the bewitching smile on the sweet lips of
this Psyche, if it is not a miracle of art, is--"

"The degradation of art," the old man put in; but Alexander hastily
added:

"The victory of the exquisite over the coarse."

"A victory!" exclaimed Heron, with a scornful flourish of his hand. "I
know, boy, why you are trying to garland the oppressive yoke with flowers
of flattery. So long as your surly old father sits over the vice, he only
whistles a song and spares you his complaints. And then, there is the
money his work brings in!"

He laughed bitterly, and as Melissa looked anxiously up at him, her
brother exclaimed:

"If I did not know you well, master, and if it would not be too great a
pity, I would throw that lovely Psyche to the ostrich in Scopas's
court-yard; for, by Herakles! he would swallow your gem more easily than
we can swallow such cruel taunts. We do indeed bless the Muses that work
brings you some surcease of gloomy thoughts. But for the rest--I hate to
speak the word gold. We want it no more than you, who, when the coffer is
full, bury it or hide it with the rest. Apollodorus forced a whole talent
of the yellow curse upon me for painting his men's room. The sailor's
cap, into which I tossed it with the rest, will burst when Seleukus pays
me for the portrait of his daughter; and if a thief robs you, and me too,
we need not fret over it. My brush and your stylus will earn us more in
no time. And what are our needs? We do not bet on quail-fights; we do not
run races; I always had a loathing for purchased love; we do not want to
wear a heap of garments bought merely because they take our
fancy--indeed, I am too hot as it is under this scorching sun. The house
is your own. The rent paid by Glaukias, for the work-room and garden you
inherited from your father, pays for half at least of what we and the
birds and the slaves eat. As for Philip, he lives on air and philosophy;
and, besides, he is fed out of the great breadbasket of the Museum."

At this point the starling interrupted the youth's vehement speech with
the appropriate cry, "My strength! my strength!" The brother and sister
looked at each other, and Alexander went on with genuine enthusiasm:

"But it is not in you to believe us capable of such meanness. Dedicate
your next finished work to Isis or Serapis. Let your masterpiece grace
the goddess's head-gear, or the god's robe. We shall be quite content,
and perhaps the immortals may restore your jo