his mantle without inquiry or reproof. Constantly disappointed he became disturbed and sad. Must he return without her who had revealed him to himself? her who had taught him how blessed a thing is a first, full, deep affection, so unselfish, so abiding, so unlike the maddening thrill of passion or the light ever-changing spells of fancy?

He was one day pacing a secluded alley in the garden of Nero when Alana suddenly crossed his path. He recognized her and, after a respectful salutation, spoke of the gay pageant and the garland of brilliant lamps.

"I am honored by your remembrance," answered the Jewess, "though it was sadly against my will that I was made so conspicuous."

"Thanks, then, that thy will was not consulted; but tell me, beautiful maiden, who was it stood at thy side like a cloud robed goddess? Perhaps she is one of thine own household, for thine eye rested very lovingly upon her."

"Thou hast learned little of Rome," returned Alana," if thou knowest not that it is scarce safe to converse of our private affairs with our kindred, much less to entrust them to the keeping of a stranger. What pledge canst thou offer for thine honor?"

"The word, lady, of a prince and a soldier."

The Jewess had learned the whole history of the prince. She knew that he was noble and generous, and that he loved truly her youthful friend. The idea pleased her. Should the affection be mutual it would procure for her guests a secure asylum, which they could never find in Rome. The young man breathed quickly and his foot pressed the earth less firmly than usual as he followed his guide. All the pride and contempt which had before mingled with his thoughts of woman had vanished. The mind, educated mind, which had shone on the sweet countenance of Flora, had, though he knew not what it was, inspired him with respect, and through her the whole sex was elevated in his eyes. He had arrayed his person with the utmost care and yet he felt while he did so that such solicitude would scarcely recommend him. He was uncertain how to appear and what to say, and he was anxious and silent.

They passed through narrow lanes to a low, massive portal which compelled them to stop ere

entering. A wilderness of turns and windings succeeded, and long passages whose stone walls were almost dripping with the accumulated moisture. At length the air grew fresher, and they entered a room, three sides of which were lattice work, so white and delicate that it seemed cut from ivory. Here and there the fragile bars were interrupted by gilded ornaments and mosaics of rare woods. Twined within and without, falling in festoons and then knotted up again, were vines springing from marble vases, and high up amidst their clustering blossoms hung silver lamps, sending a pleasant light down through the sleeping foliage. Violet colored cushions, over which the flowers seemed to have been scattered rather than wrought, lay about, intermingled with chairs gracefully fashioned from ebony and cedar inlaid with pearl. There were small tables, too, elaborately carved and strewn with manuscripts, guitars, goblets of wine and baskets of half finished embroidery, which displayed the rich fragments of silk through their golden network.

But none of these tasteful ornaments saw the Median prince, for the lady of his heart was there, the same soft curls upon her neck, the same fleecy drapery around her fragile figure, in all the same save that her face seemed to him yet more delicately expressive. The lady Flavia received him courteously and soon placed him at ease, while Flora marked with approbation his slender though well developed form, his high brow, the subdued brilliancy of his superb eyes, and the ease and grace of his demeanor, in which there appeared dignity unmarred by arrogance or conceit.

When she joined in the conversation her mother retired a short distance, for she was weary and harassed, and preferred to remain silent. The young people soon discovered topics familiar to them both. They moved as if by one impulse nearer the door, which was shaded by a group of orange trees. The moon beams played over their glossy leaves, and they whispered with perfumed breath loving and beautiful things to the dewy night. There was an ever-changing succession of light and shadow along the narrow vista through which they gazed, and closing it was an aviary, where ever and anon some Eastern bird, awakened from its slumber, sang a last good even and then hid its head again beneath its folded wings. But a deeper light was shining in those young, beating hearts, a more delicious melody floated from and over them. The prince at last glided to the young girl's feet. In those low, sweet tones which entrance more than beauty he spoke of his far off home. He painted the velvet lawns and the white snow of its crested mountains. Sometimes he touched upon old, heroic histories that he might see the eye of his listener kindle with his own,

but he loved best the drooping lash and the tender sympathy that lingered there when he chose little domestic themes, the pastimes of his boyhood, and pictured his young brothers casting the jerreed, or bounding onward in the chase.

The moon was high in the heavens when the Jewess stood again on the little bridge with her guest. A smile was on her lip, for all the evening she had been weaving a romance of which he was the hero; and long after he had waved his last farewell she stood bending over the waters building a pretty air castle for the Flower of the Tiber.

It was the last night of Tiridates's stay in Rome, and Nero reproduced in his honor the fete which Tigellinus had, a short time previous, given to himself. The same spot was chosen, the gardens of Agrippa lying behind the Pantheon, and there were the same gorgeousness, the same profusion, and the same theatrical air that marked all his enterprises and characterized all his amusements. The productions of every climate and many countries were brought together. The swift-footed deer peered out from the thicket, the brown sibsib far from his native Atlas burrowed in the path of the gentle giraffe, and the dark-eyed gazelle trembled at the greyhound of Bagdad. There were deep woods where the oak and larch, the elm and pine mingled with the dark leaved ilex; and dingles where frolicked the capricious light, now pouring itself down in a startling, dazzling shower, and now coyly retreating. Noble pinasters and plumed palms looked down upon orange bowers and hedges of roses, where sang the thrush and nightingale, and clasping vines drooped around the lapwing, whose language as she brooded over the gushing waters men thought to have been framed for the human ear. Fairy temples of Parian mar. ble stood in the cool groves, and reliefs of mythic legends seemed endowed with life in the ever flitting shadows.

Marbles were there in which the mighty masters, whose memory was to grow green with time, had written a history of their art. The perfumed Sybarite and imitative Tarentine had sent thither their offerings, while the hard outline and truth of detail of the age anterior to Phidias, the sublimity and completeness which he reached and taught in his Attic school, and the loveliness of the succeeding period completed the page. Colossal figures with massy foreheads, serene countenances and majestic eyes, and groups exhibiting a lofty purity and repose, or a profound tenderness, inspired the gazer with a reverence for the mythic grandeur, an admiration of the mythic beauty with which man had in vain sought to satisfy his thirsty heart.

In the centre of the garden spread a lake like a sheet of burnished gold in the slant beams of the

setting sun. On its bosom floated an island composed of broad terraces rising one above the other. Upon them were porticoes, miniature cascades and superb fountains. There grew the rose of Pæstum, the acanthus, the festive mimosa, and the fragrant ipomaia. The beautiful ocymum, the bridal daffodil and the cacalia, forgetful of her Ethiopian home, opened their honeyed cells; and, beside the gorgeous hibiseus, the sensitive acacia, dear to the untaught Arab, bowed its silken tassels, caressing thus the guest beneath its shade. A jet of pure falernian crowned the islet, rising between shafts of fretted gold and falling back in a shower of molten rubies into the snowy basin beneath.

Beautiful women in all the glittering array which drew upon them the sarcasm of their poets, young girls, and children of a dozen Summers danced in the grassy alleys. Grave senators and cowering magistrates, and throngs of nobles gaily habited jostled against each other, and amid the rustling foliage, the arrowy light glanced from the armor of the imperial guard.

The twilight gathered her shadows. The deepest flung she where the night wind played on the lyres of the tall pines, and among the oaken arches where the dryads met. But lightly she hovered over the flowers which lifted their orisons in incense, and quietly stole she the glitter from the dimpled lake and the radiance from the spray drops. For a moment the song and dance were stilled, and then rose softly, softly, a delicious harmony, which seemed born of the trembling lily bells. Other tones answered, and then the musicians joined in a chorus sweet, dreamy and suggestive, echoing and re-echoing in the chambers of the soul. There were pauses between the strains and each succeeding one was a thought louder than the other. At length martial instruments sent forth their inspiring notes, and a burst of lofty, triumphal music went up to the silent stars. Then from pillar and shrine, from grove and alley and cherished fane, there blazed thousands of torches, making the whole brilliant as mid-day. And from the sleeping waters, from the graceful boats covered with gold and ivory, from the tall vases set round with orient gems, from the gilded arches the rays were brightly almost fiercely returned.

The revelry was at its height, and the prince withdrew from the royal circle to muse upon his betrothed bride. He thought of her sylvan retreat and of the happy evenings he had spent there. He recalled her looks, her tones, her bashful, blushing confession, till she grew dearer to him even than she had been before. Then he busied himself with plans for ornamenting his Eastern home. Here he would build an aviary; there, sheltered from wind and storm, should blossom the flowers and ripen the fruits of the tropics. Rare marbles should edge the little lake near

his palace, and on the island in its midst he would raise a bower where birds should glance among the leaves, and where he would sit with his bride and play the airs she loved and read the eloquent words of the olden time.

A band of young girls approached. They danced round and round him, advanced, retreated and advanced again. Then they showered upon him the sweet buds of the nard, and as they did so the youth recognized the Jewess. Wherefore had she sought him? How dared she venture there? A faintness seized him, a presentiment of evil which rendered him powerless. He cast on her a bewildered glance full of pain, but he said nothing.

Presently the merry dancers with light, ringing laughter passed twice round him and one by one vanished behind a pillar. Alana was the last and she spoke in a dialect of the Persian, as if fearfu of being overheard," Thy betrothed is in the palace of Nero."

There was a fierce light in the prince's eye, the blood gushed up to his brow, and grasping his sword he drove it into the earth with such energy that, meeting the foundation below, it was shivered to its carved and jewelled hilt. Partially tranquilized by the action, he planted his feet firmly against a date tree before him, buried his face in his robe, and with the rapidity of invention peculiar to the children of the South, tempered by Northern coolness, surveyed his position and arranged his plans. An hour after his seat was vacant and his scheme approached its accomplishment.

Purple draperies wrought with golden crowns and lutes and lyres swept over the walls of a gorgeous chamber, looped up at convenient distances by bands of precious stones. Sometimes they were drawn far aside to exhibit specimens of inlaying, sometimes they were artfully disposed to reveal glimpses, only of the beauties beyond. The floor was of black marble, a clear brilliant black, which gleamed like a vast gem wherever a ray broke upon it. There were no windows, and the rich light came, or seemed to do so, from an immense cluster of diamonds in the centre of the arching roof. Reclining upon a couch, bis guitar at his feet, and his mind intent upon the rehearsal of a new piece which was to take place on the ensuing morning, was Nero, the scourge of the Roman world. Opposite, by a censer sculptured with wonderful art, sat an old man, older than the ordinary race of men, yet neither bowed nor feeble. The expression of his eyes was strange and even fearful, for, spell like, it bound the gazer until he saw a still, clear fire increasing ever in their depths. He wore sandals of ivory, and his dress, loose and flowing, leaving the arms bare, was fastened by a medal, bearing on its surface the mystic characters of his art.

Four

other magicians sat beside him, two on either hand and a careful observation might have detected the young prince in the kneeling form behind them.

'Canst thou keep silence?" asked the magician.

Ay, like the dead," answered Nero, carelessly. "I know not the mood of the spirits. It may be gentle or wrathful, but they must not be offended by speech or sign."

"Go on, go on," said the emperor.

The magician bowed his head, and presently a sweet scent like that of spring violets filled the chamber. An agreeable languor crept over the monarch. He turned his couch partly round, adjusted the pillows, and stretched himself at length with an air of pleasant expectation.

Aerial music floated around him, a rosy light dawned opposite, increased, then faded as it had come. The interior of a theatre emerged from a mass of shadows. Knight and senator, poet and orator, the soldiery and the rabble all were there. The actor knelt upon the stage, his hands outstretched, his manner almost abjectly submissive. A thunder-tone of applause burst from the audience, and Nero recognized himself.

Player and spectator disappeared, a scent of mingled perfumes arose, not dense and stifling, but delicate and fresh as when borne upon Arabian zephyrs. A dark point succeeded, gradually increasing until the walls of the imperial cabinet became visible. A vase stood on a golden table, and beside it bent in close conference a tribune and a hag horrible to the vision. Her shaggy locks, her distorted and malicious features, her gaunt figure, emaciated by the exhalations from her poisons, were all distinct. Tiny garlands of sinoke rose above the vase, but still she stirred the compound, still fed the lamp beneath, still muttered her spell. A dense vapor enveloped her, and from amid its folds there came a royal banquetting hall. Servants passed and re-passed with trays and baskets, and dishes of fruits and conserves, and reclining at table amid the youthful nobility was Britan cus, the son of Claudius. He raised a goblet to his lips, drank the contents and fell to the floor writhing convulsively. The motion ceased, blackness settled upon the sad, patient face, the limbs relaxed, and he was carried from the apartment, dead.

upon scores of the great, the wise, the good, came silently, steadily together joined by some strange, mysterious sympathy.

And Nero felt their presence, ay, to his inmost soul, but the summoned words came not at his bidding. His signet ring was on his finger, and he threw it toward the magicians. None seemed to heed the act, but the prince received it and was gone. Then, one by one, slowly and silently, the spirits passed away. Withou: the power to turn aside, the emperor watched them, and when all trace of them had faded he lay senseless and death-like under the regal canopy.

The first grey of morning broke in the Eastern sky, when a strong body of cavalry halted on the brow of a steep hill. They had ridden far and fast, and long lines of foam edged the accoutrements of

their jaded chargers. In their centre were the lady Flavia, Alana and her family, and Flora, with the prince at her bridle rein. They conversed together a few minutes, and then went forward at the same rapid pace as before.

Nero had no thought for them. Remorse, profound and terrible, had been awakened, and he was appalled at the magnitude of his crimes. They came forward in myriads, claiming to be remembered, and marking each day, each hour of many years, with its own particular transgression.

Tiridates awaited but the coming of his nephew to set out with his splendid train. He grew impatient. Is he mad or dead? he asked. "He has gone on," said an old man, and the king gave the signal for departure. But it was not till long afterward, not indeed till after the death of Nero, that he learned how the prince had twice won his bride, the beautiful Flower of the Tiber.