let me be the end of trouble. Say to the prefect that in three hours'
time the British envoy will come to his camp with the king's answer to
his summons."

The old king would have replied otherwise, but his daughter's
entreaties and the counsels of his captains who knew the hopelessness
of resistance, forced him to assent, and his herald made answer
accordingly.

Constantius the prefect--a manly, pleasant looking young commander,
called Chlorus or "the sallow," from his pale face,--sat in his tent
within the Roman camp. The three hours' grace allowed had scarcely
expired when his sentry announced the arrival of the envoy of Coel of
Britain.

"Bid him enter," said the prefect. Then, as the curtains of his tent
were drawn aside, the prefect started in surprise, for there before him
stood, not the rugged form of a British fighting man, but a fair young
girl, who bent her graceful head in reverent obeisance to the youthful
representative of the Imperial Caesars.

"What would'st thou with me, maiden?" asked the prefect.

"I am the daughter of Coel of Britain," said the girl, "and I am come to
sue for pardon and for peace."

"The Roman people have no quarrel with the girls of Britain," said the
prefect. "Hath then King Coel fallen so low in state that a maiden must
plead for him?"

"He hath not fallen at all, O Prefect," replied the girl proudly; "the
king, my father, would withstand thy force but that I, his daughter,
know the cause of this unequal strife, and seek to make terms with the
victors."

The girl's fearlessness pleased the prefect, for Constantius Chlorus was
a humane and gentle man, fierce enough in fight, but seeking never to
needlessly wound an enemy or lose a friend.

"And what are thy terms, fair envoy of Britain?" he demanded.

"These, O Prefect," replied Helena, "If but thou wilt remove thy cohorts
to Londinium, I pledge my father's faith and mine, that he will, within
five days, deliver to thee as hostage for his fealty, myself and twenty
children of his councillors and captains. And further, I, Helena the
princess, will bind myself to deliver up to thee, with the hostages, the
chief rebel in this revolt, and the one to whose counselling this strife
with Rome is due."

Both the matter and the manner of the offered terms still further
pleased the prefect, and he said: "Be it so, Princess." Then summoning
his lieutenant, he said: "Conduct the envoy of Coel of Britain with all
courtesy to the