eeks had affected them
very differently. The gem-cutter looked like the shadow of himself, and
had lost his upright carriage. He knew, indeed, that Melissa was alive,
and that Alexander, after being wounded, had been carried by Andreas to
the house of Zeno, and was on the way to recovery; but the death of his
favorite son preyed on his mind, and it was a great grievance that his
house should have been wrecked and burned. His hidden gold, which was
safe with him, would have allowed of his building a far finer one in its
stead, but the fact that it should be his fellow-citizens who had
destroyed it was worst of all. It weighed on his spirits, and made him
morose and silent.

Old Dido, who had risked her life more than once, looked at him with
mournful eyes, and besought all the gods she worshiped to restore her
good master's former vigor, that she might once more hear him curse and
storm; for his subdued mood seemed to her unnatural and alarming--a
portent of his approaching end.

Praxilla, too, the comfortable widow, had grown pale and thin, but old
Dido had learned a great deal from her teaching. Polybius only was more
cheerful than ever. He knew that his son and Melissa had escaped the most
imminent dangers. This made him glad; and then his sister had done
wonders that he might not too greatly miss his cook. His meals had
nevertheless been often scanty enough, and this compulsory temperance had
relieved him of his gout and done him so much good that, when Andreas led
him out into daylight once more, the burly old man exclaimed: "I feel as
light as a bird. If I had but wings I could fly across the lake to see
the boy. It is you, my brother, who have helped to make me so much
lighter." He laid his arm on the freedman's shoulder and kissed him on
the cheeks. It was for the first time; and never before had he called him
brother. But that his lips had obeyed the impulse of his heart might be
seen in the tearful glitter of his eyes, which met those of Andreas, and
they, too, were moist.

Polybius knew all that the Christian had done for his son and for
Melissa, for him and his, and his jest in saying that Andreas had helped
to make him lighter referred to his latest achievement. Julianus, the new
governor of the city, who now occupied the residence of the prefect
Titianus, had taken advantage of the oppressed people to extract money,
and Andreas, by the payment of a large sum, had succeeded in persuading
him to sign a doc