vil took so much more care for their own well-being and
multiplication than the good. If one of the righteous fell away, all
the others forthwith turned their backs on him; and when the penitent
desired to return to the fold, the immaculate repelled or avoided him.
But the wicked could always find the fallen man at once, and would cling
to him and hinder him from returning. Their ranks were always open
to him, however closely he might formerly have been attached to the
virtuous. To live in exclusive intercourse with these reprobates was an
odious thought. He could compel whom he chose to live with him; but of
what use were silent and reluctant companions? And whose fault was it
that he had sent away Philostratus, the best of them all? Hers--the
faithless traitoress, from whom he had looked for peace and joy, who had
declared that she felt herself bound to him, the trickster in whom he
had believed he saw Roxana--But she was no more. On the table by his
bed, among his own jewels, lay the golden serpent he had given her--he
fancied he could see it in the dark--and she had worn it even in death.
He shuddered; he felt as though a woman's arm, all black and charred,
was stretched out to him in the night, and the golden snake uncurled
from it and reached forth as though to bite him.

He shivered, and hid his head under the coverlet; but, ashamed and vexed
at his own foolish weakness, he soon emerged from the stifling darkness,
and an inward voice scornfully asked him whether he still believed that
the soul of the great Macedonian inhabited his body. There was an end
of this proud conviction. He had no more connection with Alexander than
Melissa had with Roxana, whom she resembled.

The blood seethed hotly in his veins; to live on these terms seemed to
him impossible.

As soon as it was day it must surely be seen that he was very seriously
ill. The spirit of Tarautas would again appear to him--and not merely as
a vaporous illusion--and put an end to his utter misery.

But he felt his own pulse; it beat no more quickly than usual. He had no
fever, and yet he must be ill, very ill. And again he flushed so hotly
that he felt as if he should choke. Breathing hard, he sat up to call
his physician. Then he observed a light through the half-closed door of
the adjoining room. He heard voices--those of Adventus and the Indian.

Arjuna was generally so silent that Philostratus had vainly endeavored
to discover from him any particula