tted her for the position in
which she had been placed, and those around looked on the beautiful girl
as one destined in due time to fill the mightiest position of honour in
the great Temple, and prophesied that she would soon reach the proud
eminence of High Priestess.

Saronia was not an ordinary being; one look at the rounded forehead
which shone over dark eyebrows and the unfathomable eyes would convince
the most sceptical. The mysteries had a charm for her, and now that she
had been taught the hidden secrets of Nature, she craved to understand
the powers which worked the will, to dive deeply into the sympathies
governing the soul, and to become skilled in the magical rites observed
in the worship of the goddess of the underworld.

Hers was an exceptional case, and her companions, knowing a great spirit
was in their midst, hastened her career until, moving rapidly forwards,
she stood inferior in knowledge and power to none save the
Arch-Priestess of Diana. Thus the slave became a spiritual princess, and
won the confidence of the people; they loved her for her goodness. Ever
ready with words of kindness, she won the deepest regard from the
suffering and the outcast.

Those duties were but one part of her priestly call--that part which
reflected the purest nature of her goddess.

She worshipped one goddess, yet three: Luna in heaven, Diana on earth,
Hecate in hell--a terrible gathering together of good and evil, a
trinity in unity, but not a trinity in purity, a broken circle
representing Morn, Noon, Night, Birth, Life, Death.

It was when Saronia moved into the great darkness of Hecate that the
gloom and passion of the priestess were aroused, and the constant
warring of evil against goodness within awakened new aspirations for
another experience when she might revolve in a circle of truth and
unsullied purity.

And thus it is that when we would do good, evil will present itself; so
men set up the symbol of fire as the symbol of deity. Its active
elements represent the bad; the light from the flame, the flower of the
fire, designates the good.

The mystery of evil worked mightily on the sensitive mind of the girl,
and she stretched forth through the darkness for a solution of this
great problem which has harassed the minds of men through the
ever-changing past. But no answer came, not a voice was heard, and she
settled herself as well as she could to penetrate deeper into the hidden
things, that perchance she