culapius, Nike.

[_He descends along the water-course, and exit._ NIKE _smiles
sadly, and half holds out her arms towards_ AESCULAPIUS.]

NIKE.

It is for you, O brother of Hermes, to be kind to _me_. How altered
we all are! Dionysus is not himself.... As I came here, I passed
below the little grey precipice of limestone----

AESCULAPIUS.

Where the marchantias grow? Yes?

NIKE.

And three girls in white dresses, with wreaths of flowers on their
shoulders, were laughing and chatting there in the shade of the
great yew-tree. Who do you suppose they were, these laughing girls
in white?

AESCULAPIUS.

Perhaps three of the Oceanides, bright as the pure foam of the wave?

NIKE.

Aesculapius, they were not girls. They were the terrible and ancient
Eumenides, black with the curdled blood of Uranus. They were the
inexorable Furies, who were wont to fawn about my feet, with the
adders quivering in their tresses, tormenting me for the spoils
of victory. What does it mean? Why are they in white? As we came
hither in the dreadful vessel, they were huddled together at the
prow, and their long black raiment hung overboard and touched the
brine. They were mumbling and crooning hate-songs, and pointing
with skinny fingers to the portents in the sky. What is it that has
changed their mood? What is it that can have turned the robes of
the Eumenides white, and enamelled their wrinkled flesh with youth?

AESCULAPIUS.

Is it not because a like strange metamorphosis has invaded your own
nature that you have come to meet me here?

NIKE [_after a pause_].

I am bewildered, but I am not unhappy. I come because the secrets
of life are known to you. I come because it was you whom Zeus sent
to watch over Cadmus and Harmonia when their dread and comfortable
change came over them. They were weary with grief and defeat, tired
of being for ever overwhelmed by the ever-mounting wave of mortal
fate. I am weary----

AESCULAPIUS [_slowly_].

Of what, Nike? Be true to yourself. Of what are you weary?

NIKE.

I come to you that you may tell. I know no better than the snake
knows when his skin withers and bloats. I feel distress,
apprehension, no pain, a little fear.

AESCULAPIUS.

You speak of Cadmus and Harmonia; but is not your case the opposite
of theirs? They were saved from defeat; is it not your unspoken hope
to be saved from victory, saved from what was your essential self?

NIKE.

Can it be so? I find,