again after so long a period of darkness!"

"When--" repeated Hermon, his head drooping as he spoke.

"It must, it must be so!" rang with confident assurance from Thyone's
lips.

"And then," added Daphne, gazing sometimes upward to the firmament
strewn with shining stars, sometimes across the broad, rippling expanse
of the water, in which the reflection of the heavenly bodies shimmered
in glittering, silvery radiance, "yes, Hermon, who would not be glad to
exchange with you then? You may shake your head, but I would take your
place quickly and with joyous courage. There is a proof of the existence
of the gods, which so exactly suits the hour when you will again see,
enjoy, admire what this dreary darkness now hides from you. It was a
philosopher who used it; I no longer know which one. How often I have
thought of it since this cruel misfortune befell you! And now--"

"Go on," Hermon interrupted with a smile of superiority. "You are
thinking of Aristotle's man who grew up in a dark cave. The conditions
which must precede the devout astonishment of the liberated youth when
he first emerged into the light and the verdant world would certainly
exist in me."

"Oh, not in that way," pleaded the wounded girl; and Thyone exclaimed:
"What is the story of the man you mention? We don't talk about Aristotle
and such subjects in Pelusium."

"Perhaps they are only too much discussed in Alexandria," said the
blind artist. "The Stagirite, as you have just heard, seeks to prove the
existence of the gods by the man of whom I spoke."

"No, he does prove it," protested Daphne. "Just listen, Mother Thyone. A
little boy grows up from earliest childhood into a youth in a dark cave.
Then suddenly its doors are opened to him. For the first time he sees
the sun, moon, and stars, flowers and trees, perhaps even a beautiful
human face. But at the moment when all these things rush upon him like
so many incomprehensible marvels, must he not ask himself who created
all this magnificence? And the answer which comes to him--"

"There is only one," cried the matron; "the omnipotent gods. Do you
shrug your shoulders at that, son of the pious Erigone? Why, of course!
The child who still feels the blows probably rebels against his earthly
father. But if I see aright, the resentment will not last when you, like
the man, go out of the cave and your darkness also passes away. Then the
power from which you turned defiantly will force itself upon you, a