l note was audible in the
abandoned dwelling but the twitter of the birds which still came morning
and evening to perch on the balcony, for Arsinoe and the children had
never neglected to strew the parapet with crumbs for them at the end of
each meal.

All that was gracious, all that was attractive in the old palace had
vanished at Sabina's visit, and even Hadrian himself was a different
man to what he had been a few days previously. The dignity with which he
appeared in public was truly imperial and unapproachable, and even when
he sat with his intimates in his favorite room he was grave, gloomy and
taciturn. The oracle, the stars, and other signs announced some terrible
catastrophe for the coming year with a certainty that he could not
evade; and the few careless days that he had been permitted to enjoy at
Lochias had ended with unsatisfactory occurrences.

His wife, whose bitter nature struck him in all its repellent harshness
here in Alexandria--where everything assumed sharper outlines and more
accentuated movement than in Rome--had demanded of him boldly that he
should no longer defer the adoption of the praetor.

He was anxious and unsatisfied; the infinite void in his heart yawned
before him whenever he looked into his soul, and at every glance at the
future of his external life a long course of petty trifles started up
before him which could not fail to stand in the way of his unwearying
impulse to work. Even the vegetative existence of his handsome favorite
Antinous, untroubled as it was by the sorrows or the joys of life, had
undergone a change. The youth was often moody, restless and sad. Some
foreign influences seemed to have affected him, for he was no longer
content to hang about his person like a shadow; no, he yearned for
liberty, had stolen into the city several times, seeking there the
pleasures of his age which formerly he had avoided.

Nay, a change had even come over his cheerful and willing slave Mastor.
Only his hound remained always the same in unaltered fidelity.

And he himself? He was the same to-day as ten years since: different
every day and at every hour of the day.

CHAPTER XIII.

When Verus entered the palace Hadrian had returned thither but a few
minutes previously from the city. The praetor was conducted through the
reception-rooms to the private apartments, and here he had not long to
wait, for Hadrian wished to speak with him immediately. He found the
sovereign so thoro