indered over the courtyard. It was
bare, save for one or two worshippers who crossed it. Presently a winged
thing fluttered down to my feet. But though a dove indeed, it was no
bird of mine--it knew me not. And it was draggled, begrimed, uncleanly,
as never were the doves of Aphrodite. And the sparrows (for these, too,
did I see), they were worse. I motioned them from me with loathing. I
renounced them all. Thus, Leander, have I fared in following your
counsels!"

"Well, it ain't my fault," he said; "it's the London soot makes them
like that. There's some at the Guildhall: perhaps they're cleaner."

"No," she said, vehemently; "I will seek no further. This is a city of
darkness and mire. I am in a land, an age, which know me not: this much
have I learnt already. The world was fairer and brighter of old!"

"You see," said Leander, "if you only go about at night, you can't
expect sunshine! But I'm told there's cleaner and brighter places to be
seen abroad--if you cared to go there?" he insinuated.

"To one place only, to my Cyprian caves, will I go," she declared, "and
with you!"

"We'll talk about that some other time," he answered, soothingly. "Lady
Venus, look here, don't you think you've kept that ring long enough?
I've asked you civilly enough, goodness knows, to 'and it over, times
without number. I ask you once more to act fair. You know it came to you
quite accidental, and yet you want to take advantage of it like this. It
ain't right!"

She met this with her usual scornful smile. "Listen, Leander," she said.
"Once before--how long since I know not--a mortal, in sport or accident,
placed his ring as you have done upon the finger of a statue erected to
me. I claimed fulfilment of the pledge then, as now; but a force I
could not withstand was invoked against me, and I was made to give up
the ring, and with it the power and rights I strove to exert. But I will
not again be thwarted: no force, no being shall snatch you from me; so
be not deceived. Submit, ere you excite my fierce displeasure; submit
now, since in the end submit you must!"

There was a dreadful force in the sonorous tones which made him shiver;
a rigid inflexible will lurked in this form, with all its subtle curves
and feminine grace. If goddesses really retained any power in these
days, there could be no doubt that she would use hers to the full.

Yet he still struggled. "I can't make you give up the ring," he said;
"but no more you can't mak