f distinguished rank. And how truly to be pitied was
the poor boy, who had had his youth spoilt by a stern father. A woman
easily bestows some tender feeling on the man that she pities; perhaps
because she is grateful to him for the pleasure of feeling herself the
stronger, and because through him and his suffering she finds
gratification for the noblest happiness of a woman's heart--that of
giving tender and helpful care; women's hands are softer than ours. In
men's hearts love is commonly extinguished when pity begins, while
admiration acts like sunshine on the budding plant of a woman's
inclination, and pity is the glory which radiates from her heart.

Neither admiration nor pity, however, would have been needed to induce
Sirona to call Hermas to her window; she felt so unhappy and lonely, that
any one must have seemed welcome from whom she might look for a friendly
and encouraging word to revive her deeply wounded self-respect. And there
came the young anchorite, who forgot himself and everything else in her
presence, whose looks, whose movement, whose very silence even seemed to
do homage to her. And then his bold spring into her room, and his eager
wooing--"This is love," said she to herself. Her cheeks glowed, and when
Hermas clasped her hand, and pressed her arm to his lips, she could not
repulse him, till Dorothea's voice reminded her of the worthy lady and of
the children, and through them of her own far-off sisters.

The thought of these pure beings flowed over her troubled spirit like a
purifying stream, and the question passed through her mind, "What should
I be without these good folks over there, and is this great love-sick
boy, who stood before Polykarp just lately looking like a school-boy, is
he so worthy that I should for his sake give up the right of looking them
boldly in the face?" And she pushed Hermas roughly away, just as he was
venturing for the first time to apply his lips to her perfumed gold hair,
and desired him to be less forward, and to release her hand.

She spoke in a low voice, but with such decision, that the lad, who was
accustomed to the habit of obedience, unresistingly allowed her to push
him into the sitting-room. There was a lamp burning on the table, and on
a bench by the wall of the room, which was lined with colored stucco, lay
the helmet, the centurion's staff, and the other portions of the armor
which Phoebicius had taken off before setting out for the feast of
Mithras, in