"What a delightful morning it has been!"
"It would have been pleasanter for me," replied Eulaeus, "if you had not
deprived me of your company for such a long time."

"That is to say," answered the Roman, "that I have stayed away longer
than I ought."

"You behave after the fashion of your race," said the other bowing low.
"They have kept even kings waiting in their ante-chambers."

"But you do not wear a crown," said Publius evasively.  "And if any one
should know how to wait it is an old courtier, who--"

"When it is at the command of his sovereign," interrupted Eulaeus, the
old courtier may submit, even when youngsters choose to treat him with
contempt."

"That hits us both," said Publius, turning to Lysias.  "Now you may
answer him, I have heard and said enough."




CHAPTER III.

Irene's foot was not more susceptible to the chafing of a strap than her
spirit to a rough or an unkind word; the Roman's words and manner had
hurt her feelings.

She went towards home with a drooping head and almost crying, but before
she had reached it her eyes fell on the peaches and the roast bird she
was carrying.  Her thoughts flew to her sister and how much the famishing
girl would relish so savory a meal; she smiled again, her eyes shone with
pleasure, and she went on her way with a quickened step.  It never once
occurred to her that Klea would ask for the violets, or that the young
Roman could be anything more to her sister than any other stranger.

She had never had any other companion than Klea, and after work, when
other girls commonly discussed their longings and their agitations and
the pleasures and the torments of love, these two used to get home so
utterly wearied that they wanted nothing but peace and sleep.  If they
had sometimes an hour for idle chat Klea ever and again would tell some
story of their old home, and Irene, who even within the solemn walls of
the temple of Serapis sought and found many innocent pleasures, would
listen to her willingly, and interrupt her with questions and with
anecdotes of small events or details which she fancied she remembered of
her early childhood, but which in fact she had first learnt from her
sister, though the force of a lively imagination had made them seem a
part and parcel of her own experience.

Klea had not observed Irene's long absence since, as we know, shortly
after her sister had set out, overpowered by hunger and fatigue she had
fallen asleep.  Before her nodding head had finally sunk and her drooping
eyelids had closed, her lips now and then puckered and twitched as if
with grief; then her features grew tranquil, her lips parted softly and a
smile gently lighted up her blushing cheeks, as the breath of spring
softly thaws a frozen blossom.  This sleeper was certainly not born for
loneliness and privation, but to enjoy and to keep love and happiness.

It was warm and still, very still in the sisters' little room.  The buzz
of a fly was audible now and again, as it flew round the little oil-cup
Irene had left empty, and now and again the breathing of the sleeper,
coming more and more rapidly.  Every trace of fatigue had vanished from
Klea's countenance, her lips parted and pouted as if for a kiss, her
cheeks glowed, and at last she raised both hands as if to defend herself
and stammered out in her dream, "No, no, certainly not--pray, do not! my
love--"  Then her arm fell again by her side, and dropping on the chest
on which she was sitting, the blow woke her.  She slowly opened her eyes
with a happy smile; then she raised her long silken lashes till her eyes
were open, and she gazed fixedly on vacancy as though something strange
had met her gaze.  Thus she sat for some time without moving; then she
started up, pressed her hand on her brow and eyes, and shuddering as if
she had seen something horrible or were shivering with ague, she murmured
in gasps, while she clenched her teeth:

"What does this mean?  How come I by such thoughts?  What demons are these
that make us do and feel things in our dreams which when we are waking we
should drive far, far from our thoughts?  I could hate myself, despise
and hate myself for the sake of those dreams since, wretch that I am!
I let him put his arm round me--and no bitter rage--ah! no--something
quite different, something exquisitely sweet, thrilled through my soul."

As she spoke, she clenched her fists and pressed them against her
temples; then again her arms dropped languidly into her lap, and shaking
her head she went on in an altered and softened voice:

"Still-it was only in a dream and--Oh! ye eternal gods--when we are
asleep--well! and what then?  Has it come to this; to impure thoughts I
am adding self-deception!  No, this dream was sent by no demon, it was
only a distorted reflection of what I felt yesterday and the day before,
and before that even, when the tall stranger looked straight into my
eyes--four times he has done so now--and then--how many hours ago, gave
me the violets.  Did I even turn away my face or punish his boldness with
an angry look?  Is it not sometimes possible to drive away an enemy with
a glance?  I have often succeeded when a man has looked after us; but
yesterday I could not, and I was as wide awake then as I am at this
moment.  What does the stranger want with me?  What is it he asks with
his penetrating glance, which for days has followed me wherever I turn,
and robs me of peace even in my sleep?  Why should I open my eyes--the
gates of the heart--to him?  And now the poison poured in through them is
seething there; but I will tear it out, and when Irene comes home I will
tread the violets into the dust, or leave them with her; she will soon
pull them to pieces or leave them to wither miserably--for I will remain
pure-minded, even in my dreams--what have I besides in the world?"

At these words she broke off her soliloquy, for she heard Irene's voice,
a sound that must have had a favorable effect on her spirit, for she
paused, and the bitter expression her beautiful features had but just now
worn disappeared as she murmured, drawing a deep breath:

"I am not utterly bereft and wretched so long as I have her, and can hear
her voice."

Irene, on her road home, had given the modest offerings of the anchorite
Phibis into the charge of one of the temple-servants to lay before the
altar of Serapis, and now as she came into the room she hid the platter
with the Roman's donation behind her, and while still in the doorway,
called out to her sister:

"Guess now, what have I here?"

"Bread and dates from Serapion," replied Klea.

"Oh, dear no!"  cried the other, holding out the plate to her sister,
"the very nicest dainties, fit for gods and kings.  Only feel this peach,
does not it feel as soft as one of little Philo's cheeks?  If I could
always provide such a substitute you would wish I might eat up your
breakfast every day.  And now do you know who gave you all this?  No,
that you will never guess!  The tall Roman gave them me, the same you
had the violets from yesterday."

Klea's face turned crimson, and she said shortly and decidedly:

"How do you know that?"

"Because he told me so himself," replied Irene in a very altered tone,
for her sister's eyes were fixed upon her with an expression of stern
gravity, such as Irene had never seen in her before.

"And where are the violets?"  asked Klea.

"He took them, and his friend gave me this pomegranate-flower," stammered
Irene.  "He himself wanted to give it me, but the Greek--a handsome,
merry man--would not permit it, and laid the flower there on the platter.
Take it--but do not look at me like that any longer, for I cannot bear
it!"

"I do not want it," said her sister, but not sharply; then, looking down,
she asked in a low voice: "Did the Roman keep the violets?"

"He kept--no, Klea--I will not tell you a lie!  He flung them over the
house, and said such rough things as he did it, that I was frightened and
turned my back upon him quickly, for I felt the tears coming into my
eyes.  What have you to do with the Roman?  I feel so anxious, so
frightened--as I do sometimes when a storm is gathering and I am afraid
of it.  And how pale your lips are!  that comes of long fasting, no doubt
--eat now, as much as you can.  But Klea!  why do you look at me so--and
look so gloomy and terrible?  I cannot bear that look, I cannot bear it!"

Irene sobbed aloud, and her sister went up to her, stroked her soft hair
from her brow, kissed her kindly, and said:

"I am not angry with you, child, and did not mean to hurt you.  If only
I could cry as you do when clouds overshadow my heart, the blue sky would
shine again with me as soon as it does with you.  Now dry your eyes, go
up to the temple, and enquire at what hour we are to go to the singing-
practice, and when the procession is to set out."

Irene obeyed; she went out with downcast eyes, but once out she looked up
again brightly, for she remembered the procession, and it occurred to her
that she would then see again the Roman's gay acquaintance, and turning
back into the room she laid her pomegranate-blossom in the little bowl
out of which she had formerly taken the violets, kissed her sister as
gaily as ever, and then reflected as to whether she would wear the flower
in her hair or in her bosom.  Wear it, at any rate, she must, for she
must show plainly that she knew how to value such a gift.

As soon as Klea was alone she seized the trencher with a vehement
gesture, gave the roast bird to the gray cat, who had stolen back into
the room, turning away her head, for the mere smell of the pheasant was
like an insult.  Then, while the cat bore off her welcome spoils into a
corner, she clutched a peach and raised her hand to fling it away through
a gap in the roof of the room; but she did not carry out her purpose, for
it occurred to her that Irene and little Philo, the son of the gate-
keeper, might enjoy the luscious fruit; so she laid it back on the dish
and took up the bread, for she was painfully hungry.

She was on the point of breaking the golden-brown cake, but acting on a
rapid impulse she tossed it back on the trencher saying to herself: "At
any rate I will owe him nothing; but I will not throw away the gifts of
the gods as he threw away my violets, for that would be a sin.  All is
over between him and me, and if he appears to-day in the procession, and
if he chooses to look at me again I will compel my eyes to avoid meeting
his--aye, that I will, and will carry it through.  But, Oh eternal gods!
and thou above all, great Serapis, whom I heartily serve, there is
another thing I cannot do without your aid.  Help me, oh! help me to
forget him, that my very thoughts may remain pure."

With these words she flung herself on her knees before the chest, pressed
her brow against the hard wood, and strove to pray.

Only for one thing did she entreat the gods; for strength to forget the
man who had betrayed her into losing her peace of mind.

But just as swift clouds float across the sky, distracting the labors of
the star-gazer, who is striving to observe some remote planet--as the
clatter of the street interrupts again and again some sweet song we fain
would hear, marring it with its harsh discords--so again and again the
image of the young Roman came across Klea's prayers for release from that
very thought, and at last it seemed to her that she was like a man who
strives to raise a block of stone by the exertion of his utmost strength,
and who weary at last of lifting the stone is crushed to the earth by its
weight; still she felt that, in spite of all her prayers and efforts, the
enemy she strove to keep off only came nearer, and instead of flying from
her, overmastered her soul with a grasp from which she could not escape.

Finally she gave up the unavailing struggle, cooled her burning face with
cold water, and tightened the straps of her sandals to go to the temple;
near the god himself she hoped she might in some degree recover the peace
she could not find here.

Just at the door she met Irene, who told her that the singing-practice
was put off, on account of the procession which was fixed for four hours
after noon.  And as Klea went towards the temple her sister called after
her.

"Do not stay too long though, water will be wanted again directly for the
libations."

"Then will you go alone to the work?" asked Klea; "there cannot be very
much wanted, for the temple will soon be empty on account of the
procession.  A few jars-full will be enough.  There is a cake of bread
and a peach in there for you; I must keep the other for little Philo."




CHAPTER IV.

Klea went quickly on towards the temple, without listening to Irene's
excuses.  She paid no heed to the worshippers who filled the forecourt,
praying either with heads bent low or with uplifted arms or, if they were
of Egyptian extraction, kneeling on the smooth stone pavement, for, even
as she entered, she had already begun to turn in supplication to the
divinity.

She crossed the great hall of the sanctuary, which was open only to the
initiated and to the temple-servants, of whom she was one.  Here all
around her stood a crowd of slender columns, their shafts crowned with
gracefully curved flower calyxes, like stems supporting lilies, over her
head she saw in the ceiling an image of the midnight sky with the bright,
unresting and ever-restful stars; the planets and fixed stars in their
golden barks looked down on her silently.  Yes! here were the twilight
and stillness befitting a personal communion with the divinity.

The pillars appeared to her fancy like a forest of giant growth, and it
seemed to her that the perfume of the incense emanated from the gorgeous
floral capitals that crowned them; it penetrated her senses, which were
rendered more acute by fasting and agitation, with a sort of
intoxication.  Her eyes were raised to heaven, her arms crossed over her
bosom as she traversed this vast hall, and with trembling steps
approached a smaller and lower chamber, where in the furthest and darkest
background a curtain of heavy and costly material veiled the brazen door
of the holy of holies.

Even she was forbidden to approach this sacred place; but to-day she was
so filled with longing for the inspiring assistance of the god, that she
went on to the holy of holies in spite of the injunction she had never
yet broken, not to approach it.  Filled with reverent awe she sank down
close to the door of the sacred chamber, shrinking close into the angle
formed between a projecting door-post and the wall of the great hall.

The craving desire to seek and find a power outside us as guiding the
path of our destiny is common to every nation, to every man; it is as
surely innate in every being gifted with reason--many and various as
these are--as the impulse to seek a cause when we perceive an effect, to
see when light visits the earth, or to hear when swelling waves of sound
fall on our ear.  Like every other gift, no doubt that of religious
sensibility is bestowed in different degrees on different natures.
In Klea it had always been strongly developed, and a pious mother had
cultivated it by precept and example, while her father always had taught
her one thing only: namely to be true, inexorably true, to others as to
herself.

Afterwards she had been daily employed in the service of the god whom she
was accustomed to regard as the greatest and most powerful of all the
immortals, for often from a distance she had seen the curtain of the
sanctuary pushed aside, and the statue of Serapis with the Kalathos on
his head, and a figure of Cerberus at his feet, visible in the half-light
of the holy of holies; and a ray of light, flashing through the darkness
as by a miracle, would fall upon his brow and kiss his lips when
his goodness was sung by the priests in hymns of praise.  At other times
the tapers by the side of the god would be lighted or extinguished
spontaneously.

Then, with the other believers, she would glorify the great lord of the
other world, who caused a new sun to succeed each that was extinguished,
and made life grow up out of death; who resuscitated the dead, lifting
them up to be equal with him, if on earth they had reverenced truth and
were found faithful by the judges of the nether world.

Truth--which her father had taught her to regard as the best possession
of life--was rewarded by Serapis above all other virtues; hearts were
weighed before him in a scale against truth, and whenever Klea tried to
picture the god in human form he wore the grave and mild features of her
father, and she fancied him speaking in the words and tones of the man to
whom she owed her being, who had been too early snatched from her, who
had endured so much for righteousness' sake, and from whose lips she had
never heard a single word that might not have beseemed the god himself.
And, as she crouched closely in the dark angle by the holy of holies, she
felt herself nearer to her father as well as to the god, and accused
herself pitilessly, in that unmaidenly longings had stirred her heart,
that she had been insincere to herself and Irene, nay in that if she
could not succeed in tearing the image of the Roman from her heart she
would be compelled either to deceive her sister or to sadden the innocent
and careless nature of the impressionable child, whom she was accustomed
to succor and cherish as a mother might.  On her, even apparently light
matters weighed oppressively, while Irene could throw off even grave and
serious things, blowing them off as it were into the air, like a feather.
She was like wet clay on which even the light touch of a butterfly leaves
a mark, her sister like a mirror from which the breath that has dimmed it
instantly and entirely vanishes.

"Great God!"  she murmured in her prayer, "I feel as if the Roman had
branded my very soul.  Help thou me to efface the mark; help me to become
as I was before, so that I may look again in Irene's eyes without
concealment, pure and true, and that I may be able to say to myself, as I
was wont, that I had thought and acted in such a way as my father would
approve if he could know it."

She was still praying thus when the footsteps and voices of two men
approaching the holy of holies startled her from her devotions; she
suddenly became fully conscious of the fact that she was in a forbidden
spot, and would be severely punished if she were discovered.

"Lock that door," cried one of the new-comers to his companion, pointing
to the door which led from the prosekos into the pillared hall, "none,
even of the initiated, need see what you are preparing here for us--"

Klea recognized the voice of the high-priest, and thought for a moment of
stepping forward and confessing her guilt; but, though she did not
usually lack courage, she did not do this, but shrank still more closely
into her hiding-place, which was perfectly dark when the brazen door of
the room; which had no windows, was closed.  She now perceived that the
curtain and door were opened which closed the inmost sanctuary, she heard
one of the men twirling the stick which was to produce fire, saw the
first gleam of light from it streaming out of the holy of holies, and
then heard the blows of a hammer and the grating sound of a file.

The quiet sanctum was turned into a forge, but noisy as were the
proceedings within, it seemed to Klea that the beating of her own heart
was even louder than the brazen clatter of the tools wielded by Krates;
he was one of the oldest of the priests of Serapis, who was chief in
charge of the sacred vessels, who was wont never to speak to any one but
the high-priest, and who was famous even among his Greek fellow-
countrymen for the skill with which he could repair broken metal-work,
make the securest locks, and work in silver and gold.

When the sisters first came into the temple five years since, Irene had
been very much afraid of this man, who was so small as almost to be a
dwarf, broad shouldered and powerfully knit, while his wrinkled face
looked like a piece of rough cork-bark, and he was subject to a painful
complaint in his feet which often prevented his walking; her fears had
not vexed but only amused the priestly smith, who whenever he met the
child, then eleven years old, would turn his lips up to his big red nose,
roll his eyes, and grunt hideously to increase the terror that came over
her.

He was not ill-natured, but he had neither wife nor child, nor brother,
nor sister, nor friend, and every human being so keenly desires that
others should have some feeling about him, that many a one would rather
be feared than remain unheeded.

After Irene had got over her dread she would often entreat the old man--
who was regarded as stern and inaccessible by all the other dwellers in
the temple--in her own engaging and coaxing way to make a face for her,
and he would do it and laugh when the little one, to his delight and her
own, was terrified at it and ran away; and just lately when Irene, having
hurt her foot, was obliged to keep her room for a few days, an unheard of
thing had occurred: he had asked Klea with the greatest sympathy how her
sister was getting on, and had given her a cake for her.

While Krates was at his work not a word passed between him and the high-
priest.  At length he laid down the hammer, and said:

"I do not much like work of this kind, but this, I think, is successful
at any rate.  Any temple-servant, hidden here behind the altar, can now
light or extinguish the lamps without the illusion being detected by the
sharpest.  Go now and stand at the door of the great hall and speak the
word."

Klea heard the high-priest accede to this request and cry in a
chanting voice: "Thus he commands the night and it becomes day, and the
extinguished taper and lo! it flames with brightness.  If indeed thou art
nigh, Oh Serapis! manifest thyself to us."

At these words a bright stream of light flashed from the holy of holies,
and again was suddenly extinguished when the high-priest sang: "Thus
showest thou thyself as light to the children of truth, but dost punish
with darkness the children of lies."

"Again?"  asked Krates in a voice which conveyed a desire that the answer
might be 'No.'

"I must trouble you," replied the high-priest.  "Good! the performance
went much better this time.  I was always well assured of your skill; but
consider the particular importance of this affair.  The two kings and the
queen will probably be present at the solemnity, certainly Philometor and
Cleopatra will, and their eyes are wide open; then the Roman who has
already assisted four times at the procession will accompany them, and if
I judge him rightly he, like many of the nobles of his nation, is one of
those who can trust themselves when it is necessary to be content with
the old gods of their fathers; and as regards the marvels we are able to
display to them, they do not take them to heart like the poor in spirit,
but measure and weigh them with a cool and unbiassed mind.  People of
that stamp, who are not ashamed to worship, who do not philosophize but
only think just so much as is necessary for acting rightly, those are the
worst contemners of every supersensual manifestation."

"And the students of nature in the Museum?"  asked Krates.  "They believe
nothing to be real that they cannot see and observe."

"And for that very reason," replied the high-priest, "they are often
singularly easy to deceive by your skill, since, seeing an effect without
a cause, they are inclined to regard the invisible cause as something
supersensual.  Now, open the door again and let us get out by the side
door; do you, this time, undertake the task of cooperating with Serapis
yourself.  Consider that Philometor will not confirm the donation of the
land unless he quits the temple deeply penetrated by the greatness of our
god.  Would it be possible, do you think, to have the new censer ready in
time for the birthday of King Euergetes, which is to be solemnly kept at
Memphis?"

"We will see," replied Krates, "I must first put together the lock of the
great door of the tomb of Apis, for so long as I have it in my workshop
any one can open it who sticks a nail into the hole above the bar, and
any one can shut it inside who pushes the iron bolt.  Send to call me
before the performance with the lights begins; I will come in spite of my
wretched feet.  As I have undertaken the thing I will carry it out, but
for no other reason, for it is my opinion that even without such means of
deception--"

"We use no deception," interrupted the high-priest, sternly rebuking his
colleague.  "We only present to short-sighted mortals the creative power
of the divinity in a form perceptible and intelligible to their senses."

With these words the tall priest turned his back on the smith and quitted
the hall by a side door; Krates opened the brazen door, and as he
gathered together his tools he said to himself, but loud enough for Klea
to hear him distinctly in her hiding-place:

"It may be right for me, but deceit is deceit, whether a god deceives
a king or a child deceives a beggar."

"Deceit is deceit," repeated Klea after the smith when he had left the
hall and she had emerged from her corner.

She stood still for a moment and looked round her.  For the first time
she observed the shabby colors on the walls, the damage the pillars had
sustained in the course of years, and the loose slabs in the pavement.

The sweetness of the incense sickened her, and as she passed by an old
man who threw up his arms in fervent supplication, she looked at him with
a glance of compassion.

When she had passed out beyond the pylons enclosing the temple she turned
round, shaking her head in a puzzled way as she gazed at it; for she knew
that not a stone had been changed within the last hour, and yet it looked
as strange in her eyes as some landscape with which we have become
familiar in all the beauty of spring, and see once more in winter with
its trees bare of leaves; or like the face of a woman which we thought
beautiful under the veil which hid it, and which, when the veil is
raised, we see to be wrinkled and devoid of charm.

When she had heard the smith's words, "Deceit is deceit," she felt her
heart shrink as from a stab, and could not check the tears which started
to her eyes, unused as they were to weeping; but as soon as she had
repeated the stern verdict with her own lips her tears had ceased, and
now she stood looking at the temple like a traveller who takes leave of a
dear friend; she was excited, she breathed more freely, drew herself up
taller, and then turned her back on the sanctuary of Serapis, proudly
though with a sore heart.

Close to the gate-keeper's lodge a child came tottering towards her with
his arms stretched up to her.  She lifted him up, kissed him, and then
asked the mother, who also greeted her, for a piece of bread, for her
hunger was becoming intolerable.  While she ate the dry morsel the child
sat on her lap, following with his large eyes the motion of her hand and
lips.  The boy was about five years old, with legs so feeble that they
could scarcely support the weight of his body, but he had a particularly
sweet little face; certainly it was quite without expression, and it was
only when he saw Klea coming that tiny Philo's eyes had lighted up with
pleasure.

"Drink this milk," said the child's mother, offering the young girl an
earthen bowl.  "There is not much and I could not spare it if Philo would
eat like other children, but it seems as if it hurt him to swallow.  He
drinks two or three drops and eats a mouthful, and then will take no more
even if he is beaten."

"You have not been beating him again?"  said Klea reproachfully, and
drawing the child closer to her.  "My husband--" said the woman, pulling
at her dress in some confusion.  "The child was born on a good day and in
a lucky hour, and yet he is so puny and weak and will not learn to speak,
and that provokes Pianchi."

"He will spoil everything again!"  exclaimed Klea annoyed.  "Where is
he?"

"He was wanted in the temple."

"And is he not pleased that Philo calls him 'father,' and you 'mother,'
and me by my name, and that he learns to distinguish many things?"  asked
the girl.

"Oh, yes of course," said the woman.  "He says you are teaching him to
speak just as if he were a starling, and we are very much obliged to
you."

"That is not what I want," interrupted Klea.  "What I wish is that you
should not punish and scold the boy, and that you should be as glad as I
am when you see his poor little dormant soul slowly waking up.  If he
goes on like this, the poor little fellow will be quite sharp and
intelligent.  What is my name, my little one?"

"Ke-ea," stammered the child, smiling at his friend.  "And now taste this
that I have in my hand; what is it?--I see you know.  It is called--
whisper in my ear.  That's right, mil--mil-milk! to be sure, my tiny,
it is milk.  Now open your little mouth and say it prettily after me--
once more--and again--say it twelve times quite right and I will give you
a kiss--Now you have earned a pretty kiss--will you have it here or here?
Well, and what is this?  your ea-?  Yes, your ear.  And this?--your nose,
that is right."

The child's eyes brightened more and more under this gentle teaching,
and neither Klea nor her pupil were weary till, about an hour later,
the re-echoing sound of a brass gong called her away.  As she turned to
go the little one ran after her crying; she took him in her arms and
carried him back to his mother, and then went on to her own room to
dress herself and her sister for the procession.  On the way to the
Pastophorium she recalled once more her expedition to the temple and
her prayer there.

"Even before the sanctuary," said she to herself, "I could not succeed in
releasing my soul from its burden--it was not till I set to work to
loosen the tongue of the poor little child.  Every pure spot, it seems to
me, may be the chosen sanctuary of some divinity, and is not an infant's
soul purer than the altar where truth is mocked at?"

In their room she found Irene; she had dressed her hair carefully and
stuck the pomegranate-flower in it, and she asked Klea if she thought she
looked well.

"You look like Aphrodite herself," replied Klea kissing her forehead.
Then she arranged the folds of her sister's dress, fastened on the
ornaments, and proceeded to dress herself.  While she was fastening her
sandals Irene asked her, "Why do you sigh so bitterly?"  and Klea
replied, "I feel as if I had lost my parents a second time."




CHAPTER V.

The procession was over.

At the great service which had been performed before him in the Greek
Serapeum, Ptolemy Philometor had endowed the priests not with the whole
but with a considerable portion of the land concerning which they had
approached him with many petitions.  After the court had once more
quitted Memphis and the procession was broken up, the sisters returned to
their room, Irene with crimson cheeks and a smile on her lips, Klea with
a gloomy and almost threatening light in her eyes.

As the two were going to their room in silence a temple-servant called to
Klea, desiring her to go with him to the high-priest, who wished to speak
to her.  Klea, without speaking, gave her water-jar to Irene and was
conducted into a chamber of the temple, which was used for keeping the
sacred vessels in.  There she sat down on a bench to wait.  The two men
who in the morning had visited the Pastophorium had also followed in the
procession with the royal family.  At the close of the solemnities
Publius had parted from his companion without taking leave, and without
looking to the right or to the left, he had hastened back to the
Pastophorium and to the cell of Serapion, the recluse.

The old man heard from afar the younger man's footstep, which fell on the
earth with a firmer and more decided tread than that of the softly-
stepping priests of Serapis, and he greeted him warmly with signs and
words.

Publius thanked him coolly and gravely, and said, dryly enough and with
incisive brevity:

"My time is limited.  I propose shortly to quit Memphis, but I promised
you to hear your request, and in order to keep my word I have come to see
you; still--as I have said--only to keep my word.  The water-bearers of
whom you desired to speak to me do not interest me--I care no more about
them than about the swallows flying over the house yonder."

"And yet this morning you took a long walk for Klea's sake," returned
Serapion.

"I have often taken a much longer one to shoot a hare," answered the
Roman.  "We men do not pursue our game because the possession of it is
any temptation, but because we love the sport, and there are sporting
natures even among women.  Instead of spears or arrows they shoot with
flashing glances, and when they think they have hit their game they turn
their back upon it.  Your Klea is one of this sort, while the pretty
little one I saw this morning looks as if she were very ready to be
hunted, I however, no more wish to be the hunter of a young girl than to
be her game.  I have still three days to spend in Memphis, and then I
shall turn my back forever on this stupid country."

"This morning," said Serapion, who began to suspect what the grievance
might be which had excited the discontent implied in the Roman's speech,
"This morning you appeared to be in less hurry to set out than now, so to
me you seem to be in the plight of game trying to escape; however, I know
Klea better than you do.  Shooting is no sport of hers, nor will she let
herself be hunted, for she has a characteristic which you, my friend
Publius Scipio, ought to recognize and value above all others--she is
proud, very proud; aye, and so she may be, scornful as you look--as if
you would like to say 'how came a water-carrier of Serapis by her pride,
a poor creature who is ill-fed and always engaged in service, pride which
is the prescriptive right only of those, whom privilege raises above the
common herd around them?--But this girl, you may take my word for it, has
ample reason to hold her head high, not only because she is the daughter
of free and noble parents and is distinguished by rare beauty, not
because while she was still a child she undertook, with the devotion
and constancy of the best of mothers, the care of another child--her
own sister, but for a reason which, if I judge you rightly, you will
understand better than many another young man; because she must uphold
her pride in order that among the lower servants with whom unfortunately
she is forced to work, she may never forget that she is a free and noble
lady.  You can set your pride aside and yet remain what you are, but if
she were to do so and to learn to feel as a servant, she would presently
become in fact what by nature she is not and by circumstances is
compelled to be.  A fine horse made to carry burdens becomes a mere cart-
horse as soon as it ceases to hold up its head and lift its feet freely.
Klea is proud because she must be proud; and if you are just you will not
contemn the girl, who perhaps has cast a kindly glance at you--since the
gods have so made you that you cannot fail to please any woman--and yet
who must repel your approaches because she feels herself above being
trifled with, even by one of the Cornelia gens, and yet too lowly to dare
to hope that a man like you should ever stoop from your height to desire
her for a wife.  She has vexed you, of that there can be no doubt; how,
I can only guess.  If, however, it has been through her repellent pride,
that ought not to hurt you, for a woman is like a soldier, who only puts
on his armor when he is threatened by an opponent whose weapons he
fears."

The recluse had rather whispered than spoken these words, remembering
that he had neighbors; and as he ceased the drops stood on his brow, for
whenever any thing disturbed him he was accustomed to allow his powerful
voice to be heard pretty loudly, and it cost him no small effort to
moderate it for so long.

Publius had at first looked him in the face, and then had gazed at the
ground, and he had heard Serapion to the end without interrupting him;
but the color had flamed in his cheeks as in those of a schoolboy, and
yet he was an independent and resolute youth who knew how to conduct
himself in difficult straits as well as a man in the prime of life.
In all his proceedings he was wont to know very well, exactly what he
wanted, and to do without any fuss or comment whatever he thought right
and fitting.

During the anchorite's speech the question had occurred to him, what did
he in fact expect or wish of the water-bearer; but the answer was
wanting, he felt somewhat uncertain of himself, and his uncertainty and
dissatisfaction with himself increased as all that he heard struck him
more and more.  He became less and less inclined to let himself be thrown
over by the young girl who for some days had, much against his will, been
constantly in his thoughts, whose image he would gladly have dismissed
from his mind, but who, after the recluse's speech, seemed more desirable
than ever.  "Perhaps you are right," he replied after a short silence,
and he too lowered his voice, for a subdued tone generally provokes an
equally subdued answer.  "You know the maiden better than I, and if you
describe her correctly it would be as well that I should abide by my
decision and fly from Egypt, or, at any rate, from your protegees, since
nothing lies before me but a defeat or a victory, which could bring me
nothing but repentance.  Klea avoided my eye to-day as if it shed poison
like a viper's tooth, and I can have nothing more to do with her: still,
might I be informed how she came into this temple? and if I can be of any
service to her, I will-for your sake.  Tell me now what you know of her
and what you wish me to do."

The recluse nodded assent and beckoned Publius to come closer to him, and
bowing down to speak into the Roman's ear, he said softly: "Are you in
favor with the queen?"  Publius, having said that he was, Serapion, with
an exclamation of satisfaction, began his story.

"You learned this morning how I myself came into this cage, and that my