seemed to her to be a language in itself, bestowed by
God on all living creatures, even on the birds, wherein to speak to Him;
so she allowed herself to look forward with pleasure to an opportunity
of mingling her own voice with that of the heathen lady.

CHAPTER IV.

Not long after Porphyrius and the philosopher had retired to a private
room Herse returned with Dada. Gorgo's blue spangled dress, which Damia
had sent her, suited the girl to perfection; but she was quite out of
breath, and her hair was in disorder. Herse, too, looked agitated, her
face was red and she dragged little Papias, whose hand she held, rather
roughly at her heels.

Dada was evidently abashed; less by reason of the splendor that
surrounded her than because her foster-mother had strictly enjoined her
to be very quiet and mannerly in the presence of their patrons. She felt
shy and strange as she made her low courtesy to the old lady; but Damia
seemed to be pleased with the timid grace of her demeanor, for she
offered her her hand--an honor she usually conferred only on her
intimates, bid her stoop, and gave her a kiss, saying kindly: "You are
a good brave girl. Fidelity to your friends is pleasing in the sight of
the gods, and finds its reward even among men."

Dada, obeying a happy impulse, threw herself on her knees before the old
woman, kissed her hands, and then, sitting on her heels, nestled at her
feet.

Gorgo, however, noticing Herse's agitation, asked what had happened to
them. Some monks, Herse explained, had followed them on the road hither,
had snatched Dada's lyre from the slave who was carrying it and pulled
the wreath out of her hair. Damia was furious as she heard it, and
trembled with rage as she railed at the wild hordes who disgraced and
desecrated Alexandria, the sacred home of the Muses; then she began to
speak once more of the young captain, Mary's son, to whom the troupe of
singers owed their lives.

"Marcus," said she, "is said to be a paragon of chastity. He races in
the hippodrome with all the gallants of the town and yet--if it is true
it is a miracle--he shuns women as though he were a priest already. His
mother is very anxious that he should become one; but he, by the grace
of Aphrodite, is the son of my handsome Appelles, who, if he had gazed
into those blue eyes all the way from Rome to Alexandria, would have
surrendered at mercy; but then he would also have conquered them--as
surely as I hope to live till