amentations and
dark hints, that Paulus too had been ensnared and brought to ruin by her
enemy.

As the morning-star began to pale Miriam went up to Stephanus' cave; her
heart was full of tears, and yet she was unable to pour out her need and
suffering in a soothing flood of weeping; she was wholly possessed
with a wild desire to sink down on the earth there and die, and to be
released by death from her relentless, driving torment. But it was still
too early to disturb the old man--and yet--she must hear a human voice,
one word--even if it were a hard word--from the lips of a human being;
for the bewildering feeling of distraction which confused her mind, and
the misery of abandonment that crushed her heart, were all too cruelly
painful to be borne.

She was standing by the entrance to the cave when, high above her
head, she heard the falling of stones and the cry of a human voice.
She started and listened with out-stretched neck and strung sinews,
motionless. Then she broke suddenly into a loud and piercing shout
of joy, and flinging up her arms she flew up the mountain towards a
traveller who came swiftly down to meet her.

"Hermas! Hermas!" she shouted, and all the sunny delight of her heart
was reflected in her cry so clearly and purely that the sympathetic
chords in the young man's soul echoed the sound, and he hailed her with
joyful welcome.

He had never before greeted her thus, and the tone of his voice revived
her poor crushed heart like a restorative draught offered by a tender
hand to the lips of the dying. Exquisite delight, and a glow of
gratitude such as she had never before felt flooded her soul, and as
he was so good to her she longed to show him that she had something to
offer in return for the gift of friendship which he offered her. So
the first thing she said to him was, "I have staid constantly near
your father, and have brought him water early and late, as much as he
needed."

She blushed as she thus for the first time praised herself to him, but
Hermas exclaimed, "That is a good girl! and I will not forget it. You
are a wild, silly thing, but I believe that you are to be relied on by
those to whom you feel kindly."

"Only try me," cried Miriam holding out her hand to him. He took it, and
as they went on together he said:

"Do you hear the brass? I have warned the watchmen up there; the
Blemmyes are coming. Is Paulus with my father?"

"No, but I know where he is."

"Then you must call