e terrible end
of the friend in whom he saw the only person who might have given him
consolation in this distress, and the painful thought of his poverty.

He was supported solely by what his art brought and his wealthy uncle
allowed him. The Demeter which Archias had ordered had been partially
paid for in advance, and he had intended to use the gold--a considerable
sum--to pay debts in Alexandria. But it was consumed with the rest of
his property--tools, clothing, mementoes of his dead parents, and a
few books which contained his favourite poems and the writings of his
master, Straton.

These precious rolls had aided him to maintain the proud conviction of
owing everything which he attained or possessed solely to himself. It
had again become perfectly clear to him that the destiny of earth-born
mortals was not directed by the gods whom men had invented after
their own likeness, in order to find causes for the effects which they
perceived, but by deaf and blind chance. Else how could even worse
misfortune, according to the opinion of most people, have befallen
the pure, guiltless Myrtilus, who so deeply revered the Olympians and
understood how to honour them so magnificently by his art, than himself,
the despiser of the gods?

But was the death for which he longed a misfortune?

Was the Nemesis who had so swiftly and fully granted the fervent prayer
of an ill-used girl also only an image conjured up by the power of human
imagination?

It was scarcely possible!

Yet if there was one goddess, did not that admit the probability of the
existence of all the others?

He shuddered at the idea; for if the immortals thought, felt, acted, how
terribly his already cruel fate would still develop! He had denied and
insulted almost all the Olympians, and not even stirred a finger to the
praise and honour of a single one.

What marvel if they should choose him for the target of their resentment
and revenge?

He had just believed that the heaviest misfortune which can befall a man
and an artist had already stricken him. Now he felt that this, too, had
been an error; for, like a physical pain, he realized the collapse of
the proud delusion of being independent of every power except himself,
freely and arbitrarily controlling his own destiny, owing no gratitude
except to his own might, and being compelled to yield to nothing save
the enigmatical, pitiless power of eternal laws or their co-operation,
so incomprehensible to the