e mine--into his
mouth.--I am about to play, Adventus! Open the door!"

The freedman obeyed, and the emperor peered into the antechamber to see
for himself who was waiting there.

He required an audience when he sang. The Circus had accustomed him to
louder applause than his beloved and one skilled musician could award
him. At last he swept the strings, and began singing in a well-trained
tenor, whose sharp, hard quality, however, offended the girl's critical
ear, the song to the echo on the shores of Pontus:

Echo, by the rolling waters
Bathing Pontus' rocky shore,
Wake, and answer to the lyre
Swept by my inspired hand!

Wake, and raise thy voice in numbers
Sing to Homer, to the bard
Who has given life immortal
To the heroes of his lay.

He it was from death who snatched me;
He who gave Patroclus life;
Rescued, in perennial glory,
Godlike Ajax from the dead!

His the lute to whose sweet accents,
Ilion owes undying fame,
And the triumph and the praises
Which surround her deathless name.

The "Sword of Persia" seemed peculiarly affected by his master's song,
which he accompanied by a long-drawn howl of woe; and, before the
imperial virtuoso had concluded, a discordant cry sounded for a short
time from the street, in imitation of the squeaking of young pigs. It
arose from the crowd who were waiting round the Serapeum to see Caesar
drive to the Circus; and Caracalla must have noticed it, for, when it
waxed louder, he gave a sidelong glance toward the place from which it
came, and an ominous frown gathered upon his brow.

But it soon vanished, for scarcely had he finished when stormy shouts of
applause rose from the antechamber. They proceeded from the friends of
Caesar, and the deep voices of the Germanic bodyguard, who, joining in
with the cries they had learned in the Circus, lent such impetuous force
to the applause, as even to satisfy this artist in the purple.

Therefore, when Philostratus spoke words of praise, and Melissa thanked
him with a blush, he answered with a smile: "There is something frank
and untrammeled in their manner of expressing their feelings outside.
Forced applause sounds differently. There must be something in my
singing that carries the hearers away. My Alexandrian hosts, however,
are overready to show me what they think. It