tame turtle-doves! Why not? Why should they
lament over other things--which they can just as little mend--and which
perhaps need no more mending? Ah! there lies a gallant fellow underneath
that fruit-tree!'

Raphael walked up to a ring of dead, in the midst of which lay,
half-sitting against the trunk of the tree, a tall and noble officer
in the first bloom of manhood. His casque and armour, gorgeously inlaid
with gold, were hewn and battered by a hundred blows; his shield was
cloven through and through; his sword broken in the stiffened hand which
grasped it still. Cut off from his troop, he had made his last stand
beneath the tree, knee-deep in the gay summer flowers, and there he lay,
bestrewn, as if by some mockery--or pity--of mother nature, with faded
roses, and golden fruit, shaken from off the boughs in that last deadly
struggle. Raphael stood and watched him with a sad sneer.

'Well!--you have sold your fancied personality dear! How many dead
men?.... Nine.... Eleven! Conceited fellow! Who told you that your one
life was worth the eleven which you have taken?'

Bran went up to the corpse--perhaps from its sitting posture fancying it
still living--smelt the cold cheek, and recoiled with a mournful whine.

'Eh? That is the right way to look at the phenomena, is it? Well, after
all, I am sorry for you.... almost like you.... All your wounds in
front, as a man's should be. Poor fop! Lais and Thais will never curl
those dainty ringlets for you again! What is that bas-relief upon your
shield? Venus receiving Psyche into the abode of the gods!.... Ah! you
have found out all about Psyche's wings by this time.... How do I
know that? And yet, why am I, in spite of my common sense--if I have
any--talking to you as you, and liking you, and pitying you, if you are
nothing now, and probably never were anything? Bran! What right had you
to pity him without giving your reasons in due form, as Hypatia would
have done? Forgive me, sir, however--whether you exist or not, I cannot
leave that collar round your neck for these camp-wolves to convert into
strong liquor.'

And as he spoke, he bent down, and detached, gently enough, a
magnificent necklace.

'Not for myself, I assure you. Like Ate's golden apple, it shall go to
the fairest. Here, Bran!' And he wreathed the jewels round the neck
of the mastiff, who, evidently exalted in her own eyes by the burden,
leaped and barked forward again, taking, apparently as a matter of