e recollect,' said Sallust; 'the seat of memory, my Diomed, is
certainly in the stomach.'

Passing now once again into the cooler air, and so into the street, our
gallants of that day concluded the ceremony of a Pompeian bath.

Chapter VIII

ARBACES COGS HIS DICE WITH PLEASURE AND WINS THE GAME.

THE evening darkened over the restless city as Apaecides took his way to
the house of the Egyptian. He avoided the more lighted and populous
streets; and as he strode onward with his head buried in his bosom, and
his arms folded within his robe, there was something startling in the
contrast, which his solemn mien and wasted form presented to the
thoughtless brows and animated air of those who occasionally crossed his
path.

At length, however, a man of a more sober and staid demeanor, and who
had twice passed him with a curious but doubting look, touched him on
the shoulder.

'Apaecides!' said he, and he made a rapid sign with his hands: it was
the sign of the cross.

'Well, Nazarene,' replied the priest, and his face grew paler; 'what
wouldst thou?'

'Nay,' returned the stranger, 'I would not interrupt thy meditations;
but the last time we met, I seemed not to be so unwelcome.'

'You are not unwelcome, Olinthus; but I am sad and weary: nor am I able
this evening to discuss with you those themes which are most acceptable
to you.'

'O backward of heart!' said Olinthus, with bitter fervor; and art thou
sad and weary, and wilt thou turn from the very springs that refresh and
heal?'

'O earth!' cried the young priest, striking his breast passionately,
'from what regions shall my eyes open to the true Olympus, where thy
gods really dwell? Am I to believe with this man, that none whom for so
many centuries my fathers worshipped have a being or a name? Am I to
break down, as something blasphemous and profane, the very altars which
I have deemed most sacred? or am I to think with Arbaces--what?' He
paused, and strode rapidly away in the impatience of a man who strives
to get rid of himself. But the Nazarene was one of those hardy,
vigorous, and enthusiastic men, by whom God in all times has worked the
revolutions of earth, and those, above all, in the establishment and in
the reformation of His own religion--men who were formed to convert,
because formed to endure. It is men of this mould whom nothing
discourages, nothing dismays; in the fervor of belief they are inspired
and they inspire. Their reason first ki