turity, deals kindly with the servant of his
choice! Onward! onward! to the place of darkness and doom, where I
alone am omnipotent, and all others are creatures who tremble and obey!
To thy lesson, learner! by sunset the victim must be crowned!'

He looked round on Numerian for an instant, as he prepared to drag him
forward, and their eyes met. In the fierce command of his action, and
the savage exultation of his glance, the father saw repeated in a
wilder form the very attitude and expression which he had beheld in the
Pagan on the morning of the loss of his child. All the circumstances
of that miserable hour--the vacant bed-chamber--the banished
daughter--the triumph of the betrayer--the anguish of the
betrayed--rushed over his mind, and rose up before it vivid as a
pictured scene before his eyes.

He struggled no more; the powers of resistance in mind and body were
crushed alike. He made an effort to remove Antonina from his side, as
if, in forgetfulness of the hidden enemy without, he designed to urge
her flight through the open door, while the madman's attention was yet
distracted from her. But, beyond this last exertion of the strong
instinct of paternal love, every other active emotion seemed dead
within him.

Vainly had he striven to disentangle the child from the fate that might
be in store for the parent. To her the dread of the dark shadow on the
pavement was superior to all other apprehensions. She now clung more
closely to her father, and tightened her clasp round his hand. So,
when the Pagan advanced into the interior of the temple, it was not
Numerian alone who followed him to the place of sacrifice, but Antonina
as well.

They moved to the back of the pile of idols. Behind it appeared a high
partition of gilt and inlaid wood reaching to the ceiling, and
separating the outer from the inner part of the temple. A low archway
passage, protected by carved gates similar to those at the front of the
building, had been formed in the partition, and through this Ulpius and
his prisoners now passed into the recess beyond.

This apartment was considerably smaller than the first hall of the
temple which they had just left. The ceiling and the floor both sloped
downwards together, and here the rippling of the waters of the Tiber
was more distinctly audible to them than in the outer division of the
building. At the moment when they entered it the place was very dark;
the pile of idols intercepted e