her victim, and at the same time of
disguising the pungent aromatic odour, a basket of flowers which she had
plentifully sprinkled with the deadly poison was sent to the Empress. To
make assurance doubly sure, she concealed among the flowers one of
those beautiful but deadly asps, such as that from the bite of which the
dusky Queen of Egypt, the wanton Cleopatra, died. This, for purposes
connected with her nefarious arts, she had procured as what evil thing
could not be procured?--from the dealers in deadly drugs, philtres, and
potions in the crowded Ghetto of Rome.

To ensure the conveyance of the deadly gift to the hands of Valeria
herself, Juba invented the fiction that they were a thankoffering from
the young Greek, Isidorus, to his Imperial patroness for favours
received. With her characteristic cunning Juba had possessed herself of
the secret of his services rendered to the Empress, and of the interest
felt in him by her august mistress.

Valeria was in her _boudoir_ with her favourite and now inseparable
Callirho[e:], as her tire woman, dressing her hair, when the fatal missive
arrived. As Callirho[e:] received the basket from the hands of Juba, the
eyes of the slave gleamed with the deadly hate of a basilisk, and she
muttered as she turned away--

"May the curse of Isis rest on them both. My fine lady has driven black
Juba from the tiring room of the Empress. May she now share her fate,"
and, like a sable Atropos, she glided from the chamber with stealthy and
cat-like tread.

"Oh! what fresh and fragrant flowers," exclaimed the Empress Valeria, as
she bent over them, "see how the dew is yet fresh upon their petals."
Here she raised the basket so as more fully to inhale their fragrance.
At that moment the concealed and deadly asp whose dark green and glossy
skin had prevented its detection among the acanthus and lily leaves,
seized, with his envenomed fang, the damask cheek of the fair Valeria,
and for a moment clung firmly there.

"God, save her!" exclaimed Callirho[e:], who in a moment recognized the
cruel aspic, of which, as a child, she had been often warned in her
native Antioch, and with an eager gesture she flung the venomous reptile
to the ground and crushed its head beneath her sandal's heel. On the
quick instinct of the moment and without stopping to think of the
consequences to herself, she threw her arms about her Imperial mistress'
neck, and pressing her lips to her cheek, sucked the venom from