one but is ready to bid me good day and
shake my hand or kiss my dress. Many a one has come to me in tears and
left me happy.--By the great Zeus! no one ever accused me of being
soft-hearted, but I could wish this day that I were harder; and my blood
turns to gall as I ask--What is all this for--to what possible end?"

"For the sake and honor of the faith, Demetrius; for the eternal
salvation of our people."

"Indeed!" retorted Demetrius with a drawl, "I know better. If that and
that alone were intended you would build churches and chapels and send us
worthy priests--Eusebius and the like--and would try to win men's hearts
to your Lord by the love you are always talking so much about. That was
my advice to your mother, only this morning. I believe the end might be
attained by those means, among us as elsewhere; ultimately it will, no
doubt, be gained--but not to-day nor to-morrow. A peasant, when he had
become accustomed to the church and grasped a trust in the new God, would
of his own accord give up the old gods and their sanctuaries; I could
count you off a dozen such instances. That I could have looked on at
calmly, for I want only men's arms and legs and do not ask for their
souls; but to burn down the old house before you have collected wood and
stone to build a new one I call wicked.--It is cruelty and madness, and
when so shrewd a woman as your mother is bent on carrying through such a
measure, come what may, there is something more behind it."

"You think she wants to get rid of you--you, Demetrius!" interrupted
Marcus eagerly. "But you are mistaken, you are altogether wrong. What you
have done for the estate . . ."

"Oh! as for that!" cried the other, "what has my work to do with all
this? Ere the year is out everything that can remind us of the heathen
gods is to be swept away from the hamlets and fields of the pious Mary.
That is what is intended! Then they will hurry off to the Bishop with the
great news and to crown one marvel with another, the reversion will be
secured of a martyr's nimbus. And this is what all this zeal is for--this
and nothing else!"

"You are speaking of my mother, remember!" cried Marcus, looking at his
brother with a touching appeal in his eyes. Demetrius shook his shaggy
head and spoke more temperately as he went on:

"Yes, child, I had forgotten that--and I may be mistaken of course, for I
am no more than human. Here one thing follows so close on another, and in
this house I