tingale sauce; but for the first few
minutes no one spoke. During this temporary embarrassment, Vetranio
whispered a few words in Julia's ear; and--just as the Cynic was
sufficiently recovered to retort--accompanied by the lady, he quitted
the room.

Never was popularity more unalloyed than Vetranio's. Gifted with a
disposition the pliability of which adapted itself to all emergencies,
his generosity disarmed enemies, while his affability made friends.
Munificent without assumption, successful without pride, he obliged
with grace and shone with safety. People enjoyed his hospitality, for
they knew that it was disinterested; and admired his acquirements, for
they felt that they were unobtrusive. Sometimes (as in his dialogue
with the Cynic) the whim of the moment, or the sting of a sarcasm, drew
from him a hint at his station, or a display of his eccentricities;
but, as he was always the first soon afterwards to lead the laugh at
his own outbreak, his credit as a noble suffered nothing by his
infirmity as a man. Gaily and attractively he moved in all grades of
the society of his age, winning his social laurels in every rank,
without making a rival to dispute their possession, or an enemy to
detract from their value.

On quitting the Court waiting-room, Vetranio and Julia descended the
palace stairs and passed into the emperor's garden. Used generally as
an evening lounge, this place was now untenanted, save by the few
attendants engaged in cultivating the flower-beds and watering the
smooth, shady lawns. Entering one of the most retired of the numerous
summer-houses among the trees, Vetranio motioned his companion to take
a seat, and then abruptly addressed her in the following words:--

'I have heard that you are about to depart for Rome--is it true?'

He asked this question in a low voice, and with a manner in its
earnestness strangely at variance with the volatile gaiety which had
characterised him, but a few moments before, among the nobles of the
Court. As Julia answered him in the affirmative, his countenance
expressed a lively satisfaction; and seating himself by her side, he
continued the conversation thus:--

'If I thought that you intended to stay for any length of time in the
city, I should venture upon a fresh extortion from your friendship by
asking you to lend me your little villa at Aricia!'

'You shall take with you to Rome an order on my steward to place
everything there at your entire d