my influence?'

'Yes, I thought of thee; but thy presence here is too awful to
contemplate.'

'No, no, dearest love! this is our fate. Thou art my complement; we
cannot long remain asunder. Thine essence is a part of myself; thou art
my affinity, my counterpart, that which makes my whole, my sun. Remove
it, and the whole system is shaken, and wanders into chaos and oblivion.
Had I a thousand lives, not one should be reserved; all should be thrown
into the balance for thee.'

He caught her in his arms, and his lips met hers.

'Darling, art thou safe whilst I am here?'

'I am safe from mortals, but not from the ire of the goddess. Her great
invisible spirit cannot be deceived; all that is enacted here she knows
and records.'

'True, dearest; but even Venus loved.'

'Yes; but Diana is cold and chaste. This night bespeaks my fall. To love
is disobedience; for me to disobey is dire rebellion.'

'No, no, girl! it is not so! it cannot be! The Being who created us
implanted this love; it cannot be born of sin. Man makes laws, and man
often breaks them, without calling down the anger of the gods. Lovest
thou me, Saronia?'

'Ah, Chios, that is my crime! What brought thee to the grove of Hecate?'

'Thou.'

'I?'

'Yes, Saronia--to see thee on a most important errand. I strove to find
thee in the wood.'

'I thought as much. What was thy mission?'

Resting himself beside her on a couch o'erlaid with gold, he said:

'Canst bear surprise?'

'I think so.'

'Then hear;' and, whispering softly, he said: 'One day there came a man,
a minstrel, to my home; sad as the waves telling story of storm were the
strains of his song, and sweet as the clear running brook were the
sounds from his lyre. He sang of a far-away land. Hast thou heard of the
lonely West, where the isles of the Britons lie circled in purple
mists?'

'Yes.'

'He sang of a princess priestess who stood at the shrine of their gods.
He spoke of a Roman who came to that land and stole the pure heart and
the hand of this beautiful girl, and bore her away to the Cyclades, and,
further away, to the Tyrian Seas, to a resting-place in Sidon.'

'And what became of her, Chios?'

'Thou shalt hear. Their wedded life was brief. The Roman forsook her.
She died of a broken heart, and her babe survived.'

'How sad!' said Saronia.

'Wouldst thou know the name of the British girl?'

'I would.'

''Twas Saronia.'

'Saronia!' gasped the priestess, and, uttering a