the South of Europe, and finally reached Athens.
There I met my beloved wife, who might well also have been called the
'Beautiful,' like my old Greek ancestor. There I married her, and there,
a year afterwards, when my boy was born, she died."

[*] The Strong and Beautiful, or, more accurately, the
Beautiful in strength.

[+] The Kallikrates here referred to by my friend was a
Spartan, spoken of by Herodotus (Herod. ix. 72) as being
remarkable for his beauty. He fell at the glorious battle of
Plataea (September 22, B.C. 479), when the Lacedaemonians
and Athenians under Pausanias routed the Persians, putting
nearly 300,000 of them to the sword. The following is a
translation of the passage, "For Kallikrates died out of the
battle, he came to the army the most beautiful man of the
Greeks of that day--not only of the Lacedaemonians
themselves, but of the other Greeks also. He when Pausanias
was sacrificing was wounded in the side by an arrow; and
then they fought, but on being carried off he regretted his
death, and said to Arimnestus, a Plataean, that he did not
grieve at dying for Greece, but at not having struck a blow,
or, although he desired so to do, performed any deed worthy
of himself." This Kallikrates, who appears to have been as
brave as he was beautiful, is subsequently mentioned by
Herodotus as having been buried among the {~GREEK SMALL
LETTER IOTA WITH PSILI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK
SMALL LETTER EPSILON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER
NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL
SIGMA~} (young commanders), apart from the other Spartans
and the Helots.--L. H. H.

He paused a while, his head sunk upon his hand, and then continued--

"My marriage had diverted me from a project which I cannot enter into
now. I have no time, Holly--I have no time! One day, if you accept my
trust, you will learn all about it. After my wife's death I turned my
mind to it again. But first it was necessary, or, at least, I conceived
that it was necessary, that I should attain to a perfect knowledge of
Eastern dialects, especially Arabic. It was to facilitate my studies
that I came here. Very soon, however, my disease developed itself, and
now there is an end of me." And as though to emphasise his words he
burst into another terrible fit of coughing.

I gave him some more whisky,