of a child's
sorrow. Take her, Dea Flavia! thine eloquence has triumphed over a
mother's broken heart."

Strangely enough, and to the astonishment of all those present, Dea
Flavia had listened patiently and silently whilst the woman spoke, and
now she said quite gently:

"Nay! thou dost wrong thine own child, Menecreta; see how lovingly she
turns to thee!"

"Only because in her shallow little heart there has come the first
twinge of remorse," replied the woman sadly. "Soon, in the lap of that
luxury which thou dost offer her, she will have forgotten the mother's
arms in which she weeps to-day."

"That's enough," suddenly interposed the praefect harshly. "Menecreta,
take thy child; take her, I say. Dea Flavia hath relinquished her to
thee. Be not a fool and take the child away!"

But with a gesture of savage pride the freedwoman tore herself away from
Nola.

"No!" she said firmly, "I'll not take her. That proud lady here hath
stolen the soul of my child; her body, inert and sad, I'll not have the
while her heart longs to be away from me. I'll not have her, I say! let
the daughter of Caesar account to the gods above for her tempting words,
her honeyed speech and her lies."

"Silence, woman!" ordered Dea Flavia sternly.

"Lies, I tell thee, lies," continued the woman who had lost all sense of
fear in the depth of her misery; "the life of luxury thou dost promise
this child--how long will it last? thy caprice for her--when will it
tire? Silence? nay! I'll not be silent," she continued wildly in defiant
answer to angry murmurs from the crowd. "Thou daughter of a house of
tyrants, tyrant thyself! a slave to thy paltry whims, crushing beneath
thy sandalled feet the hearts of the poor and the cries of the
oppressed! Shame on thee! shame on thee, I say!"

"By the great Mother," said Dea Flavia coldly, "will no one here rid me
of this screaming vixen?"

But even before she had spoken, the angry murmurs around had swollen to
loud protestations. Before the praefect's lictors could intervene the
crowd had pushed forward; the men rushed and surrounded the impious
creature who had dared to raise her voice against one of the divinities
of Rome: Augusta the goddess.

One of Dea Flavia's gigantic Ethiopians had seized Menecreta by the
shoulder, another pulled her head back by the hair and struck her
roughly on the mouth, but she, with the strength of the vanquished,
brought down to her knees, frenzied with despair, contin