authority
as Prefect is not sufficient."

"And the Empress Valeria; she, too, as traitor to your person and crown,
is included in the decree," insinuated, in a wheedling tone, the crafty
priest.

"Base hound," roared the Emperor, laying his hand upon his sword;
"breathe but the name of the Empress again, and I will pluck thy vile
tongue from thy throat."

"Nay, Your Majesty," said the crafty Fausta, while the abject priest
cowered like a whipped cur; "'tis but his excess of zeal for Your
Majesty's honour, which I fear the Empress betrays."

"Madam," said Galerius, sternly, "I am the guardian of my own honour.
What the Christians are, I neither know nor care. What the Empress is, I
know--the noblest soul that breathes in Rome. Who wags his tongue
against her shall be given to the crows and kites. _Dixi Fiat_--I have
spoken--so let it be," and his terrible frown, as he stalked from the
room, showed that he meant what he said.

The three conspirators, for a moment, stared at each other in
consternation. Then the wily Fausta faltered out, "Said I not, he would
defy both gods and men? We must do by stealth what we cannot do by
force. Juba must ply her most secret and most deadly arts. I have
certain subtle spells myself; and if mortal hate can give them power, I
will make her beauty waste away like a fading flower, and her strength
wane like a dying lamp."

"'Tis a dangerous game," replied Naso. "Be wary how you play it. As for
me, armed with this edict, I will strike at mine ancient foe, for whom I
long have nursed a bitter spite. Curse him! I am tired of hearing him
called Adauctus the Just. He held me to such a strict account that I had
to make a full return of all the fines and mulcts paid in, without
taking the toll which is my right." And he departed to gratify his
double passion of revenge and greed.

It may seem strange that such a truculent monster as Galerius, of whom,
in his later days, his Christian subjects were wont to say that "he
never supped without human blood--_Nec unquam sine cruore humano
coenabat,_"[35]--should be so under the spell of his Christian wife. But
the statement is corroborated by the records of history, and by the
philosophy of the human mind. There is a power in moral goodness that
can awe the rudest natures, a winsome spell that can subdue the hardest
hearts. It was the story of Una and the Lion, of Beauty and the Beast
over again; and one of the severest trials for a Christian wi