ings in order to have at his disposal
everything which renders so dear to us all the giver of bread, the
preserver of peace, the protector of marriage, the creator and supporter
of the law of moderation in Nature, as well as in human existence. Where
would all these traits be found more perfectly united in a single human
being than in your person, Daphne, your quiet, kindly rule?"

"Oh, stop!" the girl entreated. "I am only too well aware--"

"That you also are not free from human frailties," Proclus continued,
undismayed. "We will take them, great or small as they may be, into the
bargain. The secret ones do not concern the sculptor, who does not or
will not see them. What he perceives in you, what you enable him to
recognise through every feature of your sweet, tranquillizing face,
is enough for the genuine artist to imagine the goddess; for the
distinction between the mortal and the immortal is only the degree of
perfection, and the human intellect and artist soul can find nothing
more perfect in the whole domain of Demeter's jurisdiction than is
presented to them in your nature. Our friend yonder seized it, and his
magnificent work of art proves how nearly it approaches the purest and
loftiest conception we form of the goddess whom he had to represent. It
is not that he deified you, Daphne; he merely bestowed on the divinity
forms which he recognised in you."

Just at that moment, obeying an uncontrollable impulse, Hermon pulled
the bandage from his eyes to see once more the woman to whom this warm
homage was paid.

Was the experienced connoisseur of art and the artist soul in the right?

He had told himself the same thing when he selected Daphne for a model,
and her head reproduced what Proclus praised as the common possession of
Daphne and Demeter. Truthful Myrtilus had also seen it. Perhaps his work
had really been so marvellously successful because, while he was engaged
upon it, his friend had constantly stood before his mind in all the
charm of her inexhaustible goodness.

Animated by the ardent desire to gaze once more at the beloved face, to
which he now owed also this unexpectedly great success, he turned toward
the spot whence her voice had reached him; but a wall of violet mist,
dotted with black specks, was all that his blinded eyes showed him, and
with a low groan he drew the linen cloth over the burns.

This time Proclus also perceived what was passing in the poor artist's
mind, and when he took