rkling,
I see the clear pools gleam.
I hear the bulbuls calling
From blooming tree to tree.
Wave, bird, and tree are singing,
'Away! ah, come with me!'

"By Oxus's stream is rising
Great Cyrus's marble halls;
Like rain of purest silver,
His tinkling fountain falls;
To his cool verdant arbours
What joy with thee to flee.
I'll join with bird and river,
'Away! rest there with me!'

"Forget, forget old sorrows,
Forget the dear things lost!
There comes new peace, new brightness,
When darksome waves are crossed;
By Oxus's streams abiding,
From pang and strife set free,
I'll teach thee love and gladness,--
Rest there, for aye, with me!"

The light, the fragrance, the song so pregnant with meaning, all wrought
upon Glaucon of Athens. He felt the warm glow in his cheeks; he felt
subtle hands outstretching as if drawing forth his spirit. Roxana's eyes
were upon him as she ended. Their gaze met. She was very fair, high-born,
sensitive. She was inviting him to put away Glaucon the outcast from
Hellas, to become body and soul Prexaspes the Persian, "Benefactor of the
King," and sharer in all the glories of the conquering race. All the past
seemed slipping away from him as unreal. Roxana stood before him in her
dark Oriental beauty; Hermione was in Athens--and they were giving her in
marriage to Democrates. What wonder he felt no mastery of himself, though
all that day he had kept from wine?

"A simple song," spoke Mardonius, who seemed marvellously pleased at all
his sister did, "yet not lacking its sweetness. We Aryans are without the
elaborate music the Greeks and Babylonians affect."

"Simplicity is the highest beauty," answered the Greek, as if still in his
trance, "and when I hear Euphrosyne, fairest of the Graces, sing with the
voice of Erato, the Song-Queen, I grow afraid. For a mortal may not hear
things too divine and live."

Roxana replaced the harp and made one of her inimitable Oriental
courtesies,--a token at once of gratitude and farewell for the evening.
Glaucon never took his gaze from her, until with a rustle and sweep of her
blue gauze she had glided out of the tent. He did not see the meaning
glances exchanged by Mardonius and Artazostra before the latter left them.

When the two men were alone, the bow-bearer asked a question.

"Dear Prexaspes, do you not think I should bless the twelve archangels I
possess so beautiful a sister?"