d give him
information as to the name and history of the assassin; but no one
appeared to know him. Even Timotheus, the priest of Serapis, who as head
of the Museum had so often delighted in the piercing intellect of this
youth, and had prophesied a great future for him, was silent, and looked
at him with troubled gaze.

It was the prisoner himself who satisfied Caesar's curiosity. Glancing
round the circle of courtiers, and casting a grateful look at his
priestly patron, he said:

"It would be asking too much of your Roman table-companions that they
should know a philosopher. You may spare yourself the question, Caesar. I
came here that you might make my acquaintance. My name is Philippus, and
I am son to Heron, the gem-cutter."

"Her brother!" screamed Caracalla, as he rushed at him, and thrusting his
hand into the neck of the sick youth's chiton--who already could scarcely
stand upon his feet--he shook him violently, crying, with a scoffing look
at the high-priest:

"And is this the ornament of the Museum, the free-thinker, the profound
skeptic Philippus?"

He stopped suddenly, and his eyes flashed as if a new light had burst
upon him; he dropped his hand from the prisoner's robe, and bending his
head close to the other, he whispered in his ear, "You have come from
Melissa?"

"Not from her," the other answered quickly, the flush deepening on his
face, "but in the name of that most unhappy, most pitiable maiden, and as
the representative of her noble Macedonian house, which you would defile
with shame and infamy; in the name of the inhabitants of this city, whom
you despoil and tread under foot; in the interests of the whole world,
which you disgrace!"

Trembling with fury Caracalla broke in:

"Who would choose you for their ambassador, miserable wretch?"

To which the philosopher replied with haughty calm:

"Think not so lightly of one who looks forward with longing to that of
which you have an abject fear."

"Of death, do you mean?" asked Caracalla, sneering, for his wrath had
given place to astonishment.

And Philip answered: "Yes, Death--with whom I have sworn friendship, and
who should be ten times blessed to me if he would but atone for my
clumsiness and rid the world of such a monster!"

The emperor, still spell-bound by the unheard-of audacity of the youth
before him, now felt moved to keep step with the philosopher, whom few
could equal in sharpness of wit; and, controlling the raging fury of