is mending, and the greatest of thy ministers, O Asklepios, says he will
recover, so it must be true. Yet without thee even the skill of Galenus
is of little avail; wherefore I beseech you both, Heal Diodoros, whom
I love!--But I would fain entreat you for another. You will wonder,
perhaps--for it is Bassianus Antoninus, whom they call Caracalla and
Caesar.

"Thou, Asklepios, dost look in amazement, and great Hygeia shakes her
head. And it is hard to say what moves me, who love another, to pray for
the blood-stained murderer for whom not another soul in his empire would
say a word to you. Nay, and I know not what it is. Perhaps it is but
pity; for he, who ought to be the happiest, is surely the most wretched
man under the sun. O great Asklepios, O bountiful and gracious Hygeia,
ease his sufferings, which are indeed beyond endurance! Nor shall
you lack an offering. I will dedicate a cock to you; and as the cock
announces a new day, so perchance shall you grant to Caracalla the dawn
of a new existence in better health.

"Alas, gracious god! but thou art grave, as though the offering were too
small. How gladly would I bring a goat, but I know not whether my money
will suffice, for it is only what I have saved. By and by, when the
youth I love is my husband, I will prove my gratitude; for he is as rich
as he is handsome and kind, and will, I know, refuse me nothing. And
thou, sweet goddess, dost not look down upon me as graciously as before;
I fear thou art angry. Yet think not"--and she gave a low laugh--"that
I pray for Caracalla because I care for him, or am in love with him. No,
no, no, no! my heart is wholly given to Diodoros, and not the smallest
part of it to any other. It is Caesar's misery alone that brings me
hither. Sooner would I kiss one of those serpents or a thorny hedgehog
than him, the fratricide in the purple. Believe me, it is true, strange
as it must seem.

"First and last, I pray and offer sacrifice indeed for Diodoros and
his recovery. My brother Alexander, too, who is in danger, I would fain
commend to you; but he is well in body, and your remedies are of no
effect against the perils which threaten him."

Here she ceased, and gazed into the faces of the statues, but they would
not look so friendly as before. It was, no doubt, the smallness of
her offering that had offended them. She anxiously drew out her little
money-bag and counted the contents. But when, after waking the priest,
she had asked