re abstraction,
without representing to himself in fancy all those intimate details of
conjugal familiarity, so poignant, so bitter for those who love a woman
in the power of another. Now he had beheld Nyssia's blond head bending
like a blossom beside the dark head of Candaules. The very thought of
it had inflamed his anger to the highest degree, although a moment's
reflection should have convinced him that things could not have come
to pass otherwise, and he felt growing within him a most unjust hatred
against his master. The act of having compelled his presence at the
queen's dishabille seemed to him a barbarous irony, an odious refinement
of cruelty, for he did not remember that his love for her could not have
been known by the king, who had sought in him only a confidant of easy
morals and a connoisseur in beauty. That which he ought to have regarded
as a great favour affected him like a mortal injury for which he was
meditating vengeance. While thinking that to-morrow the same scene of
which he had been a mute and invisible witness would infallibly renew
itself, his tongue clove to his palate, his forehead became imbeaded
with drops of cold sweat, and his hand convulsively grasped the hilt of
his great double-edged sword.

Nevertheless, thanks to the freshness of the night, that excellent
counsellor, he became a little calmer, and returned to Sardes before
the morning light had become bright enough to enable a few early rising
citizens and slaves to notice the pallor of his brow and the disorder of
his apparel. He betook himself to his regular post at the palace, well
suspecting that Can-daules would shortly send for him; and, however
violent the agitation of his feelings, he felt he was not powerful
enough to brave the anger of the king, and could in no way escape
submitting again to this role of confidant, which could thenceforth only
inspire him with horror. Having arrived at the palace, he seated himself
upon the steps of the cypress-panelled vestibule, leaned his back
against a column, and, under the pretext of being fatigued by the long
vigil under arms, he covered his head with his mantle and feigned sleep,
to avoid answering the questions of the other guards.

If the night had been terrible to Gyges, it had not been less so to
Nyssia, as she never for an instant doubted that he had been purposely
hidden there by Candaules. The king's persistency in begging her not to
veil so austerely a face which the gods