ut he himself had
plotted that evil marriage? But she gave him no opportunity of answering
her, and went on hurriedly--

'Speak to me rather about yourself. What is this strange and sudden
betrothal? What has it to do with Christianity? I had thought that it
was rather by the glories of celibacy--gross and superstitious as their
notions of it are--that the Galileans tempted their converts.'

'So had I, my dearest lady,' answered he, as, glad to turn the subject
for a moment, and perhaps a little nettled by her contemptuous tone, he
resumed something of his old arch and careless manner. 'But--there is
no accounting for man's agreeable inconsistencies--one morning I found
myself, to my astonishment, seized by two bishops, and betrothed,
whether I chose or not, to a young lady who but a few days before had
been destined for a nunnery.'

'Two bishops?'

'I speak simple truth. The one was Synesius of course;--that most
incoherent and most benevolent of busybodies chose to betray me behind
my back:-but I will not trouble you with that part of my story. The real
wonder is that the other episcopal match-maker was Augustine of Hippo
himself!'

'Anything to bribe a convert,' said Hypatia contemptuously.

'I assure you, no. He informed me, and her also, openly and uncivilly
enough, that he thought us very much to be pitied for so great a
fall.... But as we neither of us seemed to have any call for the higher
life of celibacy, he could not press it on us.... We should have trouble
in the flesh. But if we married we had not sinned. To which I answered
that my humility was quite content to sit in the very lowest ranks, with
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.... He replied by an encomium on virginity, in
which I seemed to hear again the voice of Hypatia herself.'

'And sneered at it inwardly, as you used to sneer at me.'

'Really I was in no sneering mood at that moment; and whatsoever I
may have felt inclined to reply, he was kind enough to say for me and
himself the next minute.'

'What do you mean?'

'He went on, to my utter astonishment, by such a eulogium on wedlock as
I never heard from Jew or heathen, and ended by advice to young married
folk so thoroughly excellent and to the point, that I could not help
telling him, when he stopped; what a pity I thought it that he had
not himself married, and made some good woman happy by putting his own
recipes into practice.... And at that, Hypatia, I saw an expression on
his face whi