yrus being only a
little older than himself, while Marcellina, their sister, who was
nearly four, looked down upon the others as mere babies. Ambrose the
elder was a very important person indeed, for the emperor Constantine
had made him ruler, or prefect, of the whole of Europe west of the
Rhine, that is, of Spain, Gaul or France, and Britain. The prefect was a
good and just man, and the nations were happy under his sway; but he
died after a few years, and his wife, unfortunately, thought it wiser to
leave Treves and take her children to Rome, where they could get the
best teaching and would become acquainted with their father's friends.

It was a long and difficult journey for a lady and two boys (Marcellina
had already gone to a convent in Rome), though they were rich enough to
travel in tolerable comfort. Even in summer the passage of the Alps was
hard enough, and the towering mountains, steep precipices, and rushing
rivers must have seemed strange and alarming to anyone fresh from the
fertile slopes of the Rhineland. But the boys were not frightened, only
deeply interested, and they quite forgot to be sorry at leaving their
old home in the excitement of what lay before them.

No doubt they had many adventures, or what they would have considered as
such, before they reached the corn-covered plains of Lombardy, and
stopped to rest in the city of Milan, whose name was hereafter to be
bound up for all time with that of little Ambrose. But we are not told
anything about their travels, and when they arrived in Rome they went
straight to the old house, which had been for generations in their
father's family. That family was famous in the annals of the city, and
had become Christian in the time of the persecution; but nowadays
Christians and pagans lived happily together, and divided the public
offices between them.

The children soon settled down in their new surroundings, and felt as if
they had lived all their lives in Rome. Marcellina they seldom or never
saw, and, however much her mother may have longed after her, she was
forced to content herself with her two boys and to take pride in their
success.

* * * * *

The prefect of Rome, Symmachus by name, had taken a great fancy to
Satyrus, in spite of the fact that the boy was brought up a Christian,
while he himself was a pagan. Symmachus shared with the Christian Probus
the chief authority in Rome, and while Satyrus was to be found in