run races; I always had a loathing for purchased
love; we do not want to wear a heap of garments bought merely because
they take our fancy--indeed, I am too hot as it is under this scorching
sun. The house is your own. The rent paid by Glaukias, for the work-room
and garden you inherited from your father, pays for half at least of
what we and the birds and the slaves eat. As for Philip, he lives on air
and philosophy; and, besides, he is fed out of the great breadbasket of
the Museum."

At this point the starling interrupted the youth's vehement speech with
the appropriate cry, "My strength! my strength!" The brother and sister
looked at each other, and Alexander went on with genuine enthusiasm:

"But it is not in you to believe us capable of such meanness. Dedicate
your next finished work to Isis or Serapis. Let your masterpiece grace
the goddess's head-gear, or the god's robe. We shall be quite content,
and perhaps the immortals may restore your joy in life as a reward."

The bird repeated its lamentable cry, "My strength!" and the youth
proceeded with increased vehemence:

"It would really be better that you should throw your vice and your
graver and your burnisher, and all that heap of dainty tools, into the
sea, and carve an Atlas such as we have heard you talk about ever since
we could first speak Greek. Come, set to work on a colossus! You have
but to speak the word, and the finest clay shall be ready on your
modeling-table by to-morrow, either here or in Glaukias's work-room,
which is indeed your own. I know where the best is to be found, and can
bring it to you in any quantity. Scopas will lend me his wagon. I can
see it now, and you valiantly struggling with it till your mighty arms
ache. You will not whistle and hum over that, but sing out with all
your might, as you used when my mother was alive, when you and your
apprentices joined Dionysus's drunken rout. Then your brow will grow
smooth again; and if the model is a success, and you want to buy marble,
or pay the founder, then out with your gold, out of the coffer and its
hiding-place! Then you can make use of all your strength, and your dream
of producing an Atlas such as the world has not seen--your beautiful
dream-will become a reality!"

Heron had listened eagerly to his son's rhapsody, but he now cast a
timid glance at the table where the wax and tools lay, pushed the rough
hair from his brow, and broke in with a bitter laugh: "My dream, do you
sa