because Arsinoe had set the ex- 
 ample, though the sight of their father lying upon the floor 
 filled them with vague terror. 
 
 U'he emperor, who had neither son nor daughter, foimd usu- 
 
THE EMPEROR. * 267 
 
 ally the crying of children an insupportable annoyance, but ho 
 was too much occupied in learning the condition of Keraunua 
 CO notice it for awhile. 
 
 "' He is dead/' said Hadrian, in a few moments. " Throw 
 a cloth over his face, Mastor.'' 
 
 Arsinoe and the little ones Availed anew, which now seemed 
 to disturb the emperor. When his eyes rested upon Arsinoe, 
 whose joartly sewed garments of rich and heavy stuff were fall- 
 ing a|)art, in consequence of her rapid motions, he turned away 
 with a feeling of disgust at the gaudy trumpery of her ajaparel 
 in these circumstances of sorrow, and left the room. Gabinius 
 followed, with an ugly leer upon his face. He had called the 
 attention of Hadrian to the mosaic, and while boasting his 
 own honesty, had charged Keraunus with having jDrojJOsed to 
 sell it to him. 
 
 Now the calumniated man was dead, and he felt sure the 
 truth \vould never come to the light. That thought was jDleas- 
 ant, but he found still greater satisfaction in the fact that 
 Arsinoe could not now appear as Roxana, and the possibihty of 
 securing the part for his own daughter reopened. 
 
 Hadrian walked before him thoughtfully and in silence. As 
 they entered the work-room of the emperor, Gabinius said: 
 " Verily, great CtBsar, the gods punish a wrong-doer with 
 severe hand." 
 
 The emperor let him finish the sentence, then with a sharp 
 and scrutinizing look at his face, said : 
 
 " It seems to me better to break off all intercourse with you, 
 and give the commission I had planned to some other man. " 
 
 "My emperor!" exclaimed Gabinius "in truth, I knew 
 nothing — " 
 
 " But I think you attempted to lead me wrong, and put a 
 fault of your own upon the shoulders of another," broke in the 
 monarch. 
 
 "I! great Caesar I should — ''broke in the Ligurian, with 
 ashy lips. 
 
 "You have played the overseer a shabby trick," answered 
 Hadrian; "but I know men, and am sure no real thief dies 
 because he has been called a rascal. Only an undeserved 
 charge would destroy life." 
 
 " Keraunus was full-blooded, and the shock of learning that 
 you were the emperor — " 
 
 " That undoubtedly hastened the event," broke in Had- 
 rian; " but the mosaic in his dwelhng is worth a million 
 sesterces; and now that I look you straight in the eye, I know 
 3'ou are not the man to decline such an opportunity, no matter 
 
2C,S THE EMPEROR. 
 
 under what circumstances. If I am not mistaken, Keraunus 
 repulsed an attempt of yours to secure tlie treasure. That is 
 certainly the truth. Go, now; I wish to he alone.'' 
 
 Gabinius retired backward, bowing as he went toward the 
 door, and left the jDalace on the Lochias, muttering curses. 
 
 The new body-servant of the overseer, the old black 
 woman. Master, the tailor, and his slave, assisted Arsinoe in 
 drawing the body of her father upon the coucli. The slave 
 closed his eyes — he was dead. 
 
 Each one said this to the desjDairing girl, but she could not, 
 she would not believe it. When she lifted his heavy, inflexible 
 arm, it droj^ped back like lead. She drew the cover from his 
 face, but was glad to hide again from sight the features death 
 had distorted. Then she kissed the cold hand, and bid the 
 children do the same, saying, with a sob: 
 
 " We have no more a father. We shall never, never see 
 him again. " 
 
 The Ijlind boy touched the cold corpse, and asked: 
 
 " AVill he not wake early to-morrow morning, and let you 
 curl his hair, and toss up his little Helios?" 
 
 " Never, never. All is over with him — all." 
 
 Master entered the apartment on an errand from the em- 
 peror. He had not forgotten the blessed message learned from 
 the foreman of the j^avement-layers, 23i'omising a blessed life 
 beyond the present, and steijping nearer, he said : 
 
 "No, ]io, cliildren. When we are dead, we shall become 
 beautiful angels with bright wings, and all who have loved 
 each otlier on the earth will meet together there, Avitli the good 
 God in heaven. " 
 
 Arsinoe looked displeased, and answered: " Of what use is it 
 to deceive the children with fables? The father has gone, 
 not to return, but we shall never forget him." 
 
 " Are there no angels with red wings?" asked the youngest 
 daughter of Keraunus. 
 
 " I want to be an angel!" cried the blind boy, clapping his 
 hands. " Can the angels see, too?" 
 
 "Yes, dear child," answered Mastor, "and their eyes are 
 especially clear, and what they have to look upon is very beau- 
 tiful." 
 
 " Have done with the Christian nonsense," begged Arsinoe. 
 " Ah, children, when our father's body has been burned, there 
 will be nothing left of him but a little gray ashes." 
 
 The slave took the little boy up in liis arms, and whispered 
 in his ear: 
 
 " Only believe me, you will see him again in heaven!" 
 
THE EMPEROR. 269 
 
 As he placed Helios again upon his own feet, he gave 
 Arsinoe a purse of gold the emperor had sent, with the request 
 that she would seek a new lodging, and after the burning of 
 the body on the next day, leave the Lochias, with her brothers 
 and sisters. 
 
 Arsinoe oj^ened the chest in which were the papers of her fa- 
 ther and the money Plutarch had paid for the ivory cup. She 
 laid the heavy purse sent by Hadrian beside it, sayhig to her- 
 self that at least they would be for a long time above want. 
 Bat where should she go with the children? What place would 
 furnish them shelter? And what would become of them after 
 the gold was used up? 
 
 Thanks to the gods, she was not deserted! She had friends! 
 With Pollux she would find love and protection, and motherly 
 counsel in Doris. She was not quite desolate, and soon she 
 could weeji on the breast of her lover! 
 
 Quickly she dried her eyes, and exchanged the unfinished 
 dress of silk for the simj^le garment she had worn in the 
 papyrus mill. After loosening the pearls from her hair, she 
 started for the gate-house. When within a few steps of it she 
 began to wonder why the three Graces did not spring out to 
 bark at her; why there were no flowers or birds in the win- 
 dows. Was she deceived, or dreaming, or the victim of mis- 
 chievous spirits? The door of the home-like little house stood 
 wide open. No forgotten article or stray leaf from the grow- 
 ing plants was lying upon the floor — for Doris had left all in 
 the same order as if she were expecting to return on the mor- 
 row. 
 
 What had happened here? 
 
 Where were her friends? 
 
 A strange anxiety took possession of her. She felt the jiangs 
 of desolation. As she sat down uj^on a stone bench, thinking 
 to wait the return of those who must be coming soon, the 
 tears again filled her eyes, and fell in heavy drops upon the 
 hands lying idly upon her lap. AVhile she sat there, a crowd 
 of slaves approached the deserted building, and their master 
 ordered her to leave the bench, saying they had been sent to 
 l^ull down the little house, and telling her that Euphorion and 
 J)oris had been dismissed from service and sent away from the 
 Lochias, with all their goods. But no one knew where they 
 had gone. Arsinoe felt like a mariner whose vessel had been 
 driven upon the rocks, and feels with terror the planks and 
 beams loosening and giving way underneath him. 
 
 As usual, when in any perplexity, her thoughts turned to 
 Selene, and she determined to hasten to her for advice. 
 
270 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 It was already twilight. 
 
 With rapid stei)s, and often willing away the tears with her 
 pepluni, she returiicd to the dwelHiig for the veil, without 
 •which she dared not venture so late into the street. 
 
 Upon the steps where the Molossian had attacked Selene, she 
 met some person evidently in great haste. 
 
 In the dim light she fancied a resemblance to the slave her 
 father had bought the day before, but did not think very much 
 about it, having so much else to occupy her attention. She 
 found the old slave woman sitting beside a lamp in the kitchen, 
 ■with the children huddled about her, and near the hearth were 
 the baker and the butcher, come to claim the payment of their 
 long accounts, for the news of sorrow has swifter wings than 
 a joyful message, and so they had already learned of Keraunus's 
 death. 
 
 Arsinoe begged them to wait a moment, and went into the 
 room whei-e lay the corpse of the man who, only a few hours 
 before, had stroked her cheeks and looked lovingly into her 
 eyes. 
 
 How glad she felt to be able to pay all his debts, and rescue 
 his name from dishonor! Confidently she took the key from 
 her pocket to open the chest. 
 
 But what met her gaze? 
 
 She was quite sure she had locked it before going out, and 
 yet there it stood wide open. The cover, thrown back, hung 
 awry upon one hinge; the other was broken. 
 
 A frightful suspicion chilled her blood. The lamp trembled 
 in her hand as she bent over the chest, to which had been 
 trusted their whole dependence. 
 
 There lay the old manuscripts carefully rolled together, but 
 the two purses containing the gold were missing. She care- 
 fully took up one article after another, and ended by turning 
 out everything in the chest. But the gold was really gone. 
 
 The new slave had burst the cover, and stolen from the 
 orphans of the man who had taken him into his house oidy to 
 satisfy his vanity, tbeir whole fortune. 
 
 Arsinoe uttered a loud cry, calling in the creditors, and told 
 them all what had hajipened, begging them to pursue the 
 tliief. When they only listened with an mibelieving shrug of 
 the shoulders, she swore that she was speaking the truth, and 
 promised, whether tbe slave were overtaken or not, to pay 
 them with her own and her father's ornanieiics. 
 
 She told them the name of the trader who had sold Samier 
 to her father, and at last persuaded them to attempt the pur- 
 Buit. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 271 
 
 Again she was alone. Without tears, but shivering, and 
 scarcely able to maintain her self -control, she seized the veil, 
 wound it about her head, and hastened through the court and 
 the streets to her sister. 
 
 Certainly, since the appearance of Sabina in the palace on 
 the Lochias, the good spirits had departed. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 In a dark corner, under shadow of the wall inclosing the 
 garden of the widow of Pudens, stood the cynic who had en- 
 countered Antinous in so unfriendly a manner, defending 
 himself zealously against the charge of another man, who, like 
 himself, wore a ragged mantle, and carried a beggar^s scrip, 
 and who seemed to belong to the same company. 
 
 " Do not deny,'" said the latter, " that you are an adherent 
 of the Christians." 
 
 " Listen to me,'' was the earnest reply. 
 
 " I do not need to listen, for this is the tenth time I have 
 seen you slip out of their assembly. " 
 
 " Have I denied it? Have I not openly declared that I seek 
 truth everywhere, if there be only a shimmer of hope to guide 
 me toward it?" 
 
 " Like the Egyptian, who, wishing to catch a strange fish, 
 cast his line into the sand." 
 
 " That man acted sensibly." 
 
 " Give us an example. " 
 
 ' ' A wonder is not found where all are seeking it. In search 
 a,fter truth, one must not shun a bog; and the Christian doc- 
 trine is just such a miry thicket." 
 
 " It may be so, for all I care." 
 
 " Then look out that you do not get stuck in the morass." 
 
 " I will take care of myself." 
 
 " You said lately there were some good people among 
 them." 
 
 "A few individuals. But the majority? Eternal gods! 
 Mere slaves, beggars, poor trades-people, common folk, uncul- 
 tivated, unphilosophical heads, a crowd of women — " 
 
 " Then avoid them!" 
 
 "You are the last one to give me such counsel." 
 
 " AVftat do you mean by that?" 
 
 He stepped nearer to his companion, and asked, in a whis- 
 per: 
 
 " Where do you suppose I get the money for our food and 
 lodging?" 
 
272 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " So long as you do not steal, I do not care." 
 
 " If I give it uji, will you then ask?" 
 
 " Certainly not. We are strivijig after virtue, and slioidd 
 ;lo all we can to become independent of Nature and her de- 
 mands. Ikit they will sometimes assert tiieir rights. 80 out 
 with the matter. AVhere do you get the money?" 
 
 " Money burns the purses of those people in yonder. Alms- 
 giving is their duty and their sincere pleasure. So they be- 
 stow upon me from week to week a few drachmas, for my 
 brother in need. ■" 
 
 " Pshaw I You are the true son of your departed father. " 
 
 " All men are brethren, say the Christians; therefore I am 
 able, without falsehood, to call you mine." 
 
 " Go in then, on my account," was the laughing response, 
 witli a slap on the shoulder of his companion. " What if I 
 should follow your example, and join the Christians also? 
 Perhaps they might give me, too, a weekly stipend for my hun- 
 gry brother; then we should have a double supply." 
 
 The cynics laughed aloud as they separated; one going to- 
 ward the city, the other into the garden of the Christian 
 widow. 
 
 Arsinoe had passed by these dishonest philosophers, and, with- 
 out any detention by the porter, gone toward the house of 
 Hannah. The nearer she came to the end of her walk, tlie 
 more earnestly she sought to devise some means of letting her 
 sick sister know, without danger, the frightful events she must 
 learn sooner or later. On the way she had shed no tears, 
 but had often moaned. A woman, walking near, supposed 
 her sutfering from headache, and looked on her with compas- 
 sion. Once she stopped short, with a half purpose first to seek 
 Pollux and ask his help. But maidenly timidity restrained 
 her, as well as the doubt about finding him. And besides, no 
 2)erson could give better advice than Selene. So she hastened 
 forward again. When she reached the house of the widow, 
 aiid stopped again to think what she would say, her grief broke 
 forth anew. 
 
 Both before and behind her, many men and veiled women, 
 singly, in pairs, or lai-ger numbers, were passing into the gar- 
 den of the Avidow of Pudens. 
 
 They had come from workshops and counting-rooms; from 
 little houses in the neighboring streets, and from tie finest 
 i-esidences of the city. Each of them, the opulent merchant 
 as well as the slave who did not own so much as the coarse 
 froek or the poor apron he wore, entered with a certain dig- 
 nity and earnestness. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 273 
 
 Each greeted every other within that gate as a friend. The 
 lord gave to his servant;, the slave to his master, the fraternal 
 kiss, "for the community to which all belonged was as one body 
 animated by the sjjirit of Christ, and each treated every other 
 member as an equal, however they might differ in bodily or 
 spiritual gifts, and in worldly possessions. 
 
 Before God and the Saviour, the ship-owner and the wise, 
 gray-bearded scholar stood no higher than the unprotected 
 widow, or the ignorant and crippled slave. 
 
 Yet, a difference of rank was recognized among them, but it 
 was founded on the measure of grace received from the Lord, 
 bestowed as His special gift, and jDertaining to their inward 
 condition. 
 
 On Sunday, the day of the Lord's resurrection, the Chris- 
 tians assembled, without exception, for a service of worship. 
 
 On this day (Wednesday) all who were able came to attend 
 a love feast at the country house of Paidina. 
 
 She herself resided in the city, and had a hall capable of 
 containing several hundred people arranged in her villa for 
 the use of her fellow-believers. 
 
 The proper religious service would be attended on the fol- 
 lowing morning. 
 
 After the work of the day, the Christians assembled at a 
 common table to eat together, or at stated times, to celebrate 
 the Lord's supper. 
 
 After sunset, the elders, deacons and deaconesses — the 
 greater part of whom were confined by necessary labor during 
 the hours of daylight — came together for consultation. 
 
 Paulina, the widow of Pudens and sister of the architect 
 Pontius, was a woman of wealth and a prudent housekeeper, 
 who would not have considered it honest to diminish the in- 
 heritance of her son. 
 
 This son dwelt in Smyrna, and was nominal partner in the 
 business of an uncle. He avoided Alexandria, because he did 
 not hke his mother's connection with the Christians. 
 
 Paulina carefully guarded the capital, which naturally be- 
 longed to him, and paid only her own share toward the support 
 of the community, like the other wealthy members of the 
 circle who assembled in her house. 
 
 The opulent brought more than they needed for their own 
 maintenance, and the poor were always made welcome, and 
 not oppressed by the benefit received, being often reminded 
 that their host w^as not a human being, but the Saviour, who 
 invited all that believed in Him to be His guests. 
 
 The hour was near at hand which called Hannah to the as- 
 
274 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Bcmbly. She was compelled to be present ns a deaconess, and 
 also one of those who had charge of distributing uhns and 
 providing nurses for the sick. 
 
 8he moved quietly about the room, making her prepara- 
 tions. She i)laecd the lamp lichind the water-pitcher, that the 
 light might not strike the face of Selene, and gave directions 
 to Maria about the medicine. 
 
 Aware that her patient had attempted to destroy her own 
 life on the day before, and suspecting her reason, she 3-et asked 
 no questions, and disturbed as little as possible the girl who 
 slept much or dreamed with e^^es wide open. The old phys- 
 ician wondered at the strength of her constitution, for the 
 fever had subsided since her plmige into the water, and the in- 
 jured limb was only slightly worse. Hannah could but hope 
 the best for Selene, unless some unforeseen accident should re- 
 tard her recovery. To avoid this, the unhappy girl could not 
 be left alone, and Mai-ia was glad to take her place in the sick- 
 room Avhenever she was obhged to be absent. 
 
 The meeting of elders and almoners had already begun, 
 when Hannah, taking the tablet upon which was reconh d her 
 weekly expenditm-e for the needy into her hand, batlc good- 
 bye to the sick girl and Maria with a friendly look, whispering 
 to the latter: 
 
 " I shall remember you, true soul, in my prayers. In the 
 cupboard you will find something to relieve hunger. It is 
 scant}^, for I must save now all I can; the last medicine was 
 costly." 
 
 In the little vestibule a lamp was burning, which Maria had 
 placed there as the darkness fell. The widow stopped before 
 it, considering whether she should put it out, to save the oil, 
 when a light knocking upon the house door arrested her at- 
 tention. 
 
 Before she could answer it, Arsinoe stepped inside. Her 
 eyes were full of tears, and with difficulty she found words to 
 return the greeting of Hannah. 
 
 " What has happened, my child?" asked the widow, seeing 
 her distress. 
 
 " Ah, Hannah, all is over. Our i^oor father — " 
 
 Suspecting the blow wliich had fallen on the sisters, and 
 anxious about its ell'ect upon Selene, the widow interrupted 
 her, saying: 
 
 " Hush, my child. Selene ought not to hear this. Come 
 out with me, and there you shall tell me all." 
 
 When outside the door, Hamiah put her arm around 
 
THE EMPEROR. 275 
 
 Arsinoe, and, drawing her tenderly to herself and kissing her 
 on the forehead, said: 
 
 '' Now speak, and confide all to me, as if I were your moth- 
 er or sister. The poor Selene is too weak to counsel or to 
 help you. Keep up your courage. What has happened to 
 your father?" 
 
 " Dead, from a stroke of apoplexy,^' sobbed the girl. 
 
 " Poor, dear orphan," said the widow, in an under-tone, 
 clasping her closely. For some time she let her weej) in 
 silence, then she said: 
 
 " Now, give me your hand, daughter, and tell how it hap- 
 pened so suddenly. Yesterday your father was well, and now? 
 Truly, my dear girl, life is earnest; you are forced to learn 
 that in your youth. I know you have six younger brothers and 
 sisters, and, j^erhajDS, insufficient means of support. That is 
 no disgrace. I am certainly poorer than you are, and still I 
 hoj^e, with God's help, to counsel and assist you. I shall do 
 all in my power, but you must first tell me how it is with you 
 and what you need." 
 
 There was so much friendliness, so much to give comfort 
 and inspire hope in the voice of this Christian woman, that 
 the girl willingly yielded to her request. At first ]3ride held 
 her back from confessing how utterly destitute they were. 
 But the questions of Hannah soon brought out the truth, and 
 when Arsinoe saw that it would be useless to attempt conceal- 
 ment, she gave way to the desire to relieve her own soul by 
 expression, and described their forlorn condition, without re- 
 serve, to the attentive and kind-hearted woman who made her- 
 self acquainted with the need of each one, and also inquired 
 who was taking care of the children during the absence of 
 Arsinoe. 
 
 On learning that the old slave woman, to whom they were 
 trusted, was crijjpled, and half blind, she shook her head 
 thoughtfully, saying, with decision: 
 
 " Here instant help is a necessity. You must soon go back 
 to the little ones. Selene ought not yet to know the death of 
 your father. When your destiny is in any degree fixed, we will 
 break the matter gradually. Follow me now. The Lord has 
 sent you hither at the right moment." 
 
 Hannah led Arsinoe to the house of Paulina, bidding her 
 await her return in a little room where the deaconesses were 
 accustomed to leave their veils and outside garments; and 
 where the would be safe from inquisitive eyes and questions 
 that give pain. 
 
 To join the deaconesses it was necessary to pass through the 
 
276 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 room where the elders and deacons were assembled, for men 
 and women were not permitted to hold counsel jointly. 
 
 The chairman or bishoji of the presbyters was upon a raised 
 scat at the head of a long table, with a row of elderly men to 
 the right and left. A few of these were of Jewish and Egyptian, 
 but the larger proportion of Hellenic origin, 
 
 Hannah passed these men witli a gesture of reverence, and 
 as the door closed behind her the bishop, a handsome old man, 
 with a full white beard, raised his mild eyes, and after gazing 
 for a few moments upon the tips of his raised fingers, addressed 
 the presbyter who had admitted several to the body of believers 
 within the joast year, setting them apart by baptism: 
 
 " The greater part of your proposed catechumens depend 
 truly on the Eedeemer. They believe in Him and love Him. 
 ]?at are they striving after that sanctification obtained through 
 the new birth, which alone gives us the right to receive them 
 through baptism into the fold of the Good Shepherd? We 
 must be on our guard against scabby shee}) which mar the 
 whole tlock! Truly there have been such in these latter years 
 who have gained admittance to our number, and yet bring dis- 
 grace upon the Christian name. Shall I give you an example? 
 There was an Eg3'ptian in Ehacotis; few seemed to strive more 
 earnestly than he after the forgiveness of sin. He fasted many 
 days, and yet so soon as baptized, broke into the sliojo of a 
 goldsmith. He was sentenced to death, and before his death 
 sent for me to visit him, where he told me tliat in earlier )'ears 
 his soul had been defiled by many robberies and murders. 
 Through the act of bajDtism, the immersion in water, he exjiect- 
 ed forgiveness, and not through repentance and the new birth 
 into a pure and consecrated life. And he had committed the new 
 crime in dei^endence upon the unwearied grace of our Saviour. 
 Others, educated to the practice of ablutions necessary for 
 initiation into the heathen mysteries, looked upon baptism as 
 an act of cleansing, or a mystical, soul -purifying jirocess, and 
 as such, sought it eagerly. Here in Alexandria, the number 
 of such erring ones is great; and where can a superstitious soul 
 find more favorable ground than in this abode of jiartial cult- 
 ure, and superfluous culture, of the service of Serapis, of star 
 worship, of mystic unions, of visionary fanatics, of demon con- 
 jurers, and that incredulity so closely alUed to credulity. So 
 be on your guard against allowing baptism to those who seek 
 it as a protection or means of success. Consider that tlie same 
 water which makes the graces of a sanctified heart flourish, 
 brings death to the sordid soul. You have oi^portunity to 
 speak, Irenaeus. " 
 
THE EMPEROR, 377 
 
 ''I only wish to say/' remarked the so-called younger 
 Christian, "that I have also met lately among the catechu- 
 mens^ some who crowd in upon us from the lowest motives. 
 I refer to the idlers who have received our charity. Have you 
 noticed the cynic, whose hungry brother we support? The 
 Deacon Clemens has ascertained that he is the only son of a fa- 
 ther — " 
 
 " We will search this matter more closely when we come to 
 speak of the alms-giving," answered the bishop. " We have be- 
 fore us the requests of several women, who desire to have their 
 children baptized. We can not decide the question here, for 
 it belongs to the next Synod. It is too serious to be decided 
 in our small assembly. As for me, I am not inclined to refuse 
 this request of the mothers. For what is the highest aim of 
 the Christian life? I think it lies in becoming more perfectly 
 conformable to the example of the Saviour. And He? Was 
 He not a man among men, a youth among other youth, and a 
 child among children? Has not His existence consecrated 
 every period of life, and esj)ecially childhood? He commanded 
 the children to be brought to Him, and promised them the 
 Kingdom of Heaven. Why then should we exclude and deny 
 them baptism ?'' 
 
 " I can not share your opinion,"' answered a presbyter, with 
 high forehead and deep eyes. " We ought certainly to follow 
 the Saviour; but whoever enters that patli, must do it from free 
 choice, out of love to Him and after consecration of his soul. 
 What can a new birth signify in a life scarcely begun?" 
 
 " Your words only confirm my opinion," returned the bish- 
 0)1, " that this matter ought to come before a larger assembly. 
 \Ve will close here our discussion of the point, and hasten to 
 that of caring for the jDoor. Call in the women, Justinius. " 
 
 The deaconesses entering, took their seats at the lower end 
 of the table. Paulina occupied the place directly opjiosite the 
 Ijislio}). She had heard from the kind nurse of Selene of the 
 destitute condition of the family of Keraunus, and promised 
 to do something for their relief. 
 
 First the deacons reported upon their own activity among 
 the poor. After them, the women were allowed to si:)eak. 
 Paulina, a tall, slender woman, with black hair lightly streaked 
 with gray, drew from the folds of her soft white woolen gar- 
 ment, utterly without ornament, a tablet which she laid upon 
 tlie table before her, and slowly lifting her eyes to the assem- 
 bly, said: 
 
 '* Tlie widow Hannah has a sad history to relate. You will 
 kindly allow her to s2)eak, " 
 
278 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 raulina seemed to feel herself the hostess among lier 
 brelhren. Slic bore the appearance of suffering, for her lips 
 were contracted by an expression of pain, and heavy shadows 
 lay imder her eyes; yet the tone of her voice \yas severe and 
 decided, and her glance anything but soft and winning. 
 
 After her the story of Hannah seemed a tender song. With 
 feelings as though they were her own daughters, she described 
 the two sisters so different, and yet each so deserving of sym- 
 pathv. With touching pathos s'he spoke of all the orphans 
 left to such grief in their tender years, one of whom was a 
 beautiful blind boy, and she closed with the words: " On the 
 second daughter of the overseer— she is sixteen years old, and 
 so very pretty as to be exposed to peculiar temptations — hes 
 now the whole burden of providing for six younger brothers 
 and sisters. Can Ave decline the hand of help? No; as we 
 love our Saviour, we must not. Do you agree with me? Let 
 us not delay assistance. The second daughter of the deceased 
 Keraunus 'is now in this house, and early to-morrow moniing 
 the children must be removed from the Lochias, and while I 
 am speaking to you they are left mider very poor guardian- 
 ship."' 
 
 The words of Hannah met a hearty response, the presbyters 
 and deacons resolving to recommend their case to the assembly 
 at the love-feast. 
 
 As they had still so many points to discuss, they commis- 
 sioned Paulina and Hannah to lay the matter upon the hearts 
 of the richer members of the community. 
 
 The poor widow first led her wealthy hostess into the room 
 where Arsinoe waited with growing impatience. She looked 
 paler than usual, but in spite of her tear-stained and downcast 
 eyes, was so strikingly beautiful as to move the heart of Pau- 
 lina. 
 
 She had been the mother of two children, one of whom had 
 died in the bloom of girlhood, and no hour passed when Pau- 
 lina did not think of her. 
 
 For her sake she had been baptized, and devoted herself to 
 a series of sacrifices. She sought with all her energy to be a 
 good Christian, believing that the self-denial practiced in tak- 
 ing voluntarily upon herself, while so feeble, the heavy cross of 
 renouncing the quiet life she loved, and making her country 
 home a scene of confusion, would insure her owji entrance into 
 that heaven where she hoped to find again her innocent 
 daughter. 
 
 Arsinoe reminded her of Helena, whose image— though in 
 
THE EMPEROR. 279 
 
 truth she had been much less beautiful than the overseer's 
 daughter — had become glorified in the faithful mother-heart. 
 
 Since the dej^arture of her son, she had often thought of 
 adopting some young person, whom she might attach to her- 
 self, and educate for an offering to the Lord. 
 
 Her daughter had died a heathen, and nothing distressed 
 Paulina so much as the loss of her soul, aiid that she could not 
 carry her own struggles and efforts to the other side of the 
 grave. 
 
 JSTo sacrifice seemed too great to purchase future blessedness 
 for her child, and when she stood before Arsinoe, touched with 
 admiration for her beauty, she was seized by a thought that in- 
 stantly ripened into determination. She would win this lovely 
 creature for the Saviour, and with incessant prayer implore 
 Him to save her child in exchange for the soul of Arsinoe. 
 And it seemed to her that she had entered into a covenant with 
 the Eedeemer, when, fully resolved upon her course, she 
 stepped up to the girl, asking: 
 
 "Are you entirely alone, and without other relatives than 
 your brothers and sisters?" 
 
 Arsinoe bowed her head affirmatively, but Paulina con- 
 tinued : 
 
 " And do you bear this loss with resignation?" 
 
 " What is resignation?" asked the girl, timidly. 
 
 Hannah laid her hand upon the arm of the widow, whisper- 
 ing: 
 
 " She is a heathen!" 
 
 " I know that," answered Paulina, shortly, adding kindly 
 but decidedly. " Through this death of your father you have 
 lost both parents and protection. In my house you can have 
 a new home, and, in exchange, I only ask your love." 
 
 Arsinoe looked up in astonishment at the proud Avoman. 
 She felt no attraction toward her, and was unconscious that 
 the only gift asked was one that could not be forced even from 
 the best intentions and the most loving nature. 
 
 Paulina did not wait her aiiswer, but motioned Hannah to 
 follow her to the love-feast of the community. 
 
 Quarter of an hour later, both women returned. The chil- 
 dren of Keraunus had found protection. Two or three Chris- 
 tian families would gladly receive them. Several kind-hearted 
 women had asked for the blind boy in vain, for Hannah 
 claimed the right to take him at first into her own house. 
 She knew how Selene clung to the child, and hoped his pres- 
 ence might be useful to the chilled and depressed heart of lier 
 patient. Arsinoe did not resist the arrangements of the 
 
280 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 woman. She was really grateful, for she felt again firm 
 ground beneath her feet, though she jierceived at once that it 
 would be full of sharj) stones. The thought of separating 
 from her brothers and sisters was cruel torture, and did not 
 leave her for a moment while returning with Hannah to the 
 Lochias. 
 
 On the next morning her good friend came again and con- 
 ducted the httle flock to the city house of Paulina. All the 
 possessions of Keraunus were divided among his creditors. 
 Only the chest containing the papers followed the girl to her 
 new home. 
 
 The hour in which the little group of children were scat- 
 tered, talcing one here, another there, was the most painful 
 Arsinoe had thus far experienced, or in later years could live 
 to see. 
 
 CHAPTER Xn. 
 
 Within the inclosure of the Cfesareum, the present resi- 
 dence of the empress, was a lovely garden. Balbilla was very 
 fond of it, and since the sun on tins twenty-ninth day of De- 
 cember was especially clear, the sky and its unframed mirror, 
 the sea, shone in such indescribable beauty, and the fragrance 
 of many flowering shrubs had stolen through her window as an 
 invitation to leave the house, she had sought a sunny spot 
 under the light shadow of an acacia. This seat M'as separated 
 by shrubbery from the most frequented jjaths. Promenaders 
 not seeking Balbilla would not notice her; yet, through a gap 
 in the foliage, she was able to overlook a path strewn Avitli 
 mussel shells. But to-day the J'oung poetess M'as not inclined 
 to curiosity. Instead of watching the bright-colored birds 
 among the foliage, or looking into the clear air, or toward the 
 sea, her eye was fastened on a roll of yellow papyrus, and she 
 was busied in imi^ressing some very dry things upon her 
 memory. 
 
 She had undertaken to redeem a promise given to learn to 
 read, write, and rhyme in the yEolian dialect of the Greek 
 language. As her teacher, she had chosen the famous gram- 
 marian, Apollonius, surnamed "Dyscolos.'' And the work 
 she was striving to master was from the famous library of the 
 Temi)le of Serapis, which, since the siege of Julius Ctesar, when 
 the great library of the museum was burned, far exceeded the 
 other in completeness. 
 
 Whoever looked upon Balbilla would not imagine her to be 
 studying. There was no mark of eilort in her eye or upon her 
 
THE EMPEROR. 281 
 
 forehead; and yet she read attentively, hne after Ihie, but not 
 as one cHmbs a mountam, in the sweat of his brow; rather as 
 the pleasure promenader in the main street of a great city 
 notices all the new and striking objects. 
 
 Whenever she came upon any unfamiliar form of words she 
 experienced such delight as caused her to clap her hands, and 
 break into a low laugh. 
 
 Her profound teacher had never before met such a joyous 
 pupil, and it vexed him, to whom study was such an earnest 
 pursuit. But she seemed to make of this, as of all other 
 things, only a sjDort, and it lowered her in his eyes. After sit- 
 ting an hour upon the bench, and studying after her own 
 fashion, she rolled the papyrus together and rose for a little 
 respite. Sure of being unobserved, she stretched her limb's 
 with a feeling of satisfaction in the work accomplished, and 
 then peeped through the gap in the shrubbery to see what 
 booted man was stalking up and down the path. It seemed 
 to be the pretor, and yet it was not he. Tliis Verus, at least, 
 met her gaze for the first time. Where was the smile that was 
 wont to sparkle, hke a diamond flash, in his eye, and play 
 about his saucy lip. Where was the unruffled cheerfulness of 
 his brow, the challenging audacity of his handsome figure? 
 
 With a gloomy sparkle in his eye, with wrinkled brow and 
 drooj^ing head, he went slowly up and down, and still there 
 was no outward grief to burden him. Just as he passed by 
 Balbilla he had snapped his fingers in the air as if to say: " Let 
 come what will! I am alive to-day and can laugh the future 
 in the face!^' 
 
 But this flaring-up of the old reckless frivolity held no 
 longer than until the snajoping fingers had separated. When 
 he passed her again, he looked, if possible, gloomier than be- 
 fore. Something very mijoleasant must have destroyed the 
 good humor of her friend's frivolous husband. 
 
 That gave the poetess sorrow, for though she suffered each 
 day from the wanton audacity of the pretor, she forgave it on 
 account of the pleasant manner in which he covered his im- 
 pertinence. 
 
 Balbilla wished to see him joyous once more, so she stepped 
 out of her hiding-place. So soon as she ap^^eared, his whole 
 expression changed, and cheerily as ever he cried to her: ■ 
 
 " Welcome, fairest of the fair!" 
 
 She pretended not to recognize him, and said as she passed 
 by, drop2)ing her head : 
 
 '' I greet thee, Timon. " 
 
 " Timon?'' he cried, seizins her hand. 
 
SS2 THE EMrP.ROK. 
 
 " Ah, it is you, Vcrns," slie answered, feigning surprise. 
 " I tliouglit the 7Vthenian man-hater had left Hades to j^rome- 
 nade our garden." 
 
 " You saw right," answered the prctor; " but as the trees 
 dance when Orpheus sings, and the muse makes Bacchanals of 
 the dull, lifeless stones,' so, when Balbilla appears, Timon is 
 instantly changed with the fortunate Verus." 
 
 " This wonder should not surprise me," said the girl, laugh- 
 ing. "But may one learn what si^irit of darkness j^ractices 
 such sudden power of transformation as to change the favored 
 husband of the fair Lucilla into a Timon?" 
 
 " I shall be very careful not to expose the fiend, else might 
 the cheerful Muse Balbilla easily become the dark Hecate. 
 ]iesides, the mischievous demon is very near, and liides within 
 this little roll." 
 
 " A document of the emperor?" 
 
 " Oh, no, only the letter of a Jew." 
 
 " Probably the father of some fair daughter?" 
 
 '"' The jDoorest guess possible," 
 
 " You excite my curiosity." 
 
 " Mine has been satisfied through this roll. Horace was 
 wise in saying one ought not to fret himself over future 
 things." 
 
 " Is it an oracle?" 
 
 '■' At least something of that sort." 
 
 " And does that destroy for you this rare morning? Have 
 you ever seen me sad? And yet my future is threatened by 
 "an oracle, a terrible decree — " 
 
 ^ The destiny of a man is quite different from that of a 
 woman. ^' 
 
 '•' Would you like to hear what was foretold me?" 
 
 " What a question." 
 
 " Then listen. I received it from no less a person than the 
 JX'lphian Pythia: 
 
 ' ' ' What to thee dearest and highest was, that thou wilt lose, 
 And from Olympian heights descend to earth beneath.' " 
 
 "Is that all?" 
 
 " No, there follow two consolatory lines." 
 
 " How do they run?" 
 
 " ' But under the flying dust a careful look will discover 
 
 Solid building of stone, with marble and rocky foundation.' " 
 
 " And have you any disposition to complain of this oracle?" 
 " Is it very (;harming to wtide in the dust? One has enough 
 
THE EMPEROR. 283 
 
 of that here in Egypt. And ought I perhaps to rejoice in the 
 prospect of hitting my foot against the stones?" 
 
 " What is the interpretation?" 
 
 " Only stupid stuff." 
 
 " You have not yet found the true one; but I perceive the 
 meaning of the oracle. " 
 
 " You?" 
 
 " Yes, I. The strict Balbilla will at last descend from the 
 high Olympus of her coyness, and no longer despise the firm 
 ground — the worship of her faithful Verus. " 
 
 " Oh, this ground, this rocky foundation!" laughed the 
 girl. " It seems to me more rational to promenade the sur- 
 face of the sea yonder. " 
 
 "Only try it." 
 
 "It is ramecessary. Lucilla has made the experiment for 
 me. Your interpretation is poor. The emperor gave me a 
 better." 
 
 " What was that?" 
 
 " That I should give up writing poetry, and apply myself to 
 scientific study. He advised astronomy." 
 
 " The knowledge of the stars," said Verus, becoming more 
 earnest. " Farewell, fairest, I must go to the emperor." 
 
 " We were with him yesterday, ujion the Lochias. How all 
 has changed there! The gate-keeper's pretty little house has 
 been taken away. Nothing more is to be seen of the jolly 
 crowd of architects and artists, and the bustling work-rooms 
 are now only ordinary halls. The screen in the Hall of the 
 Muses has been taken down. My bust, began eight days ago, 
 has disappeared with the blustering young fellow who took the 
 field so vigorously against my curls that I was on the point of 
 sacrificing them — " 
 
 " Without them you would no more be Balbilla," cried 
 Yerus, with zeal. "The artist may reject what is not of per- 
 manent beauty, but we prefer those adornments in which the 
 other children of our race find pleasure. The sculptor may 
 array a goddess after the style of more serious days and the 
 laws of his art, but mortal women will follow the dictates of 
 fashion if they are clever. But otherwise I am heartily sorry 
 for the fresh, skillful fellow. He insulted the emperor, was 
 driven out of the palace, and can not be found." 
 
 " Oh," cried Balbilla, " the poor, magnificent fellow! And 
 my bust! we must hunt him up. When an opportunity offers, 
 I shall beg the emperor — " 
 
 " Hadrian will hear nothing of him. Pollux irritated him.'' 
 
 " How did you learn this?" 
 
284 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " From Antinous." 
 
 " AVe saw him yesterday, also/' exclaimed Balbilla, with 
 animation. " If ever a human being was permitted to walk in 
 the figure of a god among mortals, it is he!'' 
 
 " You are extravagant!" 
 
 " I think no one could look upon him with indifference. 
 He is a gentle dreamer, and the expression of suffering we 
 noticed in his face yesterday is doubtless only the mute pain 
 of a perfect being who has lost the j^leasure of gro\\i;h and 
 maturity in the embodiment of the ideals of his own species. " 
 
 The jDoetess uttered these words with an expression of rapt- 
 ure, as if the figure of a god stood before her eyes. 
 
 Verus listened, laughing, and interrupted her, saying, with 
 a threatening motion: 
 
 " Poetess, jihilosopher, most charming young woman, be- 
 ware of falling down from Olymi^us to the level of this l)oy. 
 AVhen fancy and visionary dreaming meet, they make a ^^air 
 which floats in the clouds, and never touch that firm ground 
 of which your oracle speaks, or even susjaect its existence 
 through the fog." 
 
 " Foolishness!" cried Balbilla, indignantly. " To fall in 
 love with a statue it must have been animated with spu'it and 
 fire by Prometheus." 
 
 "Sometimes, indeed," answered the pretor, "Eros steps 
 into the place of that unfortunate friend of the gods. " 
 
 " The true Eros, or the ' false '?" asked Balbilla, irritated. 
 
 " Certainly not the ' false,' " returned Verus. " This time 
 he only plays the part of friendly Monitor, and acts for the 
 architect Pontius, of whom your worthy matron is afraid. 
 They say you carried on as earnest a conversation during the 
 mirthful confusion of the Dionysian feast as two gray philoso- 
 jjhers walking the Stoa among "their listening disciples." 
 
 " With sensible men one talks sensibly. " 
 
 " And gayly with those who are not. How I rejoice to be 
 counted among the witless! Farewell, in the hoi^e of another 
 meeting, fair Balbilla," said the j^retor, as he deijartod, 
 mounting his chariot, and going toward the Lochias. His 
 charioteer held the reins. He himself gazed thoughtfully at 
 the roll in liis hand. This contained the result of the astro- 
 logical calculations of Simeon Ben Jochai, and was well adai)t- 
 ed to disturb the good nature of the most frivolous man. If 
 the emperor, in the night preceding the cradle-feast of the 
 pretor, should observe the position of the stars M'ith reference 
 to the latter, he would find that to the end of the third hour 
 after midnight all tlie ])lanets foretold a hap2)y lot, prosperity 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 285 
 
 and distinction. But at the entrance of the third hour Beii 
 Jochai asserted disaster and death would possess the house of 
 his prosperity. In the fourth his star would disappear, and 
 whatever else might appear during the night would have noth- 
 ing to do with him or his destiny. The emperor^s star would 
 overcome his own. Verus understood little of the tabulated 
 process, but that little confirmed the written exposition. The 
 horses of the j)retor were hastening forward, while he was con- 
 sidering what remained possible for him to do, if he would not 
 relinquish the highest goal of ambition. If the calculation of 
 Ben Jochai should prove correct — of which he had no doubt — 
 his hoj)e of the adoption must be baseless in spite of Sabina's 
 influence. How could Hadrian choose for his successor a man 
 appointed to die before himself? How coidd he, Verus, expect 
 the emj)eror to connect his fortunate star with that of one 
 destined for an earlier death? These thoughts and questions 
 brought him no light, and still he could not avoid them, when 
 suddenly his charioteer stopj)ed the horses at the outside edge 
 of the carriage-dike, to leave the way free for a procession of 
 Egyptian jjriests on thei^- way to the Lochias. The vigorous 
 grip with which his servant reined in the fiery steeds excited 
 his admiration and suggested the thought of thrusting his own 
 ■hand between the sjjokes of the wheel of destiny. 
 
 When the j)i'iestly delegation no longer detained him he 
 commanded his charioteer to drive slowly, that he might have 
 time for reflection. 
 
 "To the third hour after midnight," he said to himself, 
 " all is of good augury, toward the fourth there will apjoear 
 some signs imfavorable to me. It is only natural that the 
 shee23 will j^lay about the dead lion, and even the ass dares in- 
 sult him with a kick, so long as he is sick. In that short space 
 between the third and fourth hours, all the disastrous signs 
 crowd together. They would appear; but '' — and with tliis 
 " but " came a sudden illumination over the pretor — " need 
 the emperor see them?" 
 
 The heart of the troubled man beat faster, his brain worked 
 more vigorously, and he commanded his charioteer to make a 
 long circuit, that he might gain time for the thoughts within 
 to spring up, to grow, and to ripen. Verus was no intriguer. 
 
 Witli light and careless step he entered everywhere througli 
 the main ^jortal and des23ised the back gate. Oidy for this 
 greatest aim of life was he willing to relinquish his tastes, his 
 comfort, his pride, and scr^■o himself without regard to the 
 means emijloyed. For this end he had already done some 
 things he regretted — and he who steals one sheep from a fold. 
 
?8G TFE E5irT;non. 
 
 is sure to ho followed by others also. Upon the first unworthy 
 action of a man crowds easily another, and still another. 
 
 I'hat which Verus now set himself to do he looked upon as 
 a simi)le act of self-defense. What matter if he should pre- 
 vent the emperor from one idle hour of star-gazing! 
 
 There were only two ])ersous M'ho could assist him in this 
 matter: Antinous and the slave Mastor. 
 
 He thought first of the latter; but the Jazygean was true to 
 his master, and would scarcely allow himself to be bribed. 
 Ajid then! Fy upon it! He could not make common cause 
 with a slave! He had even less reason to hope for the assist- 
 ance of Antinous. 
 
 Sabina hated this favorite of her husband, and on her ac- 
 count Verus had never met the Bithynian with special friend- 
 liness. He fancied also that the silent, dreamy fellow kept 
 out of his way. Only through intimidation might he perhaps 
 put him to service. At any rate, the next thing to be done 
 was to visit the Lochias with open eyes. 
 
 Should he find the emperor in good humor, he might per- 
 haps induce him to appear at a banquet he would give in the 
 latter part of the night, in celebration of his birthday, and 
 which would furnish much that was agreeable both to see and 
 to hear. 
 
 A thousand favorable and helpful accidents might also arise. 
 
 Besides, the rabbi had augured for the next year undimmed 
 prosperity. Gay and careless, as if the future lay sunny and 
 unclouded before him, he looked about as he descended from 
 the chariot into the newly paved court, and was conducted into 
 the anteroom of the emjDcror. Hadrian was no longer on the 
 Lochias as an architect from Rome, but resided as monarch of 
 the world in the rejuvenated palace. He had shown himself 
 to the Alexandrians, and been received with jubilation and un- 
 precedented marks of respect. 
 
 The joy over this imperial visit was everywhere manifest, 
 and sometimes found exiaression in extravagant forms. 
 
 The council even resolved to change the name of December 
 to " Hadrian us," in perpetual commemoration of the month 
 when his arrival had honored their city. 
 
 The em2)eror was obliged to receive de})utation after deputa- 
 tion, and to hold repeated audience. On the next morning 
 the dramatic rei^resentations, the processions and games were 
 to begin, which pj-omised to occu])y many days, or, as Hadrian 
 expressed it, threatened to steal from him hundreds of good 
 hours. 
 
 Yet the monarch found time to discharge all public business. 
 
THE EMPEROE. 287 
 
 and iii the uiglit to question the stars as to what destiny await- 
 ed himself and all parts of his empire within the coming year. 
 
 The palace on the Lochias now presented an entirely differ- 
 ent aspect. 
 
 In place of the cheery little house at the gate, stood now a 
 great tent covered with rich purple stuff, and occupied by the 
 imperial body-guard. Opposite to this another has been erect- 
 ed, for the use of lictors and messengers. The stables were 
 also filled. Hadrian's favorite horse, the noble stallion Borys- 
 thenes, already too long confined, stamped impatiently upon 
 the ground of a space appropriated to himself, near which, in 
 hastily erected inclosures and kennels, were his setters, boar- 
 hounds, and harriers. 
 
 Within the first court soldiers were quartered. Beside the 
 walls squatted Egyptian, Greek, and Jewish men and women 
 who wished to present petitions. Chariots were driven in and 
 out; sedan-chairs and litters waited; chamberlains and other 
 officers of the court hastened hither and thither. The ante- 
 chamber was filled with respectable citizens hoping to be re- 
 ceived by the emperor. Slaves, who offered refreshment to 
 those waiting, or stood lazily about, failed at no point; and 
 officers, with rolls of documents under their arms, passed from 
 one set of aj)artments to another, or left the palace to execute 
 the orders of their superiors. 
 
 The Hall of the Muses had been transformed into a banquet- 
 ing-room. 
 
 Papias, now on his way to Italy with a commission from the 
 emperor, had replaced the broken shoulder of the Urania. 
 Between the statues stood chairs and couches, and beneath a 
 canojDy in the back part of the wide space had been erected a 
 throne where Hadrian sat when holding audience. On such 
 occasions he always wore the purple, but in his private room, 
 which remained the same as at first, he laid aside the mantle 
 and was as simply dressed as the architect, Claudius Venator. 
 
 In the dwelling of the late Keraunus there now resided a 
 childless and unmarried Egyptian, a severe and circumspect 
 man, who had rendered faithful service as a house-steward to 
 the Prefect Titianus. 
 
 The main room of the former family looked dreary and un- 
 inhabitable. The Mosaic paintings which had been the inno- 
 cent cause of Keraunus's death was already on its way to 
 Rome, and the new overseer had not thought it worth while to 
 fill or even cover with a mat the ugly, broken, and dusty space 
 left by its removal. The only cheerful sound now heard in the 
 deserted house was the twitter of the birds that still came every 
 
288 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 morning and evening to tlie balcony where Arsinoc and tlio 
 children had never failed to scatter crimibrf for them. 
 
 Whatever of cheer and attraction had been visible in the pal- 
 ace disa])i)eared after the visit of Sabina; .even Hadrian was no 
 longer the same jierson as a few days before. 
 
 Imperial and unapproachable in i^ublic, he was serious, 
 gloomy, and unsocial with those admitted to his private apart- 
 ments. 
 
 The oracle, the stars, and other jDrognostics foretold with 
 an assurance not to be ignored some heavy disaster within the 
 coming 3'ear. His wife, whose bitter disposition reiDelled him 
 even more in Alexandria — where all was animated and pleas- 
 ing — than it had in Eome, had coolly demanded that he should 
 no longer postjDone the adoption of Verus. 
 
 He was troubled and discontented. A desert ^dthout bounds 
 seemed to yawn before him when he turned his eye inward, 
 while the future of his outward life jjromised only a series of 
 frivolous occupations which could not fail to interfere with his 
 incessant desire for active or intellectual effort. Even his 
 handsome favorite, Antinous, whose vegetative life, untouched 
 by either the trouble or the 2^1easure of ordinary mortals, and 
 whose society had been a solace and refreshment to his spirit, 
 had undergone a change. 
 
 The youth appeared often perplexed, restless, and disturbed. 
 Foreign influences seemed to have affected him, for he was no 
 longer contented to hang as a shadow upon the person of his 
 master. He sought freedom, and had several times slipped 
 away to the city, presumably for the pleasures ordinarily 
 sought by those of his own age, and which he had formerly 
 avoided. 
 
 The cheerful and obliging Mastor was also different. 
 
 Only the Molossian remained unchanged in obedient loyalty. 
 And Hadrian himself? As he had been ten years before, so 
 was he to-day, exliibiting different character with each passing 
 day and hour. 
 
 CHAPTER Xni. 
 
 "When Verus entered the palace, Hadrian had returned 
 thither from the city only a few moments before. The 2:)retor 
 was led directly through the reception-room to his inner ai)art- 
 ment, and had not long to wait, for Hadrian wished to speak 
 with him immediately. He was in such a bad mood that 
 Verus dared not invite him to attend the banquet. The em- 
 peror walked restlessly up and- down the room, wliile Verus 
 
THE emp:eror. 289 
 
 answered his questions respecting the last business before tlie 
 Senate in Rome. Sometimes he stopped, and looked into the 
 next room. As Verus ended his report, Argus gave a howl of. 
 joy, and immediately Antinous aj^peared. Verus retreated at 
 once to the broad window, and pretended to be examinmg the 
 harbor. 
 
 " Where have you been?'' asked the emperor, without no- 
 ticing the presence of the pretor. 
 
 " A little way into the city," was the answer of the Bithyn- 
 ian. 
 
 " You know that I do not like to find you absent on my re- 
 turn home." 
 
 " I supposed you would stay out longer." 
 
 " Try to arrange it so that I shall find you at any time. I 
 am sure you do not like to see me discontented." 
 
 "No, sire/' answered the favorite, raising his hands, and 
 with an imploring look at his master. 
 
 " Let it pass now. I have something else to say. How 
 came this little vial into the possession of Hiram, the relic 
 dealer?" 
 
 And the emperor held up before his eyes the little vessel of 
 vasa murrhina which the youth had given to Arsinoe. 
 
 Antinous turned pale, and stammered in great embarrass- 
 ment: 
 
 " It is incomprehensible — I can not recall — " 
 
 " Then I will help your memory," said the emperor, with 
 severity. " The Phoenician seemed a more honest man than 
 Gabinius. In his collection, which I have just visited, I found 
 this gem, that Plotina — do you hear, boy? — that Trajan's wife, 
 Plotina, the never-forgotten friend of my heart, gave me years 
 ago. It was among my choicest treasures, and yet not too 
 precious for your last birthday gift. " 
 
 " Oh, sire, my dear sire!" cried Antinous, faintly, with be- 
 seeching eyes and hands. 
 
 " Now I ask you," went on Hadrian, sternly, and without 
 being softened by the imi^loring look of his favorite, '' how 
 came this vessel into the iDossession of the daughter of Kerau- 
 nus, as Hiram just now asserted?" 
 
 Antinous sought in vain for words, but Hadrian helped him 
 by asking in a more excited tone : 
 
 " Did the girl steal it from you? Out with the truth!" 
 
 " No, no," answered the Bithynian, quickly and resolutely. 
 " Certainly not. I shall remember — Yes — but wait a mo- 
 ment — ]iow I have it. You know certainly that it contained 
 the excellent balsam, and when the Molossian threw Selene — 
 
290 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Selene is the name of Keraunus's daughter— down the stairs, 
 and she lay wounded on the ground, I brought the vial and 
 • gave her the balsam/' 
 
 *' With the vessel?" asked the emperor, looking darkly at 
 Anthious. 
 
 " Yes, sire. I had no other/' 
 
 ** And she kept it, in order to sell it at once.-" 
 
 " You know that her father — " 
 
 "A thievish set!" exclaimed Hadrian, grinding his teeth. 
 " Do you know what has become of the girl?" 
 
 " Ah, sire!" cried Antinous, trembling with anxiety, 
 
 " I shall let the lictors arrest her," declared the incensed 
 monarch. 
 
 " No," cried the youth, with decision; " you will certainly 
 not do that. " 
 
 " Not do it? You will find that I shall. " 
 
 " No, certainly not, for when you learn that Keraunus's 
 daughter Selene has — " 
 
 " Well, what?" 
 
 " She threw herself in despair into the water — yes, into the 
 water, at night, into the sea." 
 
 "Oh," cried Hadrian, more mildly, "that certainly alters 
 the case. The lictors would hunt in vain for shadows, and the 
 girl has suffered the severest of all punishments. But you? 
 What shall I say of your conduct? You knew how dearly I 
 prized it, and still let it go into such hands!" 
 
 "But it contained the medicine," stammered the youth. 
 " Besides, how could I think — " 
 
 The emperor interrupted his favorite, saying, while he beat 
 his own forehead: " Yes, the thinking; unfortunately we have 
 long ago found out that thinking is not your vocation! This 
 little vessel has already cost me quite a handsome sum; but 
 since it was yours, I return it. Only I desire that in future 
 you should be more careful. Some time I shall ask for it. In 
 the name of all the gods, boy, how you look! Am I so terrible 
 that a question out of my mouth is enough to drive all the 
 blood from your cheeks? Truly, if the thing had not come 
 from Plotina, I should have left it with the Phronician, and 
 made no such ado over it." 
 
 Antinous approached the emperor, seeking to kiss his hand; 
 but he pressed his forehead with fatherly tenderness, saying: 
 
 " Silly boy! If you want to have me satisfied Avith you, be 
 again as you were before we came to Alexandria. Leave it to 
 others to prepare annoyances for me. The gods created you 
 for my delight." 
 
THE EMPEROR. 291 
 
 During these words a chamberlain entered to announce the 
 arrival of a delegation of Egyptian priests come to do him 
 homage. 
 
 The emperor immediately assumed the purple robes, and 
 betook himself to the audience-room, there to receive with 
 courtly honors the projDhets and sacred fathers from the various 
 temples of the ^ile valley who came to swear allegiance to him 
 as a child of the sun god and assure themselves of his favor 
 toward their religion. He granted their request to bless, by 
 his consecrating presence, the sacred temples they served; but 
 the question in what place the lately discovered Apis should be 
 nurtured he left for awhile undecided. This reception occu- 
 pied several hours. Verus avoided the obligation to present 
 himself with the prefect and the other dignitaries, and re- 
 mained standing at the window. 
 
 Turning, after Hadrian left the room, he found himself 
 alone, as Antiuous went out with the emperor. He had no- 
 ticed the lingering of the pretor, and left for that reason, feel- 
 ing always repelled in presence of the supercilious mocker. 
 Besides, the anxiety he endured, with the consciousness of hav- 
 ing f oa- the first time dealt dishonestly and underhandedly with 
 his good master, and soiled his hitherto untainted soul, quite 
 threw him off his balance. He wanted to be alone, for he 
 could not talk of commonplace affairs without pain, and to 
 pretend interest would have been hypocrisy. He sat leaning 
 upon a little table in his own room, with his face bm-ied in his 
 hands. 
 
 Verus did not follow immediately, for he perceived what was 
 gomg on within him, and felt sure that he could not escape 
 him. For a few moments all was still in both the great room 
 and the little one. Then the pretor heard the door which 
 opened upon the corridor quickly moved, and the voice of the 
 I3ithynian, saying: "At last, Mastor; have you seen Selene?" 
 
 With two long, noiseless steps Verus approached another 
 door leading into the same apartment and listened for the an- 
 swer of the slave, which an ear less sharp than that of the 
 pretor would have caught distinctly: 
 
 " How could I see her? She is still suffering, and remains 
 in her bed. I gave your flowers to the deformed girl who 
 nurses her. But I will not do it again, though you should 
 coax more than you did yesterday, and promise me all the 
 treasures of the emperor. What do you want of this poor, 
 wan, innocent thing? J am only a slave, but I can tell you — " 
 
 Here the voice dropped suddenly, and Verus guessed rightly 
 
293 THE EMPEKOR. 
 
 that Antinous Imd remembered his proximity and commanded 
 the Jazygean to silence. 
 
 But tlic listener had heard enough. 
 
 The favorite had deceived his master, and the suicide of the 
 overseer's daughter was a fiction. Who would have believed 
 this silent dreamer to have such self-possession and such cun- 
 ning gift of invention? 
 
 The handsome face of the pretor shone with pleasure as he 
 made this observation/ for now he held the Eithynian in his 
 liand. He saw at once, too, how he could accomplish that 
 which he had at heart. Antinous himself had shown the way 
 when, Avith a tenderness impossible to have been feigned, he 
 had rushed toward the emperor to kiss his hand. He loved 
 his lord, and on this love Verus could base his attempt, with- 
 out showing himself or ha'mg in danger of betrayal to the em- 
 peror. 
 
 AYith a steady hand the pretor knocked on the door of the 
 next room, and stepped Avith bold self-assurance toward the 
 Bithynian, explaining, as he did so, that he had something 
 important to say, and begging him to go with him into the 
 emperor's room, remarking so soon as they were alone: 
 
 '' I am sorry not to be able to count you among my siDCcial 
 friends, but we share one imjaortant sentiment — we both love 
 the emperor. '' 
 
 " I certainly love him," answered Antinous. 
 
 " Then it will he as close to your heart as to mine to shield 
 him from dejjressing anxiety, and prevent fear from par- 
 alyzing the free flight of his great spirit." 
 
 " Most certainly." 
 
 " I was sure I should find a helper in you. Look at this 
 roll. It coiitains the calculations and tabulations of the great- 
 est astrologer of our time; and foretells that in this coming 
 night, between the end of the second and beginning of the 
 fourth hour after midnight, the stars will reveal to our master 
 a most terrible misfortune. Do j^ou understand me?" 
 
 " Unfortunately, I do. " 
 
 " Later, the bad signs will disappear. If it be jiossible to 
 ])rcvcnt the observations of Hadrian durijig that third hour, 
 he would be saved- from life-destroying torment. "Who knows 
 but the stars lie? Or, if they reveal the truth, a disaster fori'- 
 told only falls l)efore its time. Do you agree with me?" 
 
 " Your proposition is sensible. Yet, I think — " 
 
 " It is sensible and ■wise," broke in the ])retor, firmly and 
 decisively. " It rests on you to hinder Hadrian from follow- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 293 
 
 ing the course of the stars between the second and fourth hours 
 after midnight/^ 
 
 " On nie?'^ cried Antinous, frightened. 
 
 " On you, since you are the only one who can do it. " 
 
 "I?" asked the Bithynian, dismayed. " I distui'b the em- 
 peror during his observations?" 
 
 " It is your duty.'" 
 
 " But he never allows an interruption, and should I attempt 
 it, he would only drive me away. No, no, what you desire is 
 impossible." 
 
 " It is not only possible, but necessary. " 
 
 ''But it can not be so," answered Antinous, striking his 
 own forehead. "Only hear! Hadrian has known for many 
 days that a heavy disaster threatens. I heard this from his 
 own mouth. If you know him, you have not failed to perceive 
 that he consults the stars, not alone to anticipate blessings, but 
 to learn how to prepare for threatened misfortune. What 
 would kill a weakliug serves only to sharpen his spirit for con- 
 sent. He can bear everything, and it would be wrong to de- 
 ceive liim. " 
 
 " But a greater wrong to allow such gloom to shadow his 
 heart and mind," returned Verus. " Think of some means 
 for drawing him away for an hour from his observations in the 
 watch-tower. " 
 
 " I can think of nothing, can invent nothing." 
 
 " Nothiug?" asked Verus, stej)ping closer to the Bithynian. 
 
 Antinous grew j^ale, but the pretor continued: 
 
 " In order to secure Selene from the lictors you invented a 
 plunge into the sea." 
 
 " She flung herself into the sea as truly as the gods — " 
 
 "'Hold, hold," interrupted the pretor, "do not perjure 
 yourself! Selene is alive — you send her flowers; and if it 
 should please me to lead Hadrian to the house of the widow of 
 Pudens — " 
 
 "Oh, oh!" cried Antinous, piteously, seizing the hand of 
 the Roman; " you will not, you can not, oh, verus, you will 
 not do that!" 
 
 " Simpleton!" cried the pretor, touching the distressed 
 youth lightly on the shoulder, " what would it-jirofit me to de- 
 stroy you? I have only one object in mind — to guard the em- 
 peror from this anxiety and distress. Keep him busy during 
 the whole of that third hour after midnight, and you can count 
 on my friendship; but if through timidity or ill nature you 
 refuse, then you do not deserve the favor of your master, and 
 will constrain me — " 
 
294 THE IMPEROR. 
 
 '* No more, no more/' broke m Antinous, in great distress. 
 
 " Then do you promise to fulfill my request?" 
 
 " Yes; by Hercules, what you desire shall be done. But, 
 eternal gods, how shall I begin that the emjjeror — " 
 
 " That, my young friend, I resign with full confidence to 
 your cleverness. " 
 
 " I am not clever, I can not devise." 
 
 " What you accomplish through fear of your master, will 
 succeed still better through love," returned the pretor. 
 *' Your work is easy. Still if you fail in it, I shall hold it my 
 duty to point out to Hadrian how well Antinous understands 
 looking out for his own, and how poorly for his master's inter- 
 est. I will see you in the morning, my friend! Should you 
 wish to send any more flowers, my slaves are at your service!" 
 
 With these words, the pretor went out, leavhig Antiiious 
 crushed in spirit, and leaning his forehead against the cold 
 porphyry column beside the window. 
 
 What Verus exacted Avas not exactly wrong, yet it was not 
 right. 
 
 It was treason to the noble man whom he ardently loved, as 
 a father, as a wise, good friend and teacher, and venerated as 
 a god. 
 
 Craftily to hide threatened danger, as though he wei-e a 
 weakling and no man, was repugnant, was disgraceful, and 
 would be regarded as a fault of unhraited magnitude in the 
 far-reaching estimate of his master. Other reasons now oc- 
 curred to his mind for resisting the j^retor's demand, and with 
 each new thought he cursed his ovm tardy spirit, which only 
 perceived the right path after it was too late to take it. His 
 first error had already led to another. He was angry with 
 himself, he beat his forehead with his fist and sobbed in his 
 pain, yet he did not weep. 
 
 In the midst of liis self-accusation he heard also the flatter- 
 ing words: "It is oidy to guard the sovereign from trouble, 
 and that whi(;h is asked of you is not wicked." As often as 
 he lent his ear to this voice, he began anew to rack his brains 
 for some means through which he could entice the emperor 
 away from the watch-tower during the time specified. But he 
 could think of nothing practicable. 
 
 " It can not be done; no, it can not," he murmured to him- 
 self, and then began to query if it were not his duty to defy 
 the pretor, and confess to Hadrian that he had deceived him. 
 
 If only it were not for that vial! Could he confess to have 
 given away carelessly the gift of his lord? No, that was too 
 hard, and might cost him the love of his master. And then, 
 
THE EMPEROE. 295 
 
 slioulcl lie persist in the half truth, and, simply to anticipate 
 the threat of the pretor, confess that Selene was still living, 
 the daughters of Keraunus would be ruined. Selene, whom 
 he loved with the passion of a lirst devotion, and in spite of 
 the great distance between them, would fall into trouble and 
 disgrace. 
 
 To confess his fault, therefore, was impossible, entirely out 
 of the question. The longer he thought over the matter, try- 
 ing to discover a way out of his perplexities, so much the more 
 confused he became, so much the weaker his power of resist- 
 ance. The pretor had wound him about with bauds and 
 cords, and every attemj^t to make himself free only fastened 
 them closer aiid more inextricably. His poor head began to 
 ache. And how unending the emperor's absence! He feared, 
 and yet longed for his return, AVheu at last he apjjeared and 
 motioned to Mastor to remove his ornamental robes, Antinous 
 pressed him back, and rendered silently and carefully the 
 service belonging to the slave. He was restless and troubled, 
 yet he forced himself to be cheerful while sitting opposite 
 Hadrian at the evening meal. 
 
 When, a short time before midnight, the emj)eror started 
 for the watch-tower at the northern end of the palace, An- 
 tinous begged permission to carry his instruments, and Hadrian 
 stroked his curly locks, saying: 
 
 " You are after all my dear and faithful companion. Youth 
 has a right sometimes to go astray, if only it do not forget the 
 l^atli of duty." 
 
 These words touched the heart of Antinous. and he secretly 
 pressed his lij^s to the folds of the emperor's toga, who was 
 walking in advance. It seemed as though he would atone be- 
 forehand for the offense not yet committed. 
 
 To the end of the first hour after midnight he remained 
 silently beside the emperor, wrajiped in his mantle. The fresh 
 wind of the night reheved his aching head, and incessantly he 
 sought some pretense to draw Hadrian away from the tower, 
 but in vain. His poor brain was like a dried-up well, into 
 which he sent down bucket after bucket, but nothing brought 
 back the drink he needed. 
 
 Once he summoned up courage and asked: 
 
 " AYill you not go down earlier to-night, for you take too lit- 
 tle rest, and will injure your health?" 
 
 Hadrian listened kindly and answered: 
 
 " T shall sleep in the morning; if you are tired go now to 
 rest." 
 
 But Anthious reinuincd, looking also at the stars. He knew 
 
296 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 not many of those brilliant wanderers by name, but a few were 
 dear to him, esijecially the Pleiades, which his father had 
 pointed out, and they always reminded him of his old home. 
 How quiet and peaceful had been that life compared with the 
 tumultuous beating of his heart to-day! 
 
 "Go to your sleep, the second hour has already struck,'* 
 cried Hadrian to him. 
 
 " So soon?" he returned; and as he thought how little time 
 remained in which to do what Verus had demanded, and again 
 looking into the sky it seemed to him as if all the stars were 
 loosened from their places in the blue vault, aud crowded in 
 wild confusion betwixt the sea aud the sky. In distress he 
 closed Ills eyes, and wishing his master good-night, he descend- 
 ed from the tower, lighted by a torch that flared in the wmd. 
 Pontius had put up this tower for the nightly activities of the 
 emperor, which rose like a tall steeple ujjon the firm stone base 
 of an old watch-tower, which, situated between the store-houses 
 belonging to the palace below, gave a free outlook upon the 
 sky in all directions. Hadrian, who loved to watch the firma- 
 ment alone and undisturbed, chose, even since lie had made 
 himself known to the Alexandrians, this structure to the great 
 observatory of the Serajjeum, from which one could gain a 
 still broader outlook. 
 
 When Antinous had descended from the new tower into the 
 old one beneath it, he sat down upon the lowest stair to collect 
 himself and to quiet the restless beating of his heart. 
 
 But here the fruitless search began anew. There remained 
 now but a little time for action, and saying this to himself, his 
 brain worked more vigorously. The thought now occurred to 
 him of feigning sickness and calling the emperor to his bedside. 
 But Hadrian w^as enough of a physician to frustrate this 
 scheme; but should he succeed in deceiving him, Antinous 
 would be a liar. This thought filled him with disgust of him- 
 self and terror for the future, and yet it was the only way whii-li 
 })romised any ho])e of success. vVs he sprung u]\, and ran 
 lither and thither among the store-houses, driven by his in- 
 ward um-est, he could devise no other plan. And how quickly 
 the moments were sli])ping away! It must now be very near 
 to the third hour, and he had scarcely time to hasten into the 
 palace, throw himself on the bed, and call Master. 
 
 Bewildered by excitement, and reeling like a drunkard, he 
 hastened back into tlie old tower, against whose wall he had 
 left his torch, and looked up the stone steps. 
 
 8iidd(^nly the thought occurred to Ixim that he might ascend 
 
THE EMPEKOE. 297 
 
 once more and throw himself down. Of what use was his 
 wi'etched life? 
 
 His fall, his cry would bring the emj)eror down from his 
 tower, and he well knew that his wounded and bleeding favor- 
 ite would not be neglected — that he could count upon. And 
 should he come then to his bedside, though he might be giv- 
 ing care to a dying one, he would certainly be no deceiver! 
 
 Determined for some desperate attempt, he drew closer the 
 girdle which held his chiton, and stepped into the open air to 
 judge of the hour from the position of the stars. There he 
 saw the waning crescent of the moon — the same moon which 
 had shone upon the sea when he plunged into it for the rescue 
 of Selene. With striking clearness, the image of the pale 
 young girl rose before his soul. He seemed to hold her again 
 in his arms. He saw her lying upon her bed, and once more 
 touched her cold brow with his hps. Then the vision disap- 
 peared, but an intense longing for her took its place, and he 
 felt that he could not die without another sight of her. Again 
 he looked about undecided. Before him was the largest store- 
 room, under the watch-tower, and he passed by its open door, 
 with torch in hand. Within its wide space lay chests and 
 boxes, tow, linseed, the straw and mats in which the household 
 stuff and works of art for the refurnishing of the palace had 
 been wrapped. 
 
 This he knew, and as he once more looked toward the stai'S 
 and saw that the second hour after midnight must be almost 
 ended, a sudden, frightful thought flashed through his brain, 
 and without stojoping for one instant to think of the conse- 
 quences, he flung Iris torch into that space, filled to the roof 
 with combustible stuff', and stood with folded arms to watch 
 the swiftly spreading flame, the rising smoke, the struggle of 
 the whirling black vapor in blending with the glow, the vic- 
 tory of the fire, and the crackling blaze through every opening 
 of the rude space. 
 
 The roof of palm branches and reeds was already in flames 
 when Antinous sj)rung up the stairs leading to the watch-tower 
 of the imperial star-gazer — only a few steps removed from the 
 burning magazine, with the startling cry: 
 
 * ' Fire ! Fire ! The building is burning ! ' ' 
 
 CHAPTEE XIV. 
 
 The banquet which Verus gave in celebration of his birth- 
 day did not seem anywhere near its end at the beginning of the 
 third hour after midnight. 
 
298 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Beside the titled and cultivated Romans in the suite of the 
 ciiii)oror, there were also jiresent many of the most prominent 
 ancl illustrious Alexandrians. The feast itself was long ago at 
 an end, but tankard after tankard of wine was repeatedly 
 filled and emptied. Verus himself had been unanimously 
 chosen as king and leader of the banquet. 
 
 Richly garlanded, he reclined upon a divan of his own in- 
 vention — one composed of four cushions piled together, and 
 covered with rose jDctals. 
 
 A screen of gauze protected him from gnats and flies, and a 
 lightly woven mat of lilies and other flowers covered his feet 
 and furnished fragrance for himself and a charming female 
 singer at his side. 
 
 Pretty boys, dressed as cupids, waited the nod of " the false 
 Eros.'' 
 
 How quietly he who bore that title seemed to rest upon the 
 luxiu'ious cusliions. Yet his eyes were everywhere, and cer- 
 tahily had not failed to consider all the arrangements for the 
 banquet, and the conduct of it required his closest supervision. 
 
 As at the banquets of Hadrian in Rome, short extracts from 
 new books and jjoems were brought forward by their authors; 
 then a comedy -was introduced, and afterward Glycera, the 
 most distinguished singer of the city, accompanied the harp in 
 a dithyrambus, Avith a voice of bell-like clearness, and Alex- 
 ander, a virtuoso, executed a j^iece ujion the trigon. At last a 
 chorus of dancers burst into the apartment, rocking and swing- 
 ing to the music of tambourine and double flute. Each new 
 form of entertainment elicited apj^lause. With each tankard 
 a fresh stream of merriment rose toward the oj^en roof, through 
 which the odor of the flowers and the burning essences exhaled 
 from ornamental altars found an exit. Already great pools of 
 wine, poured out as libations to the gods, lay ujion the jiolished 
 floor; shouts had drowned the music and the songs — the cheer- 
 ful feast had become an orgy. 
 
 Verus stimulated the silent and lazy guests to the enjoyment 
 of mad pleasures, and gave to all unbridled license. He ac- 
 knowledged every pledge — knew how to entertain the fair 
 singer at liis side — threw a sparkling jest into every silent 
 group; and showed to the learned guests stretched upon 
 divans not far removed, that he was interested in and only 
 waited oi)j)ortunity to share their conversation. 
 
 Alexandria, that meeting point of eastern and western 
 cultivation, had seen other feasts than this riotous drinking- 
 bout! 
 
 A good earnest conversation seasoned alw the common meal 
 
THE EMPEROR. 299 
 
 of the circle belonging to the Museum, but the reckless lux- 
 uriance of Rome had found its way into the houses of the rich, 
 and even the noblest acquisitions of the human spirit were 
 changed unawares into mere means of enjoyment. 
 
 One became a philosojiher in order to be prominent and 
 able to speak on all occasions — and a well-told anecdote was 
 everywhere more welcome than a profounder thought which 
 might awake discussion. 
 
 What a tumult, what a confusion of sounds raged within the 
 hall in the second hour after midnight! How were the lungs 
 oppressed with the lieavy odors; what repugnant sights met 
 the eye; how shamelessly propriety was trampled under foot! 
 The poisonous breath of the confined air overthrew the admir- 
 able moderation of the Greeks, and from the fumes of wine 
 enveloping this chaos of mad banqueters, rose slowly that pale 
 spirit who marked her victims enslaved for the coming day. 
 
 The circle of divans occupied by Florus, Favorinus, and their 
 Alexandrian friends, seemed like an island in this surging sea. 
 
 Even here the wine-cup had passed freely, and Florus spoke 
 with a stammering tongue, yet sensible conversation main- 
 tained its ascendency. The emperor had been hi the Museum 
 two days before, and carried on a scientific discussion with 
 the most prominent sages, in presence of their pujDils. At the 
 last, a formal dis25utation had arisen. The cris]) and dialectic 
 sharpness with which Hadrian, using the pure Attic Greek, 
 had driven his antagouist into a corner, was well worthy of ad- 
 miration, and he had left the institution with the promise to 
 confront his opponents upon another occasion. 
 
 The philosoj)hers, Pankrates and Dionysius, with the strictly 
 temjDerate Apollonius, described the single exploits of this re- 
 markable intellectual contest, and praised the wonderful mem- 
 ory and ready tongue of the emjjeror. 
 
 " And jet you have not seen him in his best hours !^' cried 
 Favorinus, the Gallic sophist and rhetorician. "He has re- 
 ceived an oracle foretelling a misfortune, which the stars seem 
 to confirm, and that destroys his mood. But among ourselves, 
 let me say, that I know very few who can suri^ass him in dia- 
 lectics; and in his cheerful hours he is simply irresistible. 
 Since we became reconciled, he has treated me like a brotlier. 
 I stand up for him against every man, for I say again he is 
 my brother. " 
 
 The Gaul looked about him after these words with glowing 
 eyes, as if uttering a challenge. He was pale from drinking, 
 irritable, boastful, and very loquacious. 
 
 " Certainly, you are right," answered Apollonius. " Eut it 
 
300 tht: emperor. 
 
 seemed to us lie mic^lit Ijo bitter in a contest. His eyes are 
 more gloomy iluin cJiecrfiil.'' 
 
 '" ife is my brother,'' returned Favorinus, "and as to his 
 eyes — by Hercules I I have seen thorn like a clear sun, or 
 flashing stars! And his mouth! I know him well! He is my 
 brother, and I will wager that, while he may condescend to 
 dispute with you — it is too comical — at each comer of his 
 mouth there lurked a roguish smile — look at me — like this!" 
 
 " 1 repeat it, he seemed to us more gloomy than mirthful/' 
 returned ApoUonius, annoyed, and Pankrates added: 
 
 " If he does understand jesting, he did not let us see it." 
 
 " That is nothing," laughed the Gaul. " You do not 3'et 
 know him, but I am his friend^ and can be wherever he is. 
 Wait a little, I will relate a few anecdotes of him. If I 
 wished, I could describe him to you as distinctly as though he 
 were lying upon the surface of the wine in my goblet. Once, 
 in Rome, as he was inspecting the newly ornamented baths of 
 Agrippa, he saw in the Ap3^doterium * an old man, a veteran, 
 who had somewhere been a companion in arms — my memory 
 is pretty good, but his never fails. Naturally, Hadrian recog- 
 nized the man, and stepped toward him. Scaurus, I think, 
 was the name of the old man; yes, Scaurus. He did not ijii- 
 mediately noti(!e the X^Jsesar, for his scars had been inflamed by 
 the bath, and he was rubbing his back against the rough stone 
 pillar. Then Hadrian asked this gray-beard, ' Why do you 
 scratch yourself, my friend?' And Scaurus answered, a httle 
 shortly, without looking around, or having recognized the em- 
 peror's voice: ' Because I have no slave to do it for me.' You 
 should have heard the em2)eror laugh! Liberal as he some- 
 times is — I say sometimes — he sent immediately to Scaurus a 
 handsome sum and two etiicient slaves. This story was soon 
 spread abroad, and when the man whom you think can not 
 joke came again to the bath, two soldiers placed themselves in 
 liis way, scratching their backs against the wall as Scaurus had 
 done, and cried out to him: ' Great Ca;sar, we have no slaves!' 
 ' Then scratch each other,' he retorted, and left the soldiers to 
 scratch." 
 
 " Excellent!" exclaimed Florus, laughing. 
 
 " Now one more true story," continued the Gaul. " Once 
 a man with white hair asked alms of the emperor. The fellow 
 was a i-agamuffin, a parasiti', who went from one table to an- 
 other and got his living out of strangers. 'J'he emperor, who 
 understands liuman r.ature, sent him away. But this hanger- 
 
 * The disroljinir room of the bath. 
 
THE EMPEEOR. " 301 
 
 on colored his hair, so that lie might not be recognized, and 
 tried his fate with the emperor a second time. But Hadrian's 
 eyes are good. He sent him from the door, saying, in the most 
 serious manner: ' I have quite lately refused to give anything 
 to your father. ' A hundred similar stories pass from mouth 
 to mouth in Eome, and if you like I will repeat a dozen of 
 the best.^' 
 
 " Relate them all; out with your stories. They are — old 
 acquaintances of mine,^^ stammered Floras. " We can drink 
 while Favorinus is babbling." 
 
 The Gaul looked in scorn upon the Roman, and answered, 
 quickly: 
 
 " My words are too good for drunkards.^' 
 
 Floras sought a rejjly, but before he had found it, the body- 
 slave of the pretor burst into the banqueting-room with the" 
 cry: 
 
 " The emperor^s palace on the Lochias is in jBames!'' 
 
 Verus kicked his lily covering to the floor, tore open the 
 gauze netting, and cried to the breathless servant: "My 
 chariot! quick, my chariot! I will see you again, on some 
 other evening, my friends; thanks for the honor you have 
 shown me. I must go to the Lochias." 
 
 Simultaneously with Verus, who, without the j)rotection of 
 the pallium, rushed into the cool night air, the greater part of 
 his guests sprung up and hastened out of the hall to see the 
 fire and hear the news. Only a few went to help the citizens 
 put it out, and many of the tipplers lay still upon their couches. 
 As Favorinus and the Alexandrians rose from theu' couches, 
 Florus cried: 
 
 " No god could drag me out, not even if the whole house be 
 burned down, and, for all I care, Rome and Alexandria, and 
 all other jalaces on the earth into the bargain. Let them burn ! 
 The Roman Empire can never be greater or more perfect than 
 under the Caesars! It may burn up like a house of straw; I 
 shall stay here and drink!" 
 
 Inextricable seemed the confusion in the banqueting-room, 
 while Verus hastened to inform Sabina of the fire. 
 
 Balbilla had been the first to notice it as she sat down, after 
 working late into the night, to look out at the sea before 
 retiring to her bed. She had instantly rushed out with the 
 cry of fire, and sought a chamberlain to waken Sabina. 
 
 The whole peninsula of tlio Lochias glowed in purple and 
 gold, and formed the nucleus of a broad stream of tender red 
 rays, whose compass and clearness changed with each passing 
 moment, 
 
302 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Verus met tlie poetess at the door leading from the apart- 
 ments of the empress into the garden. This time he did not 
 employ his usual style of greeting, but asked, quickly: 
 
 " Has Sabina been told?'' 
 
 "1 think not yet/' 
 
 " Let her be wakened. Salute her from me. I must go to 
 the Lochias." 
 
 " AVe shall follow you." 
 
 " Stay here, you would be in the way there." 
 
 " I shall take but a little room, and I go. What a magnifi- 
 cent spectacle!" 
 
 " Eternal gods! a flame is bursting out from under the pal- 
 ace in the king's harbor! Where can be my chariot?" 
 
 " Will you take me with you?" 
 
 " No, you must waken the empress." 
 
 " And Lucilla?" 
 
 " You, woman, must stay where you are." 
 
 " T certainly shall not. Will the emperor be in danger?" 
 
 *' Hardly; the old stone building can not burn." 
 
 " See how magnificent! the sky is like a purple tent. I beg, 
 Verus, that you allow me to go ^\ith you." 
 
 " No, fairest; only men are needed there." 
 
 " How imkind you are!" 
 
 "At last! There comes the chariot; you, woman, must 
 stay here. Do you understand me?" 
 
 " I will not be commanded, and shall go to the Lochias." 
 
 " To see Antinous in the flames! One can not command 
 such a spectacle every day," cried Verus in derision, springing 
 into the chariot, and taking the reins in his own hands. 
 
 Balbilla stamped impatiently. Then she went into the 
 apartments of the empress, determined to visit the fire. 
 
 The eniiircss allowed no one to see her before she was fully 
 dressed, not even Balbilla. Her dressing-maid brought the 
 message that Sabina would certainly rise, but her health would 
 not permit her to go out in the night air. 
 
 The poetess betook herself to Lucilla, and begged her com- 
 pany to the Lochias. She consented instantly, but on learn- 
 ing that lier husband wished the ladies to remain at the 
 Caisareum, declared herself under obligation to obey, and sought 
 to detain Balbilla. But the defiant girl was resolved, partly 
 because Verus had forbidden it and had opposed and ridi- 
 oiUed her wish. 
 
 After exchanging a few Avords with her friend, she left her, 
 and seeking her companion, Claudia, ex])lained to her what she 
 had determined to do; and overcoming her opi)osition to the 
 
THE EMPEROK. 303 
 
 plan witti a few decisive words, ordered in her own person the 
 house-steward to provide her a vehicle, and left for the threat- 
 ened palace an hour and a half later than Verus. 
 
 An immense crowd surrounded the land side of the Lochais 
 and the harbor at its foot, where a few store-houses and wharves 
 were in flames. Boats without number swarmed about the 
 tongue of land. 
 
 With loud shouts and immense efforts, an attempt was being 
 made to take the great ships anchored in the roadstead to a 
 place of greater safety. All was illuminated by a light as 
 clear but redder and more unsteady than that of day. The 
 north-east wind swayed the flames, making the labor of put- 
 ting them out much greater. 
 
 Each burning store-house had become a gigantic torch, scat- 
 tering the darkness of the night. The white marble light- 
 house upon the Isle of Pharos — the highest in the world — was 
 wrapped in brilliant glowing red, making the usually bright 
 light at its tip pale and feeble in comparison. 
 
 The dark bodies of the great ships and the crowd of boats in 
 the distance were surrounded by a fiery gleam, and the quiet 
 sea in the neighborhood of the shore seemed to reflect the brill- 
 iance enveloping the whole peninsula as in a mirror. 
 
 Balbilla was unwearied in her admnation of these brilliant 
 colors that seemed vying with each other, and the contrast of 
 the fullest light with the deepest shadows. And she had time 
 to consider this wonderfid picture, for her chariot moved very 
 slowly onward, and where the street led from the king's liar- 
 bor to the palace, lictors stejDped in her way, declaring positive- 
 ly that any further progress was impossible. The horses, dis- 
 turbed by the glare of the flames and the crowd that pressed 
 upon them, became unmanageable, reared, and threw them- 
 selves against the body of the chariot. 
 
 The charioteer declared he could no longer be responsible 
 for them. 
 
 The common people, rushing by to assist at the flre, began to 
 insult the idle women, who had better have stayed beside their 
 looms than crowd into the way of the citizens. 
 
 " There is time enough for pleasure-driving by daylight,'' 
 cried one, and another said: 
 
 '' Should a spark light in the curls up there, it would cause 
 the outbreak of another conflagration. " 
 
 The situation of the poetess became each moment more in- 
 tolerable, and she commanded her charioteer to turn. 
 
 But in the crowded thw'oughfare, the command was more 
 easily given than obeyed. One horse, bursting the thongs 
 
304 THE tJMPEROft. 
 
 which bound the yoke resting upon liis withers to the pole, 
 sprung to one side and frightened the crowd;, who began to 
 scold as tliey retreated. 
 
 Balbilla wislied to leaj) from the chariot^, but Claudia held 
 her fast, and conjured her not to leave her to destruction. 
 
 The patrician's spoiled daughter was not timid, but she 
 would have given a good deal by this time to have followed the 
 advice of Verus. At first she thought: " It is a fine advent- 
 ure, though I shall be glad when it is safely ended. " Later 
 the sport had lost every trace of its charm and repentance took 
 its i)lace. Wcejiing would have been much eiusier thaii laugh- 
 ing, when a deep, authoritative voice behind called out : 
 
 " Make way for the pumps! Whatever blocks their way 
 must be thrown to the side!" 
 
 These frightful words made Claudia fall on her knees, but 
 the depressed sjjirit of Balbilla found new wings on hearing 
 them, for she 'had recognized the voice of Pontius, and his 
 horse was directly behind her chariot. He was the rider she 
 had seen spring from the sea toward one of the flaming store- 
 houses, then back again to the sea, hither and thither, in all 
 directions. She turned squarely toward him, calling his name. 
 He recognized her, while tr3dng to check the speed of his 
 mighty horse, but shook his head with a smile, as much as to 
 say: 
 
 " She is a giddy-headed thing, and deserves a scolding, but 
 who could be angry Avith her?" and then commanded the guard 
 of safety accorai^anying him, exactly as if she were a bale or 
 bundle of goods, and not the titled heiress: 
 
 " Unharness the horses; we can use them to drag the water! 
 Help the ladies out of the chariot! Take them between you, 
 Nonnus and Lucanus! Now shove the carriage among the 
 buslies yonder! Room, there forward, room for our tack- 
 ling!" 
 
 Each command was obeyed as 23romptly as though issued by 
 a general to his disci phned troojjs. 
 
 After the pumps were in motion, Pontius, riding up to the 
 side of Balbilla, said : 
 
 " The emperor is well protected. As to yourself, )'ou 
 wanted a nearer look at the fire, and indeed it is a grand sight. 
 I have not time to take you back to the Ca^sareum. Follow 
 me now.' Yonder in the stone house of the harbor-guard you 
 can be hidden, and from the roof may overlook tlie Lochias 
 and the whole peninsula. Your eyes will have a rare treat, 
 but I beg you not to forget how many days of honest toil, 
 what rich treasures Avon l^y severe industry are going to de- 
 
Me emperor. 305 
 
 stmction iu this hour. That which entertains you will cost 
 bitter tears to many, and we must both hope that this grand 
 spectacle has already reached its height and approaches its 
 end." 
 
 " That I hope most heartily/^ cried the girl. 
 
 " I knew it. As soon as possible I will look after you. 
 Nonnus and Lucanus, conduct these noble ladies to the house 
 of the harbor-watch. Say to him that they are intimate friends 
 of the empress. Where are they taidng the pumps? I will 
 see you again, Balbilla!" And i:he architect gave his horse 
 free rein, and broke a path through the crowd. 
 
 Quarter of an hour later the girl stood upon the roof of the 
 little house. 
 
 Caludia, utterly exhausted, and unable to speak, sat upon a 
 rough wooden chair in the musty common room below. 
 
 The young Roman looked now upon the flames with differ- 
 ent eyes. Pontius had taught her another view from that 
 which had so lately filled her only with delight, as she watched 
 them rising high and fierce toward the sky. They were mighty 
 enough when she ascended the roof, but they soon subsided, 
 and it seemed difficult for them to rise above the clouds of 
 black smoke. 
 
 Balbilla looked about for the architect, and soon descried 
 him, for a man on horseback was lifted above the crowd. He 
 stood sometimes by one, then beside another of the ware- 
 houses. Once he disappeared for an hour, while he was at the 
 Lochias. Then he reajjpeared, and wherever he went the 
 fury of the raging element abated. Almost imjjerceptibly the 
 wind had died away, the air grew stiller and warmer. This 
 circumstance aided the labor of the citizens, but Balbilla at- 
 tributed all their success to the supervision of her vigorous 
 friend. Once she saw that he ordered a building torn down 
 which separated a burning granary from a few store-houses 
 still untouched by the flames, and understood that he wished 
 to cut off the progress of the flames. 
 
 Another time she saw him standing uj^on a low hill. 
 Directly before him was a magazine containing tow and barrels 
 of resin and tar, all hi flames. His face was toward her, and 
 she could see the movement of his hands as he quietly gave his 
 orders. His own figure, and that of the restless horse under 
 him, made a noble picture in the ruddy glow. She trembled 
 for him, she admired this fearless, vigorous, firm man, and as 
 a buniing beam fell close beside him, and the frightened horse, 
 at first beginning to wheel with him, was at length subdued by 
 his influence, the pretor's sarcasm, uame to her thought — that 
 
SOG THE EMPEROR. 
 
 slie insisted on visiting the Lochias in order to see Antinous 
 in the flames. 
 
 She saw here a worthier spectacle, and yet there rose before 
 lier lively imagination — which often, and sometimes against 
 her will, gave form to her shapeless thoughts — the image of 
 that handsome youth enveloped in the glowing light which 
 coloi-cd the horizon. 
 
 Hour after hour passed; the labor of the thousand workers 
 seemed crowned with visible success. One flame after another 
 was subdued — smoldering, if not quite extinguished, for only 
 smoke mixed with sparks now rose into the sky. Yet Pontius 
 came not to look after her. 
 
 She saw no stars, for the sky was overcast with clouds; but 
 the dawn of another day must now be near. She was chilled 
 through, and the long delay of her friend was vexatious. 
 
 As great drops of rain began to fall she descended by a lad- 
 der from the roof, and sat beside the fire in the harbor-mas- 
 ter's house, near to Claudia, who was fast asleep. 
 
 There she had been for half an hour, gazing dreamily into 
 the comfortable glow, when she heard hoof-beats, and Pontius 
 appeared, with blackened face and hoarse from hours of loud 
 command. 
 
 Balbilla forgot her vexation as soon as she saw him, greeted 
 him kindly, and told him she had watched his every motion; 
 but this lively and quick-witted girl found herself utterly un- 
 able to express the admiration which his conduct of the affair 
 had excited within her. She heard him say that his mouth 
 was parched and his throat choked with thirst, and she — who 
 was used to call a slave if needing only a pin, and to whom 
 fate had given no person towai-d whom she might gladly have 
 shown herself serviceable — filled with her own hand a cup from 
 the great clay pitcher of water in one corner of the room, and 
 passed it, begging him to drink. 
 
 He swallowed eagerly the refreshing draught, and when the 
 little vessel Avas empty she took it from his hand, and, refill- 
 ing, brought it to him once more. 
 
 Claudia, who had been wakened by the entrance of Pontius, 
 looked with surprise at this unprecedented action, shaking her 
 head. As Pontius emptied, for the third time, the cuj) that 
 Balbilla brought, he said, drawing a long breath : 
 
 " That was a drink! A better in all my life T liave not 
 tasted." 
 
 " Impure water from a poor clay cup," answered the girl. 
 
 " But better than wine of Byblos out of a golden goblet. " 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 307 
 
 " You have honestly earned refreshment, and tliirst seasons 
 the humblest beverage." 
 
 " You forget the hand which brought it to m.e," returned 
 the architect, heartily. 
 
 Balbilla blushed and cast her eyes confusedly to the floor, 
 but only for a moment. She raised them again, and said, in 
 her old bright and careless manner: 
 
 " Now, then, having received costly entertainment, you will 
 be taking yourself home, and the magician of the repast will 
 be transformed into the great architect. Before this happens, 
 I beg you to tell us what god brought you back from Pelusium 
 at the critical moment when this fire originated, and how 
 matters now stand in the palace on the Lochias. " 
 
 " My time is short," answered Pontius, but he hastily nar- 
 rated that after finishing his work in Pelusium he had re- 
 turned by im2)erial post to Alexandria. But as he descended 
 from the chariot at the post station, he had noticed the appear- 
 ance of fire over the sea, and directly after learned from a 
 slave that something was burning on the Lochias. There were 
 plenty of horses at the station, and selecting a strong one, 
 he had succeeded in reaching the palace before the crowd. As 
 to the cause of the conflagration, that was still unknown. 
 
 " The emperor," he said, " was watching the sky at the 
 moment the flames burst out of a store-house near the watch- 
 tower. Antinous noticed it first, and, crying ' Fire!^ had 
 warned his master. I found Hadrian in great excitement. He 
 commissioned me to superintend the work of jiutting it out. 
 Verus worked with me so boldly and efficiently that I am un- 
 der great obligations to him. Tlie emperor himself kejDt his 
 favorite in the palace, for the poor fellow burned both hands. '^ 
 
 "Ah!" cried Balbilla, with lively regret, "how did that 
 liapi)en?" 
 
 " As Hadrian and Antinous first came down from the tower, 
 they brought as many instruments and documents as they were 
 able to carry. But at the bottom Hadrian noticed that tablets 
 with most imj)ortant calculations had been left at the to]?, and 
 expressed his regret. Meanwhile the fire had caught the frail 
 structure of the new tower, and it seemed impossible to go into 
 it again. But the Bithynian dreamer can wake out of his 
 slumber; and wliile the emperor was looking anxiously after 
 the bundles of l)urning flax which the wind was bringing into 
 the harbor, the fool-hardy fellow burst into the burning build- 
 ing, threw the tablets down from the tower, and hastened to 
 the stairs. This bold deed would have cost the jioor fellow his 
 life if the slave Mastor, who in the meantime had hurried after 
 
308 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 him, hail not carried him into the air from the stone steps that 
 led 11]) to the new tower, where he found him swooning and 
 lialf suffocated."' 
 
 " But ho Hves, that lordly, that godlike youth, and is out 
 of danger?" asked Balbilla, in a tone of great anxiety. 
 
 " lie is now quite well. Only ui^on his hands, as I told you, 
 he will carry marks of the conflagration, and his hair was some- 
 what singed, but that will grow again." 
 
 " Tlie soft, graceful locks!" cried Balbilla. " Let us go 
 home, Claudia. The gardener will cut us a fine bunch of 
 roses, and we will send it to please Autinous."' 
 
 '* Flowers, to a man who does not want them?" asked Pon- 
 tius, seriously. 
 
 " How else can we reward his virtues and honor his 
 beauty?" asked Balbilla. 
 
 '" The consciousness of an honest effort is our sufficient re- 
 ward, or the laurel from the hands of commissioned men. ' ' 
 
 " And the beauty?" 
 
 " Tliat of women brings to them admiration, perhaps 
 also love and flowers; that of men may rejoice the eyes, but 
 the effort to honor it belongs to no mortal woman." 
 
 " To whom else, if I may be allowed the question?" 
 
 " To the art, which immortalizes." 
 
 " But the roses might cai'ry comfort and pleasure to the 
 suffering youth." 
 
 " Then send them to the sick, but not to the handsome 
 boy," returned Pontius. 
 
 Balbilla was silent, and with her companion followed the 
 architect to the harbor. There he took his leave, having 
 placed them in a boat which would carry them to the Cacsa- 
 reum under one of the arched bridges of the lleptastadium. 
 
 UjDon the way, the younger Eoman Avoman remarked to the 
 elder: " Pontius has spoiled my fun with the roses. The sick 
 Antinous is of course the handsome, and if one must believe — 
 I shall do just as I please, still it is best to leave the flowers 
 uncuf 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 The city was out of danger, the fire was extinguished. The 
 architect Pontius found no rest before noon. Three horses 
 had given out under him, but his nervous vigor and healthy 
 s])irit held out, in sjjite of all demands. So soon as he dared 
 look upon the work as finished, he betook himself to liis own 
 
THE EMPEEOK. 309 
 
 dwelling. He needed a little rest, but already in his vestibule 
 he found many who were waiting to disj)ute it with him. 
 
 A man in the midst of affairs, who sujDerintends many un- 
 dertakings, can not, without paying a penalty, absent himself 
 from the scene of his labors for a series of days. The demands 
 accumulate and plunge upon him, at his return, like water 
 when the shiice-ways that held it back are oj)ened. 
 
 Full twenty people, who were aware of his return, pressed 
 forward as soon as he appeared. Many of them, he well knew, 
 were there on important business; but he felt that he had 
 reached the end of his strength, and was resolved to secure a 
 little rest at any price. His usually considerate manner could 
 no longer be maintained against the extraordinary demands 
 made on his powers of endurance. Angry, vexed and indig- 
 nant, he pointed to his begrimed face, and cried, as he forced 
 his way through the waiting crowd: 
 
 " To-morrow, to-morrow, or if necessary, after sunset, to- 
 day. But now I need rest, rest, rest ! You see yourselves the 
 condition 1 am in." 
 
 All, even the builders and contractors, who had come on 
 pressing errands, gave way. Only one elderly man, the house- 
 steward of his sister Paulina, held him by the smoke-stained 
 and in many i3laces singed chiton, saying quickly and in a low 
 tone: 
 
 " My mistress sends her greeting. She has things to discuss 
 with you that admit of no delay. I dare not leave until you 
 promise to see her to-day. Our chariot waits for you at the 
 garden-gate." 
 
 " Send it home," returned Pontius, not even kindly. 
 " Paulina must have patience for a few hours." 
 
 '' I had instructions to bring you immediately." 
 
 *' But in this condition — like this — I can not go," cried the 
 architect, vehemently. " Have you no consideration? And 
 yet — who knows? Tell her I will come in two hours." 
 
 After Pontius escaped this j)etitioner also, he took a bath, 
 and then seated himself to partake of a meal, but even while 
 eating and drinking he was not unoccupied, but read business 
 documents, and looked over several designs drawn by his as- 
 sistants during his absence. 
 
 " Do give yourself a little time of rest," begged the old 
 housekeeper, who had been his nurse and loved him as if her 
 own son. 
 
 " I must go to my sister," he replied, shrugging his shoul- 
 ders. 
 
 "We know her well,^' answered the old woman. "For 
 
310 THE e:hperor. 
 
 nothing, and less than nothing, she sends for yon, and you 
 need refreshment. Is the cusliion laid right? And now let 
 me ask if the lowest stone- carriers have a life as hard as your-s? 
 Not even at meal-time do you allow yourself a comfortable 
 hour. This poor head is never quiet; even the nights arc 
 turned into day-time — always busy, and always must be busy, 
 and if only one knew for whom?^' 
 
 " Yes, i'or whom?'" sighed Pontius, thrusting his arms be- 
 tween he;id and cushion. ' ' You see, little mother, rest must 
 follow work, as night the day, as winter the summer. The 
 man who has dear ones in the house, as a wife and merry chil- 
 dren, it may be — those who would beautify the hours of rest 
 and make them the best of the day — he would be wise to pro- 
 tract them, but it is different with me. " 
 
 " But why different, my Pontius?'" 
 
 ** Let me finish. You know I never enjoy the gossip of the 
 bath, or the prolonged banquet. In the pauses of work I am 
 alone with myself and the very worthy old Lenkippe. The 
 hours of recreation are not my best, but empty pauses between 
 the acts in the theater of my life, and therefore no reasonable 
 person can complain if I make them shorter through some 
 useful occupation.'" 
 
 " And what is the natural conclusion of tliis sensible speech? 
 Simply that you must marry."" 
 
 Pontius sighed; but Lenkippe added, with zeal: " You need 
 not search! The most resjoectable fathers and mothers would 
 run after you and lead their fairest child to your door." 
 
 " Some (ihild that I do not know, and who Avoidd perhaps 
 destroy that time between the acts I noAv turn at least to some 
 useful occupation."" 
 
 " They say,"" answered the old woman, " that marriage is 
 a game of chance. One gets high, another low points. The 
 first gahis a wife like the diligent bee; another only a trouble- 
 some gnat. There is doubtless some truth in this, but I have 
 grown gray with my eyes open, and have often noticed that a 
 great deal depends on the husband. Such a man as you are 
 might make a bee out of a gnat, who would bring honey into 
 the house. Of course, one must choose carefully. "" 
 
 " How can that be done?"" 
 
 " One should first know the parents, and then the child. A 
 girl brouglit up to good manners, in the house of a sensible 
 father and a virtuous mother — "' 
 
 '* AVhere in this city could one find such a wonder? No, 
 no, Lenkip2)e, for the present all must go on in the old way. 
 We owe something to each other, we are contented together — "" 
 
'iHE EMtEROK. 311 
 
 "And the time is flying away," broke in the old house- 
 keeper. " You are thirty-five years okl, and the girls — " 
 
 " Let them be, they will find other husbands! Now send 
 Cyrus to me with my sandals and pallium, and order my sedan, 
 for Paulina has already waited long enough." 
 
 The road from the architet's house to the dwelling of his 
 sister was long, and he had time enough to think over many 
 things, but not over the advice of Lenkippe to take a wife. 
 
 And yet the image of one female filled his heart and thoughts 
 — but he was not disposed to revel in the vision of Balbilla, 
 lovely as it seemed — he sought instead with cruel severity to 
 set before himself whatever in lier fell below the highest stand- 
 ard of womanly perfection. It did not trouble him to find 
 some faults and failings in this Roman girl, and still he must 
 confess to himself that all belonged so inseparably to her char- 
 acter, that without them she would not be the same individual. 
 Each weakness came at last to appear to this man, educated 
 with stoic severity, as an excellence. 
 
 He had learned that sorrow casts its shadow upon every 
 man, but whoever should be favored to walk through life with 
 this beaming child of fortune would, he thought, have nothing 
 to anticipate but clear, cheerful sunshine. 
 
 Upon his ride to Pelusium, and during his sojourn there, he 
 had often thought of her, and each time her image stood be- 
 fore his inward eye his heart seemed full of unclouded happi- 
 ness. 
 
 To meet her was the greatest joy of his life, yet he dared 
 not strive to possess her. 
 
 He did not depreciate himself, and was justly proud of the 
 position he had gained throagh his own industry and skill; but 
 she was a granddaughter of the man who had the right to sell 
 his grandfather for money, and it would not have seemed to 
 him less insolent to ask the emperor for how much he would 
 sell the purple robe he wore than to woo her, so high-born, 
 rich and attractive. 
 
 But to protect her, to caution her, to refresh himself in her 
 look and her speech — in these he felt justified, and no one 
 could forbid this happiness. For she j)erniitted it, she esteemed 
 him, she allowed him to protect her — this he recognized with 
 joy and gratitude. He would instantly have gojie through 
 again with all the exertion of the last few hours, could he have 
 been sure of receiving once more a glass of water from her 
 hand. To be allowed to think of her and enjoy her favor, 
 seemed higher happiness than the possession of any other 
 woman. 
 
312 rK-E EMPEROR. 
 
 When he descended from the sedan-chair at the door of his 
 sister's cit}' house, he shooi< his head, laugliing to himself in 
 remembering that during the whole long ride he had scarcely 
 thought of anything but Balbilla. 
 
 The dwelling of Paulina had few openings on the street, and 
 those in the rooms devoted to purposes of hospitality, and yet 
 his arrival had been noticed. 
 
 A window covered with climbing plants on the side wall of 
 the house framed in a charming head that looked inquisitively 
 upon tlie busy scene below. 
 
 Pontius did not see it, but Arsinoe — for she it was to wliom 
 this jiretty head belonged — recognized him instantly, for she 
 had often seen liim on the Lochias, and Pollux had told her 
 that he was his friend and well-v/isher. 
 
 For a week she had lived in the house of the rich widow. 
 No provision for her comfort was wanting, and yet her whole 
 soul longed to go out into the city and search for Pollux and 
 his parents, of whom she had heard nothing since the death of 
 her father. Her lover was certainly seekmg her, with painful 
 anxiety, but how could he find her? 
 
 Three days after her arrival in the house she had discovered 
 this little window, from which she could get a view of the 
 street. There was always enough to see, for it was on the way 
 to the Hippodrome, and constantly alive with foot-passengers 
 and chariots either going there or to Nicopolis. 
 
 It was certainly j)leasant to look at the fine horses and the 
 garlanded men and youths who passed the house of Paulina, 
 but she did not seek the vine-wreathed aperture simply for en- 
 tertainment. No, she hojjed most of all to see some time her 
 Pollux go by, or his father, his mother, his brother Teuker, or 
 some other acquaintance. Then iierhajis she would be fortu- 
 nate enough to call one of them, and ask what had become of 
 her friends, and beg that her bridegroom might be told where 
 to find her. 
 
 Her foster-mother had twice surprised her at this window, 
 and, not unkindly, but very decidedly foibade her to look 
 into the street. She had each time followed licr back into the 
 interior of the house, but so soon as she knew that Paulina was 
 absent from home, or too busy to notice her, she slipped back 
 to the window to look for those who were in her thoughts every 
 hour of the day. She was not happy in the new and rich sur- 
 roundings. 
 
 At first it had seemed very p]('a=ant to strotr-h herself upon 
 Paulina's soft couches — i)ul her hand to no work — oat dainty 
 food, and not 1)0 obliged to look after the children, or work in 
 
THE EMPEROR. 313 
 
 the hoj-ricl papyrus mill; but before three days were over she 
 longed for freedom — especially for the children, for Selene, and 
 Pollux. 
 
 Once she had gone out for a drive with Paulina in a covered 
 reda. At fii-st she was delighted with the rapid movement of 
 the horses, and leaned over the side to see the jDeople and 
 houses fly past; but Paulma was displeased with this, as with 
 so many other things she had been accustomed to tliink right 
 and pro]3er, and commanded her to draw in her head, with 
 the remark that well-bred girls should look into their laps 
 while on a drive. 
 
 Her foster-mother was kind, never passionate — treated her 
 as though she were her own daughter, in all matter of dress 
 and attendance, kissed her in the morning and before she 
 went to bed; and yet Arsinoe had not ^ven thought of Pau- 
 lina's wish that she should love her. 
 
 The proud, undemonstrative woman, whom she felt was 
 constantly watching, seemed like a stranger in whose power 
 she was. The finest feelings of her nature were and must be 
 always concealed from her. Once, after Paulina, with moist- 
 ened eyes, had been telling her of her deceased daughter, Arsinoe 
 was softened, and following the natural dictates of her heart, 
 told her of her love for Pollux, and that she hoped to be liis 
 wife. 
 
 " Are you thinking of a sculptor?" asked Paulina, with as 
 much horror as if she had encountered a toad. Then she had 
 walked up and down the room, and with her usual qmet de- 
 cision said: 
 
 " No, my cliild, you must forget that as soon as possible. I 
 destined you for a nobler bridegroom. When you know Him 
 you will desire no other. Have you seen a single work of art 
 in this house?" 
 
 '' No," answered Arsinoe, "but so far as Pollux is con- 
 cerned — " 
 
 " Listen to me," said the widow, interrupting her. " Have 
 I not S2:)oken to you of our good Father in heaven. Have I not 
 said that the gods of the heathen are imaginary beings, in- 
 vented by crack-brained fools, and endowed with all human 
 Aveaknesses and vices? Can you not see that it is senseless to 
 pray to stones? What jiower can lie in j^erishable figures of 
 bronze and marble? We call them idols. He who fashions 
 them serves them, briiigs sacrifice to them — great sacrifice — ■ 
 for ho puts his own spirit and skill into the labor. Have you 
 understood me?" 
 
314 THE EMl>T:nOH, 
 
 " No. Art is something liigli> Jind Pollux is a good man, 
 and in his work is full of the divinity.'' 
 
 " Wait a little and you will soon come to understand/' 
 Paulina had answered, had drawn Arsinoe toward herself, and 
 at fii-st kindly, then in severe tone said: " Go now to your rest 
 and implore the gracious Father in heaven to enhghten your 
 heart. You must forget the idol-maker, and I forbid your 
 ever mentioning the name of this sculptor in my presence." 
 
 Arsinoe had grown up as a heathen, and clung lovingly to 
 the gods of her parents, and hoped, when the bitterness of 
 pain in losing her father and separathig from her brothers had 
 passed, for days of joy once more. She was little disposed to 
 sacrifice her youthful affections and all earthly jjleasures for 
 some sj^iritual blessings, whose value she could not appreciate. 
 
 Her father had always sijoken with scorn and hatred of the 
 Christians. She knew now that they could be kind and 
 benevolent, and the doctrine of a friendly God in heaven, who 
 loves His children, appealed to her, but that one should be 
 willing to forgive his enemies, and always be thinking of his 
 sins with regret, and count all the jileasures and enjoyments 
 of the gay city of Alexandria as unworthy of notice, seemed 
 to her foohsh and absiuxl. 
 
 What great sins had she committed? Could a kind God 
 wish to destroy all the happiness of her life, because when a 
 child she had stolen a cake, or broken a pot, or even been 
 sometimes defiant and disobedient? Certainly not! 
 
 And ought a good, true man, like her tall Pollux, even 
 though a sculptor, incur the wrath of a fatherly God, be- 
 cause he knew how to make such wonderful things as the head 
 of her mother? 
 
 If that were really so, then would she a thousand times 
 rather lift her hands to worship the lauglnng Aphrodite, the 
 gay Eros, the liandsome Apollo, and all the nine muses who 
 had protected her Pollux than to Him. 
 
 A secret aversion toward the severe woman whom she could 
 not understand, and whose doctrines and exhortations were 
 scarcely comprehensible, rose within her; and many words 
 that might easily have found lodgment in her heart she thrust 
 back, because they came through the mouth of the woman who 
 tried to fasten some new fetter upon her freedom with every 
 passing horn*. 
 
 Paulina had never taken her to tlie convocation of Christians 
 in her villa. She wished first to j)re]»are her, and to open her 
 soul for salvation, and would not allow herself the assistance 
 of any teacher of the community. She and she alone was to 
 
THE EMPEROR. 315 
 
 couquer the soul of tliis beautiful creature, so firmly planted 
 in the >vays of the heathen. This was part of the jjact she 
 thought herself to have made with Him, and the labor went 
 toward the price by which she expected to purchase her daugh- 
 ter's eternal happiness. 
 
 Day after day she devoted several hours to the instruction 
 of Arsinoe in her own apartment, adorned only with flowers 
 and Christian symbols. But her puj)il seemed each day more 
 unimpressionable and absent-minded. While Paulina was 
 giving instruction she was thinking of her Pollux, of her broth- 
 ers and sisters, of the festival in honor of the emperor, and the 
 handsome costume she was to have worn as Eoxana. She 
 wondered what girl would now occupy her place, and how she 
 should manage to find her lover. 
 
 As with the lessons^ so was it with the prayers of Paulina, 
 which often continued over an hour, and which Arisnoe was 
 obliged to follow, kneeling on Wednesdays and Fridays, and 
 with uplifted hands on the other days of the week. 
 • When her foster-mother discovered that she of ten looked into 
 the street, she believed that she had found the reason for the 
 absent-mindedness of her ]5upil, and only waited the return of 
 her brother to have the window closed up. 
 
 As Pontius entered the lofty hall of his sister's house^ 
 Arsinoe came toward him. Her cheeks were flushed, for she 
 had hastened down as quickly as possible, in order to meet and 
 speak with him before she was shown into the room of Pau- 
 lina. 
 
 She looked prettier than ever. Pontius regarded her with 
 pleasure. He knew that he had somewhere seen this lovely 
 face, but could not instantly tell where, for those we have met 
 accidentally we do not easily recognize in a place where there 
 is no reason to anticiijate finding them. 
 
 Arsinoe did not give him time to speak to her, for, stepping 
 directly in his way, she said timidly, after the usual greeting: 
 
 " You do not know me?" 
 
 " Yes, certainly," answered the architect; " and yet — " 
 
 " I am a daughter of Keraunus, the palace overseer at the 
 Lochias; but you know — " 
 
 " Certainly; and your name is Arsinoe! I asked to-day for 
 your father, and heard to my regret — " 
 
 " He is dead!" 
 
 "Poor child! How everything has changed in the palace 
 since I went away! The gate-keeper's house has disaj)peared, 
 a new overseer has been installed, and then — But tell me 
 first how you came here?" 
 
31(j THE EMPEROR. 
 
 '' My fiitlicr k'fL nothing, and the Clirisiiuns here provided 
 for us/ There were eight of us. " 
 
 " And does my sister provide for you all?" 
 
 " No, no. We are all scattered in different houses, and 
 never meet. " 
 
 AVith these words, the tears ran down the cheeks of Arsinoe; 
 but she collected herself quickly, saying, before Pontius had 
 opportunity to express his sympathy: 
 
 " I want to ask you something; let me sjoeak before any 
 one disturbs us.^^ 
 
 " Speak on, my child. ^' 
 
 " \ou have known Pollux, the sculptor?" 
 
 " Certainly. ^^ 
 
 " And were you not always his friend?" 
 
 " He is a brave fellow, and an excellent sculptor." 
 
 " That he is indeed. And besides — May I say all to you, 
 and will you help me?" 
 
 *' Gladly, if it be in my power." 
 
 Arsinoe blushed, and looked down in charming embarrass- 
 ment, while she said, lightly: 
 
 " We love each other; I am his bride." 
 
 " Eeceive my congratulations. " 
 
 " Ah, if it were not so far off! Since the death of my fa- 
 ther we have not met. I know not where he and his jiarents 
 are, and how could he find me here?" 
 
 " Then write to him. " 
 
 " That I can not do very well; and if I could, my messenger 
 would — " 
 
 " Has my sister made inquiries?" 
 
 " No, no. I dare not speak of him again to her. She 
 .wishes to give me to another; she sa3's the art of sculpture is 
 hated by the God of the Christians." 
 
 " Does she say that? Then you want to have me find your 
 bridegroom?" 
 
 " Yes, yes, good sir; and when you find him, say that I am 
 alone early in the morning and toward evening. Every day 
 it is so. For at those hours your sister attends divine service 
 in her country house. " 
 
 " So you want to make me a lover's messenger! You could 
 not have chosen one more inexperienced." 
 
 " Ah, noble Pontius, if you have a heart — " 
 
 " Let me finish, girl. I will seek your ])ridegroom, and if I 
 find him he shall know where you are; but I can not and will 
 not invite him to meet you behind my sister's back. He shall 
 come frankly to Paulina, and woo you. If she deny your 
 
THE EMPEROR. 317 
 
 wish, I will try to plead your cause with my sister. Are you 
 contented with this?" 
 
 " I must be. And will you not tell me where he and his 
 2)arents are?^' 
 
 " That I promise. And now one more question. Are you 
 happy in this house?" 
 
 Again Arsinoe looked embarrassed toward the floor, then 
 she shook her head with an expression of lively negation, and 
 hastened away. Pontius looked after her compassionately and 
 with sympathy. 
 
 '' The poor, beautiful creature,"' he murmured, as he passed 
 on toward the apartment of his sister. 
 
 The housekeeper had announced his arrival, and Paulina 
 came to meet him at the threshold. 
 
 In her sitting-room Pontius met the Bishop Eumenes, a 
 venerable old man, with clear, mild eyes. 
 
 " Your name is in every mouth to-day," said Paulina, after 
 the usual salutation. " They say you have accomphshed 
 wonders during the night." 
 
 " I returned home very tired," said Pontius, " but your 
 message was so urgent that I shortened my time of rest. " 
 
 " How sorry I am," cried the widow. 
 
 The bislioj) saw that the brother and sister had some busi- 
 ness to discuss, and asked if he would not disturb them. 
 
 " Quite the contrary," replied Paulina. '' It is a matter 
 connected with my foster-child, who unfortunately has her 
 head full of nonsense. She tells me she has seen you on the 
 Lochias, my Pontius." 
 
 " I knew the pretty child." 
 
 " Yes, she is of lovely exterior. But her spirit and her 
 heart have been entirely untrained, and the truth falls upon 
 her as into stony ground, for she uses every free hour to watch 
 the riders and cliariots on their way to the Hippodrome. 
 Tlirough this idle curiosity she gets a thousand useless and dis- 
 sipating ideas. I am not always at home, and think it best to 
 have that mischievous window walled up. " 
 
 " And did you call me for that?" asked Pontius, vexed. " I 
 should think your house-slaves might have done that work 
 without my assistance." 
 
 " Ferliaps so, but the wall must then be freshly whitewashed. 
 I know how kind you always are."' 
 
 " I thank you. To-morrow I|Will send two regular work- 
 men. " 
 
 " Better to-day, if possible." 
 
318 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 '' Must fherc tlien be such haste to spoil the pleasure of the 
 poor child?" 
 
 ' ' As to that, I believe it is not so miich the riders and 
 chariots she cares to sec as her brave bridegroom." 
 
 " So much the worse. I must tell you, Eumenes, that a 
 sculptor seeks her for a wife. " 
 
 " She is a heathen," answered the bishop. 
 
 "But on the way to salvation,^' returned Paulina. "But 
 we will speak of that later. There is another thing to discuss 
 with you, Pontius. The hall in my country house must be 
 enlarged." 
 
 " Then send me the plans." 
 
 " They are in the library of my poor husband." 
 
 The architect left his sister to go into the well-known apart- 
 ment. 
 
 As soon as the bishop was alone with Paulina, he said, shak- 
 ing his head : 
 
 " If I can judge correctly, my sister, you are making a mis- 
 take in the training of the child intrusted to you. Not every 
 one is called, and refractory hearts must be led to salvation 
 with a gentle hand, and not dragged or jDushed into the way. 
 "Why cut off from this girl, who stands yet with both feet in 
 the midst of the world, all in which she finds 2)leasure? Per- 
 nit her to enjoy every lawful enjoyment which is api>ropriate 
 to youth. Do not hurt Arsinoe needlessly; let her not feel 
 the hand which leads her. Teach her first of all to love you 
 sincerely, for, if she knows nothing dearer than yourself, a 
 request from your lips will accomi3lish more than bolts and 
 walled-up windows." 
 
 " T wish nothing more truly than that she love me," broke 
 in Paulina. 
 
 " But have you tried her? Do you see in her the s])ark 
 which may be fanned to a flame? Have you discovered a germ 
 which can grow into longing after salvation, to devotion of 
 herself to the Redeemer?" 
 
 " In every human breast there lies such a germ. Those are 
 your own words." 
 
 " But in many heathen it lies deeply buried under sand and 
 pebbles. Do you feel yourself caj^able of clearing these away 
 without injury to the germ or to the soil where it lies?" 
 
 " I do feel this, and I shall win Arsinoe for Jesus Clirist," 
 said Paulina, with decision. 
 
 Pont'us interrupted the conversation. For some time he 
 remained talking with his sister and Euinenes over the pro- 
 posed improvement in her country house, then left at the same 
 
THE EMPEKOK. 319 
 
 time with Eumenes, betaking himself to the scene of the late 
 fire on the harbor and to the old palace. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Pontius found the emperor no longer on the Lochias, for 
 he had removed in the afternoon to the CEesarenm. The odor 
 of burning through all the apartments was repugnant to him, 
 and he had begun to look upon this restored palace as an un- 
 lucky jjlace. He was impatient for the arrival of the architect, 
 as the apartments originally arranged for him in the Csesa- 
 reum had been despoiled for the furnishing of those on the 
 Lochias. Pontius must now take charge of their instant re- 
 arrangement. 
 
 He found a chariot in waiting for him, and no lack of slaves, 
 and undertook at once the new work, devoting all his energies 
 to it until a late hour of the night. Tliis evening, also, he 
 was waited for in vain in his own anteroom. 
 
 Hadrian occupied now a few rooms belonging to the apart- 
 ments of his wife. He was in serious mood, and when the 
 Prefect Titianus was announced, he kept him waiting, while 
 with his own hand he laid a fresh compress upon the burns of 
 his favorite. 
 
 " Go now, sire,"' begged the Bithynian, after the emperor 
 had finished his work with the skill of a trained surgeon. 
 " Titianus has been pacing the floor a quarter of an hour.'' 
 
 " That may be," answered the monarch; " and if the whole 
 world cries for me, it must wait till these faithful fingers have 
 received due attention. Yes, my boy, we are walking together 
 through life as closely united companions. That others also 
 do; and each who so goes on with his fellow, enjoying and 
 suffering in common, thinks at last he knows his comj)anion 
 as well as he knows himself. Yet the inmost kernel of the be- 
 uig is hidden. Some day fate sends a blustering storm, strip- 
 ping off the last covering of this soul, wliich now stands un- 
 veiled before his eyes, as the seed which has fallen from its 
 shell, or as a naked body. In this night, such a storm-wind 
 has laid bare the heart of my Antinous, letting me see it as 
 plainly as this hand which I hold before my eyes. Yes, yes, 
 yes. He who hazards his blooming existence for the valued 
 possession of his friend, would sacrifice a thousand lives had 
 they been his — for his person. This night, my friend, will 
 never be forgotten. It gives you a fair right to do much which 
 is unpleasant to me, and has deeply engraved your name on 
 
330 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 my lieart as first among those to whom 1 owe gratitude. There 
 are not many such. " 
 
 Hadrian lield out his hand to Antinous, and the youth, who 
 till now had kept his eyes on the ground in confusion, pressed 
 it to bis lips in violent agitation. Then, lifting his large eyes 
 to the emperor, he said: 
 
 " You ought not to speak so to me any more. For what is 
 my life? I would let it fly away as the child does a beetle he 
 has caught, if I might sjiare you a single gloomy day.^' 
 
 " I know that,^' answered the monarch, and went into the 
 adjoining room to the jarefect. 
 
 Titianus had come at the request of the emperor, and in 
 order to fix a sum which was to be paid to the city and the 
 private owners of the burned store-houses; for Hadrian htid 
 determined to issue a decree, proclaiming that no one was to 
 sufl'er loss through a misfortune sent by the gods, and having 
 its origin in his house. The prefect had made out the neces- 
 sary estimates, and Phlegon, Hehdorus, and Celer were com- 
 missioned to send documents to all concerned, demanding in 
 the name of the Ca?sar a correct statement as to the amount 
 of loss. Titianus also brought Avord that the Greeks and Jews 
 had resolved to express their joy over the rescue of the em- 
 2?eror through large thank-oll'erings. 
 
 " And the Christians?" asked Hadrian. 
 
 " They reject theoffering of animals in sacrifice, but wish to 
 unite in a general thanksgiving prayer. ' ' 
 
 " They certainly make their acknowledgment cost little, '^ 
 said the emperor. 
 
 " Their bishop, Eumenes, has brought me a sum for which 
 one could buy a hundred oxen, for distribution among the 
 poor. He says the God of the Christians is a spirit, and de- 
 sires only spiritual sacrifices. The best ofi'erings one can bring 
 Him are obedience and the devotion of a sincere heart. '^ 
 
 "That does not sound badly for us," returned Hadrian, 
 " but it would go for nothing among the common people. 
 Philosophical teaching does not lead to piet3\ The mass of 
 
 geople need visible gods and tangible sacrifices. Are the 
 hristians here good citizens and devoted to the state?' ^ 
 " For them we need no courts of justice." 
 " Then take their money, and let it be distributed among 
 the needy; but I must forbid their general meeting for prayei*. 
 l^hey may continue to raise their hands for me in secret to 
 their great Sj^irit. Their doctrine must not be made public. 
 It is not without its seductive charm, and the safety of the 
 
THE EMPEEOK. 331 
 
 state requires that the mass remain faitlif ul to the old gods 
 and sacrifices.'' 
 
 " As you command, Cgesar." 
 
 " You know the report of Phny to Trajan upon the Chris- 
 tians?" 
 
 '' And the answer of that emjDeror.'-' 
 
 " It is well, then, that they be allowed quietly to follow their 
 own convictions, only they must not make themselves promi- 
 nent or do anytliing against the laws of the state. So surely 
 as they deny that resjject to the old gods which is their due, 
 or lift a finger against them, severity must be practiced, and 
 each trespass punished with death." 
 
 During this conversation Verus had entered. To-day he had 
 followed the emperor everywhere, hoping to hear a word as to 
 his observations of the sky, and yet he dared not ask as to the 
 result. 
 
 When he found Hadrian occupied, he asked a chamberlain 
 to conduct him to Antinous. 
 
 The youth turned pale at the sight of the pretor, but he had 
 self-control enough to offer congratulations upon Kis birthday. 
 Verus had not failed to notice the effect of his entrance upon 
 Antinous; so he at first asked indifferent questions, and wove 
 mirthful anecdotes into his conversation, saying — only after he 
 had thus succeeded in restoring his comjDOSure — in a careless 
 manner: 
 
 " In the name of the state, and all the friends of the em- 
 peror, I must thank you. You conducted the affair well, 
 though using rather vigorous measures. " 
 
 " I pray you, let that drop," broke in Antinous, earnestly, 
 and with an anxious glance toward the door into the next 
 room. " To preserve the free spirit of the emperor, I would 
 have sacrificed all Alexandria. Beyond that, we have both 
 paid dearly for our good intentions and those wretched store- 
 houses. " 
 
 " S^jeak of other things, then. You sit therewith bandaged 
 hands and singed hair, and I feel quite unwell. Hadrian said 
 you assisted bravely at the rescue. 
 
 " I j)itied the poor marmots whose provision was being fast 
 devoured by the greedy flames; and heated, as I came from 
 the banquet, I sprung in among the rescuing party. My first 
 reward was a bath of ice-cold sea- water, which some one poured 
 over my head from a leathern bottle. In me all teaching of 
 ethics become disgraced, and I have long been inclined to 
 count the dramatic writers, in whose pieces virtue is rewarded 
 and vice pimished, as simpletons; for I owo my best hours to 
 
323 THE EMPEEOR. 
 
 my i^oorest deeds, while my best bring only vexation and 
 misery. No hyena laughs more hoarsely than I speak to-day. 
 Some* internal organ seems turned into a hedge-hog, whose 
 spines give me pain; and all tliis because I let myself be carried 
 on to do things which moralists jDraise as virtuous/' 
 
 " You cough and do not look well; lay yourself down.'' 
 
 '' On my birthday? No, my young friend. But now I 
 want to ask you, before I leave: Can you tell me what Had- 
 rian read in the stars?" 
 
 ''No." 
 
 " Not even if I put my Perseus at your disjjosition for any 
 service? The man knows Alexandria, and is dumb as a 
 fish." 
 
 " Not even then; for what I do not know I can not tell. 
 We are neither of us well; I repeat it, you ought to take care 
 of yourself. " 
 
 Verus left soon after these words, and Antinous felt relieved. 
 
 The visit of the pretor had filled him with imeasiness, and 
 his repugnance toward the man increased. 
 
 He knew that Verus had made him a tool, for the emperor 
 had said that he did not ascend the tower to read the stars for 
 himself, but to cast the horoscope of the jjretor, and that he 
 had told him (Verus) of this purpose. There was no excuse; 
 there could be no extenuation of his deed! 
 
 Simj^ly to gratify this dissolute coxcomb — this smiling 
 hyiDOcrite — he had become a traitor to his lord and an in- 
 cendiary, and must bear the overwhelming load of praise and 
 gratitude from the greatest and most sharp-sighted of men. 
 He hated, he abhorred himself, and asked why the fire that 
 blazed around him had satisfied itself with injuring his hands 
 and hair so lightly. 
 
 When Hadrian returned, he begged permission to go to bed. 
 The emperor granted this request willingly, bade Mastor watch 
 beside him, and went to answer the request of his Avife for an 
 interview. Sabina had not visited the scene of conflagration, 
 but had sent a messenger every hour to re2)ort to her the con- 
 dition of things and the Avelfare of her husband. She had 
 greeted him on his arrival at the C^esareum, and then retired 
 to her own ajjartments. 
 
 Hadrian found her rec:lining upon a couch, without her usual 
 ornaments, but otherwise dressed as for a banquet. 
 
 " You wished to speak with me?" asked the emperor. 
 
 " Yes; ;ui(l it is the most remarkable event of a day so filled 
 with extraoi'diiuiry things that my request was not in vain." 
 
 " You seldom give me opportunity to grant «a wish. *' 
 
THE EMPEROR. 323 
 
 '' Are you surprised at this?" 
 
 " Perhaps so, since, instead of asking, you usually demand. " 
 
 " Let us drop this contest of idle words." 
 
 " Gladly. For what purpose did you send for me?" 
 
 " Verus is celebrating his birthday." 
 
 " And you would like to know what the stars foretell for 
 him?" 
 
 "Or still more, what the appearances on the sky dispose 
 you to do for him." 
 
 '" I had little time to consider the appearance. At any rate, 
 the stars promise him a brilliant future. " 
 
 A joyful gleam shone in the eyes of Sabina, but she con- 
 straiiied herself to remain quiet, and asked, tranquilly: 
 
 " That you admit, and yet come to no conclusion?" 
 
 " Then do you wish to hear the decisive word to-day?" 
 
 " You know that without my affirmation." 
 
 " Well, his star outshines mine, and warns me to guard my- 
 self from him." 
 
 '•' How petty! Do you fear the pretor?" 
 
 " No, but his fortune is bound up with yours." 
 
 " If he be our son, his greatness would also be ours." 
 
 " Should I make him what you wish, he would attempt to 
 make our greatness his. Destiny — " 
 
 " You have said that was favorable to him; unfortunately, 
 I must dispute it." 
 
 " You? Do you attempt to read the stars?" 
 
 "No. I leave that to the men. Have you heard of the 
 astrologer Ammonius?" 
 
 " Yes. He is a skillful man, who takes his observations 
 from the summit of the Serapeum, and many of the same 
 calling in this city have used his art to amass a fortune." 
 
 " No less a person than the astronomer Claudius Ptolema^us 
 has directed me to him. " 
 
 " The best recommendation.^* 
 
 " Well, then, I gave Ammonius the commission to cast the 
 horoscope of Verus last night. He brought it to me a little 
 while ago with an explanation. Here it is." 
 
 The emperor quickly seized the tablet Sabina offered, and 
 said, while he looked over attentively the prognostics arranged 
 according to the hours of their apjjearance: 
 
 " That is quite right! Could this have escaped me? Well 
 done! They tally exactly with my own observations! But 
 here — wait — here the third hour begins, where I was inter- 
 rupted. Eternal gods, what is this?" 
 
 The emperor removed the wax kiblet of Ammonius further 
 
334 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 from his eyes, and did not move his lijis again till he had 
 reached the last hour of the vanishing night. 
 
 Then he let the hand holding the horoscope drop, and cried, 
 shuddering: 
 
 " A horrible destiny. Horace was right when he said, 
 * High towers fall with the heaviest crash/ " 
 
 " The tower of which you are thinking is that pet child of 
 fortune, of whom you were afraid,'' said Sabina. " Give Verus 
 a short space of hapjjiness before the sad end which threatens.'" 
 
 Hadrian looked thoughtfully at the floor during these words, 
 and then answered, standing still before his wife : 
 
 " If this man do not fall before some dark misfortune, then 
 the stars and the destiny of human beings are as foreign to one 
 another as the sea from the heart of the desert, as the pulse- 
 beat from the pebbles of the brook. If Ammonius has made 
 ten errors, there still remain more than ten prognostics on 
 this tablet which are hostile and threatening to the pretor. I 
 am sorry for Verus — but the state has to suifer the misfort- 
 unes of the emperor. This man can not be my successor." 
 
 " Not?" asked Sabina, and rose from her couch. " Not 
 even after you have seen that your star will outlast his? Not 
 though a glance at this tablet will teach you that the world 
 will obey your nod long after he has turned to dust?" 
 
 " Be quiet, and give me time; but now I say, not even 
 then!" 
 
 " Not even then?" answered Sabina, gloomily. Then she 
 gathered herself up, and asked, with a passionate cry: " Not 
 even though I raise my hands imploringly and cry in your face: 
 You and destiny together have grudged me the bliss, the joy, 
 the fairest aim of a woman's life, and I will, and I must attain 
 it! I must, and I will, once — be it only for a brief si^ace — 
 hear myself addressed by beloved lips with that title, which 
 lifts the poorest beggar-wife with a nursling in her arms high 
 above the empress, who never stood beside a cradle. I will, 
 and I must, before my end, be a mother, and be called moth- 
 er, and be able to say, my child, my son, our child. " 
 
 Sabina sobbed aloud with these words, and flung her hands 
 before her face. 
 
 The emperor stepped backward. A wonder had been en- 
 acted before his eyes. Sabina, in whose eyes he had never be- 
 fore seen a tear — Sabina was weeping. Sabina had a heart 
 like other Avomen! 
 
 Astonished and deeply moved, he saw her — shaken by 
 mighty agitation — turn away from him, and sink upon her 
 
THE EMPEROR. 325 
 
 knees before the couch she had left, in order to hide her face 
 in the pillows. 
 
 He stood motionless at her side, but soon stej^ped nearer and 
 said : 
 
 " Eise, Sabina; your wish is granted. You shall have the 
 son for whom your heart longs. " 
 
 The emjoress rose, and a look of gratitude shone from her 
 tearful eyes into his. Sabina coiild smile. She could also be 
 beautiful. Such an hour of life was needed to prove this to 
 Hadrian. 
 
 Silently he drew a chair forward and sat down beside her, 
 and for a long time was silent, holding her hand in his own. 
 Then giving it freedom, he said khidly: 
 
 " Will Verus fulfill what you expect from a son?" 
 
 She nodded affirmatively. 
 
 " And what gives you this assurance?" asked the emperor. 
 " He is a Eoman, and not lacking in brilliant gifts. A man 
 of his jjosition in council and in field, and knowing so well how 
 to jjlay Eros, will not be dull in understanding the assumjition 
 of the i^eople. But he has the light disjjosition of his mother, 
 and his heart flutters hither and thither." 
 
 " Let him be as he is. We understand each other, and he 
 is the only person upon whose disj)Osition I count as surely as 
 if he were my own son." 
 
 " And on what is this firm confidence grounded?" 
 
 " You will understand me, for you are quick to perceive the 
 hints of destiny. Have you time to hear a short story?" 
 
 " The night is still long." 
 
 " Then I will speak. Forgive me if I begin with things 
 which seem to have passed away. Yet they have not, for they 
 work in me to this hour! I know you did not yourself choose 
 me for your wife. Plotina brought me into your house. She 
 loved you; whether your devotion to her belonged to the beau- 
 tiful woman, or to the wife of the emperor, from whom you 
 had everything to expect, who could say?" 
 
 " I loved and honored Plotina herself!" 
 
 " She chose in me a wife for you, of tall stature, and suited 
 to wear the jjurple, but not beautifid. She was acquainted 
 with me, and was well aware that I understood less than others 
 to win hearts to myself. E"o child could have grown up in 
 the house of its parent^ with less of love than 1 h;'d found; 
 and that my husband did not accustom me to tenderness, no 
 one knows better than you." 
 
 " I could in this moment repent it." 
 
 " It Avould be too late. But \ will not be bitter, certainly 
 
32C THE •EMPEKOR, 
 
 not. And yet, if yon will nndcrstand nic, I mnst confess that 
 when I was young I longed painfully for the love no one 
 offered me/' 
 
 " And have you yourself never loved?'' 
 
 *' No; but it hurt me that I could not. Wliile with Plotina 
 I often met the children of her kindred, and sometimes tried 
 to attract them toward myself; but while they jDlayed familiar- 
 ly with the other ladies, I seemed to excite their aversion. 
 Soon I came to return their ill-will; only the little son of 
 Ceionius Commodus — ourVerus — gave me bright answers when 
 I spoke to him, and brought his broken toys for me to mend. 
 So I won the love of the boy. " 
 
 " He was a remarkably sweet boy." 
 
 '* That he was. One day all the ladies Avere sitting to- 
 gether in the emperor's garden. Verus came running toward 
 us, and brought a remarkably fine apj)le, which Trajan had 
 given him. The red-cheeked fruit was admired by all. 
 Plotina took it from his hand, and asked, jestingly, if be woidd 
 give it to her. He turned his large eyes upon her in sur])rise, 
 shook his curly head, and ran toward me, and gave me — me 
 and no other — his apple, flung his little arms around my neck, 
 and said: ' Sabina, you shall have it.' " 
 
 " A judgment of Paris." 
 
 *' Do not jest now. This deed of an unselfish child strength- 
 ened my courage to bear the sorrow of life. I knew there was 
 one who loved me; and this one rewarded me for all I felt for 
 him — and I was never weary of doing for liim — by his loving 
 disposition. He is the only person that I feel sure will shed a 
 tear when I die. Give liim the right to call me mother, and 
 make him our son. " 
 
 "He is our son," said Hadrian, with earnest dignity, and 
 held out his hand to Sabina. She attempted to i:)ress it to her 
 lips, but he drew it back to add: 
 
 " You shall tell him that Ave adopt him as our son. His 
 wife is the daughter of Nigrinus, who had to fall that T might 
 stand firmly. You do not love Ijucilla, but we can l)oth ml- 
 mire her, for I, at least, know no otiier woman in Kome for 
 whose virtue one can vouch; besides, I OAve her a father, and 
 rejoice in tins daughter. So, then, we are blessed with chil- 
 dren. ^^'hether and when I can name Verus as my successor, 
 and jDroclaim to the Avorld its future monarch, I can not noAV 
 decide; for that, I need a more tranquil hour — till to-morrow, 
 Sabina. This day began in misfortunf; may that Avith Avhich 
 Ave together close it increase our ])rosperity. " 
 
THE EMPEROR. 327 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 There come lovely warm days in February, but whoever 
 fancies they have brought the spring will find himself mistaken. 
 The harsh, bitter Sabina had tender hours when womanly 
 emotion gained mastery; but as soon as the longing of her 
 softer disposition after maternal happiness was satisfied, her 
 heart closed tightly again, and the fire which had warmed it 
 went out. All who approached her — even her husband — felt 
 as before chilled and repelled in her presence. 
 
 Verus was sick. The first symptoms of a liver disease, which 
 the physicians had predicted, if he, the European, should con- 
 tinue his dissolute Roman habits in the climate of Alexandria, 
 began to give him trouble. 
 
 He bore the first physical sufferings fate had laid upon him 
 with imi^atience. Even the great tidings Sabina brought, and 
 which were the fulfillment of his boldest hopes, had not power 
 to reconcile him to this experience of sickness. He also learned 
 that Hadrian's fear before the excessive luster of his star had 
 almost cost him the adoption; and since he firmly believed that 
 his malady had its origin in the fire Antinous had kindled, he 
 bitterly repented his cunning interruption of the emperor's 
 calculations. 
 
 Men like to throw the blame of their misfortunes, especially 
 those that grow out of their faults, uj)on others, and thus the 
 sirffering pretor cursed Antinous and the science of Simeon 
 Ben Jochai, because the wicked deed through which the pleas- 
 ures of his life had been disturbed, without their assistance 
 would not have been committed. 
 
 Hadrian had requested the Alexandrians to jDOstpone their 
 spectacles and demonstrations until his astrological observations 
 of the course of destiny for the coming year were completed. 
 Every evening he betook himself to the lofty watch-tower of 
 the Serapeum, and from there studied the stars. On the tenth 
 of January he finished Ms work. The festivities commenced 
 on the eleventh, and occupied several days. The beautiful 
 daughter of Apollodorus the Jew represented Roxana, accord- 
 ing to the choice of the pretor. AH that the Alexandrians 
 offered the emperor was brilliant and magnificent. Never be- 
 fore were so many ships destroyed in a mock sea-fight, or so 
 many wild animals seen together on any occasion — even in the 
 Roman circus; and how bloody the gladiatorial contests, in 
 which black and white combatants oflcrcd to heart and sense a 
 
338 THE EMPEKOR. 
 
 gay spectacle. In consequence of the various elements united 
 at this central point of Egyptian, Greek, and Oriental culture, 
 the procession oifered such a feast to the eye that, in spite of 
 its excessive length, it was far less wearisome than the Romans 
 anticipated. 
 
 The tragedies and comedies introduced were rich in surpris- 
 ing effects. Conflagrations and floods were represented, and 
 gave the Alexandrians opportunity to show such skill in the 
 art of rei^resentation that Hadrian and his companions were 
 forced to confess them superior to any in either Eome or 
 Athens. 
 
 One piece by Ezekiel, a Jew who had written dramas in 
 Greek under the Ptolemies, the materials for which were 
 drawn from the history of his own people, especially roused 
 the admiration of the emperor. 
 
 During these festivities the Prefect Titianus suffered much 
 from an old difficulty of breatlung, and had his hands full of 
 work; at the same time he assisted Pontius in the search for 
 Pollux. Both men did their best, but when at last they suc- 
 ceeded in finding Doris and Euphorion there was still no trace 
 of their lost son. Papias, his former master, was no longer in 
 the city. Hadrian had sent him to Italy to set u]) Centaurs 
 and other figures at his own villa in Tibur. His wife, who re- 
 mained behind, declared that she knew nothing of Pollux be- 
 yond the fact that he had quitted the service of her husband 
 in a rude manner. 
 
 The fellow-apprentices of the unfortunate youth could give 
 absolutely no information; for not one of them had been pres- 
 ent at the time of his arrest. Papias had taken care to put 
 the man he feared into safe confinement without witnesses. 
 Neither prefect nor arcliitect looked for the honest fellow in 
 the i^risons, and would scarcely have found him had they done 
 so, for he was not in Alexantlria. The prisons of the city 
 overflowed after the festival began, and they removed him to 
 Canopus, where he was tried and incarcerated. 
 
 Pollux confessed frankly that he had taken the silver quiver, 
 and had been greatly incensed by the accusations of his mas- 
 ter. Thus he made in the outset an unfavorable impression 
 upon the magistrate; who knew, moreover, thiit Papias was a 
 wealthy and esteemed citizen. He was scarcely allowed a word 
 in his own defense, and the accusations of his master, together 
 with his own confessions, hastened the sentence. 
 
 To listen to the fictions this insolent fellow who — forgetting 
 all the respect he owed to bis employer and benefactor — wished 
 
THE EMPEROR. 329 
 
 to serve up for the benefit of the judge, seemed to that dig- 
 nitary only waste of time. 
 
 Two years of solitary confinement^, thought this guardian of 
 the law, would teach this reckless fellow to respect the pos- 
 sessions of other people and correct his contemptuous treat- 
 ment of those to whom he owed only gratitude and reverence. 
 Pollux cursed his fate in the prison of Cauopus, and hoped in 
 vain for the assistance of his friends, who, at last wearied by 
 fruitless efl'orfc, gave up the search, and asked only occasionally 
 for him. He at first so chafed and fretted under the im- 
 prisonment that he was put into closer confinement, out of 
 which he was not released until he — instead of raving — had 
 sunk into a stupor, and sjient the days in sullen brooding. 
 
 His jailer, who had learned much by experience, ventured 
 to predict that this young thief, when his two years had ex- 
 pired, would leave the prison in a state of harmless mental de- 
 bility. Titianus, Pontius, Balbilla, and even Antinous had at- 
 tempted to speak of him with the emperor, but each one met 
 a sharp rebuff, and learned that Hadrian would not forgive an 
 injury to his pride as an artist. 
 
 But the monarch showed also that he kept a true memory 
 of the benefits he received, for once, as a dish was brought 
 him containing cabbage and little sausages, he smiled to him- 
 self, and taking a well-filled purse from his pocket, ordered a 
 chamberlain to carry it in his name to Doris. 
 
 The old pair lived now in a little house near the residence of 
 Diotima, their widowed daughter. They had escaped hunger 
 and eternal wretchedness, yet a great change had passed over 
 them. The eyes of poor Doris were always red, for tears had 
 taken uj? their abode in them, and these ran over with every 
 word, object or thought wliich reminded her of Pollux, her 
 darling, her pride, her hojDC. And how few half hours there 
 were in a day when she did not think of liim! Soon after the 
 death of Keraunus, she had tried to see Selene. Hannah coidd 
 not and would not take her to the sick-room, for she knew, 
 through Maria, that she was the mother of the faithless lover 
 of her nursling. 
 
 On a second visit, Selene showed herself so reserved, anxious, 
 and peculiar in her manner toward Doris that the old woman 
 could but believe her visit unwelcome. 
 
 Her attempt to see Arsinoe had been still more unfortunate. 
 Having learned her residence through the deaconesses, she an- 
 nounced herself as mother of the sculptor Pollux, and was 
 sent away with the message that she could not speak with 
 Arsinoe, and her visits were once for all forbidden. After 
 
330 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 PoiUiiis h:ul found her, and encouraged her to make another 
 attempt — witli the assurance that Arsinoe was faithful to her 
 lover — she was met by Paulina herself, and so shari^ly repulsed 
 that she went away feeling insulted, and returned to her hus- 
 band in tears. She made no objection when Euphorion for- 
 bade her ever again to enter the house of the Christian. 
 
 The gift of the emperor was most accej^table to these poor 
 people; for, after all the excitement and the trouble of the last 
 month, Enphorion had lost the smoothness of his voice, and 
 his memory was shattered; he had been dismissed from the 
 theater choir, and his only means of earning a few drachmas 
 Avas in assisting at the celebration of the rites of some small 
 sects, or singing marriage and funeral hymns. The old y>co- 
 ple had also their daughter to support, whom Pollux could no 
 longer assist — and the birds, the Graces, and the cats must 
 also be fed. The possibility of sending them away never once 
 entered the thoughts of either Doris or EujDhorion. The" old 
 woman was no 'longer mirthful by day — but at night she had 
 many good hours; for then Hope painted fair pictures of the 
 future, and beguiled her with all possible and impossible visions 
 that kept her courage alive. How often she fancied Pollux 
 returning from the distant city into which he perhaps had lied 
 — Rome, or it might be Athens — as a great man, crowned with 
 laurels, and rich in treasures! 
 
 The emperor, who still remembered her kindly, could not 
 always be angry. Perhaps some day he would send out mes- 
 sengers to seek Pollux, and, through large commissions, make 
 good all he had done to injure him. She was sure her darling 
 was alive — on that point she could not be mistaken, though 
 Eujihorion tried to prove to her that he was dead. The old 
 musician would relate many stories of men who had been mur- 
 dered and never heard* of again, but she would not be per- 
 suaded; she continued to hope, and lived in the purpose of 
 sending her younger son, Teuker, so soon as his ajoprenticeship 
 was concluded — which would be in a few months — out upon 
 journeys to seek his dejDarted brother. 
 
 Antinous, whose burned hands had healed very soon under 
 the emperor's nursing, mourned also the disappearance of 
 Pollux — for whom he had felt a sincerer friendship than for 
 any other youth he had known — and he determined to visit 
 Doris. Rut he was more unwilling than ever to leave his mas- 
 ter, and followed him so zealously that Hadrian said sometimes, 
 playfully, he made the service of his slave superfluous. 
 
 AVhen he really had an hour at his own disposal, he pur- 
 ])osed visiting the parents of his friend, but between the pur- 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 331 
 
 pose and the performance lay a wide space that never would 
 be passed over without some powerfully constraining influence. 
 
 It was such an influence that led him — while the emperor 
 was disputing in the Museum, or occupied in studying the 
 dogmas of some religious sect, under the instruction of its 
 leader — -to the country house where the month of February still 
 found Selene a resident. 
 
 He ha4, several times succeeded in stealing into the garden 
 of Paulina, but his ho^De to meet and speak with Selene seemed 
 at first unattainable. Whenever he aijproached the house of 
 Hannah, the deformed girl always met and told him of her 
 welfare, and then .requested or commanded him to leave. She 
 was always now near Selene, for her mother was always nursed 
 by her sister, and Hannah had gained permission for her to 
 paste the papyrus leaves at home. The widow herself was 
 compelled to go to the factory, for her office as overseer made 
 her jjresence in the work-room necessary. 
 
 So it happened that Antinous was always received and dis- 
 missed by Maria, and never by Hannah. Between the hand- 
 some youth and the deformed girl, therefore, had grown up a 
 certain mutual understanding. When Antinous a2)peared, 
 and she cried out to him: "Again, already?" he would seize 
 her hand and beg lier earnestly only this time to gratify his 
 wish. 
 
 She was steadfast, and sent him away without severity, but 
 with smiling and friendly warning. When he brought out 
 choice flowers from beneath his pallium and implored her to 
 give them to Selene in the name of her friend from the Lochias, 
 she would accept, and promise to place them in her room, but 
 she said it could do neither him nor her any good to know 
 from whom they came. 
 
 After these rebuffs, he understood well how to use coaxing 
 words, but he never ventured to defy her and reach his end 
 through might. 
 
 If the flowers stood in the room, Maria looked at them much 
 oftener than Selene. 
 
 When Antinous did not appear at the usual time, Maria so 
 longed to see him that she walked uneasily back and forth from 
 the garden gate to the house of her friend. As he dreamed of 
 an angel, so he became the angel of her thoughts. She re- 
 membered the beautiful heathen in all her j^rayers, and a mild 
 comi)assion, with a mixture of pain over his lost soul, was in- 
 Bepai'uble from all her thoughts of him. 
 
 llainiah was informed of each visit, and whenever she spoke 
 of him the deaconess was troubled, and advised her to threaten 
 
333 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 him M'itli calling the porter, for she knew who this unwearied 
 admirer of her nurshng was. Once she had heard him speak 
 with Master, who used every free hour in attending the relig- 
 ious services of the Christians, and she had asked Master about 
 him. 
 
 All Alexandria, yes, the whole empire, knew the name of 
 this handsomest youth of the time, the celebrated favorite of 
 the emperor. Hannah also had heard of him, and had learned 
 that poets sung his praises, and heathen women were eager for 
 a look from his eyes. 
 
 She knew how lawless were the deeds of the great ones from 
 Kome, and Antinous appeared to her like the glittering falcon 
 that circles about a dove, and waits only a favorable moment 
 to jiounce upon and drag it with beak and talons to the ground. 
 
 She knew also that he was not a stranger to Selene — that he 
 had rescued her from the savage dog, and also dragged her out 
 of the water; but that Selene did not know Avho had saved 
 her, she was convinced from many of her words. 
 
 In the latter joart of February Antinous came three days in 
 succession, and Hannah had sent strict orders to the porter, 
 through Bisho}) Eumenes, to look out for the young man, and 
 prevent his coming into the garden by force, should that be 
 necessary. 
 
 But Love finds its way through locked doors, and so An- 
 tinous succeeded in slipping into the garden again. And this 
 time he saw Selene herself, accompanied by Hannah and a 
 beautiful, fair-haired boy, as, leaning upon a crutch, she hob- 
 bled up and dovrn the garden. 
 
 Antinous had been educated to look upon all deformity with 
 aversion, as a discord in the harmony of creation, and not a 
 condition to be kindly commiserated. Here it seemed quite 
 different. 
 
 At first the deformed Maria had been an object of abhor- 
 rence. Now he was glad to see her, although she always 
 crossed his wish, and the lame Selene, behind whom the street 
 boys had cried: " click-clap!" seemed to him more worthy of 
 adoration than ever. 
 
 How beautiful her face and her figure; and her peculiar gait 
 was not limping — no, it was swaying through the garden. So 
 — he thought afterward — might the Nereids have been borne 
 upon the lightly swelling waves. 
 
 Love is satisfied with all it sees — and that is not strange, 
 since it exalts its object, with all belonging to it, into some 
 higher order of existence. In its light, weakness becomes virt- 
 ue, and imperfections as matters of preference. 
 
THE EMPEROK. 333 
 
 The visits of the Bithyuian were not the only cares of Han- 
 nah, though the others were borne with joy instead of anxiety. 
 There had been an addition of two to her household, and her 
 income was slight. That her nurslings might not starve, she 
 worked with her own hands in the factory, besides overseeing 
 the girls, and carried home papyrus leaves, upon which she 
 and Maria worked late into the night. 
 
 When Selene was well enough she gladly assisted them, and 
 labored dihgently; yet for weeks together she had been able to 
 do nothing. 
 
 Maria looked with growing anxiety upon the pale face of 
 Hannah, and once, after she had fallen in a fainting fit, found 
 courage to suggest that wliile she might lend the pound the 
 Lord had bestowed upon her to the usurers, she had no right 
 to squander it. She allowed herself no rest, worked both day 
 and night, and used her hours of recreation, as she had always 
 done, in visiting the poor and the sick, and would soon, if she 
 so continued, instead of nursing others, require that attend- 
 ance ujjon herself. 
 
 " Give yourself,'' said Maria, " at least the nightly sleep 
 you can not do without." 
 
 " We must live," answered Hannah; " and how dare I bor- 
 row what I may never be able to return?" 
 
 " Ask Paulina to remit your house rent; she would do it 
 gladly?" 
 
 " No," returned Hannah, decidedly. "What this house 
 yields is bestowed on my poor, and you know how much they 
 need it. What we give is lent to our Lord, and He taxes no 
 one beyond his ability. " 
 
 Selene was now quite well, but the physician had said no 
 human skill could ever cure the lameness. She was Hannah's 
 daughter, and the blind Helios had become the sun of their 
 house. 
 
 Arsinoe was seldom allowed to visit her sister, and only when 
 accompanied by her foster-mother; so they never had any un- 
 restrained conversation. The elder daughter of Keraunus was 
 now contented and happy— the younger, not only sorrowful in 
 the disapj)earance of her lover, but being unhappy in the new 
 home, had become irritable, and easily thrown into fits of 
 weeping. 
 
 The younger orphans of Keraunus were well cared for. 
 They were often brought to visit Selene, and sjjoke afl'ection- 
 ately of their new parents. 
 
 Through the help of Selene, the burden of labor in the 
 house of Hannah was diminished^ and about the first of March 
 
334 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 a proposition was suggested which would make quite a change 
 in her simple life should she accept it. 
 
 In Upper Egypt Christiaii fraternities had been established, 
 and from one of these came a request to the great mother 
 community in Alexandria for a presbyter, a deacon, and a 
 deaconess capable of teaching and of guiding the neophytes 
 in the province of Hermopotis, who already numbered thou- 
 sands. The life of the community, the care of the poor and 
 the sick, needed organization through skillful hands, and Han- 
 nah had been asked to leave Alexandria, and devote her ener- 
 gies to more extended benevolences in Besa. 
 
 She was promised there a j)leasant house with a garden of 
 palm-trees, and gifts from the community, which woidd insure 
 not only her own support, but that of her adopted children. 
 Hannah was strongly attached to Alexandria, especially to the 
 poor and the sick, many of whom were very dear to her heart. 
 How many sewing-girls she had been the means of saving in 
 the factory! 
 
 She asked time for consideration, which had been willingly 
 granted. The decision was to be made by the fifteenth of 
 March, but it came for her on the fifth, for while she was at 
 the factory Antinous had succeeded in again entering the gar- 
 den of Paulina, and a little while before sunset slijjped close to 
 the house of Hannah. Maria met him as usual and tried to 
 drive him back in her friendly manner; but to-day the Bithyn- 
 ian was more excited than ever, he seized her hand, and clasjjed 
 it with passionate eagerness while he begged for grace. She 
 sought to free herself, but he would not yield, and cried, in 
 coaxing tones: 
 
 *' I must see her and speak with her to-day — only this once, 
 dear, good Maria. '^ 
 
 Before she could prevent it, he had pressed a kiss upon her 
 forehead, and hastened into the house to Selene. 
 
 Maria scarcely knew what had transpired. Bewildered and 
 enfeebled by conflict of feelings, she stood looking with t^hame 
 on the ground, knowing that something unheard of had hap- 
 pened, but so dazzled by the light this something had spread 
 around her, something to herself, to the jioor Maria, that a 
 strange, new feeling of pride was mingled with the shame and 
 indignation. She needed a few moments to recover herself 
 and to regain a consciousness of her duty, and these moments 
 Antinous used to his own advantage. Witli long strides he 
 hastened toward the room into which he had borne Selene, and 
 laid her upon tlie bed on that night which he coidd never for- 
 get, and called her name while yet on the threshold. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 335 
 
 She was frightened and laid aside the book from which she 
 was reading to her blmd brother. He called agam in a be- 
 seeching tone. Selene recognized him, and asked, quietly: 
 
 " Are you looking for me or for Hannah?" 
 
 " You, you," he cried, passionately. " Oh, Selene, since 
 the night I drew you out of the water, I can not cease thinking 
 of you, and must die with love for you. Have your thoughts 
 never, never met mine on the way to you? Are you always so 
 cold and motionless as then, wdien you belonged half to life aiid 
 half to death? As the shades of the dejDarted encom2iass the 
 place which contains all they love on earth, so, for months, I 
 have wandered about this house, and never once succeeded in 
 telling you what I feel." With these w'ords the youth threw 
 himself down before her and tried to clasp her knees; but she 
 said, reproachfully: 
 
 " What does all this mean? Stand up, and control your- 
 self." 
 
 " Oh, let me stay," he begged. " Be not so hard, so cold; 
 have compassion, and do not drive me away from you!" 
 
 "Stand up!" repeated the girL "I am not angry, fori 
 owe you gratitude." 
 
 He rose slowly and said, in a low tone : 
 
 " It is not gratitude, but a little love that I crave." 
 
 " I try to love all," answered the young Christian, " and so 
 I love you also. You have show^n me much kindness." 
 
 " Selene! Selene!" he cried out joyfully, threw himself 
 again down before her, and seized her hand passionately. But 
 scarcely had he taken it into his own, when Maria burst into 
 the room, flushed with excitement, and in a husky voice ex- 
 pressed displeasure and wrath, commanded him instantly to 
 leave the house, and, as he sought again to besiege her with 
 importunities, she cried: 
 
 " If you do not obey me I shall ask the help of the men 
 yonder who are attending to the flowers. I ask again: will 
 you obey or not?" 
 
 " Wiiy are you so cross, Maria?" asked the blind Helios. 
 *' This is a good man, and he just told Selene he loved her." 
 
 Antinous pointed toward the boy with an imploring gesture, 
 but Maria was at the window, ready to call. 
 
 "Let be," cried Antinous. "I am going," and walked 
 slowly and silently toward the door, looking once more toward 
 Selene with passionate devotion. 
 
 Then he left the room, groaning with shame and disappoint- 
 ment, yet joyful and proud, as though he had accomplished a 
 great deed. 
 
300 THE EMl'F;i{On. 
 
 Hannali met him in the garden and liastened her .'•■(eps 
 toward tlie house, where she found Maria in tears and cliokiiig 
 with sobs, and soon heard of all that had happened during ht-r 
 absence. 
 
 An hour later she informed the bishop that she would accei)t 
 the call of the community at Besa, and was ready to go at once 
 to Upper Egypt. 
 
 " With your wards?" asked Eumenes. 
 
 " Yes. It has been indeed the earnest wish of Selene to be 
 baptized by you, but since a year of iiistruction is necessary — " 
 
 " I will perform the sacred rite to-morrow." 
 
 " To-morrow, my father?" 
 
 " Yes, sister. I do it with confidence. She left her old 
 nature in the sea, and before we became her teachers she had 
 gone through the school of life. Even while a heathen, she 
 had taiien up her cross and borne it as faithfully as if a believer 
 in the Lord. The faith, love, hope which M^ere wanting 
 she has found in your house. In the name of our Saviour, I 
 thank you for this soul, my sister.'" 
 
 " Not me, not me," begged the widow. " Her heart Avas 
 benumbed, and not I, but the ardent faith of the blind boy 
 softened it. " 
 
 ' ' She owes her salvation to you both, " answered the bishop. 
 *' And we will baj)tize both at the same time. The lovely 
 child shall take the name of the fairest among the disciples. 
 We will call him ' John. ' Selene shall in future bear the 
 name ' Martha, ' if it be agreeable to her. ' ' 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Selene and Helios received baptism, and two days later, 
 Hannah, her adopted children and Maria, accompanied by 
 Hilarion, a presbyter and a deacon, embarked on a Is'ile shi]) 
 in the harbor of Lake Mareotis, which would carry them to 
 the city of Besa, in Upper Egypt, their future home. Maria 
 had hesitated about joining the party. Her old mother lived 
 in Alexandria — and then — but it was this " then " which en- 
 abled her to cut off sharply all consideration, and utter a de- 
 cisive " yes," for it referred to Antinous. For a few moments 
 the thought was intolerable of never seeing him again — for she 
 had thought so often of this handsome youth — and yet her 
 whole heart ought to belong to Him wlio luid purchased, with 
 His own blood, her peace here and her Ijlessedness hereafter. 
 
 Selene had gone on the day after her baiiii.sm to the city 
 house of Paulina, and with many tears taken leave of Arsinoe. 
 
THE EMMROS. S^t 
 
 All the love wliich really united these sisters came to exj)rcs- 
 sion in the hour of their sejoaration. Selene had heard, through 
 Paulina, that Pollux was dead, and no longer bore ill-will 
 toward the rival wlio bewailed his loss more passionately than 
 she. Earlier the j^eace of her soul had been disturbed by the 
 memory of this j^laj^'ellow. 
 
 The separation from Alexandria, where most of her brothers 
 and sisters remained, was painful, and still she rejoiced in the 
 anticijDation of her distant home, which was to be the theater 
 where her newly consecrated energies would find exercise. She 
 was no longer the same person she had been only a few months 
 before. 
 
 Eumenes and Hannah were right. It was the blind boy, 
 and not the widow, who had won her to Christianity. This 
 influence of the child had a singular source. The promise of 
 Master that Helios would one day meet his father again in a 
 shining heaven, among lovely angels, had worked powerfully 
 upon the lively imagination and tender heart of the blind boy. 
 In the house of Hannah this hope found fresh nourishment, 
 for both she and Maria often told him of the dear, kind God 
 and His Son, who loved children, and invited them to Him- 
 self. When Selene was better, and he was permitted to talk 
 with her, he told her with great delight of all the women had 
 told him; but at first his sister found no pleasure in these 
 wonderful fabrications, and tried to shake his faith in them and 
 lead him back to the old gods. But while trying to lead the 
 child, she felt herself more and more constrained to follow in 
 the same path. For awhile she went forward with uncertain 
 steps, but the example and the many wise words of Hannah 
 proved a support. She attempted no doctrinal instruction ex- 
 cejit when Selene asked for it and for its explanation. All 
 about her was an atmosphere of love and jseace, which the boy 
 felt and spoke of, and constrained her to recognize, and in his 
 own j^erson offered her the first inducement to exercise the 
 newly awakened longing to prove herself loving. The firm 
 faith of the child, which she could not shake by any reasoning 
 or by any of the m3rths she knew, touched her deeply and led 
 her to ask Hannah the meaning of this or that assertion of the 
 boy. It had been a pleasant thought to her that death would 
 end this miserable existence; but Helios left her without reply, 
 when he said, sadly: 
 
 ' ' Have you, then, no longing to see father and mother 
 again?" 
 
 To see her mother again ! That thought made her curious 
 about the other world, and Hannah fanned this spark of inter- 
 
338 THE EMPEnoH. 
 
 est to a flame. Selene had seen and felt much misery, and 
 was accustomed to call the gods cruel. Helios told her God 
 and Jesus were good, and loved men as their own children. 
 
 " Was it not kind,'' he asked, " that the Heavenlj Father 
 led us to Hannah?" 
 
 " Yes; but they have torn us from one another,'' answered 
 Selene. 
 
 " Nevermind," returned the child, confidently; " in heaven 
 we shall all meet again." 
 
 As Selene recovered, she wished to know about each one of the 
 children, and Hannah described all the families in which they 
 had found homes. Hannah seemed honest, and the children 
 themselves confirmed all she said, in their visits, and 3^et Selene 
 found it hard to believe the descrij^tion of then* life in the 
 homes of the Christians. 
 
 The mothers, said one of the promment teachers in the 
 Church, are the jjride of the children, the wife the pride of her 
 husband, both husband and children the pride of the wife, and 
 God the pride and glory of all the family. Love and faith 
 were really the band, j^eace and virtuous life the law, of the 
 Christian family; and under such j)ure and salutary influences 
 as Selene and Helios found in the house of Hannah, were all 
 the little brothers and sisters growing up ! Her good sense an- 
 swered the question, what would have become of them all had 
 her father lived and been turned out of his oflice. The}' would 
 have been plunged into misery and disgrace. And now? Per- 
 haps Providence had acted kindly toward the children. 
 
 Love, only love, was the atmosphere she breathed, and yet it 
 was love which had jJrejDared for her the most cruel sufferings. 
 Why had so much sorrow come to her through an emotion 
 which beautified the lives of others? Had any other person 
 suffered as she had? Most certainly! A gay youth had de- 
 ceived her, and made her sister happy instead of herself. That 
 had been hard to bear; but the Saviour, of whom Helios told 
 her, had been much more severely tried. Those whom He, 
 the Son of God, had come down to the earth to deliver from 
 sin and misery, hfid rewarded His kindness by crucifying Him. 
 She recognized in Him a fellow-suff'erer, and asked Hannah to 
 tell her of Him. 
 
 Selene had made many sacrifices for her family, and her last 
 walk to the jiapyrus mill could not be forgotten — but He had 
 let Himself be scorned, and had poured out His blood for His 
 own. And who was she? — who the Son of (lod? 
 
 His image became dear to her; she was never tired of hear- 
 ing the story of His life. His words, and deeds, and so gradu- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 339 
 
 ally came the day when her soul was prepared to receive the 
 doctrines of Christ with earnest longing. 
 
 With faith in Him came also the consciousness of guilt which 
 heretofore had been unknown to her. 
 
 She had labored through pride and fear — never from love — 
 the sacred gift of life she tried to cast away, from selfish 
 motives — without asking what would become of those for 
 whom it was her duty to care. She had cursed the lovely sis- 
 ter who needed her protection and her blessing, as well as Pol- 
 lux, the i^laymate of her cliildhood, and countless times blas- 
 jjhemed the director of human affairs. 
 
 All this she now recognized with pain, but she was deeply 
 touched to know that there was One who had come to redeem 
 the world, and had taken uj^on Himself the guilt of every 
 penitent shnier. 
 
 When Selene expressed to Hannah her wish to become a 
 Chiistian, she led her to the bishop Eumenes. He undertook 
 the task of instruction — and found in her an eager puj^il. 
 Like those gray and dried-uj? flowers which are quickened to 
 fresh bloom when laid in the water, so tliis long-withered heart 
 was revived. 
 
 She longed for full recovery to health that, hke Hannah, 
 she might nurse the sick, and render those offices of love which. 
 Christ desires in His followers. 
 
 Thus it was in the new faith which gave her special joy — 
 that His promise of blessing was not to the rich who were able 
 to bring large offerings — but to the penitent, longing for for- 
 giveness—to the poor and the needy, of whom she thought as 
 belonging to her own family. 
 
 Her active nature was not satisfied with thinking, and longed 
 to express itself in action. In Besa, she would be allowed to 
 work with Hamiah, and this anticipation made the parting 
 with Alexandria much easier. A favorable wind bore the 
 travelers southward and in prosperity to their destination. 
 
 Two days after their departure Antinous again found admit- 
 tance into the garden of Paulina, but, as he approached the 
 little house, looked in vain for Maria. Her absence ought to 
 have pleased him, and yet he was disturbed by it. 
 
 The way Avas free, and perhu^js this time — so said his agi- 
 tated heart — he might find Selene alone. 
 
 He ojiened the door without knocking, but did not venture 
 to cross the threshold, for in the front room stood a strange 
 man, placing shelves against the wall. The joiner, a Christian 
 to whom Paulina had rented the house for the use of his fam- 
 ily, asked the wish of Autinous. 
 
340 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " Is Hannah at home?" he stammered. 
 
 *' She hvcs here no longer." 
 
 " And her foster-daughter, Selene?" 
 
 " Has gone with her to Upper Egypt. Have you any mes- 
 sages for her?" 
 
 " Ko/' answered the youth in surprise. " When did they 
 leave?" 
 
 " Day before yesterday." 
 
 " And do they not return?" 
 
 " Certainly not for the next few years; later, perhaps, if the 
 Lord will." 
 
 Antinous left the garden by way of the broad middle path 
 undisturbed. He looked pale, and seemed like a traveler in 
 the desert who has found the sjDring choked up where he had 
 lioped to quench his thirst. 
 
 In the first free hour of the following day the youth knocked 
 again on the door of the cabinet-maker, to mquire at what spot 
 in Upper Egypt the travelers expected to locate. 
 
 " In Besa," answered the mechanic, frankly. 
 
 Antinous had always been a dreamer, but Hadrian had never 
 seen him so absent-minded, so devoid of life, as at tliis time. 
 When he tried to rouse and stimulate him to something fresher, 
 Antinous would raise his e5^es imploringly and try Avith all his 
 might to do what he wished and to wear a brighter face, but 
 quickly relapsed into the foi-mer mood. 
 
 Even upon a hunt in the Libyan forest, where the emperor 
 sometimes took him, Antinous was indolent and unsympathetic 
 in the pleasure of the free sport he usually shared with so 
 much of joy and skill. 
 
 The emperor had remained in Alexandria longer than in 
 most places, and Avas becoming weary of the festivities and 
 hospitalities, the disputations in the Museum, of intercourse 
 with eccentric mystics, soothsayers, astrologers, and charlatans, 
 with Avhich the city swarmed. Also the brief audiences grant- 
 ed to the leaders of various religious associations, the visits to 
 factories and workshoj)s of tliis driving place, began to exhaust 
 him. 
 
 One day he expressed a wish to visit the southern provinces 
 of the Nile valley. The priests of the native Egyptian gods 
 had asked this favor of him, and not only his own curiosity 
 and love of travel but various state reasons j^rompted him to 
 grant the request of this influential hierarchy. The thought 
 of seeing with his own eyes the wonders of the times of the 
 ^'luiraohs, Avhich attracted so many travelers, Avas an induce- 
 
THE EMPEROR. 3il 
 
 ment, and when lie perceived the lively interest of Antinous in 
 the plan, his determination was made. 
 
 This was the only thing in which his favorite had shown any 
 interest for weeks. Those attentions lavished upon him by 
 the Alexandrian ladies of gentle birth, no less than those of 
 Eome, disgusted him. At their banquets he was a silent guest, 
 whose presence could give pleasure to no one. 
 
 Even the brilhant and exciting spectacles in the circus, and 
 the finest races and contests in the Hipj)odrome scarcely 
 caused liim to lift his eyes. 
 
 Formerly, he had followed with attention and joleasure the 
 plays of Menander and his imitators, Alexis, Apollodorus and 
 Posidippus; but now, when they were introduced, he stared 
 into vacancy and thought of Selene. 
 
 The prospect of visiting the jjlace where she now was revived 
 him and quickened anew his expiring courage. He hoped 
 again, and whoever sees light in the future, finds the present 
 no longer totally dark. 
 
 Hadrian rejoiced to see this change in his favorite, and 
 hastened his preparations for departure. Yet months passed 
 before he was able to begin the journey. 
 
 At first he was occupied with the care of colonizing Libya 
 anew, which had been depopulated by Jewish seditions. Then 
 there were new destinatio]is of post-routes to be arranged, 
 which would bring different parts of the empire nearer to- 
 gether; and, finally, the formal consent of the senate to reso- 
 lutions respecting the inherited rights of citizenship must be 
 waited for. 
 
 Their consent was certain, but the emperor published no 
 edict without that, and much de23ended on a vigorous execu- 
 tion of this order. In his visits at the Museum, Pladrian had 
 learned much respecting the condition of the individual mem- 
 bers of the same, and worked toward the institution of ordi- 
 nances which would deliver them from the cares of life. 
 
 He turned his attention also to the destiny of the aged 
 teachers and educators, and tried to improve it. 
 
 When Sabina represented to him how large an outlay would 
 be necessary to accomjolish all this, he replied: 
 
 " We do not let the veterans starve who have devoted their 
 bodies to the service of the state. Why should we not also 
 take care of those who have served it with their intellects? 
 Which should we rank higher, might and joossession, or 
 spiritual capacity? The more difficult this question to me, as 
 emperor, so much tlie more do I feel under obligation to pro- 
 vide alike lor old officers, soldiers and teachers." 
 
342 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 The Alexandrians detained Hadrian also by many ne;v 
 offerings of rcsi)ect. They raised him to tlie rank of divinity, 
 consecrated a temple to him, and ordtiined now festivals in Lis 
 honor, not alone to win his favor toward tlieir city, and to ex- 
 press their joy and pride in his long visit, bnt gladly used this 
 favorable oi^portunity to gratify themselves and to revel in 
 special pleasures. 
 
 So this imperial visit swallowed up many millions, and 
 Hadrian, who took pains to learn the amount expended, 
 blamed the indiscretion of his extravagant hosts. 
 
 Yet full of appreciation, he afterward wrote to his brother- 
 in-law, Servianus, respecting the wealth and energetic activity 
 of the Alexandrians. He praised them in this: that none 
 among them all was idle. This one made glass, that one 
 paper, another Imeu; and each one of these restless men boast- 
 ed of putting his own hand to his ^vork. Even the gouty, the 
 blind, and the disabled, found employment. Nevertheless, he 
 called them an unmanageable peoi^le, frivolous, and possessing 
 sharp, mischief-making tongues, which had spared neither 
 Verus nor Antinous. Jew^s, Christians, and devotees of Ser- 
 apis, he says, in tlie same document, worshiped one God alone, 
 instead of the Olympian divinities; and if he also asserted that 
 the Christians paid homage to Serapis, he meant that they 
 held the doctrine of the continued existence of the soul after 
 death. 
 
 The dispute as to the place where the newly found Apis 
 should reside, also gave Hadrian much to do. 
 
 From time immemorial, the Temple of Ptah, in Memphis, 
 had been devoted to the care of the sacred bull; but this ven- 
 erable city of the Pyramids had been outstripped by Alexan- 
 dria, and the Temple of Serapis, in the latter place, surpassed 
 tenfold in size and brilliancy that in the province of Sokari. 
 
 The Alexandrian Egyptians, who dwelt in the quarter 
 known as Rhacotis, near the Serapeum, desired this god, who 
 walked the earth in the form of a bull, in their midst; but the 
 people of Memphis would not relinquish their old claim, and it 
 was not easy for the emperor to bring this deeply exciting con- 
 test to a satisfactory issue. 
 
 But Memphis kept her Apis, and the Serapeum in Alexandria 
 received gifts that had formerly been bestowed only on Mem- 
 phis. 
 
 In June the emperor was at last ready to start. He wished 
 to go through the provinces afoot or on horsebai'k, and S;ibiua 
 was to follow in a ship, after the annual Hooding of the ISile. 
 
 The empress would gladly have returned to Rome or Tibur, 
 
THE EMPEROR. 343 
 
 for Verus had been ordered by his physician to leave Egypt 
 when the summer heats came on. 
 
 He departed with his wife as the acknowledged son of the 
 imperial pair; but no word of Hadrian justified him in the 
 confident hope of being named his successor to the imperial 
 dignity. The inordinate longing for enjoyment of this disso- 
 lute man was disturbed, but not broken off, by his physical 
 suffering, and in Kome he continued to taste all the pleasures 
 of life. 
 
 Hadrian's delay in this matter was an annoyance, for the 
 imperial sphinx had only too often given a very unexpected 
 solution of its own riddles. The sad end prophesied for him 
 caused little anxiety; indeed, the prognostic of Ben Jochai only 
 stimulated him to enjoy to the full each hour of good health 
 that destiny granted. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Balbilla and her companion Claudia, Publius Balbillus. 
 and other Romans of rank, the sophist Favorinus, and a crowd 
 of chamberlains and servants, were to accompany the empress 
 upon a ship, while only a small company made the land jour- 
 ney with Hadrian, who took also a stately hunting horse. 
 
 ]3efore they reached Memphis, he had killed a few lions and 
 other beasts of j)rey, and found Antiuous once more the best 
 of companions, cold-blooded in danger, robust for travel, 
 easily contented, and ready in every emergency, he seemed to 
 his master as a comjoanion created by the gods esjDecially for 
 his own delight. If Hadrian, for hours or days together, was 
 silent and reflective, Antinous never disturbed him by a word ; 
 but his presence at such times was a blessing, for the conscious- 
 ness that he was near was a satisfaction to the emperor. 
 
 The expedition was also good for Antinous, for he perceived 
 that he was of use to his honored lord, and in this way the 
 burden was diminished which had oppressed him since his deed 
 of mischief on the Lochias. He had always preferred dream- 
 ing to talking, and their fresh movements preserved him from 
 lassitude. 
 
 In Memjihis, Hadrian was detained a month, where it was 
 necessary to visit the temple of the gods accompanied by Sa- 
 bina, whose ship had an-ived before him, and go through inany 
 ceremonies in the attire of the Pharaohs. 
 
 Sabina often felt that she sliould ptM-ish, when, as mistress 
 of tlie Nile A'alley, and adorned with the great viiltui'o's lioad 
 finery, in a long garment overlaid witli ornaments of gold, she 
 
344 THE KMPEROn. 
 
 was conducted at the side of hor husband in a procession 
 through all the vast spaces, over the rooJ", and at last into the 
 lioliest places of the sanctuary. These circuitous promenades, 
 and the man)' sacrifices they were obliged to witness^ seemed 
 to her absurd formalities. And when she returned from these 
 ceremonials she seemed exhausted to the last degree, and in- 
 deed it was no light matter to go thi-ough with all the fumiga- 
 tions and sprinklings, to listen to such long hymns and litanies, 
 to walk through all the wide spaces; and when exalted upon 
 the throne as divinities, to be adorned with so many various 
 crowns, and arrayed with every sort of fillet and symbol. 
 
 Her husband set her a good example, for the Avhole serious 
 majesty of his nature came into view at these ceremonies. 
 He found pleasure in the mystical wisdom of the priests, with 
 whom he had long and familiar interviews. 
 
 As at Memphis, and so the imperial jiair received the hom- 
 age of the hierarchy in all the chief temples of the cities hnng 
 further south. Wherever Hadrian furnished means for the 
 enlargement of a sanctuary, he must conduct the ceremony of 
 laying the corner-stone with his own hand. 
 
 With all this, he found time to hunt in the wilderness, to 
 discharge state business, and inspect the worthiest memorials 
 of an earlier age. In Memphis, he visited the ancient city 
 of the dead, the Pyramids, the great sphinx, and the Apis 
 tombs. 
 
 Before leaving, he asked for himself and his companions an 
 oracle from the sacred bull. 
 
 The poetess Balbilla had promise of the pleasantest future. 
 The bull, to whom she offered a cake, with her face turned 
 away, had been satisfied with her gift, and had hcked her hand. 
 
 Hadrian was uncertain about tlie oracle of the priest, for it 
 was given to him as a sealed roll, with its explanation — but he 
 was solemnly commanded not to open it before the end of half 
 a year. 
 
 The emperor was with his wife only at the largest cities — for 
 he journeyed by land — she by water. The ship almost in- 
 variably arrived before the land travelers, and when they at 
 last appeared, there was each time a ceremonial welcome, in 
 which Sabina seldom took part. Balbilla, therefore, took 
 more pains to make their arrival pleasant by some agreeable 
 surprise. 
 
 81ie honored the emperor, and the beauty of his favorite 
 exercised an irresistible charm upon her artistic soul. It gave 
 her pleasure to look upon him — his dejiarture was a trial; and 
 when he aii2)eared, she was always the first to greet him — and 
 
THE EMPETIOR. 345 
 
 yet he troubled himself no more about this bright girl than 
 about the other ladies of Sabina's suite; but Balbilla wished 
 nothing of him except the pleasure of looking at him and re- 
 joicing in his beauty. 
 
 Had he presumed to accept her homage as a proof of love, 
 and offered her his own, the poetess would have driven him 
 with indignation back to his proper place, and still she made no 
 attempt to conceal her admiration for his beauty, and ex- 
 pressed it in conspicuous manner. When the land travelers 
 appeared after an absence longer than usual, Antinous found 
 in that part of the ship appropriated to his use flowers and 
 choice fruits sent by her, and verses she had written for him. 
 He laid them all together, and paid little attention to their 
 donor. 
 
 The poetess remained in ignorance of this indifference, and 
 indeed troubled herself very little about his sentiments. Up 
 to this time she had easily kept within the bounds of j^ropriety. 
 Now there were hours in which .she was conscious that she 
 might overstep those limits. But what cared she for the ver- 
 dict of those around her, aiid what for the inner life of the 
 Bithynian, whose outward form alone gave her pleasure? 
 
 The possibility of waking hopes in him which she never 
 could fulfill did not frighten her, because they never once oc- 
 curred to her thought. And still she was satisfied with her- 
 self, for there was one who might not understand her actions, 
 one who had condemned in distinct language her purpose to 
 send flowers as a mark of honor to the beautiful youth; and 
 the verdict of this one was more to her than that of all other 
 men 'and w^omen together. This one was the architect Pon- 
 tius; and strangely enough it was the memory of him that 
 drove her on from one jiiece of folly to another. 
 
 She had often met Pontius in Alexandria, and at her depart- 
 ure had allowed him to promise that he would follow the em- 
 press and herself, and give them his comj^any during a jiart of 
 the Nile trip. 
 
 But he came not — he sent no word; although she knew he 
 was well and every messenger brought the emjjeror a written 
 roll from his hand. He, on whose true devotion she had 
 counted as on a rock, was no less self-interested and inconstant 
 than the other men. 
 
 She thought daily and hourly of him, and whenever a ship 
 from the north dropped anchor near theirs she watt^hed the 
 passengers going ashore, in the hope of discovering him among 
 them. 
 
 She longed for the x)resence of Pontius, as a bewildered trav- 
 
34 C THE EMPEROR. 
 
 eler longs for the return of the guide who has deserted him; 
 and still she felt angry, for he had shown by a thousaiid signs 
 that he valued Jier, that slie had a jJower over his strong will, 
 and yet he had broken his word and came not. 
 
 And she? Slie had not been insensible to his devotion, and 
 was more gracious toward this grandson of her grandfather's 
 freedman than toward the noblest man of her own rank. 
 
 And in sjiite of all this Pontius had sjjoiled the pleasure of 
 her journey by remaining in Alexandria instead of following 
 her steps. How easily might he have committed his work to 
 other architects, of whom the great cosmoi^olitan city was full. 
 
 Still, if he did not care for her, surely she Avould not trouble 
 herself about him ! Perhaps toward the end of the journey he 
 would appear, and then he should learn how she had heeded 
 his admonitions! She longed imj^atiently for a time when she 
 inight read to him all the verses she had written to xlutinous, 
 and ask how they jileased him. 
 
 It gave her a childish pleasure to add to the number of these 
 little poems, to finish them neatly, and put all her skill and 
 intelligence into their creation. She herself preferred the more 
 elaborate and heavy measures. A few of them were composed 
 in Latin, some in Attic, and others in the Jj]olian Greek — of 
 which she now understood the use — and all, just to punish 
 Pontius, to make liim angry, and besides, to exhibit to him her 
 own brilliancy of execution. She sung to Antinous for the 
 sake of Pontius, and the favorite received no flowers not ac- 
 companied by thoughts of the architect and a defiant curl of the 
 lip of Balbilla! 
 
 But no girl can sing the charms of a youth in ever-var3dng 
 verse without the inevitable penalty, and so there came hours 
 when Balbilla was inclined to believe that she loved Antinous. 
 Then she called herself his Sai)pho, and he seemed destined to 
 become her Phaon. During his long absences with the em- 
 peror she really succeeded in longing for him, even with 
 tears; but as soon as he returned, and she looked again ujjon 
 his emotionless features and languid eyes, and heard the sleepy 
 " yes " and " no " with which he anss^-ered her questions, the 
 charm was quite broken, and she honestly confessed to herself 
 that she would be quite as haiJ])y to see his image hewn from 
 flesh and marble as in living llesli and blood. At such times 
 the memory of Pontius became especially vivid, and once as 
 their ship passed through a mass of lotus leaves, among wliich 
 one handsome full-blown flower lifted its head, she wove — as 
 it was her natural impulse to do at the sight of any remark- 
 able object — a series of verses, in which Antinous was repre- 
 
THE EMPEKOR. 347 
 
 sented as a lotus flower, who fulfilled his destiny by being beau- 
 tiful, and Pontius was likened to the ship that, firmly built 
 and well managed, was invited to fresh voyages in the spaces 
 beyond. 
 
 The Nile voyage ended at hundred-gated Thebes, where 
 nothing which could interest the Romans remained unvisited. 
 The tombs of the Pharaohs hewn in the rocky cliffs, and the 
 great temple to the west of the dead city, now despoiled of its 
 brilliance, awoke the admiration of Hadrian. 
 
 The imperial party heard three times the musical sounds at 
 early morning from the famous colossal statue of Memnon — 
 whose upper portion had been shattered by an earthquake, 
 
 Balbilla described this event in several long poems, which 
 Sabina had engraved in the stone of the Colossus. 
 
 The poetess beheved she had heard the voice of Memnon 
 singing to his mother, Aurora, while her tears — the fresh morn- 
 ing dew — moistened the statue of her son, who had fallen be- 
 fore the walls of Troy. 
 
 She comjDosed these verses in the ^olian dialect, and in- 
 formed her readers — among whom she included Pontius — that 
 she was descended from no lower house than that of King An- 
 tiochus. 
 
 The huge temples on both banks of the Nile realized fully 
 the expectations of the emperor, although through earthquake 
 and sieges they had suffered much injury, and the im2:»over- 
 ished priesthood of Thebes were no longer in condition to bear 
 the expense of their i:)reservation, not to mention restoration. 
 
 Balbilla went with Hadrian to the Temple of Ammon, east- 
 ward of Thebes. In the loftiest and most vast of all jiillared 
 halls, her sensitive soul was exalted to rapture, and as the em- 
 peror noticed her glowing cheeks, as she sometimes gazed up- 
 ward, sometimes leaned against the mighty towering columns, 
 he asked what she felt in this true temple of the gods. 
 
 *' One thing above all others,^' cried the poetess, "that 
 architecture is the most exalting of all the arts! This tem])]e 
 seems a mighty epode, written, not in poor words, but in solid 
 masses. A thousand parts are here bound in one vast whole, 
 and each adds beautiful harmony to the others, and helps to 
 express the mighty thought which filled the soul of its creator. 
 What other art is permitted to express such imperishable ideas, 
 surpassing every ordinary standard of measure?^' 
 
 ' ' The poetess bestows laurels upon the architect!*' exclaimed 
 the emperor. " But is not infinitude the realm of the poet, 
 while the architect must be limited by the finite?" 
 
 "Is, then, the nature of divinity to be mcasux*ed?^' asked 
 
348 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 Balbilla, in reply. "It is not; and yet this hall is so mad© 
 tliat even the gods would find space within it/" 
 
 " Because its creation is due to a master whose soul touched 
 the border of eternity. Still, do you believe this building will 
 outlast the songs of Homer?" 
 
 " Xo; but its memory will be as imperishable as is the 
 wrath of Achilles or the wanderings of Odyssey."' 
 
 '' It is a shame that our Pontius can not hear you/' said tlio 
 emperor. " He has just comjoleted the plan for a work des- 
 tined to outlive me, him, and all of us. I speak of my own 
 mausoleum. Besides that, I shall have him build gates, courts, 
 and halls, of Egy}:)tian style, at Tibur, in memory of our 
 travels through this wonderful land. I expect him to-mor- 
 row. " 
 
 " To-morrow!" exclaimed Balbilla, while a scarlet flush 
 dyed her cheeks and spread over her forehead. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Soon after leaving Thebes, which event occurred on the sec- 
 ond of the following November, Hadrian resolved to recognize 
 Verus not only as his son but liis successor. 
 
 Sabina's appeals were not the only influences which had jire- 
 vailed to end this delay; it w^as partly the result of a wish 
 peculiarly his own. 
 
 His wife's heart had longed for a child; his own had desired 
 a son, and in Antinous he possessed one. This favorite was a 
 boy of humble, though free biilh, whom he had picked up 
 during liis travels; but it was in his jDOwer to make him great, 
 to give him the liighest posts of honor in Rome, and at last 
 make him his own heir. If any one deserved this, it was An- 
 tinous, and to him alone could Hadrian give all he possessed 
 without grudging. This had been his thought and wish for a 
 long time, but the mood and character of the Bithynian con- 
 tinually removed him from its realization. 
 
 Hadrian had taken more pains than his predecessors to raise 
 the lowered dignity of the senate, and still he felt quite cer- 
 tain of their consent to any measure he miglit propose. 
 
 'J'he leading magistrates of the republic had been recognized 
 under the most lawless of his predecessors, and still main- 
 tained their authority. Truly, all must, as they say, follow 
 the emperor, but these were always at hand, and the empire 
 might continue to exist within the limits set by Hadrian, with 
 ivise moderation, even with a weakling on the throne. 
 
 A few montlis before he would not have ventured to think 
 
THE EMPEROR. -^49 
 
 of adopting his favorite. Now he seemed to stand nearer the 
 realization of this wish. 
 
 Autinous was indeed always a dreamer, but during these foot 
 wanderings and hunting expeditions he had shown himself 
 fresh, and vigorous, and sensible, and — after leaving Thebes — 
 bold and almost cheerful. This Antinous was teachable, and 
 if he should rise from one j)Osition to another, he could finally 
 make him his successor. But at first he would keep his plan 
 concealed. 
 
 Should he publicly adopt Verus, every thought of another 
 choice would be closed to him. Yet he dared confidently vent- 
 ure to nominate this darling of Sabina, since tlie most cele- 
 brated among the Eoman physicians had written to Hadrian., 
 at his own I'equest, that the undermined health of the 2)retor 
 could not bo restored; at the very best, he had but a few years 
 longer to live. So then Verus might quietly decline in the 
 midst of brilliant hopes! After his eyes were closed he would 
 be able to place the dreamer — by that time matured into vigor- 
 ous manhood — in his place. 
 
 Upon the return journey to Alexandria from Thebes 
 Hadrian met his wife in Ab_ydos, and there made known to her 
 his determination to proclaim the sou of her choice his suc- 
 cessor. 
 
 Sabina thanked him with an " at last " that partly expressed 
 her satisfaction and partly her vexation over the long delay of 
 her husband. 
 
 Hadrian gave her permission to return to Rome directly 
 from Alexandria — and on the same day he sent letters to the 
 senate and to the prefect of Egypt. The letter for Titianus 
 contamed the commission to make known at once the adoption 
 of the jiretor, and on this occasion to proclaim a festival, and 
 grant to the j)eoj)le, in the name of the emperor, all the favors 
 which Egyjitian custom jirescribed for celebrating the birth of 
 a successor to the throne. 
 
 The princely party honored the event by magnificent ban- 
 quets, in which the emjDoror took no share. He was taken 
 across the Nile to Anta^opolis, in the desert, in order from 
 there to j)enetrate the defiles of the Arabian mountain ranges, 
 to hunt wild animals. None but Antinous, Mastor, and a 
 few hunters and dogs bore him company. 
 
 At Besa he expected again to meet the ships. He had post- 
 poned a visit to this place until the return, because he had 
 gone up on the wcster]i bank of the Nile, and a passage across 
 the stream would have takcii too much time. 
 
 On a sultry November evening the tents of the travelers 
 
350 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 were set up between the Nile and tlie chalk mountains, which 
 contained a long row of Pharaonic tombs. 
 
 Hadrian wished to visit these, for he was always entertained 
 by the remarkable inscriptions upon the walls; but Antinous 
 remained behind, for he had visited many more throughout 
 Upper Eg3'pt than was agreeable. I'hey seemed to him all 
 alike and unpleasant, for he had not the perseverance of his 
 master in studying their significance. A hundred times he 
 had gone, simply to bear Hadrian company — certainly not for 
 his own sake — into those old caverns; but to-day he could 
 scarcely contain himself with impatience and excitement, for 
 he knew that a ride or a Avalk of only a few hours would take 
 him to ]>csa — to Selene. 
 
 The emi^eror would jierhaps be absent three or four hours, 
 and if he had the courage, he might, before his return, seek 
 out the girl for whom he longed and still be back before his 
 master. But before doing this he must consider. 
 
 The em23eror had climbed the mountain and might see him 
 — messengers were expected, and he had been commissioned to 
 receive them. Should bad news arrive, his master must under 
 no condition be alone. 
 
 Ten times he went out to his good steed, thinking to swing 
 In'mself upon his back. Once he even put out his hand to ar- 
 range the head-gear and the bridle; but while in the very act 
 of putting the pliant, many-jointed bit between the teeth of 
 his horse, his courage gave way again. 
 
 Meanwhile the hours sped on, and at last it was so late that 
 the emperor might return at any moment, and it would be 
 folly to think any longer of carrying out his desire. 
 
 Then the expected messenger arrived with many documents, 
 but not Hadrian. It grew dark, and great drops of rain fell 
 from the heavy clouds, and Antinous was still alone. 
 
 Joined to his longing there came regret over the lost oppor- 
 tunity to see Selene again, and he was troubled by the long 
 absence of his master. 
 
 In spite of the rain, which fell still more heavily, he went 
 into the open air, whose opi^ressive sultriness had destroyed the 
 power of his will, and called the dogs, thinkhig he would go 
 to seek the emperor; but at that moment he heard the bark of 
 the Molossian, and soon after Hadrian and Mastor came out of 
 the darkness into the illuminated space before the tent. The 
 emperor bestowed but a brief greeting upon his favorite, and 
 silently enjoyed his attentions as he dried his hair and brought 
 refi-eshmeiits, while Mastor bathed his feet and arrayed him in 
 fresh garments. 
 
THE EMPEROK. 351 
 
 As tliey stretclied themselves upon their couches to partake 
 of the evening meal, Hadrian said: 
 
 " A strange evening! How hot and oppressive is the atmos- 
 phere! We must be on our guard, for strange dangers are 
 near/^ 
 
 " What has haj^pened to you, sire?'' 
 
 " Various things. Directly before the door of the first 
 tomb I wished to enter, I met an old black woman, Avho 
 stretched out her hands to j^revent our apjjroach, uttering 
 strange cries." 
 
 Did you understand her! 
 
 " No; who can learn this Egyptiii 
 
 lan 
 
 " Then you do not know what she said?" 
 
 " It was my duty to find out. She had cried ' Death!' and 
 again ' Death. ' In the tomb she was watching were I know 
 not how many victims of the plague." 
 
 '' Did you see them?" 
 
 " Yes. I have before only heard of this disease. It is hor- 
 rible, and corresponds to the description I have read of it." 
 
 "But, sire!" cried Antinous, reproachfully, and with anx- 
 iety. 
 
 " As we turned away from the tomb," continued Hadrian, 
 without giving any heed to the exclamation of the youth, " we 
 met an elderly man clothed in white, and a singular-looking 
 girl. She was lame, and of remarkable beauty." 
 
 " Was she also going to the diseased?" 
 
 " Yes; she was carrying them bread and medicine." 
 
 "But she did not go in to them!" exclaimed Antinous, 
 earnestly. 
 
 " She did go, in sjjite of my warning. In her comjianion I 
 recognized an old acquaintance." 
 
 "An old one?" 
 
 " Probably he is older than I. We were together in Athens 
 when both young. He was then a Piatonist, and more zeal- 
 ous, perhaps also more highly gifted than the rest of us. " 
 
 " How comes such a man among victims of the plague in 
 Besa? Is he a j^hysician?" 
 
 " No. At Athens he was zealously seeking the truth, which 
 he now claims to have found." 
 
 " Here, among the Egyptians?" 
 
 " In Alexandria, among the Christians." 
 
 " And the lame girl who accompanied the 2)hilosopher; does 
 she also believe in the crucified God?" 
 
 " Yes, slie is a nurse, or something of that sort. There is 
 really something wonderful in the fanaticism of these people." 
 
353 THE EMPEKOK. 
 
 •* Is it true that they worship an ass and a dove?" 
 
 ** Xonsense!" 
 
 "I do not wish to believe it. At any rate they are good, 
 and care for all who suffer, even for strangersf^ who have no 
 claim upon them/' 
 
 " Where did you learn this?" 
 
 " In Alexandria one hears much of the sect." 
 
 " Unfortunately, I persecute no intangible foe, and among 
 such I reckon the thoughts and beliefs of men; but I some- 
 times question whether it be for the real iirofit of a state to 
 have the citizens give up struggling against the troubles of life 
 and comfort themselves with the hope of fancied happiness in 
 another world, which perhaps exists only in their own imagina- 
 tions. " 
 
 "I could wish to have life end at death," said Antinous, 
 thoughtfully. " And yet — " 
 
 " Well?" 
 
 " If I could know certainly that in that other world I should 
 find those gathered whom I wish to see again, then could I 
 wish a second life." 
 
 " Would you like to be crowded and pushed to all eternity 
 by the many old acquaintances which death has increased 
 rather than diminished?" 
 
 " Not that, but I woidd that it might be permitted me to 
 live forever with a few chosen souls." 
 
 " Should I belong among them?" 
 
 " Yes," cried Antinous, heartily, pressing his lips upon the 
 hand of Hadrian. 
 
 " I knew that; but even at the price of never being mthout 
 you, my darling, would I not relinquish the only right mor- 
 tals can claim from the immortal gods." 
 
 " What right can you mean?" 
 
 " The right to step out from among the living so soon as 
 the not-being seems more endurable than the being, and it 
 pleases me to call for death." 
 
 " The gods certainly can not die." 
 
 " And the Christians only wish to knit a new life upon the 
 old." 
 
 " Yet a fairer one than that on the earth." 
 
 " They call it a blessed state. The mother of tliis everlast- 
 ing life is that inextinguishable love of existence we find even 
 among the most wretched of our race — its father is hope. 
 They believe in freedom from suffering in that other world, 
 for He whom they call their ift'dcemer has through His own 
 death delivered them from all pain." 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 353 
 
 " Can one, then, take upon himself the sufferings of 
 others, as a garment, or a burden?" 
 
 " So they say, and my friend from Athens is persuaded of 
 it. In the Ifeoks of magic are many directions for laying over 
 misfortune, not only from men upon animals, but also from 
 one man upon another. There have been among slaves many 
 remarkable attemjits of that sort, and in some of the provinces 
 I have had to contend with human sacrifices by which the gods 
 are thought to be reconciled or appeased. Think of the inno- 
 cent Ijjhigenia, who was led to the altar of sacrifice — and did 
 not the yawning chasm beneath the forum close again after 
 Cur tins had leaped into it? Should destiny aim a deadly shaft 
 at you, and I receive it into my own breast, perhaps she would 
 be satisfied with the fling, and ask not who had received it. " 
 
 " The gods must have little discrimination if they would not 
 accept your blood in place of mine. " 
 
 " Life is life, and that of the younger is worth more than 
 that of the old. For you many joys are yet to bloom. " 
 
 " And you are indispensable to the whole terrestrial globe/' 
 
 " After me will come another. Are you ambitious, boy?" 
 
 "No, sire.^' 
 
 " What does that signify? All others except you congratu- 
 late me on my son, Verus. Does not my choice please you?" 
 
 Antinous blushed, and looked at the ground in confusion; 
 but Hadrian said: 
 
 '' Say frankly what you are thinking." 
 
 " The jDretor is suffering." 
 
 " He has but a few years to live, and after he is dead — " 
 
 " He may, perhaps, recover." 
 
 " After he is dead, I must look about for another successor. 
 What do you think? By whom does a man, be he slave or 
 consul, best like to hear himself called ' father 'V 
 
 " By one he loves most." 
 
 '' You are right; especially when that one has clung to you 
 with truest devotion. I am a man like the others, and you, 
 my dear fellow, stand always nearest my heart, and I shall 
 bless the day when, before all the world, I may permit you to 
 call me ' father. ' Do not interrupt me. If you make vigor- 
 ous use of your powers, and show the same wakeful sense in 
 leading men as you do in the chase — if you seek to sharpen 
 your mental j)owers and grasp what I teach you — it may hap- 
 pen that some day, Antinous, instead of Verus — " 
 
 " Only not that!" cried the youth, turning pale, and rais- 
 ing imploring hands. 
 
 " The greatness with which fate surprises us appears fright- 
 
3o4 TIIR EMPEROR. 
 
 fill onl}' while it is new. The captain is soon accustomed to 
 storms at sea, and one comes at last to wear the purple as you 
 do your chiton. " 
 
 "Oh, sire! I beg you/' exclaimed Antiuous, •drop these 
 thoughts. I am not fit for greatness." 
 
 " The tiniest shoots become palms." 
 
 " But I am only a poor weed that lives in your shadow. 
 The proud Rome — " 
 
 " liomc is my serving-maid. She has often been ruled by 
 men of very ordinary grade, and I wish to show her how the 
 most beautiful among her sons can wear the purj^le. The 
 world might expect such a choice from the emperor it has long 
 known as an artist — that means, a priest of the beautiful. If 
 not, I shall constrain it to yield its taste to mine." 
 
 " You are only mocking me, Caesar," cried the Bithyuian. 
 " Certainly you can not be in earnest, and if you really love 
 me — " 
 
 " Well, boy?*' 
 
 " Then let me live quietly with you and care for you; desire 
 nothing from me but reverence, love, and devotion." 
 
 " Those I possessed long ago, and for those treasures would 
 like to reward my Antinous." 
 
 " Let me only hve near you; let me, if that be necessary, 
 die for you." 
 
 '* I believe you would make the sacrifice for me of which we 
 were speaking." 
 
 " At any hour, ^^dthout the quiver of an eyelash." 
 
 " I thank you for this word. It has become a jjleasant even- 
 ing, and what a different one I expected!" 
 
 " Because the old woman before the tent terrified you?" 
 
 *' ' Death ' is an abhorrent word. And yet to be dead can 
 not terrify the wise, though that step out of the light into the 
 darkness is frightful. The image of that old woman and her 
 shrill cry will not go out of my thoughts. Then came the 
 Christian, and made that heart-appealing speech. Before it 
 grew dark he went home with the limping girl. I looked after 
 them until dazzled by the sunlight that shone over the L3'bian 
 hills. The horizon was clear, but under the evening star 
 clouds were gathering. In the west, say the Egyjjtians, is the 
 kingdom of the dead. I could but think of that, and of the 
 oracle, and the calamity with which the stars have threatened 
 me this year, and the cry of the woman — all rushed into my 
 thoughts together. As I saw how the sun struggled with the 
 clouds, as it sunk nearer and nearer to the hills on the other 
 side of the stream, I said to myself: If the sun go down clear, 
 
THE EMPEROR. J^55 
 
 I may look confidently toward the future; but, if it be ob- 
 scured by the clouds before its setting, then will the prophecy 
 of evil be fulfilled, and it will become me to take in sail and 
 wait for the storm. " 
 
 " And what happened?'^ 
 
 " The fiery ball glowed red, and countless rays streamed 
 from it — each separated from the others, and all brilliant. It 
 w^as as if the sinking ball were a center for innumerable arrows, 
 which were to be shot into the clouds in all directions. The 
 spectacle was wonderful and stirred my heart to joyful emo- 
 tions, when a dark cloud dropped suddenly, as though exas- 
 perated by the wounds received from these golden arrows; then 
 another, and another followed quickly, and black demons 
 flung a shadowy gray veil over the luminous head of Helios, 
 as the hangman draws a coarse black cloth over the face of the 
 condemned victim, on whom he plants a knee, in order to 
 strangle him.^' 
 
 Antinous covered his face with both hands, and murmured, 
 in a tone of anguish: 
 
 " Horrible, horrible! What may be before us? Only hear 
 the thunder, and the rain beating on the tent!'^ 
 
 " The clouds send down streams. The water is already 
 running in, and the slaves must cut a trench to draw it off. 
 Tighten the j)ins, you fellows outside, or the storm will over- 
 throw this frail structure. And how sultry the atmosphere! 
 The hot wind seems to warm the rain-gusts. Here it is dry. 
 Mix me a cup of wine, Antinous. Were there any letters ?'' 
 
 " Yes, sire." 
 
 " Give them to me, Mastor."' 
 
 The slave, who was busy trying to bank up soil and stones 
 against the trickling stream of rain, sprung uj), dried his haiids 
 quickly, took one of the sacks from the chest devoted to the 
 papers of the emperor, and gave it to his master. 
 
 Hadrian opened the leather bag, took out a roll, which he 
 tore open with a rapid motion, and cried out, after running 
 his eye over the contents: 
 
 " What is this? I have opened the oracle of Apis. How 
 did they come among my fresh dispatches?'^ 
 
 Antinous came nearer, and looking at the sack, said: 
 
 " Master has made a mistake. These arc the documents 
 from Mempliis. I Avill bring you the right bag.'' 
 
 '* Wait," said the emperor, seizing the hand of his favorite. 
 " Is this a mere accident or the arrangement of Destiny? Why 
 did the wrong sack come into my hand on this jiarticular day? 
 And why, among the twenty documents it contained, should I 
 
356 THE BMPEROR. 
 
 have seized exactly this one? Look, I will explain these fig- 
 ui'esto5'ou: There are three pairs of arms, iirovided with sword 
 and sliield, close beside the Egyptian name of the month which 
 corresponds to our November. lUiose arc three signs of 
 calamity. The lutes at the tojo are significant of good; the 
 masts yonder mean an ordinary state of things. Three of 
 these characters always stand together. Three Intes signify 
 special prosj^erity; two lutes and one mast, a mixed condition. 
 One pair of arms and two lutes mean misfortune, to be fol- 
 lowed by better conditions, and so on. Here, in November, 
 begin the arms furnished with weapons, and they stand in 
 threes and threes, and signify only threatening calamity with- 
 out the mitigation of one lute. Do you see tliis, boy? Do 
 you understand the meaning of these signs?" 
 
 " Well; but are you sure that you interpret them right? 
 The arms furnished with weapons might lead to victory." 
 
 " No. The Egyptian uses them to indicate confhct, and 
 conflict and unrest signify what v/e call disaster and evil." 
 
 *' How peculiar!" 
 
 *' No, it is well planned, for they say all was originally 
 created perfect by the gods, but a portion of the universal All 
 has changed its nature through the introduction of disturbing 
 and inharmonious elements. This ex23lanation was given me 
 by a priest of Apis; and here, near the name November, stand 
 the three arms, the horrible symbol. If the lightning which 
 so incessantly illuminates this tent were to strike 3'ou and me 
 and all of us, it would not surprise me. Something terrible is 
 before us. Courage is essential to keep the eye clear under 
 such prognostics of evil, and not to grow famt-hearted. " 
 
 " Only use your own arms against the conflicting arms of 
 the l^^gyjitian gods, for they are strong," begged Antiuous; 
 but the emperor dropped his head, and said, despairingly: 
 
 " Even the divinities must yield to Destiny." 
 
 The thunder tempest continued to rage, and more than once 
 tore the tent fastenings out of the ground, so that the slaves 
 were compelled to hold the frail dwelling of their master down 
 with their hands. The clouds sent great streams of water 
 over the hills of the desert that for years had not felt a drop, 
 and filled every dried channel in their declivities with a rush- 
 ing flood. 
 
 Neither Hadrian nor Antinous closed their eyes during the 
 whole of that terril)le night. 
 
 ^J'hc emperor had opened but one of the i-olls from the letter- 
 bag containing the latest dis2)atches. This brought tidings 
 
THE EMPEROR. 857 
 
 that Titianus was greatly troubled by his old asthmatic diffi- 
 culties, and begged permission to retire from public service. 
 It was no light thing for the emperor to lose this faithful assist- 
 ant, to relinquish the service of one whom he had in liis eye 
 for the work of reducing Judea — where revolt had again raised 
 its head — to obedience, without the shedding of blood. Others 
 might succeed in annihilating the seditious race, but only the 
 mild and shrewd Titianus could conquer them with kindness. 
 
 The emperor had not courage to open another letter that 
 night. He lay in silence upon his jDillow until the morn- 
 ing dawned, and thought over the evil deeds of his life — the 
 murder of Nigrinus, of Titianus, and the other senators, 
 through which he had confirmed his own sovereignty, and 
 vowed to make new and large sacrifices to the gods if they 
 would protect him from the next imi^ending calamity. 
 
 When he rose in the morning, Antiuous was frightened by 
 his appearance, for face and lips were bloodless. 
 
 After reading his dispatches, he left, with Antinous and Mas- 
 tor, not on foot, but on horseback, for Besa, there to wait the 
 coming of his party. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 The unchained elements raged also in all their fury at Besa, 
 on the Nile. The citizens of this old city had done all they 
 were able to receive the traveling monarch in a worth} man- 
 ner. The chief streets were trimmed with flowers, which hung 
 in festoons from house to house, and also from mast to mast 
 in the harbor, and directly on the bank, statues of Hadrian 
 and Sabina had been erected. But the garlands were torn to 
 the ground with the masts, and the disturbed waters of the 
 stream dashed with ungovernable fury upon the bank, tearing 
 away one strip after another of the fruitful soil, plunging like 
 a liquid wedge into the chasms opened by the parching of the 
 soil, and excavating the high bank at the place of landing. 
 
 Toward midnight the storm raged with unprecedented 
 severity — it tore the covering of palm branches from the roofs 
 of the houses and tossed the waters of the Nile into waves that 
 looked like the surf of the sea. 
 
 The whole force of these waves was expended on a little 
 promontory where the statues of the imperial pair stood. 
 Shortly before the dawn, this little tongue of land, which had 
 no artificial protection, gave way, and loose pieces of soil slid 
 with a loud splash into the stream, followed by a portion of 
 the overhanging bank, with a noise like thunder. 
 
358 THK EMPEROR. 
 
 Then tho surface of the earth behind which supported the 
 statues sunk, and that of llie emjjeror tottered and slowly 
 bent toward the ground. "When dawn revealed the condition 
 of things, the jiediment was still in its place, but the head was 
 buried in the soil. 
 
 At break of day, as the citizens left their houses, they learned 
 from the sailors and fisherman Mdiat had happened on the 
 bank during the night; and as the storm subsided, hundreds, 
 yes, thousands, of men, women and cliildren crowded to the 
 landing-place, and about the sunken statue. They saw the torn 
 soil and knew that the stream had swept the land away from 
 the bank, and so caused the misfortune. AVas the Kile god 
 Hapi j)erhaps angry with the emperor? Surely some portent 
 of evil was in this accident to his statue. 
 
 The Toparch, the chief man of the city, undertook immedi- 
 ately the work of replacing it, as it was uninjured, and Had- 
 rian might ai)i:)ear within a few hours. Manj^ men of the 
 place, both slaves and freedmen, assisted in this work, and 
 soon the statue— of an Egyjitian style of architecture — was set 
 U2)right and stared into the harbor as before. Sabina's image 
 was moved near to it, and the Toparch went home satisfied. 
 Most of the workingmen and the idlers left the landing-place 
 with him, but other curious visitors followed, who, not havmg 
 seen the prostrate statue, expressed their opinions as to the 
 manner of its fall. 
 
 ' ' The storm could never have overturned this heavy mass 
 of limestone,'^ said a rope-maker, " and see how far it is from 
 the wash-out land. " 
 
 " It fell in consequence of the loosened soil,"' answered a 
 baker. 
 
 " That is so," said a shi]! captain. 
 
 " Nonsense," cried the rope-maker; "had it stood on the 
 loosened soil, it must have fallen into the Avater and been buried 
 by the flood ; auy child can see that. Some other power has 
 been called into play here.'' 
 
 "Perhaps," suggested the temj^le servant, who meddled 
 with interpretation of signs, " the gods have thi-own down the 
 image of the proud Hadrian to give him a warning." 
 
 " The divinities do not trouble themselves much about hu- 
 man affairs in our day." answered a cobbler; " but in such a 
 terrible night, when all quiet citizens stayed in their own 
 houses, the enemies of the emperor had free play. " 
 
 '" We are all true subjects," said a baker, indignantly. 
 
 " Kefractory rabble are you all," retorted a Konuin soldier, 
 who, like the whole cohort now serving in Hermopolis, had 
 
THE EMPEEOR. 359 
 
 been in Jiidea under the cruel Tiunius Eufus. " Brawls never 
 cease among you animal worshipers, and as for the Christians 
 nesting on the other side that ravine, one could say the very 
 worst things, and still be flattering them." 
 
 " The brave Fuscus is right/' screeched a beggar. " That 
 rabble brought the plague into our houses. Whenever the 
 pestilence appeared you could be sure of finding them, both 
 men and women. They came to my brother's. Whole nights 
 long they sat beside the sick children, and of course both 
 died." 
 
 " Were only my old legate, Tinnius Rufus, here," said the 
 soldier, grimly, " they would all be no better off than their 
 crucified God." 
 
 " I certainly have no sympathy with their religion," said 
 the baker, '' but the truth must stand. They are quiet, friend- 
 ly people, who pay their debts promptly, do no harm, and show 
 much kindness to the poor." 
 
 " Kindness!" exclaimed the beggar, who had often received 
 an alms from the deacon of the community at Besa, and been 
 advised to go to work. " The five jDriests, who served the grotto 
 of Artemis, were enticed away from the Sekos by them, and 
 shamelessly deserted the sanctuary of the goddess. And is it 
 anything good that they should have poisoned my brother's 
 children?" 
 
 " Why should they not kill children?" asked the soldier. 
 *' I heard something of that sort in Syria; and as to this statue, 
 I will never wear my sword again — " 
 
 "Hear the brave Fuscus: he has seen much," was heard 
 through the crowd. 
 
 " I Avill never wear my sword again, if they have not thrown 
 over that statue in the darkness. " 
 
 "No, no," replied the ship-master, positively; "it fell in 
 consequence of the washing away of the land, I saw it lying 
 there." 
 
 "Are you one of the Christians?" asked the soldier, "or 
 do you believe I was jesting about my sword? I have served 
 in Bithynia, in Syria, and Judea, and I know this rabble, you 
 people. Hundreds of Christians there threw away their lives 
 like an old shoe, rather than worsliijD the statue of the emjjeror 
 and offer sacrifice to our gods. " 
 
 "You hear that!" screeched the beggar; " and have you 
 Been a single oiui of them among the citizens who helped set it 
 up again?" 
 
 " Thei-e were none," said the ship-master, who began to in- 
 cline toward the opinion of the soldier. 
 
360 THE EMPEEOR. 
 
 " The Christians threw down the emperor's statue/' shouted 
 the beggar, among the crowd. " It is proved, and they shall 
 pay well for it! Whoever is a friend of the divine Hadrian 
 will help me drag them out of their houses. " 
 
 " No uproar," broke in the soldier, addressing the frantic 
 man. " There is the tribune; he will hear you." 
 
 The Roman officer, who was aijproaching with a division of 
 soldiers to receive Hadrian outside the city, was greeted with 
 loud cries by the crovv'd, but he ordered them to be quiet, and 
 learned from the soldier what had caused the excitement. 
 
 "It is very possible," said the nervous and severe-looking 
 man, who, as well as Fuscus, had served under Tinnius l\ufus, 
 and had obstinately fought his own way up from serving-boy 
 to officer. " Very possible. But where are your proofs?" 
 
 '* Most of the citizens assisted in replacing the statue, but 
 the Christians held themselves aloof from the work," cried the 
 beggar. " Not one was seen here. Ask the ship-master, my 
 •lord; he was present, and can testify." 
 
 " That certainly is more than suspicious. This affair must 
 be thoroughly investigated. Attention, you peoj^le!" 
 
 " There comes a Christian wench!" cried the rope-maker. 
 
 *' The lame Martha; I know her well," broke in the beg- 
 gar. " She runs mto all the pest-houses, and jioisons the peo- 
 ple. She was three days and nights at my brother's, turning 
 the j^illows for the children, till they drove her out. Wher- 
 ever she goes there is death." 
 
 Selene — now called Martha — paid no attention to the crowd, 
 but, with her blind brother Helios — bearing the name of John 
 — walked quietly along the path leading from the high bank to 
 the landiug-i^lace. 
 
 She wished there to hire a boat, which would take her to a 
 little village upon an island ojiposite the city, where there 
 were sick Christians, who needed medicine and nursing. 
 
 For months her whole life had been devoted to the suffer- 
 ing. She had often carried helj) into heathen families, and 
 shunned neither fever nor plague. And though, for that rea- 
 son, her cheeks had not become rosy, yet from her eyes there 
 shone a pure, mild light that glorified the serene beauty of 
 her features. 
 
 As the girl came nearer to the captain, he fastened his eye 
 upon her, and cried: 
 
 " Hey! pale wench, are you a Christian?" 
 
 *' Yes, sir," answered Selene, going quietly forward with 
 her brother. 
 
 The Roman looked after her, and as she ])assed the statue 
 
THE EMPEROR. 361 
 
 of Hadrian, with her head a little more bowed than before, he 
 commanded her, in a tone of authority, to stop and tell him 
 why she turned her face from the image of the emperor, 
 
 " Hadrian is our master as well as yours. I am in haste, 
 for there are sick people on the island. " 
 
 " She will carry them no good," cried the beggar. "Who 
 knows what is hidden in her basket?" 
 
 " Silence !'' broke in the tribune. 
 
 "They say, wench, that your fellow-believers threw down 
 the emperor's statue last night." 
 
 " How can that be? We honor the emperor not less than 
 you do." 
 
 "I wish to believe you, and you shall prove it. There 
 stands the statue of the divine Caesar; follow me and pray to 
 it." 
 
 Selene looked with terror into the face of the stern man, 
 but could not speak. "Well/' asked he, "will you follow 
 me or not?" 
 
 Selene tried to be self-possessed, and when the soldier 
 stretched out his hand toward her, she said, with trembling 
 voice: 
 
 " We honor the emperor, but pray to no image; only to our 
 Father in heaven. " 
 
 " There you have it!" exulted the beggar. 
 
 " I ask once more," cried the tribune, " will you worship 
 this image, or do you refuse to do it?" 
 
 In Selene's soul there rose a mighty conflict. To resist the 
 Roman was to endanger her owii life and rouse the wrath of 
 the i-»opulace against her brethren in the faith. Yielding to 
 his demand would be blas^ihemy, breaking of faith toward the 
 Saviour she loved, and sinning against the truth and her own 
 conscience. A frightful anxiety so overcame her that she was 
 unable to lift her heart in prayer. She could not, she dared 
 not, do what was required of her, and still that irrepressible 
 love of life in every mortal drove her foot forward until she 
 stood before the stone idol. 
 
 " Raise your hands and worship the divine Cfesar," cried 
 the tribune, who followed her motions intently, as did all 
 present. 
 
 She set her basket down on the ground and tried to draw 
 her hand out of her brother's, but the blind boy would not 
 loosen his hold. He certainly knew what was required of his 
 sister ; he certainly was aware from the history of many martyrs 
 that had been read to him, what awaited them both if she 
 
364 TUE EMI'EIIOR. 
 
 spread his arms around one of the pillars, pressed his lips 
 upon the rough wooden door, and let his head beat against it, 
 as the tearless agony of his soul agitated his body. For a few 
 moments he stood there, and did not hear the approach of 
 light footsteps. 
 
 It was Maria who came, that she might pray once more be- 
 side the tomb of her dearest friend. 
 
 She recognized the youth at once, and lightly called his 
 name. 
 
 "Maria!" he exclaimed, in return, and seizing her hand, 
 pressed it vehemently, and asked: 
 
 " How did she die?" 
 
 " Slain," she answered, with hollow voice. " She would 
 not worsliip the image of the emperor. " 
 
 " Why did she not?" 
 
 " Because she was steadfast in her faith, and hoped in the 
 grace of the Redeemer. Now she is a blessed angel. " 
 
 " Do you feel sure of that?" 
 
 " As sure as is my hope to meet the martyr who lies here 
 again in heaven." 
 
 " Maria!" 
 
 " Leave my hand free!" , 
 
 " Will you do me a favor, Maria?" 
 
 " Gladly, Antinous; but please do not touch me." 
 
 " Take this money and buy the fairest wreath you can find. 
 Hang it on this tomb, and cry as you do it, ' From Antinous 
 to Seleue!' " 
 
 Maria took the money the youth offered, and said: 
 
 " She often prayed for you." 
 
 " To her God?" 
 
 ' ' To our Eedeemer, that He would also give you blessed- 
 ness. She died for Jesus Christ; now she is with Him, and 
 He will grant her prayer." 
 
 Antinous was silent a long time, and then begged: 
 
 " Give me your hand once more, Maria, and now, farewell. 
 Will you think khidly of me, and also pray for me to your 
 Eedeemer?" 
 
 " Yes, surely; and you will not forget the poor cripple?" 
 
 " Certainly not, my good girl. Perhaps we may some time 
 meet again." 
 
 With these words Antinous hastened down the hill and 
 through the city toward the Nile. 
 
 The moon hJul risen and was mirrored in the quieted water 
 as its image had rested upon the sea when Anthious rescued 
 Selene. 
 
THE EMPEROE. 363 
 
 Here the streets seemed like abodes of the dead. Not a door 
 ivas open, not a person to be seen. 
 
 Antinous paid the boy, sent him away, and went with beat- 
 ing heart from one house to another. All looked neat, and 
 were surrounded with trees and shrubbery; and although 
 smoke rose above many roofs, they seemed all to be deserted. 
 At last he heard voices, and guided by the sound, he went 
 through a narrow street to an oj)en sjoace, where hundreds of 
 people — men, women, and children — were gathered before a 
 little house that stood in a garden of palms. He asked an old 
 man for the dwelling of Hannah, who pointed silently toward 
 the building which seemed the center of all attention. 
 
 The heart of the youth beat tumultously, and still he felt 
 anxious and embarrassed, and asked himself if it would not be 
 better to turn back and seek the sjaot again in the morning, 
 when Selene might be alone. But no! Perhaps he might 
 now be permitted to see her. Modestly making his way 
 through the crowd, who were singing a hymn, from which he 
 could not understand whether they wished to express sorrow 
 or joy, he reached the gate of the garden and saw the deformed 
 Maria. She was kneeling beside a covered bier, and was 
 weeping. 
 
 Could Hannah be dead? No, for there she came through 
 the door of her dwelling, leaning upon the arm of an old man 
 — pale, collected, and without tears. 
 
 Both advanced a little, when the old man offered a short 
 prayer, and bending forward, drew the covering from the bier. 
 
 Antinous took one step forward, but tottered back instantly, 
 struck his hands over his eyes, and stood without motion, as if 
 rooted to the sjjot. There was no vehement lamentation. 
 The old man said a few words to the assembled people. 
 
 Around him there was subdued weeping, singing, praying, 
 but Antinous saw and heard nothing of it all. His hands 
 had dropped, and his eyes were fastened on the (;old, white 
 face, until Hannah again covered it with a cloth. Even then 
 he stood motionless. Only after six young women had lifted 
 the coffin of Selene, and four mothers that of the little Helios, 
 upon their shoulders, and the whole company had gone with 
 them, he also turned and followed the funeral train. 
 
 From a distance, he saw both larger and smaller coffins car- 
 ried into a rocky sepulcher, the door closely fastened, and the 
 funeral train scattered hither and thither. 
 
 At last he was alone before tbo (h)ov of the tomb. The sun 
 went down and darkness was rapidly descending over the val- 
 ley and the hills. As there was now no one to notice him, he 
 
363 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 continued to resist the demand of tlic Tfoman, but he had no 
 fear, and whispered to her: 
 
 *' AVe will not do their will, Martha; we. will not pray to 
 idols, but be faithful to the Saviour. Turn me away from the 
 statue, and now let us pray ' Our Father, 
 
 In a loud voice, and turning his sightless eyeballs toward 
 heaven, the boy offered the Lord's Prayer.'' 
 
 Selene had first turned him, and then herself, away from 
 the idol toward the stream, and followed, with lifted hands, 
 the exam])le of her brother. Helios chuig fast to her, her 
 loud prayer mingled Avith his, and both saw and heard and 
 felt nothing more that was done to them. To the bhnd boy 
 was granted a vision of light in the far distance, and to Selene 
 was given an earnest of that blessed state where she would be 
 satisfied with the fullness of love, while the frantic crowd 
 dragged her to the earth before the statue of Hadrian and 
 plunged upon the body of the faithful boy. 
 
 The military tribune had in vain attemj^ted to keep back the 
 crowd, and when at last the soldiers succeeded in separating 
 them from their victims, the two young hearts, in the midst 
 of their triumphant faith, and the hope of a more blessed and 
 unending life, had already ceased to beat. 
 
 This occurrence vexed the tribune and filled him with anx- 
 iety. This young woman, this fair child, whose cor^jses lay 
 there before him, had deserved a better fate, and he might be 
 called to answer for their death, for the law ordained that no 
 Christian should be punished on account of his faith without a 
 judicial sentence. So he commanded that the bodies should 
 be carried to the house where they belonged, and threatened a 
 heavy punishment to any one who should that day enter the 
 Christian quarter. The beggar went shouting before the bier 
 into the house of his brother, to announce to the wife of the 
 same the fact that the lame Martha, who had nursed her 
 daughters to death, had been slain. But he reajied a poor re- 
 ward, for the poor woman mourned Selene as she had her own 
 children, and cursed both him and her murderers. 
 
 Hadrian arrived at Besa before sunset, and found there mag- 
 nificent tents prepared for his reception and that of liis 
 retinue. The accident which had befallen his statue was con- 
 cealed from him, but he felt anxious and ill. Wishing to be 
 entirely alone, he sent Antinous out to get a look at the city 
 before it should be dark. 
 
 The Bithynian accepted the permission with joy, as a gift 
 from the gods, hastened through the decorated part of the 
 city, and was conducted by the boy to the Christian quarter. 
 
THE EMPEROR. 365 
 
 The youth knew the emperor would be expecting him, but 
 he did not return to the tent. Violent agitation had overmas- 
 tered him. Restlessly he paced the bank of the stream and 
 reviewed the prominent events of his own life. Every word of 
 the conversation with Hadrian on the previous evening re- 
 turned so vividly that he seemed to hear it a second time. He 
 saw, in imagination, the modest home of Bithynia; his darling 
 mother, and the brothers and sisters he would never look upon 
 more. Again he recalled the terrible hour in which he had de- 
 ceived the best of masters and become an incendiary. Then 
 a fearful dread seized him, as the thought of Hadrian's wish to 
 set him in the place of the man whom the wise monarch had 
 perhaps nominated to be his own successor, in consequence of 
 that interference, overpowered his mind. He, Antinous, who 
 could not plan from one day to another, and went away from 
 profound discussions between serious men because he was unable 
 to follow them — he, who knew only to obey; he, who was 
 never satisfied, except when alone with his master and his 
 dreams, and far away from the tumult of the world; he, to be 
 burdened with the purple, the cares, and mountain-weight of 
 its responsibility! No, this thought was intolerable, was fright- 
 ful; and yet Hadrian never gave ujo any wish he had expressed 
 in words. The future appeared to him like a threatening fiend. 
 Pain, unrest, misfortune, stared into his face, turn which 
 way he would. What was the terrible calamity that threat- 
 ened his master? 
 
 It was approaching — it must come — unless some one could 
 be found to step between him and destiny, and receive in liis 
 own breast, in his own waiting heart, the spear hurled by a 
 wrathful God. 
 
 He was the one — the only one to do this! As a sudden blaze 
 of light, this thought flashed into his soul. And should he 
 have the courage to ofiier himself, to devote his own life for 
 his dear master, then would every wrong toward him be 
 royally expiated — then, then — oh, how wonderful, oh, how 
 glorious! — then he might perhaps find entrance within the 
 gates of that blessed world which the prayers of Selene had 
 opened for him, then he might indeed see the dear mother 
 again and the father, and some time the brothers and sisters 
 also — but now — within an hour — perhaps, in a moment, her 
 whom he loved and who had gone on before him to death! 
 
 8ucli an irradiation of hope his soul had never before known. 
 
 There lay the Nile, there was a boat! Ho plunged into the 
 ivater, and with the same vigorous leap with which he was 
 Wont to spring from rock to rock in the chase, jumped into 
 
366 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 the boat. Already he had seized the oars when Mastor, whom 
 the emjDcror had sent out to seek him, recognized him in the 
 moonlight, and desired him to return to the tent. 
 
 Antinous did not follow, but cried, as he rowed further out 
 into the stream: 
 
 " Greet the master, sahite him thousands and thousands of 
 times from me, and say to him that Antinous loved him more 
 than his own life. Destiny demands a victim. The w'orld 
 can not do without Hadrian, but Antinous is a poor nothing 
 whom no one will miss but his emperor, and for him Antinous 
 throws himself upon the altar of sacrifice. " 
 
 " Hold, unhappy one; turn back!'^ cried the slave, and 
 threw himself into a boat, but that of the Bithynian flew, im- 
 pelled by powerful strokes, swifter and swifter, with the cur- 
 rent. Master used all the strength of his arms to overtake the 
 boat, but could not get near. 
 
 In this wild race both reached the middle of the stream, 
 when the slave saw the oars of the Bithynian suddenly fly into 
 the air, and a moment later heard the voice of Antinous call 
 aloud the name of •' Selene," and was forced, in helpless in- 
 activity, to see the youth plunge into the waves, and the Nile 
 swallow in its flood that fairest of all sacrifices. 
 
 CHAPTEE XXn. 
 
 A NIGHT and the half of anotber day had passed since the 
 death of the Bithynian. Boats and water craft from all the 
 province were collected before Besa, to seek the body of the 
 drowned youth; the shore swarmed with human beings; pans 
 of burning pitch and torches eclipsed the light of the moon 
 with their glare, but they found not the fair corpse. 
 
 Hadrian knew how Antinous had died. Master had more 
 than 0}ice repeated to him the last words of his faithful friend, 
 adding nothing, and holding back nothing. The emperor's 
 memory retained them all and he sat until morning, and 
 again from morning till the sun reached its meridian, rejieat- 
 ing them over to himself. He brooded thus without food or 
 drink. 
 
 The threatened calamity had fallen; and what a calamity! 
 If destiny accepted this sutferiug, wiiich now filled his soul, in 
 place of any other misfortune, he might reckon on years of 
 freedom, but it truly seemed to him that he would rather live 
 the rest of his days in wretchedness and want witli his An- 
 tinous than without him to enjoy all that men count pros- 
 perity, joy and well-being. 
 
THE EMPEilOit. 36t 
 
 Sabiua, Avith her own and his retinue, had arrived — a crowd 
 of beings — but he strictly declined seeing one of them; not 
 even his wife was admitted to his presence. 
 
 The relief of tears was denied him, but the pahi which 
 agonized his heart and filled his spirit with gloom made him 
 so irritable that even a familiar voice, heard at a distance, dis- 
 turbed and made him angry. 
 
 Those who had arrived on the ships dared not approach the 
 tents jjrejjared for their reception, because he wished to be 
 alone in his anguish. 
 
 Mastor, whom he had heretofore looked on as a useful chat- 
 tel more than a human being, now seemed nearer, because he 
 had been the only witness of his darling's departure. 
 
 Toward tlie close of this most miserable of nights the slave 
 asked if he should not call the physician from the shij:), be- 
 cause Hadrian looked so pale; but he forbade it, saying: 
 
 '' Could I only weep as women do, or as other fathers from 
 whom death has torn away their sons, that would be my best 
 medicine. It will be hard for you poor people now, for the 
 sun of my life has lost its brightness and the trees along my 
 path their verdure. " 
 
 AY hen again alone he stared into vacancy and murmured to 
 himself: 
 
 " All humanity will mourn with me, for yesterday, when 
 one asked what beauty was possible to the race, they could 
 point proudly to thee, my faithful comrade, and say: ' Behold 
 godlike beauty. ' Now the crown has been severed from the 
 trunk of the jjalm, and the mutilated thing is ashamed of its 
 own ughness. Were all mortality but one person it would to- 
 day seem like a man whose right eye had been torn from his 
 head. I will not look upon the haggard and shapeless thing, 
 lest it destroy in me the taste for real beauty. Oh, thou 
 faithful, thou true, thou beautiful companion, what a mistaken 
 frenzy possessed thee! And still I can not blame thy folly. 
 Thou hast smitten my soul with the deepest of all woimds, and 
 still I can not be angry with thee; verily, thy loyalty was su- 
 perhuman, it was godlike!'' 
 
 With these words he rose and said, in a firm, resolute voice : 
 
 " Hear me, ye immortals, as I stretch out my hand; every 
 city in the empire shall erect an altar to Antinous. The friend 
 of whom you robbed me I will make your comj)anion. /Re- 
 ceive him kindly, ye immortal rulers of the world! Who 
 among you can boast of beauty that exceeds his? And who 
 among you all has shown me such goodness and faithfulness as 
 this your new associate?'' 
 
368 THE ESrPEROR. 
 
 Tliis vow seemed to do Iladrian good. With a firm tread 
 lie paced liis tent for lialf an hour, and tlien called Heliodorus, 
 liis private secretary, M-ho brought jiarcliment and wrote what 
 liis lord dictated. 
 
 This was notliing less than a loroclamatiou that in Antinous 
 the world possessed a new divinity. 
 
 In the afternoon a breathless messenger brought tidings that 
 the body of the Bithynian had been found. Thousands has- 
 tened to look at it, and among them came Balbilla, who had 
 behaved like a person distracted since learning the fate of her 
 idol. She had hastened up and down the bank in garments of 
 mourning and with loosened hair. 
 
 The Egyptians likened her to Isis searching for the body of 
 her beloved husband Osiris. 
 
 She abandoned herself to grief, and her comj^anion vainly 
 implored her to remember her rank and her womanly dignity. 
 Balbilla pushed her violently away, and when the tidings came 
 that the Nile had relinquished its jjrey she hastened on foot, 
 and in the midst of the crowd, toward the corpse. 
 
 Her name was known to all, and being recognized as a friend 
 of the emijress, willing obedience was rendered when she com- 
 manded those laeariug the bier on which the rescued body lay 
 to set it down upon the ground and remove the covering. 
 
 Pale and trembUng, she came forward and turned her eyes 
 upon it; but for only one short moment was able to bear the 
 sight. She turned away shuddering, and commanded the 
 bearers to go forward. 
 
 As the mourning train disappeared, and she could no longer 
 hear the shrill cries of the Egyptian women, or see them, as 
 they walked with hair and brow and breast daubed with the 
 dampened soil, and their arms flung wildly into the air, she 
 turned to her companion, and said quietly: " Let us go home, 
 Claudia. " At the evening meal she appeared dressed in 
 black, as were Sabina and all her company, but calm and 
 ]-eady to answer every question addressed to her. 
 
 The arcliitect Pontius traveled in her company from Thebes 
 to Besa. 
 
 She had omitted nothijig that could punish him for the long 
 delay, and had, without mercy, insisted upon his hearing all 
 her verses to Antinous. 
 
 He liad listened to them quietly, and expressed his opinions 
 of tliem exa(;tly as if they had been addressed to an image or a 
 god instead of a living man. Tliis epigram was praised, that 
 criticised, another condemned. To her confession, that sh« 
 
THE EMPEROR. S69 
 
 had been in tlie habit of sending him fruit and flowers, he had 
 shrugged his shoulders, and said, kindly: 
 
 "Go on giving him the same attentions. I know that 
 from this god you expect no favors in return for your offer- 
 ings.'' 
 
 This word surprised and pleased her. Pontius always under- 
 stood her. She allowed him to look into her soul, and told 
 him how much she loved Antinous when he was absent, and 
 laughingly added that she became utterly indifferent so soon 
 as he appeared. 
 
 As she utterly lost her self-control after his death, Pontius 
 left her alone and begged Claudia to do likewise. 
 
 On the day after its discovery the body was burned upon 
 costly wood. Hadrian refused to see it after learning that the 
 water had changed the appearance of his darling. 
 
 A few hours after the ashes of the Bithynian had been col- 
 lected in a golden vase and brought to Hadrian, the Nile fleet, 
 which this time bore also the emjDeror, set sail for Alexandria. 
 
 The monarch remained with only his slave and his secretary 
 upon the boat that carried him. Sometimes he sent for Pon- 
 tius to visit him, and heard gladly his deep voice as they dis- 
 cussed either the plans for his mausoleum at Eome, or the 
 memorial monument he projDOsed to erect, after a design of his 
 own, in the larger city to be founded on the site of Besa, and 
 which he already called Antinoe. 
 
 But these interviews occupied only a few hours, and Pontius 
 was then at liberty to return to the company of Balbilla on 
 the shij) of Sabina. 
 
 A few days after they left Besa he sat one evening alone 
 with her on the deck of the vessel, that, carried forward by 
 the current and propelled by a hundred oars, was rapidly near- 
 ing its destination. Since the unfortunate death of the 
 favorite, Pontius had carefully avoided speaking of him to 
 Balbilla. 
 
 But now she had become attentive and social as before, and 
 sometimes a sparkle of the old cheerfulness ajDjjeared in her 
 eyes. Pontius thought he understood her varying moods, and 
 did not touch upon the cause of the violent but quickly extin- 
 guished fever from which she had suffered. 
 
 " What have you been discussing with the emperor to-day?" 
 asked Balbilla. 
 
 Pontius looked at the deck for a moment, considering 
 whether he should utter the name of Antinous. She noticed 
 Jiis hesitation, and said: 
 
370 niE EMPEROR. 
 
 "You can speak; I am able to hear all. That foolishness 
 is past. " 
 
 " The emperor is at work upon plans for buildmg a new 
 city to be called Antinoe, and also a memorial monument to 
 his poor favorite," answered Pontius. " He will not let any 
 one help him; but I must show him the difference between the 
 possible and the impossible." 
 
 " He looks up at the stars, and you at the road on which 
 you are walking." 
 
 " An architect can not use that which totters or does not 
 stand upon firm ground. " 
 
 " That is a hard word, Pontius. I have certainly behaved 
 very foolishly within these last weeks." 
 
 " Would that all the wavering might recover their equilib- 
 rium as quickly and so solidly as you do! Antinous was a 
 demi-god in beauty, and a brave, honest fellow besides. ■" 
 
 " Do not say any more to me of him," said Balbilla, shud- 
 dering. ' ' His look was horrible. Can you forgive my conduct?" 
 
 " I have never been angry with you." 
 
 " But you have withdrami your respect. " 
 
 " No, Balbilla. The beauty so dear to all, as a kiss of the 
 muse, enticed the light-winged poetic soul to fly out of the 
 right path. Let her fly! The noble womanhood of my friend 
 was never carried after it. That stands on firm groimd, I am 
 sure." 
 
 " What a good, kind word! But it is too good and too kind! 
 I am a poor creature, moved by every breeze, a vain fool who 
 knows not in this hour what it may need in the next — a spoiled 
 child who loves to do what it ought not, a weak girl who finds 
 pleasure in opposing the o2)inions of men. For all in all — " 
 
 " For all in all a gentle favorite of the gods, who to-day 
 climbs the rocks with a vigorous step, and to-morrow tends 
 the flowers in the sunshine — for all in all a being unlike every 
 other, Avanting for the perfection of womanhood only — " 
 
 " I know what I need," cried Balbilla; " a strong man on 
 whom I can relv, whose warnings I should heed. You — you 
 are that man. Vou, and no other, for when with you it is 
 hard to do anything else than Miiat is right. Here I am, Pon- 
 tius. Will you have me, with all my caprices, my faults and 
 my weaknesses?" 
 
 "Balbilla," exclaimed the architect, beside himself with 
 profound astonishment, and pressed her hand long and fervent- 
 ly to his lips. 
 
 " You will? You will have me? You will never desert 
 me; will warn, su^jport and protect me?" 
 
THE EMPEROR. 371 
 
 " Till the end of my life, even nuto death, as my child, as 
 my own eyes— as — dare I then say and believe — as my beloved, 
 my other self, my ^\^ife!^' 
 
 '• Oh, Pontius, Pontius!" she returned, and pressed his 
 strong hand in both her own. " This hour gives to the 
 orphaned Balbilla father and mother again, and besides that, 
 the husband she loves!" 
 
 "Mine, mine!'^ cried the architect. "Oh, eternal gods! 
 all my life long I have not found time to enjoy the blessings 
 of love, and now you grant me the treasure so long withheld 
 with interest and compound interest." 
 
 " And can you, a reasonable man, so overestimate the value 
 of your jewel? You will find something good in it, and life 
 is no longer worth living without its j^ossessor. " 
 
 " And to me it has long seemed cold and desolate without 
 you, strange, unique, incomparable creature!" 
 
 " But why did you not come sooner, and save me from be- 
 ing such a fool?" 
 
 " Because, because," answered Pontius, earnestly, " a flight 
 toward the sun seemed to me too bold; because I remembered 
 that my father's father — " 
 
 "■ He was the noblest man whom the ancestor of my family 
 attracted toward its greatness." 
 
 " He was — consider it well in this hour — your grandfather's 
 slave. ' ' 
 
 ''I know that; but I know also that no man on earth is 
 worthier of freedom than you are, and whom I could so hum- 
 bly ask, as I ask you : Take me, the poor foolish Balbilla, to 
 be your wife; lead me and make of me what I am capable of 
 being to your honor and my own." 
 
 The rapid voyage brought to Pontius and his beloved hours 
 and days of highest happiness. Before the fleet entered the 
 harbor of Mareotis, Pontius revealed his happy secret to the 
 emperor. Hadrian smiled, for the first time since the death 
 of Antinous, and asked Pontius to bring Balbilla to him. 
 
 " I have poorly interpreted the Pythian oracle," said he, 
 after laying the hand of the poetess into that of the architect. 
 
 *' Do you wish to know, Pontius, how it runs?" 
 
 " You need not help me, dear child. "Whatever I read once 
 or twice I never forget. Pythia said: 
 
 " ' Whiit to thee was dearest and highest, that thou shalt lose, 
 And from Olympian heiglits descend to eartli beneath; 
 But under the rtying dust, a careful look wiU discover 
 Solid buikling of stone, with marble and rocky fouadation.' " 
 
372 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 " You have chosen wisel}', girl; the oracle assures your 
 treading a firm road through life. As to, the dust of which it 
 speaks, that is in a certain sense inevitable; but this hand 
 Avields a broom which can sv/eep it away. Celebrate your 
 Avodding in Alexandria, so soon as 3'ou please, but afterward 
 you must go to Rome. I shall make that condition. I have 
 long wished to introduce new and worthy members to the rank 
 of knighthood, for only thus can its fallen dignity be restored. 
 This ring makes you a knight, my Pontius; and for such a 
 man as you are, and the husband of Balbilla, we shall find 
 later a i)lace in the Senate. As to what there may be of 
 ' marble and rocky foundation ' in our time, you can show in 
 the building of my mausoleum. Have you changed the plan 
 of the bridge?" 
 
 CHAPTER XXm. 
 
 The news of the recognition of the " false Eros " as suc- 
 cessor of Hadrian was received with rejoicing, and again the 
 citizens used their o^^portuuity to hold a succession of feasts. 
 Titiajius took pains to see that the usual acts of grace were 
 performed, and among these was the opening of the prison of 
 Canop'AS, which made Pollux free. 
 
 The unfortunate sculptor had become very pale during his 
 imprisonment, but neither emaciated or j)hysically debilitated, 
 while the freshness of his disposition, his joyous courage and 
 originality, seemed utterly broken. His features — while on 
 the way from Canopus to Alexandria in his torn and soiled 
 chiton — ex23ressed neither gratitude for the imexpected gift of 
 liberty, nor pleasure in the anticipated meeting wath his own 
 relatives and with Arsinoe. He went from one street of the 
 city to another with unsympathetic indifl'erence; but he knew 
 the way, and his feet took the path leading to the house of his 
 sister. 
 
 How Diotima rejoiced, how the children shouted, how im- 
 patient they all were to lead him to the old people ! How high 
 the Graces leaped to welcome the wanderer to the new home 
 of Euphorion! 
 
 And Doris! — poor Doris almost lost her senses in the joy- 
 ous suri)rise, and her husband was obliged to catch her in his 
 arms, as her long-missing and yet never given-ujs son, stood 
 suddeidy before her, and said, inditi'erently: 
 
 " Here I am." 
 
 How tenderly they kissed and caressed the beloved fugitive 
 returned at last ! Eujjhorion exjn'essed his joy in both prose 
 
THE EMPEROR. 373 
 
 and verse, and brought his handsomest theatrical robes out of 
 the trunk to rejjlace the torn cliiton ol' his son. 
 
 A vigorous stream of imj^recations and maledictions poured 
 from his lips as Pollux related his story. 
 
 It was difficult to get through with it, so often did his father 
 interrupt and his mother constrain him to eat and drink far 
 beyond his jjower. Even after he assured her that he was 
 satiated, she put two new pots on the fire, for she was sure he 
 must have been starved in the prison and would be ready to 
 eat again within two hours. Euphorion himself took him to 
 the bath in the evening, and would not leave liis side for a mo- 
 ment on the return home. The consciousness of his presence 
 was like an agreeable jjhysical sensation. Usually, Euphorion 
 was not inquisitive, but now he could not cease asking ques- 
 tions, until Doris led her son to the freshly prepared bed. 
 
 After he had retired, Doris came again into his chamber, 
 kissed him on the forehead, and said: 
 
 " To-day you are thinking too much of that terrible j^rison; 
 but to-morrow, my boy, will you not be yourself once more?" 
 
 " Let me rest now, mother, I shall be better,'^ he replied. 
 " Such a bed is a sleeping potion; the rough plank in the 
 prison was different." 
 
 " You have asked nothing of your Arsinoe," said Doris. 
 
 " What have I to do with her? Now let me sleep." 
 
 On the next morning Pollux was just as he had been on the 
 previous evening, and for many days his condition remained 
 unchanged. 
 
 He hung his head, spoke only when questioned, and if Doris 
 or Euphorion attempted to speak with him of the future, he 
 would ask: 
 
 '^ Am I a burden to you?" or say, "You ought not to 
 trouble me. " 
 
 Yet he was kind, took the children of his sister into his arms, 
 played with the Graces, walked up and down, and did justice 
 to the food set before him. Now and then he asked about 
 Arsinoe. Once he allowed himself to be led to her dwelling, 
 but did not knock on the door of Paulina, and seemed to be 
 frightened by the grand house. 
 
 After being inactive a week, and so sluggish and indolent 
 and indisposed to exertion that the heart of his mother was 
 filled with anxiety as she looked at him, Teuker suggested a 
 happy thought. 
 
 The young gem-cutter had not of late been a frequent guest 
 in the house of his parents, but since his brother's return he 
 came almost daily. His term of apprenticeship was over, and 
 
374 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 he seemed on the way to become a master of his art. Never- 
 theless, he considered his brother's natural gifts to be much 
 superior to his own, and tried by every means to awaken his 
 dormant energies. 
 
 "At this table/' he said to his mother, " Pollux used to 
 work. This evening I will bring a lump of clay and a good 
 piece of wax. You shall place them here, and lay his tools 
 and implements beside them. Perhaps the sight of these 
 things may waken his old love for sculpture. Let him make 
 only a doll for the children, he would get into the sjjirit of the 
 thing, and soon go from the smaller to the larger. '' 
 
 Teukcr brought the articles, and Doris placed them on the 
 table with the imijlements for work, and watched the conduct 
 of her son next morning with a beating heart. 
 
 He rose late, as he had done every morning since his return, 
 and sat long before the bowl of soup his mother had provided 
 for his breakfast. Then he strolled over to the table, and 
 stopping before it, took a bit of the clay into his hand;, rolling 
 it between his fingers into little balls and cylinders, brought it 
 close to his eye for scrutiny, then threw it upon the floor, and 
 said, Avhile he rested both hands on the table, and leaned over 
 to his mother: 
 
 " You want to have me work again, but I can not. I should 
 accomplish nothing. " 
 
 Tears came into the eyes of the old woman, but she made 
 no reply. 
 
 Toward evening Pollux begged her to put away the tools. 
 After he had gone to rest she did so, and while moving about 
 in the dark lumber-room where she kej)t them with all sorts 
 of unused tilings, the light she carried fell uj^on the jjartly 
 finished wax model, which had been the last work of her un- 
 fortunate son. 
 
 This suggested a new idea. She called Euphorion, and bade 
 him throw the clay into the court, and place the model on the 
 table, near the wax. Then she placed the very imjolements he 
 had used on the fateful day of their expulsion from the 
 Lochias near to the well-begun image, and requested her hus- 
 band to leave the house M'ith her early in the morning, and re- 
 main away until afternoon. 
 
 " It may be," she said, '* when he sees his last work, if no 
 one is near to distract, or to notice what he does, that he may 
 find and gather up the scattered threads again and go on with 
 the work where he left it." 
 
 The mother heart had hit upon the true idea. 
 
 After Pollux Jind taken hia soup, he went, as on the day be- 
 
IrME EMPEKOK. 3^5 
 
 fore, to the table, but the sight of liis last work had quiet a 
 different effect upon him from the crude mass of clay and wax. 
 His eye brightened. With careful scrutiny he walked around 
 the table and examined the work as carefully as though for the 
 first time inspecting some new and beautiful object. Memories 
 awoke within him. He laughed aloud; he struck his hands 
 together and said to himself: 
 
 " Magnificent! Something can be made out of that thing!'* 
 
 His lassitude disajipeared, a confident smile played about his 
 lips, and he plimged his hand firmly into the wax. But he did 
 not at once begin the work. He tested the power of his fin- 
 gers to mold the pliant stuff according to his will. The wax 
 was no less obedient to his bending and twisting than in 
 former days. Perhaps, then, the anxiety which had consumed 
 his life — the fear that he had utterly lost his skill and his 
 claim to be a sculptor while in the prison was only a baseless 
 delusion! 
 
 He would at least try how it would go. 
 
 No one was there to notice him, and he might venture. 
 
 Great drops of anxiety stood in beads upon his forehead as 
 he at last concentrated the power of his will, threw back his 
 hair in the old way, and seized with both hands a large piece 
 of wax. 
 
 There stood the model for the statue of Antinous, partly 
 finished. Could he succeed in copying that beautiful head 
 off-hand? 
 
 His breath came quicker and his fingers trembled at the out- 
 set. But soon liis hand gained its old firmness, his eye became 
 keen and steady, and the work made good progress. 
 
 The handsome face of the Bithynian stood clearly before his 
 inner eye; and when, four hours later, his mother looked in at 
 the window to see how her device had succeeded, she gave a 
 loud exclamation of surprise — for there, alike in every feature, 
 stood the head of Antinous, upon a support, near to the partly 
 finished model. 
 
 Before she had crossed the threshold her son rushed to- 
 ward her, lifted her up in his arms, kissed her on lips and fore- 
 head, and cried, beaming with joy: 
 
 " Mother, I can work! Mother, mother, I am not lost!*' 
 
 Later in the afternoon Teuker came in and saw what he had 
 done, and, for the first time, really rejoiced in his brother's 
 reappearance. 
 
 While the two artists sat together, and Teuker suggested, in 
 rcjily to the complaints of Pollux about the poor light in the 
 liouse of his parents, that he finish his statue in the workshop 
 
376 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 of his, Teuker's, master, Eiqjhoriou, climbing silently to the 
 liighest shelf of his provision shed, brought to light an am- 
 phora, filled with noble Chian wine, which had been given to 
 liim by a rich merchant, for whoso weddi)ig feast he had com- 
 mitted the part of Hymeuanis in a choir of youths. For 
 twenty years this jar had been preserved for some especially 
 happy occasion. This, and his best lute, were the only articles 
 which Euphorion carried with his own hand to the house of 
 Diotima from the Lochias, and thence to his new home. 
 
 With dignified pride the musician placed the ancient am- 
 phora before his sons, but Doris quickly covered it with her 
 hands, and said: 
 
 " I do not grudge the good gift, and would gladly drink a 
 cup with you now; but a shrewd general does not celebrate hia 
 victory before the battle is over. So soon as the statue of the 
 beautiful youth is finished, I will myself deck the old jar with 
 ivy, and beg you to favor us, my good old man; but not be- 
 fore. " 
 
 " Mother is right," said PoHitx. " The amphora is now set 
 apart for me, and if 3'ou allow it, father shall not strike the 
 wig of black pitch from its head until Arsinoe is again mine.'' 
 
 " Very well, my boy," cried Doris, *' and then I will crown 
 not only the jar, but all of us as well, with nothing but sweet 
 roses." 
 
 On the next day Pollux carried his unfinished model to the 
 workshop of his brother's master. The worthy man cleared 
 the place for the sculptor, for he valued him highly, and 
 wished to make ujj to him, so far as possible, for the injury 
 he had suffered from the unworthy Papias. 
 
 From sunrise until the evening approached Pollux was now 
 at his work. With true devotion, he gave himself up to the 
 reawakened delight of creation. Instead of wax, he used clay, 
 and made a full-length figure of Antinous, representing him 
 as the young Bacchus might have appeared ;;o the pirates. 
 The folds of a mantle fell lightly over his shoulder to the 
 ankles, exposing the right arm and the perfectly proportioned 
 chest. Vine leaves and grapes adorned his richly curling, 
 locks, and a pine-apple, rising upward like a flame, rested 
 upon his crown. The left arm was raised, and the gracefully- 
 curved fingers grasped lightly a Thyrsus staff, which rested on 
 the ground and extended above the head of the god. Partly 
 hidden by the folds of the mantle was a lordly wine-jar. 
 
 For a week Pollux had zealously devoted all the hours of 
 daylight to his work. Just before night fell he had sli})ped 
 away from the shop to \\'alk uii and down before the house of 
 
THE EMPEROR. S?? 
 
 Paulina, but he refrained from knocking on the door and call- 
 ing for his dear Arsinoe. He had learned from his mother 
 how carefully she was guarded from him and his, but this 
 strictness of the Christian was not what hindered an attempt 
 to recover his dearest possession — but a vow given to himself 
 not to entice her away from her new and safe home before he 
 was fully convinced of his own power to be a sculptor, who 
 might hope to accomijlish great things, and dared venture to 
 link the destiny of a beloved object with his own. 
 
 As he, on the morning of his eighth day of work, was rest- 
 ing a little, the master of his brother passed by, and stopping 
 to note his progress, exclaimed, after looking at it long and 
 carefully: " It is the work of a master; our time has produced 
 nothing to compare with it." 
 
 One hour later Pollux stood at the door of Paulina, and let 
 the heavy knocker fall upon it. When the steward opened to 
 him he asked for Paulina, but she was not at home. Then he 
 inquired for Arsinoe, the daughter of Keraunus, who had been 
 received by the widow. 
 
 The old servant shook his head, saying: " My mistress is in 
 pursuit of her. She disappeared last evening. A most un- 
 grateful creature! She has tried several times before to run 
 away." 
 
 The sculptor laughed, slapped the steward on the back, and 
 said: 
 
 " I will find her very soon!" Then he sprung down the 
 steps and hastened to the house of his parents. 
 
 Arsinoe had received much kindness in the house of Paulina, 
 but had also gained some painful experiences. For months 
 she had believed her lover to be dead. Pontius had told her 
 of his disappearance, and her benefactress always spoke of him 
 as one dead. The poor child had shed many tears for him, 
 and when the longing to talk of him with some one who had 
 loved him overcame her, she begged Paulina to permit her to 
 visit his mother, or allow Doris to come to her house. 
 
 But the widow had commanded her to give up every thought 
 of the idol-maker and all belonging to him, and spoke with 
 contempt of the good wife of the gate-keeper. 
 
 It was just at this time also that Selene left the city; and 
 now the longing to see her old friends became a passionatp 
 craving in the heart of Arsinoe. 
 
 One day she slipj^ed into the street, determined to search for 
 Doris; but the door-keeper, whom Paulina had commanded 
 not to allow her exit without her own special permission. 
 
378 THE EMPEHOK. 
 
 noticed her departure, and led her, not onl}' this time, but on 
 several other occasions, back to her foster-mother. 
 
 It was not alone the desire to speak of Pollux wliich made 
 the resistance of Arsinoe, in this house, so hitolerable; it rested 
 on several other grounds. 
 
 She felt herself a prisoner, and was really such; for after 
 each attempt at running away her freedom became more re- 
 stricted. It is true that she had failed to acquiesce in what 
 was required of her, and had indeed met her foster-mother 
 with violent words, tears, and bitter complaint; but these im- 
 happy scenes — that always ended with Paulina's assurance that 
 she forgave her — were followed by long intervals in her drives, 
 and by various petty mortifications. 
 
 Arsinoe began to hate her benefactress and everything con- 
 nected with her. The hours of prayer and instruction were 
 seasons of martyrdom; and soon the doctrines to which she 
 might have been won, became so confounded with the being 
 who sought to drive her into them, that she defiantly closed 
 her heart against their influence. 
 
 The Bishop Eumenes, who had been elected patriarch of the 
 Alexandrian Christians, visited her oftener than before while 
 Paulina lived at her country house. 
 
 Her foster-mother really believed she could do without his 
 help, and that she must accomplish alone the work of her con- 
 version; but the sympathy of this worthy old man was extended 
 toward this poor, ill-guided cliild, and he tried to comfort and 
 point out to her the goal toward wliich Pauhna was leading 
 her in its real beauty. 
 
 After such discourses, Arsinoe was softened and inclined to 
 believe in God, and to love Christ; but so soon as her foster- 
 mother called her again to the school-room, and repeated the 
 very same things — only in her own manner — the heart of the 
 young girl closed again; and when she was expected to pray — 
 though she raised her hands as usual — yet out of defiance, 
 offered her devotion only to the Grecian divinities. 
 
 Sometimes the heathen acquaintances of Paulina came in 
 their costly finery to pay visits, and their appearance reminded 
 Arsinoe of former days. How poor she had been then; and 
 yet she always had a blue or a red ribbon to braid with her 
 hair and to bind her peplum. Now she was allowed to wear 
 only white garments; even the smallest colored ornament in 
 lier hair or upon her dress was strictly forbidden. Such vaiu 
 trifles, Pauliiui would tell her, might do very well for the 
 heathen, but the Lord did not notice the body. He looked 
 only into the heart. ^Ui, the heart of this i)oor unfortunate 
 
THE EMPEKOE. 379 
 
 child could certainly- be no pleasant spectacle to the Father in 
 heaven, for it was boiling with hatred;, disgust, distress, im- 
 patience and blasphemy from morning until evening. This 
 young nature had been formed for love and cheerfulness, yet 
 both these had left her sorrowing. But Arsinoe had not ceased 
 to long for them. In the early part of November, on their 
 change of residence to the city house, she had failed in another 
 attemjDt to run away, and Paulina determined to punish her 
 by not speaking to her for a fortnight, and forbidding any of 
 her slaves to do so. 
 
 The social Greek child was reduced almost to despair during 
 these days, so that she meditated climbing to the roof and 
 throwing herself down from thence. But Arsinoe was still 
 too fond of life to carry out so cruel a plan. 
 
 On the first of December Paulina spoke with her once more, 
 forgave her, as usual, after a long, kind sjieech, and told her 
 how many hours she had spent in prayer for her improvement 
 and enlightenment. Paulina spoke the truth, in one sense, 
 yet she had never felt true love for Arsinoe, and had for a long 
 time seen her go and come with aversion; yet she needed her 
 conversion to obtain fulfillment of her heart's dearest wish. 
 It was for the sake of her daughter's eternal blessedness, and 
 not for the cure of the refractory girl in her own household 
 that she asked for her enlightenment, and dared not relax any 
 eft'orts to soften the obdurate heart of her foster-child. 
 
 On the afternoon preceding the morning when Pollux at last 
 knocked on the door of her house the sun was especially 
 bright, and Paulina allowed Arsinoe to ride with her. 
 
 They visited the house of a Christian family living on the 
 Lake of Mareotis, and so it happened that their return was 
 delayed until almost evening. 
 
 Arsinoe had long ago learned to see all that went on around 
 her, while pretending to look at the ground, and as the vehicle 
 turned into their own street, she noticed in the distance a man 
 who resembled her long-wept Pollux. She fastened her eyes 
 upon him, and put a violent constraint upon herself to avoid 
 screaming; for it was certainly he who walked slowly along 
 the street. She could not be mistaken, for the torches of a 
 couple of slaves who walked before a sedan fell full upon his 
 face and figure. Then he was not lost; he was alive, he was 
 seeking her! 
 
 She wanted to shout for joy, but controlled herself until the 
 carriage stopped before the house of Paulina. According to 
 custom, the porter hastened forward to assist his mistress in 
 descending from the high-built veda: and in the moment 
 
380 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 when rauliiiu's back was turned, Arsinoc sj^rung out on the 
 opposite side of the covered vehicle, and ran down the street 
 where slie had seen her lover. Before Paulina had noticed her 
 absence she was lost among the thousands who, at that time 
 of the evening, streamed from the factories and workshojjs, 
 going toward their homes. 
 
 The slaves of Pauhna, who were instantly sent out to over- 
 take the fugitive, returned this time without success, and 
 Arsinoe also failed to find him she sought. 
 
 For an hour she wandered in vain, and then began to query 
 how she could find the house of his parents. Eather than re- 
 turn to her benefactress, she would have spent the niglit with 
 the homeless wanderers in the vestibule of the temple, with 
 only the hard marble pavement for a bed. At first she re- 
 joiced in the possession of her liberty, but as no one could tell 
 her where the singer Euijhorion lived, and young fellows 
 pressed after her with insolent language, anxiety drove her 
 into a street leading to the Bruehiom. 
 
 She had not become free from her persecutors when a sedan, 
 accompanied by lictors and many torch-bearers, passed by, in 
 which sat Julia, the good wife of the prefect. Arsinoe knew 
 her at once, and following, reached the door of her house at 
 the same time with Julia, who saw her beside the path as she 
 descended, standing in modest attitude, but with hands raised 
 imploringly. 
 
 Julia greeted the poor creature, for whom she had felt so 
 maternal an interest, beckoned her to herself, and hstening 
 with a kindly smile to her request for shelter during the night, 
 led her with satisfaction to her husband. 
 
 Titianus was suffering, but glad to see again the pretty 
 daughter of the unfortunate palace overseer, listened to the 
 story of her flight with many tokens of disapproval, but with 
 kindness, and expressed the liveliest satisfaction of hearing 
 that Pollux was still alive. 
 
 The lofty patrician bed in one of the guest-chambers of the 
 prefect had held many of the liighcr rank, but never one who 
 was refreshed by happier dreams than this poor young orphaned 
 fugitive who only yesterday had cried herself to sleep. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 Arsinoe rose betimes on the next morning, and— embar- 
 rassed by the elegance of her surroundings — walked up and 
 down the room thinking of Pollux. Then she took pleasure 
 in the reflection of her own image in the great mirror above 
 
THE ElIPEUOK. .-J81 
 
 her dressiug-table — comparing meanwhile the conchy upon 
 which she again extended herself, with those in the house of 
 Paulina. 
 
 She felt herself once more a ]3risoner, but this time her place 
 of confinement was agreeable, and when she heard slaves pass- 
 ing the room, she ran to the door to listen, thinking it possi- 
 ble Titianus might have sent for Pollux, and would permit 
 him to come to her. At last a slave woman brought in break- 
 fast, and the request from Julia that she would amuse herself 
 in the garden with the flowers and the aviaries until she 
 should come to her. 
 
 Early on this morning Titianus received tidings of the death 
 of Antinous, and was much overcome by the news — less for 
 the sake of the haj)less youth himself than for the emperor. 
 
 After giving orders to the officers to make known the sad in- 
 telligence among the j^eople, and to announce some suitable 
 manner in which the citizens could express their symj)athy in 
 the monarch's bereavement, he received a visit from 'the 
 patriarch Eumenes. x 
 
 This worthy old man had been regarded as among the 
 choicest friends of Titianus and Julia since their interviews to 
 discuss the thanksgiving service of the Christians after the 
 emperor's rescue from the burning palace. They spoke to- 
 gether of the unhappy effect the death of this rarely gifted 
 youth was likely to have upon the emperor and his govern- 
 ment of the empire. 
 
 " Whenever Hadrian," said Titianus, " allowed his restless 
 brain an hour of recreation to recover from the vexations, 
 disappointments and annoyances, of which his life is always 
 overfull Le would go out hunting with this vigorous lad, or 
 found always a pleasant, good-humored companion in his own 
 apartment. The sight of the Bithynian refreshed his artistic 
 eye — and how well Antinous understood listening — thought- 
 fully, modestly, silently. Hadrian loved him as a son, and he 
 clung to the emperor with more than child-like devotion. The 
 emperor once said to me : ' In the turmoil of busy life An- 
 tinous stands before my eyes as the incorporation of a beauti- 
 ful dream.' " 
 
 " The emperor's grief at losing him will be indeed great," 
 said the jDatriarch. 
 
 " And the loss will make still more gloomy his brooding and 
 grave disposition, add to his capricious and restless wander- 
 ings, and increase his distrust and irritability. " 
 
 "And the circumstances attending his death," added the 
 
382 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 patriarch, " will furnish new food for his attachment to super- 
 stitions." 
 
 " That^is to bo feared. We have not happy days in pros- 
 pect. The late revolt in Judea will cost thousands of lives. " 
 
 " Oh, that you might have had the guidance of affairs in 
 that province!" 
 
 " You know how it is with me, my worthy friend. In my 
 bad days, I am incapable of speaking or thinking. As the 
 asthma increases, I am as one suffocated. I have wilhngly 
 devoted several decades of energy to the State, and now feel 
 justified in using the remnant of my vigor for other things. 
 My M'ife and I intend to retire to our property on tlie Lake of 
 Como, and there try whether we may become worthy of the 
 salvation and capable of grasping rightly the truths you have 
 taught us. You are there, Julia? In deciding to leave this 
 busy life, Ave have both thought more than once of the words 
 of that wise man of Judea, wliich you lately repeated to us. 
 When the angel of God drove the first pair out of Paradise, he 
 said: 'Henceforth you must find Paradise in your own 
 hearts. ' We turn our backs upon the i^leasures of a great 
 city-" 
 
 " And we do this without regret," broke in Jidia, " because 
 we carry within ourselves the germ of indestructible, pure, 
 and enduring happiness. " 
 
 " Amen," said the patriarch. " When two such as you are 
 dwell together, the Lord is the third in the bond. " 
 
 " Permit your joupil Marcianus to make the journey with 
 us," begged Titianus. 
 
 " Gla^y," answered Eumenes. " Shall I send him to you 
 directly?" 
 
 "Not immediately," returned Julia. " I have this morn- 
 ing an important and also an agreeable business to occupy 
 my time. You know Paulina, the widow of Pudens. She 
 took a pretty young girl into her house." 
 
 " And Arsinoe has run away from her." 
 
 " W^e are sheltering her," said Titianus. "Her foster- 
 mother seems to have failed in attaching her to herself, or in 
 exerting a good influence upon her character." 
 
 " Yes,^' answered the jiatriarch. '*' There was only one key 
 that could open the shrine of that full, joyous heart. That 
 was love; but Paulina has tried to break it open by force and 
 resolute coercion. It remained to the very last closed, and 
 the lock has been ruined. But may I ask how the girl came 
 into this house?" 
 
THE EMPEROR. 383 
 
 " That I will tell yon later. We did not see lier yesterday 
 for the first time," said Titianus. 
 
 " And I am going to take her to her bridegroom/' cried 
 Julia. 
 
 '' Paulina will claim her of you/' returned the patriarch. 
 " She is seeking her everywhere; but the girl will never thrive 
 under her guidance, " 
 
 " Has the widow formally adopted Arsinoe?" asked Titianus. 
 
 "'No; she intended to do so, when her foster-child — " 
 
 " Intention is nothing in law, and I shall be able to protect 
 om- pretty guest. ' ' 
 
 " I will fetch her," cried Julia. " The time must have 
 seemed very long to the poor child. Will you go with me, 
 Eumenes?" 
 
 " Gladly," answered the old man. '^ Arsinoe and I are 
 good friends — a conciliatory word from me will do her good, 
 and my blessing can not harm even a heathen. Farewell, 
 Titianus, the deacons are Avaiting for me." 
 
 When Julia returned to the apartment, accompanied by her 
 young charge, there were tears in the girl's eyes, for the kind 
 words of the old man went to her heart, and she realized that 
 she had received good as well as evil from Paulina. 
 
 The matron found her husband no longer alone. The 
 wealthy Plutarch with his living supports was with Mm, and 
 offered to-day, dressed in black instead of gay-colored gar- 
 ments, and adorned only with white flowers, a very singular 
 appearance. 
 
 The old gentleman was speaking to the prefect in a very 
 animated manner, but on perceiving Arsinoe he broke off his 
 speech, clapped his hands, and gave every demonstration of 
 pleasure in meeting again the fair Eoxana, in whose behalf he 
 had visited in vain all the gold-workers shops of the city. 
 
 " But," said he, with youthful eagerness, " I am quite tired 
 of keeping the ornaments for you. There are enough other 
 useless things in my house. They belong to you and not to 
 me, and this very day I shall send them to Julia for your use. 
 Give me your hand, dear girl. You are paler, but seem more 
 mature. Do you not think, Titianus, she would still do for 
 Eoxana? But your wife will have to trouble herself again 
 about the dress. All white, not a ribbon in the hair — just 
 like a Christian!" 
 
 " I know one who will understand how to adorn these soft 
 tresses," answered Julia. " She is the bride of the sculptor 
 Pollux." 
 
 "Pollux!" cried Plutarch, in 2freat excitement. "Move 
 
384 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 me forward Antfeus and Atlas I The sculptor Pollux is your 
 lover I A great, a royal sculptor I The same, noble Titianus, 
 of whom 1 was just speaking to you.'^ 
 
 '* iJo you know him?" asked Julia. 
 
 " No, but I have just come from the workshop of Perian- 
 der, the gem-cutter, and have seen there the model for a statue 
 of Antinous that is unique, marvelous, incomparable. The 
 Bithynian as Dionysius! No Pliidias or Lysippus need be 
 ashamed of such work. Pollux was absent, but I put my hand 
 on the work. The young master must execute it at oiice in 
 marble. Hadrian Avill be enraptured with this image of his 
 beautiful and devoted favorite. You — any judge of such 
 work — indeed every person must admire it! I shall buy it, 
 and the only question is whether I myself or the city had bet- 
 ter offer it to the emperor. Your husband will decide that 
 question." 
 
 Arsinoe glowed with joy on hearing these words, but she 
 stepped modestly back as an officer brought Titianus a docu- 
 ment just received. The prefect looked it over and said, turn- 
 ing to his wife: '* Hadrian exalts Antinous to a place among 
 the gods. " 
 
 " Fortunate Pollux!^' cried Plutarch. " He has made the 
 first statue of the new Olympian divinity. I will present it to 
 the city, and it shall be set up in the Antinous temple, whose 
 foundation stone must be laid before the emj^eror returns. 
 Farewell, noble people! Greet your bridegroom, my child; 
 his work belongs to me. Pollux Avill be the first among his 
 fellow-artists, and I had the good luck to discover this new 
 star. This is now the eighth artist whose true worth I have 
 discerned while he was still unknown! Your future brother- 
 in-law Teuker will also be a famous man. I have given him 
 the order to carve a hkeness of Antinous upon a gem. Once 
 more farewell, I must go to the council. We shall discuss 
 there a temple for the new divinity. Forward, both of you!" 
 
 An hour after Plutarch had left the prefect the chariot of 
 Julia stood at the entrance of a street, much too narrow to 
 admit a vehicle with a span of horses, that ended in a little 
 
 freen plot, on which stood the small house of Euphorion. 
 ulia's outrunners found very readily the dwelling of the par- 
 ents of Pollux, led Julia and Arsinoe to the open sj^ace, and 
 pointed out the door on which they should knock. 
 
 " How flushed you are, my girl!" exclaimed Juiia. " I do 
 not want to intrude upon your first meeting, but would like to 
 deliver you with my own hand to your future mother. Go 
 into the house yonder, Aretus, and ask Doris to come out to 
 
THE EMPEROE. 385 
 
 ns. Say only that some one wants to sjDeak with her, and do 
 not mention my name." 
 
 Arsinoe's heart beat ^o violently that she could not utter a 
 word of her gratitude. 
 
 ' ■ Step behind this j^alm-tree," begged Julia; Arsinoe 
 obeyed, but it seemed that some other will and not her own 
 led her into the hiding-place. She heard also notliing of the 
 first words exchanged between the Roman lady and Doris. 
 She only saw the dear old face of the mother of her Pollux — 
 and in spite of the reddened eyes and the wrinkles sorrow had 
 furrowed she could not be satisfied with gazing upon it. It 
 reminded her of childhood's happy days, and she longed to 
 rush forward and throw herself upon the neck of the good, 
 kind woman. Now she heard Julia say: 
 
 "And I will bring her to you — she is just as lovely, and 
 maidenly, and sweet as when we saw her for the first time in 
 the theater." 
 
 " Where is she?'' asked Doris, in a trembling voice. Julia 
 pointed toward the palm-tree, and would have called, but this 
 time her young charge could not control the longing to fall 
 upon the neck of some beloved object, for Pollux had come 
 out of the door to see Avho had called his mother; and to see 
 him, and with one loud cry of joy to fall upon his breast, was 
 for Arsinoe one and the same thing. 
 
 Julia looked at them with moistened eyes, and when with 
 friendly words to both old and young she took leave of the 
 joyfully reunited group, she said: "I want to provide your 
 outfit, my dear girl, and this time I think you will use it, not 
 merely for one fleeting hour, but for a long and haj^py life." 
 
 In the evening of this day hearty song echoed from the little 
 house of Euphorion. Doris and her husband, Pollux and 
 Arsinoe, Diotima and Teuker, decked with garlands, reclined 
 around the rose-wreathed amphora, and drank to 2:)leasure, to 
 joy, to art, and to love, and to all the good gifts of the pres- 
 ent. The abundant hair of the happy bride was once more 
 plaited with i)retty blue ribbons. 
 
 Three weeks later Hadrian arrived in Alexandria. He did 
 not show himself at any of the festivals celebrated in honor of 
 the new god Antinous, and smiled incredulously when told that 
 a new star had appeared in the heavens, which an oracle had 
 declared to be the soul of his darling. 
 
 When Plutarch conducted him and his retinue to the Bac- 
 chus Antinous, which Pollux had finished in the clay, Hadrian 
 was deeply moved, and AS'ished to know the artist who had 
 wrought such a marvelous work. Not one of the company 
 
 13 
 
386 THE EMPEROR. 
 
 had the courage to mention the name of Polhix in his pres- 
 ence; but Pontius ventured to come forward in behalf of his 
 young friend. He related to Hadrian the unfortunate sculp- 
 tor's histor}^ and asked the emperor to forgive him. 
 
 Hadrian nodded an assent, and said: " For the salie of the 
 dead he shall be forgiven." 
 
 When Pollux was brought to him, the monarch extended his 
 hand, and jDressing that of Pollux within his own, he said: 
 
 " The Heavenly Powers have deprived me of his love and 
 loyalty, but your art has preserved for me, and for the world, 
 his beauty. " 
 
 Every city in the emj^ire was eager to build temples and to 
 erect statues to the new god ; and Pollux, Arsinoe's hajipy hus- 
 band, received orders for statues and busts in a hundred differ- 
 ent places. But he declined the greater part of them, and 
 gave out no work as his own which he had not made with his 
 own hand and formed after some original conception. The 
 copying of his works he left to the other artists. 
 
 His master, Papias, returned to Alexandria, but Avas re- 
 ceived so coldly and contemptuously by his fellow-artists that 
 in an unhappy moment he put an end to his own life. 
 
 Teuker became the most famous engraver of gems of his 
 time. 
 
 Hannah left the city of Besa soon after the martyrdom of 
 Selene. The oflBce of chief deaconess in Alexandria was given 
 to her, and through this she blessed others down to a good old 
 age. 
 
 The deformed Maria remained in the little Nile city, which 
 Hadrian had enlarged into the brilliant Antinoe. There were 
 there two graves from which she could not tear herself away. 
 
 Four years after the marriage of Arsinoc, Hadrian sum- 
 moned the sculj)tor, Pollux, to Pome, where he Avas to erect a 
 statue of the emperor upon a chariot drawn by four horses. 
 This work was intended to crown the mausoleum constructed 
 by Pontius; and Pollux accomplished his task in such a mar- 
 velous manner that upon its completion the emperor said, 
 laughingly, to him: 
 
 " Now you have earned the right to break a lath over the 
 work of other masters. "" 
 
 The son of Euphorion, with his much-admired and faithful 
 wife Arsinoe, saw their children growing up to be virtaous 
 citizens on the banks of the Tiber. They remained heathen, 
 but the Christian love which Eumenes had shown the foster- 
 child of Paulina could never be forgotten, and she kept always 
 » friendly sanctuary for it in her heart and her home, 
 
THE EMPEROK. 387 
 
 Doris fell asleep a few months before tlie departure of the 
 youthful pair from Alexandria, and her husband soon followed 
 hej-. The longing for his cheerful companion was the disease 
 of which he died. 
 
 Pontius was also upon the Tiber, a faithful friend of the 
 sculptor. 
 
 Balbilla and her husband gave to their demoralized country- 
 men the example of a worthy marriage in the old Eoman 
 sense. 
 
 The bust of the poetess was finished in Alexandria, and 
 found, with all its curls and ringlets, favor in the eyes of Bal- 
 billa. 
 
 Verus was permitted to bear the title of Ca?sar during the 
 life-time of Hadrian, but he died, after a lingering disease, 
 long before him. Lucilla nursed her husband with tender un- 
 selfishness, and realized with deep jjain the longed-for posses- 
 sion of his entire devotion. It was their son who in later 
 years wore the j^urple. 
 
 The predictions of the prefect were fulfilled. The faults of 
 the emperor grew with his years, the petty side of his nature 
 becoming more rudely prominent. 
 
 Titianus and Julia led a quiet life on the Larius Sea, far 
 from the busy world; and before their death, both received 
 Christian baptism. They never regretted the pleasure-seek- 
 ing and restless city, with its glittering shows — for the real 
 beauty of living had taken root hi their hearts. 
 
 It was Mastor who brought to Titianus the news of the em- 
 23eror's death. While yet alive, Hadrian had given him his 
 own freedom, and he bequeathed to him a handsome legacy. 
 The prefect received him as a tenant, and continued to ex- 
 change friendly relations with this Christian neighbor and his 
 pretty daughter, who grew up among the fellow-believers of 
 her father. 
 
 When Titianus carried to his wife the sad tidings, he said, 
 earnestly : 
 
 " A great prince has passed av/ay. The petty traits which 
 disfigured the man Hadrian will be forgotten by those who 
 come after him, for Hadrian, the monarch, was one of those 
 Avhom Destiny has placed where they belong, and who, true to 
 their duty, struggle restlessly to the very end. With wise 
 moderation he had learned to bridle his own ambition and 
 defy the fault-finding and criticism of all the Eomans. To 
 renounce possession of the provinces, whose maintenance would 
 have exhausted the resources of the State, was certainly the 
 hardest, though perhaps the wisest, resolution of his life. He 
 
388 THE EMPEHOR. 
 
 had wandered throiiffli the new emjiire, the limits of which he 
 had himself fixed, from one eiid to the other, shrinking from 
 neither cold nor heat, and sought to be as well acquainted with 
 every part as though the empire were only a small 2)ersonal 
 inheVitance. His duty as a monarch compelled him to make 
 many journeys, and his love for roaming lightened this task. 
 He was actuated by a passion for learning and understanding 
 all. Even the unattainable coidd not bound his desire for 
 knowledge; and always strivmg to sec further and to dig deej^er 
 than is allowed to human intellect, he sacrificed a large share 
 of his mighty vigor in seeking to tear down the curtains which 
 hide the future. No one ever attemjDted so many accessory 
 occupations as he, and yet no emperor has kept the chief ob- 
 ject of such a life — the strengthening of the State, and pre- 
 servmg and increasing the prosperity of its citizens — more un- 
 swervingly in the eye than he has done. " 
 
 THE END. 
 
SERAPIS. 
 
SERAPIS 
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 The busy tumult ot city life had for some hours been hushed ia 
 Alexandria; on high, moon and stars sped noiselessly on their way, 
 uud already dreams had visited many u couch. 
 
 It was a fine, fresh, truly balmy nighl, but although quiet reinged 
 on the streets and limes, tbre was lacking, at this unquiet time, "tho 
 genuine tranquillity that is really sonthini: to the spirit. 
 
 Fur a full week past, a certain oppiessive, (everish character had 
 attached itself to the repose oi the night. 
 
 The houses and shutters were closed, as if not only to guard 
 against disturbance to slumber, but atiacks upon life and property. 
 
 From those slumbering houses came, instead ot cheerful, merry 
 voices, the sound ot the soldier's heavy foot-tall, and the rattling of 
 his armor. 
 
 If occasionally some Roman challenge, or the agitated voices of 
 sleepless monks, made themselves heard, a Bhulter opened here, or 
 a door there, and the scared face of a man peered timidly into the 
 street. 
 
 Many a late-comer piessed into the deep embrasure of some gate,, 
 upon the approach ot the watchman, or availed himself of the 
 shallow cast by some overhanging wall. 
 
 Like the breast of him who scales the Alps, a mysterious some- 
 thing checked oppressively the i)ulsations ot the stirring city. 
 
 On this night of the year 891 after the biith ot our Saviour, an 
 eldeily man was seen gliding along close by the houses in a narrow 
 street that took its course from the harbor ITibotas. 
 
 He was plainly but respectably dressed, and, with liead beni over, 
 looked sometimes straight ahead, and Eomttimes sideways. If a 
 sentry approached, he drew back into the shadow. 
 
 Without being a thief, he had his own reasons for getting out of 
 the soldier's way, tor this very day both natives and foreigners 
 had been strictly forbidden to appear upon the streets after the clos- 
 ing ot the port. 
 
 He stopped before a large house, the long, windowless wall of 
 which stretched along inhospitably between two cross streets. 
 I'ausing before its gieat middle gate, he read by the dim light of a 
 lantern this inscription: 
 
 " Ti> the Martyr. Opened l)y his widow, Maria, to all those who 
 uccd ii shelter, ' He who gives to the poor, lends to the Lord, ' " 
 
i. SEllAl'lS. 
 
 " At wlijxt per cent?" rnultered the. old man; and a derisive smile 
 crossed bis beardless lipf?. 
 
 Tliestioke of the knoekcr echoed sharply Ihronuli the quiet street, 
 tind after a lew i)riet qiiestious troiii willuii, and ju&t as stuleulious 
 answcis from svithoiit, a little door iu.«iilc the .u;reat gate operied. 
 
 The old man made a movement as though he would p.nceed 
 straightway across the outer court, but a human being crept up to 
 him on all fours just like an animal, seized firm hold of his ankle, 
 and calleil out in a grufit voice: 
 
 " Is'ot till the gate is ^iut. Pay your money! It is for the poor, 
 you know I" 
 
 The old man threw the doorkeeper a copper coin. Ife quickly 
 pocketed it, and then, calchinirin his hand the end of the rope wilii 
 •which he was tied, like a chained dog, to lhe|X)st, he addressed this 
 question to the other: " ]No wet thing for a Christian?" 
 
 "It has not rained for a longtime," ran the answer, and un- 
 hindered now, the night-arrival opened a second door, and entered 
 an immensely large court, above which arched the blue canopy of 
 the skies. 
 
 A few torches on the pillars and some little fires on the ground, 
 here blendi'd their pale and flickering litcht with tiie pure si)lendor 
 of the stars. The almosphcre of the whole place was heavy wjlli 
 vapor, made up of smoke, mingled with the odors of freshly cooked 
 viands. 
 
 Even out upon the street the old man had heard a confused buz- 
 zing, roaring, and surging of sound; now there burst upon him a 
 loud chishing of discordant tones. This emanated from some hun- 
 dreds »f men, with which the sirawcovered court was crowded; 
 here in groujis, there singly, were they sleeping, even snoring, while 
 others walked about, chatted or sung. 
 
 The inn was indeed full, and more than half of its modest guests 
 c.-nsistcd of monks, who had yesterday and the day before streamed 
 into the city by troops, from their various hermitages in the desert, 
 and in yet greater numbers from the monasteries in the city. Some 
 of I hem had stuck their heads together and were e;iruestly whisper- 
 ing to one another, Others disputed loudly, and with the psalm- 
 Hinging of a large group in the northerly coiner of the court mingled 
 quci-rly the "three," "four," "seven ' of the gand)kT, and the 
 voice of the vender, who offered to sell cheap bread, meat, and 
 onions. To that wall of the court which lay opposite the entrance, 
 was joined an open passage lined with doors on either hand. These 
 led into tlie chambers destined for houseless fauuliea with women 
 and children. 
 
 Into sui'h a chamber the old man stepped, and was gladly wel- 
 comed by a young man, who was carving a bit of reed for the 
 mouth piece of a double llute, and by a stalely matron. 
 
 The name of the newly-arrived was Knrnis, and he was the hi-ad 
 of a family of traveling minstrels, who had just reached Alexandria 
 yesterday fr()n\ Rome. Things went badly with him, foi. although 
 it is true that the lives ot liimseU and family had been rescued from 
 j)irates, escaping as they had done, in a boat, to the African coast, 
 the bag had been lost in which he carried the whole remains ol his 
 torluue. The young ship-owner, to whom he hacf been indebted 
 
SERAPIS. 5 
 
 for bis deliverance, had procured him fidmission lo the inn of his 
 nintlier, the widow Maria; l)ut lie hud not found this at all to his 
 iniud, and so, had set out as early as noonday to seek other quar- 
 ters. 
 
 "All in vain," cried he, as he wiped the sweat from his brow. 
 " I've chased after Medius through half the town. At last 1 came 
 up with him at the house of Posidonius, the wizard, for whom he 
 p!ays waitman. Behind the curtain there was to be singing. Cioss- 
 yrained Galimatias, but at llie same time old sages with flute ac- 
 companiment in the style of Olympus — not so bad either. Then 
 spirits were made to appear. A rare show, 1 can tell you! And 
 there was Medius in the thick of everything. 1 led the chorus and 
 sung something with them. And all I got by it, was a little stingy 
 bit of silver— pah! But quarters, free quarters here, are allowed to 
 nothing but owls. So much for law, that cursed law!" 
 
 While the older man was talking, the younger had exclianged a 
 cheorful and knowing look with the matron. Now he interrupteil 
 him and said in a (one of gladness: 
 
 " Make yourself easy, father, we know of something good in 
 store lor us." 
 
 " \'ou?" asked the old man, shrugging his shoulders incredu- 
 lously, while his wife placed before him a broiled chicken on a 
 stool that was meant to serve as a table. 
 
 " Yes, we, father, we," continued the son, laying down his knife. 
 " You know we made a vow to offer a sacrihce to Dionysius, when 
 we were delivered out of Die hands of ILose robbers; for he, too, 
 was once captured by piiales--and so we set out to find his temple. 
 Mother knew the way, but when we,— Dada, 1 mean, and 1 — " 
 
 " Wh — what?" interposed Karnis, who had just now caught 
 sight of the appetizing dish before him. " A whole ciiicken, a 
 chicken broiled in butter too, in a time of such trouble as this?" 
 
 Ihese last words were uttered iu angry and reproacnful tones, 
 but the matron laid her hand upon his shoulder and said, soothingly: 
 " We'll soon bring matters straight again. Not a sesterce is to be 
 earned by tormenting one's self. Let us enjoy the present, and leave 
 the gods to care for the morrow 1" 
 
 " Well," said Karnis, in altered tones, " if it must be that cocks 
 oi- hens fly at a body's throat instead of a dried-up little bird there — 
 But you are right, Herse, now as always. Only— only— here am I 
 feasted like u senator and you— you. 1 bet j^ou have drunk noth- 
 ing but milk and eaten with it plain bread and radishes. Is that 
 lightV hy this means the chicken turns pheasant, 1 do believe, 
 and j'ou, old woman, take this leg. Are the girls asleep already? 
 Wny, here is wine, too. Hold out your glass, my son! Pour me 
 out 10 the gods! A libation to Dionysius!" 
 
 Both poured a small libation upon the floor and drank. Then the 
 old man thrust his knife into the breast of the fowl and ate with 
 full enjoyment, while Orpheus— interrupted as he Mas by many a 
 question— continued his narration. 
 
 " Tile temple of Dionysius was not to be found, for Bishop 
 Theopliilus had had it pulled down. To what divinity now should 
 tliey offer ilu? wealth and tlie cakes? Being in Egypt of course to 
 the motherly Isis. Her sanctuary lay on Lake Mcerio, and mother 
 
6 SERAPIS. 
 
 had soon found it again. There slie happened to get into conversa- 
 lion with a priestess, and no sooner had she let fall that liiey — for 
 llerse had been cautious enough in nuikinj; this conimuuic.alion — 
 tiiat they belonged to a family of singers who had come to make 
 their living in Alexandria, than the priestess brought up to them a 
 young lady, closely vpiled." 
 
 " This iady," continued Orpheus, the son of Karnis, whose pait 
 It was sometimes to sing tenor, sometimes to play the llute, and oc- 
 casionally to harp on the lyre, " then invited us to come to her 
 house later, and confer with her about various Ihiugs. Whe drove 
 oil in an elegant carriage, and of coarse we were failhtul to our 
 appointment. Acnes was with us too. A magnificent house it 
 was! Nothing handsomer have we seen either at Rome or Anlioch. 
 We were welcomed in friendly fashion too, and introduced besides 
 to a right old lady, and then a tall, grave gentleman, a priest, 1 
 think, a philosopher, or something of the sort." 
 
 " No Christian trap, you are sure?" asked Karnis susi^iciously. 
 " You do not know this town, and since that law— '•' 
 
 " Rest easy, father! There were statues of tlie gods in the halls 
 antl corridors, and in (he apartment, where the fairGorgo, daughter 
 ol the rich merchant Porphyrins, received us — we know now who 
 the father of the young cirl is, and many another thing besides — the 
 sacrificial stone beneath the statue of Isis was quite freshly anointed. 
 The philosopher asked us too, whether we knew that Theodosius 
 had published a new law, which forbids a maiden to appear in 
 public, either for singing or playing on the flute." 
 
 " And did Agues hear that?" asked the old man with subdued 
 voice, pointing to the curtain, 
 
 " She was with Dada in the garden, upon which the apartment 
 opened, but mother confessed that the girl was a Christian, although 
 of good stock, and berause she is in our service, pledged to sing 
 with us. Then the philosopher exclaimed to the fair Gorgo: ' F«ir- 
 tunate!' Then the pair whispered together, the girls were sum- 
 moned, and had to show oH what they "could do." 
 
 " And how did it turn out?" queried the old man, and his eye 
 began to grow animated. 
 
 " Dada trolled like a lark, and Agnes!— well, how shall 1 begin 
 to tell you? lou can easily imagine, though Ifer voice sounded 
 lovely, but just the same as it always does. One divines its quality 
 and compass if ever allowed to come out fully. What has she to 
 complain oi in our service? Yet every souiui that passes her lips 
 acquires that tinge ol melancholy, against which you even have been 
 able to do nothing at all. As for the rest she pleased better than 
 Dada. for 1 noted'well tliat Gorgo and the ])hilosopher had ej-es for 
 her only, and that when they exchanged glances and low words of 
 approval, they evidenily referred to Agnes. After llie second song 
 the young lady came forward, praised the girls, and asked it we 
 would trust ourselves to learn a iiew song. 1 said my fatlier is a 
 ereat master, who understands the most difficult thing at fust hear- 
 ing." 
 
 " The mo9t dilHcult thing, did you say? Eh? Hum! Depend 
 upon tliat!" smirked the old man. " Did she show you tiie notes?" 
 
 " No, it was something akin to Jiinus, and slie sung it tor us." 
 
SEEAPIS. 7 
 
 " So Ibc dauglitei ot the lich Porphyrias treated you to a song? 
 You?" laughecTKarnis. "Zounds! How the world turns round. 
 Since female singers are no longer to appear before refined 
 audiences, Art will reveal herself in a reversed position. She will 
 not be put down. In future the hearer will be paid for keeping still, 
 and the singer purchase the riglit of putting him to the torture. Our 
 earn, our poor ears will be the victims!" 
 
 Orpheus shook his head, smiling at this outburst of sentiment, 
 again threw down his knife, and eagerly interposed: "Only hear 
 her, and just so certainly as that I am youi son, you will give away 
 your last copper to hear her again!" 
 
 " That might be!" growled the old man. " Yes, there are mas- 
 ters here too. Did you say that she sung Linus?" 
 
 " Something very like. It was a dirge of striking power, 
 
 " ' Come back, beloved, oh come 1 
 To thy deserted home l' 
 
 was a refrain continually recurring. And there was one place 
 where these words came in : 
 
 " ' Oh, that a month had every tear, 
 To joiu with me and call thee nearP 
 
 Ah ! how she wailed forth that lament, father. 1 think that in all 
 my li'e 1 never heard anything lilie it. Just ask mother! Even 
 Dada's eyf^s did not keen dry." 
 
 " Yes, it was glorious," assented the matron. " I kept wishing 
 that you could only have been there!" 
 
 Karnis rose to his feet, and as he restlessly paced np and down 
 the room, moving his arms vehemently, he kept talking to himself: 
 " So then, so. A friend of the muses she is. The large lute was 
 saved. Good, good. My chlamys, hum, this dirty hole here! If 
 the girls were not asleep— but to-morrow bright and early Agnes is 
 to— Is she tall? Is she beautiful?" 
 
 Dame Herse had contentedly followed with her eyes her easily 
 excited husband, and now joined in his talk. " No "Venus, no muse, 
 assuredly not! She is hardly ot medium height, prettily formed and 
 yet not diminutive. Black eyes, long eyelashes, brows that meet in 
 the middle. 1 could hardly call her beautiful, as Oipheus does." 
 
 "Well, well, mother," cried he, "1 know that beautiful is a 
 strong word which father has taught me to use charily; but she — 
 what could be called beautiful, it not she, when she opened those 
 large, black eyes of hers and threw back her head as she poured forth 
 that lament? Each tone came from the very depths of her heart, to 
 scale as it were the heights of heaven. Y'es, if Agnes could learn that 
 from her ! ' Throw your whole soul into what you sing. ' A thousand 
 times have 1 heard you repeat that direction, tliat and only tnat. She, 
 Gorgo, does that very thmg. And how she stood there! Bent like 
 a bow ! Each note was a telling arrow; each one struck right at the 
 very heart, and each was pure, spotlessly pure." 
 
 "Hush, hush!" exclaimed the old man, stopping his ears. "1 
 can not close my eyes, until it is light— and then! Take that silver 
 there, Orpheus; all, all, I have no 'more. Go early to market, buy 
 laurel, ivy, violets and roses; but no lotus llowers of which the mar- 
 
» SETIAPIS. 
 
 ket hore is lull. Pretentious tliing-s without perfume; 1 ran not 
 bear liiein. We go crowned into llie temple of tlie muses." 
 
 " JS'olliiug but Ituy, buy!" laughed llerse, showius lier husband 
 some pieces ot shiaiug gold. " This we got to-day, ami if all goes 
 as it shoidd do—" here she paused, pointing to "the curtain/and 
 continued witli lowered voice: " Everything depends upon Agues 
 not failing us." 
 
 " How so? Wherefore? She is a good airl and I'll — " said 
 Kainis, walking toward the back pait of the room. 
 
 "No, no," warned Ilerse, holding him back. " She does not 
 know yet the point in question. She is to sing with tnat noble 
 young lady — " 
 
 " Well?" 
 
 " She is to sing with her in the sanctuary of Isis." 
 
 Karnis turned pale, aul utterly disconcerted, as though awakened 
 from a brilliant dream, to be thrust back into a wretched reality ; 
 he inquired anxiously: " In the temple of Isis? Agnes? Before 
 everybody? And she knows nothing about it?" 
 
 " No, father." 
 
 " No? Then indeed, then — The Christian Agnes in the temple 
 ot Isis, and that here — here where Theophiliis, the l)ishop, tears 
 down sanctuaries, and the monks go further than their master. 
 Children, children, how round and many-tinted are anap-bubbles, 
 but how soon they burst! Do you know what you have bcl'oie 
 you? If the black flies get scent ot it and it comes to iiuht, then, 
 by the great Apollo, then had it been better tor us to have fa'lca 
 into the clulclies of those pirates. And yet, and j'et! If 1 only 
 knew liow llie girl — " 
 
 " She wept at the lady's singing," interposed Ilerse, eagerly, 
 " and as little prone to speak as she is, this time she said, on our 
 wa}^ home, ' Oh! to be able to sing like that liappy maiden!" " 
 
 Again Karnis straightened himself up, and exclaimed, with re- 
 newed confidence: " There spoke my Agnes. Yes, yes, she too 
 loves the divine art! she sings, she will sins;; we'll risk it! Evrn 
 tiiouoh it imperils my lite, yours, nay, that of us all. Ilerse and 
 Orpheus, what is there for us to lose? Out gods, too, would have 
 their martyrs! Poor life, it is without a charm. Our art Irom (ir-t 
 to last has had all that 1 possessed. 1 hoast not of having deilieatrd 
 it to her; and now should 1 once more inherit fullness of land ami 
 vveulth, 1 would become a begsiar again to do her a pleasure. We 
 have always held her sacred; but wlio could help despaiiiug, when 
 he sees how th^y persecute heaven's majestic dauchter? !She is no 
 longer endured but in darkness, and the princess ot gods and men 
 must now hide herself and shun thp lisjlit, like a salamander, a 
 mole, or an owl. If we must die, let it be with and for her! Once 
 more let pure, genuine music refresh this old htart. and then if — 
 children, children! We belong not to this pale, dull world. So 
 long as the arts lived it was spring tipon earih! Now ilie\- are sen- 
 tenced to death, and winter is here. The leaves fall front the trees, 
 and yet we twittering birds need their foliage, in whicii lo sing. 
 Ilow often ah-eady has de.atii laid liis hand tq)on our shouldeis? 
 Every breath that we draw is only a gift of grace, the over and 
 above that ti-c weaver throws in lor good measure, the last brief 
 
SERAPIS. 9 
 
 hour (Iiat (lie oxccutioner nllows the coutleinned criminal. Life be- 
 longs to us no more; it has become a borrowed purse, full of rusty 
 coppers. The hard creditor already crooks his finger at our door, 
 rnc"enioymeni;'M«.'. l*".'' m^neve is ended. One more true, genu- 
 be ilius. ' "" ^ capital, and interest, if it must 
 
 "Soil must not and will not be!" interposed Herse, u^^.^.^...j , 
 drawing her hand across her eyes. " It Agues sings, if she does it 
 without compulsion and ot her own accord, then no bishop can pun- 
 ish us." 
 
 " He can not, and dare not!" cried the old man, "There are 
 laws and judges yet. 
 
 " And iaoriro's house," added Orpheus, "is as respectable as it 
 is rich. Porphyrius has the pover to protect us; and you do not 
 know how well we pleased them. Ask mother about it!" 
 
 " It is like a fairy-tale," chimed in Herse, with her sou's words. 
 " Before we left, the old lady drew me aside (she must be eighty 
 years old, or thereabout), and asked me where we were staying, 
 Theu i told her at the inn of Maria, the widow, and no sooner had 
 she licard this than slie struck her stall against the floor, and asked, 
 'Do you like it there?' to this 1 said, 'Mo,' emphatically, adding 
 that we must seek an abode elsewhere." 
 
 " Kiglit, right!" cried Karuis, " Those monks in the court yon- 
 der would kill us as though we were rats it they heard us practic- 
 ing pagan songs." 
 
 '" 1 touched upon that; but the old lady would not let me finish 
 what 1 was saying, but drew me closer to herself, and whispered 
 warmly, ' Just do as my grandchild wishes, and your livelihood is 
 secured; and this is lor to-day!' So saying, she dived into the 
 purse at her girdle, pressed these gold pieces into mf hand, aud said, 
 so loud that the others must have beard, ' Fifty of my own if Gorgo 
 pronounces herself satisfied with you!' " 
 
 "Fifty gold pieces!" exclaimed Karnis, clapping his hands. 
 "That freshens up the pnle colors of life considerably. Fifty, then, 
 are certain. If we siug six times, there is a talent, and witn that I 
 can buy back our old vineyard at Leontium. 1 shall restore the lit- 
 tle Odeum— they bave converted it into a stable— and if we sin* 
 there, just let the monks come if they will! 'i ou laugh! Fools 
 that you are! 1 should like to see anybody hinder my singing under 
 my own vine aud tig-tree. A talent of gold! That will fully pay 
 its price; aud 1 shall not strike the bargain, unless they throw in the 
 necessary number of slaves and cattle. Castles in the air, you 
 thiuk? But only bear: a hundred gold pieces are at le:ist assured 
 to us—" 
 
 While this loud talk was going on, the curtain had been gently 
 moved aside, and the feeble light of the small lamp that stood before 
 Orpheus fell full upon a little head, that was sutticiently charming, 
 even in its present disordered condition, A profusion of fair hair, 
 done up in curling papers, stood up saucily all around her head, and 
 fell over her forehead; her eyes were still half closed from sheer 
 weariness, but her little mouth was already quite wide awake, and 
 laughed in all the wantonness of happy, jiresumptuous youth. 
 
 Karuis continued, without oVjserving his new auditor, to enlargo 
 
10 SEllAPIS. 
 
 upon his hope of oarninp; the means tor buying hack his lost estale; 
 and now Ihe young girl tlrew tlie curtain .;loser up to tier neck, 
 slretclicd hiT round left arm far out, and called out beseechingly: 
 
 " Good father Kiirnis, please give me a little bit ot your weultb— 
 just live poor drachms!" _,^ ,„,i ,iie very next instant 
 
 The smger.stiirtej]^.V-'irf {Jie""tone of a «ood-natuied fault-tinder. 
 ^*'T5ack to bed, you good-for-nothing thing! What you have to do 
 is to sleep, not listen." 
 
 " fcsleep?" asked the girl. " And you shouting here like an orator 
 who is talking against the wind. Five drachms, father. 1 must 
 insist on that! A pretty ribbon for me will cost one, and there's 
 another for Agnes just as well. For two drachms, enough wine can 
 be bought for us all; and that would make five." 
 
 " Four they make, j'ou fine reckoner," laughed the old man. 
 
 " Four?" queried Dada, looking as much amazed as if the moon 
 had fallen out ot the sky. " Yes, if I only had a counting-board! 
 Five, then, papa, five!" 
 
 *' No, four, and have them you shall," replied the sinj,'er. " Plu- 
 lus knocks at our door, and to-morrow morning eaily you shall 
 both be crowned." 
 
 " Yes, indeed, with violets, ivy, and roses," added her mother. 
 " is Agnes asleep^' 
 
 " Like somebody dead. That is always the way with her, unless 
 when she lies there like a distracted person, with e^'es wide open the 
 livelong night. ^Ve were both so tirel, and I a"m so yet. That 
 yawn did me good. Only see how 1 am sitting!" 
 
 " On the chest?" exclaimed Herse. 
 
 " Yes: and the curtain gives way so against my back. Fortun- 
 ately, when people nod they alwavs bend forR-ard." 
 
 " How is that, though; you had a bed apiece," said the matron, 
 pushing her dausrhter before her into the sleeping room, and follow- 
 ing the girl tjehind the curtain. 
 
 In a few minutes she returned to the men and said: " That is just 
 Dada. Little Papias had slid off the chest on which he was lying, 
 and now the good thing has put him in her bed, and taken her place 
 on the chest, tired as she was." 
 
 " She would give the last thing she had to that boy," said Karnis. 
 " P>ut it is past midnight. Come, Orpheus, let us fix up ilie bed'^!" 
 
 Three long hen-baskets, which had been piled one upon the other 
 bv the wall, were soon placed on tiie floor and covered with mats. 
 They recfiived these wearj^ people; but not one ot them could sleep. 
 
 The little lamp was put out, and for about an hour all was quiet 
 ill the gloomy room. But tlien there was a terrible stir. An elastic 
 olijfct flew whirring at the wall, and ihcieupon Karnis called out, 
 " Away with thee, fiend!" 
 
 " Wiiat's the matter?" asked Herse, who had gotten up in her 
 fright: and the old man returned eneriretically, "A demon, a dog 
 ot a demon is besetting me, and leaves me no rest. Hold, you 
 scoundrel, maybe this will hit j^ou." 
 
 Bo saying, lie threw another sandal through the air. and then 
 Went on panting, without paying any heed to the rustling sound 
 of some object that he had acuideulally struck: " the trickish gob- 
 
SERAPIS. 1 1 
 
 lin will not lot me alone. It knows that, we need Agnes' voice, 
 and now wliispers, sometimes iu one ear, and then into the other, 
 that 1 must threaten her with selling hei little brother if she reluses; 
 ))ui l_l_strilie a light. Orpheus! The girl is a good one; and be- 
 fore 1 would commit such an evil deed — " 
 
 " The demon has been with me, too," said the younger singer, 
 as he blew upcn the glowing coals. 
 
 "And with me, too," added Herse with shame. " Ot course, 
 there is not an image of a single god in this Christian sty. Away 
 with thee, horrid reptile! AVe are honorable people, and give in to 
 no rascally proceedings. There, you have my amulet, husband, 
 and if the-xlemon comes back, you must turn it, you know how." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Early on the following morning the minstrels were on their way 
 to tire house ot the rich Porphyrins. The family was not complete, 
 for Dada had been obliged to stay at home. The old man's sboe 
 which had been hurled against the demon, had pulled the girl's 
 freshly- washed dress dowulrom a pole, near the hearth, and iu the 
 morning it had been fouad lying in the ashes with several great holc$ 
 burned in it. 
 
 Dada did not own another good gown, and so, in spite of her im- 
 patient refusal, and many tears, she had to remain behind with 
 little Papias. 
 
 Agues' earnest desire to fake her place in attending to the boy, 
 and to lend her a dress ot hers had been peremptorily declined; and 
 then Dada, at first quietly and good-naturedly, birt very soon in all 
 cheerfulness, had set to work helping the others. She wove wreaths 
 for the rest, and a garland ot violets, and ivy sprigs to twine in 
 Agnes' smooth, dark hair. 
 
 TJie men had already anointed themselves, and put on crowns of 
 poplar and laurel, when Porphyrins' steward appeared, tor the pur- 
 pose of conducting them to his master's house. Already they had 
 to exercise self-denial, tor the messenger induced them to lay aside 
 their garlands, because they would excite the ill-will ot the monks 
 in the court, and might provoke to violence the Christian populace 
 outside. 
 
 One illusion thus dispelled, Karnis had set forth with a heart as 
 downcast as before it had been joyous and confident of victory. 
 
 Tbe monks, who had crowded together in front ot the inn, looked 
 at him and his family with unfriendly, suspicious glances, and the 
 joyfirl anticipation with which he had looked forward to the day 
 would not curiae back to him, so long as he must needs force his 
 way through the crowds that thronged the narrow lanes lining the 
 liarbor, which were dismal and dark, and smelled of tar and salted 
 fisii. The steward took the lead, with Dame Herse, and with 
 volubility gave her any information she asked. 
 
 His master, he said, was one of the chief merchants in the city, 
 and had lost Ids wife about twenty years ago, at Gorgo's birth. His 
 two sons were, at present, away on their travels. The very old 
 lady, who had yesterday displayed such generosity toward the 
 
12 SERA PIS. 
 
 eingcrs was Damia, Porphyrins' mother. She had control of a 
 large property' of her own, and in spite of her great age still main- 
 tained her reputation as tlie presidinii: genius of her household, and 
 a woman deeply learned in occult science. 
 
 J\laria, the pious Christian, whose inn was dedicated " to the 
 martyr." had been married to Apelles, the brother ot Porphyrins, 
 but had become wholly estranged from brother and mother-in-law. 
 This was natural enough, as she stood at the head of the believing 
 women of Alexandria, and the house of Porphyrins, in spite of its 
 niastei's baptism, was as well inclined to paganism as any in the 
 city. 
 
 Karnis heard nothing of all this, lor, between himself and his 
 wife walked two slaves, bearing the musical instruments of tlie 
 minstrels, and in front of them, Orpheus and Agnes. She kept hei 
 ej'es constanll.v fixed on the ground, as (hough she would shut out 
 all consciousness of her surroundings. If Orpheus asked her a 
 question, however, she shyly looked up, and answered briefly and 
 with embarrassment. 
 
 Following a gloomy passage, the party soon reached the canal, 
 which iinited the harbor Kibotiis with Lake Mocris, where ancliored 
 the ships of the Kile. Karnis tireathcd more freely, for here it was 
 open and light, a gentle north wind bore the refreshing sea-breeze 
 toward him, and the slim palm-trees on tlie sides of the street, edg- 
 ing the water, threw long shadows over the bread road below, that 
 was teaming with motley life, while the full crowns of the syca 
 mores made'sharlows that were broad and deep. Birds sung on every 
 limb, and the aged singer drank in, with deep inspirations, the 
 woudrously light and spicy breath of an Egyptian spring morn- 
 ing. 
 
 When he had reached the middle of a high-arched bridge, that 
 spanned the canal, he suddenly paused, and gazed toward the 
 south-east, like one spell-bound. 
 
 Possessed by a deep enthusiasm, he threw up his arms, the fire 
 and brilliancy ot youth returned to his glistening eyes, and— as was 
 always the case when a glorious work of God or man filled his 
 heart with rapture — unbidden, there arose before bis soul the image 
 of his deceased eldest son, between whom and himself had existed 
 a perfect conc,eniality of spirit. 
 
 Soon it seemed to him as though his arm rested upon the shoulder 
 of tiie early-deceased young man, who far surpassed his second 
 quieter son Or])heus in ideality, and as thouL^h i)e were enjoying in 
 communion with him the grand prospect that lay outstretched be- 
 fore him. 
 
 Upon foundations of solid clill and rock rose up before him an 
 edifice of wondrous size and beauty. 
 
 It, was gorgeously illuminated by the morning sunshine, and its 
 noble outlines in the sheen of many a hue seemed actually to blaze 
 in dazzling splendor. Above its gilded cupola extended the un- 
 dimmed azure of an African sky. and like tlie sun in the firmament 
 the lofty, lustrous dome sent forth glittering rays. Carriage-ways 
 and rows of steps for devout pedestrians led uji to it. 
 
 riie su')slruclure, which sustained this maivelous workot human 
 hands, ri/,., the tein{)li> of the god Serapis, was laid as firmly as 
 
SKRAriS. 13 
 
 though for eternity, and the columns in its vestibule supported the 
 roof of a structure which seemed destined for the grandeur of 
 heavenly beings rather than for tlie insignificance of mortals. 
 
 Like children sporting under the tall'trees of an immense forest, 
 priests and worshipers moved about beneath them. 
 
 Upon the projections of the roof, in hundreds of niches, and upon 
 numberless prominent parts, all the gods of Olympus, all the heroes 
 and sages of Greece, seemed to have been convened, and here greeted 
 the comer in shining brass, there in beautifully painted marble. 
 
 Gold and a brilliant display of color shone down from all quarters 
 of this structure, and the effect in its entity was like a beautiful 
 choral song from the capacious chest of some benevolent giant. 
 
 " Hail! high ^erapis! Gladly, humbly do I greet thee. 1 thank 
 thee, that it 1s permitted these old eyes once more to behold thy 
 divine, everlastina; house!" murmured Karnis, reverentially, to 
 himself. Then he called his wife and son, pointed silently to the 
 temple, and when he sa<v how Orpheus' eyes hung in awed and 
 silent rapture upon the glorious forms of the Serapeum, he Cidled 
 out with fervor: " N'ohle fortress of the King of Gods, lofty 
 Serapis! We see here no work of a day. Its past covers half a 
 century, its future eternity! Yes, yes, tiiere she stands, and while 
 she abides in such glory the old gods are not yet vanquished." 
 
 "INobody touches that building," chimed'in the steward, "for 
 every child in Alexandria knows that the doom of tiie world is 
 sealed just so soon as they lay hands on it, and whoever profanes 
 the venerated—" 
 
 " It protects itself," interposed the singer. " But you, ye Chri* 
 tian hypocrites, who pretend to hate life and love death, it you long 
 so after the end of all things, set yourselves in array against this 
 prodigy! Just set to! set to!" 
 
 The old man shook his fist in the face of an invisible foe. hut 
 Herse repeated after him passionately: " Set to, set to!" and then 
 continued more composedly: " If everything comes to naught, the 
 enemies of the gods will perish with us; and since at the same time 
 there is an endlo all that is beautiful and all that we love, that can 
 not frighten us!" 
 
 "Make yourself easy!" replied the steward. " The bishop had 
 already stretched out his hand against this sanctuary, but the great 
 Olympius stayed the hands of these desecrators of holj'' things, and 
 they had to withdraw with bloody heads. Our Serapis is not to be 
 trifled with. He remains, whatever else may pass away. ' Eternity,' 
 says the priest, ' is with him as alittla minute, and when nullions ot 
 the generations ot men have faded away, he will be ever the same 
 as to-day.' " 
 
 " Hail! Hail to the exalted godl" called out Orpheus, extend- 
 ing his hands toward the temple. 
 
 " Yes, hail! hail to him the imperishable!" echoed his lather. 
 " Great is Serapis! His house and his images will last — " 
 
 " Until the moon is full again!" interrupted a passer-by, taking 
 «p his words in bitter mockery, and shaking his fist threateningly 
 at the temple. 
 
 Orpheus turned to chastise this prophet of evil; but he had quick 
 ly been lost in the crowd that surged onward in an unceasing tlow 
 
It SERAPIS. 
 
 " Until \ho. moon is full aRain!" miirmurert Agnes, who, like the 
 proplict (){ evil, hiid shuddered at Orpheus' eulliusiaslic outburst. 
 Tlieii she ciisi a troubled jihiuce upon the young singer, and yet 
 wlien llerse turned uud lool^ed at lier a few minutes later, the ex- 
 pression ot her features had altered, and the matron could rejoice 
 in the iiappy smile that played about her lips. Many a young Alex- 
 andiian. too, who passed by the stiangers, both on loot and in car- 
 riages, looked around after her, for that smile lent to her pale, seri- 
 ous count' nance a mysterious chaim. And it clung to her still 
 after she had left the bridge, and approached tlie shoies of the lake, 
 for when a pleasant thought had once nestled in her bosom, long 
 was it fostered tiieie; and now as she moved along in the brilliant 
 light ot morning sunshine, there arose before her inner eye tlie full 
 mnon in the niglitly sky, slie saw the downfall of the huge idol, and 
 over the ruins ot the marble temple an unconfjuerable, shining host 
 Aiiostles and martyrs were in the throng, the blessed and glorious 
 Hedeenier led the van, and ui the light clouds that encircled him 
 floated l)right angels sinking glorious songs that were distinctly 
 audii)le toiler inner ear in the midst of tlie confusing hubbub ot 
 that liusy jiort. 
 
 Not until she was summoneci to take her place in a boat were 
 lhe*e visions dispelled. 
 
 llerse had originally come from Alexandria, and Karnis had 
 spcni some delightful years here; but lo Orpheus and Agnes all 
 was novel; anil so soon as they had escaped from the loud din of 
 the mullilude that had so distressed her, even the Christian began to 
 take an interest in her surroundings, and now and then addressed a 
 question to tlie old singer. The younger man had not eyes enouglx 
 for seeing, and indeed, there was many a thing here to evoke ad- 
 miration. 
 
 Therp lay the great water-gates at the entrance of the canal, that 
 joined the" lake to the sea; tliere in an especial harbor rocked the 
 stately, imperial fleet of the Nile, whose ships had to maintain the 
 communication between lie garrison of Alexandria and the upper 
 and lower Nile; there basked the gorgeously ornate vessels, that 
 weie at the disposal of the comes, the prefecl, and other high offi- 
 cials; finally, there lay at anchor merchantmen of every size in 
 countless nrultiludts. Like immense Hocks of birds fluttering over 
 ;i corn-field, long rows ot sails in every color floated above the 
 gently undulating surface of the mirror-like hike. Every inch <>t 
 the land edging iis shoies had been built upon and utilized. To 
 the siMith, .s'trelching far away in the distance, were seen long rows 
 ot 8epaliers, niakinL'' ricli vineyards, witli the shimmering ot bluish- 
 green foliage, that told of boundless olive-groves, and liedges of 
 slender-stemmed palm-trees, whose crowns combined to form a 
 lieautituliy arched canopy oveihead. 
 
 White garden walls, many colored temples, chapels, and villas 
 Rhone lorth Irom the gicen iiackground; and there was, as it were, 
 the Hashing of diamonds, wheii the oblique rays of the sun teli 
 at h wait the drops of water that were kept in unceasing jilay by the 
 p(!rpetual rotation of w,iter- wheels and buckets. Water-works of 
 artisti<; construction, many of them devised and .set in moiion liy the 
 greatest scientists, had been the weapons with whicli man liad com- 
 
SEUAris. 15 
 
 pplled llie dcpert, flmt orijiinally encompassed Ibis lake, to deck 
 herself in green, and now reward him for his seed vvitii harvest and 
 fruit. Every trace ot a wilderness hereabout had been lost for huu- 
 drtds ot years. The generous Dionysiiis and lavish gods of llic 
 garden hud blessed the diligent hand of man, and yet, on many- 
 estates, yea, on all that belonged to Christians, their images lay 
 crushed and trampled on the ground. 
 
 J low many changes had taken place in the course ot lliirty years, 
 and none agreeable, according to this old man's view, llerse, loo. 
 shook her head trequently, and when the oarsman had measured 
 about halt !he distance, she pointed to a liroad, bare spot on the 
 shore, wlieiea new election was already rearing itself, big i aljove 
 its foundations, and called out to her husband. In melancholy tones: 
 
 " r^o you recognize that spot? What has become of our dear old 
 temple of DionysiusV" 
 
 At these words, Kamis rose up po quickly and suddenly that the 
 boat threatened to turn over, and the steward had to urge upon hiui 
 the necessity f^r keeping motionless; but he gave podr heed to this 
 warning, for liis arms were still waving wildly, as he cried out tc 
 him: 
 
 " Think you, that in Egypt here, people must turn to mummies 
 while they are still alive? Let somebody else keep quiet! It is 
 shameful, vile; enough to make a dove even swell wilii rage! That 
 clorious editice, the ornament of the city, the joy ot mankind, 
 swept from creation, blown away, like the dust ot llie streets. See! 
 Do you see! Shattered columns, marble, limbs, here, there, every- 
 where, at the oottom of the lake! This head, that torso! Inspired 
 by the gi'ds, creat masters have fashioned them, and they, tlie piti- 
 ful, ignoble creatures, possessed hy evil demons, have laid them in 
 ruins. They have buried under water what was wor-thy to have 
 lived forever. Why? Would you know? Because they shun the 
 beautitul, as the owls do light. Yes, they, they! Nothing do they 
 fear and hale so much as'beauty. Wherever she shows hei'self 
 they crush her down, though come direct from the hand of deity. 
 Before the immortals 1 arraign them; for what has become of the 
 grove— surely plained by lieaven; not man— our grove with its cool 
 grottoes, its trees of immemorial date, its shady recesses, and all 
 the pleasure and delight of which it was as full as the ripe berry of 
 sweet juice?" 
 
 " An' it please yorr it was uprooted," interposed the steward. 
 " The emperor presented the sanctuary to Bishop Theupliilus, and 
 he devoted it to instant destruction. The temple was demolished, 
 the sacred utensils melted up, and the images mocked at before 
 they were cast into lime kilns. The house over there is a Chrii^tian 
 church. Think of the airy, bright-hued colonnades of other days, 
 and then look at that dismal barn growing up in their place!" 
 
 " Why do the gods suffer it? Has Zeus lost his thunderbolts?" 
 asked Orpheus, clinching his fist, without paying any heed to 
 Agnes, who sat there, pale, and reticent, since the conversation had 
 taken that turn. 
 
 "He slumbers, to rouse up again with more dreadful power," le- 
 plied the old man. 
 
 " Oh, the broken marbles, the luiiia down there! A quck art, 
 
16 SEUAl'lS. 
 
 tli;il o( the di'Stroycr! Men liave Insl their senses ami put up wllli 
 the cMiiie. The}' liavc cast, into tlie water ami oven wlial enrapl- 
 ured the koiIs. Prudent, prudent, and wise! Tlie tisli and Ihinies 
 are mute, and eim not lift u]) a plaint, A hloud-hound, a single 
 hour sullices to bring to naught wiial it has taken exalted niind.s 
 and centuries to create. To lay waste and destroy is their boast, but 
 a temple such as tlie one thiit stood tliere can be restored just as 
 little as a grove, with its trees six hundred years old. jjook there! 
 Do you see, llerse? There, in yon ])il, wheie those black fellows 
 are mixing lime — they have put on shirts, because even the fine 
 form i-f the huniiin body is baleful to tbeiu — theie wiis the grotto, 
 where we tound your poor father agiiin." 
 
 " Tlie giotto?" echoed the matron, gazing shoreward with moist- 
 ened eyes, as she thought of that day when the feast of Dionysius 
 was being celebrated, and she, as a young girl, bad liastened to the 
 temple of' the gods searching lor her (alher. He had been a skill- 
 ful lapidary, and in honor of that god's festival, in accordance 
 with an old Alexandrian custom, had intoxicated himself with 
 sweet wine, and gone out upon the street to join in the Dionysiaa 
 procession. When, however, he did not come home the next morn- 
 ing, and both noon and evening found liim still absent, his daugh- 
 ter had set forth to look for him. Karnis, at that time, had been a 
 wealthy young student, and, as a boarder, had occupied ihe best 
 rooms in her father's house. He had met her on her dif^cult er- 
 rand, and had been kindly ready to aid her in her search; and they 
 had found her missing parent, in an ivy-wreathed grollo, in Diony- 
 sius' grove, cold and motionless, as though struck down by light- 
 ning. The by -slanders had supposed that the god had entranced 
 his votary. 
 
 During these dark hours Kainis had stood her friend, and a few 
 months later she ha<t given him her hfuid in marriaue, and, as his 
 wife, accompanied him to his home at Tauromenium, in iSiciiy. 
 
 All this now passed before her soul, and her husband, too, looked 
 down silently and moodilv inio the wti r, for each spot that lias 
 witnessed some important crisis in our life's history, if .seen again 
 after a long absence, has power to make the past live anew in Ihe 
 present. 
 
 All remained thus silent in the boat, until Orpheus touched his 
 father, and pointed out to him the temple of Isis, in which he had 
 yesterday met the beautiful young lady. 
 
 The old man turned his eyes upon that still uninjured shrine, 
 and said bitterly: 
 
 " A barbarous structure. Egpytian art has long since been a 
 thing of the dead, and the tiger may only devour the living " 
 
 " And yet Ibis .shrine is no such contemptible morsel," rejoined 
 the steward; " but it hangs too high for them, because Ihe ground 
 on which it stands belongs to our old mistress, and the law proiicls 
 private property. But later you must really look at the dock here. 
 There is priibal)ly not a greater one on the whole earlh. The wood 
 that is .vtaeked up there! Cedars of Lebanon, oak from I'onlus, 
 lruid<s of trees from Fjthiojiia, as heavy and hard as iron— they are 
 bald to be worth hundreds of talents." 
 
 " Ami does that too belong to your master'^' asked Kuiiiis. 
 
bEKAl'llS. 17 
 
 " Nn, liut llir owner ifc the <j;i;iri(]son of :i f rm iliiiaii of our house. 
 Tliey iiro now rich ami lespec'ablc peoiilc, and Master Clement sits 
 in the senate. Tliere he is, tliat man in the while robe." 
 
 " A Christian, 1 should thudi.," said the singer. 
 
 " To be sure," replied the steward. " IJut justice must be done, 
 lie U an honest, good man nevertheless. iStrict discipline is main- 
 tained both here and at the other dock, on the lake, in the liarbor 
 (A Eunostus. One thing, though, Clement can not let anybody en- 
 joy his own opinion. In this he is just lilie all the rest. ISIo matter 
 how niany slaves and workmen he buys or enrolls, he contrives to 
 nudie them all Christians, and his sons are precisely like the old 
 man. Conslantine, too, although he is an imperial officer, and as 
 spruce and spn' as the next one. As for us, we let everybody be- 
 lieve as they choose. Porphyrins makes no concealment of ids 
 views, and \"el the crowds of ships that we use in the corn trade arc 
 all built by'Chrisliaus. But here we are!" 
 
 The boat paused before a broad marble staircase that led up from 
 the lake into tiie garden of Porphyrins, andt'ie deeper Karuis pene- 
 trated into this, the more freely he breathed; for here, here, the old 
 divinities were at home. Their statues emerged resplendent from 
 theu- dark back-ground of evergreen shiubbery; they were udrrored 
 in clear pools, and sweet incense greeted the new-comers, from here 
 a garlanded altar, there, a freshly- anointed stone. 
 
 CHAPTER 111, 
 
 The minstrel family had met with a gracious reception in the 
 house of Porphyrins, but had not been called upon forthwith to 
 exercise their art ; tor, no sooner had old Damia learned that the 
 pretty, curly haired blonde, with whom she had been so much 
 pleased the day before, had been left behind in the mu of Maria, 
 than she had brougiit to Herse a robe of her granddaughter's, and 
 begged her to go back after the young girl. 
 
 Some slaves were to attend them and convey their luggage to 
 Porphyiius' Nile ship that lay at anchor before the dock. In this 
 stately vessel tliere were several rooms wbich had often received 
 guests ot the house, and were now to lodge Karnis and his fandly. 
 They seemed especially adapted to the use of musicians, for here 
 they could carry on their practicing undisturbed, and the ship was 
 at all hours accessible to Gorgo. 
 
 Ilerse had returned to the inn with lightened heart, her son had 
 been dispatched to the city to supply the place of many a thing lost 
 on tlieir vojage, and Karnis, overjoyed at his escape from that 
 monkish resort, liad suffered his new host to detain him in the hall 
 set ap;irt for men only, and there enjoyed the good gifts which 
 forlune luid showeied upon him in the mansion of Porphyrins, 
 lleie breathed the spirit that had permeated his father's house, liere 
 he found men who understood the art of adorning existence in a 
 style after his own heart, who shared his enthusiasm as also his 
 antipathies. Here he drank old wine out ot an artistically carved 
 onyx goblet; what he lieard pleased him, and wliat he iaid met with 
 full appreciation. For the uncertain future ot his loved ones here 
 
18 SERAPIS. 
 
 opened up prospects only a little interior to those that had boen 
 conjured iw tlie da}' before by liis lively powers ot imauinalion. 
 Even Uioiigli fortune's wheel slioukl apiiii turn tor him, the jiood 
 things tiiat lie was here enjoyinir shouhl be writttu down to the 
 credit ot lite, and, at least in memory, remain his endurinir posses 
 sion. 
 
 The hoary-headed Damia, her son Porphyrins, llic tair Gorjro, 
 weie all three persons of a rare sort, such as one does not often 
 uuet in life. 
 
 The woi Idly-wise merchant prince had judged the ladies to have 
 been too hasty and incautious in thus dislin.iiuis'aing these strange 
 musicians, and, in the beginning, had treated Karnis with reserve; 
 but after a brief talk with him, he had come to the conviction that,' 
 in this case, he had to do with a man of uncommon culture and 
 true stamp. The old lady had been tavorahly inclined to tiie 
 strangers from the first, because tiie nis^ht before the stars had pre- 
 dicted to her a pleasant interview on the morrow. 
 
 Her will was law under this roof. And Karnis could but smile 
 when he heaid her call a son, who must have been a long time 
 gray, " my child," or listened to hei admonitions to one who 
 looked fully equal to rcgulalinir tlie affairs of his own household. 
 A tall arm-chair was her throne, only left when she wished to be 
 borne to her observatory on the root ot the house, where were kept 
 her magic tablets and charts. The feet were ber only weak point, 
 but there were arms in plenty at her disposal, ready to push her 
 about or carry her to table, into her sleeping-apartment, and. while 
 daylight lasted, into sunny spots of the house or garden. She felt 
 t'C'St when the rays of flclios fell upon her back, for her old blood 
 needed their warmth, after the long niirht watches, whicli she still 
 kept in the observatory. Even in the hottest part ot the day she sat 
 in the sun, with a great green shade over her sharp eyes, and who- 
 ever desired to converse with her must seek the shade wherever he 
 could. When, propped upon her ivory crutch, she followed a con- 
 versation, in stooping posture, it seemed as though she were per- 
 petually on the spring, ready to break in upon the words of others. 
 She spoke her mind out, without curb or reservation, for in a long 
 life-time the right to have her own way in everything had alwaj's 
 been conceded to this heiress ot a great estate. Everi'wilh her sou 
 she claimed this privilege, and yet from that manly head of the 
 house issued a web whose root extended over halt tl;e earth. The 
 liusbandman who tilled the fruitful land on the upper and lower 
 Nile, the shepherds in the Arabian deserts, in Syria, and on the sil- 
 vian meadows of Syrenaica, the owners ot forests upon Lebanon 
 and the sliores ot the Pontus, the miners in Spain and Sardinia, the 
 l)r()ker8, the dealers and ship-owners ot all the seaports on' the 
 Mediteiranean were bound by these threads to this house on Lake 
 Mceris, and fell it they were slackened or tightened bv the hand of 
 this graybeard, who submitted like a litllt ciiild to the guidance of 
 his mother. The property ot this great merehaiit had lurn so large, 
 while he was yet a youth, tliat its increase could l)rinii- no new en- 
 joyment oitiier to himself or family, and yet its aggrandizement had 
 been liis lile-long task. Like a wrestler aiming at the llisl prize, he 
 strove after u report of high prolits on the day when Lis accounts 
 
SERAPIS. 19 
 
 were nnnii;ill3' settled up. And liis mother not only looked info the 
 Irdiii-r, Init lolluwed up each new enterprise ol the house. It the 
 decision of iiiipoiiunt questioi^s was exceedingly ditficult tor her 
 sou and his assistants lo come at, her voice settled the matter; and 
 wlien, in most cases her judgment proved to have been excellent, 
 slip ascribed it less to lier own sharp-sightedness and knowledge of 
 tiie world tiian the hints given her by the slais and magical com- 
 binations. Her son did not follow her into this domain but it was 
 veiy seldom tiiat he contradicted the results arrived at in her ob- 
 servatory'. While she turned niulit into day, he took pleasuie in 
 intercourse with scholarly friends, tor the hours of relaxation Irom 
 incipient stnigglinu' after gam, thai tlie iiieat merchant allowed 
 himself, were devoted to philosophy, and the best thinkeis of zVlex- 
 aridiia esteemed themselves piivileged to surround the hospitable 
 board of Iheir wea'thy patron. It rejoiced him when tliey styled 
 liim a "Kallias," and the pagan professors in the universitiwi of 
 the scrapeum and museum gladly recognized him as a fellow. They 
 knew that he had iieen baptized, but seeing that he was sensitive 
 on thai point, they refrained Irom all allusion lo it. The modesty 
 of his character won people's hearts, but probably yet more a tinge 
 of despondency bordering on melancholy, that imposed itself like a 
 barrier between the too-richly endowed man and the envoy of un- 
 fortunates. 
 
 In the course of conversation the aged Damia inquirfd as to 
 Agnes' origin, for it any scandal attached to her, or it she were a 
 slave, Gor-go could not, of course, show herself with her in public, 
 and Karnis would then have lo practice " The Lament of Isis " with 
 a free-born songstress. 
 
 The old man shrugged his shoulders, and invited the ladies and 
 Porphyrins to form their own conclusion as to that question. 
 
 Three years before, he informed them, he had been at Antioch, 
 and witnessed the outhrealv ot that great insurrection there, on ac- 
 count of the levyini: ot taxes. It came to bloodshed, and just as 
 soon as it was possibl , he had left the city with his family. When 
 it grew dark he had turned into a wayside inn, and there found 
 Agnes and her little brother in the bands of soldiers. In the night 
 the girl had sung a lullaby beside her little brother's couch in order 
 lo quiet him. So sweet and touching had been the nielodv that 
 tlovved from her lips that himself and wite had been induced on ac- 
 count of it, lo purchase bolh herself and brother for a trifle, lie 
 had simply p;ud the price they charged; but they bad not been 
 registered as slaves, and he had caused no description of their per- 
 sons to l)e prepared; nevertheless, it rested with himself to treat 
 tliem as slaves or dispose ot them, for the purchase had been made 
 in the presence of witnesses, whose testimony could even now be 
 obtained. He had afterward learned from the airl that her parents 
 had been Christians, and removed to Antioch only a few years be- 
 fore the outbreak ot the insurrection. They had had neither rela- 
 tions nor intimate friends in that city. Their father, as a tax- 
 gatherer in the imperial service, iiad moved about a great deal, and 
 yet Khe remembered to have heard him speak of Treves as his home. 
 The maiden had been present when ine excited populace had 
 attacked the house of her parents, and killed thesa, "together with 
 
20 sERArrs. 
 
 both their servants, and her elder hrotlier. At all events, Apnes' 
 tallier had been a hit;h oUlcer, prolnibly. loo, a Roman cilizcii, and 
 if so— the merchant Porphyrins confirmed this — tlie maidfn and her 
 brother are, at any time, entitled to claim their freedom. Tiie 
 rabble that had dragged tiie children out \ipon the street, and then 
 beyond the city gaie, had been driven oil by some soldiers, froru 
 wnom, however, Iviirnis had bought them. 
 
 " And 1 ha^'e no reason to repent of my bargain," concluded the 
 old man, " for Agnes is a lovely, gentle creature. I shall not speak 
 of ber voice, because you heard it tor yourselves yesterday." 
 
 " And with real rapture," exclaimed Gorgo. " If fiowers could 
 sing it would sound just so." 
 
 " Well, well!" rejoined Kamis. "Her voice is delightful, but it 
 lacks wings. Au uncouqueiable something cbaius the violet to the 
 ground." 
 
 " Christian reflections T ' exclaimed Ibe merchant, and old Daniia 
 added : 
 
 " ,lust let Eros come; he will loosen her tongue." 
 
 " Eros and forever Eros," repeated Gorgo, with a shrug of the 
 shoulders. " Whoever loves sutlers and drags a chain after him. 
 la order to do the best of which one is capable, nothing more is 
 needed than to be free, true, and healthy." 
 
 " That is a great deal to ask, mistress," answered Karnis, warmly. 
 " With these' three what is highest will be accomplished. But 
 Agnes, how does it stand with her? Who could be lens free than a 
 serving damsel 1 Her body, yes, that is sound, but her spirit sullers 
 and gets no rest from dread of all those Christian horrors— sin, re- 
 pentance and hell." 
 
 "We know those banes ot existence," interposed the old lad\'. 
 " Were you introduced into Maria's iuu by means of that Christian 
 girl?" 
 
 " No, noble lady." 
 
 " But then— that saint usually selects her guests diflerently; and 
 whoever is not baptized — " 
 
 " This time, however, she has entertained heathen." 
 
 " It is exactly this that surprises me. Tell me how it happened." 
 
 " We were in Rome," began the singer, "and through tlie inter- 
 vention of my patrons, Marcus, Maria's son, look us on board Ids 
 vessel at Ostia. It anchored off Cyi'ene, for the young gentleman 
 wislied to take up his brother there, and have his company as far as 
 Alexandria." 
 
 " Is Demetrius here?" queried Porphyrins. 
 
 " Yes, sir. He came on board our ship at Cyrene. But hardly 
 had we lost sight of the harbor, than we caught sight of two pirate 
 ships. Then was our prow turned, but in wlieeiing her about sud- 
 denlj', she loclged upon a sand-bank, and the boats were launched, 
 in order to save the lives of the gentlemen and the Consul Cynegius." 
 
 " Cynegius on his way hither?" asked Porphyrius again, 
 straightening himself up Rith animation. 
 
 "He lau(ie<I with us yesterday in the harbor of Eur-oslus. The 
 secretaries and olhcers in his retinue filled one boat, IVliircus and his 
 t)rother with their attendants were«to get into tlie second. We-aad 
 
SERAPIS. 21 
 
 the other passengers wouki have been left it it had not been for 
 Uada— " 
 " What, the pretty blonde we saw yesterchiy?" asked Pamio. 
 "On t lie voyage, Marcus had been greatly entertained with her 
 lively chitchat and her singing, tor in song she ran vie with any 
 nightingale. And so, when she began to plead with him, lie soon 
 yielded'aiid invited her into his own boat. But the good tiling de- 
 clared that siie would rather leap into the water than set oft witiiout 
 us." 
 
 " Bravo! bravo!" cried the old lady, and Porphyrius added: 
 
 " A good sign both tor the young girl and yourselves." 
 
 "Marcus, then," continued the oki man, " tooli us— all of us— 
 into his boal, and so we had the good fortune to make the laud once 
 more. A tew days afterward a ship of war brouglit CvnL'.<:;ius, the 
 brothers, and ourselves comfortably to this pbice; and, since we had 
 lost our property, Marcus gave us a certiticale that secured us ad- 
 mission to his mother's inn. Then the gods conducted my family 
 and myself to t)ie presence of this noble youns: lady." 
 
 " So Cynegius is here, actually here?" asked Porphyrius, once 
 more; and, upon Rarnis reiterating the statement, he turned uneasily 
 to his mother, and said: " Olympius is not back yet. Always the 
 same, as rash as a younsr m'an. If they catch him! The streets 
 swarm with monks. Something is going on. Hitch up your horses, 
 Cyrus, directly! The great Atlas shall accompany me. Cynegius 
 here! Ah!— ah! Thank the gods!" 
 
 This exclamation was called forth by the appearance of a closely 
 muffled man, who hail just that instant entered the apartment, and 
 while he threw back the cape of his cloak, and unloosed the gieat 
 cloth that encircled his neck, and had concealed a long, white beard, 
 he cried out, drawing a long breath of relief: 
 
 " Would i were there again! Cynegius is here; it gr-^ws serious, 
 friends!" 
 
 " And you were in the museum?" asked the merchant. 
 
 " ladubiiably. 1 found them all there together. Brave fellows! 
 They hold by us and the gods. Arms enough are in liand. The 
 Jews* do not stir. Onias thinks that he can go their surety, and we 
 are a match for the monks and imperial cohorts." 
 
 " It the gods lund their aid both to-day and to-morrow," rejoined 
 Pori^liyrius thoughtfully. 
 
 " Forever, if the people do their duty," cried the other, " "Who 
 is that stranger?" 
 
 "The chief of the musicians to whom we listened yesterday," 
 replied Gorgo. 
 
 " Karuis, son of Herse of Tauromenium," said the singer, mak- 
 ing a bow to the stranger, whose majestic shape and finely developed 
 head had filled him with admiration. 
 
 " Karnis of Tauromenium!" repeated he, in a tone of joyful sur- 
 prise. " By Hercules! a singular meeting! Your hand, give me 
 your hand, my old friend! How many years have passed since you 
 and 1 emptied the last wine-jug at the "house of old Hippias? Seven 
 
 * At that time two tliirds of the whole population. 
 
'i'-i SERAPTS. 
 
 liisicrs make the hair gray, but wo two hold our own yet. Novr, 
 tell nil-, sou ol Heise, who :im 1?" 
 
 " Voii :ire Olyiiipius, the great Olynipiiis!" cried Karnis, joyfully 
 (laspiiig tlic iirollered huud. " All the f;ods bless this happy nioru- 
 iii.ii!" 
 
 " All llie gods! That is a speech," cried the piiilosopher. " You 
 have not, tiien, crept under the yoke of the cross?" 
 
 " The world is only joytul in the company ot the gods," cried 
 Karnis, in a l)urst of enthusiasm. 
 
 " And we'll keep them joyful, and guard them against eclipse," 
 r Rjionded the other, warmly. "A critical time has come. No 
 mi'ie, as of old, is llie question one ot trifles. No more do we fasii 
 our l)raius over toolisUaess, and fancy that tlie fate ot the world 
 hangs '.ipon the decision of such idle dis(;u&sions, as whether man. 
 (lies in the last instant of life or in the first moment of death. Now, 
 llie question Is: Are the old gods* to reign? are we to lead a free, 
 <j\:u\ life, with the heavenly beingp on liigli, or liow the neck before 
 ilit'Crueilied Sou ot the carpenter and His gloomy doctrines; Ihecon- 
 llici here is fought lor the highest good oi humanity— " 
 
 "1 know," said Karnis, interrupting hini, "yon stood up 
 valiantly for the great JScrapis. Hantls were about to be laid upon 
 hi** sanctuary but you compelled the miscreants to give up their 
 desiirn. and retreat. The others came off scatheless—" 
 
 " But lliey have shown me what my head is woitk to them," 
 laughed Olympius. " Evagrius has set the price of three Idkiils 
 upi.n my head. For that one could buy a house, and if his views 
 ar-e modest he might live upon its rent, i have kept it intact, 
 Ihough, yet, as you see. This noble man here keeps me concealed 
 in his iiouse. We have matters for talk togeiher. Porphyrins ;iri(l 
 you, gracious Gor-go. do not for a moment lose sight ot the festival 
 of Isis. ,lirst because Cynegius is here it must be celebi-ated in full 
 splendor. He is to ri port to the emperor, who sends him here, how 
 Jlu! Alexandrians are minded. Where is that large-eyed maiden 
 wiiom we saw yesterday?" 
 
 " In the garden," I'eplied Gorgo. 
 
 " She is to sing at the foot of tlie bier," cried the philosopher. 
 " That is settled." 
 
 "It 1 can persuade the Christian to do so," remarked Karnis, 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 " She must," assevei'aled the philosopher. " U wouUi be a bad 
 commcidary ujion Alexandria's rheloricid and logical arls if an old 
 dispulani should not succeed in changing the iiiind of a simple gii'l. 
 Let that tnsk be mine. We shiill see each other soon again, noble 
 ladies. I Jinpe to convei'se with you later, Friend Karnis' Hoiv in 
 the tvorld have you chanced to become the leader ot a minstrel harul? 
 you, who used many a tinu? to come to the aid of the rest of us with 
 your father's gold. You have niuch to tell ine, my friend; but 
 business will not wait. A wor-il with you, dear Porphyriirs." 
 
 "While tills conversation was guin';- on, Aiines had lieen awaitiuL' 
 Il(!i"se's i-eturn in the colonnade wliich conducted to the front carden 
 ot the villa. Six; was shid to he alone, and rested deliuhtfully upon 
 the soft cushion l)eneath the gilded and Iresc'oed ceiliili: o( ili"is opi ii 
 place. All along its sides stood closely-set shrubs, ilense in tlieir 
 
SEUAPIS. *a 
 
 foliage, !ui!l full '^f vif>lct -colored Mowers, nr,cl their branches boldly 
 jpir.iTli'd and cast triciully shadows upon her resUnf^-place. There 
 she enjoyed the periiiine ot the strange, sweet blossoms, ever and 
 anon lusting ol the light repast that Gorgo herself had placvid belore 
 lur. 
 
 What she saw, heard, and felt here sootlicd her senses. Juicier 
 peaches, fuller, more perfect clusters of grapes, tresher pomegianates 
 and lighter cakes she had never seen or happened to taste belore. 
 
 In llie clumps of foliage-plants in the garden, and on the grass- 
 jilols between the paths there was not a single withered leaf, nut a 
 (by straw, not a miserable weed. Here buds were swelling on the 
 bouuhs of some ancient tree, there whole rows of shrubs were cov- 
 ered with richly-scented Howers, white and blue, golden yellow and 
 red; and generous fruits peeped brightly forth from the dark-green 
 glistening leaves of lemon and orange-trees. On a round lake in her 
 neighborhood, black swans described their silent circles, and occa- 
 sionally littcd up their plaintive voices. The merry singing of birds 
 mingled with the splashing of fountains, and the very marble 
 statues, mute as they were, seemed to enjoy the pleasant morning 
 breezes, and the sounds betokening lite around them. 
 
 Yes, it was well to be here; and, when she had broken another 
 peach, and its tender juicy flesh had imparted to her tongue its spicy 
 Havor, she could not help smiling at the remembrance of the hard 
 ship-biscuit that had been her portion yesterday and the day be- 
 fore. Ah! how delightful it would be, like that fair Gorgo, to 
 enjoy such good things day after day, and year after year! ffere it 
 was like Eden, the first sweet home of man, ere care had clouded 
 his existence. Here there could be no pain, heie nobody wept, hero 
 no compunction for sin was felt. To die here — Here she paused, 
 and a new train of thoughts forced itself upon her. She was still 
 so young, and yet she was already as familiar with death as with 
 earthly life; tor whenever she had confided to her spiritual adviser 
 that she, an orphan and deprived of her liberty, sufl'ered much 
 inward grief, the comfort given her had ever reference to a here- 
 after, and the joys of Paradise. And out of that hope, the dreamer 
 had created all that a young artist soul needed of enjoyment, to save 
 it from despair. 
 
 " Now," she said to herself, " how hard it must be to die in all 
 tins splendor. To live here; was not that to forego the joys ot 
 paraise, and in the heaven beyond, among the angels of God, with 
 her Saviour, must it not be a thousand times more beautiful than this 
 place?" 
 
 A slight shudder thrilled her, for here she would be no longer 
 accounted among the poor and suffering, to whom Christ himself 
 had promised the Kingdom of Heaven; here she belonged to those 
 rich who had to look forward to no inheritance beyond the grave. 
 
 Oppressed in heart, slie pushed the peach from her, and closed 
 her eyes, in order to look no more upon all this perishable glory and 
 sinful display of heathendom upon which her senses had been feast- 
 ing. 
 
 She preferred being wretched here below, in order to be forever 
 reunited with her parents beyond the skies. 
 
 She not only believed, it amounted to certainty with her, that her 
 
41 SERAI'is. 
 
 f:iilicr and inollicr iilKwic in licavcii, iiml oficii slio liad {.'i ti,o j,,,. 
 I'lilsi- lo praj' for tlralli and icunion willi tlicso dear i>arcnis; liiu, 
 M.c iliirst, not (lie yd iiwJiiln. tor lier link- biolJier liail nc.-tl of Int. 
 'riic cliilil lacked' not tor .uood allenlion to his bodily wants uilli 
 Ihosc iviniMu'artftl people iii whose servi:;e slie was: but wjlhout tiiat 
 chiid siie (lid not want lo ai)i)ear heloie her parents, and he was ti>r- 
 cver lost if she should commit liis young soul lo the keeping ot the 
 enemies of her failli. 
 
 Her heart grew sore, whenever she thougiit that this whole ta.nily 
 weie doomed to eternal ruin. Kaiuis, wlio ceitainly coukl not be 
 deemed a had man, and whom she was compelled to reverence, as a 
 master in the art that she loved — the kind, ever considerale Ilerse— 
 the Iroliosome Dada, yes, and Orpheus too, ail m\M. be losi. To 
 save these last, she ivoukl have freely foregone herself many ot Ihe 
 joys of Paradise. She saw plainly that he clung as cK-sely to idol- 
 atry ;is his parents, and yet slie |.ia3-e!l daily lor Ihe salvation of his 
 soul, and she ceased not lo hope thai a minicle might be i)erformed, 
 thai he would live to gee his day ot Damascus, and liccon)e a con- 
 fessor fur Christ. 
 
 It was so pleasant when he was near, and she never felt happier 
 than when it fell to her lot lo sing with hin^. or accompany his skill- 
 ful playing on Ihe lule. It it soTnelimes happened to her to forget 
 lierseli"an(l put into her full, rich voice all Ihat was noblest and 
 best in h<'r heart, iintl he— whose ear was no less line than his 
 rathcr's— would nod her his approval at such a moment, she loveil 
 life and found it brautiful. 
 
 In nmsic fhe possessed a link that united her with Orpheus, and 
 when h' r s )ul was exalted she could feel anrl think in song. ]\Iusic 
 was, lor her, the language of the heart, and experience bad proved 
 lo lier Ihat the heathen, loo. coukl speak and understand it. Even 
 hir heavenly father must have pleasure in a voice like Gorgo's. 
 Tliis young lady was a heathen, and yet her son^ had expressed all 
 that she hciself feU when her heart was uplifted in fervent prayer. 
 
 Often hart it been said to her that the Christian must share noth- 
 ing with idolaters, but God Himself had siivcn her into the hand of 
 Karnis, the church commanded servants to obey their masters; and 
 tong seemed lo her like a peculiar language with which God had 
 fi.dowed all animated beings, yes, birds"loo, in onler that they might 
 f.peak with Him, and so she rejoiced, wholly unconscious that it 
 would soon be her portion to blend her own voice with that of the 
 iiealheu maiden. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SiioitTT.Y after the merehnni and philosopher had withdrawn, 
 Ilersc came back with Daila. Gorgo's rich blue dress Ihat had been 
 sent lo the young girl by Damia became her admirably, but her 
 breath came tpiic'k, and her curls were rather disarranged, llerse 
 Idievvise looked excited, her cheeks glowed, and she drew little 
 Papias, whom she held by Ihe hand, icgardlessly along behind her. 
 
 Dada felt embarrassed, lesson account of Ihe costlv things that 
 surrounded her, than ot her foster-mother's injimcti(ms to behave 
 coi^teoysly awd sedately in the presence ot their entertainers, aud 
 
SF.HAPIS. 25 
 
 there was something quite peculiar in her demeanor, as, in ohedionre 
 to HtTse's direction, she bowed low before the aged lady; but llie 
 bashful and yet graceful manner in which she discharged her task 
 seemed to please Damia well, tor, with a graciousness very unusual 
 with her, she held out her hand, and invited her to draw near, and 
 kissing lier, said kindly: 
 
 " You are a good child! To be true to one's iriends is precious in 
 the sight ot the gods, and also brings its reward among men." 
 
 Then, fo' lowing a lortunate intuition, Dada tlirew herself down 
 at the old lady's feet, kissed both her hands, and remained humbly 
 sitting at her feet. 
 
 Gorgo, whom Herse's excitement had not escaped, asked what 
 had befallen her, and learned that they had been pursued by monks 
 lu the street, Dada's lyie forced from the hands of a slave, and tLe 
 maiden's gai laud torn off her liead. Damia trembled witli rage on 
 hearing this recital, abusing tlie wild hordes through whom Alex- 
 andria, the favorite haunt of the ]\Iuses, was dishonored and pro- 
 laned, and tben recurred to the rescue of the minstrel family by 
 Marcus, the son of Jlaria. 
 
 " Marcus," said she, " must be a pattern of self-restraint. He 
 exercises Lis horse with those young sinners in the hippodrome, and 
 yet— it were a miracle if true— and yet he shuns women as if he 
 were a saint already. His mother encourages him in this; but he, 
 cbarming Apiirodiie, he is the son of my handsome Apelles, who 
 would have gazed into these blue eyes from Rome to Alexandria 
 and would have willingly allowed himself to be caught, but just S(.> 
 surely as 1 hope to live to sec autumn, he would have caught hia 
 game too. How red you are, girl 1 The long and short of it is that 
 Marcus is just like the rest. " Keep your eyes well open, Dame 
 Herse." 
 
 " I'll be sure to do that," cried the matron. " And alas! there's 
 need for it too. The young gentleman was so modest on the ship, 
 and now to behave su! While we were away, he crept like a mar- 
 ten into his own mother's house, and— is it not shameful?— he 
 opened our room with the keys that are always at his disposal, and 
 invited the maiden — she is my own sister's child— to elope with 
 Inin, to forsake us, and follow him, he knows best wher-eto." 
 
 Here old Damia interrupted the indignant matron, exclaiminij 
 with a malicious smile, while she struck the ffoor with her cane: 
 " The saintly son of my saintliest of sisters-in law. fSuch a marvel 
 one does not live to see every day ! Come, come here, Dada. Take 
 this ring, it has been worn by one who was once young herself and 
 greatly courted. Nearer, nearer yet, my darling." 
 
 Vi, itli eyes full of curiosity Dada turned her curly head toward the 
 old lady, who ilrew her closer to herself, and whispered into her eat 
 softly and yet forcibly: "Turn that milksop's head lor me, make 
 him fall so madly and foolishly in love with you that he will be 
 quite i)eside himself. You can do this, and 1 — no, I'll make no 
 promises; but if the town talk reports that Maria's sou, with sighs 
 and groans, knocks nightly at the blinds of pretty Dada, "the 
 heathen and public singer, and if, in broad daylight, he drives you 
 out iu his own carriage, riding through Canopian Street past his 
 
2G SERAPIS. 
 
 nintlnT's lionso, Ihen, then, cliild, dosiro of mc what j'ou will, and 
 old Daiiii.-i will not slight your jictition." 
 
 TIkii tshc! lilted up licr head and addrcssod liorself to the rest of 
 tlio parly. " For the afternoon, Iricnds, repair to your rooms and 
 make youisolves comfortable. Go with tiiem, Dada. Later we 
 fih.ill procure you pleasant (piarler.s in the city. Come often to see 
 me, my dove, and tell me l)rcl<y stories Wlieu work is not prostiirt; 
 1 shall always receive you, for you and 1 h.ive a secret between us." 
 
 The niaiden arose and looked an.xiously at the old lady, who how- 
 over nodded pleasantly at her, as though they perfectly understood 
 each other, and again iield out her hand to her, but Dada coidd not 
 kiss it this lime, and followed her family more thoughlluliy ihan 
 usual. 
 
 Gorjio suspected what Damia was doing with the girl, and as soon 
 as the sinjrers had left the room she crew near to her grandmother, 
 and said iu a tone ot mild repioach: " It will be easy enough tor 
 that pretty blonde to lead iMarcus to the committal of many follies; 
 it is no concein of mine, for 1 hardly know him; l)ut why is he to 
 expiate wrongs done you b}'^ his mothei? How can he help—" 
 
 " He can help nothing at all," said the old lady, cutting her 
 granddaughter short in her S|)eech. "He can just as little help 
 what his mother has done as you can, beinsr ju8t twenty ye;irs old. 
 So please hold your touaue until you are asked to speaii," and this 
 was said with repulsive sharpness. 
 
 ******* 
 
 On board of the ship that lay at anchor in the dock adjoining the 
 grounds of Porphyrius, llie minstrel family found themselves re- 
 tinited. Orpheus had i)een a witness to the disturbances that agi- 
 tated the city irom one end to the other, and a fierce howl, audible 
 in the distance, confirmed his statement in this jiarticular; hut the 
 mirror-like lake looked profoundly peaceful, its blue being uncloud- 
 ed, and its bo.som calm, the slaves on the dock were at \Aoik as in 
 ((uiet times, and turtle-doves i\ew cooing from palm-tree to palm 
 tree. In the floating retreat of the min«tre!s also no sign of troublous 
 tinies was perceptible. I'he steward had made provision for every 
 want. In the roomy vessel there were chambers and beds in super- 
 fluity, the spacious cabin furnished a comfortable drawing-room, 
 and "from the small kitchen at the rear of the ship proceeded an 
 aioma of roast meat and the rattling of cooking utensils. 
 
 " This is something like living," said Karnis, as he cheerfully 
 stretched himself at full length upon a cushion, " and these couches 
 exactly tit our illustrious persons. Sit down, little wife and make 
 yourself comfortable! We are distinguished people now, and to 
 sweeten their task to the seivants, we must act as though we did 
 not know that there are people in the world, who, ifiiuatti'tig aroun.l 
 in a ring, sop their food out of an earthen bowl. Enjoy, enjo}' the 
 gifts of the present! Who knows how long this splendor is going 
 to last? All! wife, how it reminds one of former days! Charming 
 is it indeed to lie of! so, at our ease, side by side, and to convey to 
 our mouths delicacies, with the preparation ot M-Jiich we have had 
 nought to do. And you, old woman, who have been so long toiling 
 and moiling for others, you well deserve, for (,nce, to have others 
 busy in your service!" 
 
SEKAPIS. 27 
 
 Snon small tables lojulcil \Yitli excellent viands were standing; be- 
 fore each cowcli, ami the steward was inixinir ftood Mteiian wino 
 with pure water in a beautitul pitcher. Orpheus did llie pouriiiu; 
 out, and Karuis spiced the bountiful repast witli lively jokes, and 
 cheerful auecdotcs from his youth, of which he had been reniiiidcd 
 by his mcetintr with his old college-male Olympian. 
 
 Dada often joined in the conversation anil laughed louder and 
 more unrestrainedly than usual. She was in a fevei, as it were, and 
 llerse noled this well. 
 
 Thai matron ilid not feel herself tree from anxiety. For the very 
 reason that her husband always and everywhere went with his 
 wiiole ^•oul into the affair of the moment she left him to enjoy him- 
 self to tlie full, and, in his stead, looked beyond the present oil mio 
 t!ie future. Witli her own eyes she had seen what was going on in 
 Alexiindria, and wat sensible th:it they hud come there id an unpro- 
 pilious time. Ileidhen and Christian stood arrayed in tierce enmity, 
 iho one against tlif olher, and Karnis, too, would be sure to take up 
 the sword soon, now that he had recognized in his old student-iriend 
 Olympius, the leader of liis |)arty. Did the cause of Christ conquer, 
 then, no |)ity would be shown those who had openly ranged Ihem- 
 swlveson the side of tlie old gnds. Gorgo's desire to have Agnes 
 sing will) lur in the temple of Isis filled lier with special solicilude; 
 tor. if it came to that, they might easily be accused of misguiding 
 a Christian inio taking part in a pagan service and be sentenced to 
 a severe punishment. Yesterday it had all struck her in a difTerent 
 light, for then she had been thinking of tne genial old Alexandria, 
 as it had been known to her in her youth. But what an alteration 
 had not more than thirty years made! Tiie chui'ch had cast the 
 temple into shadow, and the monk the sacrificial priest. 
 
 Karnis and his family were musicians of no ordinary stamp, but 
 the law against iemaies singing in public might affect even them 
 perilously, and now. to make her ill-luck complete, hei-e comes a 
 young Christian, trying to entrap her pretty niece. To what perse- 
 culions might they not be subjected, if Marcus's infiueutial motlier 
 got wind of her son's goinir astray! 
 
 llerse liad long ago remarked what bewitching ways (he jade had 
 with men, old and young. Did a suitor please her— and there never 
 lacked one — slie could forget herself and cany on a brisk tlirtalioii; 
 but just 80 soon as she perceived that she had gone too tar, and had 
 cause for self-reproach, her sincere regret and the fault she found 
 with her own conduct, atoned amply tor what had gone before. 
 She would completely withdraw from him, and it she could not 
 avoiii meeting him, would treat him with a reserve and coldness 
 amounting to incivility. Herse had not been sparing in her censure 
 and warnings, but Dada answered to her reproofs, Ihatslie could uol 
 alter lier nature; and irierse had never been able long to maintain 
 the part of a strict censor as regards girlish ways thai, after all, were 
 very becoming. 
 
 Even now.ilio matron found it hard to decide whether it were 
 more advisable to warn Dada against young Ma''cus, and enjoin it 
 upon lier to i-ejccl any new advance on ins part, or to i)ass over what 
 hail happened in silence She knew how the insignificant grows into 
 magniiude, vvhen stamped as important. Therefore, she had only 
 
28 SERAPIS, 
 
 liirlilly questioned the maiden, as to what the secret was between 
 t)iil Daniia and herself, and appeared satisfied with Da^la's evasive 
 ri'ply; l)ijl slie suspected the truth, neverllicless, and was determined 
 not to be lackini; in circumspection. INIcanwhile, siie would let 
 lliiims lake their own course, and not mention Marcus asrain; but 
 her husband brought her project to naught, wiiile he called out to 
 D.ida, with all the cheerfulness of a hai)py man who has partaken 
 of a gootl meal, that she must tell him all abuut that young Chris- 
 tian's invasion. 8he objected a liitle at first, but was soon carried 
 away by the old man's good humor and lold her story thus: 
 
 " There 1 sat alone with the poor boy, like— 1 do not knew ex 
 acfly what— you can make the comjiarison to suit yourselves. For 
 my comfort, the key siood in its lock, but Idid not leel at all at my 
 ease, for the monks began to sing in the court outside. If one voice 
 went fo (he left, the other went to the ri<;ht. Did you ever see 
 drunken men. arm in arm, swaying backward and forward, reeling 
 to and fro! Do not laugh! By all the nine mtises, it was precisely 
 so! Presently Papiaa got very tired, and asked over and over again, 
 where Agnes was; and at last he got to crying. When 1 asked him 
 why, he said he di<in't know, he had forgotten. Being patient, as 
 1 alwa^'s am— you'll allow that— 1 did nothmg in the world to him, 
 but, as nothing would do but that a plaything he must have, 1 drew 
 the key out of the lock (for there was nothing else there that he might 
 not have broken), gave it to the youngster, and bade him blow me a 
 tune on it. That he was willing enough to do, and sweetly enough 
 it sounded. Meanwhile, 1 had lain out my burned robe, and w.-is 
 shocked at the size of the holes; but 1 conceived the idea of turning 
 the cloth, because other spots are invisible when this is done." 
 
 " You are making up that now," laughed Urpheus. " We know 
 you. If you can only tell acme story of stupidity on your csvu 
 part-" 
 
 " No, indeed!" exclaimed Dada. " Such an idea actually crossed 
 my brain just as a swallow flits through a room; but 1 was soon 
 made aware that burned holes go through and throuKh. Tlien I 
 threw iiside the garment as past remedy, and stood ui)OU tiie loot- 
 stool, in order to peep through the hole by the door, into the court, 
 for the song was at an eud, and the stillness began to oppress me. 
 Papias no longer played his flute, but had stationed himself in the 
 corner, wiiere Orpheus had been writing that letter to Tauromenium." 
 
 " The ink was there," exclaimed he, " that u^ine host lent us yes- 
 terday." •' 
 
 "Exactly so, and when mother came back there sat Papias, 
 dipping his finger into the receptacle, and spotting his while 
 gown. You can see the pretty work he made of it tor yourselves. 
 But do nut interrupt me again. 1 then looked out upon the 
 court. It was empty; the monks had all foisaken it. Then ap- 
 peared a slender young gentleman, in the doorway, dressed in a 
 wiiite robe edged witli alively sky-blue border. The'old i)orter hum- 
 bly crept after him, as far as was allowed him by the cord that 
 fastens him to the post; and while our liost spoke with him, he 
 clax|Hd both hands over his breast, as lliougli upon the right side as 
 well as lell he had a truly devoted heart. The young man— it was 
 Marcus, our benefactor, of course— crossed llu;couit in /ig-zng fash- 
 
SERAl'lS. 
 
 29 
 
 i )a, at first just as u suipu files, but tliea mov^cd slrai^dit up to our 
 door. 
 
 " Nothing more waa to be seen of either porter or host. Do you 
 remember those little Gotlis, that their father allowed to bathe ia 
 tin; SibL'^ last wiuter, when it was so cold? At first they went up 
 to the river, and kt it wet their toes, then they darted off, soon to 
 come back air^nn, and moisten forehead and breast. But they did 
 not take the phni!j:e into the cokl stream until after their father had 
 shouted out to llieni some barbnrous word or oilier. 1 can see tlie 
 young urchins now. Marcus did just like those boys; but suddenly 
 he shot up lo our door, an;l knocked." 
 
 " He Ihouijh^ of your lovely lace," laughed Karnis. 
 
 " Maybe. 1, though, did not stir, but stood still as a mouse upon 
 mv 8to(il, and kept watcliing him through the ai)erture, until he 
 asked once and ag.iin: 
 
 ■' 'Is nobody in'?' 
 
 " Then I could hold in no longer, and answered; 
 
 " ' All are out!' 
 
 " I l)cl rayed myself, you see. One can not keep everything in 
 mind. Well, laugh if you like. A smile, too, flitted across liisowa 
 liandsome face, and then he urged me to open the door and let him 
 in. for he had something important to talk with me about. I said 
 that we could communicate well enough through the aperture. Pyr- 
 amus and Tuisbe hswl even kissed through a slit in the wall. But 
 he did not enter into tne jest; but grew more and mor<; grave as he 
 rekeraled his entreaty, for upon tliis hour depended a great deal, 
 both for himself and me, and that which he had to say to me no- 
 boilv else must hear. 
 
 " The aperture was too high up to admit of whispering, and so 
 iiotliing was leit for me to do but to demand the key of Papias. But 
 that young one no Icnger knew anything of its whereabouts. 
 
 " Altiiough, when 1 tliought afterward lo ask him where his 
 flute was, he brought it to me directly. In short, tlK' ke}' was gone. 
 1 explained this to Marcus, and now he wrung his hands; bui this 
 was only for a short while, because the liost, wlio had been hid be- 
 liind a pillar, and must have been listening, sutldenly .stood close be- 
 side the young gentleman, as though he had diopiieii Iroui the 
 skies, loosened a key from his girdle, opened the door wide, antl had 
 vanished a<rain as though the ground had swallowed him up. 
 
 " Now Marcus and I stood face to face, ile was disconcerted, as 
 it were. 1 verily believe the poor fellow was trembling, antt 1 was 
 not as composed as I might have been: yet 1 managed to bring out 
 a wi-h to know what he wanted. Then he collected himself and 
 said: 
 
 " ' 1 would like—' 
 
 " ' You would like—' said I, (!ncouragingly. 
 
 " And so most likel}' it would liave gone on to: ' He would like,' 
 ' we wou.d like,' as in our school-room at Rome, when the teacher 
 would be drilling the boys in their Greek grammar lesson, liad not 
 Papias come lo his aid, for he ran up lo him, and got lossjd hiirh 
 lip in the air, as had l)een liis wont upon sliipI)oard. l\T\u-eus grali- 
 fied the boy, and then suddenly ovorwh(!lined me with a How of talk 
 that quite alarmed me. At first he said so many handsome thing* 
 
30 SERA PIS. 
 
 tli:i( 1 llioiii;bt ' now comes adeclaration of love,' ;in<l was already ic- 
 Ik-cliiiu; as to wliutlier 1 should laiiu;li at liiiu or fall n\nm liis n'lck. 
 lor li(! is a dear, haudsome yonug niau; ami, it y(u must, know ii, l 
 would have been iireatly inclined to grant liini a favur. Hut lit a^k d 
 nolliing, and troin me— attend, Father Karnis — from nje, whom our 
 TTfavenly Parent has crowned wi;li his fairest gifts, he passed ovt-r 
 to you, you old, bad, hardened, good-for-nothing jiaaau " 
 
 " 1 am, am 1?" cried the singer, playfully shaking his fist at her. 
 
 " Listen again," continued Dada. " lie paid many compliments 
 both to you and t'le mother; but do you know what charges lie 
 brought against you? You are imperiling my soul, my ininiorlal 
 fii>iil. As it vou had ever spoken to me of any other Psyche than 
 (he be'oved of — " 
 
 " Tliat isadiQerent thing," observed Karnis, more .seriously. " In 
 many a si)ng have 1 exhorted you to plume your soul for a higher 
 fiigld. You have learned to sing, and for the soul of woman there 
 is no bettec Sfhool than music and song. If that malapert— lie 
 might be my graud.'sou— comes to j'ou again with such lollies, Iheu 
 let lum be told Uon\ me—" 
 
 " Let, him ])c UAd nothing from you!" exclaimed Ilerse, " for we 
 have nothing to lio with Christians, and never shall have. You are 
 my own dear sister's child, and 1 desire, do you hear? I command, 
 that you show him the door it he ever tries tocouie near you ncain!" 
 
 " 'i'Vho is to find us out here?" ask^d Dada. " And u-hat you ini 
 pule to him is not his design. Ills concern is for what he calls my 
 soul, not for myself, and he wanted to take me. not to his own 
 house, but to that of someone else, who should be a physician for 
 my soul. 1 love to laugh, but what he brought forward was all so 
 solemnly and impressively put, that 1 could not find it in my heart 
 to iest. At least, 1 grew angrier than lever was in all my life before, 
 ami that threw him into a pa.ssion, until he was quite beside him- 
 self. You came in yourself, m(>ther, and beheld the dignified gen- 
 tleman on his knees before me, beseeching me to leave you " 
 
 " And, thereupon, I mean to give liim a piece of my mind," put 
 in Ilerse, with gruff self-satisfaction. " I'll let him know just what 
 1 think of him. lie talks a\)oul the soul, and what iie wants is the 
 maiden herself. 1 know my Christian, and predict what is to come. 
 In order to carry his point, he will have recourse to law; you know 
 now, and then you will be parted Ironi us, and stuck into one of 
 those religious establishments— convents, they call them — Ihosf dis- 
 mal dungeons— and there you wi'l get to learn moie about your soul 
 than you will care to. No moie laughing, singing, and metriment. 
 That is the way it will be; and if you are wise, you will keep your- 
 self concealed from him, until we leave Alexandria, and that wi 1 
 be soon, if you listen to reason, Karnis." 
 
 Tiiese words had so earnest and convincing a sound, that Dada 
 unconsciously closed her eyes, and Karnis thoughtfully arose from 
 his couch. 
 
 Hut no time was left him for further medilitiou. because llii! 
 steward i.jjpeared and summoned him, his son, and Agnes, to 
 Gorgo, in order to study with her " The Lament of Isis." The in- 
 vitation was not extended to Ilerse and Dada, so they too stayeil oe- 
 hind in the ship. 
 
RERAPIS. 31 
 
 Tin nifitroii hnd plenty to do in tlie lower rooms, so Dada re- 
 paired to liie deck uud looked after the olliers. Then sl)e watched 
 the ship's crew at their work, and set the childieu at phiy on the 
 shore to catching fruits and sugar plums, the remains of her 
 dessert. In so doiu", she thought ot Marcus' strange conversation, 
 of what old Damia iiad asked of her, and ot Herse's warning. In 
 the beginning, this last seemed to her well founded, but soon her 
 old confidence returned, and sue could not believe that the young 
 Cliristiiin had anj evil designs agamst her. ]\Ioreover, she was as 
 firmly convinced that he would find her out in that hiuing-place, 
 as she was that in truth he hankered sitter the possession of her 
 much admired person, rather than after her soul— for how could 
 that airy nothing benefit a lover? With what warmth had he de- 
 picted her grace, how freely had he acknowledged that her image 
 wa!> with him day and night, visiting him even in his dreams, that 
 he could not get her out of his mind, and was ready to devote his 
 life to the safvation of her soul! Only a lover could talk in tliat 
 wiiy. and from such an one much, yea, everylhing could be ob- 
 tained. On her way from the inn to the house of Porphyrins, she 
 had seen him in his chariot, and iiloried in his magnificent horses, 
 tiial he drove so gracefully and wiih such a steady hand. He was 
 hardly three years older than herself— slie was only eighteen— but 
 in spile ot his youth and bashfuluess, he could not be called unmanly, 
 anil besides, there was an especial something about him that at- 
 tracted her, and inspired her with confidence, so that she could 
 l)nt think constantly of him and ask herself, "Why soV" OI<i 
 Damia's demand disquieted her, and without this it would have 
 seemed far more fascinating to know herself loved by him, and to 
 be driven 1)^' his hand through Canopian Street. 
 
 It seemed to her quite impossible that all should be over between 
 him and herself, and while her thoughts continued to dwell upon 
 liim, and at the same time she cast an occasional glance upon the 
 workmen who were carpentering near, a boat put into shore close 
 to her ship, and from it leaped ashore a captain ot the imperial 
 horse. 
 
 A handsome man he was! How finely cut and regular were the 
 features of his embrowned visatie, how lightly curled his coal-black 
 beard, and the locks that escaped from the confinement of a golden 
 helmet. The dagger-like sword at his side was that of a tribune or 
 a prefect of cavalry, and what deeds of valor muRt not have been 
 achieved by this wariior in glittering panoply ot armor, since he 
 was not of patrician race, to secure him, at his early age, so high a 
 post. Ndw, he stood on the shore, and looked around. His glance 
 met hers, and she filt that she blushed; he, however, seemed sur- 
 prised at sight ot her, greeted her reverentially, in soldierly fashion, 
 and then stepped up to the groat ship's hulk, to the boldly curved 
 bare ribs of which some master workmen were applying measuring 
 rods and lines. 
 
 Here stood an old man ot dignifiel presence, in whom she had 
 recognized earlier the superintendent of the dock. Up to him the 
 warrior hurried. 8he heard him call out "father," and directly 
 afterward saw the arms ot the giaybeard open to inclose the offlcer 
 in u lervtnt embrace. 
 
32 SKRAPTS. 
 
 Dada gn zed fixedly wpon (lie pair, until, arm in nrm, and evidently 
 excUanginii loviui; f^rcelins^s, she bad Boea them vanish inside a laii^c 
 liouse on the extreme verge ot the doclc. 
 
 " A. handsome man!" repeated Dada, and while she awaited his 
 return, she nevertheless kept her eye fixed upon the road Dial; 
 miffht lead Marcus to her. At Rome she had seen many splendid- 
 looking soldiers, and the sliip builder's son, after all, had little the 
 advantage of these; but such a young man as Marcus, she had never 
 yet met, and tiiere was hardly his like anywhere. Tlie bold c-av 
 alryman was a fine tree among other grand oak?, but Marcus had 
 something quite peculiar to himself; and asslieauain rcllecled upon 
 what thus distinguished him above others, and made him so 
 especially lovable, his image presented itself so vividly before her 
 mind's eye, that In its consideration she forgot the tine officer, the 
 ship-buiider, and everything else besides. 
 
 CIIAPTLR V. 
 
 Kaknts and his two companions stayed away a long while. 
 Dada's amusement of watching lor the icappearance of tlie cavalry 
 officer was but of shoit duiation, and so, after she had played a 
 long time with little Papiau, as with a pet dog. she began'to grow 
 weary, and find the sliip insufferably dull. When at last sunset 
 was at hand, and the otliers had come back, she reminded Karnis 
 of his j)romise to walk about some with her in Alexandria, but 
 Tlerse bade her be patient and wait till the next day. Hereupon 
 Daila, who had been decidedly more irritable and excitable tlian 
 usual, burst into tears, and cast thedistafi handed her to her foster- 
 mother into the lake, declaring with sobs, tliat she was no slave, 
 and would run awaj^ to look for enjoyment where it might l)e 
 found. It ende(t by her behaving so improperly that finally Ilcrse 
 lost patience, and reproved her warmly. Then Dada jumped up, 
 threw^ a mantle around her shoulders, and was upon the point of 
 crossing the gangway, and going ashore; but Karnis succeeded in 
 detaining her, and after lie had caught her car, saying, " Child, 
 child, do you not see how tired 1 am?' she forthwith heard reason 
 and tried to compose herself; but the traces of distress were too evi- 
 dent, and upon her retiring into a corner, to iveep quietly all to 
 herself, the old man's heart was touched, and he felt disposed to 
 s]^eak s otliingly to her and stroke iier hair, but he restrained him- 
 self, whispered a tew words to liis wife, and tnen declaieJ himself 
 ready to guide Dada through Canopian Street to Bruchimn. 
 
 Now the maiden brightened up. dried her eyes, thretv her arms 
 around the singer's neck, kissed liis rougli cheek, and cried: 
 
 " You are the best man in all the world! Make haste, ami let's 
 take Agnes; she siiall see something loo!" 
 
 But the young Christian preferied to remain, and so Karnis set 
 off alone w'ith Dada. Oiplieus followed them, for although the 
 troops had succeeded in quelling the tumult, tlie city Wiis still iu 
 anything but ii quiet state. 
 
 Veileil, anil without anything conspicuous in her dress — Ilerse 
 had seen to this — the maiden tiavcrsed the streets, leaning on the old 
 
SERAPIS. 33 
 
 man's arm, and c;ettin,2: him to explain to her everything they saw. 
 Tlm3 engaged, the girl's good humor returned socouipleiely, and her 
 ideas were "so bright and original, tUat Karnis soon torgothis weari- 
 ness, aud gave himselt up to the enjoyment of pointing out many 
 rcmarliable things that were familiar to him, but entirely novel to 
 her. 
 
 When they reached Canopian Street, Dada was beside herself 
 with pleasure. There rose up one palatial residence after another. 
 Covered colonnades ran along parallel with these rows of houses, a 
 broad walk shaded by sycamore trees divided the thoroughfare into 
 two parts, aud on each side of tliis beautiful avenue that was 
 thronged with people, handsome equipages rolled to and fro, horse- 
 back riders took their exercise, and, in short, something striking or 
 new was to be seen at every step. 
 
 A more magnificent street Rome itself could not boast of, and 
 Dada gave loud expression to her admiration, but Karnis did not 
 join her in this; for it infuriated him to observe that the Christians 
 had removed the fountain in the middle of the walk, a venerable 
 image of Father Kile, with frolicsome children, represented as clam- 
 bering over his kuees, an:I they had also partly thrown down, partly 
 mutilated, the statues of Mercury lining the drives. Oipheus shared 
 his indignation, and this reached its climax, when, on the pedestals 
 on both sides of the lofty front: door of a particularly stately man- 
 sion, instead of the Ceres and fallas Athene of Ant.ipliilus, that had 
 been the finest ornaments of the street, and been mentioned to his 
 son by the old man, there stood iwo roughly-hewn lambs, with 
 heavy crosses on their backs. 
 
 " Like rats that somebody has caught in a trap!" exclaimed the 
 old man, " A.nd the worse part of it, is, I would lay wager, that those 
 noble adornments of the city have been broken to pieces and thrown 
 out among the rubbish. In my time, this house belonged to the 
 wealthy Philippus. Hold! 1 wonder if he was not the father of 
 him whose hospitality we are now enjoying, for he—" 
 
 " 1 heard the steward call Porphyrins the son of Philippus," re- 
 maiked Orpheus. " And Philippus, like Porphyrins, dealt in 
 grain," added Kainis. 
 
 The Ceres was to indicate that this house owed its wealth to the 
 blessinss of harvest, and the Pallas Athene pointed to the cultivation 
 of science by its owner. When 1 studied here every rich man be- 
 longed to some school of philosophy. Wealth did not stand for 
 everything. Heathen or Jew, merchant or only the inheritor ot 
 ancestral property, a man must know how to converse on something 
 else than the price of goods and the incoming or outgoing vessel. 
 
 During this conversation, Dada had let go her companion's arm, 
 and lifted up her veil with one hand, tor two men had passed be- 
 tween the lambs, that had so aroused Karnis' wrath, and tlie one of 
 them, who let drop the knocker upon the front door, was the son of 
 Maria, 
 
 " See, father, there he is!" called out Dada, while the door was 
 being opened, in a tone far louder than was needful, in order to be 
 heard by his escort; and then the singer, too, recognizing Marcus, 
 turned to his son and said: 
 
 "Now we have it all clear. Porphyrins and the father ol the 
 3 
 
34 SERAPI3. 
 
 young Clirislian are brothers. Philippus lef I Iiis house on Canopian 
 blreel to the latter — he probably beiiisi; the elder ot the brothers — 
 and now it lieloiigs to his widow, Mari;t, the presiding j^euius of our 
 inn. Una thinir must be allowed you, child, you have chosen your 
 lover from a trood family." 
 
 " I mean to do that," laughed the maiden. " But for that rea- 
 son they are proud, tool 1>iot a glance has the gentleman to spare 
 for us. Clap, clap! the door has already closed! Let us move on, 
 uncle." 
 
 After the young Christian had entered the front hall of his ances- 
 tral home, together with his companion, he stood siill, and said, in 
 a tone of urgent entreaty, " Just come with me to mother; you 
 must not part so." 
 
 " How else, then?" asked the other roughly. " She insists upon 
 her own way, 1 on mine. You had better look out forthwith for a 
 more suitable manager. To-morrow morning early 1 shall be oflt. 
 Let the earth swallow me if 1 stay among these men turned madmen 
 an hour longer than is necessary. For the rest, Maiia is i/our moth- 
 er, not mine." 
 
 "But, nevertheless, she has been your father's wife," retorted 
 Marcus. 
 
 "Very true," replied the other. " And on that account 1 call 
 you ray brother. But as for her — any kindness that she has shown 
 me 1 have repaid by a ten-years' teim of service. We do not under- 
 stand one another, and never shall." 
 
 " Yet— and yet 1 was in the church, and have— do not laugh— 
 and have prayed to the Saviour to compose your diflerences, and 
 He^- lou have been baptized, remember, and belong to Ills fold." 
 
 " To my misfortune. You make me wild with all this sweet 
 gentleness!" passionately exclaimed the other. " 1 stand upon my 
 owu strong legs; and this toil-hardened hand carries out the pur- 
 poses devised by the brain." 
 
 " No, dear Demetrius, no! You believe in the old gods, there's 
 the trouble." 
 
 "Actually," said the other, with growing impatience. "You 
 speak against the wind; and my time is limited. 1 am busy pack- 
 ing my things now, and, for your sake, will not ask for my dis- 
 missal, when 1 come presently io render up to your mother my book 
 of accounts. At AisinoG 1 liave land enough for my purposes m 
 my own right. 1 am tired of being dictated to by a woman about 
 aflairs in my own province, that 1 know perfectly how to manage. 
 I'll see you again presently, little Marcus. Oidy announce my com- 
 ing: in exactly an hour I'll call on your mother." 
 
 " Demetrius!" called the young ninn, once more trying to detain 
 liis brother; but he broke away from him with a violent exertion of 
 strength, and walked rapidly through an open court, richly adorned 
 with flowers, in the midst of which splashed a playing fountain. 
 On all sides of it were rows of chambers, and one of these belonged 
 to Demetrius. 
 
 Marcus followed his brother with a long, melancholy look. The 
 two thought and felt too difTereully for their intercourse to be per- 
 feftly harmonious; an<l a casual observer woubl never have taken 
 them tor the sons ot one fatlier, so exactly was one the opposite 
 
SEliAPIS. 35 
 
 of the other, Marcus was slender and delicate; Demetrius, on the 
 contrary, broad-shouldered, and rawboned. 
 
 After Marcus had parted from his brother, he repaired to the spa- 
 cious woman's apartment, where INlaria was accustomed to stay at 
 this hour, atter she had finished her superintendence of the female 
 slaves, weaving in the work-room, at the rear of this. 
 
 He found the widow in lively conversation with a very aged 
 pr'est, of mild, dignified aspect, i^he had crossed the line of the 
 forties, but would li.ive passed yet tor a beautiful woman. It was 
 from her that the sou had gotten his slender, spare frame, and nar- 
 row shoulders; from her the slightly stooping gait, his delicacy of 
 feature, fairness of complexion, and soft, wavy, coal-black hair. 
 The resemblance betweeu the two was made more striking t)y the 
 slender gold band that encircled the head of each; yes, a rare freak 
 of nature would have been manifested here if the black eyes of the 
 mother had not differed so totally from those of her son— for her 
 glance was keen, sharp, and at times not without masculine hard- 
 ness, while the dreamy'luster emitted by Marcus' blue eye, lent to 
 his countenance an almost feminine charm. 
 
 Her discussion with the old gentleman opposite her must have 
 involved iiaportant matters, for her cheeks hadfiushed slightly upon 
 the young man's first appearance, and her delicate, taper finger 
 tapped lightly and quickly on the arm of the sofa upon which she 
 was resting. 
 
 Marcus first saluted the priest, then kissed her hand, and after in- 
 quiring for her health with filial solicitude, informed her that 
 Demetrius was coming, after a while, to take leave of her. 
 
 "How gracious!" said she, coolly. "You know, rRverend 
 father, what I desire, and what he refuses to accede to. The peas- 
 ants, perpetually the peasants! Can you explain to me why pre- 
 cisely they, who depend far more immediately than we townspeople 
 upon the providence of God, why they, whose weal and woe lie so 
 visibly and sensibly in tlie hands of the Most High, should be the 
 very ones to harden themselves so obstinately against the message 
 of salvation?" 
 
 " They cling to old customs," answered the venerable old man. 
 " Their seed has brought forth harvests under the old gods; and be- 
 cause they have to expect no more than the tenth or twentieth part 
 of tlie grain from our Father in heaven, whom they can not see and 
 touch, lilve their idols — " 
 
 " It is forever nothing but ' mine and thine. ' Miserable cupidity!" 
 interposed the widow, sighing. " Demetrius will know well enough 
 how to defend the idolatry of his favorites. Have you time, father, 
 to stay, and help me to refute his arguments?" 
 
 "1 am already staying too long," replied the priest, " for the 
 bishop requires my presence. 1 should like to converse with you, 
 dear Marcus. Call at my house to-morrow morning, early. The 
 Lord be with you, dear children!" 
 
 The priest arose; and when Maria held out her hand to him to say 
 good-by, she signed to her son that he should withdratv to a little 
 distance, and said, in a low voice: " Marcus is not to suspect that 1 
 am aware of his dereliction from the right path. Speak directly to 
 his conscience to-morrow morning. What measures are to be taken 
 
36 SERAPIS. 
 
 with tlie girl I'll ablencl to myself. Will not Thcopliilus by any 
 possibility he able to spare me an hour?" 
 
 " Hardly now," replied the irray-haired old man. " Yon know 
 that Cyiiegius is here, and how much depends on these days, both 
 for the bishop and our cause. Give up tliat wish, I Ijeseech you, 
 daughter, tor, even it Theophilus receives you, 1 believe and— do 
 not he angry with me— 1 must hope, too, that he never yields to you 
 in this atiair." 
 
 " No?" asked the widow, casting her eyes down with a troubled 
 look; but no sooner had the reverend gentleman withdrawn than 
 she lifted them, with defiance flashing from their glance. Then she 
 let her son — he had already talked with lier, for hours yesterday, 
 about his journey to Rome — entertain her with what Demetrius had 
 said, how he had found his horse, whether he could hope for vic- 
 tory at the next race, and whatever else he had been doinir during 
 the day. Meanwhile, it did not escape her that Marcus was less 
 free of speech than usual, and tried again and again to lead the con- 
 versation up to his journey and the inn at A.le.\andria; but she 
 always evaded the subject, tor she knew at what he was driving, 
 and would not listen to him to-day. 
 
 Slaves had long since placed silver candelabra, lighted, in the 
 room, ere Demetrius finally made his appearance. 
 
 His step-mother received him with friendly mien, and asked him 
 after indillerent matters. lie gave her information with ill-concealed 
 impatience, toi he had not come to chat with her. She felt that 
 plainly; but it pleased her to detain him, ami she did so in a man- 
 ner that reminded him ot his boyish years, and the many petty trials 
 which had poisoned his young life, when this woman had stepped 
 into the place of his o\vn genuinely good and tender mother, stand- 
 ing between himself and his father. 
 
 Just as to-day, so she had met him in those times; with kindly 
 sounding words, but a heart cold and void of love. He knew that 
 she had put an evil interpretation upon each of his boyish errois 
 and lilile misdemeanors, and referred them to bad qualities and the 
 evil propensities of his nature; that she had persistently misrepre- 
 sented his character to her husband, and this crime he could not 
 forgive. At the time when his father, Apelles, was murdered, he 
 liad already outgrown the da3"s of boyhood; and as the elder son 
 ot the house, it should have been his to share the management of 
 the business with his Uncle Porphyrins; but the thought of living 
 in the same place with his step-motlier had ajipeared intolerable to 
 him, and so, especially as he had always been toud ot country life, 
 he left to Maria the house on Canopian Street, persuaded his uncle 
 to wind up the business ot Lis deceased brother, and turn it into 
 cash, while he himself left Alexandria, to UDdertake the administro- 
 tion ot their vast estate in Syrenaica. 
 
 In a few years he had attained the position of a distimrMished 
 landed proprietor. Agriculturists throughout the whole province 
 gladly consult eil him, and profited by liis example, and the account 
 book that he spread out, this evening, for Maria's inspection — three 
 immense rolls— proved b}' the unanswerable lestimcmy of figures, 
 tiiat he liad known how to double the returns ot those great estates. 
 He had a good right to claim for himself independence of action. 
 
SERAPIS. 37 
 
 and miirtit reasonably insist upon Imvincj his own way, for he was 
 upheld by the j^roud feeling of the independent man, who retcard- 
 lessly breaks the bond of irksome relations, because he possesses tlie 
 means of either resting at his ease, or dedicating his strength to new 
 undertakings. 
 
 Alter Demetrius had stood long enough his step-mother's un- 
 edifying talk, he laid his hand on the book of accounts, and re- 
 marked, without circundocution, that it was time now to talk of 
 serious matters. He had already explained to Marcus, that he 
 deemed her demand impracticable. He was no loiterer, and wished 
 to come to a conclusion at this very time, whether he should con 
 tiuue to do the best he couUi for their landed property, or confine 
 himself to the management of his own lands. It Maria insisted upon 
 the last requisition he would immediately give back to her his 
 crideutials, yet would hold himself ready to" return to ISyieoaica, 
 with the new superintendent, whom she must get soon, and induct 
 him into the dilficult relations existing there; but afterward he 
 would have nothina: whatever to do with the family property. 7 his 
 w;is his last word, viz : that when they had made their decision, be 
 it one way or the other, they should part without any life-long 
 breach, for this he did not wish, on Marcus' account. 
 
 Demetrius had spoken seriously yet without passion, but his dis- 
 course smacked so much of the bitterness thai animated him, that 
 it could not escape the widow, and so, in her reply, she emphasized 
 the fact, that it would pain her, if he attributed her desire to mo- 
 lives having any personal reference to himself. She had a great 
 deal to thank him for, and acknowledged her obligations with pleas- 
 ure. He knew that the estates on which he administered were 
 bought partly with her dowry, and partly with money belonging to 
 her husbimd, and so belonged to herself, equally with her children, 
 himself and Marcus. Plowever, her husband's will had given her 
 the unlimited disposal of the same. She had striven to prove her- 
 self worthy of tlie confidence reposed in her by the deceased, when 
 siie had intrusted the management of her proDerty to him while 
 still so young. The rents had increased under his control, and she 
 verily believed that, in the future, he would know how to attain 
 yet more brilliant results; but the ill-doings that were rife on those 
 lands were unbearable, and must be regulated, although it should 
 lessen the returns by a half. 
 
 " 1 am a Clu-istian!" she exclaimed, " and am one with my whole 
 soul. Soul and body have 1 dedicated to my Saviour. What should 
 profit me all the treasures of the world, if 1 should receive hurt to 
 my soul! and hurt it must be if 1 allow my pockets to be tilled by 
 these heatiienish peasants and slaves. 1 am inflexibly resolved that 
 our slaves in Syrenaica— and they constitute a flock of more than 
 tliree thousand" wretched sheep— that our slaves shall either submit 
 to baptism or be exchanged for Christians." 
 
 " That were to say—" passionately exclaimed Demetrius. 
 "1 am not done yet,'' interposed she. "As for the peasants 
 who occupy our land as tenants, they all — you acknowledged it yes- 
 terdaj' — cleave ol)stinateIy to idolatry. We will allow them time 
 for reflection, and then the annual contract shall be renewed only 
 with those who pledge themselves lo give up the old sacrifices and 
 
38 SERAPIS. 
 
 acknowledge our Lord. If tliey submit, it will be for their welfare 
 here, and hereatter: if the}' refuse, give thorn warning to quit, and 
 next j'ear p\it Christian tenants in their place." 
 
 "As 1 exchange this chair for anotlier," laughed Demetrius, 
 picking up a scat of heav,y bronze, and dashing it upon the hard 
 mosaic floor, so that tlie din was most startling. " 
 
 Maria started, and then continiied in stronger excitement: "My 
 bod3'^ may tremble, but my soul stands Arm, where their eternal wel- 
 fare is at stake. I desire— and to this desire, wlioever is my repre- 
 sentative must accede, be it you or some one else — 1 require that all 
 heathen temples, every image of rural or horticultural deities, every 
 altar for sacrifices, and every sacred stone, by means of which the 
 peasants carry on their idolatries, be torn awaj', overturned, or cast 
 aside. That is what 1 want." 
 
 "And that is what 1 shall never, never agree to!" cried Deme- 
 trius with loA-, wrathful voice. " To blow away like thistledown 
 what has been held dear and sacrod tor thousands of years, is a task 
 too hard for me. Go and do it yourself; you cairy that out!" 
 
 " What do 3'ou mean!" asked Maria, proudly drawmg herself up, 
 with a haughty glance of the eye. 
 
 " Yes, you, if anybody, can carry it out!" repeated Demetrius 
 steadily, without allowing himself to be intimidated. " Only to-day 
 i was looking for the likenesses of our ancestors, that hf d been 
 deir to our cliildish hearts, the venerable portraits of our latlier'a 
 grandsires and grandmotliers. who had made the greatness of our 
 family. Where are tliey? There where you have thrown our 
 tutelar deities, the ]\Iercury and Pallas Athene, those noble orna- 
 ments of our house, street, and city. They have gone to the lime- 
 kiln. Old Phabis owned this to me, with tears in his eyes. Alas! 
 poor house, robbed of its past, its adornment, and its protection!" 
 
 " 1 have given it something better in their stead," replied ]\Iaria, 
 with quivering voice, and exchanging with Marcus a glance of in- 
 telligence. " For the last time, 1 ask, will you or will you not do 
 ■what 1 ask?" „ 
 
 " 1 will not do it!" answered Demetrius coldly. 
 
 " Then our estate needs a new manager." 
 
 " You will find him, but your land, that is ours likewise, will be 
 converted into a desert. Poor laud! For, if you annihilate the 
 sanctuaries of the field, you will destroy its soul also, for they are 
 the soul of the field. Around tlie sanctuary trooped the first settlers; 
 and upon it and the gods that inhabit it, the peasant righily fixes 
 his hope for that which he sows and plants, for wife, child and 
 cattle — yes, all that belongs to him. With the sanctuary you deslroy 
 the hope of the husbandman, and with it all the joyfulness ot life. 
 1 know that the peasant will believe all his toil to'be in vain, if you 
 take from him tlie gods, who bustow their blessing upon the hard 
 labor of his hands. The husbandman beholds in seed the type ot 
 hope, in the growth of the fruit recognizes the power of the gods, 
 and at harvest delights in returning them grateful thanks. If you 
 destioy his sanctuaries, you take from him what uplifts, supports, 
 and blesses him." 
 
 " We give him other, and belter ones," answered Maria. 
 
 " Only see to it, that they are acceptable to him," gravely opposed 
 
SERAPIS. 39 
 
 Deniplritis. " Persuade him to love, to believe, and hope in what 
 you will lorcn upou him, hut take not tiom him what he holds 
 dearest, before you hud him iucHued to, and capable of acceplinj; 
 the indemnity that you arbitrarily impose upon him. Let me i;o 
 uow. We are neither of us, any longer, iu a mood for devisiua; 
 suitable plf.us lor the future. Only one thing has been settled be- 
 tween us, this evening: 1 atu no longer superintendent of that 
 estate." 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 Demetrius had made good use of his time, after leaving his step- 
 mother, and diclaled several letters to the Greek slave, his secretary, 
 who had followed him to Alexandria; as lor himself, he detested 
 liaudling the stylus. They all bore reference to his predetermined 
 departure from Syrenaica, and his purpose of confining himself to 
 the mauagercent of his own property. Now, as they lay before 
 him, rolled up, wrapped around with strinc;, and sealed, "they seemed 
 to be like stones marking a turning-point in his course of life. 
 
 Silently he walked up and down, picturing to himself the pros- 
 pective fate of the slaves and peasants, who had so long been, to 
 him, faithful servants and co-laborers, whose confidence he had 
 ■won, and among whom there was many a one for whom he felt 
 regard. 
 
 He could not imagine the lives of these people, bereft in their 
 activities and their holidays of image, sacrifice, garland and glad 
 song. They would seem, he thought, like children, forbidden to 
 play or laugh; and again was forced upon him the thought of his 
 own boyhood, and he recollected the Hist day of being sent to 
 school, and made to sit still in a gloomy room, instead of merrily 
 running at large in the sunny garden belonging to his father's 
 house. 
 
 He wondered, if the world too had reached that boundary line of 
 existence, where freedom and careless enjoy ment of life cease, and 
 the hard struggle after higher things begins. 
 
 If the Gospel contained the truth, and its promises should be 
 fulfilied, then it were perhaps advisable to accept its bond, and re- 
 sign many a brilliant bauble of existence for the sake of imperish- 
 able treasures. Many a wise and good man whom he had met in 
 life, yea, the emperor himself, Theodosius, the great and wise, was 
 devoted heart and soul to the doctrines of Christ. DeiKetrius, too, 
 knew from his own experience that his mother's faith, into which 
 he had been indoctrinated as a boy, and from wliich the same father 
 who had carried him lo the baptismal font had early apostatized, 
 provided poor mortals, in this troublous existence, great consolation 
 and a strong support. 
 
 But his peasants and work hands! Were they not healthy and 
 content? 
 
 Clinging as they did to old customs, what power on earth could 
 move them to give u\] venerable superstitions, to which they fancied 
 they owed their well-being and happiness, anil seek in uncertainty 
 what they now already deemed their own property. 
 
 He did not repent of his hrnmesa, and yet he said to himself 
 
40 SERA PIS. 
 
 that without liim Maria tvould only too soon carry ber purpose into 
 execution and accomplish lusr work ot destruction, and there stood 
 forth betore his mind's eye in long array all that she had devoted 
 to downfall, every temple, every marble statue, every leafy grotto, 
 every stone anointed by pious hands. 
 
 lie was accustomed to begin every cay at Ihe first crowinc: of the 
 cock, and to retire early. This evening, as well, he was preparing 
 to seek his couch betimes, when Marcus entered his room and 
 beiiged Dim to spare him another hour. 
 
 ""You bear a grudge against mother," said the young man, fixing 
 upon him a sad and pleading look: " but j'ou know her devolion to 
 the faith, and for that she makes every sacritice. There again, how 
 bitterly you smile! Just put yourself in my place. Suppose that 
 you loved anybody as 1 love mother, would it not pain you if soir.e- 
 body else very dear to you loo— for you are my friend and brother 
 — should be so bitterly prejudiced that the one will have nothing 
 to do with the other. My heart is heavy enough to-night without 
 that." 
 
 " Poor fellow!" returned the farmer. " Indeed 1 am your friend 
 and will be so alwavs. You are not to blame at ail for any of all 
 this! For that matter 1 myself am anything but in good spirits. 
 Y'ou have made your decree. Down with the sanctuaries, away 
 •with those who think differently tiom what we do! Arrange the 
 matter as you will, here and there it will come to deeds ot violence; 
 yes, it no blood flows, it will be a miracle. For you, the question 
 is only about an abstract idea, tliose heathen peasants in the coun- 
 try. For me the case is entirely different! 1 know those slaves and 
 tenants personally, and can call their wives and children by name. 
 Everyone of them has given me the morning and evening saluia- 
 tion, shaken me by the hand, or kissed my robe. Many a one has 
 
 come to me weeping and gone off lejoicing. By Nobody ever 
 
 called me tender-heartpd. but now would that I were less so! And 
 I boil over with rage when 1 ask myself. And for what is all this?" 
 
 " For the sake of oui holy faith, Demetrius; assuredly only for 
 the eternal salvation of these people." 
 
 " Indeed?" ask°d the farmer, drawlina out the word. " 1 know 
 better. Were that and that only the intention then would they 
 build churches and chapels, moreover send us worthy priests — 
 Eusebrius, for instance, and men of his stamp — who should try 
 with that love, which you so loudly protess, to win men to your 
 Lord. Early this morning 1 myself counseled your mother to this 
 course. 1 believe that, with us, as elsewhere, tlie aim could l)e thus 
 attained, not liowever in a mouth or a year. The peasant who has 
 become accustomed to going to church and imbibed confidence in 
 the new worship will ot his own accord give up the old gods and 
 their shrines. I have seen as many e.\am])les of this as 1 have 
 fingeis. Even 1 would have looked on at this with composcu'e, for 
 wliat 1 want with men is their muscle and sinew, not tlieir souls. 
 But, to burn down the old house, before you have even galliered 
 logetfier wood and stone for the new one, that 1 call crimmal. sin- 
 ful, and foolish. And when m) prudent a woman as your mother 
 commits lierscif unreservedly to s:) disastrous a policy there must 
 lurk something peculiar in tiie baekgrounii. 
 
SERAPIS. 41 
 
 " You Ihink that she wanted to set you aside, you, Demetrius?" 
 interposed Marcus, with aaimation. *' Ji3ut you are mistaken in this, 
 indeed yoii are. What you have doue for the property—" 
 
 " That, that!" cried the other. 
 
 " What have 1 or my work to do with all this? In the course of 
 the year— 1 can see throu<;;h a ii;riudstoue as well as the next one— 
 every trace of a heathenish .^od will have vanished from the villages 
 and fields of the pious Maria. That is the object held in view! 
 This glad tiding will be borne to the bishop on the wings of the 
 wind, and as one ndracle follows another, so increases the chance 
 of winnmg the saintly crowu held la view. Hence this zeal, there 
 lies the sole motor." 
 
 " You are talking about my mother," cried Marcus, lifting his 
 eyes to his brother in touching entieaty. 
 
 Then the farmer shook his bushy head, and contiiiued in a milder 
 tone: " Yes, child, 1 had forgolteti that, and it might well be that I 
 err; for I am only a man! One blow after another has struck me 
 in this house, until I hardly know myself any longer. Old Phabis 
 believes that they actually have it on foot now to"" affix the seal of 
 martyrdom to my father." 
 
 " Mother is convinced that he died for the faith, and because she 
 loved him so dearly." 
 
 " .Stuff!" snarled Demetrius, striking the table with his fist. 
 " That lie, sowed by somebody, that accursed weed, has grown up 
 until it overshadows the very roof of this house. You, indeed, 
 what cau you know about our father. But 1, 1 knew him. 1 have 
 been present, when, in company with his philosopher friends, he 
 has lauahed at all, not only at that which you Christians, but pious 
 pagans too hold most sacred. Lucretius was his Gospel. The 
 cosmogony of that atheist lay beside his bed, and when he journeyed 
 it was his companion." 
 
 " He loved the heathen poets, but for all that he was a Christian 
 nevertheless," retorted Marcus. 
 
 " Wo more and no less than Uncle Porphyrins and I," cried the 
 farmer. " ttince our grandfather Philippus received baptism good 
 fortune and harmony have turned their backs upon this house. 
 That he might not lose the job of supplying with corn both the 
 Stale and emperor he abjured the old gods, he became a Christian, 
 and made Christians of his children. But he had them educated 
 by his heathen friends, and so they passed for what they were not. 
 When it could not be avoided he showed himself with them at 
 churcli, but their dail}^ lives, their pleasures, their recreations were 
 !ill healhenisn, and when any crisis occurred in their life they 
 . offered a bloody sacrifice to tiie gods. To draw back was an im- 
 possibility, for the Christian who proves recreant to the faith acd 
 goes back to his idols loses the right to will his own properly by 
 testament. You know the law, and if you ask why 1 myself am 
 without wife or offspring, dearly as 1 love children, why, as a 
 solitary man 1 drag out a dreary existence, let me tell 3'ou, it is be- 
 cause 1 serve the old gods openly and- freely, not going to church 
 because 1 despise falsehood. What should 1 do with children who 
 must be disinherited because of my acts? The right to will prop- 
 erty, that alone induced my father to have me baptized as a boy 
 
42 SERAPIS. 
 
 and pretend to be a Christian. "With Lncrelius in liis traveling- 
 bag — witii these hands 1 phiced the little roll beside his purse— he 
 set olT for Petwi to obtain a contract for supplying the City ot Kocks 
 with corn. On his way home he was murdered, eviilently by his 
 own servant Anubis, who knew what valuables he carried upon his 
 person, and has never been heard of since. At the same time 
 heathenish i^aracens had falkn upon and killed some (Jhristian pil- 
 grims and anchorites in the district ot country between Petra and 
 Aila. Upon this and this only j-our mother founded the riglit to 
 call our father a martyr. And yet she was well aware ot his senti- 
 ments, and had shod plcnl}^ of tears on their account. Now she 
 expends vast sums on everj'^ church Ijeing built. Now she estab- 
 lishes an inn on charitable principles, and again casts handfuls ot 
 gold to monks and convents, with a never-to-be-sated ztal. To 
 what end? Our father is to be recognized as a martyr! But hilhcr- 
 to she has lavished her means and toil in vain. Tlie bishop is, so 
 far as I am concerned, a hateful tyrant; 1 know him right well, so 
 he accepts what she oilers and yet accedes not to her wisues! Now 
 she brings her best forces into' the field, and suriirises him with a 
 new marvel. Like a juggler, who makes a black egg out ot a 
 white one by a turn of the hand, she converts a pagan into a Chris- 
 tian landscape. For my part, 1 shall not help her to carry on her 
 little game." 
 
 During this discourse Marcus had sometimes cast down his eyes, 
 then again opened them wide, looking at his biolher in wonder and 
 distress. Fax a long while he found not one word to give back in 
 reply, and it was manifest that a fierce conflict was beinc fought in 
 his breast. 
 
 Demetrius did not disturb him, and silently put in order the 
 l>apyrus leaves on the table, until Marcus addressed him, and alter 
 drawing a deep sigh in a tone of assured conviction and with a 
 blissful smile which illuminated his whole countenance, exclaimed : 
 
 " Poor mother! Like you, many will misinterpret her; why 1 
 was myself in danger of doubting her. But now, 1 think, I under- 
 stand her peifectly. She loved my father so devotedly, and what 
 he failed to gain for himself, while in the flesh, that she would 
 now struggle after in behalf of liis immortal soul. lie had received 
 baptism, and her prayers, her self-sacrifice, will avail to obtain 
 grace for him from Him, who so gladly pardons. She believes in 
 the death, by nfartyrdom, of oui dear deceased, and it the chuich 
 extends salvation to them who have bled for her, then is he saved, 
 and she will meet him again beyond the skies, and there in purer 
 light, when her Lord shall summon her hence, overflowing wi'h 
 love and intense gratitude, he will extend his arms to embrace the 
 beloved companion, who will have .«aved his soul. \cs, now 1 
 understand her perfectly, and from this time forth will aid her, and 
 the hardest tiling shall not be hard to me, the best thing not too 
 good, to expend in unlocking heaven's gate to the poor, imperiled 
 soul of our father!" 
 
 At the last words the young man's face glowed with enthnsi- 
 nsm. and even the rough farmer's heart was softened, but to con- 
 ceal his emotion he said in a tone more careless and harsh than 
 usual •. 
 
SERA PIS. 43 
 
 " That is bravely put, nn^ dear boy!" Then he hiirrietlly drew 
 his hand across his eyes, slapped Marcus on the shoulder, and con- 
 tinued with animation: " Rather die tliau give up what you know 
 to be right. To give candid expression to one's thought never yet 
 hurt anybody. It people can not alwai^s agree, they at least learn 
 how to comprehend one another. 1 have my way and you yours. 
 "We have been sincere with each other though; and yet atter trag- 
 edy comes the iarce, so 1 think that we may as well clnse this ex- 
 citing evening with a little harmless chit-chat." 
 
 So saying, Demetrius threw himself out upon a cushion at full 
 length, inviting Marcus to do the same, and soon the conversation 
 turned upon horses, as it was exceedingly apt to do when these two 
 came together. Marcus praised tUe mares which had been trained 
 for him by his brother, and which he had yesterday exercised in 
 the hippodrome, and the larmer added selfcomplacently : 
 
 "All four by the same father and mothers of most excellent 
 stock. 1 broke them in myself, and should like to— But why 
 were you not in the stable this morning early?" 
 
 " 1 couUl not come," replied Marcus, and he blushed slightly. 
 
 " Then we'll drive out to Nicopolis to-morrow, and I'll show you 
 how to get Megara past the Taraxippus."* 
 
 " To-morrow, say you?" asked Marcus, with embarrassment. 
 "1 have to go and call on Eusebius early in the morning, and 
 then — " 
 
 " Well, then?" 
 
 " Then I must, that is to say, 1 would like to—" 
 
 "What?" 
 
 " Of course— Perhaps 1 might, nevertheless. But no, no, it can 
 not be done— 1 have — " 
 
 " AVhat, what, what?" asked the farmer, with growing impa- 
 tience. " My time is limited, and if you want those horses to run, 
 and know not my way of managing them, most assuredly they will 
 not do their best for you. When the market filis up, let us lake a 
 drive. We shall need a few hours for the hippodrome, then dine 
 at ' tlie Damon,' and before it gets dark—" 
 
 " No, no," asseverated Marcus; " just to-morrow 1 certainly can 
 not—" 
 
 " He who has nothing to do is generally pressed for time," inter- 
 posed the farmer. " Is to-morrow a holiday?' - 
 
 " Not that, but, gracious heavens, although 1 should like to—" 
 
 "Should like to, should like to!" exclaimed Demetrius, indig- 
 nantly, plautinsc himself with crossed arms in front ot his brother. 
 " Say in brief: ' 1 will not,' or, ' What 1 intend lo do, is my sccrtt 
 and none of your business;' but be done with that miserable affec- 
 tation!" 
 
 These vivacious words augmented tae young -man's embarrass- 
 ment, and while he was racking his brain for an answer that would 
 come near tiie truth, and yet not betray himself, Demetrius, who 
 had not taken his eyes ofl of him, called out: 
 
 "By the foam-born Aplirodite! 1 do declare there is a lady in 
 the case— an appointment! Women, women— everywhere women!" 
 
 * gometliing used for scaring horses. 
 
44 SERAPIS. 
 
 " An appointment!" repeated Marcus, after his brother, shaking 
 his head in token ot liissenl. " Kobody is expecting nie; and yet 
 better that you siiouid misinterpret me than that 1 siiould speak 
 talriely. Yes, then, 1 am on the search atler a woman, and it 1 do 
 not find her to-morrow, it 1 (h) not to-morrow attain that to wliich 
 my heart nrjres me, tiien slie may l)e lost, not to me at all — for 1, 
 1 cast not heavenly love away for the love of the tlesh — but to my 
 Lord and Saviour. The morrow's slake is Hie, eternal life, or ever- 
 lasting death for a tair being formed in the likeness of God." 
 
 The farmer's amazement was ever increasing, and with a gesturo 
 of impatience, he paid: 
 
 " Again you huve overstepped the boundaries of the territory on 
 which we occupy common ground. You are an enigma to me. 1 
 should not suspect you of being old enough to l)e disturbing j^our- 
 self about the imperiled souls of fair women. With those who 
 swim on the surface one goes into the water without risk, but the 
 drowning ones drag us down with them, "iou are a handsome ras- 
 cal, have money, and drive tine horses, and there are plenty of 
 sharp women liere spreading their nets — " 
 
 " The question is not about me," eagerly replied Marcus. " Here 
 1 am the fisher, a fisher of souls, and such shoidd every believer be. 
 She is innocence, simplicilj'' itself, with all her sweet mischief. But 
 she has fallen into the hands of sinful heathens, and here, where se- 
 duction goes about like a roaring lion, she will be lost it 1 do not 
 save her. Twice 1 have seen her in my dreams, once close to the 
 jaws of a raging dragon, and the other time on the verge of a tower- 
 ing precipice, and both times an angel called to me, and bade me 
 save her from the teeth ot the monster, and falling into the abyss 
 below. Since then her image has been ever present with me, 
 whether I eat, talk, or ride, and just as perpetually 1 hear the warn- 
 ing voice of the angel. Au:l her, upon whom the Jlost High has 
 lavished all the gifts with which He adorned Eve— her, to guide her 
 into the path ot salvation, that is a blessed duty, and 1 'will per- 
 form it." 
 
 The farmer had followed the inspired words of his brother with 
 increasing solicitude. Now he shrugged his shoulders and said: 
 
 " One might envy your acquaintance with this favorite ot the 
 gods, but 1 should thinlv that your work ot soul-saving might be 
 postponed. You have been away from Alexandria for a whole halt 
 year, and it she has kept her head above water so long—" 
 
 " Speak not so; j'ou dare not talk thus," cried Marcus, pressing 
 his hand upon his heart, as though it pained him. "1 liave no 
 time to lose, tor 1 must ieain wliither that old singer has led her. 
 I am not so inexperienced as you think. JTe brings her here to make 
 an ill use of her beauty and to enrich himself. You met her your- 
 self on shipboard. 1 had procured them lodgings here, you know, 
 in my mother's Xenodochiuni." 
 
 " For whon\?" asked Demetrius, folding his arms. 
 
 " The singers whom 1 took into our ship at Ostia. And, now, 
 now, they have vanished from that pliice of letuge, and Dada — " 
 
 " Dada'i'" cried Demetrius, bursting into a loud peal of laughter, 
 without ol)gerviug that Marcus shrunk liom liim in glowing indig- 
 nation. " Dada, that fair-haired little giil, is before your eyes, night 
 
SERAPIS. 45 
 
 and day, and an angel exhorts you to the rescue of that merry, 
 lively thing? Shame upon you, my boy! What will you bel me? 
 If 1 sacrifice this parcel of sold she would be off with me to-mor- 
 row, me, the rawboned, freckle-faced countryman with my hair 
 bristling all over my head like a chamber-maid's mop. 1 tell you 
 she would with me to ArsiuoB, or anywhere else I chose. Let the 
 .iade go, you foolish piece of innocence! Such a soul as that is 
 fitted for a more commonplace heaven than yours." 
 
 " Take that back!" cried Marcus, beside himselt, and he doubled 
 up his fist. " But that is just you. With your own impure eyes 
 f nd heart you soil what is purest, and discern even spots upon the 
 Bun. Of a ' siu^er ' anything may be believed, 1 know. But that, 
 just that, is the very thing! ""1 would save hei from that curse! If 
 you can bring one fault to her charge, do so; if you know nothing 
 against her, and would not stand before roe in the light of a slan- 
 derer, then take back what you have said, on the snot!" 
 
 " 1 take it all back," said Demetrius, composedly, " for 1 know 
 nothing more of your beauty than what 1 read in the glances of her 
 pretty ,"merry eyes, glances speaking to you, me, Cj^negius and his 
 scribes. But people say that the language of the eye does not al- 
 ways speak truth. So, no oliense, please! If I understood you 
 aright, you are in ignorance now as to the whereabouts of the 
 singer. If you have no objection I'll aid you in your search." 
 
 " As you will," returned Marcus, provoked. " In spite of your 
 mockery I shall do what 1 believe to be my duty." 
 
 "Right, right," replied his brother. "Perhaps this maiden is 
 difterent from other public singers of her sex, among whom, in my 
 younger days, 1 spent many a night in carousal. At Barca 1 once 
 saw a while raven with my own eyes, but after all perhaps it was 
 only a dove. In this case your judgment is of more weight than 
 mine, for you concerned youiself about the girl, while 1 did not; 
 but it is very late already. Good-night, then, till to-morroW, Mar- 
 cus, my boy!" 
 
 The brothers parted, and as soon as he was left alone Demetrius 
 paced up and down the apartment, shaking his head. 
 
 When his body-servant came to pack up his things he called out 
 to him peevishly: 
 
 " Be done tnere, we shall stay a few days longer in Alexandria!" 
 
 Marcus did not retire to rest. His brother's scorn had shaken his 
 soul to its very foundations. An inner voice told him that the 
 experienced man of the world might be right, but at tlie san:e time 
 he reproached himself biiterlyfor paying any heed whatever to this 
 voice. The old curse of her calling rested heavily upon Dada; she 
 herself was pure, pure as the lily, pure as the Heart of a little child, 
 pure as the blue of her own eye and the metal of her voice. What 
 the angel had bidden him do, he would perform. He must, he 
 could save her. 
 
 Deeply moved, he peeped through the great front door, out upon 
 Canopian Street, and followed its course. As he was about to turn 
 into a cioss-street, in order to reach the lake, he found it blocked 
 up with soldiery, tor it led to the prefecture, the present abode of 
 the emperor's enibassador, Cynegius. of whom it was reported that 
 he had come to close the teiiiples, and before its doors the excited 
 
46 SERAPIS. 
 
 populace liad massed itself in the afternoon in order to demonstrate 
 its repiignanci! to sucli a uiission. 'I'oward sundown an armed force 
 Lad interposed and dispersed tlie mol). IJy another way, however, 
 the young Christian linally reached the lulvc-shore. 
 
 CHAPTER Vll. 
 
 WniLE Marcus restlessly paced to and Iro on the strand with 
 Da(hi's imase before his eyes, and tliouglit out persuasive arguments 
 with which lie would touch her heart, and produce in her mind con- 
 viction of the true plan ot salvation, it had grown quiet in the Hoat- 
 ing liome ot the minstrel family. A soft, whitish mist hovered over 
 Lake Moeris, like a light veil" that had been woven by the night 
 out of moonshine and clouds laden with moisture. 
 
 Work had long since ceased on the dock, and the mighty ribs of 
 hulks foi half-made ships threw wondrous ghost-like shadows that 
 rested like dark incorporeal crabs, ceniipedes, or gigantic spiders on 
 the sandy ground, silvered by the moonlight. 
 
 Not a sound from the city penetrated to this distance. She lay 
 there as though under the spell ot drunken stupor. The Roman 
 cohorts had cleared the streets, extinguishing the lights in the houses 
 as well as upon the streets and squares, but the moon shone over 
 Alexandria's roofs, and afar oft, from the light-house on the north- 
 eastern *iioint of the island of Pharos blazed lamps, with the efful- 
 gence ot a midnight sun. 
 
 In the gi-and "cabin, in the stern of the vessel, reposed the two 
 maidens on downy couches, covered with line drapery. Aynes was 
 awake, and looked out into the darkness with wide-open eyes; Dada 
 liad long since fallen asleep, and yet her breathing was troubled and 
 irregular, and at times lur red lips contracted painfully. She 
 dreamed of the excited throng, that, the day before, had torn the 
 flowers out ot her hair, and saw ]\larcus interpose and rescue her 
 trom her pursuers; then she believed herself to be tailing from the 
 gangway that joined the ship to the shore, while old Damia stood on 
 land, mocking at her without ofTtring her any help. Night had 
 always brought to her hitherto either sound sleep or pleasant dreams, 
 but this time one disagreeable vision followed after the other, al- 
 though the evening had brought her a great joy. 
 
 Soon after her return home from her walk into the city, the 
 steward had come on board, and with his old lady's compliments, 
 presented to her an elegant dress, and an Egyptian waiting-maid 
 besides, who was familiar with all the requirements of a lady's toilet, 
 and would be her personal attendant so long as she remained in 
 Alexandria. 
 
 Su-ch a robe Dada had never before called her own. Ihe under- 
 skirt was of siift sea-gieen silk, and was trimmed with wide lace, 
 above which run a garland of blush roses and rose-buds, executed, 
 in fine needle-work. The irpper robe was of the same color, and 
 edged with the same lace. This upper garment was to be clasped 
 at the shoulders by costly bands, the center-piece of which was a 
 line oval-shaped mosaic, representing a halt-l)lo\vn rose set in gold. 
 In a separate box lay a golden girdle, a bracelet of the same precious 
 
SERAPIS. 47 
 
 metal, in the shape ot a serpent, a golden crescent, in the center of 
 which, as on the shoulder-bands, was to be si.eii the picture ot a 
 rose, and a metal minor of faultlessly polished surface. 
 
 The slaee was a middlc-ased woman with brown, cunning face, 
 and immediately lent Dada aid in pulling on her new rose-dress. 
 Nor did this accomplished maid omit to dress the young lady's hair 
 anew; and, while thus engu,i;vd, liad not wearied, like some young 
 lover, of ringing the changea upon all the fair gifts with which 
 Nature had endowed her young mistress. 
 
 Agnes had smilmgly watched her, had obligingly handed the maid 
 the pins and ribbons that she needed, and feasted herself on the 
 l)leasure and beauty ot her companion. 
 
 At last Dada repaired in full dress to the grand saloon, and there 
 was gratifietl by hearing many au approving Oh! and Ah! from the 
 men assemliled there, with ivhom sat also the singer .Aleclius, whom 
 Ivarnis had met in tlie street, and with whom he liad associated 
 himself. 
 
 Even Herse, who had received her rather ill-humoredly upon her 
 return from the city, could not lefrain trom bestowing upon her a 
 kindly smde, although, at the same time, she shook her linger at 
 her, and said: 
 
 " The old lady has set out to turn your head completely. All (hat 
 is very pretty, but it will only provoke llie tongue ot slander. Al- 
 ways remember thai you are my own sister's child. 1 shall cer- 
 tainly not forget it, and keep my eyes wide open." 
 
 Orpheus had nothing more pressing to do than to light all the 
 candles and lamps, of which there were an abundance in this 
 richly-furnished aparlmcnt, and when Dada now presented herself 
 before Ki.rnis in the full ghiie of wax-light, he exclaimed: 
 
 ■■ i^ike a senator's daughter! Long live the beauty!" 
 
 Then she ran up to Uim, and gave hwn a kiss, bul, on the other 
 hand, wLien Orpheus came about her, extolling the tineness of text- 
 ure and arlislic workmanship ot her armlets, and, at the same time, 
 turned the serpent encircling tier round arm, she drew back indig- 
 nantly. 
 
 Medius, a man of Karnis' age, and a former associate ot his, 
 kept his eye continually riveted upon tlie maiden, and whispered to 
 her uncle that Dada could hold her own in a comijurison with any 
 beauty of Alexandria, and that with this jewel he might in tlie 
 most honest manner again become a wep.lthy man. 
 
 At his solicitation, she must undertake Ihe pruseutatit n of many 
 line characters. Slie had to pose ns flebe, who hands ueelar to the 
 gods, as Nausicaa, listening to the tales of Ulysses, and as Sa|)pho 
 singing. 
 
 The girl delighted in this acting, smd when Medius, who never 
 left her side, wanted to prevad upon licr to show herself in similar 
 characters at the enteitainmeiils ot ]?osidonius, the wizard, belore a 
 se'ect assemblage, assuring her that thus ni a few mouths she could 
 make her family rich again, she (-lapped her hands, and exclaimed: 
 " You dragged yourself along wilJi me through the streets, and to 
 reward you for acting as my escort l)ow 1 w<ndd like to Duv back 
 for you your pretty vineyard. 1 am therefore to show myself be- 
 fore the people so— so, and so am 1, and let them gape at me? The 
 
48 SERA PIS. 
 
 idea has suddenly taken me that 1 can hoax the spectators! If they 
 do not come loo close lo nie, 1 could in truth—" 
 
 "Tlien you could do iiolliiug belter," said Medius, interrupting 
 her, " lliau play the parts tliat would be assigned you by Posidonius. 
 Ills' auilieiices want to see lovely visions, friendly {guardian spirits, 
 and the like. You enurLu; from the clouds, behind a transparent 
 veil, they greet you with enthusiasm, or adoringly stretch out their 
 arms to vou." 
 
 All this seemed very fascinating to Dada, and she was about to 
 give her h;ind to Medius in token ot asseatwhen her eyecaugld. the 
 futensely anxious expression upon the Christian girl's countenance, 
 ■who stood just opposite to her, blusliing deeply. Tlie blood rushed 
 into her own cheeks, and w^ith a curt, " But it will not do," she 
 turned hei back upon Ibe old man, and threw herself down upon 
 the sofa next an elegant Cliina vase. 
 
 Now Medius began to hesieae Karnis and Hersc with representa- 
 tions, but they rejected his offers, because they hoped to leave 
 Alexandria in" a few days; a>id so nothing was left for him to do 
 but submit. JMeanwhiie he did not give up the game as utterly lost, 
 and in order to win Dada's favors made her laugh by comic antics, 
 or showed her surprising tricks of sleight of hand, and soon the 
 floating parlor rang with laughter, the clicking of glasses and merry 
 songs,"iu which even Agneo had to take a part. Not until toward 
 midnight did Medius take his leave, when llerse hurried off her 
 family to bed. 
 
 After the wiiling-maid had undressed her young mistress Dada 
 threw herself into the arms ot the Christian, who was just about le- 
 tiring. and kissmc; her passiouiitely, cried out: " You are much, 
 much' better thnn l! How do you always know wiiat is right?" 
 
 And with this she comjjosed herself for rest, but once more ad- 
 dressed Ague?, saying: " Marcus will certainly find us, and! would 
 like to know wliat phin he has for me." 
 
 A few minutes later, and slumber had sealed her eyelids, but the 
 Christian was still waking, lier thoughts iound no rest, and sleep 
 that had been so kind to her the night before, now refused to visit 
 her couch. 
 
 So much had happened to her to-day that filled her bosom with 
 disquiet. The unrestrained jollity of this family of minstrels had 
 hitherto been witnessed bv her as a silent sympathizer, and these 
 light-he.irted people had then always struck her as spendthrifts, 
 who wasted their substance in a few days, then to starve long years 
 in rueful penitence and woe. Uneasy about the salvation of these 
 poor souls, but glad in her own faith, she had then sought rest with 
 her Saviour and Redeemer, and soon found it. I3ut to-day matters 
 were difl'erent with her, for in the liouse of Porphyrins she bad en- 
 countered a new and unlooked-for temptation. 
 
 She liad ai:ain heard Gorgo sing, and blended her own voice with 
 hers. Her ear had drunk in strains breathing of tiitler woe, lofty 
 aspiration, and warm outpourings of the heart in praise of that beau- 
 tiful and mighty divinity, and her soul luid been tilled with shud- 
 dering rapture, althougl'i she knew ihat tiicy liad emanated from 
 the brain ot heathen poels, and been exquisitely set to music by lost 
 
SEHAPIS. 49 
 
 idolators. And yet, and yet, they had touched hei heart, filling her 
 breast with delight and her eyes with tears! 
 
 iNow she must also acknoft'ledge to herself that she could have 
 lent to her own woe, her own s'"'titude, her own aspirations, her 
 own liope ot life eternal, no fairer, purer, more inspired expression, 
 than had done this fair devotee to pai;ani8m. 
 
 Astonishment, unrest, yea, aslit^ht feeling of jealousy, had mingled 
 in her rapture at Gorgo's singing. 
 
 How was it possible that this heathen could feel and render out- 
 wani expression to what she had ever considered as the Clirislian's 
 l)rerogative, and what she herself had experienced in the liveliest 
 manner, when iu closest communion with her Saviour. 
 
 Could her own feelings have not been genuine? had intercourse 
 with heathens perverted her? This suspicion disturbed her sorely, 
 and it must have had its origin in something more than mere sell- 
 torture; for had it even come info her mind \o inquire to whom that 
 hymn for two voices was addressed with its plaintive appeals, when 
 Karnis had first gone through it with hei alone, and she had sung 
 it, timidly in the beginning, the second time more confidently, and 
 finally, carried away by the beauty and deep fervor ot the lament 
 that it contained, accompanied Gorgo in it without a mistake? 
 
 Now, she knew, for Karnis himself had told her. 
 
 It was the lament of Isis over her deceased husband and brother 
 —oh! the heathenish outrage! And that deceased one was the 
 idol Osiris! The weeping widow, who called him back " with the 
 still voice of tears," was that chief ot heathen goddesses, concerning 
 whose worship her father had frequently spoken with such abhor- 
 rence. But this lamsnt was so genuine and true, so permeated by 
 the agonized feeling of an afflicted soul, that it touched her to the 
 heart. The suffering Mother ot God might have pleaded just so for 
 the resurrection of her Son; just so must she have bewailed, 
 lamented, and called back to life liim, the " godlike one," as he was 
 called in her father's Arian confession of faith! 
 
 But all this was nothing but heathenish deception, the jugglery and 
 legerdemain of the devil, and yet had she not looked oii t"o the end, 
 Hnd given herself up to it, with her whole soul? i'es, more, yet. 
 After she had understood tlnit Gorgo represented Isis, but she, 
 Nephlhys, the sister of the deified pair, she had only faintly opposed 
 the proposition to take part in this duet, in the temple of the god- 
 dess; and when Gorgo had drawn close up to her like an affectionate 
 sister, and besought he'' not to spoil her pleasure but griint her re- 
 quest, she had not repulsed the fair tempter with severity, but only 
 prayed for time to reflect. 
 
 But whence could she have gathered spirit for refusal, when this 
 noble young lady, those character and singing appeared so very 
 charming and attractive, face to face, and with her beautiful arms 
 thrown tenderly around her neck had implored her tluis: " Now, 
 do it, love, do it, to please me. Vfhat 1 ask of you is nothing bad! 
 A pure song is acceptable to every god. Lament, if you choose, for 
 yours, who likewise suffered severely on his cross. It does me good 
 io hear jou sing. Say j'es! For my sake, do not refuse." 
 
 Then had she, whose heart was keenly susceptible of gratitude and 
 affection, flung her arms around the heathen maiden's neck, pressed 
 
50 SERAPIS. 
 
 her to her bosom, and exclaimcfl: " As you will, wlialevcr you ask, 
 shall be done!" And Orpheus, too, had ur^ed her to be oblltring to 
 Gnrsro, himself and tlie rest of the family, and it had seemed im- 
 possible to her to refuse the first entreaty ever made to her by the 
 modest young man to Avhoni she would so willint-ly have granted 
 evcrvthins^, but iievertlieless she had restrained herself, and in her 
 contusion, without thinkinir, or weiirhing properly her words, had 
 she sought only for evasion and postponement. 
 
 She might have compromised herself awkwardly enough, but 
 C!orgo had not pursuea lier entreaties further; and when she had 
 found courage, after leaving Porphyrins' house, to refuse dcci:ledlv 
 to enter tlic temple of Isis, Kamis had answered nothing ])ut: " Be 
 grateful that this blessed viigio, this favorite of the Muses, deems 
 you worthy of singing with her. The rest follows with time." 
 
 In these sleeiiless Jiours of the night, was made manifest to her 
 the abyss on which she stood. Like Judas, she i)ad been in the act 
 of betraying her Lord, not for filthy lucre's sake, but out of regard 
 to the fleeting melody of a human voice, and her own art, to gratify 
 a suddenly awakened fancy; probably also, because it gratified her 
 childish vanilv to be placed on tiie same footing with a noble lady 
 of distinction,' and a sougscress that Karnis and Orrheus admired 
 extravagantly. . 
 
 ^he was an enigma to herself, and one passage in the Bible after 
 another forced themsehes upon her m mory, and condemned her. 
 
 There lay Dada's rose-dress! To-day it had been worn lor the 
 finst lime, in a month would be hardly presentable, and how very 
 soon wouhi it be cast aside, as worn out. And so, exactly so was 
 it with every worldly pleasure, every joy in this brief, earthly ex- 
 istence. A h ! most assuredly she was here below no happpy maiden, 
 in Karnis' sense of the term; but in you bright world on liigh, there 
 were delights of eternal duration, and what were it to deny one's 
 self little gratifications here in order to secure great imperishable 
 ones, in the world beyond! There should she possess in superfluity 
 what the soul longed for. there, it might perhaps be granted to her 
 — bice poor Lazarus for the rich man— to moisten Gorgo's lips. 
 
 She knew now what answer ^he had to give on the morrow; and 
 with the firm resolve to put far from her the request to sing in the 
 temple of Isis, she found slumber and repose just as the dawn began 
 to biigblen the horizon in the east. She awoke late, and then fol- 
 loweci Karnis and Orphens, with downcast eyes, and firmly closed 
 lips, to the house of Porphyrins. 
 
 CHAPTER VIU. 
 TnK steward had not mentioned Dada to-day, when he invited 
 the singers to Porphyrins' house, and the slighted one worried 
 over it this time. The dauirhter of that old corn-sack said she is u 
 haughty princess, who cares for other ]ieople only just so far as 
 they gratify her jiurposes. If slie had not dreailed lieimr deenu'd 
 intrusive, she would liave availed liersclf of old Damia's inviinti u 
 to viisit her often, and, despite G<n-go's neglect, dropped, like a 
 meteor, into the middle of Porphyrins' music-hall. That this grand 
 
SERAPIS. 51 
 
 young lady should have conceived any dislike for her, did not enter 
 into her mind; for it was possible enough that a poor singing-girl 
 might hav«been ovsrloolved, but who had over met her in other than 
 a friendly manner? Nevertheless, she claimed for herself the right 
 not to be able " to bear " lorphyrius' proud daughter, and just as 
 the others were setting oft, she called out to Agnes: " You need not 
 murder her, in my name, but neither are you to give her my com- 
 pliments! It is only a shame thiit 1 am condemned to stay here all 
 alone with Rerse. Do not be surprised, when you come back, to 
 find me turned into a stifi, brown mummy— we are here in Egypt 
 for that to be sure. I'll will you my old gown, my dear; tlie rose- 
 dress you would not put on as yet. If you mourn for me very 
 prettily, I'll appear to you in your dreams, and put sugar-plums 
 into your mouth— ambrosial ones, such as the gods eat. Why you 
 do not even leave me the boy to tease!" 
 
 In sooth Agnes' little brother had been neatly dressed, and was 
 to accompany the party to Gorgo, who had asked to see hini. 
 
 After the rest had left the ship it was speedily manifest that 
 Dada's vexation was only skin-deep; for, no sooner had she caught 
 sight of the cuirassier's gray-bearded father, than she sprung bare- 
 footed (as she was accustomed to go in the house) up the narrow 
 snip's stairs, threw herself on a cushion, shaded by a linen tent-cloth, 
 leaned over the deck-railing, and began to watch all that was going 
 on in the dock, and upon the road running along the shore. Before 
 time had commenced to hang heavy upon her hands, her new tire- 
 woman returned from paying many little services to her former 
 mistress, that were still incumbent upon her. She crouched down 
 at her tVet, and begun to give her information about everything 
 that excited her interest. The fiist questions naturally had reference 
 to Gorgo. This young lady, as she heard now. had already rejected 
 many suitors, belonging to the first families of the city; and indeed it 
 Sachepris the slave, spoke correctly, all for the sake of the old mas- 
 ter ship-builder's sou. with whom slie had grown up, and who was 
 an officer in the emperor's service. But this attachment, llie maid 
 tlionglit, would not lead to a union, for Constantine was a zealous 
 Christian, and his family immeasurably superior to that of 
 Porphyrlus', and although it was true that he had comeback hnme, 
 loaded with distinctions, yet Damia, who had control of everything 
 at last, entertainea quite diCTerent views for her grandchild. 
 
 These communications excited Dada's sympathy in the hishest 
 degree, but she followed the maid's talk, with yet greater attention, 
 ■when she came to talk of ]\larcus, his mother, and brother. The old 
 Eg3q)tian was Damia's tool. 8lie had expected to be questioned 
 about that young Christian, and no sooner had Dada uttered his 
 name, than she glided close up to her, laid her hand softly upou 
 her arm, looked up at her with glittering eyes, and whispered to 
 her liurriedly — for Herse was not within earshot, as she moved to 
 and fro between her cabin and the deck— in her impure Greek: 
 " Such a pretty young mistress, to be kept shut up like a poor slave! 
 It mistress w(mld only choose it, she could have just as fine a time 
 as our Gorgo, easily, just as easily as anything; yes. as guod times, 
 and better! So young, so lovely! And 1 know somebody, whc 
 
52 SERAPIS. 
 
 •would like to set my benutiful mistress in red gold, Ti-hite pearls, 
 and precious stones, if charming Dada would onl}' consent." 
 
 " And wh}' should charming Dada not couseiit?" said (lie maid- 
 en, mimicking tier maid in lively manner. " Who has so much 
 to bestow upon me? You— 1 no more remember your name than 
 if 1 were doul)le as old as j'our lady Damia. " 
 
 " Sachepris, Sacliepris is my name," answered the slave, " but, 
 if you plmse to, call me anything else. The gentleman whom 1 
 mean, is the young sou of the rich Maria. A handsome man is J^Ir. 
 l^Iarcus, and he has horses, such splendid hoises, and gold is more 
 plenty with him thau pel)b]es heie on the shore. Sachepris knows 
 that he has sent slaves abroad now, to search lor pretty mistress. 
 Give him a token, write to Mr. Marcus." 
 
 " Write?" laughed Dada. " At my home girls are taught other 
 things; but it 1 could, do you think 1 Avould ao such a thing? 
 Write to him, 1 certainly should not! It any one wants to find me, 
 let him look for me!" 
 
 " He is looking, he is looking tor you, lieautitul lady," asseverated 
 the waiting-maid, " and he is full, quite full of you; and if 1 only 
 dared—" 
 
 "Well?"' 
 
 " Then 1 would put right oft and say to Mr. Marcus, say all in 
 secrecy — " 
 
 " V/hat? Finish your speech!" 
 
 " In the first place 1 would tell him where my lovely mi-stress is 
 staying, and then, that he might Lope — hope I should say, that my 
 most beautiful of mistiesses would some time, tliis evening perhaps — 
 it is not tar off— it is riglit near here. Only see that little white 
 house over there! It is an inn, and the host is a freedman of my 
 noble lady Damia's, and for money wculd keep you for a day, a 
 night, for several days. And there 1 should say — why shouUl 1 
 hold ray tontrue? There Mr. Marcus is waiting for his charming 
 lady-love, and will get for her dresses, compared with which the 
 rose-dress is but a beggar's gown. Then you will get gold— as much 
 gold as your heart can desire. 1 will guide you there'myself , where 
 your lover will receive you with optn arms." 
 
 " And that this very evening!" cried Dada, the blue veins swell- 
 ing upon her forehead and temples. " Fy! you brown serpent! 
 Have you learned such arts from your Miss Gorgo? How shocking 
 that is! fy, fy, how Ijase and vile!" 
 
 Marcus, whom she had taken to be good and pure, was the last 
 person from whom she would ever have expected such an insulting 
 proposition. She did not want to believe all that, and as she mot 
 the si}', cunning glance of the Egyptian, her own eye flashed 
 brightly, and with a decision and severity, for which the waiting- 
 maid would never have given her ci edit, she exclaimed: " It is false, 
 all false! Confess it, woman! How did Marcus get to you yester- 
 day, it he does not know where we are? You are silent, you will 
 not speak! Oh, now 1 understand the whole thing! He, he would 
 never have dared to have such a thought. But your noble lady 
 Damia, she it is who talks through you; you are only lier echo, and 
 Marcus— Ciuick, this minute, confess it on the spot, you hag — " 
 
 " Sachepris is a poor old hlave," begged the maid, with uplifted 
 
SERAPIS. 53 
 
 hands. " Sacbepris must only obey, and if pretty mistress should 
 betray her to the lady Damia— ' ' 
 
 '■ She, she it was who invited me to that littJe inn?" 
 
 The slave nodded. 
 
 " And Marcus?" 
 
 "If pretty mistress had consented — " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Then — But, great Isis! if you shoiild betray a poor slavel" 
 
 " That 1 will not do. Then you would have also—" 
 
 " 1, yes, i would have gone to young Marcus, and in your name 
 invited him." 
 
 " Shameful!" cried Dada to the Egyptian, and her tender limbs 
 trembled slightly. " How wicked, how horrid is all this! But as tor 
 you, you stay here only until the rest come back, when I'll pack 
 you home to your old mistress. 1 have, the gods "be thanlied, two 
 sound hands, and need no waiting-maid. But there. What is the 
 meaning of that? That elegant sedan-chair has stopped here, and 
 the old gentleman is bowing'to you." 
 
 " The inteudant of the noble widow Maria," whined the slave, 
 but Dada turned pale and asked herself what business a messenger 
 from Marcus' mother could have here. 
 
 Ilerse too, who, for Dada's sake, kept a continual lookout upon 
 the briilge connecting the ship with the shore, had seen the approach 
 of the widow's intendaut, and discerned in him an embassador of 
 love, in behalf of Marcus; but how amazed was she when the old 
 man politely but very peremptorily summoned her to enter the 
 sedan-chair,' and attend him to his mistress. 
 
 Was this an artifice? Did he only wish to entice Herse away from 
 the ship in order to leave the coast free tor his young master? 
 
 But no. 
 
 He had handed her a small tablet, and upon it was this super- 
 scription: " Maria, the widow of Apelles, to the wife of the singer 
 Karnis. " This, Herse, being an Alexandrian and well educated, 
 could read fluently. To the above address followed the same urgent 
 summons, that had been verbally delivered by her messenger. To 
 secure herself against imposition, she beckoned the slave aside, and 
 learned that the steward Phabis was a trusty old retainer of tne 
 widow. No deception was to be thought of in this case, and she 
 was obliged to accept the invitation. This disturbed her greatly, 
 but she was a circumspect woman, heart, mind, and mouth in the 
 right place, and quickly apprehended the necessities of the occasion. 
 While she gave her outer person a presentable appearance, she handed 
 over to the Euyptiau maid (whom she had taken with her into her 
 chamber) the little tablet, ordering her to convey it to her husband 
 without dela}', to tell him whither she had gone, and to request him 
 to return to Dada without delay. But suppose that her husband 
 and son could not get off? Then the girl would be left all alone oa 
 the ship, and then!— Forthwith before the eyes of her motherly 
 solicitude appeared Marcus luring Dada away, or, if the young 
 Christian did not succeed in finding out her abode she beheld her 
 niece escaping of her own accord and strolling about on Cauopiau 
 Street or in the Bruchium, where at noon all the fashion and frivol- 
 ity of Ale.xandria had its rendezvous. She saw, shuddered, pondered. 
 
54 SEIIAPIS. 
 
 nnd suddenly an expedient occurred to lier tliiit promised to meet 
 the (lilllculty. It ^v;ls not new, and a iavorito one among E.iry()lians. 
 81ie had seen it resorted to by the lame tailor wlio had been her 
 father's tenant, when he had to ^^ait upon his cvistomeia at their 
 homes, and leave his youn^ wite at home. 
 
 Dada lay bartfooted upon deck, llerse was going to hide her 
 shoes. 
 
 This she proceeded to do with flying fingers, and lodged up in 
 their one trunk saved, not only the sandals of the blonde, but 
 Agnes' also and her own. A glance at the hem of the Egyptian 
 slave's robe convinced her that hers could not be rendered available. 
 
 " Though a fire should break out here," thought she, " my Dada 
 would not go out upon tlie street with her prettj' little feet deformed 
 by such huge, clumsy coverings as those tlungs there." 
 
 Alter this task had been accomplished llerse breathed more freely 
 and proceeded to take leave of her niece. Because, however, she 
 felt that she had to make up to her for something, she addressed 
 her in a peculiaily endearing manner: " Farewell, child, I hope the 
 time will not seem long to ycu. There is a great deal to be seen 
 here, and the rest will soon be back again. This evening, if the 
 town is not too riotous, we shall all ride together to Canopian Street 
 and eat oysters. I'll see you soon again, my darling!" 
 
 So saying, she gave her a kiss, and the maiden looked up in sur- 
 prise, for her foster-mother was usually sparing of such demon- 
 strations of affection. 
 
 Soon Dada found herself quite alone on the ship, and lor diver- 
 sion nibbled at some candy while she kept herself cool waving her 
 new fan. At the same time her thoughts tlwelt continually upon 
 the shameful plot devised against her by old Damia; and while it 
 delighted her that she had not fallen into the snare, but penetrated 
 its design, her wrath kept increasing against the unworthy old 
 woman and Gorgo, whom she could not dissociate from tier. I3e- 
 tween whiles she would look out, sometimes for Marcus, sometimes 
 for the cuirassier. Tliat it had been impossible for her to attribute 
 evil to the young Christian, and that she could not help trusting 
 him implicitly, endeared him to her peculiarly ; but she was curious 
 also about the prefect, the youthful love of the proud merchant's 
 daughter. Meanwhile time slipped by, the sun rose higher in the 
 sky; looking abroad, fault-finding and dreaming wearied her, and 
 yawning, she began to consider whether she should stretch herself 
 out at full-length for a nap or go below, and for pastime once more 
 try on the new rose-dress. But her balancing between the two came 
 to naught, for, in the first place, the slave came bacic from her walk 
 and immediately afterward she saw the cuirassier approaching the 
 lake through the dock. Hereupon she quickly drew herself up, 
 adjusted the crescent surmounting her curly locks, and waveil him 
 a graceful salute with her fan. 
 
 The prefect of cavalry who knew from earlier times that the ship 
 was made use of for furnishing accommodation to Porphyrins' 
 guests, and had heard nothing in his father's house of its present 
 occupants, ])owed low before the beauty on the deck, making her 
 reventially the military salute. Dada graciously acknowledged it; 
 but this new accpiaintance seemed to be brought speedily to an end, 
 
SEKAPIS. 00 
 
 for the soldier walked on without lookintr arounri. His appearance 
 today was more striking than on yesterdaj'. His hair was lieshly 
 curled and oiled. Lis cuirass and helmet slione with such lustei, and 
 the crimson stuft of his coat was so new and splendid that they 
 could not have been more so, if he had been about to present him- 
 self before tlie throne of the emperoi. The merchant's daughter 
 had not shown poor taste, but her friend seemed to hold his head 
 as high as she did herself, it charmed Dada to make bis acquaint- 
 ance and see if he actually had no eyes for anybody else save Gorgo. 
 Tlie opposite, little as she concerned herself with him otherwise, 
 would have given her great sati.sfaclion, and she determined to put 
 him to the test. No time was to be lost, and as she knew there 
 would be impropriety in her calling to him, she yielded to the sud- 
 den iminilse and tliiet\' the pretty fan into the water which had just 
 be( u ptesented to her the day bc-tore. As she did so she uttered a 
 shriek, m which fright and coucern blended in the most natural 
 m inner possible. 
 
 Her ruse succeeded. The otficer turned around, his eyes met 
 lieis, and now Dada bent far over the parapet of the ship, pointed to 
 the mirror of the lake, and called out disconsolately: " It has fallen 
 into th water! Ob, my fan!" 
 
 Again tlie officer made a slight bow. Then he left the road and 
 came to the shore, while Dada continued her exclamations in a 
 quieter manner: '"There! There! If you only would! 1 would 
 like to get my pretty fan again so much! See, only see how oblig- 
 ing he fs! There it is swimming straight up to you." 
 
 Coustantiue the prefect had soon picked up the fan, which he 
 shook dry as he crossed over to the ship. 
 
 She received ihe fan joyfully, strolied smooth its wet featheis, 
 and thanked him who had rescued it with warmth and aninuitiou; 
 but he assured her that he only wished the service done her had 
 been a greater one. Then he would have withdrawn, bowing in as 
 formal a manner as he had done before, but he was detained in a 
 way that v.'as quite unexpected, for the Egyptian slave stepped in 
 his way, kissed the hem' of his coat and cried: "What joy for 
 father,' mother, and poor Sachepris! Mr. Coustanline is at home 
 again!" 
 
 " Yes, home again, at last!" returned the soldier with a deep, 
 resonant voice. "Your old mistress holds her own bravely. That 
 is right. 1 am on my way now to call on the rest." 
 
 "They know already that you are here," replied the slave. 
 " Great joy ari.ong them all. Have asked if Mr. Constautine had 
 forgotten his old friends." 
 
 " Not one, not one." 
 
 "And how long has it been since Mr. Constantine went away? 
 Two years, no, three whole ones, andyel not one bit chanced. Only 
 that scar over the eye! Withered be the hand of the viilaiu who 
 put it there." 
 
 Dada had long ago remarked upon the broad sword-cut which 
 furrowed the whole brow of the soldier, so far a3 it might be seen 
 beneath his helmet, and now interrupted the sluve: " How can you 
 men delight in hewing and slashing at one another so? Only think, 
 if that thrust had gone just one hnger's- width deeper you would have 
 
56 SERAPIS. 
 
 lost, your eye, and then raUicr died than be blind. To be able to see 
 notliing with light all around, how dieadtul that must be! The 
 eartli I hen would he in darkuess. you could distinguish nothing any 
 more, neither the lake, nor llie ship, not even nie liere. " 
 
 " That would he a pity," interposed the prefect, shrugging his 
 shoulders while he smiled. 
 
 " A pity!" cried Dada. " That sounds like nothing; the expression 
 should be a much stronger one, 1 ehould think. It is dull and tiie- 
 s(une enough sometimes with two open eyes, wliat n)ust it he then 
 if they refuse to perform their otliee, and one can not be diverted V)y 
 seeing what is goinsr on in the world aroimdV Do you know, sir, 
 that you have not merely done me one favor, but two at one and 
 the same time?" 
 
 "1?" asked the prefect of cavalry. 
 
 " Yes, you. But the second one is not complete yet. And now 
 pray, take a seat for a little while. You must know that it takes 
 away one's sense of repose it a visitor noes not seal himself before 
 he takes his leave. There, that is right, and now 1 should like to 
 ask you it you do not keep that helmet on your head, in battle more 
 especially. Y'es? Well, then how did that swoid-cut leach your 
 forehead?" 
 
 " In a close fight," answered the warrior, " things do not always 
 keep their right places. One man gave me a blow aside of my 
 helmet while another cut at me from the front." 
 
 " And where did that happen?" 
 
 " At Savus, where we fought ]\Iaximus." 
 
 " And did 3'ou wear that very helmet on your head?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed." 
 
 " Oh, give it here, and let me look at it? Ilovv heavy such a 
 thinu must, be with its iron hasps!" 
 
 Hereupon Constantine patiently took it off his head and handed 
 it to her. She dandled it about in her little hands, tound its weight 
 unbearable, and then lifted il up, to put it on top of her own curly 
 locks; but this did not seem to please the warrior, and with a curt 
 "1 pray you," he look the helmet out of her hands, set it down, 
 and rose up to go. 
 
 Then Dada made an animated gesture, motioning him to remain 
 seated. " No, no, 1 am not satisfied with your second service 
 rendered. 1 was about to expire of loneliness when you appeared 
 in the very nick of time, and if you would finish your work of 
 charity you must tell me something aboui that battle, where you 
 trot your wound, and who nursed you, and whether the Pannonian 
 women are really so beautiful as reported." 
 
 " Alas! time fails me to do all that," Interposed the prefect, " and 
 as for time hanging heavy upon your hands, Sachej^ris there can 
 help you to pass it away tar more cleverly tlian 1 can, at least; I 
 know her of old as being excellent at story-telling. A pleasant day 
 to you!" 
 
 "\Vith this parting salutation Constantine withdrew, nor, as he 
 advanced in Porphyrins' garden, did he look around even once at 
 the ship or its lovely occupant. 
 
 Mucli mortified, Dada looked after him, her cheeks suffused with 
 blushes. She had again done soinelhiug ot which she well knew 
 
SERAPIS. 57 
 
 Herf3e would disapprove, and, what was much more painful to her, 
 Agnes likewise. The stranger with whom she had tried to llirt 
 was a worthy man. Goigo had reason to he proud ot such a lover, 
 and now if he should go off, and probably finding her out of sorts, 
 should tell her that he had been detained against his will by tlia^ 
 bold public singer, whom could she blame but lierself ? She had a 
 feeling as though there was something in and about her that made 
 her seem worse than she was and wanted to be. Agnes, Marcus, 
 the prefect, and Gorgo, too, were something higher, nobler than 
 herself and hers, and for the first time she felt that the dangers, 
 before which the young Christian had desired to protect her, were 
 no mere chimeras of the brain. She could not desisrnate tliem by 
 name, but she felt that, without prop and support, without weapons 
 against the foolish impulses of her own soul, she would flutter 
 through the hours, from one undertaking to another, like a leaf 
 driven l)efore the wind, and she said to herself that everybody, just 
 because she and her family were professional singers, distruated 
 her, and look the liberty of suspectiuir her of what was disgraceful. 
 She could not help quarreling a little with the destiny of herself and 
 family, while there came over her a nameless longing after a new 
 and nobler life. 
 
 Silently she sat lost in thought, with her eyes fixed upon the 
 water, although she saw nothing of all thai was passing around her, 
 until the slave came running up and pointed out to her a carriage 
 thai had stood still at the street which separated the hedge of the 
 temple of Isis from the dock, and in which the Egyptian main- 
 tained that she again recognized a pair of Marcus' horses. 
 
 Hereupon Dada jumped up quickly, and with glowing cheeks 
 ran down into the cabm to get her shoes; but everything in the 
 shape ot a sandal had vanished, and flerse had done well to take 
 the Egyptian's toot-gear into consideration, for the maiden was 
 driven at last to do the same, and would not have been ashamed 
 to make use of her shoes if they bad not been so huge and ill-shapen, 
 
 Ilerse had played her this trick, and it was easy to read with 
 what end in view. In order to put her off her guard the false 
 woman had put on all that show of tenderness. Such deceitful- 
 ness was base and treacherous. And she had heretofore submitted 
 to all this as rreekly as a lamb, but this, this was too much, and 
 not to be endured. 
 
 Now the slave came into her chamber and summoned her upon 
 deck. Ihere a new visitor had presented himself in the person of 
 an old acquaintance and fellow-traveler, Demetrius, Marcus' elder 
 brother. 
 
 At any other time the agriculturist would have met with a friend- 
 ly reception as a consoler in her solitude, but he had selected an 
 unlucky hour for his visit and project, as he might have conjectured 
 from the girl's flushed cheeks and moist eyes. 
 
 He had come— cost what it would— to take her with him to his 
 estate at Arsinoa on the sea coast. The po.9sessinn of the fair maiden 
 had little fascination for him, but he had a keen desire, yes, he held 
 it to be his duty to redeem his inexperienced brother from tlie perils 
 into which his silly infatuation for this singing-girl threatened to 
 plunge him. 
 
58 SERAPIS. 
 
 A purse full of gold pieces and a necklace of turquoises and 
 rtianiDiids were to be his coadjutors in this scheme. lie hud bought 
 th(> l;ittiT in tlic jewelry bazaar in the Jew (piarteis for a sum that he 
 had ahcady several limes wratlifully com muled into a shipload of 
 corn and a whole cellar full ot wine and oil. I'he farmer moved 
 clumsily siraiirht up to his mark, inviting tlie maiden simpi}'^ and 
 bluntly to forsake her protectors and follow him to Arsinoy. 
 
 When she asked him in surprise wl:at to do there, he replied that 
 he stood in need of a jolly companion. He liked her, and if he 
 dared not flatter him?elt with having heretotore found favor in her 
 eyes he liad brought something with him that might sue succes-s- 
 fully in his behalf, and somethinii else that might lielp him to win 
 a smile from her. lie was no curmudgeon, and if slit liked this 
 and that — so saying he S|u-ead out the glittering chain and laid the 
 full purse upiiu the cushion, then she might consider it as payment 
 upon account, and calculate upon more if her pocket was deep. 
 
 Dada did not interrupt him, for the indignation that more and 
 more overmastered her took her breath away. Ihis new humilia- 
 tion overstepped all the limits of the endurable, and when at last 
 she had recovered the power to speak and act she threw the purse 
 from her cushion, and after it had fallen clinking to the floor kicked 
 it further away with her bare toot, as though it had been tainted 
 ■with plague. Then she planted herself right in front of the farmer, 
 and called out, " Shame upon you all! lou believe because i am 
 u poor girl, a singer by profession, and because you have dirty 
 gold — Your brother Marcus would not have done so, assuredly 
 not! But yoti, you horrid boor! If you ever again dare to set foot 
 on this ship Karnis and Orpheus shall hunt you down like a mur 
 derer or thief. Eternal gods! what, what have 1 done to muke 
 everybody think nie bad? Eternal gods — " 
 
 Hereupon she broke out into loud and convulsive sobbing, and 
 rushed up to the steps that led into the lower part of the ship. 
 
 Demetrius called after her in soothing words, but she would not 
 heed him. 
 
 Then he sent down the slave to implore her to give him a hear- 
 ing, but this only brought him an order to leave the ship forthwith. 
 
 Then he obeyed, and as he picked up the purse iy3 thought: 1 
 could get backthat granary full of corn and that wine-ship, but I 
 would throw away four more besides it 1 could undo this miserable 
 husiness. H one were wortliier and better one's self one would not 
 be half as apt to accuse others of being base and dishonorable. 
 
 C a AFTER IX. 
 The city of Alexandria was stirred to its very depths. There 
 ■were plottings by Christians and heathen, conflicts between the two, 
 and interference of armed force in bloody cpiarrels, going on trom 
 morning till night at the centers of political life; but, as when a 
 house f'ncounlers the severest strokes of destiny, afterward as .veil 
 as before, the little details of every-day lite must be attended to, as 
 children, tor instance, continue (heir plays when their father lies 
 upon his death-bed, thus, in the excited and imperiled condition ot 
 
SERAPIS. 59 
 
 the sreat cily, the little interests of individual life maintained their 
 rights. 
 
 True, the stream of pleasure and traffic met with manj-^ an ob- 
 struction, but still it flowed on. The doctor visited his patients; 
 convalescents, with the aid of a friendly hand, made a first eflort to 
 loiter out of the sick-chamber into the diuing-hall, and alms weio 
 both given and taken. Hatred spread herself everywhere, but love, 
 too, stood her ground, strengthening old, and forming new ties. 
 Care and anxiety pressed upon thousands, while others sought to 
 draw profit from the general unrest, and as many more went forth, 
 wiih light heart, on a seaich after pleasiu'e and enjoyment. Horses 
 wero exercised in the hippodrome, and in the Canopian suminer- 
 lioijses, there were entertainments, music, and laughter in plenty ; in 
 the popular gardens, encircling the Paneum, they wagered rudily 
 gold oi filttiy copper at cock or quail figlits. So the child sits, and 
 from the roof of his father's house, which still peeps forth abo'^e 
 the flood that has swallowed up the whole village, he launches his 
 toy-boat upon the treacherous element; so tlie boy lets his gay- 
 colored kite mount up to the sky whence black clouds are threaten- 
 ing to burst in fury; so the okf n:au counts up the savings of a 
 lile-lime, even wliile the bony hand of death is clutching at his 
 lieart-slrinjis; so dances merry youth upon the quaking; ground at 
 the base of a volcano. 
 
 Who troubles himself about the whole? 
 
 Each man has his own individual self to think of and care for. 
 What man liimself needs and desires— be it great or small — has for 
 hi in higher significance and a sweeter charm than the claims of the 
 great l)ody-politic as regards which he is no more than a tiny drop 
 of blood, or an eyelash. 
 
 In Porphyiius' house still lingered Olympius, the man whose 
 spirit and will had once already told so significantly upon tlie fort- 
 unes of the city, and for a nod from whom halt of Alexandria 
 tarried even now. 
 
 The merchant and his family shared the opinions of this party 
 chief and called themselves his confederates; but among them, too, 
 the trivialities of life held sway, and Gorgo, his fellow-comhalant 
 ui the strife for tlie old gods, thought only with divided attention 
 upon the great cause to which she was enthusiastically attached, 
 because a friend of her youth, from whom she had a riLcht to ex- 
 liect a visit, stayed aw^ay longer than was becoming. 
 
 Yesterday she had sung " The Lament of Isis " witli li«r v.iiole 
 soul, and eagerly solicited Agnes' accompaniment; but !>Uhough 
 to-day, too, she was excellently in voice, yet she had intetruoted the 
 song, sometimes upon hearing a door in one of the side-rooms shut, 
 or loud talking in the garden; then again rendered a passage with 
 so much less true sensibility than tlie day before, that I\!arnis "vould 
 gladly have felt free to reprimand her sharply. But this woi"d not 
 do, and so he gave vent to his dissatisfaction by whispering «-o his 
 son: 
 
 " There you see again thai tiie most astonishing gifts and fflpa- 
 l)ilities avail nothing wliere the two can still be kept apart, v*?"'^ 
 one carries on art, not as the first and last object ot existence f**^ 
 more as a luxury or pastime." 
 
60 SERAPIS. 
 
 Agnes had been true to her resolution, but declared decidodl^y that 
 it was impossible for her to cross the threshold of the temple of Isis, 
 and this refusal had been received quietly, and without serious op- 
 position. Gorgo's request lo repeal tiie song of yesterday with her, 
 slie had not telt able to decline, for all pointed to her being excused 
 from participation in the festival of that goddess. How could slie 
 know that the bearded philosopher, who had j'esterday listened a 
 breathless auditor to her duet with Gorgo, had taiken it upor him- 
 self to dissipate her objections, and persuade her to yield? 
 
 Olympius laid great stiess upon her co-operation, for all the at- 
 tractions of the ancient worship were to be combined in tlie temple 
 of Isis, and the more imposing and brilliant were the ceremonies of 
 the coming festivity, the higher must rise the enthusiasm of the 
 liealhen, which was evidently to be put to a severe test in the near 
 future. From the temple, the thousands whose hearts were devoted 
 to the old gods, were to march in solemn prDcession to the prefect- 
 ure, and if they traversed the city in right mood, it was to be expcted 
 that everything would join them, not dislinc;tly .lewisli or Christian. 
 
 Thus, it would amount to a proclamation of astonishing magni- 
 tude, and show Cynezius, the emperor's legale, how the majority 
 of the citizens were minded, and wliat would be the import of push- 
 ing matters to extremity, and laying hands on the chief temple of 
 the city. 
 
 lie, the mighty orator, who had grown gray at intellectual work, 
 deemed it mere play to overcome the silly scruples of a capricious 
 young girl. 
 
 As the storm deals with a light cloud, so would he scatter them to 
 the winds by the weight of his arguments, and he who saw con- 
 trasted this man of the Jupiter-like head and venerable beard, his 
 thoughtful brow and broad chest— whence, at his own pleasure, 
 gushed a stream of discourse, either of sweet persuasiveness or irre- 
 sistible force — with Agnes' modest and maidenly timiditj^, could 
 not have doubted for which ot the two victory would declare. 
 
 Not until to-day had Olympius found tune to speak at length 
 wilh his old friend Karnis, and while the girls had gone into tiie 
 garden to show little Papias the swans and tame gazelles, he seized 
 the opportunity of acquaintinii himself with all lliat he desired to 
 barn about the young Christian, and the fortunes of the minstrel as 
 well. 
 
 Tlie latter felt complunented that this renowned scholar, the head 
 of his fellow-believers, in the second city of the universe, who was 
 clothed with the ofBce of high-priest of Scrapis, and before whose 
 superior powers ot mind he had already bowed as a student, should 
 reiiu;mber his moiicst person, and listeu to his recital of the manner 
 in which he, the accomplished son of a rich family, had come to be 
 a wandering minstrel. 
 
 Olympius had been Karnis' friend, when, at the high school, 
 instead ot the latter's applying himself cvholly to the study of law 
 in obedience to his fatlier's wish, he had devoted himself lo the study 
 of music, wilh all zeal, and already shone !xs singer, player on the 
 lute, and leader of heathen choruses. 
 
 '1 lie tidings of his father's death had come to Karnis while still 
 a student at Al'^xandria. Before he left this place, then, he had 
 
SERAPIS. 61 
 
 irarried Ilcrse, who was his equal neither as to fortune or family, 
 and with her sailed over to his homeatTauromenium in tticily, there 
 to enter into possession ot an inheritance whose size and importance 
 ■v\ere a surprise to himself. 
 
 In Alexandria, the theater had been a tar more familiar spot to 
 him than the museum and the high-school ot the Serapeum. As an 
 amateur he had sung there in choruses, and frequently supplied 
 the place of their leaders. 
 
 In earlier days, the theater of his native city, Tauromenium, had 
 been widely famed; but upon his return home he had found it re- 
 duced to a melancholy condition. The greater part of the inhabit 
 ants ot this gloiious city at Mount Etnas' foot, had gone over to 
 Christianity, "and with them the rich burghers, at whose expense 
 plays had been put on the boards, and choruses supported. Minor 
 pieces were always being acted, it is true, but singers and actors 
 were being starved, and in their great, beautiful theater no more 
 was anything broiight before the public at all worthy of its past. 
 
 That cut to the iieart this rich young friend ot music, and with 
 the stirring activity of his nature, he soon managed to tind fa- 
 vorers ot his plan among those of his fellow-citizens who had re- 
 mained loyal to the old gods and retained a taste for Grecia's divine 
 arts of miisic and poetry. 
 
 The theater was to be the heathens' rallying point of antagonism 
 to Christians, it was to enter into rivalship with the churches, lure 
 back apostates, and strengthen those who had remained true to their 
 old convictions. From the stage the Greeks of Tauromenium were 
 to be reminded of the might of its old divinities, and the greatness 
 of its past. 
 
 To this end was it necessary to rebuild its ruined sanctuary, and 
 after Karnis had advanced, in cash, a large part ot the required ex- 
 penditures, the leadership of the theater was intrusted to him. 
 
 He devoted himself heartily to this task, and soon brought it to 
 pass that the stage of Tauromenium and the musical entertainments 
 m the Odeum attracted its citizens, and were spoken of far and near, 
 on account of their artistic perfection, 
 
 Such results must be attained by great sacrifices, and Karnis, de- 
 spite Herse's remonstrances, had never refused to make fresh ad- 
 vances of money, when the failure of his own creation was at stake. 
 
 Thus passed some twenty years; but then came the day when his 
 rich inheritance was exhausted; the time speedily ensued, when the 
 Christian communily were ready to sacrifice everything in order to 
 give the death-blow to this heathenish stone of stumbling in their 
 niidst. Ottener and ottener, during the performances, bloody con- 
 liicts occurred between the Christians, who had forced an entrance 
 into the theater, and the heathenish spectators, until finally came a 
 decree from the Emperor Theodosius, prohibiting the presentation 
 upon the stage of heathen plaj'S and operas. 
 
 The theater at Tauromenium, to which Karnis had partly given, 
 partly lent, his whole fortnne, existed no longer, and the money- 
 lenders who liad advanced sum after sum for the maintenance of an 
 art still in a flourishing condition, through his instrumentality, he 
 becoming security, now sold tor debt his house and lands, and 
 
62 SERAPIS. 
 
 would have cast him into prison, it he had not evaded this disgrace 
 by (light. 
 
 'Good friends had so aided his family as to enable them to follow 
 him, and in conilnnation with them, he bad begun his journe)Mng3 
 as professional singer. Otlen had he and his fared right hardly, but 
 he had always managed to remain true to art, and the Olympic gods. 
 
 The philosopluT had followed all this narrative witii sympathy, 
 and many a token of approval, and when Rarnis, at last, brought it 
 to a close, with tears in his eyes, Olympius laid his hand upon his 
 Bhoulder, drew him up close, and cried: 
 
 "Bravo, bravo, old fellow! We keep true to the same good 
 cause. You have sacrificed to it j'our all, as 1 have mine, 'liut 
 Ftill we need not despair. If we conquer here, friends will lift up 
 their heads in thousands of places. The cast of the stars last night, 
 and the appearance of this morning's sacrifice, prognosticate tre- 
 mendous re relations. What lies prostrate to-day may be soaring on 
 powerful wings to-morrow. All omens foretell the downfall of 
 what is greatest, and what to day should be greater than Rome, that 
 ancient oppressor of the nations? These days will hardly bring the 
 final decision, but much, of deci) eignificance for us, depends upon 
 them. 1 have dreamed of the fall of the empire and seen emerge 
 from its ruins a great Grecian kingdom, standing there strong and 
 beautiful, under the protection of the Olympian gods, and upon the 
 realization of this dream each of us must stake our all. I'ou have 
 given us a glorious example of the spirit of S3lf-sacrifice, and 1 thank 
 you for it, in tlie name of all sharers of our sentmients; yea, of the 
 gods themselves, whom 1 serve! The most pressing duty now is to 
 avert the stroke aimed at us by the bishop's hand through Cynezius. 
 It has already effected the downfall of the costly shrine of the 
 Apameian Jupiter. If the legate departs without having accom- 
 plished Ins errand, it will turn the scale greatly, very greatly, in our 
 favor. Then will it cease to be madness to believe in ttie viciorioua- 
 ness of our cause." 
 
 " Teach us to hope again!" cried the ginger. " With that only 
 much is won; only I do not see how this upheaval — " 
 
 " What we want is time, and in this way it is gained," replied 
 Olympius. Everything is prepared, but nothing readj'. Alex- 
 andria, Antioch and INeapolis are to be the centers of the revolt. 
 The great Libanius is no man of action, but he consents to our 
 plan. No lesser a person than Floreniius has taken it upon himself 
 to electioneer for us among the heathen officers; Messala and the 
 ndghty Goth generals, J raiut andGenerid, are ready to give in their 
 adlierence to the old gods. There will not lack leaders for our 
 army — " 
 
 " For out army?" queried Karnis, in amazement. " Have mat- 
 ters gone as far as that?" 
 
 *' 1 speak of the army of the future!" cried the scholar, with en- 
 thusiasm. " It numbers not a man as yet, but hlready it consists of 
 many legions. The nucleus of our host is foimed of whatever is 
 strong in mind and body, cultured youth, and muscular men. Fly- 
 ing, a Maximus had gathered together tlie army that deprived 
 Gratian of both throne and life, and came within a hair's-breadiii of 
 slaying Theodosiu?— and what was he but an ambitious rebel? 
 
SERAPIS. 63 
 
 What lured his folln\vers to him but the hope ot sharing his booty? 
 But we, we, enlist them, by appeals to the loftiest ideas, the warm- 
 est wishes ot the heart, and as the prize ot victory we point to the 
 ancient faith, the old treedom ot spirit, the old beauty ot life. As 
 for that humanity, about which the Christians prate, that i;a\idy 
 patchwork cover of disgusting barbarism, let them disfiguie tlieir 
 existence with if. if they please; but we are Greeks, as such be- 
 come tlie thinking head and the refined and delicately sensitive 
 sou! of the universe. The edifice of state, which we are planning 
 to erect, after the fall ot Theo*losius and the Roman Empire, is to 
 be Hellenic, and Hellenic only. The only natural feeling that made 
 the Gieeks strong against the millions of Darius and Xerxes, is to 
 take possession of us anew, and we are to show the barbarians from 
 ourselves, how the patrician hinders the humble man from reckon- 
 ing himself as one ol his illustrious house. The Greek gods, Greek 
 heroism, Greek arts and sciences, will rise up among us out ot the 
 dust, with a rapidity proportioned to the force which has been ex- 
 erted to hold down the ivings with which they were meant to i\y, 
 and must soar aloft forever." 
 
 " 1 feel that to my heart's core," cried Karnis. " My old blood 
 again finws taster, and if 1 only had a few more hundreds of tal- 
 ents to devote — " 
 
 "Then wouhl you give them all for our new Greek empire," 
 joyfully interposed Olympius. 
 
 "And like you. noble man. so think numberless other friends. 
 What glorious Julian would have accomplished, had not murderers 
 stretched him so young upon his bier, we shall succeed in, for 
 Kome— " 
 
 " Rome is still all-powerful." 
 
 " Rome is a Colossus, cemented together out of a thousand blocks, 
 and among these there are a hundred and more who are hardly kept 
 in place by the crumbling mortar, and, so tar as themselves arc con- 
 cerned, could not, too soon, be dissevered from the horrid monster. 
 Our summons shakes them loose, and they will rush to meet us, we 
 selecting the best ot them for use. Time— only a tew months' time, 
 and the army will assemble on the Campanian plains at the toot of 
 Vesuvius, thronging thither by land and by sea. Rome voluntaril}'- 
 opens her gates to us, who restore to her her ancient gods; the sen- 
 ate proclaims the emperor deposed and the republic "bnru, Theodo- 
 sius marches forth to meet us; but the idea for which we rush into 
 the field dies in advance of us. and knocks at the hearts of othcers 
 and soldiers, who gladly, oh! how gladly, would sacrifice to the 
 exalted occupants of Olympus, and only perforce kiss the wounds 
 of the crucified Jew. Tbey desert irom the Uibarum which led Con- 
 staatine on to victory, and flock over to our banners, and these ])an- 
 ners exist already. "These have been prepared in this city, and are 
 well concealed in the house ot ApoUodore. Exalted demons held 
 them out to my pupil Ammonius when he lay rapt in ecstasy, feel- 
 ing himself one with God, and I had them painted from his design." 
 
 " And what do they represent?" 
 
 " The bust of Serapis with the modins on his head. It is inclosed 
 within a circular border, on which are to be seen the signs of the 
 zodiac, and around them the ima<;e8 ot the great Olympian gods. 
 
64 SERA PIS. 
 
 The heart of our jxod is llitit ot Zetis; the measure of grain upon liis 
 head represents the future blessing expected by tlie hu.sl>au(lniiin. 
 The /oiliac ])roniises us propitious stars, and the figures which form 
 it are not commonplace, but ricli ia beautiful significance. The 
 twins are the guides of the mariner. Castor and Pollux; by tlie 
 lion we see Hercules, who masters him; the fish are dol'iliins, the 
 friends of music. Upon the balance, the sciile holding the cross 
 springs high into the air, and the other is weighed down with I lie 
 laurel ot JPhusbus Apollo, and the tbunderbolt of Zeus. In short, 
 our standaid will unfold all ihat is dear to the Greek, and that fdls 
 his soul with reverence. On the top of the ensign hovers the 
 iY//.r, Willi the crown of victory. Let the right leaders of the 
 movement l)e found at each center, and then will the banners be 
 forwarded, and with them arms also tor the country peo}>le. For 
 each province, a rallying point has been selected, the watchword is 
 fixed, and the da}' for the march determined upon." 
 
 "And they dock hither," broke in Karnis upon his speech, 
 " and 1 and ray son will not be missing from their midsl ! Oh, 
 lovely day, oh, great, exalted day! flow gladly shall i die if I may 
 only live to see victims smokimr once more upon T)egarlanfled altars 
 before the wide-open gates of every temple in the taud of Greece, 
 in honor of the OI_ympic deities; once more see inspired maidens and 
 young men form in Jine, to the sound of Hellenic ilutcs and lutes, 
 and unite their voices in chorus! Then, yes, then will light be re- 
 stored to the world, then will life again meaa enjoymeat, and 
 death, taking one's leave of a blessed feast!" 
 
 " kTO, so shall it be!" exclaimed Olympius, intoxicated by the 
 loud echo of his own enthusiasm, and he pressed the singer's hand. 
 We shall again pre'sent life to the Greeks, and teach them to despise 
 death as ot old. To darken existence, and seek blisj fulness in 
 death, that we leave to those barbarians, the Christiaas! But the 
 ladies have finished their song There is much to be done lo-day, 
 and the first thing is to dissipate the scruples of your refractory 
 pupil." 
 
 " You will not find that so easy a task, either," said Karnis. 
 " Arsiuments are dull weapons wherewith to fight women." 
 
 " Not always," replied the philosopher. "One n^ust only know 
 how rightly to handle his sword! Leave me to deal alone with the 
 child. Female singers here have died out, as it were; we liave 
 already tried it with three, but they were all badly taught and 
 commonplace. H this maiden accompanies Gorgo, her voice wil". 
 deeply touch men's hearts. We need inspired multitudes, and she 
 will help to enthuse them for us!" 
 
 " Weil, well. But you yourself, Olympius, who are the soul of 
 the gieal revolution, for which we hope — you ought to keep aloof 
 from this festival! A price is set upon j'our heaii, and although 
 Porphynus does protect you, yet his house is swarming with slaves. 
 They know you, and should one of them, allured by the golden 
 bait—" 
 
 " They will not betray me," said the sage smiling. " They know 
 that Danna, their trray-liaired nustress, and 1 have authority over 
 the demons of the upper and nether spheres, and that a nod from 
 her or me annihilates them; but even supposing that an Ephiales 
 
SERAPIS. 65 
 
 should be found among them, a leap into those doors there saves 
 me. Dismiss care, my triend, ou that point; oracle and star both 
 foretell for me another death than through the treachery ot a slave!" 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 Olymptus went to look for Agnes in the garden and found her at 
 the brim of a maible lined basin of water, handing her little Irother 
 bread, in order tnat he might feed the swans. 
 
 The pliilosopher greeted her iiiiuUy, took the child up in hia 
 arms, nnd pointed out to him the ball that bobbed now up, now 
 down, in unison with the fountain's jet. 
 
 Papias showed no fear of the tall man with his venerable, white 
 beard, for out of his clear eyes shone a mild and sunny luster; his 
 voice, too, sounded soft and sweet, as he asked him whether he, 
 too, had a ball, and knew how to play with it as well as did lie 
 water of the fountain. 
 
 Papias said no to this, whereupon Olympius turned to Agnes and 
 said: 
 
 " Get the boy a ball; there is no better plaything, Icr play ouf,ht to 
 be a graceful movement, tliat is, end and aim to itself. Play is a 
 child's work, and the ball that he throws, pursues, catches, shaipc-ns 
 his eye, makes his body supple, and teaches him a twofold lesson, 
 that man must put in practice, at every stage of his lite, viz. : to 
 look down upon the earth, and then direct the glance upward." 
 
 Agnes thanked him by an approving nod; but Olympius set llie 
 boy down again upon the ground, and sent him to the inclosure 
 where the tame gazelles were kept. Then he went straight to his 
 point and said: 
 
 " 1 hear that you decline to sing in the temple of Isis; tliey have 
 taught you to regard as an evil si)irit that goddess, to whom, uever- 
 theless, many good men turn in trustfulness; but do you know wha/ 
 she typifies?" 
 
 "No," replied Agnes, casting down her eyes: but quickly she 
 raised them again and added courageously: " And 1 do not wish 
 to know, for your gods are not mineT" 
 
 " Well, well, your faith diverges from ours at many points; but 
 you and 1, methinks, have still something in common. We both 
 belong to the number ot those who have learned, and joyfully ex- 
 ercise that ' looking upward '—there tlie ball mounts up again. 
 Do you know that ihere are many men tvho believe that the world 
 had its origin in a series of mechanical processes, and that there is 
 no deity who guides, guards, and adorns the existence of mankind';'" 
 
 " Ah, yes! 1 have been compelled to hear so much of such blas- 
 phemous talk at Piome." 
 
 " And it has run oft from you just like water from the silver- 
 white plumage of yondei swan, who has been diving, and now 
 comes up to the surface, Those who deny the being of God have 
 appeared to you foolish, perhaps even contemptible: isn't it so?" 
 
 " 1 have only pitied them from the l)ottom ot my heart." 
 
 "And with good right. You are an orphan, and wliat parentJ. 
 are to iheir child, so are the gods— that is divinity— for all that ia 
 
66 SERAPIS. 
 
 yclept man. lu this, GoTgo, 1, and many others whom you style 
 htalben, feel ])reci?el3' as you do; but you— have you asked your 
 8elt, Why you, to ■whom life has brought to many ills, are so firmly 
 l)orsuaded that there is, nevertheless, a benevolent deity who regu- 
 lates benignly the world and your own destiny? In short, why do 
 you believe in God?" 
 
 " 1?" asked Agues, looking at the philosopher, with wonder de- 
 picted in her ej'e. " What could there be without God? You put 
 such strange questions: all that 1 see, has been created by Our 
 Father in Heaven." 
 
 " l>ut there are some born blind who believe in Him." 
 
 " They teel him even as 1 see Him." 
 
 " Say, rather, as I think 1 see and feel Him. But 1 think that 
 reason has a right to put to the test what the soid only susjifcts, and 
 that it must be delightful to see this supposition confirmed by well- 
 weigl\ed arguments and changed into certainty. Have you hap- 
 pened to hear ot Plato the philosopher?" 
 
 " Yes, Karnis often mentions him when he ia conversing with 
 Orpheus about matteis that 1 do not understand." 
 
 " Well, this same Plato has with reason supplied proof for the 
 example which the heart can solve so satisfactorily for itself alone, 
 Otdy listen: Suppose you were to stand on a point of land at the 
 entiance of a harbor, and you were to see a ship approaching from 
 afar oir, which carefully avoided all shoals and came in a straight 
 line to the protecting roadstead, would you not be justified in believ- 
 ing that there was a steersman on tiuit ship guiiling and directing 
 it? Certainly. You not only may, but must, agree that such a 
 vessel is directed by the hand of a pilot. And if you look up toward 
 heaven, and observe the well-ordered course of the heavenly bodies, 
 if you see how all upon earth, both great and small, follow fixed 
 and ettrnal laws, move undeviatingly within predelerminod limits, 
 then again you may and must believe in (he hand ot the steersman: 
 and who other than Almighty God is the pilot ot the universe? 
 Does my similitude please you?" 
 
 " Very much. And yet it only confirms what 1 knew without 
 that." 
 
 " And yet, methinks, it must delight you to find your convictions 
 80 beautifully established." 
 
 " Quite assuredly." 
 
 " And you esteem the sase who thought out that similitude? 
 Yes? Well, then, this man was one of those whom }^ou call heathen, 
 believed as I do, and has found for you, too, confirmation of the 
 principles upon which your own failh is iounded. But we, Plato's 
 more modern disciples,* have gone further than he, and stand in 
 closer proximity to you Christians than you are apt to believe. That 
 we, just as little as you, can conceive of the existence ot the world 
 and the destiny of man, apart from deity, is obvious to you. And yet 
 you are equally persuaded that your divinity :ind ours are entirely 
 different. But can you tell me in what that Viiltereuce consists?" 
 
 " 1 do not know," answered Agnes, in distress. " 1 am a poor 
 
 * The School of Philosophy kuown a.s that of the New riatonists. 
 
SERAPIS. 67 
 
 ignorant girl: and ■who can even remember the names of your many 
 gods?" 
 
 " Yes, yes," continued Olympius. " There is the great Serapis, 
 whose temple you saw yesterday; there is Apollo, to whom Kurnis 
 loves best to sucritice; there should be, too, the triendly Isis, and her 
 sister Nephthys, whose lament you sung so thrillingly with my 
 young friend; and besides them I could mention so many immortals 
 that Gorgo, who is leading your ]it;le brother tliere to the lake, 
 might walk backward and forward ten times between us and the 
 snore before 1 should have finished, and yet, and yet, dear child, 
 our deity is yours, and yours ours." 
 
 " No, no. It is not!" cried Agnes, with growing anguish. 
 
 "Just hear me," continued Olympius, with the same benignity 
 as ever, but surpassing dignity; "and answer my questions sin ply 
 and candidly. We are agreed in this, too, are we not, that you 
 recognize deity in the works of creation, and also in the workings of 
 your oi\-n inner senses? So far, good. What appearances in nature 
 are those that make you feel peculiarly sensible of its nearness? 
 You are silent, are you? Yes, yes, the young lady has outgrown 
 her school-days, and needs not respond to the questioning of her 
 officious tormentor. 
 
 " And yet, wliat 1 desire to hear from you is beautiful and dear 
 to your hear!, and if you would not press those white lips so firmly 
 together, but rather give me the answer for which 1 entreated you, 
 then you would, in so doing, remind yourself of much that is high 
 and gloriou?. You would tell me of morning's young light, of tbe 
 soft blush that tinges the clouds when the shining orb of the day- 
 star rises out of the sea. You would say: In the thousand blossoms 
 that unfold themselves at morn, in the dew that they drink and 
 that decks them with diamond-showers, in the ripening heads of 
 ■wheat in the fields, m the swelling fruit on the trees -in all these 1 
 recognize ihe ruling power of deity. I feel its infinite greiitncss 
 when the inmieasurable expanse of the ocean rolls before me in its 
 wonderful blueness. 1 feel it when I raise my eyes by night and 
 watch the course in the sky of its myriads of shining stars. Who , 
 has created ihem in such inconceivable numbers? who guides them 
 so that they glide by one another in exquisite harmony, movuig to 
 and fro in well-measured minutes and seconds, silently and yet full 
 of deep significance, at immeasurable distances, and yet in close con- 
 junction with the fate of the individual man? Yes, that, all that, 
 bears witness to the existence of deity; and when you consider and 
 gratefully wonder at it, then you feel yourself close to the Almighiy. 
 Yet, if you were deaf and blind, and lay imprisoned and fetlered 
 within the gloomy precincts of a fast-locked dungeon, you would 
 feel it none the less if love, pity, or hope touched your heart. But 
 rejoice, child! The celestials have endowed you with fair gifts, and 
 with sound senses you may enjoy the beauty of all creation. You 
 practice an art that links j^ou with deity a3 though b}' means of a 
 bridge, and when a song pours forth from your full heart, the 
 divine ilself speaks from you; when you hear strains of noble 
 musi«, it is the voice of divmity itself that touches your ears, lu 
 and around you is traceable power from on high, which we are con- 
 6C10U8 of everywhere and at every hour. And this immeasurable, 
 
68 SERA PIS. 
 
 infinite, unlimited, gracious, and nnfailinply wise power which per- 
 meates and conlrols as well tlie life of ihe world as the hearts of 
 men, is called difleiently by dilTcrent people, ijiit is tlie same to all 
 nations, wherever they dwell, however they are named, or whatever 
 they l)elievL'. You Christians call it your lleavenly Father, we have 
 |j:iv('a it the name of the Original. Vour God, too, speaks to you 
 from the everlasting sea, the waving graintield, and the pure light 
 of lliesun; }ou, too, call his gilts music that lavishes your heart, 
 and ihe sweet love that attracts man to man; but we go a step fur- 
 ther and bestow upon every fippearance in nature, and every exalted 
 impulse of the heart, in which we recognize the immediate agency 
 of the Most lligh, especial names, and thus call the sea Neptune, 
 the corn-fields Ceres, the charm of music Apollo, and the delights 
 of love Venus. When you see us offering sacritiee before a marble 
 statue, you must not think that our devotion is paid to the inanimate, 
 perishable stone. Deity comes not down into the image, but the 
 image is fashioned after the itlea which the deity that it is to repre- 
 sent personates, and through this idea it becomes one with deity, pre- 
 cisely as through the bond of spirit everything else natural is linked 
 ■with the phenomena of the supernatural woild. But this is going 
 too far for you. Let it suffice, if 1 assure you that the statue of 
 Ceres, with the sheaf in her hand, is only tor the purpose of remind- 
 ing us of the gratitiide due to deity tor daily bread vouchsafed us; 
 a song of praise in honor of Apollo thanks the great being for those 
 wings woven out ot harmonies upon which the soul mounts upward 
 imtil it feels the nearness ot the jMost High. It is names, only 
 names, that part us, as though you would be any other than j'our- 
 self if 1 were to call you Ismene or Eudoxia. And now — no, keep 
 your seat— now you must hear this one tbing more, viz: that Isis, 
 the much abused Isis, is nothing, and signifies nothing, but the 
 benevolent agency of the deity in nature and in human life. M'hat 
 ve esteem our own under her, vou call the goodness of the ]M()St 
 Higli, made manifest in fiiendly gifts, whithersoever we turn. The 
 image of Isis reminds us in the same way of the lavish generosity of 
 the Creator.as the cross, the fish, and the Iamb remind you of Christ. 
 Isis is the earth, out of whose motherly bosom the will of God 
 makes food and refreshment flow tor man and beast: she is the 
 sweet attachment that God implants in the hearts of lowers; she is 
 that tender sentiment that unites husband and M'ife, brother and 
 sister; that imparts bliss to the mother with her infant at her breast, 
 and makes her willing and strong to undergo any sacrifice for the 
 prelly darling to whom she has given birth. She shines as a star in 
 Ihe firmament by night, she pours consolation into suffering hearts; 
 she, who has known herself the torture of ungratified longing, cools 
 the fevered brow of the afflicted and forsaken, and cures tiie sick 
 wiih a soft and healing hand. When in winter and days of drought 
 nature retu.«es to let new life germinate; when light is obscured; 
 when falsehood and criminal pleasures estrange the soul from its 
 ])ure source, then Isis lifts up her wail and calls back her lost hus- 
 band Osiris that he may take her again into his arms and fill her 
 will) tresh power to prove God's goodness toward the earth ann its 
 inhiibilants. \on have heard her'lament, and if you will join in it 
 at her festival, fancy yourself standing with the much-sutfering 
 
SERAPIS. 69 
 
 mother of your crucified God before Eis open gepulcher, beseeching 
 Heiiven to let him rise iioni the dead!" 
 
 These hist words Olyiupius had spoken iu high excitement, as 
 though he were sure of the maiden's assent; but their effect had 
 been exactly the opposite of what he had expected; for while Agnes 
 had listened to him with growing embarrassment, and bowed before 
 his arguments, lilve the bird whom the serpent's gaze fascinates and 
 attracts, in consequence of tlie last proposal of the philosopher, the 
 spell of his ensnaring discourse fell from her likeaulumn leaves froni 
 tlie crown of a tree shaken by a gust of wind; for they immediately 
 railed up before her her Saviour and His sutierings, reminding her 
 too of the spiritual conflict through which she had jjassed the 
 night before, and of the resolution witli which she had come into 
 Torphyriiis' house. Forgotten, blown away, like light dust from 
 rocky roads, were all the corrupting propositions which she had 
 heard, and her voice sounded firm and repellent as she replied lo 
 the philosopher: " Your Isis has nothing to do with the mother of 
 our Lord, and how can you compare your Osiris with Him who 
 hath redeemed the world from death?" 
 
 Surprised at llie decided manner of this objection, Olympius got 
 up and retorted quickly, and as if he had anticipated It: "1 wili 
 just explain that to you! Osiris— we put him, the Egyptian goci, in 
 place of our Serapis, in whose mysteries you would find much that 
 might prove exalting even to a Cliristian heart— Osiris, like your 
 master, voluntarily took death upon himself in order lo— again; 
 just like Christ— redeem the world from destruction. To whatever 
 is extinct, dead, and withered away, he, the resurrected one, restores 
 new life, new blossoming and fruitage. Whatever has seemed to 
 be given up imto death, he awakens to a fairer existence. Risen 
 irom the dead himself, he knows how to bring the departed soul to 
 resurrection; and if it ha£ kept itself, by high laieht, above the be- 
 fouling tilth ot tlie sensual, and he, the judge, finds that it has kept 
 itself worthy of its pure source, tlien he allows it to return to the 
 eternal, unclouded world of pure spirits, whence it originated. Do 
 you not also strive after purity, in order that your soul may find an 
 everlasting abode in the realms ot light? Again, ever again, we 
 meet the same ideas, only bearing difterent' shapes and names. 
 Only try to apprehend rightly the meaning of my discourse, and 
 you will gladly join in that pathetic lament, which calls back the 
 exalted one. How much he resembles your master! For, like 
 him, is he not one risen from the dead, and a redeemer? Whether 
 temple or church, both are the tabernacles of deity. At the ivy- 
 crowned altar of the mourning goddess, at the foot of the lofty 
 cypresses, that cast their deep and pleasant shadows upon the snowy 
 whiteness of the marble steps, which sustain the god's bier, you 
 will Irendjle with that sacred awe which seizes upon every pure soul 
 the moment lliat it feels conscious of the presence of the Godhead 
 —call it what you will, Isis, whom you know now, and who is 
 nothing else than the reflection ot divine goodness, will understand 
 Iiow to thank yoa, will restore to you that perfect freedom, after 
 which you pant. She will give to you, through us, introduction 
 into a (Uirisiian family, in recognition of the service that j'ou will 
 have rendered, not to her, but to laith iu divine goodness. There, 
 
70 SERA PIS. 
 
 with your little brotbcr, yon may live free, and after your own 
 heart's desire. To-morrow you will attend Gorgo to the temple of 
 the goddess- -" 
 
 Here Aij;ncs interrupted the philosopher, crying out, " But 1 &hall 
 not attend her!" 
 
 Iler cheeks had become flushed, and her bosom heaved tumultu- 
 ously, while she continued: 
 
 " i will not. 1 dare not. 1 can not! Do with me what j'ou will. 
 Sell me and ray brother; let us turn the hand-mill; 1 do not sing in 
 that temple!" 
 
 Upon this exclamation, Olympius frowned, and his bearded lips 
 tramed an angry reply, but "he restrained himselt, drew nearer to 
 Agnes, laid his 'hand upon her shoulder, and said, with the deep 
 measured tones ot a fatherly adviser: 
 
 " Consider, child; think well over all that you have heard from 
 me. Take to heart, too, what you owe to that dear boy, and to- 
 morrow give lis your maturely-weighed consent. Your hand, my 
 daughter; old Olympius is one who means well by you!" 
 
 So saying, he turned his back upon Agnes, and returned to the 
 house. Betore its door stood the singer and Porphyrins, engnged 
 in animated discussion. Word had reached Karnis that young i\Iar- 
 cus' moth2r had sent for his wife, and forthwith his lively im- 
 agination had pictuied Herse encompassed by a thousand dangers, 
 ttireatened by the widow, and under examination before judges. 
 The merchant advised him to await the issue, as also did Damia and 
 Gorgo. who had been attracted hither by the loud talking of the 
 men; but he would not be detained, and hurried oil, with Orpheus 
 following, to carry help to his wife. 
 
 Agnes was left behind, alone with her little brother, in the vast 
 garden; and so soon as slie found that no one was paying any atten- 
 tion to her, she fell upon her knees, drew the boy cfose up to her, 
 and whispered to him: "Pray with me, Papias, pray, pray, that 
 the Saviour may protect us, and not let us lose the way that leads 
 us back to our parents. Pray, pray, with me, now!" 
 
 For a minute she and the boj' remained kneeling on the ground. 
 Then she got up suddenly, took the child by the hand, and with 
 fleeting bre'ath drew him along after her through the open garden 
 gate, into the road on the lake-shore, thence into the first streel lead- 
 ing into the city. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Agnes' flight was unnoticed at first, for each member of the mer- 
 chant's family was particularly engaged. 
 
 After the singer's departure, Gorgo had stayed a long while with 
 her grandmother, and ai last repaired to the colonnade tronting the 
 garrten, whence was an outlook upon the park terraces and the 
 beach as tar as the dc^ck. Tliere she leaned against the shatt of a 
 pillar, and trom under the shadow of the purple flowering shrub- 
 bery gazed earnestly and thoughtfully forth toward the south. 
 
 She thought of her childhood, its privations and enjoyments. 
 
 Fate had denied her a mother's love, that sunshine of life's spring. 
 Down yonder in that splendid mausoleum ot dark porphyry rested 
 
SERAPIS. 71 
 
 the mortal remains of the beautiful woman to whom she owed her 
 being, and who had been snatched away fiom her ere she had en- 
 joyed her titst caress. 
 
 But round about that gloomy monument lay the blooming garden 
 bathed iu sunshine; and there, beyond that wall, overgrown with 
 the foliage of green creepers, was the dock, that scene of innumera- 
 ble joyous sports to her as a child. Sighing deeply, she looked at 
 the tall hulks of the ships in view, and tarried for the man to whom 
 her heart had belonged ever since its awakening, with whose image 
 was associated everything delightful in her childhood, as well as 
 what had peiturbed her youthful spiiit. 
 
 Constantine, the youngest sou of the master ship-builder, Clement, 
 had been the fellow-student and most intimate friend of her brother. 
 He had excelled them both in mind and gifts, and naturally become 
 the leader in their games. When quite a little thing, she had run 
 about after the boys, and Constantine had always been patient with, 
 bi ought out, and protected her. Afterward the time had come 
 when l)oth he and his brothers sued for her participation in their 
 merrymakings. When her grandmother had read iu the stars that 
 evil influences crossed the course of her granddaughter's planet, then 
 Gorgo was carefullj^ shut up iu the house, otherwise she had been 
 allowed to follow the boys freely in the garden, on the lake and dock. 
 There ships and houses had been built by the happy band: there 
 old Melampus, in a room set aside for the purpose, used to cut out 
 figure-heads for the prows of the finished vessels, and would give 
 them clay and let them help him. Constantine was his apt scholar; 
 and she used to sit still, when he would model her head; and among 
 the twenty likenesses which he made of her, many had been quite 
 good. 
 
 Melampus decared thai the young gentleman might have become 
 a great sculptor if he had been a poor man's child; and Gorgo's 
 lather admired his talent, and was pleased when the lively boy tried 
 to copy the beautiful busts and statues in his house; but to the par- 
 ents, and especially the mother of the young artist, these attempts 
 were a horror; and he himself never seriously entertained the 
 thought of devoting himself to such heathenish work, for he had 
 fully imbibed the Cnristian spirit of his house, and had managed, : 
 also, to fill with enthusiasm for the faith Porphyrins' sons, who 
 had early received baptism. 
 
 The nerchant noted this well, and suffered it in silence, for his 
 boys must remain Christians in order to retain the right to will prop- 
 erly; and his originally noble, but rather yielding nature revolted 
 so painfully against the necessity of confessing a faith that was hate- 
 ful to him, that he would gladly spare his sous this pain, and so, 
 with a bhrug of the shoulder, but quiet satisfaction, he saw them 
 follow Constantine to church and wear the blue color of the Chris- 
 tians at races and public spectacles. 
 
 With Gorgo the case was different. tShe was a woman, and had 
 no call to show her color's in life; and it made her father happy to 
 see her share his own enthusiasm for the old gods, and his Greek- 
 like views of the world. She was the ornament of his life; and 
 when he heard ringing in his ears from her juvenile prattle, and 
 later on her conversation and taking songs, the same sentiments 
 
72 SERAPIS. 
 
 that animated his own bosom, he was grateful to his mother and 
 friend ()l3Mni)ius, who had awakened and fostered in her sueh teel- 
 in<j:s iuid opinions. 
 
 Constaiitine'8 attempts to show her tlie beauty of his faith, and 
 to win her over to the same, tailed utteilj'; and the older the two 
 grew the greater became their diversity of bcntimcnt, and the more 
 indignantly did tiie one brook opposition on tlie part of the oilier. 
 
 A passionate affection, conceived early, attracted the ship-builder's 
 Bon to his lovely playmate; and the more enthusiastically he clung 
 to liis own faith, so much the more vehemently he glowed wiih de- 
 sire for her conversion. But Olympius' ])upil was not easily to be 
 won over; yes, she often cornered him with queslions and argu- 
 ments, and while for her contending for their faitlis was no more 
 tlum a wrestling-match, bringing all her powers into exercise, witii 
 lilin it was an altair of the heart. 
 
 Damia und Porphyrins were pleased spectators of these hot dis- 
 putaiions, and clapped their hands in applause, as at the public 
 games, when Gorgo pressed hardly upon her higlily-exciteU opponent 
 with merry laughter snd slashino arouments. 
 
 Then came a day when Constantine observed that his whole- 
 hearted advocacy of what was, to iiim, most sacred, had become a 
 theme for jest and ridicule. From that lime the youth, who was 
 alread}' approaching the verge of manhood, kept himself ratlier 
 aloof from his neighbor's house. But Gorgo ever drew him back 
 with magnetic power; and if thej' chanced to be alone, ever and 
 anon ihe old conflict would be renewed; and when this was the 
 case, more earnestly and more bitterly than in e;,rlier days. 
 
 The attraction was mutual, so that it he had more elfectually ex- 
 erted self-control and remained longer absent, she would have pined 
 away through longing for nis lelurn. They felt that they belonged 
 to each other, and yet, that an impassable gulf yawned between 
 them, and just as often as they tried to l)ridge it over or fill it up, 
 a mysterious, irresistible fascination drove them to deepen it, 
 through new contention; and finally Constantine foun:l it insup- 
 portable to see what ho held most sacred, contemned and diagged 
 into the dust, by her of all people in the woild. 
 
 He would l)e gone from Gorgo and Alexaridria at any price. 
 
 The narratives of the captains both of war and merchant ships, 
 without this, had filled him with a craving to become acquainted" 
 with foreign people and lands, ills father's trade, to which he was 
 destined, had no attraction for him. He wanted to gel away, only 
 to yet away, and a fortunate accident soon opened up to him the 
 road to travel. 
 
 One day Porphyrins had taken him with him on an excursion to 
 Canopus. The old gentleman had lidden in a carriage while his 
 sons and Constantine accomjianied him on horseback. Outside the 
 city gate they had been met by Homanus, the cliief commander of 
 the imperial troops, attended by an escort of hij^di officials. lie 
 stopped by the carriage of the distinguished mercliant, and finally, 
 in tlie course ot conversation, pointing to Constantine. lie had asked 
 if that was liis son. 
 
 " No," Porphyrins had replied, " but 1 would that he were." 
 
 At these words the ship-builder's son liad bluslied deeply, but 
 
SEKAPIS. 73 
 
 Ronianr.s had turned his horse toward his, and laying his hand on 
 his arm called out to the colonel o£ cuirassiers tioni ArsiuoC: " A 
 soMier after Ares' own heart! Hold him fast. Columella!" 
 
 Before the cloud of dust raised by the hoots of the retreating 
 cavalry liad cleared away, Constantine had made the firm resolve to 
 be a soldier; but in his paternal mansion this proposition was re- 
 ceived in very different ways. 
 
 If is father found little to object to in it, for he possessed only 
 two docks and three sons. The balancing of the scale was turned 
 by the consideration that Constantine, with his powerful will and 
 great strength, was well fitted for the profession of arms. His pious 
 uiotiier opposed it, on the authority of the great teaclieis Clement 
 and Tertulliau, vsho had forbidden believers to take the sword as 
 soldiers, and cited the case of the holy Maximilianus, v»'ho, under 
 Diocletian, had been compelled to enter the army, and had sufleied 
 death by an executioner's hand because he could not be induced to 
 shed his neighbor's blood in battle. The profession of arms, she 
 declared to be irreconcilable with a devout Christian walk and con- 
 versation. 
 
 The father, however, did not heed this argument; for new times 
 had come, the greatest part of the army had received baptism, the 
 Church herself prayed for victory, and at its head stood the great 
 emperor Theodosius, that pattern of a genuinely orthodox and zeal- 
 ous Christian. 
 
 Clement was master in his own house, and so Constantine entered 
 the corps of cuirassiers at ArsinoG. 
 
 In the war against the Blemmyer he had succeeded in meriting 
 his first distinctions. 
 
 Later Arsinoe again became his garrison, and because Alexandria 
 could be easily reached from that town, he kept up constant inter- 
 course with his own family and that of the merchani. 
 
 Not quite three years ago he had aided in quelling the mutiny 
 ■which had broken out in his native city, on behalf of the usurper 
 Maximus, and soon afterward had been summoned to Europe, in 
 order to take part in the war, which Theodosius had undertaken 
 against that same Maximus. 
 
 A disagreeable misunderstanding had interfered with the harmony 
 of Conslantine's leave-taking of Gorgo; for, wlien he hud held out 
 his band to old Damia, she had promised' with her gianddaughter 
 to oiler up a sacrifice In his behalf, from tiaie to time. Perhaps 
 this offer had been made in good faith; but he had regarded it as 
 meant in derision, and so turned to go with his feelings deeply 
 hurt. 
 
 Gorso, however, could not bear to part from him thus; and 
 so, without paying any heed to her grandmother's astonishment, 
 she had called him bank, held out both hands to him, and biddea 
 him a cordial " farewell." 
 
 Damia had looked after him in silence, and ever afterward avoided 
 calling his name before Gorgo. 
 
 After the victory over Maximus, Constantine had been advanced 
 ffith unprecedented rapidity, to take Columella's place at the head 
 
74 SERAPIS. 
 
 of tlie cuirassiers, and yesterday entered Alexandria as prefect, with 
 his ilia miUdvia.* 
 
 Gorgo b:ul not ceased to think of him fondly, but lier love for 
 1)1 in lunl aicaiii and again struck her in tlie light of a treason, 
 a breach ot faith toward hei gods; and, to atone for her fault, she 
 had departed from the neutrality of her falhei's house, and actively 
 ioined Olympius in his battling for the faith of their fathers. She 
 had become a daily visitor at the shrine of Isis, and the prospect ot 
 hearing her sing at hig'i festivals had filled the temple of that god- 
 dess more than once. That time when Olympius had protected the 
 sanctuary of Berapis against the assaults of the Christian mob, she 
 and her grandmother had stood chief among the ladies who sup- 
 plied their struggling fellow-believers with the'means of subsistence. 
 
 All this had lent" iutei est to her life, but every little victory ac- 
 corded her in this battle had filled her soul with pain and unrest. 
 Months and years had passed by with her as adversary of her lover's 
 faith. The glad, lively child had changed into the serious grown 
 girl, the determined woman. She was the only one in the house 
 who ventured to gainsay her grandmother, and to insist upon wliat- 
 ever slie deemed right. The desire ot her heart remained unsatis- 
 fied; but her strong mind found fit food in her surroundings, and 
 so would have gained the upper hand and controlled ner character 
 and actions, if music and singing had not kept awake and lively the 
 softer stirrings of her deep, true, womanly nature. 
 
 The tidings of Constanline's return had moved her to the very 
 depths ot her being. It brought her either the highest bliss or fresh 
 inquietude and torture. 
 
 There he was. 
 
 There was the crest of his helmet emerging from the green, and 
 now his whole tigure was discernible, as lie stepped forth from the 
 shrubberj^; she pressed closer up against the pillar because she felt 
 that her Icuees were trembling. 
 
 Proud and loftily erect, in glittering armor, he came to her, exactly 
 as he had appeared to her in imagination upon many a sleepless 
 night. 
 
 ISow he was passing by her mother's mausoleum, and it seemed 
 to her as though a cold hand were laid warningly upon her loudlj-- 
 beating heart. Now flashed upon her the image of her father's man- 
 sion, with its rich artistic decorations, and side by side with it the 
 home of the master ship-builder, with its plain, coldly-naked, and 
 uncomlortable rooms; and it seemed to her as though, in the latter 
 she must stifle, wither, perish. But then he himself appeared on 
 his paternal threshold, and it seemed to her as though she lieard 
 again the silvery laugh of his boyish voice, and now again her heart 
 began to grow warm. She, the clear-headed womeu^ well versed 
 in the doctrine of self-knowledge, forgot that she had said to herself 
 the night before, that he would just as little renounce his Christ as 
 she her Isis; and although the summit of her wishes be attained, it 
 could signify for him and for her brief happiness followed by long 
 misery. All this she forgot; she knew nothing more now of reason- 
 
 * An ala miliaria consists of twenty-four turmae or nine hundred and sixty 
 horse; a prefect had command of them. 
 
SERAPIS. V5 
 
 int^ and nice balancing; for, as her ear caught the sound of his step, 
 she had to exert strong selt control to keep herself from rushing out 
 to meet him with wide-open arms. 
 
 Now, at last, he stood opposite to her, now he extended his right 
 hand warmly and honestly; and as their hands remamed tirmly 
 clasped, the hearts of both were so full, that they found not one 
 word for salutation. Only their eyes spoke what they felt; and when 
 he remarked that hers swam in tears, he called her name once, and 
 then again rapturouBly and yet questioniugly, as though he were 
 not quite sure of the meaning of her emotion. 
 
 Then she laid her tender left hand upon his strong one that still 
 kept her right hand closely clasped, and said with a sunny smile: 
 " Welcome, Constantine, welcome home. How glad 1 am that you 
 have come back!" 
 
 " And I, I tool" cried he deeply moved. " Oh Gorgo, Gorgo! 
 Can it be that whole years have passed between that farewell and 
 
 DOW?" 
 
 " They have indeed," replied she, " and what troubled, warring 
 years they have been!" 
 
 " But today we solemnize the festival of peace!" exclaimed he 
 fei ventlv. " 1 have learned to leave to every one his own, provided 
 that he leaves mine untouched. The old quarrel is buried. You 
 accept me as 1 am, and 1, 1 shall hold to the noble and beautiful in 
 which you --ire so rich. The fruit ot every right battle is peace. 
 Let us pluck it, Gorgo, and enjoy it gratefully together. Ah me! 
 now, that I stand here, looking down upon this garden and yonder 
 lake, hearing the strokes of hammers coming from the dock, and 
 looking into your eyes, it appears to me as though the days of our 
 childhood were to begin anew; only richer, more unclouded and 
 fairer." 
 
 "If my brothers were only here." 
 
 ** 1 have seen them." 
 
 " Where?" 
 
 " In Thessalonika, well and cheerful, and 1 have letters for you 
 from them." 
 
 " Letters?" cried Gorgo, withdrawing her hand from him. " That 
 is what i call a slow messenger. House adjoins house, and an old 
 friend finds not one mmute from one noon to the other to acquit 
 himself of his trust, and carry to his neighbors—" 
 
 rieiehe broke in. "My parents came first, you know. And 
 then that exacting tyrant, the service, did not allow me to call my 
 breath my own, from yesterday afternoon till a few hours ago. 
 Roinanus has even trenched upon my time for sleep, and kept me 
 with him until the moon set. For that matter 1 did not lose much 
 thereby, for, before 1 had seen you again, 1 could hardly have closed 
 an eye! Early this morning 1 wa3 on uuty again, and seldom have 
 1 ridden more unwillingly to the front. Later, too, came ilelay after 
 delay, even on my way here; and now 1 must render acknowledg- 
 ments to the interruption, for to that 1 am indebted most likely, tor 
 finding you alone. Care for it now, that we remain so, for such an 
 instant returns no more. There goes the door already." 
 
 " Come with me into the garden," cried Gorge, becKoning him to 
 
76 SERAPIS. 
 
 follow. " My heart fs as f ul? as yours. At the fish-pond undo 
 neiilh the old sycamore-tree— there is the (luietest place!" 
 
 Under the dense foliage of this venerable tree, stood a bench that 
 when children they had constructed themselves. There she sat 
 down, bat he remained standing before her, and said: 
 
 ■' Here, here, you shall listen to me! Here have we often heeu 
 happy." 
 
 " So happy!" echoed she. softly. 
 
 " And to-day," continued he, " to-day, we are so agam. "What a 
 hammeiing and thumping there is here! It is well that my coat of 
 mail so well panoplies my 'breast, else 1 verily believe it would burst 
 from sheer hope and gratitude." 
 
 " Gratitude?" asked Gorgo, casting her eyes down: but he went 
 on passionately: 
 
 " Yes, from gratitude, the purest, strongest gratitude! How 
 rich, inexpressibly rich you have made me, you hardly know 
 j'ourself; but no emperor has ever known how to rewurd love 
 and faithfulness more generously than you, the trouble and com- 
 fort, the pain and joy of my life! You have — it was the first thing 
 my mother told me after 1 got here — you have shed ])uriiing tears 
 on her bosom when the false tidings of my death reached here. 
 That has fallen upon my heart like morning dew upon withering 
 hope; so rich a present as that was never bestowed upon a poor 
 wanderer before. 1 am no orator, and how can empty words give 
 expression to what 1 feel? You must suspect without that; no, no, 
 you know what for so many years—" 
 
 " 1 know," answered she, looking him full in the eyes, and 
 suffering him to sit down beside her and taKe her hand again. " If 
 it were otherwise, I could not bear it, and I admit freely, too, tliat 
 1 have shed more tears about you than you imagine. You love 
 rae, Constantine — " Here he threw his arms around her; but she 
 freed herself, and exclaimed urgently: " No, 1 beseech you, no— not 
 so, not yet, until I have told what distresses, what hinders me from 
 casting myself freely and gladly into the arms of happiness. 1 
 know indeed, what you must, will, and may ask, but before you do 
 so, Constantine, let me remind you of what used to disturb the tran- 
 quillity of our lives so cruelly, even while we were still children. 
 Like a whirlwind it has often torn us apart, us whom the current 
 of our hearts had been forcing together, so long we think! Of 
 what .inites us 1 need not remind you, we both know that well, only 
 too well — " 
 
 " No, no," responded he, firmly. 
 
 *' Tliat we are yet to learn to know in fill its fullness and beauty. 
 The other thing, that whirlwind, of which you speak, has troubled 
 and disturbed rae again and again more than it has you; but since 
 1 have learned that you wept tor me, and that you love me, all 
 solicitude has been swept away, and 1 confidently believe that all 
 will work well. Y"ou know me, Gorgo, know tliat lam no dreamer 
 and enthusiast; yet 1 expect all that is fairest and highest, at your 
 side, if one ihing only stands fast: Is your heart full, quite full of 
 love, as mine is? Have you thought of me daily, hourly', during 
 my long absence, as 1 always, always did of you?" 
 
 Hereupon Gorgo bowed her Uead and repeated with glowing 
 
SERAPIS. 77 
 
 cheeks: " 1 love you, and hnve never loved any one else: all the time 
 tbat you were gone 1 followed you in thought, lovingly, and long- 
 ingly; and yet, yet, Constantiue, there is one thing else — " 
 
 "It parts us no more,'' exclaimed the enraptured prefect, " since 
 we have love, that great, perfect love that conquereth all things. 
 At her nod that whirlwind melts away lilce an infant's breath, 
 she bridges every chasm — she — in the most beautiful words of the 
 greatest apostle— she can remove mountains, she is long-suffering 
 and kind, believeth ali things, euduretli all things and never failelhl 
 She abides with us to the end, and will teach us how to find that 
 peace of which she is the refuge and adornment, the child and 
 mother!" 
 
 At these words Gorgo had looked warmly into the warrior's eyes; 
 but he pressed his lips to her hand, and continued, full of deep 
 emotion: 
 
 " I'es, mine, mine you shall be, and 1 will and may sue lor your 
 hand. There are words spoken in life that one never forgets. 
 Your father once said that he wished 1 were his son! On the 
 march, in my tent, in battle, everywhere, that speech went with me: 
 for me it had only one sense: 1 shall be his son if Gorgo is my 
 wife! And now, now that hour has come — " 
 
 " isot yet, not this very day," interposed she, urgently. " What 
 you hope for is my hope too. Our love can bring us all that is de- 
 iightlul. What you must believe, believe, and for my part, 1 shall 
 never urge upon you what 1 deem most sacred. I shall leave every- 
 thing, bear everything, and find all easy for your sake. What shall 
 be granted to your Christ, and what to our gods, has already found 
 solution; but not to-day nor to-morrow even. Let that be past first 
 which 1 have taken upon myself for these days. My heart and 
 love are vours; but should I flee from the battle to-day or to- 
 morrow, oUiers, Olympius especially, would have the right to point 
 the finger of scorn at me." 
 
 " What means that, what can you contemplate?" asked Constan- 
 tino earnestly and anxiously. 
 
 " The winding up of my past life. Before 1 can say: there, you 
 have me, 1 am yours." 
 
 " And do you not belong to me already, not to-day?" asked he, 
 pleadingly. 
 
 " To-day, no!" answered she, firmly. " To-day 1 am claimed by 
 the great cause that for your sake 1 renounce, it bears about with 
 it the death sentence of its own dignity, and yet to only one other 
 is conceded the right to despise it. 1 perform that which 1 have 
 taken upon myself. Asli not what T mean. It would vex you — 
 but day after to-morrow, when the feast of Isis is over — " 
 
 The young lady's last words were cut short by a shrill call from 
 old Damia, and several female slaves were seen hurrying through 
 the garden on a search after her. 
 
 Both rose from their seats, and while they were approaching the 
 house, Coustantine said gravely: " 1 insist upon noihing, but trust 
 to my expfrience: what we give up hardly, yet must resign, the 
 more quickly and resolutely we break with it, the better. Nothing 
 is gained by that deUiy, the pain is only prolonged. Consider, 
 Gorgo, this postponement, this procrastination is a barrier that you 
 
78 SERA PIS. 
 
 interpose betvveou ua and our happiness. You were ever of a reso- 
 lulG spirit; courage tbis time too, and cut short ofi what can not 
 last!" 
 
 " Yes, yes," returned she quickly. " But what transcends my 
 power, and makes me break my word, that you can not, may not 
 ask. The coming morrow does not yet belonij; to you; it shall be a 
 day ot leave-taking. But then— 1 want nothing; but you. lean 
 not leave you, j'our happmess sliall be mine: only do not make too 
 hard tor me parting from ad that has been dear to me from a child, 
 yhut your eyes to wiiat will take place to-morrow, and then— Oh! 
 that we had' oidy found out, from the first, how to keep the step 
 upon the right road! We know each other so well, and I am sure, 
 1 am sure that our hearts will find exquisite plcasuie in bearing for 
 one another's sake whatever diversities the mind will not appre- 
 hend nor assent to. 1 could be so unspeakal)ly happy, and yet, 
 and yet, my bosom is so oppressed, and 1 am— no, 1 am not yet 
 happy!" 
 
 CHAPTER Xll. 
 
 TnE returned soldier had been cordially received by his friends 
 In the neighborhood, but old Damia had been made uneasy by the 
 deportment of Coiistantme and Gorgo when they entered the liouse 
 after their first meeting. 
 
 He appeared thoughtful and agit&ted, she in a state of joyous ex- 
 citement, as though she had made up her mind to something un- 
 usual. 
 
 Had Venus a hand in the game? Could the pair have turned into 
 seriousness the old sports of their childliood? The young prefect 
 of cavalry looked handsome and fascinating euDugh, and her grand- 
 daughter was only a woman at best. 
 
 As far as Constantine was concerned the old lady had no personal 
 dislike of him, nay, she prized his steadfast, manly gravity, and 
 taking all in all, was glad, too, to see him again, but to think of — 
 Ihe ship-builder's son, the grandson of a freeiiman, the Christian, 
 and bearing service under the emperor, be it as prefect or something 
 yet higher — as a suitor for her Gorgo, the cliarmlng heiress of the 
 largest part of her wealth, who was courted by all the youth and 
 nobility of Alexandria — this was something surpassing her ability. 
 And since she never exercised self-restiaint, her hand was extended 
 to him, it is true, with an ill grace, but quickly enough she showed 
 hmi by sharp and cutting speeches that her'aversion to his faith 
 kept as lively as ever. 
 
 JLihe joined in every discussion, and when Demetrius (who had 
 repaired to his Lncle Porphyrius' house, after having been snubbed 
 bj"- Dada) spoke of the horses that he hail trained for Marcus, and 
 (Constantine asked him it there were anyP.arbary blood-hoises from 
 his stud now to be purcha?e<l in Alexandria. Danda exclaimed: 
 " You excel your cru(nfied God in all respects; IIo roiie on a young 
 ass, l)ut for you even the t)esl horses of lOgvpt are not good enough!"' 
 
 Birt the prefect was not to be discomposed tliis day, and although 
 he would liave been perfecily capable ol making a biting retort to 
 each sarcasm, j'ct he restrained himself, and made it appear as 
 
SERAPIS. 79 
 
 tlionsh lie mistook the old lady's onshxiigbt as bits of barmlcss 
 pleasantry. 
 
 Gorgo rejoiced at his moderation, and thanked him lor i( with 
 mute tilauces, and a pressure of his hand when she could bestow it 
 unobserved. Demetrius, who had known tlie prefect when a boy, 
 and through Porphyrins' inteivention had sold him the tirst horse 
 that he had ever called his own, hail met him cordially. As soon 
 as they had exchanged the first salutations, he had remarked to him 
 jocularly that he had already had tne pleasure of seeing him a while 
 ago, that he was in a good school, and had the luck of scaring up 
 the finest srame in Alexandria. So saying, he had tapped him on 
 the shoulder, and winked at him knowingly. His meaning 
 altogetlier escaped Conatantiue; but Gorgo had thought him pre- 
 sumptuous and disagreeable. 
 
 Porphyrins besieged the new-comer with questions, and the pre- 
 fect enjoyed talk with him, until there arose a great stir in the gar- 
 den. Soon a most unpleasant .scene was witnessed there: Dame 
 Herse was to be seen pushing and dragging Dada's Egyptian maid 
 before her beside herself with rage, and indulging in violent re- 
 proaches, while her husband was exhorting her to moderation, 
 Orpheus, too, who came behind the others from lime to time, ad- 
 dressed a soothing word to his excited mother. 
 
 Soon the minstrel family had conce up to the other group, and 
 Herse undertook, unsolicited, to exphiin the cause of her anger. 
 
 She had only had a brief conversation with Marcus' mother, for she 
 had oeen exactly of her mind as to the advisability of their forth- 
 with leaving Alexantiria, and refused positfvel}^ to be paid by her 
 for what she meant to do of Uer own accord. Upon the widow's 
 threatening to bring her before the judge, she had replied that they 
 were no public singers, but exercised their musical talents for their 
 own pleasure as free citizens. To the anxious mother's acciisatiou 
 tliut Dada was trying to entrap htr son answer had not been lack- 
 ing, but she had indignantly declared that the good fame of her 
 own sister's daughter was a iar weightier consideration with her 
 than what might be said concerning a young man in A.lexandria, 
 seeing that so much license is allowed his class here. Thereupon 
 JMaria had retorted that, on her side, Herse must not forget that 
 means stood at her, viz., Maria's command, for briuiring punishment 
 upon those who should manage to beguile a Christian young man, 
 and entice him into the paths of rum. 
 
 Here the interview had drawn to a close. In front of the Cano- 
 plan mansion Herse had found her husband and son, and, with 
 them, liad returned immediately to tlie ship. 
 
 There they had met with a dreadful surprise; for they had found 
 nobody on board but the old Egyptian slave, and by her been in- 
 formed thill Dada had sent her oil to get her a pair of shoes. Wheu 
 sue had come back with them, the maiden liad vanished. The 
 slave had also seen Argus and her little brother make their escape 
 into the open country, through that gate of the garden which opened 
 upon the beach. 
 
 " As to what has gone with the Christian," cried Herse, " that is 
 a matter of small moment;" but Dada, her niece, she went on to 
 say, had ever been true to them, and as many conjurors and 
 
80 SEKAPIS. 
 
 maj^iciana as there were in Alexandria, to talk of allowing a well 
 ■wouKin lo vanish wa8 an absurdity. Some deceiver had taken ad- 
 vantai^e ot the child's inexperience, and most assuredly that 
 Egyptian hiig, that brown slave, had had a hand in the game. 
 
 She did not mean to accuse anybody, but slie knew people who 
 would like above all things for Dada and that milksop ot a young 
 Christian to go to ruin and misery together. 
 
 All this she had poured forth sometimes passionately, sometimes 
 amid tears, in so domg rejecting with indignation, her liusband's 
 atempts to pacify her; for delicate as were his sensibilities, lie had 
 felt deeply pained by his wife's loud and unladylike manner in the 
 presen(^e of strangers, their superiors in station. 
 
 Old Damia had attentively followed Ihewralhful woman's stream 
 ot talk, but had oidy noticed with a shrug ot her shoulders and 
 slightly scornful smile, her covert insinuation against herself. 
 
 Porphyrins, who had found this scene highly distasteful, now in- 
 terposed, and after the fact slated had been proved, that Agues had 
 secretly left the garden, he bade the slave narrate the series ot 
 events that had taken place on shipboard, in the absence of the 
 singers; for every untrue word that she spoke, she might expect a 
 half-dozen strokes of the bastinado upon the bare soles of her feet. 
 
 This threat brought from the Egyptian a loud wail ot distress, 
 but Pori;hyrius knew how to put a speedy stop to such a demon- 
 stration; and now Sachepris *)egan to tell, in accordance with truth, 
 what had hai)pened until llerse's return to the ship. 
 
 The beginning of her recital contained nothing ot special interest, 
 and after she bad been urged to greater haste, she continued: " And 
 theu — then came Mr. Constantine, into theship where we were, and 
 prt'tly mistress jested with him, and begged him to take off his hel- 
 met, for pretty mistress wanted to see his scar, that bad swoid-cut 
 over the eye there, and Mr. Constantine took it off — " 
 
 " That is not true!" interposed Gorgo. 
 
 " Yes, but it is though. Sachepris loves the soles ot her feet, mis- 
 tress," lamented the slave. " Just ask Mr. Constantine himself." 
 
 " 1 was on the ship," affirmed he. " As 1 was coming from the 
 dock a young lady's tan tell into the water. 1 fished it out for her," 
 at her request, and gave it back to her." 
 
 " Yes, it was so. just sol" cried the slave. "And pretty mis- 
 tress laughed, and talked with Mr. Constantine, and— was it not so? 
 —and took his helmei away from him, and rocked it backward and 
 forward in her hands." 
 
 " So you stopped to trifle with that blonde hu«sy on your way here, 
 did you?" asked the indignant young lady. " Fy upon you men!" 
 
 Ill these words were discernible the keenest anper and resentment 
 againiit Constantine. lie interrupted her speech, however, calling her 
 name earnestly, and reproachfully; but she could not control her 
 wrath, and continued, tiring up anew: " So you flirted with that 
 girl, (lid j'ou, on your way^in the middle ot youi way heie? For 
 ^hamel once more, lor shame! They call it a blessing to be light of 
 heart! {""or my pait the gods preserve me from such a gift! Toy- 
 ing, triflintr, and ho! what a sudden change, deepest — most solemn 
 earnest uess I And theu, who insures me against it— before the 
 
SERAPIS. 81 
 
 iliadowhus advanced the lieadth of two fingers on the dial, trifling 
 again!"' 
 
 ' Gorgo laughed bitterly and scorntnlly. Then suddenly she 
 ceased, and uirned pale, for a change had come over Constantine 
 that rerrified lier. 
 
 The scar over his eye assumed a purplish tint, and bis deep voice 
 liad a 8lraui:;e, husliy sound, as, ■witli l)owed necli, and bead bent 
 far forward, he exclaimed: " And though you bad seen me with 
 your own cye.-< llirt with the girl, you should not have believed it; 
 and if you say once more that j'ou do believe it, then 1 give you 
 back your fy! for shame! with mterest. It cuts me to the quick; 
 but so be it I" 
 
 Tiie band of the prefect, meanwhile, had clutched convulsively at 
 the back of the chair before him. Like a tlireateuiug war-god he 
 stood confronting the maiden, and his glowing eye sought hers. 
 
 Hereupon Damia could hold in no longer, but struck the floor 
 hard, with her staff, and ground her teeth with rage against the 
 warrior. 
 
 " That were my prerogative! To threaten and dare the daughter 
 of this house, as oue would treat a common sohlier! Ears are open, 
 my little man in the gay coat. In the house of a free Alexandrian 
 citizen, nothing is to be gotten by ordering, but by showing good 
 manners!" So saying she turned to Gorgo, and gently wagging her 
 head from side to side, continued thus: 
 
 " So it turns out, my little dove, when one condescends too kind- 
 ly. Let us make a quick thing of it. How d'ye do and good-by lie 
 often close together!" 
 
 Then tlie prefect turned and had put his foot upon the stairs lead- 
 ing into the garden, but (iorgo rushed after him, grasped him by 
 the hand, and called to the old lady: 
 
 " He is rijjbt, grandmother; certainly he is right! And you, Cou- 
 Btantine, stay and pardon my folly. If you love me, mother, keep 
 pilence; he will give us the explanation afterward!" 
 
 Tlie soldier breathed a sigh of relief, and nodded to her silently: 
 but the slave began anew : 
 
 "And vvben Mr. Constantine left, Mr. Demetrius came, and Mr. 
 Demetrius— what can poor Sachepris know?— let Mr. Demetrius tell 
 about it himself!" 
 
 " That is quickly done," said the farmer, who knew not how to 
 understand lialf of what was <roing on and being said before him. 
 " i\Iy brotner Marcus is over head and ears in love with the pretty 
 litile minx, ami to guard his inexpe/ienced youth from a snare, I 
 wanted to take the burden upon my own shoulders, for they are 
 broader, and stronger. 1 went into the attair whole cloth, and 
 offered the girl — I am ashamed of my mad proceeding — why, 1 
 offered her the treasures of Midas; but to offer and take are two 
 different things, and the tigerish thing sent me off — Castor and Pol- 
 lux—sent me ofl with a flea in my ear. My consolation was, that 
 Constantine had .pist left the girl when 1 got there. Thought 1, 
 at;aiiist such a Mars as that, a poor rustic Pan, from the woods, 
 stands no chance whatever; l)ut, as Mars renounces his Venus, then, 
 not to fall loo low in my own oninion, 1 must agree ihat the lively 
 blonde is a much better girl than we take her to be. My offer, tor 
 
S2 SERA PIS. 
 
 "nhich any oilier beaiif.y that 1 am acquainted with lieroahout would 
 have followed a cripple to Uades. iiisulled her so lliat sLe shed tears, 
 and 1 have long since l)e.i!;un to respect that same Dada." 
 
 " She is my own sister's child!" intenupted Ilerse, who had l)eeii 
 made really indignant at the flighting tone used by every one ia 
 si)eaking of her foster-child, and so emphasized the word " own " 
 as strongly as if she were overrun with slep-sisters. " If we do have 
 to earn our bread by singing, nevertheless we have seen better days! 
 He that is Croesus to-day may be I^azarus to-morrow. As for our- 
 selves, Karnis has not squandered away his wealth—it was foolish 
 of him but splendid none the less, and maybe we would do it atraiu 
 —but he sacrificed his inheritance in the interests of downtrodden 
 art. But who inquires where wealth went, provided that it is gone! 
 If one wins and keeps, then people all praise him; dogs hite the 
 poor! The maiden— we have kept her well, treating her like our 
 own daughter, and sharing with her our last penny. Karnis hf.s 
 gone to no end of trouble cultivating her voice; and now when they 
 could have done something, and tlicir singing satisfied even strict 
 judges, now they might have helped us to earn a good living— now 
 —now." 
 
 The worthy matron, at these words, burst into tears; but Kami's 
 sousht kindly to soothe her and said: " We'll come through all 
 right without th«m: Nil despcrandf/m* sa.js the Roman Horace. 
 For nothing but that? Only such a reason as that?" cried 
 Karnis. " flow will it vex the noble Olympius? and— by Apollo— 
 my heart has' not been so UeaTv for a long while! fir. do you re- 
 member our conversation on the ship concerning the dirge over 
 Pytho? ^\ ell, we had transposed Ihe ' Lament of Isis ' likewise 
 into lyrical harmony, and to hear this young lady's wonderful voice 
 and that of our Agnes blending with the accompaniment of 
 Orpheus' flute-playing— oh, it was enchanting! Wings grew out of 
 my old heart, as 1 listened to that smging. Day after to-morrow 
 all the people were to have shared this enjoyment with us in the 
 temple of Isis. It would have inspired such enthusiasm as was 
 never felt before! Yesterday, the maiden's whole soul was in the 
 thing; why, even this morning she sung that lament with the noble 
 Gorgo from beginnmg to end. To-morrow, one more practicinir, 
 and then these two young ladies would have made such music as 
 pi-obably was never before heard in the old temple of Isis." 
 
 Constanline had listened to his last wonls witii increasing chagrin. 
 He stood close beside Goi-go, and while the rest were consultiiTg as 
 to what measures should be taken in order to recover the fugitives, 
 he asked his beloved in a low voice, with lowerinsr brow: 
 
 " You thought of singing in the temple of "isis? Before the 
 whole crowd, and with a creature of that stamp?" 
 
 " Yes," answered she, firml)'. 
 
 " And even yesterday you knew that 1 had come home?" 
 
 She nodded assent. 
 
 "And still you could practice witii tnat actress while you were 
 waiting for me?" 
 
 "Agnes is no actress like the other one who played with your 
 
 * Nothing; is to be despaired of 
 
SERA PIS. 83 
 
 helmet," replied Gorgo; and tlic strong lineaments of her dark eye- 
 brows contracted defiantly. " Igavu you to unrlerstaud a wliileago 
 that I was not yet yours. As yet, we serve different gods." 
 
 " Yes," he exclaimed so loudly that tire others loolved around at 
 him, and old Damia again stirred uneasily in her arm-chair. 
 
 Then he forcibly restrained himself, looked silently down for a 
 long lime, and finally whispered to the young lady: 
 
 ""l have suffered enougli for one day. Consider what you do, 
 Gorgo; God save me from despair!" 
 
 80 saying, he bowed before the young lady and the rest of Ihose 
 assembled, muttered an excuse on the plea of being called away by 
 duty, and rapidly retired. 
 
 CHx\PTER Xlll. 
 
 The horse-loving frequenters of the hippodrome could give no 
 tidings as to Dada's wuereabouts, for she had followed no frivolous 
 young man— not she. 
 
 Shortly after the slave had left on the errand after her shoes, the 
 singer Medius had made his appearance at the ship, asking to speak 
 with fvarnis. 
 
 He had ouly come to persuade Karnis and his wife to let Dada do 
 him the favor to appear in some of Posidonius' entertainments. 
 His hope of success had been small; but now all turned out exactly 
 as he could have wished, and Dada's desire to keep her tamily igno- 
 rant just at first of whtre she was, came very opportunely for him. 
 
 While Karnis luid been manager of tlie Tauromenium Theater, 
 Medius had been employed there as leader of the churus, and beeu 
 the recipient of many an act of kindness from the hand of the girl's 
 uncle. 
 
 These, he said to himself, he could now repay, for matters went 
 wretchedly enough with the old man, and whatever was made out of 
 so brilliant a star as Dada, should be honestly shared with his ben- 
 efactor. No harm should come to the girl, and gold, he thought, 
 still shines and retains its value, even though it be made for us 
 against our wills. 
 
 yince Medius was a provident man, he induced Dada to take with 
 her the new rose-dress and the ornaments belonging to it, and his 
 clever fingers packed away neatly whatever she handed him. In 
 the basket which he used for this purpose, he laid moreover con- 
 fectioner}', orangi'S, and pomegranates, " for the children at home," 
 and quickly consoled ihe maiden tor the loss of her shoes. He would 
 lead the ass, and she should rule him. A veil covered her face, and 
 her little bare feet were safely disposed of under tbe folds of her 
 skirt. 
 
 At home, the first thing he should do would be to order a sweet 
 little pah- of sandals for her from the same shoemaker who worked 
 
 for the wife of and the governor's daughter. 
 
 Their getting off, including the preparations incident thereto, oc- 
 cupied hut a lew moments, and so much that was amusing oc- 
 curred in the hurry-scurry of the hasty retreat, that Dada recovered 
 her spirits, and tripped laughmgly across the street with her little 
 bare feet. 
 
84 SEKAPIS. 
 
 In wanton mood she swung ben ell up on the little gray donkej''s 
 back, and when it then moved forward, and she liugired up Ihe little 
 basKet holding her own things that Medius had placed between 
 her and the animal's neck, shesaid that they would take hei for the 
 young wife of a horrid old man, carrying home her marketing. 
 
 With mischievous glee she pictured to herself ilerse's face 
 when she should discover upon her return home that it was possi- 
 ble for folks to find their way al)road without shoes. 
 
 " Let her worry about me, it she chooses to!" cried she, content- 
 edly. " Why does she attribute to me everything ihat is silly and 
 bad? But this 1 tell you at the outset, that if 1 am not pleased at 
 your house, and do not like the parts 1 have to perform, then you 
 and 1 will j)art company as speedily as we have formed one. \Vhy 
 do 3'ou lead me through such mean little streets? 1 want to see 
 everything, and ride through the main streets!" 
 
 But Medius durst not gratify this wish, for in the great avenues 
 of the city's tratfic there were great disturbances to- day, and he 
 might account himself blessed it they srot safely home without chal- 
 lenge. 
 
 His humble house was situated on a square between the Greek 
 town and Rliakotis the Egyptian quarter, just opposite St. Mark's 
 church, and contained room enough for Medius, his wife, his wid- 
 owed daughter and her live children, although, from top to bottom, 
 it was stulTed and hung with wonderful objects. 
 
 Dada's curiosity was never sated here, and in the course of a tew 
 hours, Medius' pretty grandchildren hung about her as fondly as it 
 they had been old friends. 
 
 Agues, the Christian, had not been fortunate enousfh to find a 
 home so easilj'^ and quickly. 
 
 Without protector, unveiled, and wholly self dependent, she hur- 
 ried aimlessly along, holding her little brother by the hand. 
 
 She would away, only away from those who threatened her with 
 the loss of eternal salvation. 
 
 She knew that Karnis had bought her with money, that she was 
 his property. According to Chiistian doctrine, too, the slave owed 
 obedience to his master, but she did not feel as if she were a slave, 
 and even though she were, the master had a right to the service of 
 her body, but not her soul. 
 
 And yet the law was on the singer's side, and he might pursue 
 and capture her. 
 
 This thought would not forsake her, and so from fear of the po- 
 lice, she avoided the more frequented streets, and pressing close up 
 to the houses, passed through l)y-streets and lanes. 
 
 She had once, at Antioch, seen how a runaway slave had suc- 
 ceeded in leaching and touching the emperor's statue, and found 
 protection from his pursuers. 
 
 There must be such a one here: but where was it? A woman 
 whom she questioned directed her to a larger street. She was to 
 follow this as far as Canopian Street, which she was to cut throiiuii, 
 and the first cross street lo the left would lead her out upon Uie 
 great Bruchian Square, where, in front of the prefecture, close to the 
 bishop's palace, she would liua the new statue of Theodosius. 
 
SERAPIS. 85 
 
 Tbis intelligence and the mention it made ot the bishop gave a 
 netv direction to her course. 
 
 To dety lier master and run away jrom him was wrong, to obey 
 him would have been a great sin. 
 
 Wuat should she do, what leave undone? 
 
 Ihere was only one to whom she could turn for counsel, only one 
 who could redeem her from the anguish that tormented her, viz., 
 the shepherd ot souls for this city, its bishop. 
 
 tshe, too, was a sheep of his fold; to him, to him only, could sh(!, 
 must she turn! 
 
 Tnis thought fell like a ray of light into her heart, beclouded aa 
 it was by doubt and fear. Drawing a deep sigh of relief, she drew 
 her little brother close up to her— he had been crying bitterly to be 
 taken back to Dadu— and told him that they were gomg to a good, 
 good man, who would show them the way to their parents. 
 
 But the child did not want to go to that man, he wanted Dada. 
 
 Sometimes by main force, sometimes by promises and entreaties, 
 «he had to drag the boy along, until they reached Canopian Street. 
 
 Mere it swarmed with excited multitudes, here there were soldiers 
 afoot and on horseback, endeavoring to keep the peace, and all thia 
 piqued the child's curiosity and distracted his mind from the long- 
 ings after home and its surroundings. 
 
 When Agnes found the street which opened upon the square ot 
 the prefectiiie, she was borne away by the stream of people pressing 
 forward in a dense mass. To turn around would iiave been impos- 
 sible here, and she had to summon up all the strength and determi- 
 nation left in her to prevent being separated from her little brother. 
 
 Pressed upon, pusbed, bantered and insulted by men, and severely 
 scolded by women for dragging a child along with her in such a 
 tumult, sire finally arrived at the square that she sought. 
 
 A hideous medley of dissonant noises grated upon her keenly 
 sensitive ears. She would have fallen to tUe earth and wept, but 
 her eyes kept dry, and she maintained her footing, for from afar 
 oft, surmounting a lofty portal, she saw a great, gold cross; that 
 beckoned to her like a hand outstretched in welcome from a father's 
 house, and beneath its protection she must find calm, comfort, and 
 safety. 
 
 But how should she get there? 
 
 The vast square was as full of men as a quiver of arrows. One 
 was crowded up against the other. To move forward here meant 
 breaking one's way, and nine tenths ot those through whom she 
 must force her passage were men, fiercely excited, raging men, men 
 wliose wild, strange appearance aroused in the spectator horror and 
 disgust. 
 
 The most part were monies, who had streamed hither in response 
 to the bishop's summons from the caverns and cloisters, from the 
 hermitages and cells of Colceunti on tie Red Sea, and even from the 
 Uoper Egyptian Tabenna, joining together their rough voices in the 
 passionate outcry: 
 
 "Down with the idols! down with SerapisI Death to all the 
 heathen!" 
 
 These hosts ot that Saviour, whose character was goodness, an^l 
 whose feeling love, seemed to have deserted his bright and friendly 
 
86 SERAPIS. 
 
 banner for the blood}' standard of murderous hate. The disheveled 
 liair of their heads and beards made a terrific Iraming for excited 
 luces with glowing eyes. 
 
 The nakedness of "their emaciated or bloated bodies was sparsely 
 covered l)y shacrgy sheep or goat-skins, scars and stripes were thick 
 upon tlieir meager limbs, which had been inflicted by the thong 
 haiiiiing from their girdles. 
 
 From the brow of that one called " the crown-bearer," ran red 
 blood, tor just to-day, with ostentatious zeal, he Lad pressed into 
 the flesh a crovrn ot thorns, that, conformably to his vow, he (hu>t 
 not lay aside day or night, for, in his own body he wanted to bear 
 about a peipetual reminder of what liis Saviour's sufferings must 
 have been. Another, whom tliey called, in his convent, '■ Lillie 
 Oil-jug," supported himself upon the two standing nearest him, for 
 liis meager limbs could hardly support any longer tlie swollen body 
 which tor nine whole years had received no other nourishment than 
 slugs, snails, locusts, and Nile water. A third was bound to his 
 companion by a heavy chain. They dwelt together in the same cave 
 in the chalk mountains near Lycopolis, and had sworn to each other 
 to deprive one another of sleep, so that they might double the term 
 of their penance, and for the hardest privation "known on this side 
 of tlie grave, reap twofold enjoyment in the world to come. 
 
 All lelt that they were fellow-combatants in the same strife. The 
 same thought, the same vehement desire moved them all. 
 
 What was to them an abomination, what threatened hundreds of 
 thousands with ruin, what lured Satan to maintain his kingdom in 
 this world, was now to fall, was to be forever anuihilated. 
 
 In their eyes, the heathen world was an abandoned woman, and 
 supposing that the adornments she wore were beautiful to the heart 
 and mind of fools, nevertheless it must be torn from the painted 
 Jezebel. They would continue to lash her away from the ransomed 
 eartli, and forever cut off the temptress from return thillier. 
 
 "Down with idols ! Down with Serapis! Down with the 
 lieathen!" was bellowed and roared around Agnes; but just when 
 the raging multitude yelled loudest, the formot a tall, majestic man 
 •was seen on the balcony above the cross, and his hand waved a 
 gesture of peaceful greeting to the seething crowd below. His 
 manner was cool and dignified. So soon as he extended his arm 
 those present knelt, and Agnes with them. 
 
 She suspected, nay, she knew, that yon lordly man up there was 
 the bishop whom she sought; but she did not point him out to 
 Papias, for Theophilus looked far more like a proud prince than the 
 good, kind man of whom she had spoken to him. 
 
 She could never dare to present herself before this grand gentle- 
 man. IIow could such a ruler over millions ot souls find thought 
 and time for her and her little concerns? 
 
 But in his retinue there must be many presbyters and deacons, 
 and to one of these she would turn, it the crowd would only dis- 
 perse and let her make her way to the door with the cross over it. 
 
 Twenty times had she striven to advance, hut with wliat poor le- 
 sult! ISIost of the monks thrust her back witli abhorrence when 
 slie tried to slip past them. One, upon whose arm she had laid her 
 hand, in order to persuaile him to move aside, had shrieked out, as 
 
SERAPIS. 87 
 
 though a snake had bitten him; and when the crowd had pushed 
 her against the " crown-bearer " he too thrust her away, and yelled 
 out: 
 
 " Away with thee, woman! Touch me not, thou imp of Satan, 
 thou spawn of the evil one, else i shall tread tbee down!" 
 
 ±|"or a long while to return had been no less impossible than to 
 press forward, and so passed hours that seemed to her like long 
 days. And nevertheless she felt no exhaustion — only anguish 
 and disgust — and stronger than any other feeling, longing, the 
 keenest longing, to reach the palace and speak to a priest. 
 
 The sun had long since crossed the meridian, when something 
 occurred that, striking the weeping Papias as new and unusual, 
 attiacted him and diverted his mind from his sorrows. 
 
 Upon the balcony ot the prefecture Cynegius showed himself, 
 the emperor's legate, a strongly-built man of medium height, with 
 the round head "of a cunuiug'lawyer. That dignitary, consul and 
 prefect ot tlie whole East, nolonger wore the woolen toga of the old 
 Roman pa'riciau, wliich was wrajiped about the bod}^ io graceful 
 folds, but a l(<nfr, close-litting gown of purple silk brocaded with 
 gold flowers. On his shoulders glittered the insignia ot his high 
 oiTices, a circular ornament of a peculiar texture, very strung and 
 artistic. He greeted tlie crowd witti a condescending bow, and 
 after a herald liad thrice sounded the trumpet, Cynegius pointed to 
 his private secretary, who had followed him; this official straight- 
 way opened a roll and culled out in a loud, tar-reaching voice, 
 " Quiet, in the emperor's name!" 
 
 A fourth blast ot the trumpet, and now the vast square was so still 
 that the heavy breathing of the horses of the guard in front ot the 
 prefecture could be distinctly heard. 
 
 " In the name of the emperor!" repeated the officer selected to 
 deliver the in:perial mandate. 
 
 Cynegius bowed, but again pointed to the private secretary, and 
 then to the effigies of Ciesar and his wife, which, on the two sides 
 of the balcony, at the top of gilded poles, were in full view of the 
 assembled throng, and that officer continued: 
 
 " Theodosius Caesar, through his trusted envoy and servant, 
 Cynegius, sends greetings to the people of the great and noble city 
 of Alexandria. He knows that its good and faithful citizens piously 
 and steiidfastly confess that holy laith which Peter, the prince of 
 the apostles, has transmitted to believers; it is known to him, that 
 they are orthodox Christians, and cleave to the doctrines which the 
 Holy Spirit dictated to the fathers at Nice. Theodosius C«sar, 
 who styles himself with humility and pride, the sword and the 
 shield, Ihe champion and defense of the only true faith, congratu- 
 lates the good citizens of. the great anrl nol)le city of Alexandria, 
 because, in their majority, thefhave abjured the devilish tenets ot 
 Arius and adhered to the true N iceue creed; and makes known to 
 them, through his faithful ana honorable Bervant (Cynegius, that 
 this and no other faith shall prevail, as in his whole empire, so, too, 
 in Alexandria. As througho"iit all his dominions so also henceforth 
 in Egypt any doctrine opposed to this true faith sl)aU be put down 
 by law; those also, who cleave to any other doctrines, profess or 
 
propacate them, shall be reaarded as heretics, and treated accord- 
 in-ly/' 
 
 The jirivatc secretary had to pause, for loud shouts of applause 
 troni tlie assembled multitude interrupted him agaia aud again, 
 
 Kot a note of disapproval was licard, and should any one have 
 dareit uplift it, most assuredly he would uot Have escaped scathless 
 from that assembly. 
 
 ISot until the heiald had sounded the trumpet several times did 
 he succeed in reading further, as follows: 
 
 " To Ihe deep concern of the Christian heart of your Caesar has 
 it come to his ears, that the old idolatry which has so long struck 
 humanity with blindness, and held it aloot from the gates of para- 
 dise, still possesses temples and altars through the stubborn power 
 of the devil's followers. INow, because it was repulsive to the most 
 merciful and Christian heart of the emperor to take vengeance upon 
 the posterity, accomplices, aud companions in error of that raging 
 foe to our holy faith, for the persecution unto death, which so 
 many sainted martyrs bave suflered throut;h blood-thirsty and cruel 
 j)agans, since forsooth our Lord says, ' Vengeance is mine, 1 will 
 repay,' therefDre, Theodosius CfEsar has only decreed that in this 
 great and noble city of Alexandiia the temples of heathen idols be 
 closed, their images destroyed, aud their altars overturned, lie 
 who stains himself with blood sacrifices, who slaughters an innocent 
 animal as a victim, he who enters an idolatrous temple, who per- 
 forms a religious service there, or bows down to the image ot any 
 idol, yes, whoever puts up a prayer in a temple, be it in country or 
 town, he shall be subject to a fine of fifteen pounds in gold, and he 
 who has knowledge of such a crime, without calling public atten- 
 tion to it, shall be liable tor the same fine."* 
 
 The last words remained inaudible, for a jubilant shout shook 
 the air, so loud and unmeasured, as even in this state of popular 
 uproar had never yet been heard. 
 
 There was no end to it, and no blast of the trumpet could drown 
 it this time, for it swept through the streets and lanes, and over the 
 city squares. It reached to the ships on thelaUe, it penetrated into 
 the houses of the rich and the huts ot the poor; yes, it was faintly 
 audible to the watchman who trimmed the far oft lamps of the 
 Pharian lighthouse, distinctly visible by night; and in an incredibly 
 short space ot time, the whole of Alexandria knew that the emperor 
 had pronounced sentence against the heathen worship. 
 * The great, fatal news had penetrated also into the museum and 
 serapeum; once more gathered together the young people, who had 
 grown up in heathenish wisdom, in the high schools of Ihe city, 
 having nourished and purified their spirts at the noble fount of 
 Greek philosophy, and had their heaits filled with enthusiasm for 
 the good and the beautiful in the sense ot the old Greeks. They 
 answered to the summons of their teacher 01ymj>ius, and under the 
 gudiance of Orestes, tlie grammarian —for the high-priest himself 
 had to make preparations for the defense of the tSerapeum — and 
 rusiied, with the arms held in reatliness for them hy Olympius, be- 
 neath banners set up by him, to the square fronting the prefecture; 
 
 * Codex Theodosianus xvi., 10, 10. 
 
SERAPIS. 89 
 
 in order to chase awaj' the monks, and send Cynegius back to his 
 emperor, with the reijuisilions whicn he had made upon Die 
 lieathcn. Youthful, noble figures, clad like the Hellenes, when 
 Athens was in its pristine clor}^ hurried hither to the fray. As 
 they dashed alon<r there burst from their lips a battle-song of Cal- 
 liuus, in which slight alterations had been made lo suit their case, 
 nobody knew by whom: 
 
 " How long j-e youug heroes? What, slumbering yet? 
 To arouse you, the heart in your bosom was set! 
 Does shame not o Vrwhelm you ? Youi- foes, see appear ! 
 Those Christians how scorujfully laugh, mock, and jeerl" 
 
 Whatever opposed them they overthrew. Two maniples of in- 
 fantry who held the approach to Konig Street by the way ol Bru- 
 cliiiim made a show of resistance, but they could not withstand the 
 pressure of tiie inspired tbrong, and so they succeeded in gaining 
 Caisareuin street and the square fronting the prefecture. 
 
 Here they sung tlie last verse of the summons to battle: 
 
 " Who cowardly from his duty flies 
 
 No judge's hand shall crown with bay. 
 But who in battle bravely dies 
 Of him shall unborn nations say: 
 ' He stood for us, in stormy hom-, 
 A strong defense, like to a tower."* 
 
 Here these garlanded youths with their fine, Greek heads, 
 Ihoughthil brows, anointed locks, redolent of perfume, and beauti- 
 ful limbs developed in the gymnasium, measured their strength 
 with lliose dark men in sheepskin, those pscetic dreamers, those pen- 
 itents grown gray under fasting, scourging, and mortifications of 
 the flesh. 
 
 These opposed themselves to the oncoming of youth, intoxicated 
 by enlhusastic devotion to freedom ot thinking and inquiring, to 
 art and beauty. 
 
 Both s'ood up for that which they deemed the highest good, both 
 were e(]ually sincere in their conviction, both deemed what Ihey 
 fought for dearer and more precious than their own brief span of 
 lite. 
 
 But the heathen youth carried swords, while the monks possessed 
 only one weapon, viz., the scourge, which they had been wont to 
 wield not against others, but only against their own rebellious tlesh. 
 
 A wild, disorderly wrestling and struggling began, in which ad- 
 jurations and psalm singing mingled with the battle-song ot the 
 heathen. 
 
 Here fell a wounded, there a dead monk, yonder a tender, beauti- 
 fully formed youth was struck down by the hard fist of a penitent. 
 Breast to breast wrestled a lecluse with the young scholar who had 
 just yesterday begun to elucidate the new Platonic doctrines before 
 enthusiastic auditors. 
 
 And in the midst of this turmoil stood Agnes, with her little 
 brother, who had pressea close up to her, and whose tears and cries 
 of distress had hushed for very horror. 
 
 * Brande's book of Greek eongs. 
 
90 SEKAPIS. 
 
 Ac;ony, intense agony bewildered her biain, and tortured her body 
 as tliouj^h with corporeal pain, that began at her heart, and radiated 
 througli every fiber ot her being. 
 
 Already, wholly under the domination ot fright, the imperial 
 mandate had fallen upon her eats witliout its meanmg being more 
 than half comprehended. Now slie kept her eyes Ijist, elmt, and iu 
 her stupefaction neither saw or heard anything ot all that was pass- 
 ing around her, until, in her close proximity new noises and war- 
 like clangor touched her ear; the clattering of horses' hoofs, the 
 blare of trumpets and ever increasing loud shrieks and shouts of 
 murder! 
 
 At last, at last it became quieter, and when she ventured to open 
 her eyes again, the square round about her was emptied of men, as 
 though it had been swept by unseen hands. Only here and there 
 lay a corpse, and in the Cfesareum Street there was still a dense 
 throng; but this, too. retreated further and further bacli, before the 
 advarice of a troop ot mail-clad cavalry-men. 
 
 Now she drew a sigh of relief, and freed the boy's head from the 
 folds of her skirt, in 'which she had buried it through fright. But 
 the end of horrors had not come, for over the square dashea, in 
 wild flight, a crowd of young students, and behind these a company 
 of the cuirassiers, w^ho had parted the fighting Christians and 
 heathen. 
 
 The pursued raced straight toward her, and again she closed her 
 eyes, expecting to be trodden under the feet of the rapidly approaching 
 horses. A fugitive knocked the boy down. Then for the first time 
 her senses completely failed her, as well as strength to stand up, and 
 with a low moan she sunk lifeless upon the dusty flagstones. Hard 
 by her, over her, chased pursuer and pursued; then, when at last- 
 she knew not after how long a time— she opened her eyes again, it 
 seemed to her as though she were flying; and all of a sudden she 
 became aware of having been picked up by a warrior and being 
 borne on his strong arms like a child. 
 
 Then was she seized with shame and fresh fear, and she sought 
 to disengage herself from him, but he voluntarily let her down, and 
 when she found herself standing upon her feet, and found that she 
 could stand alone, she cast a bewildered glance around, and sud- 
 denly shrieked hoarsely, for her mouth and tongue were both 
 parched: " Lord Jesus, where is my brother?" 
 
 With this shriek she pushed back the thick hair from her brow, 
 and breathlessly examined her surroundings with long looks of 
 feverish inquiry. 
 
 She found herself still on the square, close up to the door of the 
 prefecliue; a horseman, probably the servant of her deliverer, led 
 by the bridle close beside him an unencumbered horse; upon tlie 
 pavement lay gasping, wounded men. ruaii-coated soldiers formed a 
 long, ilouble fence on the side next Ca-sai-eum Street; but of little 
 Papias nothing was to be seen. 
 
 Hereupon she cried out again, and this time with such deep grief 
 that the warriors at her side looked upon her most compassionately. 
 
 " Papias, my little brother! Oh, my savior, my savior! where is 
 the child?" 
 
 " We shall look for him," replied the soldier; and his deep voice 
 
SERAPIS. 91 
 
 Bounded mild and consoh'np^. " You are young and beautiful: what 
 led you into that crowd at such a time ot tumult?" 
 
 Here she blushed deeply, cast down her eyes, and Baid, in low 
 \iurried tones: " 1 was on my way to the bishop." 
 
 "At an evil hour," replied Constantine, the prefect, who had 
 found her, apparently lifeless, on the square, and had deemed it 
 advisable not to I rust" the safety ot this j^racetul young creature to 
 any of his men. " Thank God that you have come off as well as 
 you have. 1 must return to my command. Do you know the 
 bishop's residence? There it is, and as for your little brother- 
 Wait! Are you at home here in Alexandria?" 
 
 " No, sir," answered she, timidly. 
 
 " But you are living, maybe, with relatives or friends?" 
 
 " No, sir, no. 1 am— 1 have— You know, 1 only wanted to get 
 to the bishop." 
 
 " Strange. Try your chance, then! My time is limited; but 
 later, directly afterward 1 have to speak with the chief of police. 
 How old is the boy?" 
 
 " Not quite six years .old yet." 
 
 " Is he dark-haired, like you?" 
 
 " No, sir. fair-haired," and a% she spoke, tears started to her eyes. 
 " He has light, curly hair, and such a dear, lovely little face." 
 
 Here the prefect nodded smilingly at her, and questioned hei' 
 further: 
 
 " If they find him— Papias is his name— to what place shall tliey 
 bring him?" 
 ."1 do not know, sir; for— or — ray head, my poor head! If I 
 only knew— Yes, if you find him, then bring him here to the 
 bishop's." 
 
 " To Theophilus?" asked the officer in amazement. 
 
 " Ves. yes, even to him," answered she quickly. " Or — wait — 
 bring him to Ihe bishop's gate-keeper." 
 
 " That is less distinguished, but might be more advisable," an- 
 swered the warrior, wlio, beckoning to his servant, wrapped his 
 liorse's bridle around his hand, vaulted into the saddle, waved to 
 her with his hand, and galloped back to his troops without paying 
 any heed to her modest " 1 thank you, sir." 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The spacious vestibule of the episcopal palace was alive with 
 human activities. Priests and monks went in and out, widows, 
 who as deaconesses weie in attendance with bandages ready to lid- 
 minister the friendly consolation of their office, and acolytes were 
 lifting the wounded and placing them upon stretchers, in order to 
 bear them to the hospitals. 
 
 The deacon Eusebius, young Marcus' old instructor, was the 
 leader in all the good works being carried on here, and saw to it 
 that the wounded heathen youth received equal attention with the 
 Christians. 
 
 In front ot the palace veterans of the twenty-second legion 
 marched up nnd down, supplying the place of the door-keeper, who 
 had been accustomed to stand here in quiet times. 
 
02 SERAPIS. 
 
 Ai^nea looked around !n vain for such an one. and then, with- 
 out being noticed bj'' the soldiers, she joined the company ot women 
 ami men who were mininterlng to the wants of the sick. 
 
 Siie was very thirsty, and when she saw one of the widows mix 
 wine and water, and that refreshing draught rejected witli ilisi;ust 
 by ibi' wounded man tor whom it «\'iis meant, she pluclced up heait 
 aii.l asked the deaconess to spare lier a little swallow ot it. 
 
 Tiie one ilius appealed to immediately ollered her the cup, and 
 aslced whom she had come to .see there. 
 
 " 1 want to go to the lord bisliop," answered Agnes; but she re- 
 flected, and quickly corrected herself, " 1 should like to speak to the 
 bishop's door-keeper.'' 
 
 " There," said the widow, pointing out to her the gigantic form 
 ot a nu\n who slood in half obscurity at the extreme rear ot the ves- 
 tibule. 
 
 Then, for the first time, the maiden remarked that it was already 
 evening. 
 
 If night came on, where should she stay, where tind shelter? 
 
 Cold chills ran over her, and with a brief " Thank you," she went 
 up to the door-keeper and asked him please to receive her little 
 brother if he .should be brought to him. 
 
 *' Good," returned the giant idndly. " If he is brought here he 
 sliall be carried straight to the orphanage of ' The Good Samaritan,' 
 and you have only to inquire there." 
 
 Now the girl took courage, and besrged him to take her to a priest; 
 but the door-keeper directed her rather to the churches, tot the 
 ecclesiastics about the bishop had plenty of work on their hands to- 
 day, and no time lett for trifles. 
 
 Still Agnes persevered in urging her request, until finally the 
 otlier lost patience, and bade her go her ways. Just then three 
 ecclesiastics passed throuch the door, before which Ihe porter had 
 planted himself, so as to block up the way, and now again Agnes 
 took heart, stei>ped up to one of them — a presbyter in advanced 
 years — and maile an earnest appeal to him: 
 
 " Ah, worlh}^ father, 1 implore you to hear me! 1 must speak 
 ■with a priest; and that man there drives me off, and says none of 
 you have lime left for me," 
 
 " Docs he say that?" asked the presbyter, turning and indignantly 
 addressing the jwrter: " The Church and her servants are never, at 
 any hour, too busy to heed the call ot the pious souls who seek them 
 for spiritual aid. 1 shall see you again, presently, brethren. What 
 Avould you have, my child?" 
 
 " 1 am so lieavy at heart." answered Agnes, lifting up eyes and 
 hands imploringly toward the priest. " 1 love my Saviour; but can 
 not do what I choose, and know not how 1 shall act so as to escape 
 falling into grievous sin," 
 
 " Follow me, then," said the other, going in advance of her, 
 through a little garden, into a large open court. 
 
 Then he entered a side chamber, whence a flight of stairs led into 
 the upper story of the palace. 
 
 While mounting them, her heart pulsated in anxious and yet hope- 
 ful excitement. She kept her hands crossed over her breast, and 
 
tried to pray, but hardly succeeded for (liiiiking of her little brother, 
 aud what she should say lo the presbyter. 
 
 Preseutiy they reached a lofty apartnu'nt, wiieie the window-shut- 
 ters were already closed, aud brauchin,!;- lamps burned above cush- 
 ioned seats, occupied by scribes, men of various ages. 
 
 " Here we are," said the presbyter, droppino; into an arm-chair 
 quite remote from the scribes. " Lay bare jour trouble to me, but 
 be brief, lor 1 am neglecting important business in order to spare 
 you these minutes." 
 
 " Well, sir," began Agnes, " 1 am of tree parentage, our home 
 having originally been in Augusta Irevirorum,* My father was a 
 tax-gatlierer under the imperial government." 
 
 "Well, well: but does that belong to the subject?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, yes. Father and mother were good Christians, but 
 were killed in the insurrection at Antioch — you know about it, three 
 years ago it happened— and then I and my little brother— Papias is 
 his name — " 
 
 •' Well, well—" 
 
 " And then they sold us both. My master gave money for us; 1 
 saw him do it; but still we were not treated as slaves. Now they 
 require of me, for they are heathen, and wholly devoted to—" 
 
 " So they ask ot you idolatrous things?" 
 
 " Yes, worthy father, yes; and that is why 1 ran away." 
 
 " Riglit, right, my child." 
 
 " But it is said that the slave shall render obedience to the master, 
 is it not?" 
 
 " To be sure; but our Father in Heaven has precedence over our 
 masters in the flesh, and one should a thousand times rather break 
 faith Vvith the one than the other." 
 
 This conversation had been carried on in low tones, in considera- 
 tion of the busy men at the desks; out as he uttered those last 
 words the presbyter had spoken louder, and they must have been 
 heard in the adjoining room, too, for the heavy, plain stuff curtaiu 
 was drawn back, aud a voice of rare power and depth called through 
 tlie opening: 
 
 " Back already, Irenseus? That suits adraiiably; 1 have some- 
 thing lo say lo you." 
 
 " Directly, sir; in two minutes 1 shall be at your service," re- 
 turned the other, while he stood up and said, addressing Agnes: 
 " You know now what your duty is. And il youi master should 
 liHve you apprehended aud require you to observe heathenish prac- 
 tices, helping at their sacritices or such like matters, then you will 
 find protection trom ua: my name is Irena^us." 
 
 litre the presbyter was again inteirupted; for, once more the cur- 
 tain had opened, and this time a man bad stepped out of the next 
 room, whom iioljody could torget that had ever met him before. 
 
 it was the bishop, whom Agues had seen upon the balcony, and 
 slie recognized him immediaU-ly and moved toward him on her 
 bended knees, that she might humbly kiss the hem of his robe. 
 
 Theophilus accepted this homage, and measured the maiden with 
 bis powertul eyes; tut Agnes dared not lift hers, for there was 
 
94 SERA PIS. 
 
 sometbing overpowering in this man's presence. Now he opcnetl 
 his lips and inquired, while he pointed to As^nes with his small 
 hand : 
 
 " What would this maiden have?" 
 
 " The child ot tree, Christian parents from Antioch,'' replied the 
 presbyter, " she has been sold to idolaters: was asked to en,ir!iu;e 
 in itioiatrona practices; has run away trom her master, and wo aid 
 now consider — " 
 
 "You have told her to which master honor is due?" said the 
 bishop, cuttinsr him short in his speech. Then he turned to Agnes 
 and asked: " Why did you turn hither and not to the deacon ot 
 your church?" 
 
 " We have only been here a few days," answered the maiden 
 shyly, and now she ventured to lift her eyes to the countenance of 
 this prince in the church, whose pale, handsome features looked as 
 if they were chiseled out of fine marble. 
 
 "Then go to the holy sacrament at St. Mary's Basilica," sug- 
 gested the bishop. " The service is about to commence: mean- 
 while, however — you are a stranger here, nave run away from your 
 master, and are very young for such a case, very — Kight is com 
 ing on. Where do'you expect to tind lodgings?" 
 
 ^' 1 do not know,'"' returned Agnes, and tears started to her eyes. 
 
 " 1 call that courage," murmured Theophilus to the presbyter, 
 and then continued as he again turned to Agnes: "Thank the 
 saints, we have places of retuge in this city for persons in ynur 
 situation. The scribe there shafl give you a paper that will procure 
 you admission to one. From Antioch, are you? That was the 
 asylum ot Selincus. To what parish did your parents belong?" 
 
 " To that of .lohn the Baptist." 
 
 " The Baptist? Where Damascius preaches?" 
 
 " Yes, holy father; he used to be our paslor." 
 
 " That Arian?" asked the bishop, drawing up to its full height 
 his comnianding form, and firmly compressing his lips, while the 
 presbyter, takins his cue, asked severely: 
 
 " And yourself, most likely, you too are infected with the Aiian 
 heresy?" 
 
 " My parents were Arians," answered Asrues with embarrass- 
 ment, " and taught me to pray to the god-like Saviour." 
 
 " Enoufihl" interposed the bishop, shortly and sterulj'. " Come, 
 Irena^us." 
 
 So saying, he beckoned to the presbyter, parted the curtain, and 
 retired, with lofty dignity, in advance of the other. 
 
 Agnes stood there as though struck by lightning, pale, trem- 
 bling, hopeless. 
 
 Was she then no Christian? 
 
 Was it a crime for the child to share her parents' belief? 
 
 Were those who had just held out a saving hand to her only to 
 withdraw it so inimically and abruptly, were they C-hristians in the 
 sense of the all-merciful Kedeemer ot the world? 
 
 There fell upon her soul torturing doubt as to all that she had 
 hitherto deemed holy and immaculate, doubt as to everything, only 
 not Christ and his god-bke, yea. godly goodness, for what a dilTer- 
 ence there was to her between Him and this man pronouncing such 
 
SERAPIS. 95 
 
 harsh sentence against his tellow-man? And, in the agitation, 
 grief and despair lliat had taken possession of her, she could shed 
 no tears, and stood there motionless, rooted, and, as it were, spell- 
 bound to the spot, where she had listened to the bishop's speecli. 
 
 At length she was aroused to consciousness by the squeaking 
 voice of the oldest scribe, who, addressing a younger assistant, 
 called out: " 1 hat girl disturbs me; show her the way out, Peter- 
 bastis!" 
 
 To this person, a handsome young Earyptian, the interruption to 
 work which had been prolonged through the whole day, was more 
 than welcome, so he got up leisurely, collected his writiug materials, 
 stroked back the black hair which in vpriting had fallen over his 
 forehead, and instead of the stylus, stuck a deep blue larkspur 
 behind his ear. Then he danced up to the door, opened it, stared 
 boldly at the beautiful girl with the look of a connoisseur, gave 
 her a passim;; bow, and said as he pointed her the way out: 
 
 " By your leave." 
 
 Without delay and with bowed head, Agnes left the writing- 
 room; but the Egyptian slipped after her, aud as soon as he had 
 closed the door behind him lie seized her hand and whispered: 
 
 " If you can wait a short half -hour, my dear, then I'll take you 
 to a charming place." 
 
 She had paused and looked at him questioningly, for she had not 
 understood his meaning. But, emboldened by this, he had lain his 
 arm over her shoulder, and tried to embrace her. She thrust him 
 from her like some repulsive beast, and hurried down the steps as 
 fast as her feet could carry her, and tnrough the little garden, 
 gained the spacious vestibule. 
 
 JVliauwhile it had grown dark aud quiet there. 
 
 Few lamps lighted the lofty apartment with its many columns, 
 and the flickerinl;; glare of a torch fell upon the benches which were 
 set there for waiting clergy, laity and supplicants. 
 
 Exhausted to the last degree— she herself knew not Whether from 
 anguish and disillusion or from weariness and hunger— she sunk 
 down and hid lier face in her hands. 
 
 During her absence the wounded had been conveyed to the hos- 
 pitals. Only one they had not ventured to move. He lay on a cush- 
 ion, between two pillars, at a tolerable distance from Agues, and 
 liie light of a lamp, which they had placed on the medicine chest, 
 fell upon his bloodless features, displaying their youthful beauty. 
 
 At his head knelt the deaconess, gazing silently into the still face 
 of death. Beside the deceased lay old Eusebius stretched out on the 
 ground, and pressing his face against the sleeper's breast, never 
 more to heave with the breath of life. 
 
 Only two sounds broke >he deep stillness of the deserted hall; 
 these were the low moans of the aged man, and the tread of the 
 veterans who kept watch in front of the bi:3hop's palace. 
 
 The widow, with folded hands, gazed fixedly upon the counte- 
 nance of the dead, and did not disturb the deacon, for she knew that 
 h(! was praying, praying for the safety of this heathen soul, cut off 
 in the midst ot its sins. 
 
 After some long mmutes the old man arose, dr»^d his wet eyes. 
 
96 SERAPIS. 
 
 pressed his lips upon the cold Land of the corpse, and then said, as 
 he pointed to his tace: 
 
 " iSo youug, so handsome, a cJicf d'mtvre of Our Heavenly 
 Father's skill. Early this morning an exiiltant lark, the delijiht of 
 a niolher, ana now — and now! How man}- hopes, how much warm 
 happiness is extinguished there! Oh, my blessed Saviour, thou 
 wlio hast sajd, ' not every one who sailh unto me, Lord, Lord, shall 
 enter into the kingdom of heaven,' who hast shed thine own blood 
 tor the redemjiliou of the heathen, redeem, save me this one, too. 
 Thou good shepherd, take into thine arms this poor lost sheep!" 
 
 In deep, passionate sympathy, the old man lifted up both arms, 
 gazing upward a long time, as though in an ecstasy of woe. Then 
 he composed himself and said: 
 
 " Good sister, do you know? That was the only son of Berenice, 
 the widow of the rich ship-owner Asck-piodore. Tliat poor, poor, 
 bereaved mother! Just yesterday he drove in his own chariot ancl 
 lour on the road to Marea, outside the city walls, and to-day— to- 
 day ! Go to her and impart the dreadful news to her. 1 would go 
 myself, but 1 am a priest, and it would pain her to receive the tragic 
 tidings through one of us, I mean one of those against wliom ihe 
 blinded youth drew the sword. You go to her, then, sister, and 
 touch her mother's heart softly, very softly, and if she will listen, 
 point out to her, prudently point out to her that there is one with 
 whom balsam may be found for every wound, and that we, each 
 and all who believe in him, lose our beloved ones only to find 
 them again. Direct her to hope. Hope, hope rs everything. They 
 call hope green, for it brings spring-time, to the heart. Perhaps for 
 her, too, there will come a fresh spring.' 
 
 The deaconess rose to her feet, imprinted a kiss upon the eye of 
 the dead, promised the deacon to do her best, and was soon out of 
 sight. 
 
 Eusebius, too, prepared to leave the vestibule when he heard the 
 sound of low weeping coming from the direction of the benches. 
 He paused to listen, shook his gray head, and murmured to himself: 
 
 " Oh, Lord, thou alone kuowest why thou hast beset the rose of 
 this existence with so many and sharp thorns!" 
 
 Then he went up to Agnes, and when she got up at his approach, 
 he said kindly: 
 
 " Why do you cry, dear child? Have you, too, your dead to 
 weep?" 
 
 " No!" replied she, quickly waving him off with her hand. 
 
 " But what do you seek here then at this late hour?" 
 
 " Nolhiniz:, nothing," answered she, impulsively. " It is all over! 
 Dear me, dear me, how long have 1 been sitting here? 1 know, 1 
 know, that 1 must be gone." 
 
 " And have you nobody to go with you?" 
 
 She shook her head mournfully. 
 
 Then he looked at her more closely, and said: 
 
 " Then 1 shall take you home with me. You see 1 am an old 
 man and a priest. Where do you live, my child?" 
 
 " i — 1?" stammered Agnes, anfl with liot tears gushing from her 
 eyes, she ciied: " Oh, God, my God, whither shall 1 turn?" 
 
 *' So you have no home, no place of refuge?" inquired the old 
 
SEE APIS. 97 
 
 man. "Trust me, child, and tell me candidly what afflicts you; 
 perhaps 1 may know how to help you." 
 
 " You?" asked the girl, bitterly. " Are not you, too, one of the 
 bishop's presbyters?" 
 
 " 1 am a deacon, and Theophilus is the head of my church; but 
 just for that very reason — " 
 
 "No." resumed Agnes, bitterly, "I want to deceive no one. 
 My parents were Arians, and because their faith is mine the bishop 
 thrust ine from him, hardly, and without pity." 
 
 " Ah, indeed," said Eusebius, " did the bishop do that? Yes, he, 
 he is the head of so many Christians, and must ever keep the great 
 in view, and the small, what is the small to him? But 1, 1 am an 
 insignificant man, and the inaividual rests on my heart. You see, 
 child, the Master has said: 'In my father's house are many man- 
 sions,' and the quaiter in which Arius sought his abode is not my 
 choice, but none the less it belongs to the Father's house. It is 
 not so wrong in you, after all, to hold fast to what your parents 
 taught you. " How shall 1 call you?" 
 " Agnes is my name, sir." 
 
 " That means a lamb. Beautiful, beautiful! 1 love that name, 
 and because 1 am a shepherd, although a very humble one, let me 
 be your comforter. Why do you weep? What seek you here? 
 How comes it that you know not where to find a home?" 
 
 All this Ihe old man said so lovingly, and such sincere fervent 
 sympathy was expressed in his fatherly manner that Agnes began 
 to hope again, and with full confidence answered all the questions 
 that he had put to her. 
 
 With many a hem, hem! and "just hear that!" Eusebius list- 
 ened to her. Then he invited her to follow him home, where he 
 knew that his wife would find a little corner in which to tuck her 
 away. 
 
 She joyfully consented, and thanked him warmly, when he or- 
 dered the porter to send her little brother to him, if he should be 
 bioiiglit back. 
 
 Calmed, and as though freed from a heavy burden, she followed 
 her new friend through a few streets and lanes. 
 Finally he stood still before a little garden-gate, and said: 
 " Here we are. What we have we give gladly, but it is little, 
 very little. Who can live luxuriously when so many ot their fel- 
 lows are pining in misery and want?" 
 
 While they walked forward between two narrow flower beds the 
 deacon pointed to a peach-tree and said: 
 
 " In former years that tree lias borne as many as three hundred 
 and seven peaches, and it pays tor itself well, even now." 
 
 From the huml)le dwellicrg to the rear of the garden twinkled a 
 hospitable light, and as they entered the small front-yard a queer 
 little dog limped to meet hia master witli glad barks. It hopped 
 along quite briskly upon its fiontlegs, but'its back had been 'in- 
 jured, and one hind leg liung uselissly suspt-nded in the air. 
 
 " My (riend Lazarus," said the old man, cheerily; " 1 found the 
 poor little beast one day on llie street, and he, too, is a creature of 
 God; as tor his being lame, I console myself with that verse from 
 4 
 
98 SERAPIS. 
 
 one of the psalms: ' The Lord hath no pleasure in the Btrength of 
 llie horse, nor in the legs of a man.' " 
 
 All this sounded so cheerful and pleasant that Agnes had to 
 smile with him, and when, after waitrng a little while, she received 
 a cordial and motherly greeting trom tlie deacon's wife, she would 
 have felt happier than for a lone; time if anxiety about her brother 
 had not weighed heavily on her mind, and it she had not longed 
 so very much to see him. 
 
 But soon even this care was hushed for the time, because so 
 worn out and exhausted was she, that after eating only a tew 
 mouthfuls, she had lain down upon the neat couch prepared for her 
 by old Elizabeth and immediately fallen asleep. 
 
 She was restinc; on the old man's bed, who expected consequently 
 to pass the night upon a small sofa in his study. 
 
 The husband and wife no sooner found themselves alone, than the 
 old man told Elizabeth how he had found Agnes, and wound up by 
 saying: 
 
 " It is strange about those Arians and other heretical Christians. 
 1 can not think so badly of them, if they only hold to the one thing 
 needful. It we are rieht— 1 believe that we are—and the son is 
 equal with the father, Ihen is he without spot or blemish; and what 
 were more divine than to overlook the eiror of another, if it relates 
 to our own person? What could be more wretchedly human than 
 to be angry at that error, and take cruel vengeance upon Ihe person 
 who commits it? Understand me, please. Alas! or raiher, God b(! 
 thanked. I have not risen high, down here, and am noihine; but r\ 
 humble deacon. Now, if a boy were to come and take me for an 
 acolyte or something so, am 1 to condemn ani punish him for his 
 mistake? By no means! And our Saviour, metliinks, is much too 
 purely divine, to hate those who deem Ilim only godlike. He is 
 love itself, and when the Arian gets to heaven and beholds Jesus 
 Christ in the whole glorj'of His divinity, and falls down before Him, 
 full of rapture and penitence, at most, the Saviour would take him 
 by the car, and say: ' Thou fool! thou seest now who 1 am; but 
 thine error is pardoned thee!' " 
 
 Elizabeth nodded at him approvingly, and said: " That is so; yes, 
 it will be just so! Did Dur Lord thrust the adulteress from Himl* 
 Have we not the parable of the Good Samaritan? That poor girH 
 We have always wished for a daughter; now, we might have one, 
 and how lovely she is! God graciously gratifies all our desires! 
 But you must be tired, old man. Go to rest now! ' 
 
 " Presently, presently," replied Eusebius; but at the same mo- 
 ment he struck upon his foreliead. and continued, as it shocked and 
 vexed: " There now, in all this trouble I have quite forgotten what 
 was my bounden duty. Marois! He is still like a person pos- 
 sessed, and if I can not quiet his conscience before he jroes to rest, 
 no good will come of it. Tired am I, very tired; but duty goes be- 
 fore rest. Do not oppose me, mother. Give me my cloak. 1 must 
 go to the young man." 
 
 A few minutes later the old man was on his way to Canopian 
 Street. 
 
SERAPIS. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 After Constantine left, care and anguish pressed heavily upon 
 ;he house ot Porphyrius. 
 
 Messenger alter messenger had appeared to summon Olympius 
 iway. A pagan secretary of the vice-regent Evagrius liad betrayed 
 i.lie plot ou toot, and the pliilosopbpr forthwith made ready to depart. 
 The merchant himself gave the order for harnessing the horses to 
 \iis close "harmamaxa," and undertook to convey arms and ban- 
 ners to the Serapeum. The magazine where these were stored lay 
 on one ot his estates, in the Rbacotis, at the back of a wood-yard 
 that was approachable from here by two streets, and was hidden 
 from the views of passers by sheds and timber. 
 
 The old aqueduct, which had supplied with water the altars and 
 tiubeterranean rooms allotted to the mysteries of Serapis, had passed 
 hard by its back wall. Since its removal, under the Emperor Juiian, 
 the subterranean and well-cemented canal had been dry, and allowed 
 men, in a stooping posture, to reach the temple unseen. 
 
 This hidden passage had, just a short time before, been opened 
 again, and was now to be used for conveying arms into the temple. 
 
 Damia had been, for the most part, a silent witness to the engross- 
 ing but brief interview between her son and the philosopher; but 
 every now and then she coi'ld not forbear throwing in between the 
 sentences of the men a soft, " Earnest, solemn Earnest!" or an em- 
 phatic, " That is right, there must be no sparing!" 
 
 Olympius seemed to lind it peculiarly hard to say farewell, this 
 time, and when the merchant held out his hand to him, he drew 
 him to his bosom and said, with deep emotion: " Thankyou, friend; 
 thank you for much! We have lived, and if we tall, it is tor the 
 good of generations yet to come. What would existence be toi us 
 two, with the scourge and torturing scruples. The omens are not 
 propitious, and if everything does not deceive, we are on the thresh- 
 old of the end. What lies beyond, we philosophers see approach- 
 ing with equanimity. The everlasting thinking over us has ordered 
 all things so beautifully, that we may well believe all that is inscruta- 
 ble to our minds will likewise be arranged so as to conduce to our 
 best good. The pinions of the soul move more freely and lightly, 
 even now, at the bare thought of the time when they shall be re- 
 lieved of the weight of this burdensome body!" 
 
 Then the high-priest threw his arms upward, as though he felt a 
 drawing from on high, and pronounced a prayer of inspiring 
 eloquence, in which he laid before the gods what he and his had 
 done tor them, and vowed a sacrifice. 
 
 All this sounded so exalted, and the flow of his speech was so 
 pure and smooth, that the merchant ventured not to interrupt him, 
 although he found this delay on tbe part of the leader of his cause 
 painful and unbearable. 
 
 When the youthfully emotionate old man had, at last, come to a 
 close, his white beard was bedewed with many a tear, and when he 
 saw that the eyes of ueither the old lady nor Gorgo were dry, he 
 
100 SERAPIS. 
 
 •would willingly have besiun to talk apain, but Porphyrius only al- 
 lowed liim time to put Damia's liand to liis lips, andto whisper to 
 Gorgo: " You wcie born in a time of excitement, but beneath aus- 
 picious signs. Two worlds are cominsr into cnllision. Which will 
 conquer? For you, darling, 1 have only one wish: be happy!" 
 
 Oiympius had left the hail, but still the rneichant strode thought 
 fully up and down; and as his eye, in passing, caught his mother's, 
 •which impatiently toUowed him, he suicl, without looking at the old 
 lady, half to himself: "If he anticipates such an end, he, who 
 among us dare hope any longer?" 
 
 Hereupon Damia straightened herself up, and cried out, passion- 
 ately: " 1? 1 dare and CHn hope, and be confident! Shall every- 
 thing go to ruin that was devised and fashioned by our forefathers? 
 shall that dark superstition, like lava over the city of Vesuvius, 
 pour down over the whole world, and bury •whatever in it is light 
 and fair? No! a thousand times no! Perhaps our degenerate, 
 cowardly rare (that has lost courasre for fear of future nothingness, 
 and the power to enjoy life) may be voted to destruction, as in 
 Deuclalion's days. Well, then, well! What must come, let it come! 
 But a world such as tliey want can not exist! Suppose their mon- 
 strous efforts succeed, and they lay in ashes that temple of temples, 
 the house of our Serapis, and overthrow the image of that great 
 one? Well! Once more, 1 say well! Then, truly will it be done 
 and over with us, with all, but with them, too— with them, 1 say." 
 
 With fierce hatred she doubled up her fist, ami then continued, 
 with a sigh: " 1 know whatl know— there are indubitable signs, and 
 1—1 understand their interpretation, and say true, indubitably true 
 it is, what every Alexandrian child has learned at its nurse's breast, 
 is, tiiat with the fall of Serapis, the earth caves in, just like a ball 
 of dry earth that is crushed by a horse's lioof. A hundred oracles 
 have predicted this, it is written by the stars on the cnart ot the 
 heavens, and inscribed upon the book of fate. Let it, let it be! For- 
 •ward, only move ever forward! He dies sweetl.y, who departing, his 
 breast pierced by his own sword, beholds his enemy in like case with 
 himself. 
 
 Beside herself, with a rattling in her throat, and gasping for breath, 
 old Damia sunk back; but she soon recovered inGorgo'ssupi)orting 
 arms, and no sooner had her eyes unclosed again, than she called to 
 hei son, with stronir indignatiou: "What, still here? Is time so 
 cheap? Wait. Will j'ou wait? You have the keys, and tliey lack 
 arms!" 
 
 " 1 know my duty," retorted the merchant, composedly. " One 
 thing after the other. 1 shall have been long on the spot eie the 
 young men assemble. Syiius brings the signal agreed upon; 1 am 
 dispatchin!.' courier-s, and liien it will be time to leave." 
 
 " Couriers! To whomT?" asked Damia. 
 
 "To Barcas. He has command over several thousand Lybian 
 peasants and slaves. The other is to the Egyp'ian Pachomius, who 
 is enlisting recruits from among the fishermen and country people 
 in the PJastern Delta." 
 
 " 1 know, I know. Twenty talents— Pacbeomius needs money — 
 twenty talents from my coffer it tliey are here in good time." 
 
 " Ten— thirty-told luore would 1 give, weie they now in the city!" 
 
SEEAPIS. 101 
 
 exclaimed tlie merchant, for tlie first time giviiig outward manites- 
 lation of the strong feeling with which he was penetrated. 
 
 " Wlien I enieied into life my own father dedicated me to that 
 superstition. Still 1 wear its chains; but now, at this crisis, 1 feel 
 more strongly than of old; will show, too, that 1 know how to 
 remain loyal to the old gods. "We shall not be found lacking, and 
 yet there is no chance of safety, if the imperialists do not procrasti- 
 nate, if they put at tlie work before the arrival of Barcas, then all is 
 lost; on the contrary, if Barcas comes, if he comes in time, then may 
 we hope that, after all, everything will turnout for the best. What 
 can those monks do? To the two legions of the garrison only the 
 cuirassiers of our Constnntine have been added." 
 
 " Our?" screeched the old lady. " Whose, 1 ask, whoseV We, 
 we have nothing to do with that paltry Christian!" 
 
 Here Gorgo interrupted the enraged old lady, and exclaimed: 
 " Have a care, grandmother; have a care! Consider what he was 
 to us! He is a soldier, and must do his duty ; but he loves us!" 
 
 "Us, us?" laughed Damia. "Did he declare his love to you 
 awhile ago? Did he? And you only believe him, simpleton! 1 
 know him, know him well. For a bit of bread, a sup of wine from 
 the hand of his priest, he would plunge us all, and you with us, into 
 misery! x\ti! — ah! ihose must be the couriers!" 
 
 Porphyrins promptly dispatched the young men who had entered 
 the hall, then clasped Gorgo gravely and fervently in his arms, and 
 lastly stooped down to kiss his mother, which was something he 
 had not doue for a long while before. 
 
 Then Damia let her crutch fall, pressed her hands long and firmly 
 upon her son's temples, and, at the same time, murmured many 
 words, some of them seeming to be the heart's outpourings, others 
 magical incantations. 
 
 The ladies were alone, and for a long time both kept silence. 
 
 The old woman sat crouched up Tn her arm-chair, but Gorgo 
 leaned her back against the pedestal of Plato's bust, and looked down 
 thoughtfully. FinallJ^ Damia broke the stillness, and asked to be 
 carried into the women's apartment. 
 
 Gorgo waved her back with her band, stepped up to her, and 
 said, impressively: " Not yet, mother. You must hear me first." 
 
 " Hear you?" asked the old lady, with a shrug of her shoulders. 
 
 " Yes, mother. 1 have never deceived you; but one thing 1 have 
 always kept hid from you, because 1 was not certain of it myself 
 until this morning. Now 1 am. Now, I know that 1 love him. " 
 
 " That Christian?" asked the old woman, and, with a violent 
 movement, she pushed back the shade from her eyes. 
 
 " Yes, him, Constantino; and 1 will not, may not hear you speak 
 disrespectfully of him." 
 
 Hereupon the old woman uttered a shrill peal of laughter, and 
 cried out, scornfully: "Ah, indeed! Then shut your ears, my 
 pretty one, for so long as these lips stir — " 
 
 "Hold, grandmother, hold!" interposed the maiden. " Do not 
 impose upon me more than 1 can buar. Cupid has hit me of late, 
 as he does other girls, and he did it only once, but you do not know 
 how deeply. When you revile him, you cut into the wound, and so 
 cruel you can not be. Do it not, 1 beseech you; give it up, else-^" 
 
102 SEKAPIS. 
 
 " Else?" 
 
 " Else 1 shall die, mother, and you love me yet." 
 
 Earnest and tender at the same time was the sound of these 
 words. They related to the future, but this seemed spread out be- 
 fore Gorge's eyes with the certainty ot what is already past; but 
 Damia cast a quick, stolen glance upon her grandchild, and there- 
 with a slight shudder thrilled her frame; for a divine effulgence was 
 resting on the maiden's brow, and over herself there stole a feeiing 
 as if she were in a temple, conscious of the presence ot heavenly 
 beings. Gorgo waited in vain for an answer, and then, inasmuch 
 as lier grandmother persisted in silence, she returned to the pedestal 
 where she had leaned before. Finally Damia lifted up her withered 
 countenance, looked straight at her and asked: " A.nd what is to 
 come of it?" 
 
 " les, what is to come ot it?" repeated the girl despondently, as 
 she shook her head. " 1 ask myself and can not find the answer, 
 for although his image is quite near me. yet high walls and mount- 
 ains, as it were, rise up between us. That image— his image— per- 
 haps 1 may succeed in obliterating it. But remain and revile it, 
 never!" 
 
 Now the hoary-headed old woman relapsed into a fresh leverie, 
 and her lips mechanically repeated Gorgo's last word, at ever longer 
 intervals, until at last almost inaudibly she murmured, " never, 
 never — no, neverl" 
 
 The present and all its belongings retreated and she felt revive 
 again pains that she had long forgotten. Shercmembeied the cruel 
 day, when the young f reedman, that noble astronomer and philoso- 
 pher, who had been given to her for a teacher, and whom she had 
 loved with all ihe passion of her ardent nature, on her account, and 
 because he hud dared to aspire to her hand, had been expelled from 
 her father's house and by slaves. 
 
 She had been compelled to renounce him, and after she had be- 
 come the wife ot another, he had risen to fame and distinction; yet 
 she had given him no token that he still dwelt in her thoughts. 
 Two-thirds of a century lay between the present and those blissfid 
 and yet horrible days. He had long since departed this life, and slill 
 she had not forgotten him, and now tuo thought of him. A strange 
 power of double sight showed to her her own person as she had been 
 then, and the image of her granddaughter Gorgo, whom she saw 
 not with her natural senses, although she stood just opposite to her. 
 The two swum together, and the same pain which had inibiltered ihe 
 soul of the one was now also threatening the otlier. But she, 
 Damia, had dragged hers with her through long decades, like that 
 chain with the iron ball which holds the crimin'al fast to the bench 
 of oais, and accompanies him like an incorporate, opjn-essive 
 shadow wherever he goes; Gorgo's sufferings could not last long, 
 tor she saw the end of all things coming; slowly, but with inevitable 
 certainty, it came nearer and nearer. 
 
 "When had enthusiastic youth and hurriedly assembled country- 
 folk even been able to make an effectual stand against the Koman 
 soldiery? 
 
 !5he who only a short while before had expressed such confidence 
 to her sou, now beheld the emperor's legions rout Olympius, Barcas' 
 
SERAPTS. 103 
 
 Lybians and Pachomius' fishermen, while the temple of Serapis 
 ■was besieged and stormed. Firebiands were hurled inlo its hal- 
 lowed halls, its roofs were hiokea in, its ceilings crumbling; struck 
 by heavy stones, that noble work of Bryaxis, the God's exalted 
 statue sunk amid clouds of choking dust. And now, now from 
 nature rose a universal wail, as though she had endowed with voice 
 every star in the firmament, every wave of the sea, every leaf on the 
 trees, every blade of grass in the fields, every clifl; on the seashore, 
 every grain of sand in the boundless desert; and this woe! woe of 
 the world was drowned by peals of thunder, such as no mortal ear 
 had ever heard before, no earthly creature could endure. 
 
 The heavens opened, and out of dense darkness poured death- 
 dealing clouds of tire, while from the riven lap of earth darted forth 
 consuming flames which leaped up to the very dome of heaven. 
 Everything was changed into fire and ashes, what had been air, in 
 its heavy tall struck the aold and silver of the stars from the far-ofl: 
 bell of the heavens; and now this too bowed, bent, and broke, bury- 
 ing the earth, shivering into a tho\isand splinters. Ashes, ashes, 
 gray, choking, dusty ashes tilled the world, and now arose a hurri- 
 cane, wildly scattering this too and dispersing it, when the Nothing 
 opened its huffe, insatiate mouth, drinkinsr in thirsty, mighty 
 draughts, whatever more was left, and, instead of the world and 
 the gods, men and iheir works, there was left only one thing; that 
 horrible, grisly, incomprehensible Nothing. And in, about and 
 above it — what dimensions however could have nothing? — reigned in 
 cool, unsympathetic, self-sufiiciency beyond all reality, and even that 
 thought which presupposes a plurality, the unimaginable unity of 
 that primordial being of the new platonic school which she be- 
 lieved in. 
 
 Cold chills ran over old Damia's body, followed by fever heats at 
 this thought, but she believed in it, and would believe in it. The 
 " No " which she had been murmuring to herself changed imper- 
 ceptibly upon her lips, into a distinct and ever louder " ISIothing." 
 
 Gorgo kept her eyes fixed upon her grandmother as though spell- 
 bound. 
 
 What had come over her? 
 
 What signified her wandering eyes, the rattling in her throat, the 
 contortions of her features, the convulsive quivering of her feet and 
 bands? 
 
 Had she become a lunatic? What meant that Nothing, that 
 ghastly Nothing, which she was perpetually repeating? 
 
 The girl could bear it no longer, and driven by toituring anxiety, 
 she rushed up to the old lady, placed her ham! upon her shoulder 
 and cried out: " Mother, grandmother, wake up! What mean you 
 by that dreadful Nothing?" 
 
 Upon this Damia started, shook herself, shuddering slightly; and 
 asked, at first in a hollow tone, but then with an enforced cheerful- 
 ness tliat struck Gorgo as yet more awful. " That Nothing? Did 
 1 speak then of that Nothing, my pet? You are sensible. That 
 Nothing! ah! You loo have learned to think; are you able to de- 
 fine precisely the exact meaning of the idea ' Nothing '—the monster 
 you know has neither head nor tail, face nor back— -1 say are you 
 ready to determine its exact limits?" 
 
104 SEHAPIS. 
 
 " What is the use ot it, mother?" asked Gorgo, with renewed 
 Bolicitude. 
 
 " She too does not seize and apprehend it," smiled the old woman, 
 absently to herselt. " And nevertheless, only yesterday ivlelampus 
 was saying that you followed his lectures on conic sections more 
 easil}' tnan many a male student. Yes, darling, 1 too once upon a 
 time stiulied mathemiitics, and how much I calculate even now, in 
 my observatorj' ; but it comes ever harder to me to conceive of what 
 a matiiemalical point is. It is nothing, and yet it is sonielhing. But 
 that great last Nothing! How ioolish it sounds, tor that Nothing 
 cnn be neither great nor small, can approach neither earlier nor 
 later. Is that so, my dear? Who could not think nothing; out to 
 think ot that Nothing is hard; for that we two are not prepared. 
 But why fash our brains with it? We need only wait till tomorrow 
 or the day after; then comes something tliat will reduce our own 
 dear persons, and this excellent world to what we can not even 
 imagine to-day. That Nothing will come: 1 hear from afar oil the 
 iron tread of that airy monster without body and feet. A droll 
 giant that, smaller than the mathematical point of which we were 
 speaking, and yet great beyond measurement. Yes, yes! Our 
 spirit has long polyp-like arms, and can embrace that monster too; 
 but that Nolhins: he reaches with more difficulty than the ' un- 
 bounded ' and 'infinite.' And this Nothing, have I dreamed, 
 comes to the throne now and opens its mouth, its toothless jaws, and 
 gulps us all down into the maw that it has not, all of us; me and 
 you and your prefect together with the good-for-nothing town, to- 
 gether with heaven and earth. Wait, only wait! Still shines the 
 sublime image of Serapis, but the cross casts a powerful shadow; 
 it has already obscured half the light of the earth. The empeior — 
 our gods are an abomination to him— Cyncgius only puts his wishes 
 into action." 
 
 Here Damia was interrupted, for the steward rushed breathlessly 
 Into the room and cried: 
 
 " Lost, lost! An edict of Theodosius shuts up all the temples of 
 the gods, and the cuirassiers have dispersed our men!" 
 
 Hereupon the old lady shrieked: " Do you see it now? Now it 
 is coming. The oncoming of the Nothing has begun. Yes, yes; 
 your cuirassiers are brave troops! They dig a great, great grave! 
 there is room in it for many; for you, for me. and tor "themselves. 
 and tlieir prefect too. Call the bearers, man, and have me borne 
 into the Gynajconius;* when 1 get there tell rae what has happened." 
 
 Arrivfd in the women's apartment the steward imparted all the 
 information that he possessed. It sounded melancholy enough; but 
 one thing seemed to him consolatory: Oylmpius wasin theSerapeum 
 and had begun to intrench himself there with a great host ot the 
 faithful. 
 
 Damia was min3ed to hope no more, and therefore hardly heeded 
 this intelligence; but over Gorgo's soul this e.xerted a powerful 
 effect. She loved Constantine with all the devotion of a first, only, 
 long pent-up love. Her p:)ltry suspicion had been long since re- 
 pented of, and it would have cost her little to humble her pride, 
 
 ♦ The private apartment assigned the ladies of the family. 
 
SERAPIS. 105 
 
 hasten atfor him, and make apologies. Bui that loyalty to the gods, 
 on account ot whicli he harl left her in anger, that bhe would main- 
 tain at any price, ihat she durst not break now when everything 
 was at slake. That would have been cowardly desertion. Yes, if 
 Olympius conquered then she could go to him and say: " You remain 
 a Christian and leave me my childhood's faith, or else open my 
 soul to yours." But now, now her part was to subdue her heart's 
 leaning and stand steadfastly at the postof danger. She was Greek 
 to the core; she knew, she felt this, and nevertheless her eye had 
 gleamed with pride during the steward's recital. It had seemed to 
 her as though she saw Constantine before her, as, at the head of his 
 knights, he rushed upon the heathen, to scatter them, like a flock 
 of sheep, to the four winds of heaven. Her heart had beaten more 
 warmly in behalf of the foe than of her unhappy friends. The lat- 
 ter had appeared to her like a shaken reed, while he embodied for 
 her all that was strong. 
 
 This conflict of feelings pained her, but her grandmother had 
 shown her the way in which they could be accommodated. 
 
 Wherever he commanded there perched victory, and it the Chris- 
 tians did succeed in overturning the image ot Serapis, then the 
 joints ot the world would be broken, and the earth cave in. She 
 too knew the oracles and writings which predicted this as with one 
 voice, she had heard it repeated by her nurse, by the workwomen at 
 the loom, by worthy men and keen-sighted philosophers; and tor 
 her the horrible that impended, involved the solution of every puz- 
 zling contnidiction, the bitier-sweet hope ot perishing with him. 
 
 When it was growing dark the inspector of sacrifices appeared, 
 wliose daily duty it was to examine the entrails of an animal tor 
 Damia, and their aspect was so unfavorable that he feared to report 
 what he had found. 
 
 The old lady had known it beforehand, took it coolly and had her- 
 self carried to the observatory, in order presently to consult the stars. 
 Gorgo remained in the women's apaitment for a long while alone. 
 From the rooms adjoining this sounded the monotonous clatter of 
 looms, at which many women were at work, to-day as ever. 
 Suddenly it ceased. 
 
 Damia had sent word to her female slaves from the watch-tower, 
 that they might stop work and rest the next day if they chose. 
 According to her orders wine was to be shared out to them in the 
 great servants' hall, as generously too as on the great Dionysian 
 feast. 
 
 It grew right quiet now in the Gynteconitis. There lay the gar- 
 lands of flowers which she herself had woven with her young 
 friends for the purpose of decorating to-morrow the temple of 
 Ic'!g. The steward had informed her, that this venerated sanctuary 
 was closed, and had been occupied by soldiers. 
 
 So it was all over with the festival, and she might have found it 
 in her heart to rejoice at this, because it relieved lier ot the necessity 
 to offend Consta'nline; but now she ihouchl again with subdued 
 melancholy of the friendly goddess, in whose beautiful temple she 
 had so often found comfort and enlivennient. She reminded herself 
 of the lime, when, as a little girl, she had plucked the first flowers 
 from her own parterre, and had stuck it in the ground beside the 
 
106 SERAPIS. 
 
 tountain, from which water was procurecl for libations. With her 
 own money slie had bouRht rare peituraes wherewith to anoint the 
 altar of Isis, and when she iiad been heavy ot heart, relief had come 
 to her in prayer offered up before the goddess' marble image. iJow 
 glorious had been the feasts held in the honor of Isis; with what a 
 glad, full heart had she herself joiued in those songs. The most of 
 the poetry and exaltation of spirit that had been hers in childhood 
 were associated with Isis and her temple. And now they had 
 closed it, and the image of the heavenly probably even now lay 
 shattered in the dust. 
 
 Gorgo knew all those lofty ideas upon which the worship of the 
 goddess was founded, but she had never turned in praj'er to them, 
 but only to the statue, in whose magical power she confided. 
 
 What had happened noiv to isis and her sanctuary might sooa 
 happen to Serapis and his. 
 
 This grieved her, tor she had been accustomed to deem the tem- 
 ple of this god as the heart of the world, the center of gravity, which 
 maintains the equilibrium of all cosraical life, and Serapis himself 
 was inseparable from his abode, filled with magical and mystical 
 powers. 
 
 All the prophecies, all the Sibylline sayings, all the oracles lied, 
 if the downfall of his image remained unpunished, if the destruc- 
 tion of the earth did not follow it just as surel}' as the breakage of 
 a dam causes the overflow of the land. And how could it be other- 
 wise after the explanation which her new Platonic teacher had given 
 her of the nature of God! 
 
 Kot like an overflowing vessel did Serapis pour out, but that 
 great, unapproachable one exalted above all being and imagination, 
 lor whose gieatness every name was too small; the transcendently 
 good and beautiful in which 'all was and will be, that is it, the 
 quintessence ot that which is called godly, and out of this abundance 
 originated the godly thinking, the pure thought, that pertains to the 
 one, as light to the sun. 
 
 This thinking with its life— this, too, not in time, but eternity — 
 could move or rest at pleasure; it comprehended a plurality, while 
 the one was only one, and completely indivisible, could only re- 
 main one. 
 
 The idea of each living being came from the second, the eternal 
 thought, and tnis all-animating, quickening power of thought in- 
 cluded all the original forms of beings endued with life, compre- 
 hending the immortal gods themselves; their ideas, their original 
 forms only, not themselves. And as eternal thought emanated 
 from the one, so from him emanated as a third the soul of the 
 world, whose double nature touched here upon eternal, lofty 
 thought, there upon the lower material world. She was the 
 heavenly Aphrodite, who rocked herself blissfully in the pure 
 splendor of the bright world of thought, and could not free herself 
 from the dust of the corporeal, viz., matter, on which the senses 
 fasten, and in which sin conceals itself. 
 
 The head of Serapis was that eternul thought, in his broad breast 
 rested the soul of all, and the fullness of the originals of every 
 created thing. The exterior world served him tor a footstool. 
 That mighty creative power served him which soaicd up to the in- 
 
SERAPIS. 107 
 
 comprehensible and unimaginable One. as did also the subject 
 powers. He was the sum of all, the totality ot the created, and at 
 the same time also the power which inspired and animated, guard- 
 ing it from destruction by perpetual renovation. His power kept 
 in^harmonious accord the manifold divisions of the material and 
 immaterial universe. 
 
 Whatever was animated, inspired nature as well as inspired man, 
 were inseparably connected with him. 
 
 If he, if Serapis fell, then would the key to the arch of the uni- 
 verse be destroyed, and with it " the sum of all," nay the all itself 
 ceased to be. 
 
 What was left, was not that nothing, of which her grandmother 
 spoke; it was the One, the cold, beingless, unintellisible One. 
 
 With the fall of Seiapis came the world to nought, and perhaps 
 it would please him, out ot his superabundance, to cull into being 
 another world for other strange crealures of the future. 
 
 From such thoas2;hts Gorgo was startled by a terrible noise, that, 
 proceeding from the remote quarters alloted the slaves, penetrated 
 easily the ladies' apartment. Could her grandmother have opened 
 too freely to them her wine-cellar; were those unhappy creatures 
 already madly drunK? But n^! Not thus sounded the merry-mak- 
 ing of slaves, who, under yoke to Dionysus, forgot the present and 
 gave unbridled expression to their delight. 
 
 She listened, and now distinguished the mourner's howl, and pas- 
 sionate lamt ntations. Something terrible must have occurred. Had 
 her fattier met with an accident? 
 
 Deeply solicitous, slie hurried across the court till she came to the 
 servants' quarters. Servants of all classes were behaving as if they 
 had lost tbeir senses. Disheveled hair covered the faces of the wom- 
 men, and howling they beat their breasts; the men sat crouched up 
 before the untasted pitchers, and wept in silence. 
 
 What sorrow hati fallen upon their household? 
 
 Gorgo called up her nurse, and now learned from her that the 
 augur had reported soldiers drawn up in array before the Serapeum, 
 and moreover that the emperor had commanded the prefect of the 
 East to lay hands upon the temple of the king of gods. To-day or 
 to-morrow that monstrous event was to take place. They must pray 
 and repent of their sins, for with the downfall of the holiest of all 
 holies will be involved that of the whole earlh too. The entrails of 
 the sacrificial victim offered by Damia had been black and gan- 
 grenous, and from the breast of the god in the holiest of all has 
 issued an awful lament. The columns in the great Jiypostyle had 
 trembled, and the three heads of Cerberus, at the feet of Seiapis, 
 had opened their jaws. 
 
 Gorgo listened to her old nurse in silence, and made only this an- 
 swer: " Let them mourn 1" 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 The day had passed away rapidly enough to Dada in the house 
 of Medius; for there had been various costumes and most wonder- 
 ful stage-scenery to be looked at, the children had been lively and 
 
108 SERAPIS. 
 
 sociable, and playing with them had pleased her peculiarly, since 
 all her little tricks and songs with which Papias had Jong been 
 familiar met with great applause from them. 
 
 It entertained her also, to investigate wherein consisted the 
 domestic grief by wiiich the singer had represented himselt as 
 victimized, to her toster-parents. 
 
 Medius was one of those, who buy all that strikes them as espe- 
 cially cneap, and so, this morning, in tlie harbor Kibotus he had 
 chanced to be present at an auction sale of herrings, and pmchased 
 a great tun full of salt tish for " a mere song." These goods belnj^ 
 now delivered, his wife fell into a great rage, which she expended 
 in the first place upon the unfoitunate carrier, and then upon the 
 guilty purchaser. Each of them (so she caciilated) must needs be 
 a hundred years old before the bottom of the tun should be seen 
 and the last herring eaten up. 
 
 The singer, on the other hand, showed the monstrous error of her 
 calculation, eagerly emphasizing the point that the very healthy 
 nourishment furnished by this excellent fish, was certainly fitted to 
 prolong indehnitely the lives of ihe whole family. 
 
 These reckonings, which were by no means made in sport, 
 amused Dada far more than the tablets, cylinders and balls covered 
 with figures and cabalistic signs to which Medius desired to diaw 
 her attention. In the midst of his eaaer explanations, she ran ofE 
 from him and began to show his grandchildren how ji little rabbit 
 snuflies when a cabbage-leaf is oflered to him, and how he moves 
 his ears. 
 
 The account of the occurrences in front of the prefecture, which 
 reached Medius in the afternoon, disturbed him greatly and drovo 
 him light away into the town. 
 
 Toward evening he came home, an altered man. He must have 
 learned something horrible; for his countenance was ashy pale, and 
 the usual assurance of his manner had been replaced by a troubled, 
 disconceited air destressing to behold. 
 
 Sometimes he walked up and down, uttering groan after groan, 
 then he threw himself on the sofa, gazing fixedly at the ceiling, and 
 again he would run into the vestibule, and from there peep cau- 
 tiously out upon the street. 
 
 Dada's presence seemed suddenly to have grown irksome to him, 
 and the considerate girl immediately perceived this, and she declared 
 to him, without circumlocution, that she would like to go back to her 
 friends — the sooner the better, llereupon he slirucged his shoulders 
 and sighed: " Do as you choose. So far as 1 am concerned, you 
 can stay either: it is all one!" 
 
 Up to this point his wife had taken no notice of his proceedings, 
 for hp was ever eccentric and often violent, if 8n3dhing crossed 
 him; but now she wanted to know, williout any concealments, what 
 had come over him, and he forthwith gratified her wish. He did 
 not want to distress the ladies any sooner than he could help, l)ut it 
 had to be told some time: Cyncgiiis had cone to destroy the image 
 of Serapis, and what would hapoen then she knew herself. " To- 
 da}'," lie cried, " we live; but to-morrow — a thousand to one — to- 
 morrow joy is at an end, and the earth swallows up the old nest and 
 ourselves in it." 
 
SEKAPIS. 109 
 
 These words fell upon receptive soil. The singer's wife and 
 daughter were terribly shocked, and since it pleased Medius to 
 depict the approaching ruin in so much the more vivid colors, as he 
 saw that his words produced a deeper impression, they soon began 
 to whimper, and then burst into loud wails ot griet. When the 
 children, who had been carried into the sleeping- room, heard the 
 lamentations of the grown people, they imitated them, and Dada too 
 soon caught the infection. As for Medius, his own eloquent repre- 
 sentation ot the threatening end of the world had made so profound 
 an impression on himself that he completely gave up his boasted 
 character of a " strong mind," and his lavonte saying that every- 
 thing called God has been desigoingly invented by priests and 
 princes to take advantage of ignorant men, and forced upon these 
 forsooth in order to subsidize them, until finally he was heard to 
 whisper prayers, and dived deep into his purse, when his wife asked 
 for leave to sacrifice a black lamb the next morning in partnership 
 with one of her neighbors. 
 
 SI ep forsook all eyes that night. Dada found the singer's house 
 intolerable. Perhaps Medius only imagined such horrible things, 
 but if ruin really was coming, she would a thousand times rather 
 perish with her own people than in company with this family, some- 
 how — she could not herself say why—peculiarly uncongenial to 
 herself. Sbe expressed her wish to her host, the following morn- 
 ing, and he forthwith made ready to escort her back to Karnis. 
 
 In the first place, he could not make the use of her that he had 
 expected. He was in tlie service of the great magician and con- 
 jurer Posidonius, to whom half the city ot Alexandria resorted. 
 Christians, Jews, and heathen, in order to hold intercourse with the 
 departed, with gods and demons; to gain ways and means for at- 
 tracting love and iujuriug one's enemies; to learn th*^ art ot making 
 one's self invisible and discerning the future through his instru- 
 mentality. 
 
 Dada was to have made her first appearance, in his master's be- 
 half, before a matron, as the glorified spirit ot her deceased daugh- 
 ter; but, m consequence of the recent disturbances in the city, this 
 ricli lady had gone into the country, yesterday, at noon. Also, of 
 the other patrons of his chief it was not to be expected, even if affairs 
 turned out more favorably than could be anticipated, that they 
 would venture forth upon the street by night. These rich gentle- 
 folk were so cowardly and circumspect, and inasmuch as the em- 
 peror besides had issued some new and stronger edicts against magic, 
 the magician himself deemed it advisable to postpone the sittings 
 tliat had been announced. 
 
 Medius could make no present use of the girl, therefore; yet he 
 put on the appearance ot yielding so readily to her wish, merely to 
 spare his friend Karnis anxiety. 
 
 The morning was clear and hot, and the city, despite the early 
 hour, tull ot excited multitudes. Anguish, curiosity, defiance were 
 painted upon all faces, but Medius got unchallenged, with his young 
 companion, as far as the temple of Isis, on Lake Mojris. The gates 
 of the temple had been driven in, and were guarded by soldiers, but 
 close to its southern and western walls pressed hundreds and hun- 
 dreds ot the heathen. Many of them had watched through the night 
 
110 SERAPIS. 
 
 bore, ill prayer, and expectation of the horrors impending and not 
 to i>e averlecl, and now they knelt around in groups, whimpering, 
 weeping, cursing or gazing hopelessly on the ground, in dull res- 
 ignation, worn out and broken-hearted. 
 
 Tliey presented a pitiable spectacle, nor could Dada wholly escape 
 participation in so universal a sorrow, although, for that matter, all 
 the way along, she had dreaded Dame Herse's scolding, tar more 
 than the destruction of the world. 
 
 Medius, with a loud gioan, fell upon his knees, and dragged the 
 girl down with him, for upon the temple's inclosure-wall a priest 
 of tlie goddess had just shown himself, and after elevating the oacred 
 sistrum of Isis, and muttering unintelligible prayers and incanta- 
 tions, began to speak. 
 
 He was a shoit, thick-set man, fron\ whose forehead the perspira- 
 tion was running m streams, while in the glow of the ever-increas- 
 ing heat ot the sun, he sketched a frightful picture of the gigantic 
 horrors soon to overtake the city and its citizens. 
 
 His speech was pompous and bombastic, declaimed in a loud, dis- 
 sonant voice. E/ery now and then he would wipe his dripping 
 cheeks with the end of liis white linen priestly robe, or snap after 
 air when his breath failed him, like a fish on the sand. 
 
 All this did not disagreeably affect the multitude, for the hatred 
 in which his speech was steeped, and anguish in view of the near 
 future, which was mirrored in his every word, fully voiced their 
 own feelings; only Dada grew livelier and livelier the longer she 
 looked at him, and because the day was so bright, because on the 
 wall, close by the priest, a cock-pigeon, with just as droll flappings 
 of the wing as ever, tripped everywhere after his mate, and most 
 especially because young life be^t so vigorously in her own bosom, 
 as though everything must turn out for the best, tlie world struck 
 her, in spite of the evil prophecies of the passionate old man up 
 there, as a risht beautiful and not specially unsafe place of abode. 
 On the eve of destruction the Earth must assuredly look very 
 different from what she did to-day, and it would recur to her as 
 very unlikely that the gods should have conlided their plans to such 
 a buffoon of all men in the world. For the very reason that this 
 fat man predicted the horrible so confidentl}^ she would not believe 
 it; and now when some helmet-plumes appeared behind the orator, 
 and two strong soliiier-hands clasped each ot his plump ankles, and 
 forcibly lowered him from his lofty stand into tlie temple-court be- 
 low, she could hardly restrain her laughter. 
 
 Meanwhile, serious grounds for apprehension speedily made them- 
 selves manifest, tor a tiunip<'l sounded, and a maniple of the twenty - 
 second legion advanced determinedly against the grieving populace, 
 and dispersed them. 
 
 Medius was among the first of the fugitives. Dada kept by his 
 side, and when he quickened his pace through fear, she did the 
 same, because, in spite of the cold reception that she apprehended, 
 she lonued to be reunited to her family— the sooner the better. 
 
 Never had she felt so conscious of the warm love she bore them. 
 Let Herse scold as much as she chose. Her most angry words were 
 better than Medius' sweetest flatteries. She delighted in thoughts 
 ot each individual, yes, iu Agnes aud little Papius too. and it seemed 
 
SERAPIS. Ill 
 
 to her as if she were going to meet dear ones, from whom she had 
 been parted tor years. 
 
 Now they came to Ihe dock which was separated from the temple- 
 hedge only by a lane, and then appioaclied the ship. She pulled otf 
 her veil and waved it, but her greeting was not responded to. 
 Surely they must have removed to Porphyrius' mansion, for even 
 now some men were withdrawing the bridge, which connected the 
 vessel with the land. Swift of foot she now look the lead of Medius, 
 and was fortunate enough to overtake tiie steward, who had been 
 giving directions to some slaves at work on the ship, belore he had 
 reached his master's garden. 
 
 That official was delighted to see her, and immediately informed 
 her that his old mistress had promised Dame Herse to receive her 
 under her own protection, in case she should return. But Dada 
 had a pride of her own, as well as others. She liad no fancy for 
 either Goigo or her grandmother, and by the time Midius came up 
 wth her, out of breath, she had already positively declined the old 
 lady's invitation. 
 
 The ship was once more empty. 
 
 Kainis, so the steward informed her, had repaired, with his son, 
 to the Serapeum, in order to share in its defense, and Herse had 
 followed them, because women loo— Olympius had said so — might 
 make themselves useful in the imperiled' sanctuary, by giving food 
 to the combatants, and lending the wounded. 
 
 Disappointed and out of spirits, Dada looked upon their deserted, 
 floating abode. 
 
 She would have liked best to follow her family into the be- 
 leaguered temple, but how could she get there, how make herself 
 useful there? Neither was she a heroine, for, from a child, she had 
 ever sickened at the sight of blood. Nothing was left for her, then, 
 but to follow Medius bacik to his house. 
 
 The singer allowed her time enough to reflect, for he had joined 
 the steward under the shade of a sycamore-tree, and there they 
 proved to one another, with all the arguments which they had 
 picked lip in these last days and hours, how inevitable the destruc- 
 tion of the world was, if the statue of Serapis were overthrown 
 
 During this livelj' discussion, the two paid no heed to the maiden, 
 who was resting on Mercury overturned in the road. Dreams, 
 grumbling, sleepmg in broad daylight, were things opposed to her 
 wide-awake, healthy nature, but heat and excitement of mind had 
 exhausted her to-day, so^that she was soon overcome by a light half- 
 slumber. 
 
 So often as her weary head sunk upon her breast, it seemed to 
 her as if the temple of Serapis were falling; when she lifted it again, 
 she became conscious of the heat, that she had lost connection with 
 her friends, and against her inclination must go back to Medius. 
 Finally her lids shut more closely, and because she sat in the full 
 glare ot the sun, things before her eyes assumed a roseate hue, and 
 she Dad a wonderful vision: Marcus, the son of Maria, took the 
 modius or wheat measure (which she had always seen on the head 
 of the statue of Serapis) oft the god's head, and handed it to her 
 It was full of violets, lilies, and roses, and she was charmed with 
 the flowers, and as he had held out the modius to her, she had 
 
112 SERAPIS. 
 
 thanked him. Hereupon, he kindly and calmly extended his hands 
 to her; but she pave him hers, and her ted in us were very pleasant 
 under the quiet, coinpjissionale naze of those large eyes which had 
 ottcn been present with her upon the sliip, for minutes at a time. 
 She would have so gladly spoken to liim, but could not, and looked 
 on tranquilly, too, and without solicitude, when she saw the statue 
 ot the god and the hall it occupied enveloped in flames. No smoke 
 mingled with this bright, kincily fire, but it forced her to protect 
 lier blinded eyes, and when Blie raised her hand, in order to do this, 
 it awoke her, and upon opening her eyes, she saw Medius standing 
 before her in the sun, inviting her to come and go back home with 
 him. 
 
 She acceded, and silently listened to bis assurance, that the lives 
 of Karnisand his son were not worth a copper, if they tell into the 
 hands of the Roman troops. 
 
 Downcast and sorrowful to a degree such as she had never known 
 before, she had passed by the half-finished vessels on the dock, 
 upon which no busy laborers were at work to-daj\ when there 
 emerged from the little street which separated the workshops from 
 tlie Isis temple an elderly man with a boy, and the latter— she had 
 no time to ask herself whether she saw aright, or were deceiving 
 herself— broke away fnmi the band of his guide, as soon as he 
 caught sight of her, and ran up to her, calling her by name. 
 
 A minute later and little Papinshad flown shouting into her arms, 
 been pickerl up by her, and flung his arms around her neck, as 
 though he would never more be parted from her; but she hugged 
 and kissed him, feeling her eyes wet with tears of joy. In a trice 
 the melancholy, afliicted maiden was again our sprightly Dada 
 
 I'he man who had conducted the l7oy hither, was immediately 
 besieged by a thousand questions, and from his friendlj^ answers it 
 appeared that be had found the hoy crying at a street corner, thai 
 hs had taken him home with him, and with some trouble, discov- 
 ered that he belonged to people who had found lodgings on a ship 
 beside a dock. In spite of the troublous times, he had brought the 
 boy back, because he could imagine how great the anxiety of his re 
 lations must De. 
 
 Dada thanked the friendly artisan with all warmth, and when he 
 saw how happy the maiden and child were, in being together again, 
 he rejoiced in the sight, and cheerfully withdrew 
 
 Medius had been a silent spectator of this scene, and looked upon 
 the pretty boy with an eye ot satisfaction. If the earth should sur 
 vive, he could make fine use of him; and when the girl cheerfully 
 besought him to find a little nook in his Iiovise for the boy, he ob 
 jected on the score of his scanty income, and the narrow accommo- 
 dations furnished by his dwelli'ng, but hesitatingly consented, after 
 Dada had offered him her gold bracelels to defia}''tlie cost. 
 
 On their further way, she continued to gaze rajiturouslv upon the 
 boy. She did love him so dearly, and lie presented himself to her 
 in the light of a bridge, a connecting Unk between herself and her 
 friends. 
 
SERAPIS. 113 
 
 CHA.PTER XVII. 
 
 The wife and danghter ot Medius had, in conjunction with their 
 neighbors, sacrificed a black hxmb to Zeus, as at other times in case 
 ot earthqualces and terrible tempests; but this had been done in all 
 secrecy, for the edicts, which forbade the oflerinE; of blood}^ sacri- 
 fices to the gods, had been immediiitely put in force. The more 
 individual members of the singer's family mingled with other citi- 
 zens, the deeper-rooted became their conviction that the end of all 
 things was at hand. 
 
 When daikness fell, the old man buried liis money, for no matter 
 if everyihing did go to rack and ruin, he thought that maybe it might 
 be aUowed him to escape the general doom, although why or 
 wherefore, he did not know. Great and small sought their rest 
 during that warm night in the open air, that they micht not be 
 crushed beneath the bursting roots and falling walls. The follow- 
 ing morning was a very hot one, and one crouched beliind the other 
 in the meager shade ot a palm and fig tree, the only things of large 
 growth in the singei's garden. 
 
 In spite of the ibroiling heat ot the sun's rays, Medius was in per- 
 petual mniion. He ran into the city, only to return each time with 
 speed to his own family, and augment their tribulations by impart- 
 ing to them the horrible things that he had learned outside. Their 
 hunger was stilled with bread, cheese, and fruits, for the two female 
 slaves had lel used to cook any longer on the hearth inside the house. 
 
 Sometimes tliesinger deported himself gently and tenderl}-^ towaid 
 his family, then again like a madman, and his wife outdid him in 
 every particular. At times she would have him and the children 
 freshly anoint the house-altar and pray; soon afterward she was re- 
 proacidng the gods vviih their tricRs and cruelty. When the tidings 
 came that the finperialists had engirdled the Serapeum, she reviled 
 and spat upon the pretty figures ot the Penates, and, a few minutes 
 afterward, was vowing a sacrifice to the Olympic jjods. The con- 
 fusion was abominable, and as the glowing orb of day mounted 
 higher and higher, so augmented the inner and outwaid distress of 
 great and small. 
 
 Dada looked upon all this with disgust, and shook her head if one 
 of the women declared thai she lelt the shock ot an earthquake or 
 the roll of distant thunder. She could not herself explain w^hy she, 
 who was usually so timid, could not partake in the universal alarm, 
 at the same time that she felt compassion for the poor agonized 
 women and children. 
 
 Not one of these concerned themselves about her, and so time 
 dragged on most wearily and clipped the wings of hei joyous spirit. 
 In addition (he burning rays of an African sun poured down upon 
 her, tor the first time to-day. When at last the afternoon had come, 
 she found it unbearable in the glare of the parchetl-up garden, and 
 looked out for Papias. He was sitting on top of the wall, looking 
 at the people, who were pouring into St. Mark's church. 
 
 Dada followed his example, and from the open door of the house 
 
114 SERAPIS. 
 
 of God came the sounds of many voices united in song; she listened 
 to the music, trom which she had been long debarred, wiped the 
 perspiration from the boy's brow with his peplos, and said, point- 
 ing to the church: 
 
 " It must be cool there, inside." 
 
 "To De sure it must," answered the boy. " It is never hot in 
 church." 
 
 " Do you know, we'll go over." 
 
 This was a good thought; tor, thought she, it must be better and 
 more endurable everywhere than here; and, moreover, it charmed 
 iier to have a peep at one ot Agnes' churches, and either to sing 
 again herself, or htai otiiers sing. 
 
 " Come!" called she to the boy, slipping with him into the for- 
 saken house, in order to steal through the little vestibule into the 
 open street. 
 
 Medius noted her movements well, but he did not restrain her, for 
 he was sunken in perfect indifierence. 
 
 An hour ago, he had settled up theaccountsof his life, and to the 
 pitiful sum "of his good deeds added his hospitable reception of 
 Dada and her little charge; but immediately afierward he had set 
 about calculating how much he could make out of the girl and boy, 
 it, atler all, things went well. Now it seemed all one to him, 
 whether evil overtook his own people and Dada in-floors or in the 
 garden. 
 
 Dada and the child had soon reached St. Mark's church, the old- 
 est place ot Christian worship in the city. It consisted of an area, 
 the narthex, and the chuich proper, a very lonsr hall, with flat root, 
 that was wainscoted with dark wood, and rested upon two rows of 
 small pillars. A trellised railing divided this hall into two parts. 
 In the extreme rear of this the floor was raised by & podium, and 
 upon this stood a table, around which a semi-circle of chairs was 
 arranged. The one furthest back, and at the same time the middle- 
 most, was distinguished by its height and fine workmanship. They 
 were all unoccupied, but around about them a few deacons moved 
 to and fro, clad in surplices of bright brocade. 
 
 In the middle of the anteroom many penitents had collected 
 around a little fountain, and these, with their lacerated backs, and 
 tiieir deep contrition, presented a yet more pitiable spectacle than 
 the frightened crowd which Dada had seen in the morning at the 
 Isis temple. 
 
 yiie would have gladly turned around again here, but Papiasdrew 
 her forward, and when she had tound admittance to the body of the 
 builaing, throuirh the lofty middle door of entrance, she drew a 
 deep breath of reliet, and such a pleasant feehng came over her as 
 she had rarely experienced before; for in the only half-tilled, tar- 
 reaching hall, with its lofty pitch the subdued light prevailing there 
 leally did her eyfs good' 
 
 The taint odor of the incense that filled the chuich, and the soft 
 singing of the assembled multitudes were soothing to her senses, and 
 after slie had taken her place on one of the seats, she felt well hid- 
 den from observation. 
 
 What a snug, peaceful place ot refuge was this church; in all 
 
SERAPIS. 115 
 
 Alexaticfria, thought she, there were few places where one could rest 
 in such tranquillity as here. 
 
 For a long while, resting in body and soul, she enjoyed the 
 coolness, tbe peace, the perfume, and the music, but soon her atten- 
 tion was attracted to two women in the seat directly in front of her. 
 
 One who held a child in her arms whispered to the other: 
 
 "\ou here, among the uubaptized, Hannah? How are your 
 family?" 
 
 " I can not stay long," ran the answer; " it is all tHe same where 
 one sits, and when 1 go, 1 do not like to dsturb others. My heart is 
 BO heavy, my child is badly oft. The doctor says he can not last 
 Ihrouih the day, and that was what brought me to church. " 
 
 "Right, right! You just stay here. I'll run straight across to 
 ^our house. My husband belps me to nurse gladly." 
 
 " Thanks for your friendly offer; but Catherine is attending to 
 the bov, and he is hidden there." 
 
 " Then, at least, 1 can pray with you for the dear child." 
 
 Dada had not lost a single word of this dialogue. The woman 
 who had left her suffering child, in order to intercede for him here, 
 had a peculiarly sweet countenance; and as the maiden watched the 
 two women, and saw how, with folded hands, they bowed their 
 heads and looked down, she thought: " Now they are praying for 
 the sick boy," and involuntarily she bowed her own curly head, 
 and murmured softly: 
 
 " "ie gods, or Thou, Christ God, or howsoever Thou mayest be 
 called, who hast power over life and death, make this poor mother's 
 ]ittle son well. If I get to my own people again, 1 will sacrifice to 
 thee a cake, or a cock; a lamb is so dear!" 
 
 And now she had a sense of having been heard by an invisible 
 spirit, and it gave her a peculiar gratification to go over again this 
 informal petition. 
 
 Meanwhile, a miserable little blind man crouched down on a seat 
 near her, and by his side stood the old dog, who led him about. He 
 held him by a string, and his faithful comrade was willingly put 
 up with in this holy place. The old man joined loudly and rever- 
 entially in the psalm, which had been begun by the rest; his voice 
 had lost its quality, but his singing was faultlessly correct. This 
 did Dadd, good, and although she only half understood the words of 
 the psalm that they were chanting, yet she quickly caught the sim- 
 ple melody, and at first began timidly and almost inaudibly to fol- 
 low little Papias' example, and sing with them; but soon more 
 courageously, and finally, with the full power of her voice. 
 
 In all this it was to her as though she had come to land after a 
 stormy and adverse sea- voyage, and found a welcome among friend- 
 ly people; and as slie looked around upon the singers, to see it the 
 news of the approaching end of the world had not penetrated here 
 too, she could not come to any satisfactory conclusion, tor, indeed, 
 upnn many a countenance were depicted deep anguish of spirit, con- 
 trition, and vehement longing after help perhaps, maybe something 
 quite different; but loud lamentation such as she had heard at the 
 Isis temple was nowhere audible, and most of the men and women 
 assembled here sung or prayed with devout composure. 
 
 Of those wild monks, who had struck hei- with such fears, at tha 
 
116 SERAPIS. 
 
 Xcnodochimn ot Maria, and in the street, not a single one was 
 to be seen; in lliesc days ot unrest they had placed their small 
 slren'^lh anil ixi^t;ii\. enlhnsiasin at the disposal of the church militant. 
 The service nf God in St. Marie's ehurcli had been announced by 
 Eusebuis, the deacon ot that diocese, to take place at this unusual 
 hour, because he wished to trauquilize the hearts ot those who had 
 been made anxious by the recent disturbances. 
 
 Uada saw how the old man mounted to an elevated desk, on the 
 other side of the railing, which separated the baptized irom the un- 
 baptized, and Eusebius' silvtr -white head ot hair and beard, with 
 his cheerful countenance, thoughtful brow, and mild, benevolent 
 eye. pleased her particularly. 
 
 Slie had always thought ot Plato as young, him of whom Karnis 
 delighted to talk, and iiom whose teachings even fhe retained some 
 idea's; but he must have looked jtist so at an advanced age. Yes; it 
 would have bt-autitully t)ecome that old man up there to die at a 
 glad wedding feast, like the great Athenian. 
 
 The old priest would certainly hold a discourse, but, however 
 much he might please, this drove her to make a start for leaving, 
 because, although she could listen motionless to music tor hours, 
 nothing' was more irksome to her than to listen long to spoken 
 words.'^when she herself must keep silence. 
 
 She got up then to go, but Papias again detained her, imploring 
 her, with his great cliiki-eyes, not to spoil his pleasure but stay, so 
 she'yielded. Nevertheless, the opportunity to withdraw unobserved 
 had been favorable, lor the woman in front of her was just prepar- 
 ing to leave, and shaking hands with her neighbor, on bidding her 
 fareivell. She had already risen from her seat, when a half-grown 
 girl stepped up to her from behind, and said: 
 
 " " Come, come, mother; the doctor says the danger is past. He 
 lias opened his eyes and asked for you." 
 
 Then the mother whispered to her neighbor quickly and rapt- 
 urously: 
 
 '• It" all proves tor the best!" and hurriedly retired with her 
 daughter. 
 
 The one left behind lifted her eves and hands, as though in grati- 
 tude, and across Dada's lips ton flitted a smile. 
 
 " IlMd the Christ God heard her prayer, too?" 
 
 Meanwhile, the i)riest had brouglit his short prayer to a close, and 
 bei;un to explain to his congregation that he had summoned them 
 to church in order to guard them against foolish fears, and to lead 
 them to reflect how a true Christian should deport himself in the 
 subsequent days of trial and unrest. Fie would like to show his 
 brothers and sisters what is to be dreaded from the idol, and its fall, 
 what they liave to thank the heathen for, and what he expects from 
 his fellow -believers, after tlie new and splendid triumph to be anti- 
 cipated for the church militant. 
 
 " Let us take a glance backward, beloved," continued he, alter 
 this introduction. " Ilou have all heard of Alexander the Great, to 
 whom this noble city owes hei existence and her name. lie has 
 lieen an excellent tool of the Most High, for he carried the language 
 and science ot the Grei ks into every land, so that, in the fullness ot 
 time, the doctrine which was to proceed from the only begotten 
 
SERAPIS. 117 
 
 Son of God might be understood by all nations and find entrance 
 into ail hearts. So many nations dwelt upon the eaith at that time, 
 there were so many hundreds of idols, and in so many dill'erent 
 tongues and moiles did men address their prayers to that higher 
 power, which makes itself manifest wherever are mortal creatures. 
 
 " Here, on tbeNile, after Alexander's death, reigned the Ptolemaic 
 Kings, and in Alexandria the Egyptian citizens addressed their 
 prayers to other idols than the Greek ones, and the two could unite 
 m no common sacrifice. Then Philadelphus, the second Ptolemy, 
 a wise man, gave them a common god. Inconsequence of a vision, 
 he had him brought here from Sinope on the Pont us. Serapis was 
 the name of the idol which, not Heaven, but the wise expedient of 
 a man, placed here on the throne of deity: a costly temple was built 
 for him, which ranks even now as one of the wonders of the world, 
 nil they erected an image of him, than which mortal man never 
 i.i-liioned a more beautiful one. You are acquainted with both of 
 ibeni, and you know, too, how, before the proclamation ot the Gos- 
 pel, all Alexandria, with the exception ot the Jews, crowded to the 
 Serapeum. 
 
 " A slight suspicion oi the lofty doctrine of Him, through whom 
 God redeemed the world, had already dawned upon the minds of 
 the best among the heathen, the hearts of those wise men, not yet 
 partakers of grace, though, who sought and wrestled after truth, 
 atter inner enlightenment, and a knowledge of the Most High. The 
 Lord had called them to prepare the soul ot humanity for the glad 
 message, and make it ready to accept it when the star should rise 
 and stand still over Bethlehem. 
 
 " Many a one of these men linked beautiful teachings with the 
 service of Serapis. before the hour of salvation had come. They 
 commanded the woishipers of idols to consider the welfare of the 
 soul more earnestly than that ot the body, for they had recognized 
 the imperishable duration of the spiritual, divine part of us earth- 
 born creatures, we who are called into existence through sin and 
 through love, and we wlio must therefore die in our guilty love and 
 may rise again tlirough the power of eternal love. Like the Egyptian 
 wise men befoi-e them in ihe time of Pharaoh, these Hellenists sus- 
 pected and proclaimed that the soul is made accountable beyond the 
 grave for all that is done or left undone in its fleshly tabernacle. 
 According to that eternal law which is written in the heart of the 
 heathen likewise, so that, by nature, they might do the works of 
 the law, they well distinguished between virtue and vice; yes, there 
 arose among them tar seeing minus, that did not indeed know 
 God, but none the less, in the name of Serapis, required the erring 
 to repent, and declared it to be salutary to cut loose from the illu- 
 sory joys and vain aelights ol earth, and to renounce the evils ot 
 thought and action that the senses bring upon us. They summoned 
 their pupils to gather themselves together for the thoughtful in- 
 vestigation of the truth and deity, and, in Ihe spacious halls of the 
 Seriipeum, opened cells and cloisters for women doing penance, 
 where also many pardoned men, dead to the world ot sense, and 
 devoted to the consideration of only such things as they deemed 
 highest, made their preparations to meet death. 
 
 '* But, beloved, that grace, which we enjoy— not for any merit 
 
118 SERAPI8. 
 
 or worthiness ot our own— had not yet been poured out on the lost 
 childnn ol a beniglited age. And in all these uoble, yea, most ad- 
 niiralik' upward strivings there mingled, at the same time, here, 
 coarse superstition with its bloody sacrillces and foolish reverence 
 for fragile images and irrational beasts; there, the deceptions and 
 pernicious art ot sorcery and magic. The idea, too, of true salvation 
 was distorted and dimmed liy the conceits of a vain and fickle phi- 
 losophy, while to- morrow saw already refuted what lo-day she 
 had thought firmly established. By and by, then, the temple of 
 the Sinopian idol had come to be a place of cheating, blood-shedding, 
 the vilest superstition, lust, and abominations. True, learniug was 
 slil! fostered in the halls ot the Serapeum, but, grown hard ot heart, 
 their young men turned away from the tiulh, which had come into 
 the world through the grace of God, and became priests of error. 
 Falsified and degraded through wretched folly the doctrines that 
 the wise had connected with the idea of Serapis, lost their height 
 and aignity, and ever since the great apostle, after whom this 
 church is named, brought the gospel to Alexandria, the throne of 
 the idol has been tottering, and the doctrine of sal ration has under- 
 mined and nearly overthrown it in spite ot the persecution of be- 
 lievers, in spite of edicts made by Julian the Apostate, in spite of 
 the desperate efforts of philosophers, sophists, and heathen, for 
 Jesus Clirist, our Lord and Master, has transformed the fleeting 
 slmrtow of a dimly suspected truth, embodied in the Serapis belief, 
 into a living reality. Instead of the confused nebula Serapis has 
 emerged tlie purely radiant, warm star of Christian love, and, as 
 the rnoou pales before the victorious orb ot day, so will the worship 
 of Serapis die a natural death in a thousand places where the Gos- 
 pel has found reception. Bere, too, in Alexandria, its flames will 
 only be meagerly fed in future; and it the power of our pious Uhris- 
 tian em pei'or suppresses it to-morrow or the day after, then, beloved, 
 will it fall smoking to the ground, and no earthly power can re- 
 kindle the flame. Not your, our grandchildren, no, but our sons 
 will ask: ' Who was gerapis?' The one, so soon to he brought 
 low, is no more a mighty god, but an idol robbed of prestige and 
 dignity. There is no question here of a battle of power against 
 power; there is nothing left now but to give the covp de grace to 
 (me already vanquished. The thoroughly rotten tree will hurt no- 
 l)ndy by its fall, but everything against which it strikes in its crash 
 helps to reduce it to powder and rubbish. This prince has long 
 outlived himself, and when his cracked scepter escapes from his 
 hand only a few will lament him, for the new King has already 
 ascended his throne, and he is the kingdom and the power and the 
 p;lorv forever. Amen!" 
 
 Dada had listened to the deacon's discourse without especial 
 sympathy, but something in this last sentence had struck her not- 
 withstanding. The old gentleniim up there looked good and just, 
 and Father Karnis was assuredly a fair-minded man, and moreover 
 one always accustomed to look on the bright side of a subject. 
 How came it, then, that the preacher up yonder drew so pitiable a 
 picture of the same God whose greatness her foster-father had been 
 vaunting only the day before? 
 
 How could one think so very dilTerently fr-om the other? The 
 
SERAPIS. 119 
 
 priest seemed to her more prudent than the singer; the young Chris- 
 tian Marcus certainly had a good heart; a better, more patient creat- 
 ure than Agnes never existed under the sun, and so it might well 
 be that Christianity was, in reality, something quite different from 
 what her foster-parents loved to represent it. She was now per- 
 fectly satisfied as to the diretui consequences involved in the over- 
 throw of the Serapis temple, and bo she listened more attentively as 
 tlie old priest continued: 
 
 " Let us rejoice, my beloved! The days of the great idol, Serapis, 
 are numbered! Would you know to what he may have been likened 
 in our midst? Among the thousand ships and galleys crowding a 
 large harbor appears a splendidly built and richly pennoned trireme, 
 whereon the plague rages. Woe to those who approach her, woe 
 to the imprudent ones who allow themselves to be enticed by the 
 rich ornaments with which she is adorned, to step on board. How 
 easily they fall a prey to the pestilence themselves, and heedlessly 
 convey it from ship to ship, from the ships to the laud, until the 
 contagion has infecttd both harbor and city. Thanks also to those 
 who ttirust this glittering vessel from our roadstead either to siaK 
 or burn it up. Our Father in Heaven give courage to their hearts, 
 strength to their hands, and bless their deed! When it is said: ' The 
 great Serapis lies level with the ground, he is no more, the world 
 and we are treed from him,' then shall they, in this slate and every- 
 where, where Christians dwell and pray, solemnize a glorious fes- 
 tival. 
 
 "But then, then let us be just, then must we all remind one an- 
 other of the great and good gifts, which the trireme once brought 
 our fathers, while yet she plowed the main, with a sound crew on 
 board. If we do this, then shall we behold the proud galley sink, 
 with quiet compassion, and comprehend the grief of those wliomshe 
 once bore through the ebb and flow of the tide, and who telt bound 
 to her by many a cherished association. Then shall our joy be 
 twofold, inasmuch as we ourselves possess a strong vessel, with 
 stout planks and masts, and a steady pilot, and can cordially invite 
 those others to come aboard with us, so soon as they are cured of 
 the plague with whose contagion they had been infected. 
 
 " 1 tiiink you have understood this similitude. When Serapis shall 
 have fallen, then will there be much sorrow and tribulation among 
 the neathen, but we— if we are true Christians— are not to pass by 
 on the other side, but endeavor to heal the afflicted and sore at 
 heart. When Serapis falls ye are to be physicians, physicians for 
 the soul, like your Master; and since it should delight us to heal, the 
 first thing for us to do will be to ascertain in what consist the 
 sufferings of those to whom we would gladly show ourselves help- 
 ful, for the selection ot the medicine must be determined by the 
 nature of the sickness. 
 
 " 1 mean, only he can administer consolation who can heartily 
 enter into the feelings ot the one in need of comfort, the one who 
 feels another's burden as though it were his own. And this art, 
 dear hearers, together with faith, is the quality of the Christian best 
 pleasing to the Most High. 
 
 " Before my spiritual eyes 1 already see the magnificent Seiapeum 
 brought to nought, the masterpiece of Bryaxis destroyed, and thou- 
 
120 SERA PIS. 
 
 sands upon thousands of lamenlinff heathen. As the Jews by th« 
 rivers of Biibylon hung their harps upon the willows and wept, 
 when tliej remembered Ziou, go 1 see them bewailinej its past 
 glory. To be sure, what they mourn they themselves have spoiled 
 and "desecrated, au.l when something higher took its place they 
 hardened their hearts, and instead of leaving the dead to bury their 
 dead, and throwing themselves hopefully into the arms ot the new 
 bfe, they would cleave to the putrefying corpse! They have been 
 fools, but their (oily was sincere, and" it we win them for our holy 
 faith then will they be true unto death to Jesus, and the crown ot 
 life, even as they have been to their uld gods. ' There will be more 
 joy in Heaven over one sinner that lepents than over ninety and 
 nine just men.' You know that; and whoever ot you loves the Saviour 
 can prepare for himself high joy by showing these sorrowing 
 heathen the way to his heavenly kingdom. 
 
 " But, you ask, is not the suliering of the heathen vain, and what 
 is this that they bewail? In order to comprehend this, come with 
 nie and let us' picture to ourselves what they fancy they lose, and 
 you will find it, indeed, to be no small thing, including much, tor 
 which we, and, with us, all humanity owe them gratitude! 
 
 " We call ourselves Christians, and do so with pride, but we also 
 call ourselves Greeks, and rejoice in this name, too. Under the 
 protection ot those t.ld gods who^^e downfall is now imminent, the 
 Greek nation has performed astonishing deeds, has improved like a 
 skilUul gardener the glorious endowments given it from on high, 
 and brought them to marvelous perfection. In the realm of thought 
 Greece has ])een mistress ot nations, and to perishable materials lent 
 a form, exalting them to the heiiiht of the imperishable and in- 
 spired. No other nation, before or since, nas been created fairer 
 than Greece. But, here, you will ask why the Saviour did not ap- 
 pear to the fathers in those great days? Because what they did, and 
 now call beautiful, only refers to the perishable form, to theexterior 
 merely; and because a generation, which devoted its whole feeling 
 and thought with so much inspired and devotional warmth to the 
 beautiful— that is, the seeming— bore no affec'ion toward the being, 
 the true being, that has come down to us wnlh the only begotten 
 Son of God. But for all that the beautiful is beautiful; and should 
 a time come in which tiie seeming is wedded with the being, in 
 which the eternal truth will clothe it.self in perfected form, then, 
 yes, not till then, will be realized thi-ough the Saviour's grace what 
 the fathers strove after in their great days. 
 
 " And this seeming or outward appearance tliat was so fondly 
 nurtured by them, renders us srlorious service, it we see well to it 
 thai we are not thus blinded and drawn away from the one thing 
 needful. To whom but the heathenish Hellenists do the great 
 teachers of the faith owe, next to God, the noble art ot arranging 
 their lofty thoughts and noble sentiments, and casting them into 
 molds, which are comprehensible to Christians, and at the same 
 time elevate, instruct and eciifyV In a heathen school of rhetoric 
 has each one ot your teachers, even I the poorest ot them, jrained 
 the ability to communicate to you, my hearers, in flowing speech, 
 that which the Spirit gives me to say. And if some day Christian 
 schools arise in which our sons can acquire the like ability, tlien 
 
SERA PIS. 121 
 
 many laws must remain in force there, discovered by the heathen. 
 If we possess the means to erect churches in honor of the Most 
 High, the V^irgin, and the holy saints, which are worthy of their 
 exalted greatness, then shall we have to thank for these the noble 
 master-builders in heathen Hellas For a thousand things of daily 
 necessity, and innumerable others that adorn existence, are we in- 
 debted to heathenish arts. Yes, beloved, when we review all that 
 they liave done justice will not withhold from them two things, 
 viz., thanks and admiiation. And to God himself have the best 
 among them been well pleasing, for he has let them behold from 
 atar olf what he has brought right neiir to us, and poured into our 
 hearts through divine revelation. You are all familiar with the 
 name of Plato. He, to whom salvation was a sealed book, with 
 the seer's eye, has foreshadowed what stands revealed in clear, pure 
 light befoie the eyes of us, the redeemed. He recoguizi^d the fact, 
 that eartiily beauty is related to heavenly truth. It is the great 
 feeling of love that sustains and unites us all, and he, he has already 
 named that enthusiastic drawing to the imperishable divine Eros, 
 that is, godly love. At the head of the great staircase of ideas, which 
 he erected, he placed the good, and tor him goodness is the highest 
 idea and the last attainable; goodness, whose reality hedemonstrsited 
 with all the resources of his powerful and clear intellect. This heathen 
 would have been worthy of the grace that blesses us. Practice justice 
 toward the blinded, justice according to Plato's definition, who calls 
 the viitue of reason wisdom, the virtue of courage valor, the control 
 of the sensual moderation. Where these three rule together in har- 
 mony, there he finds what we call justic?. Well, then, well ! So, try all 
 things, and hold fast that which is best; that is to say, weigh wisely 
 whatever is valuable in the works or inventions of the heathen, that 
 it be prized and kept ; on the contrary, trample courageously under 
 foot idolatry, which brings degradation into our midst, and threat- 
 ens peril both to body and soul, yea, all that makes life precious; 
 but, beloved, at the same time torget not what we owe to the 
 heathen, and exercise moderaticm, keep within bounds; for thea 
 only will you, will we, be just. ' Not to hate, but to love are we 
 here.' This sentence was spoken by no Christian, but by Sophocles, 
 a great heathen, and it appeals to us!" 
 The old man drew a deep breath. 
 
 Dada had followed nim attentively; but it delighted her to hear 
 praised in this place, too, tho.".e whom she had been brought up to 
 honor. Not until since Lusebius had begun to talk of Plato had 
 she been disturbed; for, before her sat a haggard man with a long 
 peaked head, and another smaller one of agreeable appearance. 
 The first one had conlmually rocked himself to and fro, had pulled 
 at the oiher's sleeve, and more than once made a gesture, as 
 though he would jump up and interrupt the preacher in his ser- 
 mon. Evidently this behavior wm displeasing to the Christians 
 around him, as was manifested by nods and soft whispers; but he 
 heeded them not and kept on hawking aloud, and even shuffled 
 with his feet while tlie deiicoii continued: 
 
 " And now, beloved, how are we to deport ourselves during the 
 critical days of trouble jiust ahead? Like Christians — like Chris- 
 tians, on the model of our Master, conformably to the doctrine that 
 
122 SERAPIS. 
 
 our Lord has communicated to us through his twelve aposlles. Let 
 them speak tor me. They call to you: 
 
 " There are two wajs, one ot lite, the other of death; but there 
 is a great difference between the two ways. The way of life now is 
 this: in the first place, you are to love God, your Creator; in the 
 second, your neighbor as yourself. ' Whatever you would that 
 men should do unto you, do you also to them.' But the doctrine 
 contained in these words is: ' 131es8 those that curse you, and pray 
 for your enemies, and bless those who persecute you, for what 
 thank have ye, if ye love them that loveyouV Do not even the 
 lieathen the same?' But you are to love them that hate you, and 
 you will have no enemy. 
 
 "These words of the twelve apostles 1 urge upon you today. 
 Take lieed of mocking and persecuting those who have been your 
 enemies. To honor a conquered foe was also a duty beautifully 
 performed by the noble among the heathen; for you. Christians, 
 let it be a law. It is not so hard either to forgive an enemy when 
 we see in him a future triend; and in loving him, too, the Christian 
 succeeds when he reflects that every brother man is a neighbor, 
 and is loved too by our Saviour, who is dearer lo us than life. 
 
 " "I'he heathen, the idolater, is the hereditary foe of the Christian; 
 but soon he will lie chained at our feet, and then, then pray for 
 him, be'oved; and since the Most High, who is without spot and 
 namelessly great, forgives the sinner, surely we can forgive him, 
 ■we who are small and full of sin. Fishers of men ye are to be; 
 prove yourselves such! Draw your enemy to you throuirh friendli- 
 ness and love, show him by your example the beauty ot the Chris- 
 tian lite, let him recognize the benefit of salvation, lead those from 
 whom we have taken our idols into our churches, and if we have 
 riu;litly overcome, through faith, love, and prayer, those blinded 
 ones over whom the sword triumphed, and they rejoice with us 
 over redemption through Christ Jesus, then will there be one shep- 
 herd and one flock, and joy and peace take up their abode in this 
 distracted city— '' 
 
 Here the preacher was interrupted, for in the narthex* a wild 
 huhhul) arose, and to the loud shouts of battling men was joined 
 the bellowing of an ox. 
 
 The congregation started from their seats in alarm, and now the 
 door was burst open, and Into the church rushed a band of heathen 
 3'oung men who had been set upon by double their number, and 
 chased into the house of God. There they began anew to make des- 
 peiate resistance. Crowns stripped of their leaves, and tattered 
 garlands of flowers fluttered around the brows and shoulders of the 
 worsted party. 
 
 Ill the neighborhood ot St. Mark's church they had been attacked 
 bv monks, while they, in defiance of the new edicts, were driving a 
 irayly decorated heifer to the temple of Apollo, ani. in the confu- 
 sion, the animal to be sacrificed had thrown himself with them into 
 the narthex. 
 
 The struggle in the church did not last long. The idolaters were 
 soon overcome; but Eusebius threw himself between them and the 
 
 ♦ Auteroom for penitents in the old Christian basilica. 
 
SERAPIS. 123 
 
 monks, and tried to rescue the vanquished from the hands of the 
 raging victors. 
 
 The women had pressed to the door in their terror, but they 
 ventured not to torce their way into the narthex, for there the des- 
 tined victim ran turiousiy around, pushing down whatever opposed 
 him in his mad career. 
 
 At last the sword of a policeman struck him on the neck, and he 
 fell bleeding 1o the ground. 
 
 Now all hurried past the prostrate heifer, and rushed frantically 
 into the open square. 
 
 Daila found herself fn the midst of the fugitives. She drew the 
 bo.y along after her, although he resisted with all his might, and 
 beside himself, dinned into her ear that Agnes was in the church 
 and ne wanted to go back to her. But ihe girl would not hear him, 
 and in deadly anguish dragged him along at her side. 
 
 In front of Medius' house she paused for breath, and when the 
 boy persisted in declaring that he had seen his sister in the house of 
 God she turned to go back there with him. In the church no one 
 any longer obstructed their progress, but she got no further than to 
 the partition which separated the seats of the baptized from those of 
 the unbflptized; for there lay many corpses with frightfully man- 
 gled limbs. 
 
 How they ever got back to Medius' house she did not know her- 
 self. 
 
 The cruel seriousness of life had come before her for the first 
 time, and when the singer sought her in her own room that even- 
 ing he was amazed to see tlie alteration in her appearance, for a 
 shadow seemed to have fallen upon her bright countenance, and 
 her eyes swam in tears. How bitterly she had wept Medius could 
 not indeed suspect. He ascribed the change which had come over 
 her to the peril impending, and was glad to be able to assure her in 
 good faith that the danger was as good as over. The magician, 
 Posidonius, had been with him, and completely assuaged his anx- 
 iety. This man, tor whom he had often acited second part in illu- 
 sory apparitions, exercised a great influence over him, since he had 
 thrown him into a trance by mysterious means, and forced him to 
 subject his own will to his in Mo. And this wizard had now re- 
 covered his old assurance, and with his wonted assumption of infal- 
 lil)ility, asseverated that the fall of Serapis would involve no further 
 ill results than the crashing of an old, broken column. Since this 
 Medius had smiled at his own anxiety: yes he had again become 
 one of the " strong-minded," and when the magician had oftered 
 him three tickets of admission to the hippodrome, he had caught at 
 them with both hands. 
 
 The races weie to take place in spite of the panic which had 
 seized upon the citizens, and upon his inviting Dada to share this 
 rare pleasure with himself and daughter she quickly dried her eyes 
 and thanked him joyfully. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Grave as was the outlook in the city of Alexandria, the races 
 were nevertheless to be held next day. So it had been determined 
 
124 SEUAPIS. 
 
 a tew hours before in the pnlace of Bishop Thoophilus, and ciiers 
 were already hurrying Ihrou.iru the streets and public squares, lu 
 order to invite the citizens lo that desiiable spectacle. 
 
 In the otilce of "The Ephemeris "* very early in the morn- 
 ing would be given out, as had been dictated to half a thousatid 
 slaves ol ready penmanship, what citizens were to let their horses 
 run, what charioteers were to manage the coursers, and what prizes 
 were to be distributed to the victors. They were to be bestowed 
 upon Christians or heathen, indilTerently. 
 
 The sultry air in the great assembly hall was oppressive, and op- 
 pressed in spirit, too, were the presbyters there piesent, for they 
 purposed, this time, not to submit blindly to the mandates of their 
 chief, and they knew that Theophilus could dart thunder-bolts, 
 when contradicted. 
 
 Besides the spiritual lords there had assembled also the imperial 
 envoy Cynegius, the city prefect Evagrius, and the commandant 
 of tlie troops and Comes of Egypt, Romanus; the imperial officers, 
 Roman statesmen, who knew Alexandria and its citizens, and had 
 often felt the spiritual superiority of that prince of the church, held 
 to him. The legate Cynegius wavered, but the presbyters, who 
 could not rid themselves from the same apprehensions which had 
 taken hold of the entire city, ventured to declare themselves as op- 
 posed to a too rash prt;cedure, and to call the holding of games on 
 days of such serious danger a presumptuous undertaking; jes, a 
 criminal tempting of Providence. 
 
 To Theophilus' mocking query as to what the danger consisted 
 in, if— the Comes will stand surely for that— the Serapeum falls on 
 the morrow, one of the presbyters made answer in llie name of his 
 brethren. This man had earlier worked wonilers as an exorcist, and 
 was in all orthodoxy the head of a Gnostic sect, and passionately 
 devoted to the study of magic. Long since grown gray, with tlie 
 zeal and force of conviction, in an earnest discourse he represented 
 that Serapis wns the most to be dreaded of all heathenish demcms, 
 and that all the oracles ot former times, the prediction of the 
 prophets, as well as all the conclusions of the magicians and astrolo- 
 gers must deceive, if his downfall (which he and his brethren 
 would, ot course, regard as a great boon from on high) did not draw 
 after it fatal convulsions ot nature. 
 
 Now Theophilus gave the reins to his wrath, tore down the little 
 crucifix from the wall where it hung over ids bishop's seat, and 
 broke it to pieces. At the same time he cried out with a deep voice, 
 quivering from excitement: 
 
 " Whom do you esteem great, the only begotten Son of God, or 
 yon silly idol?" 
 
 He flung the fragments of the venerated object which he had 
 destroyed upon the' table before the presbyters, who encircled it. 
 Then, as though shocked at his own bold act, he cast liimself upon 
 his knees, uplifted hands and eyes beseechingly to heaven, and 
 finally seized the splinters of the crucilix in order to kiss it. 
 
 The effect ot his rash deed was powerful. 
 
 * The newspapers of the ancients, which, as in Rome, so, also in the other 
 ereatest capitals of the world, used to appear, and eoinmunioate to the citizens 
 the moat qoteworthy news. 
 
SERAPIS. 125 
 
 Horror and breiithless suspense were depicted upon the features 
 of tiiose piesent, and not a baud, not a lip stirred, when Theophilus 
 again rose up, proudly and defiantly measuring every individual 
 with his stern eyes. 
 
 For a long lime he kept silence, as though he expected a re- 
 joinder; yet 1 he repellent bearing of his majesiic form said plainly 
 that he held hmiselt ready to crush opponents. 
 
 But none of the presbyters did gainsay him, and it among the 
 imperial officers Evagrius looked on with a dubious shake of his 
 prudent head, on the other hand tlui emperor's legate nodded at 
 him approvingly. But this prince of the church seemed to trouble 
 himself neither about the approbation nor displeasure of others, and 
 certain of his cause, represented in brief, incisive sentences how 
 ■wood and stone had nothing to do with deity, even though they 
 boie the form of what is most sacred and worthy of veneration, or 
 by the iiand of man are superlatively decorated with the devil's bait 
 of perishable beauty. The stronger is the demoniacal power as- 
 cribed by superstition to rude matter, whatever be the shape it 
 bears, so much the more hatefid should it be to the Christian, tie 
 who ascribes powor to the will of a demon, though it be only to 
 turn one breath of the Almighty according to its pleasure, let him 
 beware of idolatry, for its satanic claws have already fast hold of 
 his garment. 
 
 Upon tins accusation, pale grew the cheek of many a presbyter, 
 and not an objection was made, when the bishop desired them, if 
 the strong temple ot Setapis should fail into tlie hands of the Roman 
 soldiery on the morrow, to destroy it without postponement and 
 long leflection. and not to desist from the work of destruction 
 until that proclamation of their city's shame shall have vanished 
 from the earth. 
 
 " If the world breaks in pieces on that account," cried he, " well, 
 then, the heathen are right, and we are wrong: and then to perish 
 were delight; but so surel}' as I sit upon this throne, through the 
 grace of God, just so surely is Serapis a vain figment of blind folly's 
 brain, and there is no god save the God whom 1 serve." 
 
 " His is the kingdom for ever and ever, amen!" chanted the eldest 
 of the presbyters after him, and Cynegius declared that he would lay 
 no obstruction in the way of war to the death against the iflol. 
 
 The Comes now stood up to speak in defense ot tlie order issued 
 by the bishop, to let the racing take place the next morning. 
 
 He sketched a telling picture of the light, fickle-minded disposi- 
 tion of the Alexandrians, passionately addicted as they were to pleas- 
 ure. The military over whom he had control was a small body in 
 comparison with the number of heathen citizens, and it concerned 
 him much to keep a great proportion of iSerapis adorers at a distance 
 from the threatened sanctuary at the decisive moment. Gladiatorial 
 spectacles were interdicted, they had grown accustomed to tights be- 
 tween animals, but a race, in which heathen and Christians entered 
 the lists against one another, mu>t, just at this time of the hard 
 contest l)etween the two religions, exercise a mighty drawing power, 
 and lure thousands ot the most diingerous idolaters to the 
 hippodrome. All this he had already weighed with the bishop and 
 Cynegius; yes, this passionate destroyer of heathen temples Jiad come 
 
126 SEKAPIS. 
 
 to Alexandria with a written permit from the emperor to destroy 
 the temple ot Serapis; but, as a cautious statesman, he had first 
 ascertained whether the time aud cotijuuclion of ciicumslances were 
 favorable for beginning the worlc of annihilation. What he had 
 seen and heard liere, had only strengthened his conviction, and after 
 he had removed some scruples and exliorted lo mildness, in the 
 spirit of his commander, he gave orders, in I lie emperor's name, for 
 the temple of Serapis to be taken by force ot arms and destroyed; 
 he also appointed the races for the morning ot the next day. 
 
 The assembly bowed low in acquiescence, and after Theopbilus 
 had closed the session with a pruyer, he withdrew to his tasteless 
 study, humbly, with bowed head; not as though he had won a hard 
 l)attle, but like one who had sustamed a defeat. 
 
 The sentence of the great heathen idol had been sealed, but within 
 tlie vast area of the Serapeum nobody thought ot despair aud speedy 
 surrender. 
 
 The mighty sub-structure upon which rested this greatest ot all 
 the temples in the Hellenic world, faced its assailants with smooth, 
 lightly escarped surface of indestructible firmness. A carriage was 
 led across a richly adorned lauding, and at the middle part ot the 
 beautiful bow that this described, arose a lofty double staircase, con- 
 ducting to the three portals in the main front of this mammoth build- 
 ing. 
 
 The heathen had taken care to block up these approaches with all 
 speed, aud images of noble workmanship, statues aud busts of kings 
 and heroes, Mercuries, columns, monumental stones, sacrificial 
 altars, seats and benches of skillfully chiseled bronze, had been hurled 
 upon the road and steps that had been torn up and broken by a 
 thousand hands. 
 
 The quadratic flagstones and the granite steps ot the staircase had 
 been heaped together for protecting walls, and these kept increasing 
 long after the besiegers had approached the temple; tor the heathen 
 tore up paving-stones, little pillars, gutters, aud long stone balcony- 
 lailings, from the crown of the lool, and cast them upon the 
 rampart, and wherever it was possible upon the attacking troops, 
 wlio, for the present, would not be tempted to do serious battle. 
 
 The leaders of the imperial legions had miscalculated the strength 
 of the temple's defenders. They had supposed only a few hundred 
 to have been thrown into it; but'on the roof alone more than a thou- 
 sand showed themselves, and with every hour theSerapeum seemed 
 to till more threateniugly with heathen men and women. 
 
 The Romans supposed that these increasing numbers had been 
 concealed, since the arrival of Cynegius, in the secret halls and 
 chambers of the Serapeum, and did not suspect that they were con- 
 liuually gaining accessions. 
 
 Karnis, too, with llersc and his son, had come from Porphyrins' 
 lumber-yard, through the dry canal, into the sanctuary, and a long, 
 seldom broken stream of adherents to Serapis and the old worship 
 liad both preceded them and followed upou tlieir track; while old 
 Euscbius, in St. Mark's clmrcli, had been exhorting his congrega- 
 tion to exercise Christian love toward the besieged idolaters, heathen. 
 
SERAPIS. 137 
 
 resolule for defense, bad collected in the halls of the Serapeum to 
 the number of four thousand. 
 
 A goodly host, but this edifice was of such gigantic proportions, 
 the mass of those present and streaming hither filled only very scat- 
 teringly tlie roof, halls, and subterranean chambers and corridors. 
 Nowhere was ihere any crowd, and least of all in the apartments of 
 the temple proper; yes, in the grand rotunda, over which a cupola 
 proudly arched, where comers were received, in the broad anteroom 
 following, and in the unparalleled hy^wstylc, on the rear wall of 
 which opened the semi-circular, tower-like niche containing the 
 renowned image of Serapis, only isolated groups of men were to be 
 seen: and even those appeared dwarfishly small, as measured by the 
 eye, through the immensely long rows of pillars. 
 
 Only in'the rotunda, with its four columns, exceeding all human 
 measuremeui, shone the full light of day, coming in, as it did, 
 through the window in the tympan upon which the cupola rested. 
 In the vestibule reigned dim twilight, in the hypostyle a half dark- 
 ness crossed by wondrous gleams of light, producing a mystical 
 efiect. 
 
 The shadows of the giant pillars in the vestibule, and of the double 
 rows of those lining the colonnades on both sides of the liyiwstyU, 
 lay like long strips of black crape upon the many-colored pavement, 
 mosaic circles and eclipses edged and adorned the smooth surface of 
 this faultlessly polished floor, and in it were mirrored the gorgeous- 
 ly painted astrological devices on the stone roofs, the processions of 
 tlie gods and mythological groups, that decorated the walls, in skill- 
 fully executed, brilliantly-colored ato-?-efew, as well as the statues 
 and Mercuries between the pillars. 
 
 A superabundance of tine forms and coloring here met the eye in 
 overwhelming confusion, the breath lelt oppressed by the sweet 
 streams of incense, pervading these halls, and the magical, mystical, 
 original signs, figures and shapes were so many, that the unsatisfied 
 mind, thirsting after explanation and the signification of the unknow- 
 able and mysterious, delayed nearer approach to any one thing. 
 
 Like a thick cloud which conceals some mountain summit, flowed 
 down to the ground, in trout of the niche where was the image of 
 Serapis, a heavy curtain, which giants seemed to have woven" at a 
 loom of superhuman size. It fell in beautiful folds from the lop of 
 the hypostyle to the floor, and, while it hid the god from profane 
 Inoks, it fastened the gaze upon the world of mysteriousljMieautiful 
 and strange figures, with which it was inwoven and embroidered. 
 
 The gold and silver plate and the precious stones, which this 
 drapery concealed, had higher value than the treasury of a mighty 
 monarch. And all this seemed so overpoweringly great that, beside 
 it, man shudderingly felt his own insignificance, that the spirit 
 sought after new standards of measurement, in order to fit itself to 
 such unusual circumstances. 
 
 The infinite and immeasurable seemed here to border upon the 
 finite; and he who, with head bent back, looked up to the tops of 
 the pillars, and the unattainable height ot the roofs, felt the powers 
 of his healthy vision fail before he liad succeeded in taking in or ap- 
 prehending even a small i^ortioa of the teeming images and figures 
 thereon inscribed. 
 
128 SERAPIS. 
 
 And yet here, where Greek beauty was combined wi th the gofgeous- 
 ness and grandeur of the East, the tiniest thing could bear scrutiny; 
 for there was no architectural form, no work of the sculpt or, 
 painter, worker in brass, mosaicisi or wc-aver, which did not bear the 
 stamp ot genuine merit and hii^h perfection. The brotvnish-red, 
 mottled porphyry, the white, yellow nud rerl marble profusely be- 
 stowed here, were the finest and purest which Greek liands liad 
 ever fashioned. Each one of the tiiousaud pieces of sculpture to be 
 found here was the masterpiece of a great art ist ; and whoever devoted 
 himself lovingly to examination of the mosaics on the dazzlingly 
 polished floors, or whoever scrutiniz.ed closely the ornamental slabs, 
 which framed the aUo-reUevos and parlilioned the wall into sections, 
 must have been smitten with wonder and admiraliou at the magical 
 beauty, the elegance and copiousness ot invention, which lent even 
 to these small works grandeur, charm and significance. 
 
 Hundreds of courts, halls, corridors and chambers svere annexed 
 to these immense apartments dedicated to culture, or spread them- 
 selves out in divers stories underneath. 
 
 There weie long rows of chambers, holding more than a hundred 
 thousand volumes, which constituted the famous library of the 
 Serapeum. With these were connecting reading and writin.a; rooms; 
 here were dining, waiting, and assembly roorcs for the superintend- 
 ents of the temple; for teachers and scholars, there pungent odors 
 issued from laboratories, and appetizing ones from the kitchens and 
 bakeries. Within the strong walks of the basement lay the forsaken 
 cells of the penitents, and the dwelliui,^s of the lower employes and 
 slaves of the temple, who were reckoned by the hundred- in the 
 subterranean re2;ions opened that mysterious world of halls, grottoes, 
 passaa;es and caverns appointed tor iniiialion into the mysteries and 
 practice of the same; and unon the root of the sanctuary were 
 erected observatories, and liere still rose up the great watch-tower 
 whence an Eratosthenes and Claudius Ptolemy had studied the 
 stars. Astronomers, astrologers, tellers of the hours and magicians 
 there passed their nights; deep untler them, in the temple courts, 
 about which stables and magazines ranged themselves, flowed the 
 blood of victims, and were inspected the entrails of the heifers and 
 sheep slaughtered. 
 
 Yes, the abode of Serapis was a world on a small scale, and the 
 centuries had superabuniiantly supplied it with beauty and the 
 noblest gifts of art and science. Magic and sorcery wove about it a 
 mysierious, mj'stic charm, and philosophy had 'liukod deep and 
 manifest speculations with the nature of Serapis. Assuredlv, this 
 sanctuary was the heart ot Hellenic life in Alexandtr's cily! 'What 
 wonder, if the heathen fancied that at the fall of Serapis and his 
 abode, the whole earth must perish with it! 
 
 With timidly beating hearis had they poured into the Serapeum 
 expecting to go to ruin with their god; and yet full of enthusiastic 
 desire to pieveut his fall. 
 
 Wliat a marvelous mixture of mm and women had this day 
 found themselves together within th«^se hallowed precincts! 
 
 Grave scholars, philosophers, grammarians, mathematicians, 
 physicists, surL^'ons, adhered t) Olympius and silently followed 
 him. Rhetoricians with smooth faces, magicians aud sorcerers, 
 
SERAPIS. 139 
 
 whose lonsr beards flnwerl over robes embroidered with sinffiilar 
 devices; Rtiideuts clad lilce their predecessors iu the palmy days ot 
 Athens; men of every age, who called tliemselves artists, and yet 
 who only knew how to imitate what greater times had created— un- 
 foriunates, who, at this epoch of the unnihilation of the beautiful, 
 found nobody to cherish their abilities, and stimulate tliem to 
 embody in actuality their higher ideals. 
 
 Play-actors from the theaters which liad been put down; breadless 
 tragedians whose theaters had been closed by emperor and bishop; 
 singers and tlute-players, liungiy priests ard temple-servants, who 
 hacTbeen expelled from heathen sanctuaries; advocates, scribes, sea- 
 captains, handicraltsmen, and few merchants besides; for Christian- 
 ity had ceased to be the religion bt the poor, and property-holders 
 attached themselves to the faith favored liy the authorilies. 
 
 if is female favorite had followed one of the students, and seeing 
 this, forthwith others of his fellows had gone back to the city and 
 returned with their sweethearts and their friends. iSo, then, mixed 
 up with the men, was a great number of wi'eathed and bedizened 
 ■women, servant-maids thrust forth from the temples, and priestesses 
 of better reputation, who remained true to the old gods or were ad- 
 dicted to magic. 
 
 In striking contrast with these women showed a tall and aignified 
 matron in black mourning garb. It was Berenice, the mother of 
 the young heathen who had been ridden down ana wounded upon 
 the Prefecture Place, and whose eyes had been closed by Eusebius. 
 She had come into the Serapeum to aid in avenging her sou's death, 
 and to perish with the gods for whom he hail imperiled his life. 
 The wild commotion around distressed her, and wholly absorbed iu 
 woe, and deeply veiled, for long hours she kept her place at the foot 
 of the bionze statue of Justice,* silently looking on the ground. 
 
 Olympius had intrusted tlie supermtendence of the men capable 
 of bearing arms to the hoary-hiaded legate Memnon, an experienced 
 general, who had lost his left arm in battle with the Goths, and was 
 sometimes troubled with reducing this heterogeneous little army to 
 obedience to the veteran; sometimes he had to compose differences, 
 to untangle wild disorder and regulate excesses, again to issue orders 
 which had reference to the maintenance of his forces, and the great 
 saciifice in which he wanted to unite all those loyal to Serapis. 
 
 Karnis kept close by his side, lending him a helping hand wher- 
 ever such a thing was possible. Orpheus had been ordere:! to the 
 i-oof along with other young men, and there had a hard time in the 
 burning sunshine, upon hot copper plates, and beside the square 
 stouL's and columns of the glowing cupola which they expected next 
 morning to hurl upon the assailants. 
 
 Dame flerse nursed the sick and wounded; for some few, who 
 had rashly exposed their persons at the blocking up of the ap- 
 l)roaches, had been reached by the arrows and lances of troopers, 
 inactive though they were; and a far greater number of heathen 
 youth had come to grief while at work upon the root through sun- 
 stroke or ailments of that sort. 
 
 * PunishiDg and rewarding, accurdmg to the Egyptian conception of her 
 fcharacter. 
 
 5 
 
130 SERAPIS. 
 
 In the spacious halls of the temple it was cooler than in the glow- 
 ing; fetreels ot llie city, and time passed swiftly with tlie besieged. 
 
 JMany of tiiem had to work with tiieir iiands or keep guard, others 
 exclianged opinions, disputed, or went ofl into dissertations upon 
 tliat wliicli sliouid and must be. Many cowered upon the ground 
 overcome by anguish, or religious awe, praying, uc uttering adjura- 
 tions, and weeping. Mairiciaus and astrologers with their followers 
 had withdrawn into side-rooms and compared tables, in order to 
 calculate, to prognosticate, to seek for new formulas, and to defend 
 Ihem against attiicks. Between them and tlie library was an un- 
 broken stream of comers anil goers, and the tables were covered 
 witli rolls and tablets which contained old prophecies, horoscopes, 
 and effective conjuralions. Messenger after messenger, on behalf 
 of repose, went from liiem into the great halls, where hundreds of 
 young men with their girls were dancing, kissing, and wildly 
 careering to the sound ot shrill jiipes and the twanging ot stringed 
 instruments, shaking *in their hands llie clashing tambourine, that 
 they m.ight make merry use of liie few hours yet allotted them, ere 
 they must take that leap into noihinguess, or be swallowed up by the 
 uncertain shadow ot tieath. 
 
 Thus the sun drew near its setting, and now suddenly resounded 
 through the vast area of the teofiple the thundering, shattering, 
 deafening roar of ils mighty gong. 
 
 Like surging waves ot a sonorous sea, rolled back the echoes of 
 that mighty brazen voice from the hard walls of the sancluai-y. How 
 it rushed and roartd through every corner ot that gigantic building, 
 from the highest chamber on the astronomers' watch-tower to the 
 lowest depths of the darkest dungeon, and called all together who 
 had found their way into the house of Serapis. 
 
 The sacred rooms filled up from the rotunda, an ever-increasing 
 stream forced its way into the vestibule, and soon the hppostyle, too, 
 was crowded with men and women. 
 
 Without distinction ot age or sex, without respect to the usual 
 forms, and the higher or lower degree of consecration which each 
 one had received, the worshipers of Serapis pressed toward the ven- 
 erated niche, until their progress was stayed by a chain which 
 neokf/ren* had stretched across at a certain distance, from the unap- 
 proachable semi-circle. Shoulder to shoulder in breathless silence 
 the parishioners of the king of gods awaited what was to come in 
 the l)ody ot tlie InipostyJe, and its adjoining corridors. 
 
 Soon was heard a low chant as suug by male voices. 
 
 It lasted only a few minutes, when there burst forth a thundering 
 salute to the god, accompanied by flutes, cymbals, lutes and the 
 beating of ketlle-drums. 
 
 Each one had lifted up eyes and hands, gazing upon the curtain in 
 feverish suspense. 
 
 Deep twilight veiled the images and signs upon the immense 
 tapestry; but now, now came life into the rigid folds, now they 
 stirred, now beiran to run like streams, brooks, water- veins, tliat 
 flow after haviug been long dammed up; now the curtain was low- 
 ered, and now, now it tell suddenly, and ao quickly that the eye 
 
 ♦ Temple-servanta. 
 
SERAPIS. 131 
 
 could hardly follow its movement. And now rang from a thousand 
 lips, as from a single mouth, a cry of admiration, astonishment and 
 rapture, for Serapis had revealed himself to his own. 
 
 lu full dignity sat tne majestic form of the god upon his golden 
 throne, which was studded with precious stones. Thoughtfully 
 and seriously looked down upon his worshipers that handsome, 
 benignant countenance. The rich masses of curls that framed his 
 wise brow, and the kalatJws* which rested upon the crown of his 
 liead were of virgin gold. At his feet lay the Cerberus, stretching 
 forth his triple head whence flashed rubies with fire-like gleam. 
 The noble body and garments of the god were of gold and ivory — a 
 oMidel of power in repose. 
 
 Perfectly harmonious, faultlessly beautiful in entirety as in the 
 smallest of its parts, was this image of superhuman power and 
 divine majesty. If this prince rose from his seat, why of course 
 the earth must tremble and the heavens quake. 
 
 Before such a king even the strung bowed with joy, for no mortal 
 man ever rejoiced in such exalted beauty. This ruler of the uni- 
 verse triumphed over every adversary, even death, the monster, 
 which ciouched in impotent fury at his feet. 
 
 AVith bated breath, thrilled by pious awe, enraptured and yet 
 dumb from reverential fear, looked up those thousands at the won- 
 drous form of their god, as seen through the veil of gathering twi- 
 light. And now — oh moment without parallel !— an envoy froln the 
 sinking sun, a briglii sunbeam broke through the blue vault of the 
 niche that was strewn with golden stars, as though it would kiss 
 the lios of the god, its father, and its sovereign. 
 
 Then, like the roaring of thunder, and the dashing of the surf 
 against a rocky cliff, rang forth so overpowering a shout of joy from 
 tlie breast of the assembled multitude, that the statues and brazen 
 altars in the vast hall shook, the curtains trembled, the tools for 
 sacrificing clattered, the hanging lamps and chandeliers began to 
 oscillate, and its echo bounded back from the wall, like a rushing 
 torrent in a flood, and broken into a hundred streams, waved from 
 pillar to pillar. 
 
 Behold the great orb of day acknowledged its master, Serapis was 
 still enthioneil with unbroken onmipotence; it was not he who was 
 found lacking in ability to protect himself, his world and his own! 
 After sundown darkness quickly tell upon the temple, when, lo! 
 suddenly there was a flickering of light in the vault arching over 
 the god. The stars were in commotion, touched by invisible hands, 
 and from many hundreds of five-rayed points flashed variegated 
 tlames in gorgeous splendor. In a flood of bright-hued, magical 
 light, the god once more showed himself to his people, and now tor 
 the first time in his full, noble, individual beauty. 
 
 Again the temple resounded with the jubilant shouts of enthusi- 
 astic heathen, and now appeared Olympius in floating rotje, with 
 the fillet and insignia of the high-priest before the pedestal of his 
 god's image. lie poureil out a drink-ofleriug before the heavenly 
 one from a golden chalice, scattered costly incense, and in eloquent 
 speech challenged the liege men ot Serapis to battle for their god 
 
 * Kalathos or modius, viz., the measiu-e of grain upon the head of Serapis. 
 
133 SERAPIS. 
 
 and conquer, or, if it must be so, to perish for him, and with him. 
 Then, wilh far-reaching voice, he uttered a fervent prayer that 
 came from the depth of his heart and found its way to the hearts 
 of all present. 
 
 Now tlie curtain rose aaain amid (he solemn chanting of a choral 
 hymn, and while thousands followed its ascent in silent devotion, 
 temple-servants moved to and fro, lighting the lamps on the roofs, 
 walls, and pillars. 
 
 Karnis had let go his hold of his dear ones, for he needed his 
 hand in order to wipe away the tears that had flowed over his old 
 cheeks, in this great hour of consecration; the mother was held in 
 close embrace by her son, and Porphj-rius, who had fallen in with 
 kindred spirits, nodded to the singers, withaglance full of meaning. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 One hour after sundown the sacrifice of oxen in the great court 
 of the Serapeum was over. The god (so announceathe augurs) had 
 accepted it— the inspection of the entrails had resulted more auspi- 
 ciously than on yesterday. 
 
 The flesh of the slaughtered beeves went immediately to the 
 kitchens, and it the odor of roast meat was as pleasant to Serapis as 
 to his worshipers, then might they reckon upon a favorable issue to 
 their resistance. 
 
 In the upper rooms of the temple a cheerful feeling soon spread 
 itself amomr the besieged; for Olympius had supplied them bounti- 
 fully wiili grape-juice from the stores of the sanctuary, and as a 
 consequence of the salutation to Serapis and I he sacritice turning out 
 so auspiciously, new confidence and festal joy now became their 
 portion. 
 
 Since couches were lackin£r, the question was how to turn night 
 into day; and, inasmuch as life among the most of them was staked 
 upon the enjoyment of the moment, and the new and stranne ever 
 appeared charming to them, they were soon roistering in madly 
 merry mood. 
 
 Of cushions there were none, such as they had been accustomed 
 to recline upon when eaiing and drinking, and so now they picked 
 up the most wonderful utensils, and changed them into impromptu 
 seats. Where beakers were lacking they let pitchers circulate, or 
 sacrificial chalices and similar ware pass from mouth to mouih. 
 The head of many a young man rested upon the lap of his sweet- 
 heart, many a girl leaned against the back of an old man; and as 
 flowers were wantmg, messengers were sent out to fetch blossoms, 
 green branches, and vine leaves from the city. 
 
 Such were easily procured, and those returning messengers brought 
 the news that tlie races would take place in the morning. 
 
 This intelligence was of creat importance to many; and when 
 Nikarch. the son of rich Ilipiioklei'les, and the tapestry weaver 
 Zeiiodotus, whose span of four-in-hand had already come off victors 
 once betore, and with which he hoped to win the wreath this time, 
 too, rapidly withdrew, in order lo make the necessary arrangements 
 in the stables, Ilippias, the fine charioteer, ioUowedj who had been 
 accustomed to drive in the arena the steeds of great merchants. 
 
SEEAPIS. 133 
 
 These three drew after them horse-lovers, friends of the charioteers, 
 flower-dealers, renters ot seats, iu short, many who promised them- 
 selves at the hippodrome especial gain or enjoyment. Each indi- 
 vidual Ihought that defense was not his sole concern; and since the 
 god is favorably inclined, he is well able to take care of his own 
 sanctuary until after the races were over. Then tbey would return, 
 to conquer or die with ihe rest. 
 
 Many thought, too, of wife and child, and the good bed at home, 
 and so were thinned the ranks ol the carousers. Nevertheless, far 
 the larger half of those gathered here ren\ained, to the number of 
 more than three thousand men and women. 
 
 These gladly took possession of the half-emptied wine-jugs of 
 their vanished comrades; merry music was provided, and they 
 drank, sang, and dmced, with llrigiit garlands on their heads and 
 shoulders, until far into the night. Their rejoichig soon became a 
 mad revel, while loud shouts and roistering outcries aeain disturbed 
 the magicians, who had grown absorbed anew in calculating, read- 
 ing, and contending over their tablets and parchment-rolls. 
 
 The mother of the slaughtered youth cowered still beneath the 
 statue of Justice, and patiently endured having her heart wrung by 
 their shouts ot drunken merriment. Each peal of laughter, each 
 outbreak ot mad excess over there cut her to the quick, and yet it 
 would have sounded lovely in her ears, if only one more had been 
 added to those thousand voices. 
 
 When Olympius, with head on high, still in the rich dress ot his 
 ofBce, traversed the temple hails at the head of the other priests, he 
 too remarked her, whom lie had known as a proud, happy mother, 
 and begged her to follow him to the friends whom he had invited 
 to his table; but she shrunk from social intercourse with men whom 
 she knew, and kept her station beneath the statue of the goddess. 
 
 Wherever the high-priest showed himself he was greeted with 
 enthusiasm. Brightly and cheerfully he called to the revelers, 
 " Make merry, friends!" enlivening them with witty, kindling 
 words, and reminding them of Pharaoh Mykerinus. An oracle had 
 foretold that he had only six more years to live; and thereupon to 
 prove this to be a lying prophecy he had spent all his nights in 
 reveling, and thus made a whole dozen out of the six years granted 
 him. 
 
 "Imitate him!" cried he, lifting up a goblet, "yes, compress 
 into the few hours allotted to us the enjoyment of a year! From 
 each glass that you carry to your lips, pour out to the gods as 1 do 
 here!" 
 
 Uproarious applause followed this lively challenge; flutes and 
 cymbals unbidden attded their quota in full, copper beakers clanked 
 merrily together, and many a little fist beat upon the tambourine, so 
 that tlie calfskin groaned, and the little bells on the rim rang out 
 joyously. 
 
 Olympius thanked them, and with kindly greetings passed on his 
 way through groups of his own people. 
 
 Seldom had his heart beat as high. Perhaps his end was not far 
 distant, but it should be one worthy ot him! 
 
 He knew how the sunbeams liad been deflected, that had kissed 
 the mouth ot tSerapis. For centuries this surprising spectacle an^ 
 
134 SERAPIS. 
 
 iuddcn illumication of (he ceiling over the god's head had been 
 played off at high festiv.ils us had beon the ciise lo-day; but those 
 were only lures for the niultiiude, whose dull minds musl be im- 
 pressed by the wonder-working power of the god, which the elect 
 recognized every\vhere iu the magical coml)iiKit1ons of all the forces 
 and phenomena in nature and in human life. As for himself, he 
 believed firmly in the might of Serapis, and the predictions and cal- 
 culations from which it had been ascertained, that his fall would 
 occasion the return into chaos of the world as it is. 
 
 Many winds blew over the world, all driving the ship of life 
 deathward: whether she gets there to-day or to morrow, what of it? 
 The approaching end of all things did not frighten Olympius. Oidy 
 one thing filled his vanity with regret; there would be no genera- 
 tions to follow after who should eslol his heroic exploits, and sacri- 
 fice of life, for tne sake of the gods! 
 
 But all was not lost yet; and his sunny nature saw in the flush of 
 the sunset sky the promise of the glorious dawn of a coming morn- 
 ing. If the expected succor appeared, the good cause in Alexan- 
 dria here would conquer, and the exaltation of all the heathen Greek 
 world be complete; then would father and mother have rightly 
 called him Olympius, tor then would he excnange with none of the 
 Olj'mpian gods, then should the fame of his name be more endur- 
 ing than marble or brass, contmuinff to shine with the luster of a 
 sun so long as a Greek heart honors the old gods and loves its coun- 
 try. 
 
 This night — perhaps his last one— should be a rarely glorious festal 
 occasion; and so he had summoned his tiienas and intimate asso- 
 ciates, the leaders of intellectual lite in Alexandria, to a symposium 
 In the sense ct the great sages and philosophers of ancient Athens, 
 to lake place in the assembly-ioom of the iSerapis priests. 
 
 How very differently did it look here from the council-room iu 
 the bishop's house! 
 
 The Christians assembled around a wretched table, encompassed 
 by naked walls, and occupjiue: wooden chairs. The vast apart- 
 ment, to which Olympius had invited his frienils, was a regal hall 
 magnificently furnished with costly wainscoting, embossed metal, 
 crimson hangings, and rich in treasures of art. 
 
 r^uxurious cushions covered with lions' and panthers' skins invit- 
 ed to repose; and when the muchiionored man joined his guests, 
 after making a progress through the temple, all the couches were 
 closely occupied. 
 
 Helladjus, the renowned grammarian and high-priest of Zeus, lay 
 upon his right hand. Porphyrins, the benefactor of the Serapeum, 
 upon his left; Karnis, too, liad found a place among the guests of 
 his old friend, and how he did enjoy the delicious wine that circu- 
 lated here, as well as the witty and lively conversation, of wliich he 
 had been so long deprived. Olympius liad been unanimously elect- 
 ed symposiarch, and had challenged his friends to occupy them- 
 selves, in the first place, with the old question as to what is the high- 
 est good. 
 
 They all, said he, stood, as it were, upon the threshold, and like 
 travelers who have forsaken a dear old liome. in order to seek for a 
 pew, uncertain one in the di.'^taiKC, once mcue ask each other what 
 
SEKAPIS. 135 
 
 has been best and most thankworthy of what they have enjoyed 
 under the protection of their old household gods; so it became them, 
 in this liour, to picture what had been the highest good of their ex- 
 istence upon earth. Yes, they stood, perhaps, on the eve of a 
 glorious victory; but, perliaps, too, on the bridge which unites the 
 shore of lite with the boat of Charon. 
 
 Such stuff was familiar to each one, and, in a trice, an animated 
 discussion w;is in progress. Assuredly the talli here was more 
 flowery and showy than in ancient Athens, but the conversation did 
 not. lead to the fathoming and elucidation of the old question. The 
 disputants only brought forward what had been earlier tliought and 
 called the highest good; and when Helladius called upon them, in 
 the first place, to pronounce clearly upon the nature of human 
 beings, there ensued a brilliant argument upon the question: "Is 
 man the best or the worst of living creatures?" 
 
 At the same time, there was much to be heard of the mystic con- 
 nection between the spiritual and material worlds, and startling was 
 the power of imagination with which these wonderful thinkers had 
 peopled with demons and spirits all the steps of the staircase, which 
 linked the incomprehensible, self -existent One with that manifesta- 
 tion of divine form, Man. 
 
 They understood now, why many an Alexandrian feared to throw 
 a stone, because he feared to strike one of the good spirits with 
 which the air was teeming. 
 
 The more obscure were the propositions, the more victoriously 
 image and metaphor trod down simple words, and yet the speakers 
 rejoiced in the brilliancy of their rhetoric, and the fullness of their 
 ideas. They supposed themselves to have grasped the supernatural 
 by dint of mind and rraagination, and In their idle speculations, 1o 
 have advanced far above the ancients. 
 
 Karnis was eniaptured; and Porphyrins wished that Gorgo was 
 by his side, for, like all fathers, he would have preferred his child's 
 experiencing what he deemed high intellectual joy, to enjoying it 
 liimselt. 
 
 In his house, meanwhile, it looked sultry and miserable. In spite 
 of the dreadtul heat, old Damia had not descended from her ob- 
 servatory on the roof, where were to ])e found scrolls, instruments, 
 and whatever else was needed by the astrologer and magician. 
 
 A priest of Saturn, who had won for himself a name by his pro- 
 ficiency in these arts, and for years past had come to her aid when 
 she wished to apply to occult science in any emergency, was to- 
 day, too, found in place. He handed her the astrological tables, 
 drew circles and ellipses, inscribed triangles and other figures at her 
 dictation, reminded her of ihe mystical significance of numbers and 
 characters, which sometimes escaped her failing memory, calculated 
 for her, applied tests to her and his own products, and lead aloud 
 to hei the conjurations which she judged eflncacious in a. given case. 
 Often, too, he showed her new ways, and proposed novel formulas 
 tvhich might compass hei end. 
 
 According to the prescription, she had fssled from early morning, 
 and as the heat of the day increased, was often overpowered by 
 sleep in tlie midst of her work. If she stalled up, then, and her 
 assistfuit had meanwhile arrived at conclusions which contradicted 
 
136 SERA PIS. 
 
 her prcconceplions, she reprimanded him sharply and compelled 
 him to ^o over attain the finished reckoniofr. 
 
 Gorgo fieciuenlly went up to her, but altliough she brought her 
 refreshments witli her own hands and ollered them, she could not 
 move the old lady even so much as to moisten her lips with fruit 
 juice; tor to break her last would have been to call m question the 
 result ot her work. 
 
 Wliile she seemed to sleep, the maiden sprinkled the room with 
 strong essences, poured acme of thom upon her grandmother's 
 gown^ carefully wiped the beads ot perspiration from her brow, and 
 fanned lier into coolness. 
 
 Tlie old lady submitted to all this; and although she had only 
 closed her weary eyes and assumed the appearance ot one asleep. Id 
 order to feast upon the tender solicitude of lier darling. 
 
 Toward noon she sent the magician away, in order to gain 
 strength through a short nap, and after she awoke, she collected all 
 her faculties, and with grave assiduity resumed her labors. 
 
 When she had reached tlie conclusion, she knew that nothing 
 could avert the frightful calamity predicted by the old oracles. The 
 fall of Serapis and the end of the world were surely just ahead. 
 
 The magician hid his head, when he overlooked the piocessesby 
 which she had come to this conclusion, and groaned m undisguised 
 horror; but she dismissed him with calmness, handing him the 
 purse, which she had newly filled that morning, saying with a bit- 
 ter smile: " For the hours betwen now and the end." 
 
 Then — the sun had long since crossed its zenith— she leaned back 
 exhausted, and directed Gorgo not to allow any one to disturb her, 
 nor to return herself until she should call her. 
 
 No sooner was she left alone, than she looked tor a long wliile into 
 a shining mirror, at the same time repeating the five vowels without 
 cessation, and then she gazed expectantly upward. 
 
 riiis singular proceeding was to lead to a certain result. Her aim 
 was to die to the whole world of the senses, viz.: to make herself 
 blind, deaf, and insensible to everything corporeal, that was parting, 
 with its contaminating burden, her spiritual, godly nature from its 
 heavenly source. 
 
 Freed from its earthly shackles, her soul was to look upon the 
 god whence she sprung. 
 
 After long fasting and struggling, she had, already several times, 
 nearly attained this aim, and had never forgotten the intoxicating 
 delight ot those hours, in which it had been with her as though 
 she were floating in imn:easurable space airily as a zephyr sur- 
 rounded by light Inilescribably glorious. 
 
 The faiiitings, which she had already long felt, came to further 
 her purpose, for soon she felt a slight tremor, cold sweat oozed from 
 her pores, her limbs seemed to give way, she saw and heard noth- 
 ing more; she felt as though not the luncs only, bui every part of 
 her body inhaled cooling breath, and before her eyes coursed con- 
 fusedly light circles, in red and dark violet blue. Did they receive 
 tlieir strange si)lendor from the eternal light that she sought? Did 
 not a mysterious power already liti her upward, to meet her highest 
 i.imV Had the soul freed itself from the body's chains! Had she 
 
SERAPIS. 137 
 
 already become one with the Godhead? Had the search after God 
 produced Mentity with God? 
 
 No! For the arms, which she had spread out like wiugs, now 
 sunk down, aud all had been in vain ! A slight pain in those old 
 feet had again remanded her to the wretched world of the senses, 
 above which she sought to soar. 
 
 Again and again she snatched at her mirror, looked into it, and 
 then gazed skyward, but just so often as the bodily sensations ceased 
 to assert themselves, and the freed soul began to flap her unfettered 
 wings, there came a sound, a quivering muscle, a fly, that touched 
 her hand, a drop of perspiration seeking to make its way from ihe 
 forehead to the cheek, all to aid the senses in maintaining their 
 rights. 
 
 How hard it was to rid one's self of adhering clay! 
 
 The sculptoi who chisels the superfluous off of a block of marble, 
 in order to retain the image of a god, was her model, but the super- 
 fluous was more easily removed from the stone than from the soul 
 knitted so long closely with the corporeal. 
 
 Aud yet she did not cease to wrestle tenaciously after the attain- 
 ment that others had made before her, but it came no nearer to her, 
 rather, it retreated to an ever remoter distance; for between her and 
 what she strove after, projected itself a series of pictured memories 
 and strange visions, that would not be exorcised. The chisel 
 slipped, was turned aside, lost its sharpness, before the divine image 
 emei-ged from its encasing stone. 
 
 One illusion of the senses after another crowded upon her. 
 
 First she saw her Gorgo, the idol of her heart. Pale and beauti- 
 ful she lay upon a foaming wave that bore her aloft upon its briny 
 back, and then hurled Jier into tlie yawning abyss, that opened be- 
 neath her. 
 
 She too, young, hardly mature as she was, was voted to the com- 
 mon destruction; she, too, was to be broken by the same dreadful 
 hand, that daretl to fell the highest of the gods. 
 
 luQumitable hatred drove her far away from the goal she sought, 
 and now the phantasmagoria changed, and she saw a wildly flutter- 
 ing flock of coal-black ravens, describing silent circles in the mist, 
 at an unattainable height aboVe her; but suddenly they vanished, 
 and now from the gi'ay fog plainly emerged the monument of Por- 
 phyrius' deceased wife, Gorgo's mother. 
 
 How often had she approached it with emotion, but now she diil 
 not want to see it, not now, aud it disappeared at her desire too; 
 but in its stead appeared the image of her son's lovely wife, the 
 same who rested within that costly monument, and to do battle with 
 that face broke her will-power. A.nd, nevertheless, it showed her the 
 deceased, taking ihat last most fatal walk of her life. 
 
 A solemn procession moved from the lofty door of her house out 
 irpon the street, in festal array. At its head were flute-players and 
 singing-girls, then came a white ox, its mighty neck twined about 
 with a bright red wreath of pomegranate flowers, the blossoms of 
 the tree, which, with its kernelly fruit, was a symbol of fruittulness. 
 Its horns were gilded, and al its side walked slaves with white 
 baskets full of bread, cake and flowers, in gay contusion. Others 
 followed after, with light blue cages, in which perched geese and 
 
138 SERAPIS. 
 
 doves. The ox, tlie flour cakes, fhe flowers and birds were destined 
 for the sanctuary of llithyia, to be brought in oJTering (o that 
 friemll.y goikU'SS, who stood by lying-in women. 
 
 Behind the ox stepped (iorgo's mother, beautifully crowned with 
 flowers, her gait that of a -wohian near confinement. Plow modestly 
 and piously were her eyes cast down! She evidently tliought upon 
 the coming hour of trial, and accompanied the sacrifice with silent 
 prayer. 
 
 Damia herself followed Her with lady friends of the family, 
 clients, their wives and her own waiting-maids. All carried pome- 
 granates in the right hand, and in the left gay garlands of flowers, 
 which she had freely and kindly woven. 
 
 Thus they proceeded until th(y got to Clement's dock; hut there 
 they encountered some wild monks from the Nitrian cloisti rs, and 
 wtien these "belield the victim, they were loud in their censures and 
 reviled the heathen. The slaves indignantly repelled them. Then 
 the hollow-cheeked wearers of sheep-skin rushed with thongs upon 
 the innocent animal to be slaughtered, that was an abomination to 
 them, and the steer lifted up his powerful head, turned, bellowing 
 to the richt and left, stifiened his tail, broke away from thegayl),' 
 decked 1)03'S, whom hilberlo he had patiently followed, slung one 
 of the monks high into llie air upon his brancliiug horns, turned 
 and lan raging upon the women who followed him. 
 
 They scattered, like a flock of doves, upon which a hawK has 
 pounced. Some had been forced into the lake, others against the 
 inclosure of the dock, and she too, who was living through all this 
 tor the second time, midway to union with the divine nature, she 
 was dashed to the ground with the pregnant woman, to whom she 
 extended her hands. 
 
 Gorgo owed her life to this torturing hour, while her mother 
 reaped death for her sake. On the following morning there was a 
 funeral in Alexandria, grand, solemn, and pompotis, as if a victori- 
 ous general were being borne to the grave. As for the monk gored 
 by the steer, the bishop had made proclamation, that for his re- 
 sistance to the abomination of bloody sacriflces to idols he had 
 won an everlasting crown in paradise. 
 
 The ravens, those black ravens began again to flap their wings 
 before Damia's eyes, and a glorious" young Greek hero cheerily 
 drove them awaj' with his Thyrsian staff. 
 
 His powerful, supple limbs still shone from their anointing for 
 the Timagetian ring, the theater of liis victory in all the exercises of 
 youth. He bore the features, he had the ringleted hair of iier son 
 Apelles; and now lie was transformed, and his form had the 
 emaciated aspect of a penitent, ami liis knees bent beneath the bur- 
 den of a heavy cross: Maria, his widow, had stamped him the 
 favorite of the gods, with tlie cognomen of martyr for tiie cause of 
 the crucified Jew, making a false assumption tor him, in the pres- 
 ence of his own son and all men. 
 
 Damia doubled up her trembling fingers, and now again appeared 
 the ravens, circling above the prostrate penitent with a wild flap- 
 ping of their wings. 
 
 Then came forward her own husband to meet her composedly, 
 without paying any heed to these birds of ill omen. Thus had he 
 
SERAPIS. 139 
 
 come to her, many, many years ago, saying laughingly: " The best 
 bargain of my life! For a cup of water 1 am to furnish Thessa- 
 louica and Couslaniinople with corn; a hundred golden solicli tor 
 every drop!" 
 
 Fortunate merchant! The earnings of that day had been tenfold, 
 and water, simple water from the Nile — " baptismal water," the 
 priest called it— Lad filled the coffers of his son likewise, and from 
 the original hide of land expanded into vast estates; but this water, 
 this simple water silently demanded a return for its gifts, and ibis 
 both father and son had declined to give. Through its power, 
 whatever they touched was transmuted into sold, but upon the 
 happiness and peace of the house it had fallen like mildew. 
 
 One branch that had grown out of its old Macedonian stock was 
 severed from the other; between it and the parent trunk in Canopian 
 Street surged like a deep sea, salted with corroding hatred, that 
 gieat falsehood of her deceased husband. 
 
 That falsehood had poisoned a thousand hours for her son, forc- 
 ing the proud man to resiiru the dignity of the free and noble-think- 
 ing. At heart with the old gods, he had, every year more than once, 
 to humble himself and bow tbe knee, in a Christian church before 
 the crucified One, and publicly confess him, in company with the 
 hated professors of a different faith. That water, that horrible gold- 
 dispensing water, it was attached more firmly to him than the brand 
 upon the arm of a marked slave. It could not be wiped off, nor 
 rubbed off, for it the false Christian and enthusiastic friend of the 
 Olympian gods openly acknowledged this, and abjured that despised 
 new faith, then the g'ifts of that wonder-woriving water, yes all the 
 possessions of that ancient house fell to church and state, while 
 Porphyrius' children, the grandchildren of the rich Damia, were 
 beggared. 
 
 And all this, all on account of the crucified Jew I 
 
 Praise and thanks be to the gods! The end of this misery vpaa 
 close at hand. 
 
 A shiver of delight thrilled her as she reflected, that with her and 
 hers cjl that was called Christian would be crushed to powder, an- 
 nihilated. She would have lauehed aloud if her throat had not been 
 parched up, and her tongue so dry; but her features expres^sed tri- 
 umphant scorn, and in the midst of the ravens, who circled closer 
 and closer about her, she saw Marcus, the son of Maria, driving the 
 singer-gill Dada through Cannpian Street, while her hated daugh- 
 ter-in-law looked after them and beat her breast in woe. 
 
 Seized with intoxicating delight, she rocked to and fro upon her 
 arm- chair; but not for long, because those black birds seemed to 
 fill the whole apartment, and deseiibed an ever-contracting circle 
 about her with rapid, endless strokes. She heard them not, but 
 could see them, and the eddying current in their wake whirred 
 past her, and she had to follow it with her head, until she was seized 
 with vertigo, and forced to catch hold of something tor a firm sup- 
 port. 
 
 Cowering, her hands clutching convulsively the arms of her chair, 
 there sat the old lady, like a rider who is dragged around the 
 avenue in a ring by a runaway horse, until her senses lorsook her, 
 
140 SERAPIS. 
 
 and galled by overexertion and fatigue she sunk to the floor, ligid 
 and as it -were lifeless. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 GoKGO had enjoyed no repose after being dismissed by her grand- 
 mother. The noble tranquillity of her deportment had changed to 
 littulness that appeared unnatural in her, since from an impetuous 
 child she had grown into a maidenly young woaiau. 
 
 The attempt to rid herself of the anxiety which oppressed her 
 breathing, and the pain at her heart which stung like a wound, by 
 singing and playing on the lute had only augmented her restless- 
 ness. The remedy which had hithcrtfl always availed to restore its 
 lost equilibrium lo her soul had become inefficacious, and Sappho's 
 love-song, which she had begun to sing, had intensified, as it were, 
 the emolions of her own heart, and stirred them into renewed 
 activity. She had become conscious that every fiber, every nerve 
 of her being was consecrated to the one man whom she loved. She 
 ■would have thrown away lite as a thing of nougLit lor one hour's 
 sweet intercourse with the object of this devotion. Belief in ttie old 
 gods, the heathen world containing the ideals of her young heart, 
 her opposition to Christianity, her noble art, in short all that con- 
 stituted the charm of her life, was thrown iato the shade compared 
 with this one affection that w\'is absorbing her soul. All, all drove 
 her to give herself up unreservedly to her beloved, and nevertheless, 
 not an instant did she hesitate as to which side she should take in 
 the approaching collision between the powers governing the world. 
 
 These past hours had changed to confidence her belief that the 
 end of all things was at hand. The destruction of the ■world drew 
 on; she purposed to perish united with Constantine, and that ap- 
 peared to her a piecious boon from the gods. 
 
 "NVhile Damia had exhausted her strength in endeavoring to break 
 her soul loose from its bonds terrestrial^ Gorgo went sometimes to 
 the distressed slaves, in order to raise their spirits, and save them, 
 through occupation, from blank despair; sometimes she mounted to 
 tlie roof to find out if indeed her grandmother were not needing her 
 yet. 
 
 When darkness fell she had remarked that several servant-maids, 
 and wiin them, a few men, had run off. They had earlier shown 
 partiality for the new faith, and now made their escape to Christian 
 associates, or had taken refuge in some church, in oider to place 
 lliemselves under the protection of the crucified God, whose great 
 l)ower could perhaps stay the coming ruin. 
 
 Porphyrius bad sent one messenger who should inform his mother 
 and herself that he was well, that the Serapeum had found a goodly 
 number of defenders, and that he would spend the night in the 
 sanctuary. There was an evident hesitation on the part of the 
 Romans, and if the heathen should succeed next morning in repell- 
 ing tlieir first attaclv, succor might yet arrive in time. 
 
 This hope Gorgo did not share; tor a client ot her father's had 
 brought the news that the Biamitcs, who had come to Naucratis, 
 liad been there dispersed by a tew imperial maniples. Destiny went 
 on her way, and no power could divert her from her courBC. 
 
SERAPIS. 141 
 
 Tlie evening brou2;ht no coolness, and when night had tully come, 
 and still her grandmother did not call, Gorgo could not restrain het 
 growing anxiety, anJ after knockmg in vain at the door, entered 
 the observatory. 
 
 Her nurse had preceded her with a lamp: both women paused 
 upon the threshold, petrified with horror, tor before them lay the 
 gray-haired old lady un the floor. The back of her head leaned 
 auaiust the seat of the chair, from which she had slid down, and her 
 pale countenance, ghastly and bereft of animation, looked toward 
 ilipm, with half-closed eyes and wide-open mouth. 
 
 Wine, water, cordials were at hand; the couch, ordinarily destined 
 to rest the star-gazer, received the unconscious form; and, after 
 some minutes, the women succeeded in restoring the old lady to life. 
 
 With wandering glance she looked into the face of Gorgo, who 
 was kneeling at her side, and murmured softly to herself: "The 
 ravens! W^here are the ravens?" 
 
 Then she let her eyes rove over the tablets and rolls which had 
 been pushed oS of the couch and table in order to make room tor 
 her, the lamp and medicaments. 
 
 They lay around uiaou the pavement, and this glance called forth 
 in her a healthy and rousiuu indignation, so that she found strength, 
 although hoarsely^ and in hardly intelligible, bi'oken sentences, to 
 scold at such disregard of those sacred writings, and the disorder 
 into which they had fallen. 
 
 While the nurse picked up the writings, Damia again fell into a 
 swoon. 
 
 Gorgo rubbed her forehead, and tried to introduce a little wine be- 
 tween her lips; but the old lady only closed them tighter, until the 
 nurse came to her young mistress' assistance. Then they suc- 
 ceeded in giving her a tew drops of the refreshing liquors; and im- 
 mediately Uie old lady opened her eyes, moved her tongue quickly, 
 as if the taste had gratefully to\iched her palate, then seized the 
 goblet herself, drew it to her mouth, and although the glass swayed 
 so violently to and fro that half its contents were spilled, she swal 
 lowed and swallowed, until it was completely emptied. Then she 
 cried out with the avidity of the starving: "More, more; 1 must 
 drink!" 
 
 Gorgo handed her a second glassful and immediately afterward a 
 third, and Damia emptied this too with equal eagerness. 
 
 Tlien she drew a long breath of satisfaction, directed a look of 
 revived intelligence upon her grandchild, and said: 
 
 " Thanks, child! Now it goes again lor a bit. The world of the 
 senses and all appeitaining thereto are intrusive, and fasten them- 
 selves to UH like burrs. We would like to be rid of them, but they 
 will cleave to us. Whoever can be satisfied with wretched human 
 existence, let him enjoy them. They laugh over the poetess- 
 Praxilla, you know, because she lets the dying Adonis lament. How 
 was it? At the moment of death she lets liim regret the loss ot 
 apples and pears. But is not that fine? Right, right, a hundred 
 times right, was Piaxilla. There they are fasting, torturing them- 
 selves— 1 know something about it— in order to attain the godlike. 
 They taint, and consume themselves in so doing, while they might 
 have been so comfortable if Ihey had allowed themselves the en- 
 
142 SERAPIS. 
 
 joyment of apples and pears. Greatness never j'et made any man 
 happy. Let him who would teel pkasjuitly never cease to be small. 
 Such are children, and thtretore ihcy are" so happy. Apples and 
 pears! For me they too will soon be gone. It the great originator 
 of the universe spares himself, then will still remain the idea, 
 apples and pears, and perchance he may be pleased, after the great 
 catastrophe, to let a new world succeed ours. It then he again 
 embodies the ideas: man— and apples and pears, it would be to 
 plagiarize from himself. If he is beneficent, then he will give up 
 incorporating for the second time that irite idea ' man,' but, if not, 
 then he will leave the poor wight apples and pears. I mean that 
 little enjoyment; for in all gieat pleasures, as they are called, lurk 
 pain and misery. Another glass! 1 relish it. After to-morrow, no 
 more of this either. 1 might grieve over this good gitt of Dionysus; 
 there is something superior in it to apples and pears. Then comes 
 what Cupid gives to mortals. That is going to its end, too. But 
 thai is something no longer analogous to apples and pears. That is 
 greater, greater enjoyment; and "therefore is, ai the same time, so 
 full of cruel pain. Rapture and agony, who knows their limits? 
 Laughter and tears: they belong to both. Are you weeping? Yes, 
 yes, yes. Poor child! come here, 1 want to kiss you." 
 
 Herewith, Damia drew the head of the kneeling maiden tenderly 
 to her breast, and again and again pressed her lips upon her fore- 
 head. 
 
 Finally she let her go, surveyed the room with uneasy glances, 
 and said: " How you have disarranged those; tablets and scrolls. It 
 1 could only explain to you how they all tally and agree! We know 
 now, too, how il comes. Day after to-morro\v there will be no longer 
 a heaven and earth; but — listen, child!— but if Serapis falls, and all 
 things do not cave in like a tumble-down hut, then "there is nothing 
 in magic; then has the course of the stars nothing to do with the 
 destiny of the earth and its inhabitants; then are Ihe planets nothing 
 but lamps, then is the sun only a shining oven, then are the old gods 
 will-o'-the-wisps, emanations from the marsh of human cogitation. 
 Such is the great Serapis~yet wherefore be wrathful aaainst him? 
 Here there is no it or but. 'This diptychum here! 1 shall Bhow you 
 our conclusion. There!— here! It flickers so before my eyes. 1 
 can arrange it no more — and, let it go so: what was decided up on 
 hisrh, who could alter it down here? Let me sleep now. jLarly to- 
 morrow morning I'll explain it all to you. Poor child! How we 
 have tormented you with learning! How diligent you always were! 
 And now, to what end? 1 ask, to what end? "The great abyss swal- 
 lows that up with the rest." 
 
 " Let it be so," interposed Gorgo. " Provided that nothing dear 
 to me on earth precedes me to destruction." 
 
 " And the same blow strikes the enemy, too!" cried Damia, her 
 eye flashing with e.xultation. " Only whither are we going? whither? 
 The soul is of divine substance, and therefore never to be destroyed. 
 Shu returns— am 1 right or wrong?— she returns to her original 
 source, for like attracts like; and so the irodlike resolves itself into 
 the essence of deity." 
 
 " 1 believe it, 1 know^ it!" responrietl Gorgo. decidedly. 
 
 " You know il, do you?" asked llic old lady. " Not so L For 
 
SERAPIS. 143 
 
 our best knowledge is but a presentiment, if not tounded upon cal- 
 culation. There is nothing so unbounded but that we may attain 
 to it by reckoning; but that, that slauds tirmer than rocks by the 
 sea, and therefore 1 believe in the conclusion that we reached upon 
 these tablets with proof and counter-proof. But the future faie ot 
 tile soul, who can reckon it? Yes. if the old order of things remain 
 standing, and what is below keeps below, and what is above main- 
 tains its position on high, then, then, indeed your learning will not 
 have been in vain; for then would your soul, fixed upon the intel- 
 lectual, the pure, the exalted, be drawn to Goii, as a kindred spirit, 
 to be united and swalloweil up in him, as the drop that has fallen 
 out of the moist cloud again ascends on high and dissolves into 
 moisture once more. Tlien would — there misht be such a thing as 
 the transmigration of souls— then would your songful heart awake to 
 find itself a young nightingale — " 
 
 Here the old liidy beciime silent; absently as it were, she looked 
 up, and after a pause of long continuance went on, with an altered 
 expression of countenance: "Then would Maria, my son Apelles' 
 widow, glide into a serpent's egg, and, as a creeping adder — Eternal 
 God!— those ravens! What do those ravens want? There they aie, 
 back again! Air, air! A. glass. 1 can not — 1 am chokmg! Away, 
 away with ihat drink t To morrow, to-day— everything sinks, sinks 
 — do you not feel it? Black — black — and now led, and now black 
 — everythins: is sinking:! Hold me! It gives way beneath my body. 
 Where is Porphyrius? Where is my son? My feet! Rub my feet! 
 Cold, cold! Water! It comes higher! Now it is at my knees! 1 am 
 falling — help! — 1 am falling!" 
 
 In fearful anguish the dying woman fought the air with her arms, 
 as in drowning, her cry for help grew lower and lower, her h^ad 
 sunk up(m her laboring chest, and soon slie breathed out her much- 
 tortured and restless spiiit upon her grandchild's bosom. 
 
 Gorgo had never seen any mortal die, nor looked upon the face of 
 the dead. She could not take in the thought that this heart, which 
 had throbbed so warmly for others and beaten with such tender love 
 toward herself, was forever stilled ; that this spirit, which, even in 
 sleep, had been in perpetual motion, was quiet at last. 
 
 The nurse had quickly come in between her and the deceased, 
 liaii closed her eyes and mouth, and done everything to save her 
 darling from the horrifying spectacle presented by her grandmother 
 :dler death. But Gorgo could not be drawn from her side, and 
 wiiile she called tor everything that might resuscitate the lifeless 
 li'uly, the annihilating power of death had come too close, and made 
 iuclf shockingly manifest. She felt the beloved body stiffening and 
 growing cold beneath her hands, but her spirit still returned to the 
 thought that all, all was over now between herself and her mother's 
 lailhful representative. 
 
 Every restorative of which she had ever heard she would see ap- 
 plied, and she forced the nurse, in spite ot her confident assertions, 
 that no human aid could avail here, to send for a physician and to 
 have the priest of Saturn brought; for powerful conjurations — that 
 she had learned from tlie deceased herself — had compelled many a 
 departed soul to return to the body which it had deserted. 
 
 When she was alone, and looked into the rigid face of the corpse, 
 
144 SERAPIS. 
 
 a deep awt came over her, and yet she mastered it sufficiently to 
 draw gratefully and mournfully to her lips the thin hand, whose 
 caresses she had so otten accepted quite as a matter of course. 
 
 How cold and luird it was! Shuddering she let it drop, and the 
 large rings upon the fingers struck rattling against the wood ot the 
 couch. 
 
 That extinguished hope, and now she knew that her motherly 
 tiiend was gone, dead, and forever silent, 
 
 A tharp, cutting pain overcame her, and at the same time a sense 
 of utter desolation— that humiliating consciousness ot impotence 
 against a brulal force that tramples down human resistance as the 
 warrior does grass and flowers upon a meadow. 
 
 Shaken by violent sobs, she threw herself on the floor beside the 
 corpse, and wepi like a passionate child, from whom some strong 
 hand has tnken what he loved. She wept from rage at her own 
 weakness freely, when she pictured to herself her own loneliness, 
 and the great grief impending over her father. 
 
 That kindly remembrance ot a past, common bliss, which mingles 
 an element ot sweetness even in the bitterest cup, stood aloof from 
 her heart in this cruel hour. Only one thought seemed to her con- 
 soling, viz., that the gult which had swallowed up this beloved one 
 would soon, soon open to receive herself and all living. 
 
 There upon the table lay the guarantee for the approaching end 
 of things, and longing for this culmination gradually obtained the 
 mastery, in her spirit, over every other feeling. 
 
 Under this influence she rose up, and ceased to weep. 
 
 As soon as her nurse should return she desired to leave the house, 
 lor here she could abide no longer; duty anil the impulses of her 
 lieart drew her away, and pointed out to her the place where she 
 should lind the last thing that she desired of life. 
 
 From nofiiend, but through herself should her lather learn what 
 had befallen them both, and she linew that he tarried in the Sera- 
 peum, the same place where to-morrow she hoped lo find Constan- 
 tine It was the duty of her lover lo open theie the door for destruc- 
 tion, and she wanted to go through it with him and at his side. 
 
 Waiting seemed long lo her, but at last, at last a noise was heard 
 on the steps. 
 
 That was her nurse's step, but she did not come alone. 
 
 Did she bring the physician and conjurer? 
 
 Now the door opened. 
 
 The steward crossed the threshold with a branching candlestick 
 in his hand, then aiipeared she tor whom she waited, and then— her 
 heart stood still— then Coustanline, and with him his mother. 
 
 Pale and speechless G 'rgo greeted her unexpected guests. 
 
 The nurse had not found the physician, whose help, at any rate, 
 would have ccome loo late; but inasnuich as the stevvKrdcss, with 
 other Christian slaves, had stolen oil and the faithful creature had 
 said lo herself that her dear child needed the comfort of some sym- 
 pathizing female friend at luind, she had gone to neighbor Clement's, 
 and asked his wife to follow her lo the deceased, and her discon- 
 solate young mistress. Constantine had come home a short time 
 previously, and had silently attended the two women. 
 
 There now stood mother and son, and while the latter looked 
 
SERAPIS. 145 
 
 without resentment into the pale face of the old lady to whom he 
 was still a debtor tor many a kindly act, and then lastened his eye 
 upon Gorgo, who stood there with looks cast down, struggling for 
 composure, Maviamue tried to administer to her friendly consola- 
 tion. 
 
 She praised eagerly whatever did not seem to her utterly sinful 
 and godless in the departed, and brought into view all those grounds 
 for comfort, with which a good Christian tries to uphold the hearts 
 of those who have lost some dear one; but this well-meant exordium 
 fell upon Gorgo's ear as if it had been addressed to her in some 
 unknown tongue, and not until Mariamne drew nearer, and, with 
 motherly kindness drew her up to kiss her, and incite her to go 
 home with her, did she feel at all touched, recognizing that she 
 meant well, and had ever been good to her. 
 
 But the (Christian matron's last words had reminded her of a duty 
 that she felt to be obligatory upon her, and so, collecting her facul- 
 ties, she thanked her kindly, and begged her to assist her in re- 
 moving the corpse to the ihalamos, and then to take charge of its 
 key. 
 
 It devolved ujion herself, she said, to seek her father, because no 
 other than herself should inform him of what had happened. 
 
 Mariamne's urgent entreaty that she should swerve from this 
 resolution, and pass the night with her, she positively rejected. 
 
 Coustantiae had so far remained silent in the background. Kot 
 until Gorgo approached the corpse and gave orders for its removal 
 did he approach her and hold out to her Jus right hand, simply and 
 cordially. 
 
 She looked him full in the face, placed her hand in Ins and said 
 softly: " 1 had done you injustice, Constanline, and hurt your feel- 
 ings; 1 was really sorry, even before you left. You bear me n(» 
 grudge, 1 know, for you have felt for me in my desolation, and 
 come to me. There is nothing, nothing more between us two, is 
 there?" 
 
 " 24othing, nothing!" responded he, warmly, and in the excess of 
 his feeling he grasped her other hand, too. 
 
 It seemed now as though every drop of blood mounted to her 
 heart with a sudden rush, as though he were a part of her being that 
 had been forcibly torn away from her, and must, must be restored 
 to her, though it cost him and her fortune and life. 
 
 And she obeyed this impulse and withdrew her hands from his 
 clasp, in order to fling them about his neck and cuddle up to him 
 fondly as a sick child to its mother. 
 
 She knew not how it happened, how it was possible that it could 
 have happened, and yet happen it did, that without heeding Mari- 
 amne — who beheld with silent horror how her son's lips sought and 
 found both the brow and mouth of the fair idolatress — that she 
 wept upon his neck and felt a thousand roses blossom in her soul 
 and, at the same time, a thousand thorns lacerating her heart. 
 
 What had happened here was obliged to have happened ; it was 
 ber betrothal with the one whom she loved, and at the same time 
 her farewell to him. The destiny of her life was lulfiUed at that 
 moment. What was left for both was to perish together at the 
 
146 SERAPIS. 
 
 same time vHh all tilings living, and she looked forward to it as 
 the sleepless man does (o morning. 
 
 Mariamiie had stepped aside, foi she had the dim feeling that 
 some great event was passing before her. that something irievo- 
 cable had been enacted against which no interference woidd avail. 
 
 \Vhen Gorgo had freed lierselt then from Constantine's arms there 
 was something solemn, vmapprochahle in hei demeanor. Slie was 
 like a grave enigma to that simple woman that she knew not how 
 lo solve, but it did her good wiien Gorgo came forward and pressed 
 her lips upon her hand. Her moulh was scaled, as it were, for she 
 telt that whatever she might have said would not have been the 
 right thing, and afforded her great leliet, that she could soon show 
 herself helptul in the removal of the corpse. 
 
 Gorgo had carefully covered up the still face, and when the de- 
 ceased had been carried into the lower story and laid out upon the 
 broad nuptial couch in the thalamoa, she decorated this with flowers. 
 
 The priest of Saturn meanwhile had entered, and asserted that no 
 power in the world coidd have restored life to this inanimate bodj-. 
 Damia's unexpected end and the young girl's griet touched the true 
 man deeply, and he immediately gave consent, when Gorgo, in a 
 low tone, asked him to wait for her at the garden gate, and thence 
 conduct her to her father. 
 
 As soon as he had retired she handed over the keys of the trunks 
 and presses of the deceased, then entered the; adjoining room, where 
 CoDstanline had waited while the bier was being decorated, and 
 gave him a serious and apparently composed farewell. 
 
 He extended his arm, in order to emlirace her again, but she 
 would not sufler it, and when he implored her t > follow him she 
 answered sadly, " ]S(o, dear one, 1 may uot. I have other duties 
 now." 
 
 Then he exclaimed ursrenily: " Mine call me too, but you have 
 given yourself to me. \ov\ are my own. Tou no longer belong to 
 yourself alone, and 1, 1 desire, 1 "demand, that you grant my first 
 request. Go with my mother, or stay here with the departed. 
 M'herever your father may be is not, can not be the riffht i)lace for 
 my betrotlied bride. 1 "suspect wiiere he tariies. Be warned, 
 Gorgo. The fate of the old gods is sealed. We are the stronger, 
 and so soon as to-morrow —by yourself, by all that I hold dearest 
 and most sacred— to-morrow Serapis falls." 
 
 " I know it!" answered she, firmly. " You have orders to lay 
 hands on the godV" 
 
 " I have, and shall obey them." 
 
 She nodded at him approvingly, and said resignedly and without 
 resentment: " You are performing your duty and can not do otlier- 
 wise! But however it may eventuate, we are one. Conslantine, 
 one. Nothing can part us. Whatever happens we liclong to each 
 other, and stand together, I by ^ou, you by me. even to the end." 
 
 So saying she held out her")i"and to him and gave him one long 
 look that was lull ol love. Tlien she once more tlirew herself 
 upon his mother's bosom, and kissed her fervently. 
 
 " Come, come with me, my child!" implored Maiiamne, but she 
 extricated herself from her embrace and cried out. " Go, if you love 
 me. and leave me alone!" 
 
SERAPIS. 147 
 
 Ro saying she returned to the thalmnos, where rested the departed, 
 and before me otheis followed her had opened one of the doors con- 
 cealed by the tapestry on the wall, and naade haste until she was out 
 in the open air. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 TiTE night was dark and sultry. Dark masses of cloud were 
 heaped together in the north, and above Lake Mceris, upon whose 
 ashen-gray surface crisp liUle waves were dashing up foam, hovered 
 a whitisli mist like vapor over a hot bath. 
 
 The moon looked pale and blindly, as it were, out of a brownish 
 circle of tog; a spectral gloom overshadowed the roads and the 
 heat-radiatiug houses of the city. 
 
 In the west, over the desert, a smutty brimstone yellow tinged the 
 black clouds in the sky, and at intervals blinding flashes of distant 
 liglitniug came from the north, quivering through the hot and 
 murky atmosphere. 
 
 A warm wind from the south-west drove clear sand into the 
 streets, across the lake. These fine molecules of dust stung and 
 burned the cheeks of the passers-by wlio walked further, with 
 downcast eyes and closed lips. 
 
 Nrituie, like man, seemed to have been overtaken by some deep 
 trouble. The air that came in tittul gusts, the coming and going 
 of forked lightning, the queer form and coloring of those portentous 
 clouas, all gave to this night an unwonted sickly and distressing 
 aspect. It Wrts as thougli heavens, water, air, and earth were 
 making ready for something of unheard-of awffulness. 
 
 Gorgo had thrown on a mantle, and covered her head with a 
 veil, a"nd followed the priest of Saturn with glowing brow and 
 stroniily beating beart. 
 
 When she b^jard steps behind her she started, for it might be 
 Constantine following her; when a fresh gust of wind peppered her 
 face with prickly particles of sand, or the lightnina- gave to the 
 clouds a more lurid lint, her blood stopped flowing, lor did not 
 these signs betoken the first act of the final tragedy so soon to be 
 enacted? 
 
 She was familiar with the road that she had traversed, but its 
 length seemed to have become tenfold on this occasion. 
 
 At last, however, she reached its limit. 
 
 At one of the entrances to her father's lumber-yard she gave the 
 watchword and sign designated. 
 
 Soon she had left behind her the beams and piles of wood which 
 hid the entrance to the canal; a slave whom she knew, preceded her 
 with a torch, and now began the walk through the underground 
 passage. 
 
 It was hot and mustj' enough in here, and bats, which had been 
 scared up by the torch of the guide, flew around flapping their soft, 
 phantom-like wings, and filling her with feai and disgust; never- 
 tlieless she felt less timid here than in the open air, and as she pur- 
 sued her way, meditating upon the venerated temple of Serapis, and 
 pictured to herself its wondrous beauty and solemnly exalted grand- 
 
148 SERAPIS. 
 
 eur. there came over lier a longing to get to that supremely glorious 
 goal that banished all anxieiy. 
 
 To submit to death there, to perish there with her beloved, did 
 not seem hard to her; yes, it was a proud privilege to be permitted 
 to await one's last hour in the most illustrious abode ever erected 
 by mortal man in honor ot a god. 
 
 Let destiny be accomplished here; the highest boon that she had 
 asked of life had been granted her, and where was there on eaith a 
 prouder monument than the sanctuary of the ruler ot the world, 
 whose supremacy tbe other gods too tremblingly acknowledged? 
 She had known tlie sacreii halls ot that gigantic building from a 
 child up, and she fancied them crowded with thousands ot noble 
 souls whom the same lofty sentiment linked together as brothers in 
 this momentous hour. 
 
 In spirit she heard the pious song streaming from the oversowing 
 hearts of inspired youths and men, who were ready to lose lite tor 
 the god of their fathers; she breathed the smoke of burnt-offerings 
 and the odor of incense; she saw choirs of young men led b}' priests, 
 in grave, measured movements, encircling garlanded altars with 
 the mazes of a graceful, solemn dance. 
 
 Among the oTd men who liad crowded around Olympius gravely 
 discussing the latest phenomena and the inner kernel ot the my.ster- 
 ies among the adepts,* who from the observations of thp Berapeum 
 followed in rapt suspense the significant course of the stars, the 
 drifting of the clouds, and the flight of birds, she would surely find 
 her father too; and the fresh wound in her heart began to bleed 
 anew as she represented to herself how deeply he must be shocked 
 and pained by the news ot which she was the bearer. 
 
 However, she would surely find him in grave and solemn mood, 
 filled with pain at the destined destruction of the world, but prepared 
 to meet the heaviest calamity with dignified composure, and so she 
 should bring her tidings of woe to a well-prepared heart. 
 
 She was not afraid of encountering the throng of men assembled 
 in the Serapeum. Iler father and Olympius were there to piotect 
 her, and in Dame Herse too she should find a reserve; but even with- 
 out these three sl.e durst mingle unsolicitously with those thousands, 
 on this serious ni.nht, perhaps the last of all nights, because she was 
 convinced that every sincere friend ot the gods was expecting his 
 own end and the falling of the sky, with only less apprehension 
 perhaps than herself, a feeble girl. 
 
 Such was the tenor of her thoughts until, with her guide, she ar- 
 rived at a strong gale. 
 
 After this had also been opened to her, they trod the subterranean 
 vaults which were dedicated to the solemnization of the mysteries of 
 the god, and wherein adepts have to submit to severe tests before 
 they were deemed worthy of sharing the higher duties ot the 
 esoterics. 
 
 The halls, chambers and passages now trod by her for the first 
 time were dimly lighted by lamps" and torches, and what met her 
 view during this progress tilled her with pious awe, and worked 
 mightily upon the power of her imagination. 
 
 ♦ Those who had been iuitiated into the mysteries. 
 
SERAPIS. 149 
 
 All that she saw, every room, column and statue, deviated from 
 the ordmary and natural in its forms, relations and appurtenances. 
 
 To a pyramidal chamber, whose triangular inclined sides met 
 together in a point, followed a hall shaped iil^e a many-sided prism. 
 
 A road flanked by spbinxes led tlnough a long, wide passage, 
 and here Bhe had to cling to her escort, for close behind the mixed 
 shapes to her riuht yawned a dismal abyss. On another side rush- 
 ing water dashed over her and plunged with wild commotion into 
 the depths beinw. Immediately afterward she came to a spacious 
 giotto'hewn out of the living rock, and out of this grinned at her a 
 row of gilded crocodile heads. Here the smell of smoke grown cold 
 and pungent resin oppressed lier breathing, and the path led her 
 over gridirons and marvelously shaped ovens. From the walls 
 looked at her hideously painted figures of condemned criminals, 
 Tar>tuius, Ixion and Sisyphus rolling liis stone. At her side were 
 caverns with iron doors, as closely locked as though behind them 
 were secured countless treasures or unapproachable secrets, and her 
 dress grazed many a statue and tool that was closely shrouded in 
 tapestry or curtaining. 
 
 If she looked sideways she saw horrible monstrosities and mys- 
 terious figures and embiems; it she looked up, her eyes met here the 
 human and bestial figures of the zodiac, that, in Egyptian style, sail 
 in ships and boats over the back of a woman stretched out at full 
 length; there pictures from the master hand of some Greek artist; 
 the jPleiades, the twin knights Castor and Pollux, with stars upon 
 their foreheads, and Berenice's hair studded with stars. 
 
 Confusing, harrowing was the impression made upon the pilgrim 
 by this mysteiious net her world. 
 
 What she saw in passing by was only dimly lighted, hardly dis- 
 tinguishable, and yet wore the spell of enchantment; what myster- 
 ies and w^onders did not what she saw inclose? 
 
 It seemed to her as though that eml of earthly existence for which 
 she waited had begun, and she were already living as a guest in 
 gloomy Iladcs. 
 
 Gradually the path ascended, and finally a winding staircase led 
 her up to the main body of the temple. Sometimes she had been 
 met by men, but a solemn repose had prevailed throughout those 
 subterranean regions. The deep stillness had only become more 
 perceptible through the hollow sound of approaching and retreating 
 footsteps. 
 
 It must be so, phe had expected to find it so here. This repose 
 reminded her of nature's deep silence before the bursting forth of a 
 raging tempest. 
 
 While Gorgo was going upstairs she removed the covering from 
 her head, arranged the folds of her robe, and straightened herself up 
 into that dignified priestly bearing assumed by noble virgins, who 
 drew near to the altar of deity. But the higher she came the louder 
 grew the babel of sounds that greeted her ears. Flute-playing ami 
 the beating of drums were specially noticeable. She thought that 
 the religious circular dance had begun. 
 
 Now she stood in one ot thcapailnientsat thesideot iha hypostyle. 
 Her attendant opened a tall door adorned with gilded bronze and 
 silver, while Gorgo, stepping solemnly with high head and down- 
 
150 SERAPIS. 
 
 cast eyes, followed him into the consecrated precincts, where, in 
 unclouded f^lory, sat culhroued the sacred image of the god. 
 
 Without pause she traversed the colonnade at the side ot the 
 hypoHtyle, and descended the two steps which led into the bioad body 
 ot the greatest and noblest of all the rooms in the temple. 
 
 The wild alarm which she had heard through the door when it 
 opened, had surprised and bewildered her, and now when in blank 
 amazement she opened her eyes and looked about her, such a horror 
 and diead seized upon her as the tiaveler in the dark experiences, 
 when, naving believed himself treading a flowery mead, he discovers 
 that the mire of a bottomless marsh is dragging him below. 
 
 Reeling, she supported herself on the s"tatue of the nearest god, 
 and while she asked herself whether she were awake or dreaming, 
 she looked around, shuddered, and listened moie intently. 
 
 What was going on there she did not want to see and hear; it 
 struck her as repulsive, abominable and loathsome; but it was too 
 patent to be overlooked and ignored, and it was as real as it was 
 common and disgusting. 
 
 For a long time eye and ear were spell-bound and hei limbs para- 
 lyzed, but soon deeply wounded, she clapped her hands before her 
 face, and wounded maidenly ir.odesly, cruel disenchantment and 
 holy indignation at the wanton desecratitm of what she deemed hal- 
 lowed and irreproachable, rushed in torrents over her deeply ag- 
 grieved soul, and she could but weep — weep bitterly, as she had 
 never done before since she was born. 
 
 bobbing, she threw her veil over her face, and muffled herself up 
 as though she were guarding herself against cold and frost. 
 
 Nobody paid any heed to her. Her'escort had forsaken her, too, 
 in order to look for her father. She must await his return, and 
 sought for a hidmg-place. Then she caught sight of a woman in 
 mourning garb, who cowered low beneath the slatne of the goddess 
 of justice. She recognized the widow of Asclepiodor, and'witha 
 sigh of relief she drew nearer to her and said, weeping: " Let me 
 sit here; we are both mourners." 
 
 " Yes, yes!" responded the other, and without knowing what 
 had befallen Gorgo, and only controlled by the mysterious fascina- 
 tion of meeting with one who, like ourselves, is tastinir of bitter 
 grief, she drew her up close to herself, and at her side found once 
 more ability to shed soothing tears. 
 
 So sat those mourners silently together, and before them tossed 
 and raved unbridled pleasure. 
 
 A knot of men and women waltzed with loud uproar through the 
 halls of the temple. 
 
 Without time or measure the flutes shrieked, the cymbals clashed, 
 and drum-skina groaned over the mad revelers. 
 
 Intoxicated patit^iphoi'i had opened the chambers where were stored 
 thetpriests* roi)es and teiuple utensils, and drimken men had dragged 
 out the panther skins, such as the priests wore when otTlciating. 
 brass carriages, wooden bieis, upon whicii the images ot the cods 
 were borne in solemn processions, and other things. 
 
 In the hall at the side of those pillngcd rooius, numerous students 
 and young girls had stayed behind iiiul wire there piepaiing some 
 
SERA PIS. 151 
 
 (bing grand, in which service much time and grape juice were ex- 
 pended. 
 
 ilost of the plunderers had immediately repaired to the hypostyle 
 with their booty, and there treated to wonderful things. 
 
 A. fat vineyard-dresser must needs represent Father Dionysus, 
 and was enthroned upon a four-wheeled sacrificing cart of heavy 
 beaten brass, with gay gai lands of Howers twined around his naked 
 limbs. A pitcher of alabaster stood between his monstrous legs, and 
 his greasy paunch shook from laughter, while a hallooing crowd 
 drew liim through the sacred hall in wild career. 
 
 In mad excitement, unmanned by the frenzy of intoxication, the 
 drunkards had cast off their clothes, and these lay around in a 
 motley heap between the pillars and in red pools of wine. Around 
 the flushed faces of the girls floated disheveled hair, in which hung 
 confusedly withering leaves and brilliant flowers. Youths, men, 
 old people, leaped as if possessed, with Inyrsian staves and the rude 
 symbols of the fruit-dispensing god at their side. 
 
 A few priests and philosophers did their best to quell the tumult 
 and exhort to moderation, but a drunken flute-player planted him- 
 self in front of them, threw back his head and shoulders, blowing 
 so lustily into the double flute which now pointed skyward that it 
 were enough to rouse the dead, and his female companion hurled 
 her tambourine upon the impertinent establisher of peace. Clatter- 
 ing, it bounded against the shaft of a column, fell upon the bald 
 head of an augur, ami by him was cast further. Other timbrels 
 followed the first, and soon one tambourine after the other clove the 
 air, aimed at the heads of the drunken. 
 
 Everybody wanted to snatch one of the timbrels, so they jumped 
 after them, wrestled for them, and with the calf -skin beat upon their 
 neighbors' heads. 
 
 Intoxicated girls had swung themselves into the idol-chariots, 
 and screeched aloud excited by mingled pain and pleasure, while 
 reeling bearers dragged them in a rapid course through the hall. In 
 so doing one of the wenches lost her balance, when she was picked 
 up amid wild shrieks of laughter and forced to resume her place 
 upon her perilous throne. 
 
 The car holding the vine-dresser also came to grief by means, to 
 be sure, of the body of some stupidly drunken creature; but nobody 
 set the vehicle to rights, and while the unhappy man was struggling 
 in vain with lamentable howls to extricate himself from the box in 
 which he was held fast, thirty young men who had harnessed 
 themselves to the car dragged it further and past Gorgo, who be- 
 held with speechless indignation how the hard brass of the creaking 
 axle-trees crunched remorselessly right through the exquisite mosaic 
 figure, the center-piece of the hall pavement. At last his own 
 weight gave freedom to the unconscious Bacchanal, and now his mad 
 train called him back to life by turning him over and dipping his 
 wild-looking, l:)leeding head into a tremendous \ase of mixed 
 liquors. Around the rescued Dionysus then twirled hundreds in 
 the mazes of a licentious dance; and because every tambourine was 
 broken, and the fluie players out of breath, ilrunken fellows beat 
 tunes on the pillars with their Thyrsian staves, and three students, 
 
152 SERAPIS. 
 
 like mad, blew brazen trumpets which they had found among the 
 temple ulensils. 
 
 But much opposition was raised to this uproar. 
 
 Next approached a pious band that, with veiled heads in the 
 iieighborhood ot the image of Serapis, mimicked the conjurations 
 of a magician, and howled piteously; then these gave place to ora- 
 tors, who had somehow managed to attract some auditors; and lastly 
 play-actois and singers, who had collected in the vestibule in order 
 to act a play of satyrs, which, indeed, was so wanton and senseless 
 that the trumpet-blowers had but little the advantage of them. 
 
 As opposition helped the acting none, the players rushed from the 
 vestibule into the hypostyleand tried to silence the restorers of peace 
 by dint of force. 
 
 A Inerce battle ensued; but the combatants were soon parted, and 
 now the actors and their opponents fell into each other's arms, and 
 an Homeric poet, who bad put together an elegy for this evening 
 on " The Gods Oppressed by the liosts of Superstition," made up 
 ot verses extracted from the " Iliad " and the " Odyssey," seized 
 tins favorable opportunity and began reading aloud to drown the 
 noise, wbeu the very successful fruit of the work before alluded to 
 in the store-room, outbidding everything else, entered the basilica. 
 
 A storm ot admiration and delight was raised. Even the most 
 drunken articulated a word of rapture, and in this there was indeed 
 ottered to their intoxicated gaze a beautiful and gorgeously colored 
 picture. 
 
 Upon the lofty pedestal, destined to bear a smaller image of Sera- 
 pis, and the holy symbols of the god at great festivals; stood Gly- 
 cera, Ihe most beautiful courtesan in the city, and she was rolled in 
 triumph throufrh the haU by jubilant young men. 
 
 Bhe lay in a great wooden trough, meant to represent a shell, 
 upon the summit ot the scattolding, and on its lower steps sat every- 
 where graceful girls, who made pretty but improper gestures, some- 
 times directed to her, sometimes to her male attendants, svho tried 
 to pick up the flowers that they were scattering, and fought over 
 them with lover like ardor. In the beautiful courtesan every one 
 had recognized Aphrodite, born of the foam, and with one mouth, 
 as it were, she was proclaimed and honored as queen of the world. 
 
 Speedily men rushed up to pour out libations to her and encircle 
 her. hand in hand, with loud singing, and in the giddy whirl of a 
 wildly exciting dance. 
 
 '■ To Serapis with her! Let us marry her to the god!" shrieked a 
 drunken student. 
 
 " Heavenly Love is his bride!" 
 
 " To Serapis!" shrieked others echoing him. " Glycera solemnizes 
 her marriage wiiii the god this very night!" 
 
 And now moved tlie motley besotted crowd toward the image 
 behind the mammoth curtain, and with them the towering pedestal 
 surmounted by that beautiful, laughing woman. 
 
 The liglitning and rolling ot distant thunder had hitherto re- 
 mained unheeded, but now a blinding light flashed through the 
 hall, and at tlie same lime came a latlline, crashing, and growling 
 clap ot thiiudei that shook the desecrated aboiieot deity. Sulphur- 
 ous vapor penetrated through Ihe open windows under the roof , and 
 
SERAPIS. 153 
 
 a second flash of lightning quickly followed the first, and this 
 seemed to have rent the heavens asunder, for there followed it a shat- 
 tering, deafenino- roar, so hideous and appalling a din, as (hough 
 the Icey-stoue to the flrinament had given way and the heavens were 
 to be precipitated upon the earth, Alexandria and the Serapeum. 
 
 With uncontrollable impatience tlie monstrous power of an Alri- 
 can tempest discharged itself; and ihe roisterers hushed suddenly, 
 the sroblet fell untasted from the guzzler's trembling lips; glowing 
 cheeks turned pale, the dancers broke their chain, and uplifted their 
 hands in prayer, while lips, awhile ago bawling and blaspheming, 
 opened now in cries for mercy. The nymphs in the retinue ot 
 Venus sprung tremblingly from their perch, and the foam-born 
 Aphrodite in the shell sought to free herself from the veils and 
 garlands of flowers which had been wrapped about her, and not 
 being able to reach the lower step of the scaffolding, uttered a loud 
 shriek ot distress. Other voices mingled with hers, bowling, curs- 
 ing, and bewailing their fate; for through the uncurtained windows 
 dashad and splashed chilling moisture from the rain-spout into ihe 
 halls and upon the heated limbs of the drunken revelers. 
 
 The storm howled through the vast circumference of the Sera- 
 peum, thunder and lightning raved on in unbroken power, and like 
 anis whose hill has been disturbed, the horrified, half sobered con- 
 vivialists huddled together uneasily, almost beside themselves. 
 
 And into the midst of this confusion rushed Orpheus, the sou of 
 Karnis, who had, up to this time, kept watch upon the root, and 
 shrieked: " The world goes under; the heavens have opened! My 
 father, oh, where is my father?" 
 
 And everybody believed him, pulled off their wreaths, tore their 
 hair, and gave themselves up to wild despair. 
 
 "Whimpering and wailing, raging and loss of composure ran from 
 one to another; and without hope ot a morrow, or even another 
 hour, each one thought only of himself, his own clothes, and how 
 he could hide his naked, shivering body, and save it from perishing 
 through cold. 
 
 To that wild scuffling after clothes that had been thrown aside, 
 were added loud groans, piteous wails of despair, the harrowing 
 cries of women and children, and the sobs of those unhappy ones 
 who had been smitten by panic. 
 
 It was a pitiable scene, calling forth pity and abhorrence. Gorgo 
 beheld it, and ground her teelh for shame and indignation, wishing 
 that an end might be put to herself and the world as a riddance. 
 
 These lunatics, these wretches, these cowardly wights, these ani- 
 mals in the shape of men and women deserved nothing better than 
 destruction; but was it to be imagined that God would reduce to 
 nothingness His wisely, beautifully ordered universe for the sake of 
 this abominable rabble? 
 
 The thunder and lightning roared and flashed about her after- 
 ward as before; but she believed no more in the end of things, be- 
 lieved no more in the greatness, majesty, and purity ot the god 
 there bebind that curtain. 
 
 With glowintr cheeks, red for shame, she felt as if it were a dis- 
 grace lo be reckoned amonu his adherents; and as the bowlings of 
 the despairing multitude pierced her ear in ever louder and piteous 
 
154 SERA PIS. 
 
 sounds, Conslantine's earnest, tearless form ptesonled ituelt before 
 bei soul in all its beauty and power. 
 
 She was his, wholly and forever his, and in future, pillowed upon 
 his breast, she would share with him everything . his love, his 
 house, his dignity, and also bis God. 
 
 CHAPTER XXll. 
 
 Through those heavy clouds that emptied themselves upon the 
 Serapeum glimmered the faint lijrht of coming dawn; but this ihe 
 agonized heathen did not note. No leader, no eslablisher of peace, 
 no comforter restored to them courage and composure, forOlympius 
 and his guests, the leaders of intellectual lite in Alexander's city, 
 also the protectors ot this sanctuary, kept those beneath them long 
 in waiting. 
 
 The lightning, which iiad struck the brass cupola, and darting 
 off had followed a flag-slalf, had terrified the tree-thinkers and 
 philosophers, too, and the symposium was brought to a conclusion 
 only a trifle less undignified "than the orgies in the temple halls. 
 
 Among the friends"of the high-priest only a tew, to be sure, had 
 been carried out ot themselves so far as to show their deadly fear 
 undisguisedly; but instead ot it, at the table ot Olympius no sooner 
 did the crisis seem imminent, than declaiming and actinff became 
 more pronounced, and Gorgo's respect foi her tellow-btlievers would 
 nut have been specially increased if she could have hear(t the re- 
 nowned grammarian and biograph3^-writer Helladius with trem- 
 bling knees and bloodless lips, recitinir some verses from the chained 
 Prometheus while the thunder rolled; and how the grammarian 
 Ammonius, who had written a famous bcok on " Expressions Like 
 and Unlike," fore open his robe and l)ared his breast as a target 
 for the lightning, with a glance aiound, challenging the admiration 
 of those present. Alas! his herniculemeanor was observed only by 
 a tew, tor most of them, includinir the new Platonic philosopher, 
 historiographer, and firrce toe to the Christians, Eunapius, had cov- 
 ered their heads with their mantles and awaited the final catastroplie 
 in dull resignation. Some had fallen on their knees to pi ay with 
 uplifted hands or to murmur adjurations; and a poet who had won 
 crowns by his didactic poem, " Man, the Lord and Master of tiie 
 Gods," had fallen down in a tainting tit, his laurel decorating the 
 dish of oysters beside his couch. 
 
 Olympius had left his seat as symposiarch, and leaned with coni- 
 l)osiire against the door-post, awaiting death with manly courage. 
 
 Father Karnis, too, who had applied too freely to the wine-bottle, 
 but had been restored to sobriety upon the outbreak of the sti>rm, 
 jumped up and flurried out past the high-priest. He knew that his 
 wife and sou were not far oft, and wished to die in their proximity. 
 
 Porphyrins, as well as his neighbor, the great surgeon Apuleius, 
 belonged to the number of those who had covered their heads with 
 their mantles. More peacefully than many another could he face 
 coming ruin; for, like a provident man and fai -seeing mercUaut, he 
 liad cared for everything. 
 
 Did the world remain standing desjiiie ilie victory of the Chris- 
 
SERAPIS. 155 
 
 tians, and did that law stand in torce against him which declared 
 the last will of an apostate invalid, then a p/incely estate, that neither 
 church nor state could touch, was held in leadiness for his family 
 by a ricli and reliable friend. On the contrary, should heaven and 
 earth indeed be destroyed, he was secured against a tedious and 
 torluring death, by an unfailing medicine that he carried about his 
 person. 
 
 While thunder and lightning were venting their fury, he, with 
 Olympius' other guests, had spent many long and anxious mo- 
 ments; suddenly in rushed Karnis' son, Orpheus, shouting just as 
 passionately and despairingly as he had done a few minutes before 
 in the great hall of the temple: " Tlie end! the end! The world is 
 coming to pieces! Fire is falling from heaven! Flames! Fire is 
 consuming the earth aheady. Here, with my own eyes, have 1 seen 
 it! 1 come from the roof. Father! Where is my father?" 
 
 At this outcry, Olympius' guests started up wilh fresh horror, 
 and the mathematician Pappus shrieked: "The burning of the 
 world has begun! Consuming fire bursts from tlie skies!" 
 
 "Lost, lost!" wailed Eunapius; but the merchant Porphyrins 
 quickly thrust his hand withiu tne folds of his purple festal robe, 
 and drew forth a small crystal vi.il, and with pale but composed 
 features stepped up to the high-priest, aod laying his hand upon 
 tlie arm of him to wiiom he had been all liis life-time devoted with 
 tenderness and admiration, he gazed fondly upon him, and whis- 
 pered in his ear: " Farewell, friend! How often have we argued 
 over Cato and his end: you against, 1 for him. Now 1 imitate him. 
 See, here is enough for us both!" 
 
 So saying, he quickly put the vial to his mouih, and a poition of 
 its contents had wet his lips before Olympius had recovered from 
 his surprise, and caught him in his arms. 
 
 The eflect of the deadly poison showed itself instantaneously. 
 But hardly had the merchant lost consciousness before the physician 
 Apuleius Imrried to his assistance. 
 
 This excellent man had allowed himself to partake of the uni- 
 versal dismay, and was awaiting tlie end of all things in silent resig- 
 nation. No sooner, however, had the call for medical aid resound- 
 ed through the hall, than he dad freed his head from its covering 
 and hurried to the merchant's side in order to counteract the effect 
 of the poison with as much promptness and acumen as he uad ever 
 sliown in his best days by the sick-bed or in the lecture-room. 
 
 When tlie soul seems given over to despair, then is a sense of 
 duty the last and only principle that can nerve and once more bring 
 it into action, and it shows what a high instinctive regard men 
 really have for this life against which they aie accustomed to 
 inveigh so loudly, that they will exert themselves as earnestly and 
 tenderly for its preservation just before it terminates as when it 
 was in the flush of youth and strength. 
 
 The merchant's desperate deed had been accomplished close be- 
 fore the eyes of Orpheus, and this new horror had cast the former 
 one so far into the shade, tlisii he volunteered aid lo the surgeon, and 
 Jielped to place the unconscious form upon tlie nearest sofa. Then, 
 he again hurried to the door, continuing his si arch after his parents. 
 
 But Olympius, who in the face of his friend's weakness felt 
 
156 SERAPIS. 
 
 anew how much dependerl in these hours upon his manly presence 
 ot mind, detained him, and with sternness denuiuded a clear state- 
 meut of wIkU had actually occurred upon the loof. 
 
 The youu.i; singer obeyed, and wliat he hail to communicate 
 sounded tlisquieting enough. A ball ot fire had fallen upon the 
 cupola with frightful resonance, and had combined with a strebm 
 of flames which seemed to issue from the ground. Then had the 
 sky again opened, with blinding glare, and at the same lime 
 Orpheus' own eyes had beheld a huge monster, maybe a moving 
 fountain, that slowly and with terrific din had approached tlie rear 
 of the sanctuary. Not rain, but streams— jier feet torrents of water 
 had rushed down ui)on him and his comrades. 
 
 " Neptune," cried Orpheus, "leads on the floods of the ocean 
 against the temple, and the neighing of his four chariot horses I 
 have heard — it could not have been any illusion — 1 have heard with 
 my own ears!" 
 
 " The neighing of Neptune's horses! The emperor's horses you 
 mean!" 
 
 And now with the agility of a young man he flew to the window, 
 pulled bacli the curtain, and looked into the open air toward the 
 east. 
 
 The storm had passed away as suddenly as it had appeared. Day 
 was dawning. 
 
 Over Aurora's crimson robe like a full overskirt hung heavy 
 folds ot giay and black cloud, while the edges were bordered by 
 bands of glittering gold. Far lo the north gleamed occasionally pale 
 lightning^ and the thumier of the retreating storm was hardly audi- 
 ble any longer; but the studs, the neighing of which had so terrified 
 Orpheus and the guards, had come nearer to the sanctuary, and 
 stopped close beneath the southern wall ot the temple, where there 
 were neither doors nor any other mode of access. 
 
 What did the Imperialists want at this strong, inaccessible place? 
 Yet there was -no time now for long reflections, and like a warning 
 now thundered through the temple that gcng which was meant to 
 collect all the defenders ot the Serapeum toirether. 
 .But Olympius needed no more encouragemeni. 
 
 With the fiery passion of a fanatical partisan leader, of the 
 champion lor a great, sorely imperiled cause, he turned to bis guests 
 and Oade them remember their manhood, and with him resist even 
 unto death. 
 
 In this brief, pithy call to arms his voice sounded hoarse from 
 excitement, and it had powerful effect, for the very reason that the 
 celebrated orator had forborne to influence the highly cultured audi- 
 ence around him by modulation of the voice, and studied choice of 
 diction. 
 
 Infected with the warmth of the enthusiastic old man, they 
 collected all their energies and hurried after him to the apartment 
 ^\here arms stood r-eady for them. 
 
 A coat of mail on the l)rfast ami a sword to brandish in his hand 
 made a soldier out of each of these sages and powerfully re-enforced 
 the courage ot all. Among these heroes but little was said about 
 " the great word." The time for grave action was upon them. 
 
 Olympius had re(iuesled Ihe surgeon Apuleius to have the 
 
SERAPIS. 157 
 
 poisoned merchant conveyed to his own private chamber by the 
 hypostyle, seeiug that so far no antidote had taken effect. Temple- 
 ser Pants bore Porphyrins down a side staircase, while the high-priest 
 led his panoplied friends quickly and silently down the main stairs 
 into the great halls. 
 
 There the company armed for the fray encountered surprises and 
 disillusions more appalling than they could have imagined. Olym- 
 pms himself felt utterly at a loss in the beginning; for out of his 
 genial companions had been made in one night poltroons and muti- 
 neers, wliile within the precincts of this holy temple were all the 
 tokens of a lost batile. 
 
 Implements broken and cast aside, battered instruments, furniture 
 torn and wetted through and through, flowers and garlunds 
 withered ami stripped oi their leaves, were lying around on all 
 sides. Red wine like pools of human gore swam over the cracked 
 beauties of the mosaic floor; here and there, at the foot of some 
 column, lay the bodyoi a man— whether dead or in a fit of drunken 
 stupor, who slioulil say?— and the disagreeable exhalations from a 
 hundred smoking lamp- wicks offended the senses, for in this con- 
 fusion they might burn or go out as it happened. 
 
 And what a lamentable spectacle was that presented by men and 
 women who had been up all night, and were now sobered and 
 miserable! 
 
 The wretched sensation of having insulted God and challenged 
 his wrath was stirring in every soul. A speedy end would have 
 been welcome to many a one, and a richly endowed disciple of 
 Ilelladius had actually adventured that plunge from being into not 
 being, which, according to his conviction; began beyond the grave, 
 by striking his head asraiust the hard marble, and there he lay witli 
 fractured skull at the foot of a column. 
 
 With confused brain, aching head, and agonized heart, had these 
 unfortunates come to curse the present, and wnoever of them dared 
 to think of the future, it seemed like a horrible abyss to which the 
 flying hours were driving them imperceptibly and yet with irresisti- 
 ble force. 
 
 And time moved on and on; everybody saw. everybody felt it: 
 the night had vanished and day l)egan to dawn; the tempest had re- 
 treated, but instead of the implacable power of nature now advanced 
 a new horror in the shape of the no less inexorable power of the 
 emperor's military. 
 
 In a struggle between man and the gods tliere was only one pos- 
 sible issue f"o"r him, viz., defeat. In the contest between man and 
 man, it was allowable, although the issue might not be victorious, 
 to think of escape. 
 
 The one armed veteran Meranon, during those orgies within the 
 temple, had kept watch on the roof and had made preparations to 
 hold tlie assaulting enemy at bay, until the storm ' e out and 
 attacked Ins men with thunder and lightning. Then hal the majority 
 of the garrison on the root taken refuge in the lower rooms of the 
 temple. Only the old captain had stuck to his post despite hurri- 
 cane anil water-spout. 
 
 With the one arm left to him, he had clung to a statue on the 
 parapet of the roof, in order not to be swept and washed away. 
 
158 SERA PIS. 
 
 From thence he had issued orders, but the roaring of the hurricane 
 had drowned his voice, and of the tew left behind none had heard 
 his words of coniniaud. 
 
 The neighing of horses, and the walliing mountain which had put 
 Orpheus lo flight, had not escaped his observation either. "What 
 aproaciied was" Roman enginery tor siege-laying, and faithful as 
 WHB the veteran to the cause, the leadership of wliich he had iimler- 
 taken, yet an emotion resembling joy thrilled his warlike old soul 
 when he recognized that true and genuine soldiers still followed the 
 Imperial ensigns, under which he" had shed his heart's blood more 
 than once. 
 
 His old brothers in arms had not forgotten how to defy the ele- 
 ments, and their general had been well advised when he diiected the 
 finst attack to be made on apparently the strongest part of the tem- 
 ple. 
 
 It was plain that he had here to do with a real warrior, and with 
 a grim curse and uiocking smile he thought upon the heterogene- 
 ous rabble over which he had command. 
 
 Yesterday he had sought to moderate Olympius' vaulting hopes, 
 and said to him: "Not by enthusiasm, but the art ot war one 
 beats his enemy!" 
 
 Now he had to cope with an adversary who was his match; and 
 how he was to be supported by the death-despising enthusiasm ot 
 youth, which he had undertaken to lead, and from which, in secret, 
 he still expected great things, he was only to learn too soon. 
 
 The point was to mal^e impassable thai breach in the rear wall of 
 the sanctuary until the arrival ot the expected Libyan succors, and 
 also to defend the front ot the sanctuary from the roof. For every 
 one wlio could lift a stone and brandish a sword there was use in 
 this struirgle. and when he counted over the number of his men he 
 thought that the sanctuary might hold out successfully for a long 
 while. But his reckoning was false; for he did not know what a 
 power of attraction the races exercised over bis " inspired youth," 
 and what an alteration had come over their mood. 
 
 As soon as the storm had lulled suflicieutly for him to withdraw 
 his hand from its support, he called together the remnant left be- 
 hind, and had the brass gong beaten whicli was to summon the com- 
 batants to tlie roof; audits nietallic clangor rang through the gloom 
 with mighty vibrations. A deaf man must have heard it in the 
 deepest cellar ot the sanctuaty, and nevertheless minute succeeded 
 minute, and three quarters of an hour had elapsed and not one mim 
 had made his appearance on the roof. 
 
 The impatience of tlie old luf.n changed to astonishment, astonish- 
 ment to sullen rage. The messengers whom he had dispatched 
 returned no more, and the protect iiig root of the Romans pressed 
 up nearer and nearer to the .soulliern Vail of the temple, clTectuallv 
 shielding their pioneers from the .scattering shower of stones, witli 
 wliich at his command they should have been molested by his men. 
 
 The enemy purposed to find a secure resting-place for their bat- 
 leriug-machine, whose brazen ram'shead was to lay bare a breach 
 in the temple wall. Every second ot delay on the side of the 
 defenders abetted powerfully the aim ot the foe, A hundred, 
 
SERAPIg. 159 
 
 iwo hundred hands more on the roof, and his undertaking would 
 have become tutile! 
 
 Disappointment and a bitter feeling of his own impotence forced 
 tears of rage into the old man's eyes, and when at last a messenger 
 came back and reported that the men and women below were going 
 on like distracted people, and tiiat, to a niixn, all refused to mount 
 to the roof, he uttered a fierce oath, and dashed down-stairs. 
 
 Furiously he rushed among the wailing throng, and when he saw 
 with his own eyes wiiat this fatal night had made of his warriors, 
 lie thundered against thtm imperiously, in a few clear words repre- 
 sented to them what was at slake, ordered witliout being obeytd, 
 yelled at tlie most retraetoiy, pushed individuals angrily before him, 
 and when he noticed that many, with females at their sides, were 
 fleeing toward the gate leading into the secret passge, he opposed 
 himself to their progress, sword in hand, and threatened to hew 
 down every one who should attempt to make his escape. 
 
 During this proceeding Olynipius with his followers had entered 
 the great hall, and when at the place where was the loudest up- 
 loar, he saw the general struggling with mutinous fugitives, who 
 sousht to wrest his sword from him, he hurried to his aid, with his 
 guests, and supported by them, held back the hundreds forcing 
 tlieir way to the door of exit. 
 
 It grieved the old man to use the arms which he and his had 
 grasped in pious exaltation of spirit against his own refractory fel- 
 lows, but it had to be done, and while his men, to whom Karuis 
 and Orpheus had also joined themselves with their lances and 
 shields, held back the pushing mob from the subterranean rooms, 
 he took counsel with the old men skilled in war, and they quickly 
 came to the determination to drive the women forth from the 
 temple, and to divide the men into two companies, ot which one 
 should be sent up to the roof, and the other to the rear wall of the 
 temple, where the Roman battering-ram must soon begin to play. 
 
 Olympius courageously threw himself between his followers and 
 tlie men and wonien bent upon flight, exhorting them with power- 
 ful thundering appeals to remember their duty. 
 
 Quietly- and respectfully they listened to him, but when he an- 
 nounced the resolve to exclude women from the temple these latter 
 raised a loud outcry. Many clung to their lovers, while others 
 instigated the men to flee in detiance of or<lers. 
 
 Several women, the beautiful Glycera al their head, who had a 
 few hours ago, as Aphrodite, smiled upon her w-orshipers in full 
 assurance of victory, now did their best to escape from this scene 
 of horror, and set forth with all speed to seek admittance to the 
 underground passMue. They remembered that they did not lack 
 for admirers in the city either. 
 
 But they did not get far, for a temple-servant rushed to meet 
 them with advice to turn back, for the Imperialists had discovered 
 the entrance to the canal, and held possession of the lumber-yard. 
 
 Now they followed the watchman with loud lamentations, and 
 hardly had they set fool upon the great hall aaam before a new 
 shock was given them, for the brazen battering-ram with its iron 
 mouth bounded against the rear wall of the temple for the first time. 
 
 The Imperialists held possession of the secret passage, ana had 
 
160 SERAPIS. 
 
 begun the assault. That was much, but all was not yet lost, and 
 in this momentous hour Olympius and Memnon proved what they 
 
 IV CIO. 
 
 Tlie tirst ordered Ihe great portcullis to be lowcied and the bridges 
 to l)e brolu-n oil liiat spunued the abyss in those sul)terranean 
 regions destined for the ceiebralion ot the mysteries, and this task 
 could be perloimed in good time, tor the troops liad not yet vent- 
 ured to penetrate into lliat mysterious passage, wliere snares and 
 ambushes might well be expected, but Memnon liurried to the spot, 
 where the ram was making its second thrust, and shouted to the 
 multitude: " Whoever is noi a wretched coward let him tollow!" 
 
 Then the triends ot Olympius trooped about him, Karnis and 
 Orpheus of course being ot the number, and he ordered everything 
 that was movable in Ihe sacred halls to be heaped up as a wall ot 
 protection before the impeiiled spot, and to spare neither the not:)lest 
 and holiest images, nor the marble and brass columns and altars of 
 sacrifice. 
 
 If a breach should be efftcted from behind this wall it was meant 
 to stay the further advance ot the enemy by launching arrows and 
 darts, of which they had plenty. 
 
 The old man was pleased that at all events the way ot deserters 
 was blocked up, and as soon as he saw statues torn down from their 
 pedestals, altars dragged from consecrated spots, where they had 
 stood for halt a century, benches and alabaster vases overturned 
 together, and the stone wall of defense thus growing, he drew off a 
 small detachment tor work upon the roof. 
 
 There was no more running away, and many a one, who, a short 
 while before, had hoped to flee, now climbed to the top of the temple 
 with quaking knees, because he fancied himself safer from tlie 
 enemy there than at the breach. 
 
 Olympius shared out weapons, went encouragingly from one to 
 the otlier, and in so doing came upon Gorj^o, who still tarried with 
 the widow of Asclepiodor beneath the statue of justice. 
 
 He informed lier that her father haa been taken sick, and had her 
 directed to his private room that she might aid the physician in 
 taking care of him. 
 
 The mourning matron was not to be induced to forsake her place. 
 She longed for the end, and knew that it could not be far oft. ^Vith 
 ear intent she listened to the blows of the biillering-ram. Each one 
 seemed to her a thrust at tbe joints which held the universe to- 
 gether. One more, and then another, when surely the rotten walls 
 wou'd iiive way, and the same ffulf which had swallowed up her 
 son, anil long years ago her husband, would open to receive her 
 and her sorrow. Shivering, she drew her mantle over her face in 
 order to hide from the sunshine, which bfgan to stream through the 
 windows. The light pained her. She had hoped that there would 
 be no more day. 
 
 The women, and with them a few dastards, had withdrawn to the 
 lotunda, and soon ribald words and peals ot laughter made the 
 place to lesound. 
 
 From the roof, meanwhile, blocks of stone and statues were being 
 hurled at the assailants. 
 
 It vexed tliose who toiled in the lower balls to see others idle, so 
 
SEKAPIS. IGl 
 
 lliat the refractory, too, were compelled to bestir themselves, and 
 the wall destined to defend the inner wall of the temple grew apace. 
 No wall before had ever been constructed of nobler materials, 
 each one was a choice work of itrt, had been regardeil as sacred tor 
 a hundred j^ears, or in beautiful script preserved the record of 
 worthy deeds. This wall should protect the highest of the gods, 
 and Karnis, with his son and wife, was among Uie defenders who 
 speedily mounted it. 
 
 CHAPTER XXin. 
 
 GoRGO sat at the head of the couch where lay her apparently 
 lifeless father. She looked lovingly upon his pale, waxen feature-s, 
 and watched for the exhalations of breath, which stirred his uosirlls, 
 now slightly, then painfully and convulsively. 
 
 His cV:)ld, moist right liand was clasped in hers, and site stroked 
 it, and whenever the lashes over his closed eyes quivered would 
 press it to her lips with child-like tenderness. 
 
 Olympius' chamber h^y at the side of the hypostyle, in the rear of 
 the lofty colonnade, to the right, and obliquely oppo.site to the great 
 veiled statue of Serapis. 
 
 The noise made in building the wall of defense, and the crash of 
 the blows from the battering-ram were in close proximity to this 
 apartment, and whenever the ram's head butted against the wall 
 the patient started, and an expression of keen pain flitted across his 
 countenance. 
 
 Truly was Gorgo grieved to behold her lather's suffering, truly 
 she told herself the sanctuary must soon fall into the hands of the 
 Christians, but she had a grateful sense of security and privac}' 
 here in her friend s half-darkened, comfortable room, apart from 
 those wretches on whom she thought with horror and aversion. 
 
 Her l)()dy was, indeed, greatly exhaualed bj^ her sleepless night, 
 but the deep exercise of mind t'hiough which she had i)assed were 
 still actively at work within, so that her spirit could not have found 
 repose though she had been resting upon the soft couch in her 
 own quiet chamber at home. Restlessly her thoughts worked on, 
 and here she found time to think over her own experiences in these 
 last hours, and what had befallen her grandmother and falher. 
 
 So far she had exchano:ed only a few words with the surgeon, 
 who was devoting him.self unweariedl} to the restoralion of the sick 
 man, and had assured her that he hoped sotm to restore him to con- 
 
 Now she gave him a questioning glance, and said gravely, and 
 sadly: " \ou spoke of antidotes, Apuleius. My father wanted lo 
 evade ruin and so sought to take his own lite. This is so, is it 
 not?" 
 
 The physician measured he* with a scrutinizing glance, and after 
 he had assented to her quesiion. and conununieated lo her the cir- 
 cumstances nndei which the fatal deetl was done, he continued 
 moodily, in a subdued voice: 
 
 "1 he terrible storm deprived him of composure, as it did me, 
 yes, all of us, and yet we have only witnessed the prelude to the 
 great tragedy, wheiein shall be enacted the overthrow of the world 
 6 
 
1G2 SERA PIS. 
 
 and mankind. It draws near; we hear Its approach. There the 
 sloncs are crashing! The brass battering-ram of the Christiana is 
 opening a way for itself through." 
 
 Tlie last words of the physician were portentous, and had in 
 tiiom the ring of despair, accompanied as they were by the fall of 
 heavy stones, that this time had been dislodged Irora the joints of 
 the wall bv tlie battering-ram. His prophetic speech seemed on the 
 point of iulfillmerit. 
 
 Gorgo turned pale: yet what frightened her was not the doctor's 
 prediction, but the trembling of the walls about her. 
 
 Bui the Serapeum had been founded for eternity, and altliouiili 
 the ram might batier down one wall it did not bring the building to 
 totter, mucii less fall. 
 
 Louder and louder now arose the uproar of the battle on the out- 
 side, and overtaken by a fresh anxiety the physician planted him 
 self at the door in the attitude of a listener. 
 
 Gorgo observed tliat his hands trembled. He, the man, was 
 afraid, while she felt no other solicitude save about her suHering 
 father. The broach brought Constantine into the temple, and 
 where he commanded she was safe. In the destruction of the 
 world she believed no longer. 
 
 When the physician turned around again and noted how quietly 
 and composedly she wiped the perspiration from the sick man's 
 brow, he said in hollow tones, " What avails it for the ostrich to 
 hide her eyes? They are wrestling there for the decision. Let us 
 make ready for extremities. It they daie to lay audacious hands 
 upon that god— and dare it they will — then all is lost both to con- 
 queror and conquered." 
 
 Hereupon Gorgo shook her head, and exclaimed, with eager con- 
 fidence: " No, no, Apuleius; for. if Serapis is the one whom we 
 take him to be, why does he suffer his enemies to annihilate his 
 image and his sanctuary? Why, then, does he not infuse coinage 
 into ihc hearts of his faithful ones at this trying hour? I have seen 
 the boys and women who herded here to do battle for him. 
 Cowards are they and bad women; and it the master is like his 
 servant, then will lie be served right if he does fal-1, and every 
 lament over him were a crmie. " 
 
 "Speaks Porphyrins' daughter thusi" retorted the physician, 
 with cutting reproach. 
 
 '• Yes, Apuleius, yes! Thus must 1 speak after what 1 liave 
 lived through, seen, and experienced during tne past niglit. 
 fcjhametul, vile, horrid has it been; yes, the mere thought ot- being 
 CDunled among those belonging to such a deirenerate .set is enounii 
 to infmiate me. Whoever names me in the same breath insults me! 
 A god served as tins one is shall not be my god; and you. you who 
 have learned to think, you wise scholars, how can you "oelieve that 
 tlie (yhrisiian's God, after having conquered and paialyzed yours, 
 will suffer i^erapis to anniuilate his world, and the creatures with 
 whom fie has inliabiled it?" 
 
 Ilerc! the i)hvsiciai) started up and asked her sternly and harshly. 
 
 " Do you belong to the (Mirislians?" 
 
 Gorgo (lid not answer him at once, and only blushed deeply Bui 
 Apuleius would not be pacilied, antl again asked: 
 
SKUA PIS. 163 
 
 " Art! you, indeed, then a Christian?" 
 
 Then she ioolced him tiili in the face, and firmly answered: 
 
 " No, but I would Hive to beeonu; one!" 
 
 Tlie physician shrugj^ed liis shoulders, ana turned away; but 
 Gorco drew a deep breath ot relief, and il seemed to her as if this 
 ansAti' had lifted a heavy burden from lier soul. She hersell haidly 
 knew how that bold enfranchising speech liad passed her lips, but 
 she felt thai it had been the correct answer to the physiciau s quis- 
 liou. 
 
 Henceforth there was no further conversation between the two, 
 and il, was a relief to her to be allowed to preserve silence; for I hat 
 sp ech had unlocked to her a new world ot thoughts and feelings. 
 
 Henceforth her beloved was no longer an adversaiy, and wlien 
 the noise ot the battle at the breach touched her ear she duist tiiink 
 joyfully of him and his victorious arms. 
 
 Slie felt that his cause was the purer, nobler, worthier, and she 
 rejoiced in that love of which he had said that it should support 
 :uid protect their future common life like a strong tower and a safe 
 and friendly covert. 
 
 Cou) paled with that love, all that siic used to deem the indispen- 
 sable atlornment of life appeared to her vain and jejune, and as she 
 looked upon her father's face, and pictured to herself how he had 
 lived and how much he had suflered, she referred to him the 
 words ot Paid, that Constantine had addressed to her upon his le- 
 t urn home, and her heart overflowed with love for the unhappy 
 man. 
 
 The tieep seams of suffering about the mouth and eyes of her 
 father, she well knew how to account for; lor Porphyrins had 
 made no secret ot the pain felt by him every time that he saw him- 
 self forced lo ci.uless a faith that in his heart he abjured. 
 
 This great untruth, this acting ot a double part, this attempt to go 
 in two directions, had poisoned e.vistence for this veraciously dis- 
 posed man, and Gorgo knew for whose sake, and through what 
 motives he had undergone this misery, this martyrdom o'^f spirit. 
 He lay stretched there as a warning for her, and his suffering lace 
 admonished her lo make a whole-liearted offering of heiself lo the 
 cause that she was about to espouse. She would proft ss Christian- 
 ity out of love, yes! For at this hour she saw in the faith which 
 was soon to be hers, and which Constantine had often so enthusias- 
 tically descril)ed, one thinsr above all, viz., eternal love. 
 
 So peaceful, so well equipped for everything good and lovely, 
 she had never before felt, and yet without the battle grew hmder 
 and louder, the imperial trumpet already mingling in the battle-cry 
 of the heathen. Nearer and nearer to her drew the oncoming tide 
 of conflict. 
 
 'Ihe batteiing-rain had already made a wide opening in the icar 
 wall ot the temple, into which the heavy-armed soldiers of the 
 twenty-second leuion were pressing, holding their shields before 
 them: but many a veteran had paid for his boldness with his lite, 
 for a shower of spears and arrows had rained upon them from the 
 liastily reared bulwark. But their great shields had caught many 
 a missile; many an arrow, too, had bounded back harmlessly from 
 brass helmets and sleel coats of mail, antl those who were spared 
 
104 SERA PIS. 
 
 pressed forward; and over the liodios of the fallen a conlinually 
 reneweci stream ot assuilauts found llieir way into the temple 
 
 Well i)rotecled by complele suits of armor, veteran soldiers ap- 
 proached the bulwark on their knees, i\hile others sent SDcais and 
 arrows aj^uinst the garrisun over their heads. A few wounded heathens 
 sunk smitten to the floor, and the gushinj: streams of their led gore 
 worked powerfully upon their comrades. Rag« stirred in the breast ot 
 even the most liniid, fear vanished fjetore desire to avenge tiie mur- 
 der of tiieir comrades, so tliat out of cowards grew brave men, 
 while scholars and artists ihirsted tor blood. Peaceful bookworms 
 were suddenly aglow with pa'riotism, and smitten tvitii the grand 
 passion of slaughtwing and exterminating the foe, stood shoulder 
 to shoulder, and recklessly staked their lives. 
 
 I'iarnis, tiiat old, genial friend of the Muses, stood at the very 
 top of the bulwark, with his .'•on at his side, roaring out detached 
 sentences from a war-sonc of Tyrttcus, as lie sent lance after lanee 
 against the enemy. At the same tune sweat ran in streams from 
 his bald forehead,' and his eje gleamed with warlike ardor. 
 
 At his side Orplieus shot" arrow iitter arrow from a tremendous 
 bow. The abundant tresses ot his Apollo-like head were thittering 
 loosely, while his clieeks glowed as with living tire. 
 
 When lie struck one of the Romans tlie old man shouted to him: 
 " litavo, my sou!" and then woulii draw iiimselt up and liuri his 
 lance, witli a line of he.\amet( r, or anapest verse upon his lips. 
 
 Hall hidden by an altar, which happened to lie on top ot the hur- 
 riedly built wall ot defense. Dame Herse cowered and handed the 
 men the weapons ot which they stood in need. Her gown was torn 
 and bloody, her gray hair had freed itself from the crescent and 
 ribbons which had held it up, and fell wildly over her face. The 
 careful housewife was transformed into a Meiiara, and slirieked to 
 tlie men: " Kill the dogs! Stand firm! Spare not one Christian!" 
 
 Rut the men stood in no need of these exhortations. The hot en- 
 thusiasm which animated them had coupled itself to a fierce thirst 
 alter battle and redoubled their strength, 
 
 Orpheus' arrow had just transfixed a bold centurion who had 
 already set foot upon the lowest step, pieunng his neck above his 
 coat ot mail, when Ivarnis let fall the liince tliaf he held uplifted 
 ready to hurl, and Bunk williout a word. A Roman dart had struck 
 him, and there he lay, with the spear in his breast, like a cliff in the 
 surf, upon which a little tree has taken root hesifle a red spring, 
 bubbling with warm water. 
 
 Orpheus saw the out-gush ot his father's blood, and threvv himself 
 on his knees at his side; but tlie old man pointed to the bow which 
 his son had Hung aside, and murmured to him eagerly: "Leave 
 me! What matters it about meV P'or the Gods! Do you hear? 
 F<)r the G-^ds we are lighting liei-e! On! Aim well! On!" 
 
 But the son would not be i-e|)ulsed by tiie dying man, and as lie saw 
 liow deeply the spear liad jienelraled into the breast ot the old man, 
 hr. sobbed aloud and threvv up his arms with a passionate cry ot 
 griet. 
 
 .lust then an arrow struck him. too. in the shoulder, another 
 pierced his neck, and he fell ga.spinir foi breath. 
 
 Karuis saw him lall, and witli a mighty effort sought to rise and 
 
SERAPIS. 165 
 
 jio to his as-sistance, but it was all in vain, and tlieu bo clincbed his 
 Bst iu iinpoteut rage, and pronounced Elcclra's curse upou ber ene- 
 mies as loud as be could, half speaking, bait singing: 
 
 " What I ask, do not spurn 1 
 From these murderers turn 
 Into woe, their dehght! 
 Into darkness then- sight 1" 
 
 But tbose beavy-arnied soldiers did not hear or heed the old man's 
 curse, as tbey rushed impetuously forward through the breach in the 
 wall. Sense failed bim to return for the first time wbcn Herse (who 
 liad first lifted up ber sou and leaned bim against a pedestal) came 
 up to bim, tying bis bandkercbief around (be shaft of the lance, ami 
 endeavoring to stancb the blood tbat was flowing in a ceaseless 
 stream, and moistening bis brow witb wine. 
 
 When be felt ber warm tears upon bis cheeks, and looked into 
 tbose kind eyes overflowmg witb pity and keen agony of woe, bis 
 iieart melted within bim. Tbe best hours whicli they bad enjoyed 
 together during their long married lite passed iu review before liim, 
 and be looked tenderly and gratefully up at her, feetily stretcbing 
 out bis band to ber. The matron arew it tearfully to ber lips, but 
 lie smiled and kept nodding at ber, while be soltly repeated to ber 
 over and over again Lucian's: " Be comforted, soon wilt tbou go 
 too!" 
 
 •' Yes, yes, yes! Soon sball 1 go too. Witbout i'ou, witboul you 
 both, and witbout the gods, wbat should 1 do here?" 
 
 So saying, she turned to ber son, who, witn full consciousness, 
 had followed ever}' movement of bis parents and now tried to speak. 
 But tbe arrow in bis throat deprived bim of breath, and to talk 
 pained him so tbat be could stammer fortb nothing like " tatber " 
 and "mother." Yet bis poor efiorts at utterance expressed vol- 
 umes of love and gratitude, Karnis and llerse understanding all 
 Ibiit he would so gladly bave said. 
 
 Tears closed tbe matron's lips, so neitber of the three could speak, 
 t)ut tbeir beads were close togetber, and tbey exchanged mute signs 
 of love. Thus amid tbe alarm of trumpet-calls and commingling 
 of blood, a few peaceful moments flew by; but Herse's bandker- 
 cbief grew redder and redder from ber husband's blood, and tbe old 
 man's e}'es began slowly to revolve, as though tbey would once 
 more take in a complete picture of this woild, m which he had ever 
 sought after whatever adorns life. Suddenly, however, they stood 
 still, and fastened themselves upon tbe bead of an Apollo that bad 
 been cast upon tbe heap thrown up for defense, and tbe longer the 
 singer's glance remained fixed upon tbe beautiful features of the 
 god tbe brighter and clearer was the splendor in which it shone. 
 
 Once more he found strength to raise his feeble band, and it 
 pointed to the sunny head of that immortal youth: but hu lips mur- 
 mured sottly: " He, he — of all that was beautiful in life — Orpheus, 
 Herse — we have to thank bim for tbe best. Our end is also to be 
 bis. Tbose, those peoiile there, are conquering Ihee and us! They 
 dnam of a Paradise beyond deuth; but where thou reignest, Oh 
 Phrebus, there is bliss already upon earth. They boast "of loving 
 death and baling lite, and now that tliey conqu(!r, music has re- 
 ceived ber death-blow too, and, if it goes on, tbey will destroy 
 
166 SERAPIS. 
 
 iKixiity, aixl put out the sun. Dark, dark, dismal, silent, and hate- 
 tul, now is llic s^Hiul. l)iit;iit eiirtli. 'J'by kingdom, oh, Phoebus, 
 how sunny aiul tull of delight!" 
 
 Here brealh faihd him; yet soon he rallied, and cried out wiih 
 blowing eyes: " We, we need light, and the tuneful sound ot liule 
 and harp, bright flowers around careless brows, we — hold me, ITurse 
 — thou, thou— hear mo, Phoebus Apollo— Hail to thee! Thanks lo 
 thee, who hast taken much Irom me, and given me everything! 
 (Jome, oh come! Orpheus, Ilerse! Do you see him come?" ; 
 
 Quickly and imperatively he pointed willi his hand into the dis- 
 tance, and bis wide-open eye followed the direction of his guiding 
 linger. With a mighty exertion ot his last powers he raised up a 
 liltlc; but the next "instant be had already fallen back, his head 
 sunk slowly upon the breast of bis companion, and a hot stream of 
 blood gushed from bis quivering lips. 
 
 The hilarious tiiend of the Muses was a corpse, and the next 
 minute bis son, too, lost consciousness. 
 
 The temple shook and groaned with the tumult ot battle and the 
 blare of trumpets. 
 
 The conllicl liad changed to a hand-to-hand fight. The heavy- 
 armed soldiers had scaled the opposing wall, and wrestled with the 
 Ileal hen, breast to breast. 
 
 Ilerse saw them coming, pulled the spear from her husband's 
 breast, and with daring, ravmg, and yet impotent thrusts, attacked 
 the besiegers, and glowing with hatred and tierce thirst for revenge, 
 cursed them wildly as they came. 
 
 Then slie obtained her veliement desire: a lance thrust her 
 through, and lifeless she sunk down between her husband and sou. 
 Her death-struggle did not last long; but in death she still found 
 strength to stretch out her arras in order to touch with her head 
 botli of her beloved ones. 
 
 The battle raged above the fallen, the Imperialists forcinsz the 
 defenders of the bulwark into the bails' of the temple, and the plan 
 ot attack, wnich hiul been devised at the council of war in the 
 palace of the Comes, wa'; punctiliously carried out with cool cour- 
 age and iron resolution. 
 
 A few maniples jnirsued the fugitives to the great entrance, helped 
 them lo burst the doors open, and drove them across the landings 
 and stairs, and the masses of stone there heaped up, into the aims 
 of the trooiis stationed in front of the temple. These quickly girded 
 them about and clutched :it them, as the hunter falls to ujiou tiie 
 game that has been scared up for him by dogs and whippers-in. 
 
 In advance ot all liurried forward tUe abandoned women assem 
 bled in the rotunda, who received the soldiers with a cry ot delight. 
 
 Only whoever had weapons was strucii down. Berenice, the 
 widow ot Asclepiodor, bad found a sword on the ground, and 
 with it cu open her veins. Beneath tiie statue of Justice was found 
 her corpse, sne having bled lo death. 
 
 A few maniples had immediately hastened to the storming of 
 the breastworks on the roof, and bad forced its defenders either to 
 yield or rush over its t)rink. 
 
 Old .Vlumnon, wlio hail in this case fought against his emperor's 
 general, ana could count upon no mercy, swung himself over Iho 
 
SERAPIS. Ifi7 
 
 parapet of the roof into the abyss below, and others followed his 
 example; tor was not the end of all thintrs coming nearer and 
 neaier. and to the more noble a voluntary death in battle, for the 
 sake of the ijreat Serapis. seemed finer and more praiseworlhy than 
 to languish fife out in the ehams of the foe. 
 
 CIiA.PTER XXIV. 
 
 The terrible storm of the past night had tilled the whc)le city 
 with horror. They knew what threatened Serapis, what stood lie- 
 tore them if he fell, and everybody had supposed that the destruc- 
 tion ot the world was at hand. But the tempest was over, the sun's 
 ravs had scattered vapors and cloud, the sky and sea were radiiuit 
 in' limpid blue, while tree and shrub were glorious in their renewed 
 Iresimess. And yet tlie Koman had not ventured to hiy hands on 
 the patron ot the city, that highest of the gods. Serapis had per- 
 hups onlv sent thunder, liglitning, and torrents of rain as mes- 
 sengers to warn his enemies. Let them take heed ot pushing him 
 to extremity, let them abstain from the crime of touching his like- 
 ness. 
 
 jSot only thouglit the heathen thus. Christians and Jews as well 
 shuddered" in prospect of the fall of Serapis and his temple. 
 
 It was tlie pri;ie, tiie emblem of Alexander's city; to it were at- 
 laclied institutions and schools benefiting thousands, and under its 
 protection was science, of which the Alexandrian was protid; to 
 the Serapeum belonged the ever-cherished medical faculty whicli up 
 to that time enjoyed^tlie unchallenged reputation of being the fiist 
 in the world; in its observatory astronomers regulated the course of 
 the year and thence sent forth the annual calendar. An hour of 
 sleep in its halls brouglit dreams full of import, and the future re- 
 mained a sealed book it Serapis fell; for the God revealed to his 
 priests not only through the course and position of the heavenly 
 l)Odies, but also through many other channels, what must and should 
 come, and it was so delighttul from the commonplace present to 
 peer inti) the mysterious morrow and day after to-morrow. 
 
 Even Christian prophets answereil the questions of their brethren 
 in a manner that admitted ot tlie worst interpretation, and as one 
 does not willingly cut down a tree planted by one's ancestors, even 
 thotigh it shuts out light from the house, so many a baptized person 
 could not bear to think ot his native city without the Serapeum and 
 Serapis. 
 
 The temple might be closed, it might be prohibited to bring bloody 
 sacrifices to the god; but his image— the very noblest work of 
 Bryaxis by the way— to touch or destroy that was a rash momentous 
 act, a crime imperiling the city and the world. 
 
 So thought the citizens, so thought tiie soldiers too, who, by dis- 
 cipline, were forced to draw the sword against the god in whom 
 many of them believed. 
 
 JNo sooner had the report spread that early in the morning tho 
 troops had undertaken an attack upon the Serapeum, than thou- 
 sands upon thousands flocked together in fiont of it. awaiting in 
 anxious suspense the issue of the conlli(;t going on wiihm the temple. 
 
 The sky was still as cle"i and blue as upon other pleasant iinys, 
 
168 SERA PIS. 
 
 but in the north, over the sea, a light cloud was apparent, perhaps 
 the forerunner ot that teirible army of clouds which the god meant 
 to bring into the field against his toes. 
 
 The defenders of Ihe sanctuary were led forth. It had been de- 
 termined in the council ot war to e.\ercise mildness toward thc^in, 
 and (;ynegius had full power to pardon, in toto, every prisoner who 
 would swear in future to oHer no more sacrifices and to give up 
 fre(^uenting the temple. 
 
 or llie hundreds who had fallen into the hands of Ihe Romans not 
 one refused to take this oath, and they soon dispt-reed with pent-up 
 feelings of suUen rage, and many of them joined Ihe expectant mul- 
 titude in order to await here the further proceedings ot the Imper- 
 ialists and perhaps the end ot things. 
 
 Tl»e gates ot the temple were wide open, here the servants ot the 
 Serapeuui were cleaning, there many hundreds ot soldiers clearing 
 the steps and landings ot the blocks of stone and statuary with 
 which the heathen had rendered them inaccessible, and as soon as 
 this work had come to a conclusion they were seen bearing forth 
 the bodies ot the dead and wounded. Amung the latter was 
 Orpheus, the son of Karnis. 
 
 Those defenders of the sanctuary who had happily escaped and 
 joined the crowd were besieged with questions, and all confirmed the 
 statement that so far ^erapis had remained untouched. 
 
 The citizens breathed more freely, but soon tliey were seized by new 
 excitement, for %n ulci^ ot panoplied horsemen appeared, clearing 
 the track for an immeasurably long procession, whose psalm sing- 
 ing drowned the shouts and murmurings of the multitude, the rat- 
 tling of armor", and the stamping of horses' hoots. 
 
 Now it was clear where the monks had stayed. Nowhere else 
 had they ever been missing when a blow was to be struck at the 
 heathen, but until now only individual ones had shown themselves 
 before the Serapeum. 
 
 There now they appr-oached, a song of rejoicing upon their lips, 
 and a wilder, more relentless ligiit in their eyes than ever. 
 
 J3eneath a lofty canopy moved the bishop "in great stale, llis tall 
 majestic form was proudly erect, his lips firmly closed, lie looked 
 like a stern judge who steps upon the tribunal to pronounce fen- 
 tence, with all severity, in some case of shameful crime. 
 
 The multitude trembled. 
 
 The bishop and monks in the Serapeum portended the tall, death, 
 and destruction of the most exalted of all idols. The cheeks of even 
 the more courageous turned pale, many who had left wife and 
 children behind fled home^'aid in order to perisb with them, it 
 perish they niirst; others stood still, watching the imperiled temple 
 amid execjations and prayers; but tiie most part— men lurd women — 
 pushed forward to tne sanctuary, risking their lives to witness the 
 monstrous event impending there that promised lobe a spectacle of 
 spectacles. 
 
 At the toot of the grand approach Ihe Comen rode forward lo meet 
 the bisho]), leaped from his horse and greeted him reverentially. 
 The imperial legate had not appeared; he had i)referred in the lirat 
 
 * A huudred iiieii. 
 
.SERA PIS. 169 
 
 place to remain at llie Prefecture, and purposed later beincj present 
 at the races from tlieir commencement as representative of liis 
 emperor, at Ihe side of the city-prefect. Evagrius, who likewise held 
 himself aloof from the attacks upon Serapis. 
 
 Romanus nodded to Constantine Ihe leader of the cavalry after a 
 brief interview. The whole body set oil, and headed by their pre- 
 fect ascended the inclined plane, which led to the lofty front gates 
 of the Serapeum. 
 
 The Comes followed them with his staff, after him came with pale 
 faces and hesitating? foo'steps a few otTicers of rank and Chris'tiau 
 members of the City Senate, and lastly— he had suffered the others 
 to take precedence of him— the bishop with the priests and chanting 
 monks. 
 
 Heavy armed infantry closed up the procession, and after these 
 pushed on the crowd without being hindered by the troops who 
 kept their station in front of the temple, and did not lose sight of 
 them. 
 
 The great halls of the temple had been cleaned as well as was 
 possible in such hasle. 
 
 Of all those who had streamed hither to defend the god and his 
 abode, no one was left behind but the sick Porphyrius and his 
 nurses. 
 
 After silence had prevailed outside for a long while and a series 
 of torturincr moments had elapsed, coarse fists had knocked at the 
 door of that apaitment. Goigo had htu-ried forwartl to unbolt it, but 
 the physician had held her back, and now the door was forcibly- 
 burst open, lifted oft its hinges and hurled into the corridor upon 
 which it opened. 
 
 Immediately afterward soldiers had entered the room and were 
 making an inspection of the same. 
 
 The physician was pale as death, and incapable of speech had sunk 
 down upon a chair Ijesiile his patient's couch; but vvithqulet dignity 
 Gorgo had turned to the centurion in command of the intruders and 
 explained to him who she was, and that she was here to aid the 
 physician in attendance upon her ill father. Then she had requested 
 to speak with the prefect of cavalry, Constantine, or the Comes, 
 Komanus, who were acquaintances of her own and her father. 
 
 It was nothing strange that a sick man should be brought to the 
 Serapeum, and the calm, unembarrassed dignity with which Gorgo 
 spoke, as well as the high rank of tlie men to whom she appealed, 
 caused the centurion to meet her most respectfully; but he had re- 
 ceived orders to put forth from the temjile every one who was not a 
 Roman soldier, and so he desired her to wait, and speedily returned 
 with the commander of his legion, the legate Volcalius. This 
 knightly patrician, like all connoisseurs in horse-flesh, knew the 
 owner of the finest animals in Alexandria, and gave Gorgo, it is 
 true, pel mission to stay by the sick man; yet he bade them consider 
 that grave occurrences were at hand, and upon Gorgo's insisting on 
 remaining with her father he detailed a guard tor lier protection. 
 
 The soldiers had their hands full, so merely thrust asile the door 
 that they had bui-st open instead of replacing it upon its hinges; but 
 Gortro pushed back the curtain — inasmuch as this did not aifcct her 
 fatUer'8 comfort— wliicli now wastUeonly thing sepHrating her from 
 
170 SEHAPIS. 
 
 tlio corridor to the right of the liypodylc, and looked out above the 
 heads ot a double row of toot soldiers. 
 
 They had been placed at the side of the lowest step which led to 
 ihe corridors on both sides ot the hypostyle. 
 
 Already from the distance Gorgo perceived that a great multitude 
 ot men were approaching, movmg slowly forward with long inter- 
 ruptions. In tiie vestibule they made a long halt, and ere they 
 entered the basilica twenty priests took the precedence, with singu- 
 lar movements and wonderful incantations. These were exorcists, 
 w ho were to banish by pious exercises the evil spirits and demons 
 who had made their home in this favorite spot for idoJatry and ita 
 abominations. 
 
 "Ihey held crosses before them, moving tliem like weapons, with 
 whicii they were lighting foes invisible. Tliey touched with them 
 the pillars, the floor and the statuary lett standing, cast themselves 
 upon their knees, with their left hands making the sign of the cross, 
 and finally planted themselves like soldiers in three tiles before the 
 niche containing the god's efligy. pointed to it with their crosses, and 
 recited in a loud voice Ihat sounded stern, imperious, and wrathful, 
 those strong sentences and powerful formulas which were appointed 
 for exorcising the worst, vilest, most stift-necked of all the lieathen 
 demons. 
 
 A crowd of acolytes who had followed them swung censers be- 
 fore the pestiferous nest of the king of idols, and the exorcists 
 dipped i-ods in the caldron which was borne in their train and 
 sprinkled with them the idolatrous figures upon Ihe curtain and the 
 mosaics traced on the floor. 
 
 These carryings on consumed many minutes. Then— and now 
 Gorgo's heart began to beat cjuicker and quicker — then appeared 
 Constantine in a rich suit of arruor, and behind him an nlu ot a hun- 
 dred ]iicked men, bearded veterans were they, with s(;arred faces. 
 
 Instead of swords they carried axes in their hands, and behind the 
 last member of this imposing company came soldier boys with tall 
 ladders, which they leaned, by Constantine's order, against the 
 niche. 
 
 The foot-soldiers who formed a hedge on the side of the colon- 
 nade started when they caught sight of those ladders, and Gorgo 
 felt l)y tire trembling of the curtain, where stood the doctor at her 
 side, how great his agitation must be. It was as though the execu- 
 tioner's ax had been held up before a people with which their king 
 was about to be executed. 
 
 Now appeared the bishop and dignitaries, singing priests and 
 monks spread themselves out in the vast room, and made incessantly 
 the tign of the cross, the crowd streamed into the Iiypo.tiyle and 
 pressed as far forward as was allowed by the chain which the soldiers 
 had stretched across between them, thebishop and other dignitaries. 
 The people, heathen and Christian, in lively mixture, tilled also the 
 colonnades; the chain, however, kept them back from that end of 
 it into which the chamber of the sick Porphyrins oi)ene(l. and so 
 they did not obstruct Gorgo's view ot the niche, hidden by the 
 curtain. 
 
 The psalm-singing thundered through the spacious temple halh, 
 
SERAPTS. 171 
 
 drowning the ginaiis r.nd murmurs of the raving multitude, filled 
 with anguish, and prepared tor all that was horrible and sacrilegious. 
 
 Every one knew what crime was meditated liere, and yet but few 
 could believe that they would actuidly dare to perpetrate it. 
 
 ^Vherever Gorgo looked she saw pale faces distorted by passion- 
 ale and painlul excitement. 
 
 Even the priests and soldiers were infected by the same apprehen- 
 sions. Willi leelh clinched, many kept their eyes fixed stolidly ou 
 the ground, others, in order to mask their anguish of spirit, cast in- 
 iiignant and defiant glances at the murmuring people, who were 
 trying to put down tlie psahnsingin;^ with their loud threats and 
 curses, while the echo redoubled the many-tongued clamor in those 
 vast halls. 
 
 An uneasiness, an agitation without parallel pervaded this densely 
 paclved assemblage. 
 
 The heathen quivered from rage, their flncers fumbling for amulets 
 and magical charms, or shaking their fists; the Christians trembled 
 from timidity or pious expectancy, and moved their hands, makmg 
 tlie sign of the cross; or, with oulslrelched middle finger, protecting 
 themselves against the trickish attack of demons. That something 
 dreadful, overpoweringly horrib'e w.as impending, could be read 
 upon all features, gathered from every movement, and was betrayed 
 by the loudness of the oaths and the songs ot the pious. 
 
 It was with Gorgo as though she stood upon the brink of a crater, 
 earth and tiir quaking about her, as though she could see the hot 
 ashes and lava mounting upward, to return to earth and spread ruin 
 and desolation far and wide. 
 
 The commotion among the heathen grew louder and louder; single 
 stones and bits ot wood flew toward the spot where tarried the 
 bishop and dignitaries, but all at once the noise cease<l, and, as if by 
 a miracle, it grew still, quite still throughout the broad domains ot 
 the temple. 
 
 It was as though the nod of Almighty God had suddenly changed 
 the ocean, lashed into fury by the "tempest, to a calm and peaceful 
 lake Upon a nod from the bi^ho]) acolytes had drawn near the 
 niche containing the statue of Serapis, and the curtain which had 
 hitherto withdrawn him from the vulgar gaze slowly fell. 
 
 Thei-e sat Serapis on his throne, thence he looked down upon the 
 multitude in majestic dignity, unapproachable, with cool pride, as 
 thont;h he were highly exalted above the puny carryings-on of the 
 •worms of the dust at his feet, and to-day the siglit of him produced 
 the same impression as ou yesterday. 
 
 How beautiful, how marvelously noble and precious was this 
 ■work of human skill! It forced from Christians, even, a low, long- 
 drawn out exclamation of surprise, admiration and astonishment. 
 
 The heathen were silent at firsr, overpowered by pious awe and 
 blissful rapture, but then they broke forth into a loud, enthusiastic 
 ehout ot joy, and their " Hail to Serapis!" " ]jast forever, Surapis!" 
 rauiT from column to column, and floated upward into the starry 
 ■world of the stone roof. 
 
 Gorsio held her hands crossed over her breast, when she caught 
 sight of the god in his exalted beauty. Faultlessl}' and spotlessly 
 pure, wholly and entirely perfect, stood this noble work before her, 
 
172 SKUA PIS. 
 
 perhaps only a britMe idol, hut >;;o(l-likc, as fho immortal work of a 
 friend to deity, inspired by all heavenly niniiilesfalions. 
 
 Her eye, as if spell-bouud, cluug lo that form wliicli was human, 
 and }-et transcending the human as fat as eternity does time, or sun- 
 light the far-reaching light-house on Pharos; and she said to larselt 
 that it were impossible to lay hands ou that nuble, glorious statue, 
 Banctitied by the nobility of imperishable beaut}'. 
 
 She saw how tUe bishop took one step buck after the curtain had 
 fallea, and half opened his lips, perhaps in order to give exjiressioa 
 to his admiration by some exclamation like the rest; but she saw, 
 too, how he closed them only the more tightly, how fiercely his eye 
 flashed when the glad shouts of tlie heathen rang foith.'how the 
 veins upon his high forehead swelled when tliat " Hail to Serapis!" 
 was heard. Then she saw how the Comes whispered a few sonlii- 
 ing words to the church -prince, perhaps to induce him to spare 
 the idol, not as a god, but as a work of art; and liow then — her 
 lieart stood still and she had to cling last to the curtain — the 
 Comes turned away from the Inshop, shrugging his shoulders, and 
 with a movement of his band direc:ed toward the image, conveyed 
 an order to Constantiue. 
 
 He bowed with military gravity, and then gave a command to his 
 troopers, which was drowned t)y'the wild cries of the heathen, but 
 the import of which she shuddcringly guessed. 
 
 Those weather-beaten warriors were stirred. An inferior ofTicer, 
 after he had handed the vexillum* to the man next him, and taken 
 his ax from his hand, walked toward tlie statue, looked up at it, 
 and then stepping slowly and hesitatingly backward, returned to 
 his comrades, who stood loitering, looking at one another deject- 
 edly, questioningly, and defiantly. 
 
 Airain Constantine gave the word of command, and this time, in a 
 tone louder and more imperious than before, but the troopers did not 
 budge; and when the infeiioi ollicer threw down his ax otliers fol- 
 lowed his example, pointing to the god with violent gestures, and 
 addressing words to the prefect, which must have contained a re- 
 fusal to obey his order; for he stepped up closer to that mutinous 
 interior ollicer, a gray-haired veteran, laid his liand upon his shoul- 
 der, shook him violently, and threatened both him and the lest. 
 
 In those brave soldiers the habit of obedience to orders and love 
 of their valiant superiors, contended with awe of tlie god; tliis was 
 seen in their agitated countenances, by their hands uplifted in en- 
 treaty; but the'i)refect inexorably reiterated his command, and when 
 now, too, obedience was refused him, lie turned off from the 
 trooptirs, v.'ith a gesture of bitter contempt, and called to the double 
 row of foot-soldiers lining the colonnade behind which Cforgo fol- 
 lowed these proceedings, bidding them execute the oriler. 
 
 But these, too, dared to disobey. 
 
 The heatlien sent up a shout of triumph, and, with loud cheers, 
 encouraged the soldiers in their resistance. 
 
 Then once more Constantint; turned to liis own troopers, and find- 
 ing that Ihey perseveieil in their rtiliisal, with firm step he ap- 
 proached the ladders, with strong arm lifted out from the wall, 
 
 * A standard for cavalry udonn-d with u peiuiou. 
 
SERAPIS. 1 73 
 
 leaned it a.c:Minst the breast of the god, took up the ax which l:iy 
 uearest him, mouuted from one round to llie other, when all at once 
 the n(jise of tlie heathen was hushed; it grew so still in the vast hall 
 that one link upon a soldier's shirt of mail could be heard clinking 
 against the oilier, so still that one could hear his neighbor breathe, 
 and Gorgo thought Ihat she heard the pulsations of her own heart. 
 
 Man and goil stood ej'e to eye, and the man whose errand there 
 was to lay violent hands upon the god was her betrothed. 
 
 In breathless suspense she toUoned each of his movements, and 
 would have liked to hurry after him, from round to round, to catch 
 him by the arm and restrain him from the committal of such an un- 
 heard-of crime, and this, not out of any dread as to tlie ruin with 
 which he threatened herself and all the world — but only because she 
 felt that as his ax clave the ivory, so his act of violence against 
 this never-to be-restored marvel of human skill might shatter her 
 love for him. She feared not for him, because in her thoughi he 
 appeared as it were a thing set apart and invulnerable; but her 
 wtiole soul thrilled with horror of the deed that he dared to commit. 
 Her glance clung to him, as the distressed child to the neck of its 
 mother, and the thousands assembled there, in those instants of tort- 
 uring suspense, saw nothing, nothing but him. 
 
 Never did there reign more perlect silence in the heart of the 
 desert than now in this hall overflowing with passionately excited 
 luen. Of all the five senses, only one was in requisition here, viz., 
 the sight ; and yet it had nothing to fasten upon but the simple 
 object of a human hand armed with an ax. 
 
 Hearts stood still, the breath was held suspended, there was a 
 singing and roaring in a thousand ears, and a flickering of vision to 
 many who strove to see clearly but could not; and these thousands 
 resembled in spiiit the condemned criminal, with his head upon the 
 block, who hears the steps of the executioner, and upon the thresh- 
 old of death still hopes tor a reprieve. 
 
 Gorgo cotUa not find the answer to lier question; for she too must 
 see, only see. 
 
 And she saw how Constantine closed his eyes, as though he 
 dreaded to see the fulfillment of destiny brought about through his 
 hand; she saw how with his left hand he grasped the idol's flow- 
 ing beard, saw how he drew back his right arm for a powerful 
 stroke; saw, heard, felt how the ax, once and again whizzed down 
 upon the cheek of Serapis; saw and heard how beautiful.'y polished 
 ivory struck upon that stone floor m large and small well-rounded 
 bits, rebounding from elasticity, or else shivering into smaller frag- 
 ments. 
 
 She hid her face with her hand, and, weeping aloud, buried her 
 head in the curtain. Sobbing and groaning she felt and thoughi of 
 nothing than that something terrible, inconceivably terrible, had hap 
 pened. 
 
 An unparalleled noise, like reverberating thunder and the dashing 
 of surt upon the beach, was roaring around her, but she heeded it 
 not; and when at last the doctor called to her, as he drew her 
 away from the curtain, and her eyes oi)ened again, instead of that 
 sublime statue in the niche, there stood facing her a shapeless wooden 
 trunk of a body, against which leaned many ladders, and at the 
 
1T4 SKRAPIS. 
 
 foot of which, \n hcwiklcring ronfusion, lay hoaps of ivory "hav 
 iuiis, gold plates, and broUon maihle chips. 
 
 Constanliiie bad vanished; upon the rouiiils of Ihe ladder, and 
 upon the block now stood, in motley disorder, cavalrymen and 
 monks, niakinj^ a finish of the work of destnu tiou. 
 
 As soon as the prefect had struck the first blow, and the jrod had 
 received it in passive tranquiiJily, the men had rushid upon him, 
 and spared their leadei the prosecution of the work of destiuclioa 
 by him begun. 
 
 The great image in the niclie was no longer a god. 
 
 No more was There a Seiapis; the heaven of the heathen had lost 
 its king. 
 
 In speechless rage, and 3'et with agonized souls, the worshiiKMS of 
 the dethroned god" rushed' out into the open air, and sought in vain 
 lor avenging clouds in the bright sunlight of a clear, blue, radiant 
 sky. 
 
 "Theophilus, too. and the Comes had withdrawn, after the bishop 
 hiul committed to the monks further oversight of the work of de- 
 struction. 
 
 He knew his followers in sheepsliin, and was confident that in a 
 tew days not an idol, not a represenation not a sign, tliat reminded 
 of the old gods, would be left intact; as for the thousand slaves, to 
 whom the leveling with the ground of the Seraiu'um was to l)e in- 
 trusled. his impatience would intleed have to grant a twenty-fold 
 longer respite. 
 
 The C'«///(;< repaired without delay, to the hippodrome: and thither 
 preceded him hundreds, bearing with them to the assembled throng 
 the liilinirs that Alexandria had lost her Serapis. 
 
 Constantine had separated himself from the destroj'ers, and sat 
 down upon the steps leading to the colonnade. 
 
 Absorbed in dark and melancholy thoughts, his eyes were fixed 
 upon tlie ground. 
 
 rie was a solaier, and felt the responsibility of his calling. Whai 
 had boon done he was compelled to do; init noboily suspected how 
 hard U had been for him to pel form that frightful task. 
 
 He stood in awe of his own act, and yet he would have com- 
 mitted it again ou the morrow, if he had been placed in the same 
 circumstances as on to-day. ^ 
 
 Oe regretted that beautiful work of art as a lost treasure, but he 
 felt that it had been right and necessary to remove it from the world 
 At the same time he thought of Gorgo and how shfc would bear the 
 news, wlio had given herself to Iiim just ou yesterday. lie lov(d 
 her wiih his whole heart, and yet he knew that the ground upon 
 which she was averse to his faith was because she believed it to be 
 inimical to the beautiful. And was it her lover who had lifted his 
 arm like a rude savage against that noblest work of art, which, in 
 his heart, he esteemed as hiizhly as she did? 
 
 He reflected, and in so doing probed the inmost recesses of Ids 
 foul. and again he had to admit lh;it he had done no wrong, and 
 another time would have to act similarly, even at the risk of losing 
 lier. He knew nothimr nobler than (Joriro; should he dare then, to 
 lead her to Ihe altar with a stain upon Ids honor? Ilut he did not 
 hide It from himself that his deed had dug a det'i) chasm between 
 
SEUAPIS. 175 
 
 her and himself, a d in his Irouhle he was reminded of the tragedy 
 and that Destiny ot the ancients which punishes her victims as guiliy 
 willionl their havini: guilt of their own. 
 
 This day, perhaps, marlied tlie downfall of his happiness; most 
 prohably he must go forth into battle, and fight on until he met 
 death on the battle field. 
 
 Thus he sat pondering, and his looks grew more and more dark, 
 his head sinking lower and lower upon his burdened bosom. Then 
 Jie felt a light touch upon his shoulder, and when he turned around 
 there stood Gorgo behind him, and she oflered him her right hand; 
 but he sprung from his seat, seized the dear hand with passionate 
 ardor, looked sorrowfully into tlie young girl's eyes, and said, 
 liinidlj^ and with deep emotion: " 1 should love to hold it, hold it 
 • forever; but will j'ou let me, when 1 tell you wliat this right hand 
 has done?" 
 
 ' 1 know it," replied she with firmness. " And was it not hard, 
 very hard for you to do it?" 
 
 " Unspeakably, unspeakably hard!" replied he; and he drew up 
 his shoulders as though struck by new pain at the recollection ot 
 that dark fatality. 
 
 Then she gave him a long, tond look, and exclaimed: " And you 
 did it because you must nni will be what you are. That is right; L 
 teel it to be so, and shall try to imitate you, and break with tliat 
 half-heartedness which poisons existence and changes the firm path 
 of life — 1 have experienced this — into a tottering, unsafe bridge. 1 
 will be wholly, wholly yours, and henceforth iiave no other God 
 than yours, and out of love for you learn to love your God, of whom 
 you have so often spoken to me as a God of love." 
 
 "He is so," cried Constantino, "and you will understand and 
 know him, too, without any teaching, tor whoever has a heart full 
 ot love, in him our Saviour dwells. Oh, Gorgo, Gorgo! 1 have 
 siiattered that beautiful idol, but 1 will sbow yui th-di as a good 
 Christian, too, the beautiful may be cherished and esteemed both in 
 house and heart." 
 
 "i believe you!" cried she joyfully. "The earth still stands 
 firm and shakes not, in spite ot the fall of Serapis; but it really 
 seems to me as though one world had been obliterated from my soul, 
 and as though a new one had arisen that is higher, purer, and per- 
 haps even more beautiful than the other!" 
 
 He pressed her hand to his lips; but she beckoned him to follow 
 her, and led him to her father's couch, who, with wide-open eyes, 
 was leaning against the physician's breast, and greeted them with, 
 a faint smile as they entered. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 The great hippodrome was filled by many thousands of specta- 
 tors. At lirs^t, t') be sure, whole rows of seats had stood vacant, 
 while at other times the people had begun to assemble directly after 
 midnight, and long b-.-forc the beginning of the sliow every seat 
 
170 SERA PIS. 
 
 had bcon occupied. As for the upper wooden galleries of the trih- 
 ucics wlicrc; vveie lice seats and standing-room, thoy were generally 
 so crowtlcii, even e;irly in the morninj;;, that there were ofleu bat- 
 tles over thetn, not a tew. 
 
 This time many had been licpt baclv in tlie beginning, from at- 
 tendance upon tiie entertainment to which they had been so long 
 loolcing, ardently looking forward, in the first place hy the storm 
 of the past night, anxiety as to the issue of the fight over the Sera- 
 peum, and dread lest the world should actually come to an end. 
 But when the sunny sky preserved its clearness, and it was kiiowu 
 that the statue of Serapis had been respected during the whole dura- 
 tion of the tight in the sanctuary, when they saw the imperial legaie 
 Cynegius and the city prefect Evagrius enter the arena in great 
 pomp, and that they wtre followed by many senators and distin- 
 guished lords ami ladies from Christian, heathen, and Jewish cir- 
 cles, even the timid took heart, and the commencement of the rares 
 liaving been postponed tor an hour before the first team had been 
 led into the waiting-place near the stfnting-puiut, the seats were 
 ahundautly well occupied, although not so full as usual. 
 
 Tiie nundjur ot teams entered for the race was not a whit behind 
 the usual mark, for the heathen had bent their every energy tovvaid 
 showing their fellow citizens of a dilTereni faith and the envoy of 
 Theodo'sius that, in spite of all persecutions and imperial edicts, 
 they were still a power to be by no means despised. 
 
 The bishop's declaration that Christianity had ceased to be a re- 
 ligion for the poor here received striking confirmation; for a great 
 part of the seats set aside for dignitaries, senators, and rich fami- 
 lies of the city, were taken by confessors of his faith, and the men 
 and women occupying them in gorgeousness ot apparel and splen- 
 dor of jewelry yielded in nothing to their heathen compeers. 
 
 The Christian turn-outs, too, which punctually presented them- 
 selves at a place appointed for the assembling together ol the 
 chariots entered for the race, could not fail to please the connois- 
 seur; nevertheless, he could not help looking with greater confi- 
 (ieiiee upon the heathen horses, and especially their drivers. The 
 reason for this was plain, inasmuch as hitherto victory had fallen 
 lo their side in nine cases out of ten. 
 
 The four-in-hand with which Marcus, the son of Maria, appeared 
 at the halting-place outside the ring had never before appeared in 
 the hippodrome. Demetrius, the brother of the owner, hjid trained 
 for him this double pair ot noble coal-black Barbary steeds, and 
 tliey e.veited attention among the judges, who were accustomed I > 
 saunter about in theso-calle(l oj^pidum behind the carc.rcs* in order 
 to inspect the horses, predict the fortunes of the day, to impirt 
 counsel lo the charioteers, arid lay down their wagers. 
 
 Perhaps these perfect animals might equal the famous chestnut 
 stallions of the rich Iphicrates, who had already won so many laces; 
 but more than the horses must the drivers or charioteers be taken 
 into consideration, and although ]\larcus understood well en(mgh 
 how to handle the reins— this had been seen in courses made tor 
 
 * Covered sheds or carriage-hoases, in whieli the teams u.sed lo wait, befor<t 
 the signal luwl been given for the stwrt. 
 
SERAPIS. 1-77 
 
 exercise— yet he could hardly compare himself with the handsome 
 Hippias. 
 
 Tliis man, like most who entered the lists here, was a charioteer 
 by profession, it was said of him that he had driven across a 
 bridge not tul'y the width of his carriage-wheel tracK, and many 
 could testify that with horse and chariot he could trace the name of 
 his mistress in the sand of the liippodrome. 
 
 Most and highest bets were made upon liim ami the chestnuts of 
 Iphicrates. A few adventured smaller sums ui)on Marcus' Biir- 
 bary steeds, yet, when they compared the tall but sliglitly-built 
 form of the Christian, the delicate features of his face, v\ith the 
 dreamy expression of his large blue eyes and thesolt down upon his 
 tipner lip, with the Achilles-form and Mercury-head of Hippias, 
 tlie'y began to tremble for their good gold. 'Yes, if his farmer 
 brotlier, who was now standing by his chariot, or a profes ed 
 cliaiioteer had charge of those superb horses, it would Ije a pleasure 
 t(? bet upon them. "Marcus had been away upon a trip, and at men- 
 tion of this they shrugged tlieir shoulders; tor not until the last 
 few days had his steeds been introduced to the race-course. 
 
 Time pi'ogrtssed, and when the imperial envoy, who had been 
 chosen umpire, had taken his place, Demetrius wliispered to ]\lar- 
 tus a few more words of caution, and then wilhchew to the arena. 
 
 He had secured to himself a good seat on the shady side of the 
 stone 2')o<Umn, although several seats among those allotted to his 
 family stood empty; but he would not make use of one there, be- 
 cause he wished to avoid his step-mother, who liad made hei appear- 
 ance under the escort of two kinsmen of hers, senators. 
 
 He had met her neither yesterday nor the day before, for the 
 promise lie had made old Karnis, of looking lor his wife's sister's 
 child, had left him no breathing space, for he had been truly ear- 
 nest in his effort to find the maiden. 
 
 The high spirit with which she had disdained his magnificent 
 nresenis, utterly poor as she was, had iuspirect him with respect 
 for lier, and it struck him in the light of an insult to himself or 
 his brother when Gorgo tiarl called her a hussy. 
 
 He thought that he had never met a more lovely being; lie could 
 not forget her, and the thought pained him that she might sink in 
 the mire of the great city, into which she had plunged through inex- 
 perience. His brother had a prior claim to her; and with him he 
 would not contest it. While he had not grown wearv of hunting 
 her up in every place of youthful resort, even in Carnopus Street, 
 he had only piirposed to bring her into a place of safety, aa a trens- 
 nre likely to be lost to his family otherwise, and which must l)e 
 safely garnered in the first place before it could be proved who had 
 the best founded claim to its possession. 
 
 All his eflorts, however, had been in vain, and he had come to 
 the liippodrome in anything but a pleasant mood. 
 
 There, tlie bitter animosity which had met him everywhere in his 
 native city during this visit, appeared to stir with no less activity 
 than out upon the street. The solemn procession in which the 
 ciiariois used to repair tc the lace-course, this time liad not dared to 
 form; without pomp, individual equipage;? had driven into WxQop- 
 
178 SERAI'IS. 
 
 iv'ilmn, and the sfaluea of the cods which used to be placed upon 
 "the xpina* no lonuer dared be seen in the hippodrome. 
 
 All this vexed Demetrius, and ;ilter he had iouud his seat, he 
 looked peevishly uroiind upon the spectators. 
 
 In the place set aside tor his family, and furnished with cushions 
 and lion-skins, sat his stepmother. Her upper and lower rohe 
 showed the blue color of the Christian contestants, and consisted of 
 deep-blue silver brocade, in which were artistically interwoven 
 crosses, tish, and olive branches. Her black liair was smooth, and 
 lay close to her temples, and was without wreath; but n strini; ot 
 large old pearls was around her head, and from Miis hungdowQ 
 upon her forehead a circlet of blue sapphires and white opals. The 
 back of her head was veiled, and with au absent air, as if she might 
 be praying, she looked down into her lap. Here rested her hands, 
 and they clasped a ciucilix. 
 
 Such repose of manner, such a modest, downcast glance became 
 the Christian matron and widow. Everybody should see that this 
 spectator had not come here to gratify a taste for worldly pleasures, 
 but only to be present at a triumpii of her own party, and especially 
 of her sou over the idolaters. Everything about her bore witness to 
 her creed, even the pattern of her clothes and style of adornment, 
 even the silk warp of her gloves, into which were woven a cross 
 and an anchor, so that they cut one another and formed the figure 
 ot the Greek X, the initial sanding for Christ's name. 
 
 She wanted to look plain and free from the vanity of this world, 
 but what she wore must be costly, tor she was here to do honor to 
 the faith which she represented. 
 
 To wear wreaths of sweet, fresh flowers she would have put far 
 from her as a heathen abomination; but for the proceeds of that 
 string of pearls the whole arena might have been garlanded, and a 
 hundred arms filled with flowers every day the whole year round. 
 ]t seems so much easier to deceive the all-wise Creator of us all 
 than our simple neighbors. 
 
 Just as Maria sat there in stilT, modest dignity, so the painters 
 and sculptors ot the time began to depict llie Virgin ]\Iary, and the 
 farmer shivered as long as his eye rested upon his step-mother. 
 
 After such a glance it did him good to hear the merry laugh that 
 rang in his ear, coming up to Inm from the lowest step\)t ttie 
 jmUum. When he found the place whence it came, he would not 
 trust the evidence of his own senses, for there sat the wearisomely 
 sought-after Dada between an old man and younger woman, and 
 seeming to have encountered something very enjoyable. 
 
 After Demetrius had comfortably and cheerfully stretched him- 
 self, lie erot up, for just behind Dada sat his attorney, and inasmucli 
 as it seemed advisable to him not to let the game escape from liis 
 net this time, he went up to this man and asked him in a wldsj^er 
 to change seats with him, and the old man obliged him i)!easantly, 
 giving him a significant smile as he vacated the seat in his favor. 
 
 * The spine is a long i^flestal (in the circus of Caracalla it nu^isured abonk 
 two liundred and .seventy-live meters) wliicli cut tlie race course inio two iiarts, 
 beiriK orifrinallj' couslriK-ted of wood, afterward of stone. Its lieij:lit wa.s rch- 
 erally nine meters. Tlie goals were at the two euds of this— four nictcns away. 
 
SERAPIS. 179 
 
 Diida bad spent a sleepless night for the first time since she could 
 remember. Who knows whetticr storm and tempest of themselves 
 could have disturbed her slumbers; but there was enougli of a varied 
 anil moving character working upon her brain to deprive her of 
 sleep, vvilliout going further to discover its cause. 
 
 Hornet imes she had thought of her fanuiy, who were doing battle 
 for Serapis, sometimes of Agnes, and what had become of her, some- 
 times of the church and the uood old priest's sermon, sometimes of 
 the races at which she was to be present, and at the same lime the 
 image of the Christian Marcus haunted her soul with persistent 
 vividness. 
 
 As a matter of course she would take the side of his horses; but 
 ■what a strange conjunction: she, Karnis' niece, on the Christian side! 
 
 Vet stranger was it, meanwhile, that she could no longer believe 
 all those bad things, which from a child up she had been hearing 
 of the adherents of the crucified Jew. Karnis cuuld not forgive them 
 for having shut up his theater at Tauiomenium, and perhaps had 
 not rightly understood them. 
 
 Hhe had often enjoyed light pleasant hours at the festivals of the 
 old gods, and they certainly deserved to be called beautiful and 
 bright— dreadful too, when they were angry; but for a long while 
 licr soul had felt an undefinea longing that no heathen temple had 
 ever provided material for stilling. 8he knew not by what name to 
 call it, and would have found it hard to describe, but it had been 
 quieted for the first lime in that church by prayer, singing, and the 
 .sirmon of the old priest; then she had felt that with all her tolly 
 and helplessness, even though she should remain separated from her 
 foster parents, she need no longer stand alone, but could lean upon 
 and cling to a great, loving and helpful power. And she neeiled 
 such a support, for she was so easily deceived. The girl Stepha- 
 nion, a flute-phiyer who had bi.eu with them at Rome, had gotten 
 everything out of her that she wanted, and had passed ofC on lier all 
 her own misdoings. There must be something peculiarly defense- 
 less about her; for everybody undertook to manage her as it she 
 were a child, or attributed such things to her as made her perfectly 
 furious. 
 
 In the hippodrome she thought only of the living present, and felt 
 hrrself to be fortunate, for it was her portion to sit on the lowest 
 row of the stone j)0(U^im>i, and moreover on good chairs, in the 
 shade that belonged to the rich Posidonius; aiwl this was something 
 entirely diflerent from when, in Rome, she had once stood in the 
 Circus Maxiraus, on the second wooden gallery crowded and 
 squeezed, unnoticed by anybody, looking upon the races from a dis- 
 tance and down upon the heads of men and animals. 
 
 ITerse }:ad never again taken her along with her there, for on go- 
 ing out she had lieen pursued and spoken to Ijy men5'oung and old, 
 aiid her foster-mother had afterward shielded her everywhere against 
 danger, and never since allowed her to take ten steps in the city un- 
 attended. 
 
 Here it was much finer than up there in the circus; for liere she 
 was separated from the track only by a narrow canal, which was 
 bridged over just in front of her, a'nd'it was nice, too, to be noticed 
 and attract u thousand approvin<i looks to one's self. 
 
180 SERAPIS. 
 
 Even the great Cynes;iuR, the nofarj^ind legate of the emporor who 
 had iih-ea:ly singled her out on the ship, oitcu looked across ul lier. 
 A sliort tiuie before he had been borne across the track on a goldrn 
 litter b}' leu gigantic l)lack9, preceded by twelve lictors, who boi- 
 iasces wreathed in laurel, and now he sat upon a decorated throne 
 chair in the middle of the tribune over the point of departure — hut 
 she was not concerning lierselt With that bedizened old man. 
 
 She had eyes tor everything, and whatever struck her she got 
 j\I. dius and his daughter to tell her about and cxplidn. 
 
 Demetrius delight'cHi in her gay spirits, and (hen she touched the 
 singer and whispered to him: " Only see liow those people over 
 there stretch out their necks to look at us; hut my dress is prelty! 
 Where did your Posidonius get these expensive roses? On ilie 
 waist from the shoulder to the girdle alone there areover a hundicd 
 buds; 1 counted them on my way herein the litter. What, a jiilv 
 that they tade so soon! 1 should like to dry the leaves and make 
 attar of roses Dut of them." 
 
 Uvn-. the farmer ioined in the conversation, saying across her 
 shouhk'r: " There would hardly he enough for that." 
 
 This unexpected speech caused Dada to turn around, and t^he 
 blushed when she recognized the brother of Marcus; but he assured 
 her that he had long since repented ot having made so free with 
 her the day before yesterday. 
 
 Whereupon she laughed and saii il had been her fault; as lor 
 the rest s!ie might have sent him home more courteously, but she 
 had just been put into a very ill-humor, as who would not have 
 been it thej'' had been treated as Ilerse did her, hiding her shoes, 
 so that she was compelled to stay on the deck of a ship'in the mid- 
 dle ot the water. Then she made him ae(piainted with Medius, and 
 finally asked him about Marcus and his horses, and whether he 
 thought he might hope to win the victory. 
 
 Demetrius gladly listened to her talk, and when flower-girls passed 
 through the rows of seats and offered tor sale wreaths w^ith tlowers 
 and ribbons red and blue, Demetrius bought (he very prettiest olive 
 crown ot them all for her to throw to "the victor who he lioped 
 would be Marcus. 
 
 Medius and his daughter wore scarfs in the red r>olor of the 
 heathen, and like them Dada had put a similar one on her shoulder; 
 but now the maiden got Demetrius to hand her some blue ribbons, 
 and to the disgust of- Medius, put them on instead of the red, Ite- 
 cause she was on Marcus' side. 
 
 Ilereui^on the farmer laughed aloud in his gruff voice, and as- 
 sured lier that Iuh brother was zealous enough now, Initif ho should 
 see her with those ribbons on. he would do his very best to tlumk 
 her for the pari winch she had taken, She might know one tiling, 
 viz., that Marcus liad not forgotten her. 
 
 " That pleases me!'" answered she simply, adding that it was the 
 same case with her, tor she had been thinking all night about Mar- 
 cus and his horses. 
 
 Medius could not forbear reminding her hereupon that Karnis 
 and ilerse wotild take it very ill if eiie wore ('hristian colors to- 
 liav; but she replied that she was very sorry, but blue pleased her 
 belter than red. 
 
sy.uAns. 181 
 
 This answer SdUiuied so distant and curt, th:it it ;-lruck Dciiic 
 trius, who bad usually seen her cheerful iind unrestrained, that llicie 
 was but little conueniality between Dadaand her protectors— yes, lie 
 was certain that her position was not a,^Ieeable to her. 
 
 Music sounded from the towers <m eacii side «f tfhe setting-oft 
 stand; but its strains were less lively and varied than usual, for 
 flute-playing and many other heathen fashions had been discarded 
 
 At other times the hippodrome had been a phice of resort for lovers, 
 and many a new engagement had been entered into there, but to-iiay 
 the daughters of the Ijest families had not been allowed to leave 
 their private apartments, for evil was confidently predicted on ail 
 sides; the events going on in the Serapcuirr kept many heatlien 
 youtlis aloof from tiie races, and it was as though a mysterious some- 
 thing burdened the air and checked the merriment that had wont to 
 be at home here. 
 
 Passionate excitement, expectation on tlie qrii rive, favor and dis- 
 favor liad ever Ijcl-u in place here, but to-day these feelings had 
 assumed an intensified form, hatred had mingled in tliem and 
 possessed herself of the whole. 
 
 Everywhere the lieatlren were injured in their rights, insulted 
 and oppressed. They saw the Christians triumphing in a hundred 
 departments of life, and haired is a many-sided monster who rages 
 in the fiercest, most inexorable manner when he bursts forth from 
 the venomous cave of Envy. 
 
 But the Christians, too, hated the idolaters, who, with proud self- 
 exaltation, bragged of their spirrtual possession, the inheritance of a 
 glorious past. The persecuted and reviled were now the ruling and 
 powerful party; the more domineeringly, then, they met the subject 
 faction, tlie greater injustice tliey did them; and the less possible it 
 •was for tlie ojipressed heathen to avenge this, the more deeply be- 
 gan the Christians to hate those whom they despised also as super- 
 stitious idolaters. 
 
 la their care for their divine part, the soul, hitherto the Cliiistians 
 liad sHgh'ed the nurture and physical training of tlie l)ody, and so 
 in the gymnasium and hippodrome up to this time the heathen liad 
 maintained undoubted superiority. 
 
 There, in tlie ring, the Christian scorned to sppear, for to show 
 himself with naked body was for him an abomination; but in the 
 hippodrome he had begun to drive his own horses and already more 
 than once won the crown from old victors, and so the lieatlieu felt 
 themselves threatened in this domain also with the loss of ancient 
 and well-maintained claims to unapproachable superiority. This 
 was hard to bear, this could not be bioolied, and the bare thought 
 of being surpassed here roused in the heathen, as it were, violent 
 indignation and hatred. 
 
 They showed to which party they belonged by resplendent wreaths 
 of scarlet poppies, pomegranale blossoms and glowing roses, wliile 
 their red dresses were decked off with crimson ribbons. The wliile 
 and green which tliey had formerly used as an extra means of dis- 
 tinguishing one from the other were now discarded, for their whole 
 force was to be lient against one opponent. 
 
 Red sunshades protected their ladies, and red wei-e even the has- 
 
js-i SERA PIS. 
 
 K-«ts in which wore kept the provisions destined for the hours dur- 
 iiijl which tlie rsiccs would last. 
 
 On the other hand, like the Widow Maria, all the Christians were 
 decked in blue from the head-gear to the sandals that were tied 
 around tlicir •finkles with blue ribbons, and Dada's blue iavor was 
 not at all in keeping with her rose-red robe. 
 
 The slaves Irom the cook-shops who handed refreshments 
 aiound, offered for sale red and blue eggs with Iced cakes, and 
 liquors from vases of both colors. 
 
 Where a Christian happened to he seated beside a heathen, 
 shouliler was obliquely turned to shoulder, and where those of op- 
 posite faith had to face one another, it was done with scowling 
 faces. 
 
 Cs'negius, as umpire, sought to postpone the beginning of the race 
 as long as possible; for he was earnestly desirous that the Cornea 
 shoulil accomplish his task in the iSerapeum and allow him tlie dis- 
 posal of the troops, at all events before the games came to a close 
 in the hippodrome. 
 
 Time passed swiftly enough with him, for the great multitude 
 assembled here interested him specially, frequently as he had been 
 present at similar entertainmeuls at Rome and Constantinople, inas- 
 much as it differed essentially from the spectators whom he had met 
 at other circuses. More black and brown than white men had the 
 free places in the upper tiers. Upon the stone poch'/im ot the lower 
 gallery sat upon costl}' chaii'S and sofas ot their own, Ix^tween 
 Greeks and Egyiitians, thousands ot richly rlressed men and women, 
 with sharply cut Semitic features, members of the great Jewish com- 
 munity, wliose gra^'-haired chief, the alabarch, a dignified patri- 
 archal-looking individual in Greek attire, sat in his vicinity beside 
 the leaders of the Senate. 
 
 The Alexandrian was no friend to procrastination, and already 
 the impatience ot the multitude was venting itself in wild uproar 
 when Cyuegius arose, and with a white cloth, gave the signal for 
 the races to start. 
 
 From fifty the spectators had grown to sixty and eighty thou- 
 sand, while behind the airceres Irailed six and thirty harnessed 
 teams. 
 
 Four mhsua or races were contemplated. 
 
 Twelve chariots were to take part in the first three, and to the 
 fourth were to be admitted only the three victors of Iht; preceding 
 viisxns. To him who won in this decisive struggle the olive crown 
 and palm was to be adjudgetl the honors ot the day; bis parly had 
 beaten the other and might leave the hippodrome in triumph. 
 
 In the oppulnm behind the rnrcercH it was decided by lot whence 
 each chariot should lake its dei)arture, and to what nu'snus belong. 
 Marcus came in first, and wiih him to the horror of those who had 
 l)et ui)on his liorees, that matador of charioteers, Hippias. with his 
 four chestnuts. 
 
 While heathen priests poured out libations to Neptune and 
 I'ho'bus Apollo, the tutelary deities of the horse and hippodrome— 
 for l)Ioo(lv **acriii('cs were iutenlicted — presbyter and exorc-ist, in the 
 bishop's "name, iili:sscd the Christian steeds.' A few monks had fol- 
 
SERA PIS. 183 
 
 lowed them, but were ilriven away with bitter monkery by the 
 heathen as imljiilden intruders. 
 Cynegius agaiu siu;naled. 
 
 Trumpet calls rent the air, and now the twelve first teams drove 
 iKito the sheds appointed tliem, wlieie they were to remain until the 
 sisrna] was to be given tor the start. 
 
 After a few minutes, from an altar in front of the carceres, rose 
 up an automaton eagle* with outsi)read wings, and instantly the 
 teams left their sheds and placed themi?elves up behind the setting- 
 out line, which was a broad chalk-mark drawn across obliquely, in 
 order to equalize the advantage of the teams staitinglrom the outer 
 wings. 
 
 Only those spectators occupying the preferred places over the 
 carares had hitherto been in a position, if they turned around, lo 
 overlook the horses and tlieir drivers; for tlie great mass they were 
 now, tor the first time visible, and at sight of them they broke 
 forth into loud, far-echoing shouts of applause. 
 
 The charioteers had to exert all their might lo restrain their 
 champing steeds from rushing forward at sound oi this noise, but 
 it was only for a few minutes, for again liad Cynegius givt-n a sign, 
 and now fell to tlie ground a golden dolphin which had been sus- 
 pendeil beneatli a balcony, and upon which ttie looks of all the 
 charioteers were fastened; a deafening blast from the trumjiets 
 pealed forth, and forty-eight steeds dashed out upon the broad 
 track, as though leleased from restraint by a single hand. 
 
 Playing, as it were, those powerful sets of four horses lore those 
 light two-wheeled vehicles over the hard ground, which had been 
 treed from dust by the last night's rain. 
 
 Bright sunshine glittered and sparkled and was reflected with 
 brief, intermittent flashes in the splendid gilding of the bronze, and 
 the silver oi the crescent-shaped chariots, with their vichly-carved 
 decorations, wherein stoi-d the charioteers. 
 
 Five blues mingled with seven reds, as haiJ: been determined by 
 lot. 
 
 The eye delighted to follow that sinewy form whose naked foot 
 seemed to be rooted to the carriage, whose eye to have grown to 
 that normal point, the aim of its siruggles, and yet, like the archer, 
 who takes in all at once, arrow, bow, and target, his tour horses 
 were never out of mind. 
 
 A cap with fluttering ribbons kept in place his curly locks, a 
 short and seamless jacket covered his body, around which broad 
 straps were interlapped, as though for the purpose of girding up 
 his strength. 
 
 Over the hips were the reins fastened, that the hands might be 
 left free, partly to Knide these, partly to hurl the lash and use the 
 goad. In each girdle stuck a knife with which to cut loose from 
 the horses if self-preservation required this. 
 
 Soon Hippias' chariot, drawn by tlu; four chestnut stallions, took 
 the lead of all others. Two Christian teams came next, then tluee 
 reds, while behind the rest Marcus came last; but one could see 
 that he and his chariot drew up the rear as a matter of choice, not 
 necessity, 
 
 * So at Olympia. 
 
184 SERAPIS. 
 
 Tlic son of Maria swayerl far hack, his feet pressed against the 
 silver cnrriage-iim in front of his Icnees, and with all his force he 
 curbed the career of his snorting steeds. 
 
 Soon these chased past Dada and his bi other, 1)ut Marcus heeded 
 them not. lie had been blind to his own mother, too, while pro- 
 fessional charioteers bowed to ('3'negius and noddeil at llioir friends. 
 He w.is conscious that mind and e^e must be intent upon horses 
 and goal only. 
 
 The rrowd yelled, huzzaed, encouraged their favorites by loud 
 cries, whistled and liissed, when they were disappointed in their 
 expectations, and loudest of all when Marcus appeared behind the 
 others, but he either did or would not hear them. 
 
 Dada's heart leat well-nigh to bursting. She could not sit quiet, 
 jinnped up quickly, fell back U])on her sofa, and addiessed stim- 
 ulating words to Marcus, in the brief seconds when it would have 
 been possible tor him to hear them. 
 
 IVlien he had passed her head sunk, and she said, mournfully, 
 " Poor fellow! Have a heed, Demetrius, we have bought our 
 wreaths in vaui." 
 
 But the farmer shook his head and cried, " In that slender body 
 the youth has nerves of steel. How he holds in those steeds! He 
 saves up for the time of need. Seven times, seven full times, 
 maiden, must he pass the vi/xKa* and go around ibis vast amphi- 
 theatre. What he loses now, note well, he will make up for. Hip- 
 pias, too, is already reining in his chestnuts; it is his way to show 
 oil at the start! Now be approaches the ui/ssa or kamplcr — at Rome 
 they call it the meta. Tbe sharper is the curve made in turning the 
 greater is the advantage, but that thing is dangeious. Do you see? 
 The course goes from right to left, and much depends upon the 
 left-hand horse, it must almost turn upon itaelt. Aura there in 
 our chariot is quivering like a panther, and 1 trained her myself. 
 Look j'^onder! That brazen horse rearing up -they call it the 
 iaraxipjms^ — which frightens the horses, and Meggra, llie third 
 horse, is like something possessed, but she is swift as a deer. As 
 often as Marcus gets his four-in-lianil quietly i>ast the tfii(i.i'ippus 
 we have reason to breathe more freely. But now, open vour ej'cs 
 wide, now the first chaiiot drives around the goal. It is llippias! 
 Curse him! There he is around! He is a miserable braggart, but 
 fie knows his business." 
 
 One of the decisive moments for the contest had come. The 
 shouts of the crowd had lulled; it was felt that expectation liad 
 reached its climax, and Dada's eyes hung spell-bound, as it were, 
 upon tlie obelisk, and the teams tiiat rushed up to it. 
 
 A blue followed Ilillins. and, at its heels, three leds. 
 
 Tlie Christian, who bad succeeded in keeping next to the vyssa, 
 drove his team shortly and boldly around the obelisk in order to 
 gain grounil and oullly Ilijipias, but the left wbcel of his chariot 
 struck the granite base of the goal, overturning the vehicle, and the 
 liorses of the red, whose noses almost touched his chariot, cnuld not 
 be checked at the right time. They rushed over the Christian's 
 
 * The goal, called in Greek: Nyssa&xyA Kampter ; in Latin Meta. 
 + The taraxippus at Olyinpiu hail tho sliapo of ft roinul altar. 
 
SERA PIS. 185 
 
 team that were struggling frantically on tho ground, the chariof 
 which they drew likewise nverturned, and in" wild entanglenu'nt 
 eight snorting horses hiy wallowing on the ground. 
 
 The racers to the next chariot shied when they had to pass by the 
 neighing and contused mass near the 7neia, and wholly unmindful 
 of The efforts ot th(^ir unnerved diiver, shot diagonally across the 
 track to the carcercs. The follo\\ing teams had to'make around tiie 
 overturned chariots a wide circuit that consumed time and space, 
 Marcus being ot the number. 
 
 At sight ol Ihe confusion by the meia his black steeds grew al- 
 most ungovernable, itnLl now, as they rushed past the tara.fippHS, 
 as Demetrius had dreaded, the third horse, Megara, shied. 8he 
 bounded aside, thrust her l):ick under tlie shafts, hoisting up the 
 body ot the chariot, and — Dada clapped her hands before her face, 
 but the Widow Maria, turning pale, contracted her eyebrows— and 
 the young man lost his hold and tell. His feet touched the sand of 
 the arena, but his hand grasped firmly the spiral at the extreme 
 verge of the right side of the chariot. 
 
 Many a heart on the tribune stood still, many 'a cry ot malice 
 escaped the lips ot Uie heathen, but before a half minute had 
 elapsed, with strength and agility, he had swung himself upon one 
 knee, and a minute^later he stood erect in the chariot, arranging the 
 reins with lightning like rapidity, and then on he flew. 
 
 Meanwhile Hippias had far outstripped all the rest, and when he 
 came by the carccres he paused there for an instant, as though in 
 mockery, tore a full cup from a seller ot lemonade, and swallowed 
 down its contents, with adt-risive gestuie, amid the admiring shouts 
 of the crowd, and then let his chestnuts dash forward. 
 
 A wide space separated him from Marcus and the rest on the 
 track, str.'tohing far, f.ir in the distsiuce. 
 
 When the teams approached the gaol for the second time the hip- 
 poilronie sliives had long since cleared out ot their way the over- 
 turned vehicles. A Christian followed Hippias, a heathen him, but 
 Marcus had become the fourth, 
 
 lu making the third circuit of the obelisk the chariot of the red 
 preceding Marcus struck against the hard granite as it described a 
 short curve. Together with his shattered vehicle he was dragged 
 through the arena and was left lying in the sand a corpse. 
 
 On the fifth course round the ring the blue that had hitherto kept 
 nearest to Hippias suffered the same fate, yet he escaped with his 
 life, and Marcus passed second by Cynegius' stand. 
 
 Hippias had done with jibes for the present, for the space which 
 divided the black steeds from his chestnuts diminished at every 
 circuit of the ring, in spite of Marcus' detention at the iaraxtpptix, 
 and from this time forth the sympathy ot the spectators was wholly 
 centered upon himself and the son ot Maria. 
 
 Never before had any race been so passionately, so bitterly con- 
 tested on this old race course, and the throng ot spectatoi-s was car- 
 ried away by the zeal of the charioteers, which amounted to tr-enzy. 
 
 for a long while already not a creature in the upper galleries had 
 retained a seat. Men and women were on their feet, shouting and 
 cidlini! into the arena with might and main. 
 
 The bauds of music in the towers seemed to have ceased playing, 
 
18C SKiiAris. 
 
 8ft .'omplelely were (hey overpowered by tlie stentorian ontcricH of 
 these tens of thousunils of voices. Only ilie mulrons oh tlie ilmice 
 so^ls over tlie nirarcs refained their composure, nud vet wlicii tlie 
 seveulli decisive circuit Ijciran even the Widosv Maria bcnl fiirlher 
 forward, and her hands clasped n^^re tis^htly tlie cross in her lap. 
 
 As often as Marcus drew near the obejisk on the fur/.nppiix, 
 Dada, leaning far torw^ard, pressed her band to her forehead and bit 
 her lips; but when he had happily rushed by that frightful stone, 
 and horrifying image, she had thrown herself back in her seat, draw- 
 ing a deep breath of grateful relief. 
 
 She felt herself one with Marcus, anil it seemed to her as if his 
 defeat would be her death, and as though his victory would redound 
 to her honor. 
 
 At the sixth circuit Ilippias was still ever a good way in advance 
 of the Christian youth, and the distance •vvhich'parted him from tbe 
 chestnut team seemed to have become irrevocably fixed, for it would 
 not lessen by a single hand's-breadth. 
 
 The management of the charioteers had long since completely 
 changed. Instead of holding them in, Ihey uiged them forward*. 
 Leaning far forward over the chariot-railing, they goaded on tbe 
 horses iiy words and wild, hoarse yells, laying tliC whip, too, un 
 sparingly. 
 
 With smoking flanks and foaming nostrils the animals chased on 
 in glowing, desperate haste. 
 
 From the dry, uptorn and much-beaten track dust rose in clouiN. 
 
 The other teams stayed fuitlier and further behind Hiitpias and 
 ]\larcus, and, as these now approached the goal for the seventh and 
 last time, the shouts of the crowd stopped for a second, to break 
 forth again only the louder and fiercer, and once more stop. 
 
 It seemed as though the restrained foice of worn-out lungs worked 
 with redoubled power after suspense had locked long enough the 
 jaws of those thousands. 
 
 Dada talked ik) more with her companion. Pale and l)realhlesa she 
 fl.xeil her eye upon the towering stone and the cloud enveloping the 
 teams more closely the nearer tliey approached the goal. 
 
 A liundred paces before the vuld &hv. saw the red cap of Hipjiias 
 emerge from tlie dust; but soon afterward — and now close behind it 
 — Maicus' blue one. Tlien — a thrilling, deafening shout from a 
 tbou'saml throats cleaved the sky — then once more the blue cap was 
 distinguisbalile from the gray clouds, gleaming so close by the 
 obelisk as almost to graze it and not leave room enough for a wheel 
 or horse to come in between tl;e stone and driver, and this lime was 
 seen through the dust behind — behind, not liefore it — only as far 
 from the goal as the length of a horse and chariot— the red cap of 
 Ilippias. 
 
 Maicus had outstripped his competitor hard by the goal, driving 
 round tlie hard stone by means of a bold curve, imperiling the lives 
 of lioth team and driver, liut the chestnut steeds weie left liehind. 
 
 Demetrius saw all this aa i! his eye had power to scatter dust, and 
 now, too, his composuie forsook him, and, with ti loud: "Dear, 
 siilciidid fellow!" he threw up liis arms as if in pr:iyer, and yelled 
 as though his brother could hear him: "The wlii]*! Tlie goad! 
 On, on, though it be the death of them! Spur uii those horseal" 
 
SFAixns. 1F.7 
 
 Then Dadn, wlio only suspeclpd wiifit, was irning on, tnrneii to 
 him, and tisked with qiiiverini; voice: " Does lie outstrip hiniV Is 
 he beating? Will he win?" 
 
 But Demetrius did not answer; only pointed with his finirerat the 
 cloud in front, moving ahead with the swiftness of the wind — how- 
 ever, a second cloud began to mix with it more and more, and be- 
 side himself, he cried out: "Death and destruction' Tlie other 
 passes him again. The dog! The scamp! If the boy would only 
 use the goad! On, on! Wland up to it, Marcus! Good boy! Good 
 boy, only don't give up now! Great Father Neptune I — tliere — there 
 —there— but, no! My knees tremble, lie holds his own yet, and 
 now— now!— the question is decided! Let the lightning strike me! 
 Oh I— the dust tlies together again— and now— now— may he choke! 
 No, no— praised be the Godhead! '1 hose front ones are my own 
 horses, and now — Forward, forward ! Glorious fellow! tie has 
 won!" 
 
 The horses stood still, the dust dispersed; IMarcus, the Christian, 
 had conquered in the first missun. 
 
 Cynegius handed the crown to the young man, and he received it 
 thankfully. 
 
 Theu he saluted his mother, who nodded to him with gracious 
 composure, and finally he drove back into Ihe opjndum behind the 
 sheds. 
 
 Hippias threw down his whip in a fury, and the Christian's shout 
 of triumph drowned the music, the blare of trumpets, the invec- 
 tives and the grumblimi of the defeated heathen. 
 
 Threatening fists wure uplifted behind the aireeres, thecharioteeis 
 and owners of horses ou the red side scoUledand reproached one an- 
 other; and for a little they would have torn Hippias in pieces, who, 
 to gratify a miserable desire to brag, had cast victory in the lap ot 
 their arch-enemies, those blues, those Christians. 
 
 There was a terrible uproar, an unparalleled excitement, bat Dada 
 heard and saw nothing ot all tliis. She only lot>ked down in mute 
 rapture, and bright tears coursed over her cheeks. 
 
 Demetrius saw those tears and rejoiced in them. Pointing out 
 Maria, he Informed tbe maiden that yonder was the mother of 
 Marcus. At the same time he iuwanlly vowed that, cost what it 
 would, he would unite his brave brother with this lovely and inno- 
 cent young girl. 
 
 The secontl and third missus passed oft, like the first, with many 
 an accident, and in both cases, the reds won the crown. 
 
 At the fourth decisive race, only three contestants entered the lists: 
 the two heathen victors and Marcus. 
 
 Demetrius followed this match with less suspense. He knew tliat 
 his Barbary steeds excelled the Egyptian stallions in powers of en- 
 durance; and he was the t)etter satisfied on this point, because they 
 had rested longer than the others. 
 
 Indeed, this time victory fell to the son ot Maria easily and com- 
 pletely.* 
 
 Long before the race was decided Dada had looked impatiently 
 uiion her crown, and could not now expect to cast it to lAiarcus in 
 his ciiariot. When all was over, periuips, she might find some op- 
 portunity of speaking with him, and she delighted in the tone of 
 
188 SERAris. 
 
 liis voice, and tlir look out ot his large, gotid eyes. If be were to 
 jisk lier (o follow him ii^'iiiii, she would do so. let Karnis and Jlersse 
 eav what tlity would to the contrary. Go with him aha would, 
 wherever and to whomsoever he asked. 
 
 It seemed to her as though no other could rejoice over his victor}' 
 as she did, as though she belonged to him, and had always be- 
 longed to him, being parted from him only by some caprice of a 
 trickish destiny. 
 
 Anil now, again, loud peals of triumph sounded, and. in obedience 
 to an old custom, the victor hart to ride around the track in a walk, 
 showing his gallant steeds to the spectators. 
 
 He cau.e nearer and nearer, and Demetrius invited her to follow 
 him over the canal, which separated Wiapodium from the tracu, and 
 nut throw his brother the crown she had for him, but hand it to 
 him hirself. 
 
 At this proposition she blushed deeply, and said neither jx's nor 
 no; however, she rose up quickly wi;li a bright but bashfiil smile, 
 hung a wreath upon her arm, and gave Dtiiuetrius the other olive 
 crown, and tallowed him over the little bridge to the track, on to 
 which many Christians had already crowded, seeing that the racing 
 was over. 
 
 The l)rothers greeted one another while yet far apart, but ]\Iarcus 
 did not recogni/e Dada until lie had stopi">ed beside Drmctrius, and 
 she was extending an olive crown to him bashfully, but with a face 
 radiant from joy. 
 
 He felt as if Heaven had wrought a miracle in his behalf, and 
 never had he seen her look so beautiful as at this instant. Since he 
 had seen her last she S'jemed to have grown graver and more nolile; 
 and he observed likewise the blue knot on her bosom, and the one 
 in the wreath of roses encircling her fair head. 
 
 Happiness and surprise taking possession of him paralyzed his 
 tongue; but he took the crown from her, seized her hand, but could 
 only say: " Thank, thank j'ou. Dada." 
 
 liis eye rested upon hers, he forgot where he was, and asked not 
 what it meant, when his brother suddenly turned off, and with a 
 himr bound, sprung after a nan who flew past him witli his liead 
 inullled up; he heeded not that many thousands, his own mother 
 among them, were looking at him; and herepeatetl his" thank you," 
 and " Dada," the only words that he could articulate, and he would 
 have said them ottener yet, had he not b(en interrupted, lor the 
 jxirta Ubiiinaria was burb,t open, the gate throuiih which they had 
 been accustomed to carry the dead and woun led into the street out- 
 side, and through this forced tlieir way a body of e.\ciled heathen, 
 crying to those in the hippodrome: "Serapis has fallen! They have 
 destroyed Iheimasreof Serapis! The Christians, the Christians are 
 destroying tlie sanctuaries of the gods!" 
 
 Then a'great horror fell upon the assembled multitude, the reds 
 rushed from their seats into the arena, to question, to hear, to oihr 
 resistance or seek for safety. 
 
 In a trice, the victor's chariot and horses were in n throng of men; 
 Dada, in anguish, clutched at the chariot, but ISbucus slot)ped and/ 
 drew her in, without thinking or retlection, hardly master of hiiu- 
 selt any longer. Willi liis steeds, lie soon earveil a way l(;r liiiiii-elf 
 
SERAPIS. 189 
 
 I'.ii'ongh Uie crowd, drove past the carrsres, casting a timid glauce 
 upward, wilhout tiuding his motiier, however, and liually through 
 ihe grand gate (»t exit, drove into the public street his exhausted 
 steeds, dripping as they were with sweat and covered with white 
 toam. 
 
 His hostlers had followed him. He threw the reins to them, after 
 freeing himself from liis confinement. Then he asked Dada, after 
 she had jumped witli him to the giound: " Will you follow me?'' 
 and her answer ran: " Whithersoever you will!" 
 
 The Widow Maria had risen from her seat with more haste than 
 comported with her dignity upon hearing the tidincs of the tall of 
 iSerapis; and then gained her littei, under the protection of the 
 guards, who attended tl)e legate Cynegius. 
 
 In the hippodiome disorder prevailed; reds and blues rushed upon 
 nue another like tuiious wild animals, on the podium, in the upper 
 galleries, and on the dusty racc-tracii. A nd the t)loody scuiHe— not a 
 rare thing here in quieter times — lasted until the imperial soldiers 
 parted thw unarmed combatants. 
 
 Tlie bishop was charmed ivith the victory which had everywhere 
 crowned his people's efforts; and it was not unmiugled with pleas- 
 ure that he heard of the escape of Olympius, Helladius, Ammonias, 
 and other intellectual leaders of the heathen. 
 
 Let them come back again, speak and declaim to their hearts' 
 d'jsire; tlieir power was broken, the church need fear them no more; 
 but for the intellectual development of her rulers, she had still use 
 for their science and their teachings. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 The great hippodrome was outside the Canopian Gate, to the 
 north of the street leading to Eleusis, and this was to day full of 
 men all pressing in the same direction. The confusion produced in 
 the stadium by the news that Serapis had fallen drove home the 
 more quiet and peaceable sort of citizens, and precisely to this class 
 belonged the wealthy, who had come in their carriages and litters. 
 Little room, then, whs left in the broad street for pedestrians; but 
 Btill they pushed forward; for every tiling streamed into the city, 
 and the beatheu, who followed the first messengers of misfortune 
 from the Serapeum to the hippodrome had hard work to force their 
 way through the crowds of people huirying toward home. 
 
 Marcus and I3ada allowed themselves to be borne onward by the 
 throng struggling to reach the town wall and Canopian Gate. 
 
 Phabis, Maria's old steward, who had been charged to assist his 
 young master in disrobing, after the close of the races had removed 
 his charioteer's cap from his head, thrown a cloak over his slioulders 
 and followed him, m lien he moved oil in company with the young 
 singer. The old man could right well explain tiiis episode, for it 
 was he who had escorted Dame llerBe to his mistress. She had then 
 struck him as licing a sensible and well-meaning woman, and now 
 it was evident that she had been right when she accused Marcus of 
 laying snares for her foster-child. At the time it liad been dillicult 
 for him to believe this, tor he had never yet detected his young 
 master in treading upon forbidden paths, but then Marcus was his 
 
190 SEIIAPIS. 
 
 fallier's child, and wlien a young tellow liow many love scrnpcs of 
 Apdles be had been obliired to expose. iNow came the son's turn, 
 and if be was as serious in Ids attachment to llie gracetul young girl 
 at his side as in all things else, and should take it mio bis head to 
 make tiie singer his wile, what battles be foresaw between him and 
 his mother! 
 
 The old servant attempted to follow Marcus, but was not ob- 
 served, for the latter had only eye and thought for bis " treasure 
 trove," and with bei on bis arm he struggled toward the gate in the 
 very midst of the crowd. It seemed to him as if heaven was per- 
 forming miracle upon miracle in his behalf, tor it had led Dada to 
 liim, and she wore blue favors, and to his question as to what this 
 meant, she bad replied: " For your sake, and because 1 like your 
 faith." He had been ready to drop from fatigue, but the moment 
 Dada laid her arm in his he had grown fresh again, as if by magic. 
 It is true, his swollen hands hurt him, it is true that his shoulder . 
 blades many a time contracted painfully, but just as soon as he felt 
 the pressure of her arm upon his and met the joyful look of her 
 countenance, as she turned to tell him how happy she felt, and 
 listen to his: "1 love you," he seemed to be in heaven, insensible 
 to pam and discomfort. The pressure of the throng only permitted 
 them to exchange a lew brief words; but the communications that 
 they lield with one another through mouth and eye were the dearest 
 and sweetest that either of them had ever experienced in all their 
 lives before. 
 
 Thus they came through the gate into Canopian Street, but there 
 Dada remarked that his lips had lost their color, and a slight trem- 
 bling shook the arm in which hers rested. Then she asked him 
 what had come over him, and upon his failure to reply, save by 
 pressing his left band to his brow, she drew him into the public 
 garden "which stretched out on her right hand, between the little 
 slddium and the Meandrian race course. In the grounds which 
 were beautifully laid out in grass and beds of blooming llowers, she 
 soon found an unoccupied bench, behind which arose a semi-circular 
 clump of tamarind shrubs, dispensing a deep and grateful shade, 
 and here she compelled him to lie down. He did not resist her 
 eiTorts, and bis piillid cheeks and the glassy look of bis eyes taiigbt 
 her tliat he had fallen into a fainting-fit. 
 
 How exliausted must he be after the terrible exertions of this fore- 
 noon, and after his victory he had been handed no refreshing drink, 
 no strengthening bit of food. 
 
 It wns so natural that bis strength should have given way, and 
 without being especially anxious about him, but full of compassion 
 and the wish to help, she jumped \\\> and hurried to the fruit-dealer 
 whose stand she bad passed between the garden and the street. 
 
 How glad she was that she still owwxX the tour drachmas which 
 she bad'begged of Karnis at the Xenodochium of Maria. She could 
 now make purchases tor her beloved to her heart's desire; and 
 when she came back to him with oranges, apples, hard-boiled eggs, 
 salt and bread, held in the turned-up skirt of her dress, and a small 
 bottle of mixed wine, besides a goiud in her free hand, sh(^ again 
 found \\\m unconscious. Alter she had moistened his forebcail and 
 lips, however, be o[)eued his ey<.« :igain and then she peeled oraniies 
 
SERAPIS. 191 
 
 for him so proltily as nobody else could have done, and invited him 
 to help himself — she herself boldly eating with him, because she was 
 hiiugry herself. It deliglited her that he was her guest, and that he 
 ate her modest meal with relish, and tlfht he revived again so 
 quickl}'. Indeed very soon he was ])euelrated with new delight and 
 new vigor; and now as he leaned far back, gazing gladly and grate- 
 fully into Dada's eyes, an unspeakable sense of bliss stole over him. 
 He thought he had never tasted anything half so good as this fine 
 meal, brought to him by Dada, nor any wine halt so delicious as the 
 poor stuff she had bought of the fruit-dealer. He look the apple 
 from her hand and ate on where she had bitten it with her white 
 teeth; she must drmk out of the same gourd with him, and as each 
 one had consumed one of the three eggs she brought with her, they 
 disputed over the third, until finally he yielded and consented to 
 take it as part of liis share. 
 
 After they had eaten Dada's purchase to the last morsel she asked 
 him for the first time where he expected to take her, and he replied 
 that she would be a welcome guest to his old teacher, the Deacon 
 Eusebiiis, and there meet again her old companion Agnes. Tliis 
 chai med her, and when she found out by iiaving lier attention aroused 
 at the mention of a " deacon," that her future protector was to be 
 the same venerable man whose words had touched her heart so 
 deeply at St. Mark's church, she fold Marcus of her having entered 
 the house of God, and how much more peaceful she had been in 
 mind ever since. Something had come over her entirely new there, 
 and since then she had been longing all the time to see him again and 
 talk over all this with him; what she had learned of Christ'^s teach- 
 ings did her heart good and raised her spirits. The world was so 
 beautiful, and she knew there were more good than bad people in it. 
 To love one's neighbor was a delight, and to pardon wrong some- 
 thiuij: that she could always do. It must be so pleasant upon earth 
 if everybody feels as kindiy to his neighbor as she did to him and 
 he to her, and life would be right easy if in every trouble one had 
 somebody always ready to listen to us and help us out of mere 
 goodness. 
 
 And these words struck Marcus as the greatest miracle of all that 
 had been worked this day in his favor-. The soul, which heaven 
 had bidden him save in a dream, was already walking in the path 
 of .'ialvation, and now he laid before her many a thing that seemed 
 peculiarlj' exalted and glorious in his faith, an'l finally he confessed, 
 too, that he loved his neighbor, it was true, tor Christ's sake, but 
 that full and perfect love had only been manifested to him through 
 her. No power in the world could ever part him from her, and if 
 she had received baptism their love might endure even beyond the 
 grave, so long as endless eternity endures; but she listened to him 
 rapturously and said that she was his own and would remain so for- 
 ever and ever. 
 
 To-day there wei-e only a few pei-sons in the garden, although 
 commonly at this hour in the afternocm it was thronged wnh tired 
 ]>eoplL' and children with their nurses; but these last had been kept 
 in the house to-day on account of the disturbances apprehended m 
 the street, and the first were in the hippodrome and its bustle. 
 This suited the lovers precisely, for they could sit hand in hand 
 
192 SERAPIS. 
 
 and look into cacli other's eyes, yes, as old T'habi's (wlin liad lnii<?; 
 lost sii^lit of them, and finally Ciime up with them again in tiic public 
 •^alliens) drew near them, he saw from Jiis hiding-pliice how his 
 young master shyly lool^ed around and first imprinted a kisrs upon 
 tiiu singer's curls, then upon her eyes, and finally even upon her 
 lips. 
 
 tto hours passed with them as if on wings amid grave discnuise 
 and deliglitful ehit-chat, so that when at last they gained thtir con- 
 sent to leave this quiet retreat it was already twilight. 
 
 So(m they again found themselves in Ciinopiau Street in the midst 
 of the crowd that they had often to struggle again^'t now, inasmuch 
 as the (current ot home-comers had long since ceased to How, and 
 thousands were now turning their faces to the hippodrome where 
 there were lively carryings on. Marcus slackened his pace as lie 
 was passing by his paternal mansion, pointing it out to Dada, and say- 
 ing that the day was not far distant when she should be introduced 
 there. 
 
 Suddenly she became grave and whispered: " No. no, not here, 
 not in the grand palace in this street. We would like to live in a 
 small house all quiet and to ourselves. There should be a garden 
 to it, too, with a seat where we might rest iuthesha.le. Here, here 
 lives VDur mother too!" She blushed and looked down as she 
 spoke; but he suspected what was going on in her mind, and begged 
 her only to have patience, for if slie were a Chrislian, Eusel>iu8 
 would intercede for her directly. Then he praised his mother's 
 piety and goodness, asking Dada if she had not seen her at the 
 races. 
 
 " Yes," answered she hesitatingly, and when he went on (o ask 
 if she did not think Maria beautiful and noble-looking, she replied 
 candidly: " Yes, certainly, but at the same time so high and exalied 
 that she must want quite a different sort of a daughter- Jrom a pour, 
 deserted or])han like me, a singing-girl, whom nol)ody i-espects. 
 Jiut to you, 1 am right to you just as 1 am, and you know that 1 
 love you. If 1 do not find my uncle again tlien 1 liave nobody on 
 earth to look to but you; 1 need nohody else, however, for you are 
 my ail in all, and to live for you and with you is enough tor me. 
 But you must never desert me else 1 shall die! You dare not. for 
 you liave told nre that my soul is dearer to you than your own life, 
 and it 1 have you and your love 1 shall get betier and better; but 
 if you allow an>lliing to part us, 1 shall be undone; once more, you 
 must know that then J shall be nudone body and soul! 1 do not 
 know why 1 feel so distressed. Let us hurry by this house; if your 
 mother should see us!" 
 
 lie di.1 as she wished and sought to soothe her, while, with the 
 blind love of a child lie praised his mother's virtues. But she only 
 liarkened witii halt an ear to these eulogies, and moreover he was 
 soon interrupted, for the nearer they came to the Rhakotis the 
 thicker grew ihe tlirong, and henceforth their conversation ceased 
 and they could only think of working their way forward; but sliU 
 lliey were happy. 
 
 In this manner they reached Sun Street, one of the princiixil busi- 
 ness tlii)MMiLi,hliii('s of the city, which cut C'anopian Street at light 
 auglcs, and I hey followed it to the city wall and the gale ot llelios 
 
SERAPIS. 193 
 
 The Serapeum now lay to their right, and several roads led to it 
 from Sun Street. In order to arrive at (be little street where Eiise- 
 bius lived they should have turned into Acropolis Street, but through 
 tliis, and over tlie city ot the dead* cam* tearing toward them a 
 confused mass of disorderly, ruffian-like men, who came from the 
 Serapeum. The suu was already approaching tlie western horizon. 
 
 iNow Marcus sought to escape collision with such desperadoes and 
 draw Dada to the corner house, but in vain; for the multitude pour- 
 ing out ot Acropolis Street were raving like madmen, and thought 
 ot nothing save the trophies of which they had possessed themselves. 
 
 In front of a great car which served otherwise lor the transporta- 
 tion ot balconica, columns, and blocivs of stone, several dozens ot 
 l)lacij and white fellows besides a few women and monlis had har- 
 nessed themselves, and were drawing through the streets a huge, 
 shapeless block of wood, the stump ot the destroyed image ot 
 Sera pis. 
 
 "To the hippodrome!" "Burn it!" "Down with idols!" 
 " See the divine body of Serapis!" Such were the cries sent torth 
 in tones of thunder by thousands ot lips as the tumultuous groups 
 moved on. 
 
 Monks had dragged from its niche the desecrated stump of what 
 had been Serapis, pulled it through the temple into the open air, and 
 were now bearing it through the city into the arena, to burn it there. 
 Other wearers of sheepskin and Christian citizens who had caught 
 the destructive mania, had forced their way into tlie sanctuary of 
 Anubis adjacent to the Serapeum, had thrown down from the altar 
 and destroyed the jackal-headed idols, the Canopian gods, besides 
 four immense vases on which served as covers the head of a man, 
 an ape, a sparrow- liawk, and a jackal. Now they bore these queer 
 heads ot animals before them, while others dragged with them, on 
 barrows, or carried in baskets and upon then- slioulders dismem- 
 bered limbs of statues ot Apollo, Athene and Venus, in order to 
 cast them in the flames at the hippodrome with the wooden stump 
 Serapis. 
 
 The mob had broken the god's noses, smeared the marble with 
 pitch, or bedabbled it marvelously with red paint found in the 
 writing-room of the Serapeum. Whoever got near enough the 
 stump or any other piece ot the broken idol, spit upon it, beat or 
 punched at it, and hUherto no heathen had ventured to oppose re- 
 sistance to such carryings on. 
 
 Behind the oaken heart of the image of Serapis and those other 
 trophies thronged a troop ot men, women, and monks, and a large 
 r>i/')-uca-\; (that had accidentally crossed their track and become en- 
 tangled in the seething mass of human beings that extended further 
 than the eye could reach) moved along witii them at u slow pace. 
 The noble horses drawing this vehicle had to be led and held in 
 with the bit, for they trembled from impatience and excitement, 
 eometimes trying to break away from the traces, sometimes to rear. 
 
 * A quarter of the city in its extreme west, appropriated to cemeteries and 
 catacombs. 
 
 t A four-wlxeeled carriage, used not only for traveling, but as a meaus of lo- 
 comotion iu the city also. 
 
194 SERA PIS. 
 
 In the carrum sat the merchant Poiphynus, who had recovered 
 consciousness, and Gorgo. 
 
 Constaniitie had remuiued at the side of the convalescent until the 
 phj'siciau Apuloius had declared his further attentions superlluous, 
 ana then his duty had calleil him away, iin had received the an- 
 nouncement of his daughter's projected union with the former Iriend 
 of her childhood, as welcome news, long expected. 
 
 A lew of the prefect's kniglits iiad been ordered to escort Por- 
 phyrius' carriage to the trates of the Serapeum, and .m abbot, with 
 whom Conslantine had become acquainted at Arsinoe, undertook to 
 see that the mn'wc« should be guarded on its way home, and pre- 
 served from the attacks of tlie raging multitude. 
 
 At the place where Acropolis Street joined Sun Street, and where 
 Marcus and Dada had halted, being unal)le to go backward or for- 
 ward, just as the carnage got therc% a body of armed heathen, meet- 
 ing I heir deadly foes, fell upon the Christians, who had dared heap 
 insults upon all that the}' held most sacred, and now ensued a fierce 
 straggle. JN ear to the young Christian a heathen struck down the 
 bearer of the soiled head of a Muse. Dada, in termr, piessed close 
 up to her beloved, and he began to be serionsly alarmed for her, 
 when, as he was looking out for some means of safety, he perceived 
 his brother Demetrius, who was making animated signs to him, as 
 he did so clearing a way tor him through the crowd. The farmer 
 also exchanged signs with the occupants of the carmen, and when, 
 at last, he got to Alarcus, he briefly signified to him that Dada must 
 be, first of all, put in a place of safety. 
 
 Glad to escape fiom the crowd and thedanger, sLe nimbly climbed 
 into the carriage, and after she had cursorily gieeted father and 
 daughter, beckoned Marcus to follow her; but his brother restrained 
 him, and after it had been most huiriedly arranged that the maiden 
 should be brought away from the merchant's honse, in the evening, 
 and Demetrius had wnispertd a few words in Gorgo's ear, com- 
 mendatory of the singing-girl, the carriage was once more put in 
 motion. 
 
 Among the heathen, by whom this was now surrounded, many 
 knew the noble friend of Olympius, and made way tor his carriage, 
 so that he succeeded in reaching unchallenged Euergeten Street, 
 outside ttie city wail, which gave access to the rear of the Isis tem- 
 ple, the dock of Clement and the merchant's mansion. 
 
 Few remarks had been exchanged in the carriage, for the horses 
 moved forward only one step at "a time, and under manifo'd ditti- 
 culties. 
 
 It had grown dark, and the uproar had extended to the usually 
 quiet and retired Euergeten Street. The lurid glare of flames crim- 
 soning the night-sky with their awful splendor showed what at- 
 tracted the multitude. 
 
 The monks had thrown fire into the Isis temple; by a north-west 
 wiiul, the flames had been ilriven to Ch^ment's dock, there finding 
 M'clcome and costly nutriment in the vast stores of wood and hulks 
 of vessels thens laid up. From the work-shops roared and crackled 
 rich jets of radiant sparks, emulating the light of the early stars. 
 
 I'orphyriua saw that his house hail been also iu peril, but thanks 
 
SERAPIS. 195 
 
 to the circumspection of the steward and the untiring diligence of 
 his slaves, it had been untouched by the flames. 
 
 Meanwhile the brothers liad long since left the crowd behind 
 them. 
 
 The farmer had not been alone, and as soon as he had made his 
 companion, an abbot of friendly aspect, acquainted with Marcus, 
 he gave animated e.xpression to his joy at meeting the second son 
 of Apelles, the man who had saved his life. 
 
 While he was leading Dada to Marcus in the arena, he had caught 
 sight of Anubis, vrno had attended his father as body-servani to 
 Syria, and never been heard of since. Demetrius had pursued the 
 Egyptian without delay, seized him, overpowered him, not without 
 danger, and then had him put in the prison near the prefectuil. 
 Here Demetrius had succeeded in inducing the slave to speaii, and 
 from his communications, it had been brought out that Apelles had 
 actually fallen in battle with the Saracens. The Egyptian had prof- 
 ited by his master's death only in so far as lo run off with his 
 money. The slave had escaped to Crete, and there bought a small 
 estate with his rich booty, and had now returned, moved by lon<T- 
 ing after his wife and children, in order to take them with him u> 
 his new home. 
 
 Finally, in order to confirm the truth of his narration, which 
 cleared him of having murdered his mn.'ter, and therefore merited 
 little faith, he stated that he had met in Alexandria, the day betore, 
 one ot the monks who had been cognizant of his master's end; and 
 Demetrius had immediately set out'to find this man again by mak- 
 ing inquiries among the monks. 
 
 In this he had speedily succeeded; and Cosmas, who had since 
 then been elected abbot of the INitrian brotherhood, to which he be- 
 longed, now also told Marcus how heroically his father had fought 
 with the infidels who had fallen upon his caravan. Apelles," he 
 afiirmed, had saved his own lite and those of two other anchorites, 
 one of whom was likewise in Alexandria at this time. Seven in 
 number, they had journeyed from Hebron to Aila, had put them- 
 selves under the protection of the Alexandrian's escort, and all had 
 progressed excellently until they had been attacked by infidel Sara- 
 cens, in the mountain chain south of Petra. He and two of his 
 companions had happily made their escape while the Alexandrian 
 was contending with tlie infidels; but from the clifis above, which 
 they had scaled in tlieir flight, they had seen him fall, and hence- 
 forth always mcluded him in their prayers. It would fill him with 
 joytul satisfaction to do his part in procuring for a man like Apelles 
 the place due him on the list of martyrs. 
 
 Full ot joyful impatience, Marcus wanted to hasten immediately 
 to his mother, and tell her what he had learned; but Demetrius held 
 him back. 
 
 The bishop, he informed the youth, bad bidden him wait upon 
 him that he might congratulate him upon his victory; it was his 
 duty to accept this invitation, and forthwith profit by the favorable 
 opportunity of securing to his deceased father the honor rightfully 
 his. 
 
 It seemed strange indeed to Marcus that his brother should so 
 heartily interest himself in a cause to which he had hitherto shown 
 
19G SEEAPIS. 
 
 himself so averse; however, he immetliatcly repaired to (he episco- 
 pal palace, in company willi the abbot, and after the f;irmer bad 
 wailed for them a half hour outside, his brother rcappearecJ tvith 
 sparkling eyes, and told how graciously lie had been received by the 
 primate, who bad thanked him for Lis victory, and bidden him 
 proffer some request. Thereupon he had immediately thought of 
 his father, and called in the abbot's testimony. He had immediately 
 heard what Cosmt.s had to say, and then Tlieophilus had declared 
 himself ready, with pleasure, to add tlie name of Apelles to the list 
 of Syrian martyrs. The bishoj) had ahva.ys resistetl, reluctantly, 
 the nrtrent solicitation to that ellect of so good and active a Chris- 
 tian as iSIaria; but now that he had obtained sucli satislactory testi- 
 mony to the manner of her husband's dea'.h. it would give him un- 
 feiirned satisfaction to accoid tliis highest of all honors to the victor 
 and his excellent mother. " And now," continued Maicus, " now 
 I'll run borne, and with what joy will mother — " 
 
 But bis brother would not let him finish his sentence, but grasped 
 him by the shoulder and called out, " Patience, my dear boy, 
 patience! You stay by me, and do not see your mother until 1 have 
 arranged the needful. No contradiction, 1 beg of you, unless you 
 would hinder my having the gratification of indemnifying your 
 pretty litt'e friend for gross injustice done her. Wiiat "you need, 
 above, all things, is your mother's blessing; and do you think lliat 
 will be an eas}^ thing to obtain, my boy? Not a bit of it. But I can 
 and will procure it for you, provided that you mind me and consent 
 to having ohi Karnis' niece baptized." 
 
 " She is already a Christian!" exclaimed Marcus, eagerly. 
 
 Demetrius, however, continued composedly: 
 
 " Then she is yours tomorrow^ if you submit to the arrangements 
 of your older and more prudent brother. 
 
 " That can not fall hardly upon you; for you will be obliged to 
 admit, that if 1 had not wrestled with Auubis— the lellow snapped 
 at all about him like a wounded fox — 1 could not have gotten him 
 into custody; and if 1 had not run my legs nearly oft me searching 
 after the worthy abbot, father would never have ol)tained the honor 
 mat is at last his portion. Who could have made me believe that 
 1 Should ever rejoice over tbat crown of martyrdom? Nothing is 
 impossible wilh'tbe gods, and 1 think the manesot the deceased will 
 forgive me for your sake. But it gets ever later, and so only this 
 one thincc more: as for myself, 1 claim it as mj' privilege to inform 
 your mother of what has come to pass, and for your part, go direct- 
 ly to Eusebius and ask him to receive Dada ;it his house. If he 
 consents— and he will— then go together to Uncle Porphyrins' and 
 wail there for me, so that, if all goes well, 1 may accompany you to 
 your mother, or, it otherwise, to Eusebius." 
 
 " Dada go with me to mother!" exclaimed Marcus. " But how 
 will she—" 
 
 " She will receive her as a daughter," interposed his brother, " il 
 you Keep handsomely to yourself what has liappened until 1 give 
 you leave to speak. There, the long gale-keeper Is already shutting 
 up the episcopal palace, and so nothing more leaves there to-day for 
 the cily. An ret'oir, you child of fortune! I am in a tiurry!" 
 
 So saying, Demetrius departed, leaving unanswered the thousand 
 
SERAPIS. 197 
 
 questions witli which Marcus was ready lo besiege him; biii il.e 
 latter repaired, as he had been bidden, full ot hope and _yet not 
 tree Irommany an anxious thought, to his old friend and preceptor. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIl. 
 
 While Marcus was following his brother's advice, Dada was im- 
 patiently awaiting him and Euscbius. 
 
 Gurgo had had her conducted by her nurse into the brightly- 
 lighted music-room, sending her word that she would join her "there, 
 as coon as her father's condition would allow her to leave him. 
 They had also placed refreshments before her, which consisted 
 merely of dainties, and remained untouched belore her, for it struck 
 her that the rich merchant's daughter was purposely avoiding her, 
 and the excitements which she had undergone, and a sense of kme- 
 liucss, deprived her of appetite. 
 
 To divert her thoughts, she examined the beautiful oDjpcts of art 
 all around her, felt the material with which the cushions were cov- 
 ered, and touched the lute thai was resting agamst the pedestal ot a 
 JMuse. She played only a few chords, and j-et these awalieued 
 various associations, and now she threw herself upon a divan rest- 
 ing in a less brilliantly lighted corner of the spacious apartment, 
 and save heiself up to reverie. She tliought over the varied occur- 
 rences of the last few days, and the issue seemed to her too beauti- 
 ful to be actually true. Yes, her hopes were so rich and precious 
 that she trembled lest they might fail ot tulliilment, yet these in- 
 stants of apprehension were few and brief; for her young heart was 
 full ot contidence, full-winged, so that if a ciualm of uneasiness 
 held it down, it was soon again soaring aloft, indulciug in the 
 loftiest aspirations. 
 
 Overflowing with bliss and gratitude, she thought of Marcus and 
 his love, painted her own future with him at her side, and if vexa- 
 tion at Gorgo's nou-appearanCH, solicitude al)Out the fate of her 
 family, and dread of her lover's mothei, slightly cloudea her soul, 
 quickly that feeling of raptuious delight by which she was pos- 
 sessed reasserted itself. Su she forgot time and hour, until at last 
 Gorgo joined her. 
 
 The merchant's daughter had not purposely avoided the singer; 
 she had been really detained in attendance upon her father. Nec- 
 essarily, the tidings had now reached him that his mother, the be- 
 Joved head of his family, was no longer among the living. By the 
 desire of his physician this hart been kept secret from liim so long 
 as he tarried in the Serapeum, but immediately after his return 
 home, through the incaution of a friend, he had been told a tale of 
 horror that had filled the city with excitement for some hours 
 past, and almost set him wild. 
 
 The merchant's two sons were at Thcssalonica, and a ship com- 
 ing from there had brought the wcil-authenticateil information that 
 fifteen thousand citizens had been treacherously murdered in the 
 circus. 
 
 Tlus horrible deed of blood had been committed by soldiers, at 
 the command ot the Emperor Theodosius, who had cunningly iix- 
 
198 SERAPIS. 
 
 vited the unhappy inliabilants of the place into the hippodrome, in 
 order basel}^ to slaup;hteT them there. His Gothic general, liotheric, 
 had been murdered by the populace at Tliessalonica, and the em- 
 peror had bloodily avenged this crime. 
 
 P()ri)hyrius knew his sons' ways, and was certain that they were 
 never missing where any spectacle wiis to be seen. 3Iost assuredly 
 they were among the spectators, and must have been likewise cut 
 down by the murderer's sword. Ills mother and two blooming 
 children had been torn trom him, and he would liave again had 
 recourse to the relief promised l)y [)oison if a feeble ray of hope Imd 
 not pointed to the possibility of those wliom he believed dead being 
 yet alive. Nevertheless, iiis demeanor was that of one desperate, 
 who has lust his last treasure. 
 
 Gorgo spokft to him, sought to cherish his hope that her biolhers 
 niightyet be living, leminded him of the phihisopher's duty to 
 bear calmly the strokes of fate; but he did not listen, and in the 
 midst of bitterest lamentations burst into a violent rasre. At last 
 he desired to be alone, and reminded Gortro of her duty to pay 
 some attention to Dada. Thereupon the younjr lady acted upon his 
 suggestion, but she did not do so cheerfully; for, however much 
 good she had heard of the singing-girl through Demetrius, she stil) 
 felt a little shy of her. 
 
 When she approached it was to accost her with the condescend- 
 ing manner of one who enters the wretched abode of poverty. But 
 her father was right; she was her guest and must be treated kindly. 
 
 Before she entered the music-hall she wiped oU the tears she was 
 sheilding for her brothers, too sacred in her estimation to be seen 
 flowing in the presence of a crcaturq who had transgressed the lim- 
 its which custom prescribes for her sex. Appearances led her to 
 suppose that Dada had condescended to an amour with her cousin, 
 hence all those feelings must be foieign to her which, following 
 her philosophical instructor, slie would denominate "moral ear- 
 nestness " and " striving after the highest things." She felt herself 
 greatly her superior; but it would not have been magnanimous to 
 let her perceive this, and so she advanced to meet lier graciously; 
 but Dada responded to hei salutation without cordiality and with 
 constraint. 
 
 " 1 am pleased,'' began Gorgo, " that accident has brought us to- 
 gether," and Dada replied quickly, " 1 think that 1 have your fa- 
 ther's goodness to thank, and not accident." 
 
 " Yes, he is good," answered the other, purposely taking no no- 
 tice of the iriiiation betrayed in the singer's words. " And witLal 
 these last liours have brought him unspeakable sorrow. \ou have 
 heard, perhaps, of his having lost his mother. You knew her, and 
 must be conscious of the kindly feelings she entertained toward 
 you." 
 
 " Do not speak of it!" demurred Dada. 
 
 *' Her heart was hard to win," continued Gorgo; " but she took a 
 fancy to you. Do you doubt it? If you could only havj seen the 
 carefulness with which she selected that gown which you have on, 
 and ornaments to matcli! 
 
 " Do not sjjeak of it!" implored the other once more. " She is 
 dead, and 1 freely forgive her; but she did not mean well by me." 
 
SEKAPIS. 199 
 
 " That is not handsome " interposed Gnrgo, making no conceal- 
 ment ot the indiiination with wliich this answer tilled her. " The 
 departed is poorly thanked l)y you for her too great generosity." 
 
 Here Dada shook her head "in tlie negativerand replied firmly: 
 '■ 1 am gratetul for the very smallest favor; people have rarelj'' 
 enough done me disinteresled ffood; but once for all, if it muse be 
 said, she wanted to make use ot me for her own ends, and injure 
 IVIarcus and his mother through my instrumentality. And you, you 
 nuist know this too; else why was I too mean to sing with you if 
 you did not believe me to be a girl of light character disposed to do 
 the will of the deceased? All the world takes us to be bad just be- 
 cjiuse we are sing^rti by profession; but vou know how to make dis- 
 tinctions, for you went willi Airnes. If you would not insult me 
 say no more about the gratitude 1 owe the deceased." 
 
 Gorgo's eyes fell; but after a brief pause she looked up again 
 and said: 
 
 " You do not know how terribly the poor thing suflered. Her 
 sons widow inflicted much wrong upon her — such bitter wrong, 
 thai she never could forgive her; and so you are probably right in 
 your supposition; but in any case you did please my grandmother, 
 and now, now her wish is gratified, and Marcus has found you, and 
 loves you well, too, if 1 am not mistaken." 
 
 " If you are not mistaken!" repeated Dada, with animation: 
 " May the gods prohibit that! Yes, we have found and love one 
 another; why should 1 conceal it?" 
 
 " And Maria, his mother, what does she say to it?" asked Gorge. 
 
 " 1 do not know!" replied Dada, shyly. 
 
 " But she is his mother!" exclaimed the other impressively. " In 
 opposition to her will the wedding will never, never take place. 
 What he has he gets from her." 
 
 " And she may keep it," retorted Dada, eagerly. " The smaller 
 and more modest the house to which he takes me the better. I 
 v/ant his love, nothing else. His designs toward me are good, for 
 he is not like the rest, and does not love me just because he thinks 
 1 am pretty. 1 follow him confidenlly, and of the honesty of his 
 intentions you may judge, by his placing me under the care ot his 
 ■worthy pastor, Eusebius. " 
 
 " So you have adopted his faith as yours?" asked Gorgo. 
 
 "Certainly i have," answered Dada; but the other continued: 
 " 1 am glad of (hat for Marcus' sake; and one would gladly be ac- 
 counted a Christian if they would only act according to their 
 creed. But only behold how Ihoy rage and destroy everything that 
 is beautiful. What say you to that, who have been brought up by 
 Karnis, that friend of the Muses?" 
 
 " 1?" asked Dada. " There are bad people everywhere, and if 
 they rage against the beautiful, I am sorry; but we two can de 
 light in it afterward as we did before." 
 
 ■' Well for you that you can shut your eyes, and see only as love 
 dictates!" replied Gorgo, sighing softly. " Those people are to be 
 envied vvlio succeed in silencing mind, when it is painful to liear 
 lier voice. But 1 have been brought up to think, and can not give 
 up reflection; and just this it is which builds up a barrier between 
 me and the happiness beckoning to me. And yet, so long as truth 
 
200 SERA PIS. 
 
 h the higbosl tliintr, I shall bless Ihe gift of searching atter her wilh 
 ail the facilities of the mind. My betrothed is a Christian lilie 
 yours, and 1 wish that 1 could make his tailb mine as easily as you 
 do; but it is not permitted me to jumi) into the water atter 1 have 
 perceived it to be full of waterspoulsand whirlpouh. But the ques- 
 tion here is not about me but you. Well! Marcus will be happy in 
 possessing you; but, if you do not succeed in WMnning Maria to 
 your side, "he will not stick to you; no, indeed. 1 know those 
 Cliristians well, and am well aware that there is no peace of mind 
 possible to them in marriage without a parent's blessing; and it 
 Marcus talis to receive his motber's blessing he will torment him- 
 self to death, and grow weary of life as though he had committed 
 some great crime." 
 
 " But in spile of all that you say," interrupted Dada, " he can be 
 happy just as little without me as 1 without him. And 1, 1 have 
 never sued for any man's favor, and yet everywhere 1 have been 
 treated kindly. AVliy should 1 not succeed in gaining his mother's 
 afiection? 1 shall put forth every eflnrt to please her, and it must 
 gratify her to see her son happy. Eusebius will speak a word to her 
 in our behalf, and she will assuredly bless us; but if it is ordered 
 diflerenlly, and 1 may not be his wife in the sight of man, yet 1 
 shall just as little desert him as he me, even though he should lord 
 it over me as if he were my master and 1 his servant." 
 
 " But yon, poor thing, do you know nothing, then, of the dig- 
 nity and honor of the wife?" asked Gorgo, clapping her hands. 
 *' You bewail the fate of public singers, and the hard sentence pro- 
 nounced against them by the world, and what a sentiment you ex- 
 press there! It sounds like, do what I want, or I despise the usages 
 of society!" 
 
 At this D.ida fired up and eagerly exclaimed: " Despise, did you 
 say? 1 despise the usages of society, did you say? Oh, no. a thou- 
 sand times no! 1 feel myself to be utterly insignificant, and tiieie is 
 nothing at all great in me, and because 1 know that 1 do not pre- 
 sume. Kever in my life have 1 ever found courage to despise anvi 
 body, even a child. "^ Out now there has been awakened within me 
 something -through Marcus, through him alone— something that 
 makes me strong; and if 1 see that manners ami customs are 
 leagued against me, because 1 sung in public, and it they should 
 withhold from me what is nevertheless my right, tlien within these 
 few hours 1 have gained courage to submit patiently to the issues 
 of life and death. What you call ' honor' 1 have been taught to 
 hold and guard sacredly, like yourself, and 1 have preservedil too 
 as jealously as any girl ever diil Not as if 1 were doing any great 
 thing either; but you have no idea how it is, when any man who 
 sets up to be sjreat, deems himself justifieil in l)eing impertinent to 
 you and trving to entrap you. lou and young ladies of your sta- 
 tion lintl il quite dillerent, for you have walls and defenses thrown 
 up around you. We are deemed fair game by men, while you arc 
 approached like goddesses. And then! 1 have not heard it only 
 from Karnis — who knows the world and people of fashion — no, I 
 liave .seen it myself at Rome in senators' houses, where there were 
 young lords and ladies in jilenly, for 1 keep my eyes open: among 
 you love is like lul<(>warni ivaler in the bath, but us— it cousumea 
 
SERAPIS. 201 
 
 lis like fire. The Lesbian Sappho leaped from the Leucadia cliffs 
 when she was scorned by foolish Phaon, and if thereby 1 could 
 eave IVIarcus from evil, 1 will follow hei example. You too confess 
 that there is one wlioni you love, but what you feel for him can 
 liardly be the right thing, with all that ' mind,' ' reflection,' at least 
 in my love. I know nothing of any ' if ' or ' but,' and yet however 
 much it urges and presses 'me, 1 shall patiently wait under Euse- 
 bius' protection, and submit to whalever may be prescribed for 
 me. But in spile of all Ihis j-ou pronounce sentence against me, if 
 you— but you— how you stand there! Oil, how you Took through 
 me!— \ou— just so you looked that first time 1 heard you sing, and 
 you— by all the nine Muses— you yourself belong to us and not to 
 that other cold-blooded class; you are as much and more of an 
 ailist than 1 am, and if the right iove once takes possession of you, 
 see to it that you do not soar further above custom and the usages 
 of society than 1 who am and would like ever to remain a good, 
 modest girl, in the furnace of whatever fiery trial!" 
 
 Here Gorgo was reminded of the hour in which she, the woman, 
 had ottered as a free gift to the man of her choice what, according 
 to the code of custom, could be granted only in response to suit. 
 
 Blushing, her eyes tell ixjfoic those of the poor singing-girl, and 
 while she was pondering upon a suitable answer, the sound ot men's 
 steps was heard approaching, and soon there entered, first Eusebius 
 with Marcus, and then Gorgo's betrothed. 
 
 I'he later was greatly cast down, tor at the burning of his father's 
 dock his second brother had lost his life, and under the pressure of 
 such a calamity, it hardly weighed at all in the balance that his 
 father had lost a consider:! Die part of his property through the de- 
 struction of those great stores of lumber. 
 
 Gorgo had met liim in uncertaintv, and with embarrassment; but 
 after she had learned what had befallen him and his, she drew up 
 to him and tried to console huu. Tlie other, likewise, sympathiied 
 in his affliction, and soon, too, a ti;ne for weeping came to Dada; 
 for, through Eusebins, she learned of the death of her adopted par- 
 ents, and Orpheus' severe wound. 
 
 In the bright music-room there was naught but mourning, until 
 Demetrius appeared, in order to fulfill his promise and conduct his 
 brother and Dada to Maria, who was expecting them. 
 
 He had come in a carriage, for he asserted that his legs would no 
 lunger carry him. Man, said he, is just like the horse. Aswilt- 
 riding nag easily gives out when made to draw, and a strong 
 draught-horse soon tails ■when forced to run. His own feet are no 
 better fitted for town-parements, and theconfusion, racing and chas- 
 ing wear him out just as quickly as a rapid race wouldaplo\v-hor.se. 
 He thanks the gods that this day is over. Not until to nioirow will 
 he have strength enough to enjoy the fruit of his labors. But de- 
 spile this assertion, his whole person beamed with the satisfaction 
 that he experienced to the extent that his manners had a consoling 
 effect upon the afllicted party, eacli of whom he addressed with 
 cordiiilil}'. 
 
 As he suggested their breaking up, Gorgo once more kissed Ihe 
 singer. As soon as she perceived her distress, and noticed her silent 
 
202 SERA PIS. 
 
 weeping, she had hurried to her side and embraced her as if she had 
 been a sister. 
 
 Constauline, Gorgo, and old Eusebius were left alone, and the 
 younii lad}' loured to unburden her overflowing heart. She had 
 indeed promised her betrothed to tollow liim to his afflicted par- 
 ents; but thus she could not and would not present herself before 
 the Christian pair, beseeciiing their blessing. Tlie last occurrences 
 hud poisoned lier joj' in the new faith to which she had so hopefully 
 resorted; and althougli itpained lier tocost Conslauliue Iresh trouijle, 
 whose burdens weie hf-avy enough without this additional weight, 
 yet both duty and tlie love of Tnith bade her give him an insight 
 into her soul, laying bare before him the doubts and scruples which 
 liad been pouring m upon her during these last hours. 
 
 Ihe presence of the venerable priest was welcome lo her, for it 
 Wis her wish to become, inwardly, a convert to Christianity; and 
 no sooner did she find herself alone with him and Coustantine, than 
 she poured out before them the complaints which she had to make 
 against their fellows in the faith. Crime upon crime hatl been com- 
 mitted by Christians. They had destroyed the creations of art with 
 fiendish shouts of malice. There lay in aslies the temple of Isis, 
 and here the dock, destroyed by Christian incendiaries; her tears 
 were not yet stanched, and they flowed for her Christianly disposed 
 brothers, slaughtered in company with thousands of innocent 
 heathen and fellow-believers by the same emperor wdio styled him- 
 self the rock and most faiiliful follower of the Saviour's teachmgs, 
 and whom Coustantine had often praised as a wise monarch and 
 pious Christian. 
 
 When, at last, she had closed her heavy accusations, she called 
 upon Coustantine and the priest to justify the actions of their party, 
 and give back to her spirit^to confess a tailh that permits such 
 ciiuus. 
 
 But neither the one nor the other sought to palliate such proceed- 
 ings, and Conslantine acknowledged that all tliis flew directly in 
 tlie face of that high love, which his faith required from its pro- 
 lessors. The hud servant, cried he, has committed bad actions, 
 which ai'c directly opposed to the spirit and regulations of his mas- 
 ter's household. 
 
 But this acknowledgment did not at all satisfy Gorgo, who now 
 maintained that the master must be judged by his servanis' con- 
 duct; she herself hid only turned her back on tile old <rods. because 
 of her supreme contempt for their worshipers; but now she had been 
 an involuntary witness— the deacon must pardon her — of the fact, 
 that many Christians exceeded even those wretches in the abomina- 
 tions of which they were guilly, as well as brutal coarseness and 
 barbarity. Such experiences filled her with distrust of the faith 
 which she was about to adopt, and her soul felt shaken to its very 
 foundations. 
 
 Eusebius had, so far, listened to her in silence, but now he drew 
 nearer to her and asked her, in gentle tones, it she would deem it 
 right to drain the bed of the bountiful Nile, and leave it dry, be- 
 cause, occasionally, were destroyed in its overflow houses and the 
 products of the field? 
 
 " These days, these deeds uf shame," continued he sadly, " soil 
 
SERAPIS. 203 
 
 the pure and noble book of our faith's history, and whoever is a 
 true' Christian must bitterly bewail the excesses ol the rude multi- 
 tude. The emperor's shameful, bloody deed will also be condemned 
 by the church; it throws the darkest stain upoa his lionor and his 
 lair fame; moreover, his own conscience will (ash him. Far be it 
 from me to defend what is not to be justified--" 
 
 " But all this, "interposed (iorgo, " alters in nothing the fact, that 
 with you wicked deeds are just as possible and iTequent as with 
 those whom 1 shall now cease to cull my people, r.r:d. who — " 
 
 "And from whom," interrupted ConstantiiiO, " yOu uid not in- 
 tend to separate, Gorgo, merely on account of their Gemeanor. 
 Your animosity — confess it, maiden — makes you unjust to your 
 self, and your "own heart. Not out of contempt for vicious ami 
 miserable friends of the old gods, l)ut out of love, I hope and believe, 
 you consent to share my — our faith." 
 
 "Well, well," said she with animation, thinking blushingly of 
 the doubt raised by the singei as to the genuineness of Her love. 
 
 " Well! Out of love for you, out of love for love and peace, 1 
 consented to become a Christian; but what 1 see done by your peo- 
 ple; say yourself, and 1 ask you, loo, reverend father, whence 
 originates it— in hatred or love?" 
 
 "Hatred!" answered Constnntine, dispiritedly; and Eusebius. 
 added, with troubled mien: "In these momentous days our faith 
 shows itself in a shape utterly foreign to its nature, noble young 
 lady. Trust my words! Have you not learned already in your 
 young life that just what is greatest and highest becomes the vilest 
 in its exaggeration? Let noble pride transgress propei limits, and 
 it becomes unscrupulous ambition; tlie lofty virtue of humility 
 trenches on the unworthy exhibition of self-will, a spirit of untiring 
 energy tempts to that mad chase after fortune in whicb is trodden 
 down all that interferes with its attainment. What is sweeter than 
 the tender mother; but when she does battle for her child she is 
 trnnsformed into a tigress. Thus faith, that comforter of the heart, 
 changes imo a raging monster when it degenerates into fanaticism, 
 Would you learn to know what Chrislianity is, you must neither 
 look at the misguided mob and the ambitious, who are seeking to 
 gratify their own selfish aims, and following the dictates of passion, 
 nor even up to the throne, where power transmutes the impulse of 
 an unhappy moment into fatal deeds. Would you know what pure 
 acd genuine Christianity is, then enter the domestic circle, and btJ- 
 hold the families of true believers. 1 know them, tor my humble 
 office leads me into daily and hourly converse with them. You 
 must look upon them if you intend to bestow your hand upon a 
 Christian, and with nim raise up a family altar. There, child, there 
 you will see the blessed fruits of our Saviour's teachings, there will 
 you find love and harmony, mercy toward the poor, pious zeal and 
 unfeigned forgiveness of injuries endured. There have 1 seen the 
 Christian devote his last possession to the service of his unfortunate 
 adversary, the enemy of his bouse, whether heathen or Jew, because 
 such are men, and because we must feel our neighbor's sorrows as 
 our own. There you will find disposition to do every good thing, a 
 never withering hope of better days in future, when suffering sever- 
 est trials, and if death claims some dear one or beckons to ourselves. 
 
204 SERAPIS. 
 
 lliere is a firm confidenoc in the forgiveness of our sins, tbrougli Ihe 
 grace of Clirisl. Believe me, tlieu, dear joung lady, there is no 
 happier hon.e than the Chrisliim's; tor wLoevcr has a true knowl- 
 edte ot our Saviour and his doctrines need not be miserable lieie in 
 order to be made partaker ot heavenly bliss, and gain admittance 
 into the bright world above. On tlie contrary, He who called sin- 
 ners to Ilimsell, who drew little children to his heart, who pre- 
 ferred the poor l)etore the rich, wlio was a cheerful gutst at the 
 marriage fe:lst, who 1)ade us put his spiritual pound out at inttrest, 
 the same commanded us to remember him at the social meal; He 
 who opened our hearts to love, has desired to rid earthly existence 
 ol every possible pain and lack. Where love and peace reign, must 
 there not be happiness? And since He has preached nothing more 
 emphatically than love and peace. He can not have meant us volun- 
 tarily to darken life upon earth, and burden ourselves with wretch- 
 edness in order to l)e tit tor happiness hereafter. Every one who is 
 conscious of being one with Him feels himself freed from guilt and 
 misery, even here below; for Jesus has taken upon Himself all the 
 sin and suflering of the world; and if Fate punishes the Chiistiau, 
 too, with heaviest strokes, yet he bears them meekly and patiently. 
 Our Lord is love itself; He knows neither hatred nor envy, like the 
 heathen gods, and it He punishes us, He, the mild, omniscient dis- 
 ciplinarian, does it tor the best jrood of our souls. The all-wise God 
 knows wherefore, and the Christian submits with the docility of the 
 little child to the wise father, on whose goodness he may always 
 rely, and he even comes to thank Him for pains and sufferings, as 
 it they were benefits." 
 
 Here Gorgo again shook her head and replied: 
 
 " All that sounds noble and lieautiful; and it is required of 
 Christians, and certainly exemplified sometimes. But the stoics 
 demanded the same from their disciples, and, Conslantine, 3'ou used 
 to know the Stoic Damon, and remember how sternl}^ he required 
 others to rise proudly above pain luul distress. But when his only 
 daughter lost her eye-sight— she is a friend of mine— he behaved 
 like a madman. In' earlier days my father also recommended phi- 
 losophy to you, as a means for rising superior to the crosses of life 
 and the tricks of Fate. And now? You should only see my poor, 
 dear father. What good do all these lofty maxims do him now?" 
 
 " He has lo.st much, very much," remarked Constantine with a 
 slight sigh, heaved for the loss of his own brother. But Eusehius 
 shook his head gently anil said, " In such sorrow, neither philoso- 
 phy nor reasoning helps. Whar has hurt the sonl can be cured 
 only through the soul, not the mind or any ot its argumentation. 
 Faith, child, is the most efficacious l)alsam to apply. The reason 
 is its enemy; yet from the soul, its fountain, it extracts nourish- 
 ment; and let the wound from which a believer is bleeding be ever 
 so deep, it can supply balm wherewith to close and heal it. You 
 have learned to exercise a rich mind, to rest everything upon it, and 
 abide by its deoiBions. The knowledge that you have gained 
 through arguments and conclusions is the highest and last thing 
 witli you: but besides intellect the Lord has implanted spirit within 
 us. and it stirs and moves in its own ways, and the knowledge to 
 wliich it attains— even that, dear child, is faith. You love, my 
 
SEUAPTR. 305 
 
 (laughter; and love, tno. pertains to the spirit; and 1 should like to 
 advise you uol to mis up tliJit thiukiDi; mind witii love, as it does 
 not belouf^ to it. but nourish and clierisli it from your own rich 
 spirit; only in that case will it thrive beautifully and harmoniousl3\ 
 " Here 1 must malvc an end of n:y talli. for 1 have already kept 
 the wounded from the Serapeum waiting too long. If it so pleases 
 you. hereafter 1 shall expound to you Christianity in all its depth 
 and beauty; and your love for this brave man will enlist your heart 
 in behalf of my teachings. Then a day will come when you will as 
 graciously heed the voice of the spirit as hitherto the requirements 
 of intellect, and something quite new will spring up within you 
 that you will esteem more liighly than ever you did your richest 
 mental acquisitions. And this day will surely come for you, be- 
 cause he yonder has guided you into the path that leads to the por- 
 tals ot truth: and since 3'ou seek wisdom, you will find it. 
 
 " For tlie present, farewell! If you need the teacher, just come 
 to him. and 1 know he will not have to wait for you long." 
 
 Gorgo looked after the old man thoughtfully, and lhe"n followed 
 Constantine to his parents. 
 
 Silently the two traversed the short distance sepiirating the man- 
 sions, and silently they entered the house. 
 
 From the vestibule issued rays of light. The curtains before the 
 tall door stood open; and as they approached the threshold, Con- 
 stantine pouited to a hier that stood by the flower-bed in the middle 
 of this open court, and to his parents, who knelt beside it. 
 
 Neither of the two ventured to disturb then- silent devotions; but 
 now the master ship-builder arose, drew up his tall form erect, and 
 turned his manly, benignant countenatice to his wife, who now also 
 stood up. ffe drew one hand through his abundant hoary locks, 
 and held out to her his'right hand. Mariamne clasped it, looked at 
 him lovingly, and as she wiped away her tears, he said, firmly and 
 calmly, " The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away!" 
 
 Then she sunk upon his breast, and added, in low, fervent tones, 
 " Blessed be the name of the Lord!" 
 
 " \es. blessed be his name!" repeated Clement, aloud, and im- 
 pressivel3% as at the same lime he drew his arm over his eyes. 
 " Thirly-two years has God spared him to us. and in here "—and he 
 pointed to his broad breast—" in here He will live on for yoirand for 
 nie. That other loss — much property of my own and others was 
 comprised in that lumber — that other loss can be made up for in 
 the course of years. Let us thank the Most High lor fpariog us so 
 much!" 
 
 Then Gorgo felt the pressure of her lover's hand, and understood 
 what it signified, and she drew fondly up to him and whispered, 
 " That is great, that is true!" 
 
 CHAPTER XXN^llL 
 
 In the great mansion on Canopian Street, they were likewise slov 
 in retiring tonight. Even Demetrius, the fanner, in spite of his 
 fatiiiue, had been unfriie to his habit of relirinii' early forest; he had 
 to see the grain mature tli;.t he had sown lor his brother. 
 
20G SERA PIS. 
 
 It had been no light task to incUne Maria to accede to lifa wishes, 
 but he liad fumlly prevailed to l)is satisfaction. 
 
 He had been ill received, indeed, when be had begun with sound- 
 ing Dada's praises, and had proclaimed liis desire to see her married 
 to iMarcus; but in all calmness he had moved toward his goal a siep 
 at a time, and after he disclosed tlie tact, that he had it in his power 
 to obtain the martjT's crown for lier deceased husband Apellcs, it 
 had come to insinuations and open accusations of iiisiuccrilj' from 
 her side; oaths had been requited of him, and threats made against 
 him of both heavenly and earthly punishments; but he had calmly 
 let the storm blow over his head, had sworn as required, pledging 
 not only the salvation of his soul, but his worldly goods as well, 
 until, convinced of his power to obtain for her the warmest desire 
 of her lieart, she had become more accessible and assumed an altered 
 deportment. 
 
 I3ul tlien, in her vacillation and perplexity, he had not attempted 
 to assist her by even bo much as one word; leaving her to fight out 
 her own hard battle, looking on, not without malicious enjoyment 
 in the same, but likewise with some solicitude, until the first decisive 
 question was addressed to him. 
 
 She had refeired to his having fold her previously of Dada's de- 
 termination to receive baptism, and after she had been certified by 
 his answer, that the maiden was dispose 1 to become a Cliristian, she 
 had gone on to say: " And is it Marcus who has won her for the 
 failh?" 
 
 " He, he alone." 
 
 " And you swear that you deem her a pure and mo.lest girl?" 
 
 *' Gladly, and in the full conviction thai 1 speak tiuthl" 
 
 " 1 have seen her m the arena. She is beautiful and uncommonly 
 graceful; and Marcus?" 
 
 " He has set his whole heart on the girl, and 1 know that she 
 reciprocates his affection sincerely and disinterestedly. And then. 
 1 need hai'dly remind j^ou, that, in this city, among the most distin- 
 guished ladies of oar acquaintance, there are those whose origin is 
 mucn more questionable than tliat of your scon's lady-love, for she 
 belongs to a tree, unimpeachable famil^y. Her unclt's kindred he- 
 lomi to the first people in all Sicily; jet that need trouble us but 
 little, for the wife of Philip's grandson would have respect p;iid her 
 if slie were only a freedman's daughter." 
 
 " 1 know," Maria had murmured, as though all this was of slight 
 Bignifieance to her; but then she had sat si Hi a long nliilo, but at 
 last opened her eyes, and, in a voice that betotvcned the biitlle wliich 
 had been waged in her spirit, and was not yet completely won, she 
 exclaimed: " What shall 1 ask, then, more than my child's happi- 
 ness? In the Lord's sight, we aie all alike— small and great; but 1 
 am only a tveak woman, full ot imperfections and fi-ebleuess; jinil 1 
 could have wished a different alliame than this for the only son of 
 a noble house. So 1 say now: 1 regard this connectiim as a humilia- 
 tion which the Most High imposes'upon me. but 1 grant it my bless- 
 ing, and do so out of a full heart, it llie bride brings with lier as a 
 dowry the one thinir that for him, ;is for me. must croivn his every 
 wish, viz., t;ie eternal salvation ot Aiielles. The martyr's crown 
 opens for him, who was your father, as well the gates of Heaven, 
 
SERA PIS. 207 
 
 Procure it for him, and 1 shall, with my own hand, bestow the 
 singer upon my son!" 
 
 " That is a bargain," cried the countryman, and soon after mid- 
 night he had, at last, gotten to rest; for, in his presence Maria had 
 led the singer up to her son, and imparted to the betrothed her 
 motherly blessing 
 
 A few weeks later, together with Gorgo, Dada was baptized, and, 
 at the same time, received the name of Cecilia. In compliance with 
 Maria's wish, the nuptials of the young pair were solemnized by the 
 bishop himself. 
 
 In spite of the lavish proofs of more than a motherly tenderness 
 with which the widow overwhelmed her daughler-inlaw, Dada felt 
 chilled and embarrassed in her vicinity, and in the grand mansion 
 on Canopiau Street. 
 
 lYhea, therefore, a few weeks after their marriage, Demetrius, in 
 her presence, proposed to her husband that he should assume the 
 managenieuf. of their family's property in Cyrenaica, she caught at 
 the idea with enthusiasm, and Marcus quickly made up his mind lo 
 adopt Ihe suggeslion, after Demetrius had promised to go with him 
 and assist him during the first years by counsel and co-opeiatiou. 
 
 Their dread lest their mother might offer earnest objection to this 
 plan had been vain; for, although Maria declared life would be a 
 burden to her without her children, she quickly yielded to her son's 
 desire, and called it rational and good. 
 
 She did not dread the loneliness; tor, as the widow of the martyr 
 Apclles she now stood first among the Cliristian ladies in the city, 
 and preferred no longer to confine herseit to the narrowness of the 
 domestic circle. To visitors she constantly expatiated upon the 
 charms of her daughter-in-law Cecilia, praising lier beaut3% pi^ty. 
 and amiability; yes, she even made it appear as if she herself had 
 selected Dada as Marcus' wife. But Maria did not detain this " be- 
 loved daughter" in Alexandria; for, at all public assemblies to 
 which ladies were admitted, the noble widow of him who had sealed 
 his faith with blood held pre-eminence, whether or not the former 
 singer was in her company. 
 
 The youthful pair journeyed to Cyrenaica. Dada learned to 
 manage upon her husband's great estates with sound sense and ac- 
 ceptability. Out ot the lively professional singer developed an ac- 
 complished housewife; out of Marcus, the ideal lover of horses, a 
 diligent farmer. His brother Demetrius had remained with hitu 
 tliree years as counselor and guide; and when afterward he visited 
 him, as was frequently the case, he used to remark, to the happy 
 jMarcus: " In Alexandria 1 am a heathen out and out, but in your 
 Cecilia's house it is a plciisure to be a Christian." 
 
 Bet ore their departure a heavy misfortune had overtaken the 
 gray-haired deacon Eusebius. The sermon which he had preached 
 just before the fall of Serapis, in order to calm his congregation, 
 and point cut to them the right way, had been misconstrued by 
 some fimatical clergymen present, and by them represented to the 
 bishop as favorable to paganism, and blasphemous. Theophiius had 
 intrusted the in vest iiration of this affair, and ot the deacon's oithodoxy 
 to his zealous nephew and later successor, Cyril. In so doing it had 
 come to liglit, also, that he hud not only furnished shbllcr to the 
 
20S SEKAPIS. 
 
 Arian Agnes, but intrusted her with the nursfng of orthodox 
 ])alieutR, and so heavy penances had been imposed upon the vener- 
 able old ecclesiastic by youuy; Cyril. MoTeover, Thenphilus bad 
 decided tliat he should be relieved of his clerical oflice in the city 
 " where stronger minds were needed," and onl)' allowed the care of 
 souls in some country conmiunity. 
 
 It was hard ior the aged couple to leave the house and little garden 
 where they had been hai)i)y for thirty years; but they were soon in- 
 demuilicd in a handsome manner; tor Marcus summoned his worthy 
 spiritual guide to be priest on his estates. The churches which he 
 had built in his villages here were dedicated by old P^usebius, 
 whose mild teacliings and frit-ndlylove tor their souls induced many 
 peasants and slaves to be baptized. But yet greater influence than 
 his preaching was exerted by the persuasions and example ot their 
 young mistress. ]\Ian and woman, bond and free, loved her, 
 honored her, and thoutrht that to do as she did could only bring 
 honor; certainly could be nothinc: else than good and kind. 
 
 Thus, the teniples and sanctuaries on the land of the martyr's son 
 had been deserted voluntaiily, without force or threatening, and 
 soon went to decay. And as it happened on Marcus' estates so did 
 it on those of the Prefect Constanlinc. These were situated only a 
 day's journey away from Marcus' domain, and the two land- 
 owners were friends and good neighbors. What C'onstantine called 
 his had belonged to the Libyan Barcas, the same who, with his suc- 
 cors, had been vainly expected at the Serapeum. The state had con- 
 fiscated these extensive and valuable possessions; and, after retiring 
 from llie service, Constantine had purchased them with the large 
 fortune which old Damia had lefi to her irrandchild, Gorgo. 
 
 The merchant Porphyrins' sons had fortunately escaped the 
 massacre at Thessalonica, and since they were Christians, piously 
 devoted to their church, already in his life-time, iie passed over to 
 them his business, and a large share of his wealth, in order to be 
 without a care as to his last will, and keeping entirely aloof trom 
 the Christian Church, serve the old gods. Tlie bpautiful art treas- 
 tires, which Constantine and Gorgo found in Barcas' house, were 
 carefully preserved, and soon, in this region, too, only a few 
 heathen were left, although earlier it had been the center of many 
 insurrections in favor of the old c;od8. 
 
 Little Papias M'as brought up m ith Dada, Cecilia's children, on 
 Marcus' estates, and far from liis sister; for, alter she had been re- 
 lieved ot the charge of her little brother, she had sought and found 
 a life path of her own. 
 
 After his parents' death, fighting for berapis, the sorely wounded 
 Orpheus had been conveyed to the hospital, of which Eusebius had 
 the spiritual oversight 
 
 Agnes had undertaken to nurse him. and watched by his couch 
 ninht and day. For Dada and little Papias had gone away under 
 charge of Eusebius, and. in Marcus' name, she had received the 
 assurance that, in the event ot the good deacon's death, both she and 
 )ier brother should ijo taken the very l)est caie of. For the present 
 the child's education liad been committed to that venerable man, 
 and he daily delighted Agnes by repoiting to her tlie good (pialities 
 in the boy, that he supposed he hiniselt to have newly discovered. 
 
SEKAPIS. 509 
 
 As to the little fellow himself, he was well content in his new 
 home; and. rejoiced as he was to see Agnes attain, after his sister's 
 departure, he bounded oft luerril}-, wilh Eusebius and his Dada. 
 
 Orpheus recognized neither the maiden noi the child, and, after 
 his visitors lett the sick-chambler, spoke louder than ever to the 
 great x\.pollo and other heathen gods. 'I'hen he -fancied himself 
 doins battle tor berapis; and, in imagination, hewed down thousands 
 of Christian opponents. 
 
 In. such fits of rage, Agnes spoke kindly to him (although he but 
 seldom recognized her), and tried also to speak to him of her Saviour 
 and everlasting lite; but ever he would begin again his sinful dis- 
 course, and sometimes curse her. 
 
 Such deep sorrow she had never experienced before as at this bed- 
 side, and yet she could not take her eyes off his face; and when she 
 said to herself that he would soon cease to be, and that the glance 
 of his eye could never more meet hers, it seemed to he as if the 
 light of the sua would shine no more for her, and, in future, all on 
 earth be dark. But his sound constitution made him last several 
 more days acd nights. On his last evening he took Agnes for a 
 nurse, called to her, and then, with his hand in hers, fell back sense- 
 less upon his bed, to move no more; but while she waited anxious- 
 ly, minute after minute, dreading lest his hand shotild grow cold in 
 hers, she listened to the conversation of two deaconesses, who were 
 watching by the couch of the slumbering patient. 
 
 The one told the other that her sister's husband, a stone-nr.ason, 
 had died as an arch-enemy to the Christians, and asliff-necked 
 pagan. Then her sister Dorothea had taken upon herself the task 
 of saving his soul. She fled from her children, leaving them to the 
 tender mercies of the community, and repaired to a convent in order 
 to pray there in secret for the redemption of her deceased husband's 
 soul. 
 
 in the beginning, he had appeared to her with angry gestures, in 
 company with centaurs and club footed creatures, and bidden her 
 go back to her chililren, and leave his soul in peace, for he liked it 
 right well among these merry devils; but soon afterward he had ap- 
 proached her with scorched limbs, and besought her to plend pite- 
 ousl}' for his pardon, because he was being grievously tormented in 
 hell. 
 
 Then Dorothea had retired to the desert at Colcium, and still lived 
 in a cave there, being fed on herbs, roots, and mussels that the sia 
 casts on the strand. She bad deprived herself of sleep, and still 
 prayed day and night for the soul ot her husband; and power liad 
 l)een given her to keep ever in view her own and her husband's wel- 
 fare, and to think no more about hei children. Such fervid devotion 
 had finally attained the fairest reward, for it had been sonje time 
 since the deceased had appeared to her, clad in white raiment, and 
 often attended by beautiful angels. 
 
 Agnes had lost not a word of this narration; and when, on the 
 fdllowing day, she felt Orpheus grow cold, and looked upon the 
 painfully contracted features of the dead, cold shudders ran over 
 iicr; for she said to herself, this dead man, like J^orotliea's husband, 
 will -have to endure many tortures in hell. When they left her alone 
 
210 SEUAris. 
 
 ■nilh him, thon, she stooped down lo him, kissed his pallid lips, and 
 vowed to save his eoul. 
 
 Ou the same eveuinix ehe went back to Eusebius, and revealed to 
 him her wish to iro into the Colcian desert, to join there another 
 female anchorite. 
 
 The old man begged her to slay at his house, and watch over her 
 little brother, also not to leave his old companion and himself alone. 
 He explained that it was a beautiful service, on the Christian's part, 
 to exercise loving kindness and care for aged friends iu their feeble- 
 ness. 
 
 The deacon's wife, with tears, joined her entreaties to his; but 
 suddenly a strange coldness had steeled Agnes' heart; with dry eyes 
 she insisted upon having her way, and look leave of her benefactors 
 aud Papias. On foot, and besjging her food, she traveled to the 
 south-east, until she reached the shores of the Red Sea. There she 
 found the stone-mason's widow, with silvered hair, emaciated, and 
 nitrh unto death. She remained by her, closed her eyes, continued 
 in the same cavern the deceased's mode of life, and the fame of her 
 sanctity gradual^' ]ieuetraied tur beyond the confines of Egyi)t. 
 
 As a grown man and steward ot the now elderly Demetrius, 
 Papias visited her, in order to induce her follow him to his new 
 home; but she would not consent, preferring to remain in her soli- 
 tary cell. She would not hbve exchanged this lor a king's palace, 
 inasmuch as long since Orpheus had appeared to her ever}' night, 
 encircled by a halo of heavenly light, and the time drew near when 
 she might hope to met-t him again. 
 
 The Widow Maria, in her later years, undertook many a pilgrim- 
 age to shrines and holy persons, and among them the hermiless 
 Agnes; but at Cyrenaica, whither her chilaren aud grandchildren 
 frequently invited her. she never visited; for it needed stronger at- 
 tractions to induce her to sulimit to the discomforts of a journey. 
 
 Before her end every vestige of pagimism had vanished from the 
 old Greek city. AYiih it departed her crlory and petished hei 
 grandeur, and of ail the splendors of that second mistress of the 
 world, the citj' of Serapis, nothing has been left but one mighty 
 column, towering heaven waril, which belonged to that subtime 
 temple of the prince of gods, whose fall marked the close of a great 
 era in the spiritual life of humanity. Like that column, so the 
 heathen conception ot beauty in the concrete has not been lost. We 
 look up to both, and where the living soul of Christianity fills ;ind 
 Iienetrates this beautiful form with its light, theie has been fulfilled 
 liie fairest hope of old Eusebius. In Christian art the twain have 
 been made one. 
 
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