p emotion, and within
a few hours after Andreas had reported to Zeno the self-sacrificing
youth's purpose, Zeno had gone to Alexander and greeted him as his son.

Melissa found in Agatha the sister she had so long pined for; and how
happy it made her to see her brother's eyes once more sparkle with
gladness! Alexander, even as a Christian and as Agatha's husband,
remained an artist.

The fortune accumulated by Andreas--the solidi with which he had
formerly paid the scapegrace painter's debts included--was applied
to the erection of a new and beautiful house of God on the spot where
Heron's house had stood. Alexander decorated it with noble pictures, and
as this church was soon too small to accommodate the rapidly increasing
congregation, he painted the walls of yet another, with figures whose
extreme beauty was famous throughout Christendom, and which were
preserved and admired till gloomy zealots prohibited the arts in
churches and destroyed their works.

Melissa could not be safe in Alexandria. After being quietly married in
the house of Polybius, she, with her young husband and Andreas, moved
to Carthage, where an uncle of Diodoros dwelt. Love went them, and, with
love, happiness. They were not long compelled to remain in exile; a few
months after their marriage news was brought to Carthage that Caesar
had been murdered by the centurion Martialis, prompted by the tribunes
Apollinaris and Nemesianus Aurelius. Immediately on this, Macrinus, the
praetorian prefect, was proclaimed emperor by the troops.

The ambitious man's sovereignty lasted less than a year; still, the
prophecy of Serapion was fulfilled. It cost the Magian his life indeed;
for a letter written by him to the prefect, in which he reminded him
of what he had foretold, fell into the hands of Caracalla's mother, who
opened the letters addressed to her ill-fated son at Antioch, where she
was then residing. The warning it contained did not arrive, however,
till after Caesar's death, and before the new sovereign could
effectually protect the soothsayer. As soon as Macrinus had mounted the
throne the persecution of those who had roused the ire of the unhappy
Caracalla was at an end. Diodoros and Melissa, Heron and Polybius, could
mingle once more with their fellow-citizens secure from all pursuit.

Diodoros and other friends took care that the suspicion of treachery
which had been cast on Heron's household should be abundantly disproved.
Nay, the death of