called forth this great
and expressive regret. The wailing women in the road were daubing the
mud of the river on their foreheads and bosoms; men were standing
in large groups and beating their heads and breasts with passionate
gestures. On the bridge of boats the men would stop others, and from
thence, too, piercing shrieks came across to her.

At last Philippus came in and confirmed her fears. The governor's death
had shocked him no less than it did her, and he had to tell Paula all he
knew of the dead man's last hours.

"Still, one good thing has come out of this misery," he said. "There
is nothing so comforting as the discovery that we have been deceived in
thinking ill of a man and of his character. This Orion, who has sinned
so basely against himself and against you, is not utterly reprobate."

"Not?" interrupted Paula. "Then he has taken you in too!"

"Taken me in?" said the leech. "Hardly, I think. I have, alas! stood
by many a death-bed; for I am too often sent for when Death is already
beckoning the sick man away. I have met thousands of mourners in these
melancholy scenes, which, I can assure you, are the very best school
for training any one who desires to search the hearts of his
fellow-creatures. By the bed of death, or in the mart, where everything
is a question of Mine and Thine, it is easy to see how some--we for
instance--are as careful to hide from the world all that is great and
noble in us as others are to conceal what is petty and mean--we read
men's hearts as an open page. From my observations of the dying and of
those who sorrow for them, I, who am not Menander not Lucian, could draw
a series of portraits which should be as truthful likenesses as though
the men had turned themselves inside out before me."

"That a dying man should show himself as he really is I can well
believe," replied Paula. "He need have no further care for the opinions
of others; but the mourners? Why, custom requires them to assume an air
of grief and to shed tears."

"Very true; regret repeats itself by the side of the dead," replied
the physician. "But the chamber of the dying is like a church. Death
consecrates it, and the man who stands face to face with death often
drops the mask by which he cheats his fellows. There we may see faces
which you would shudder to look on, but others, too, which merely to see
is enough to make us regard the degenerate species to which we belong
with renewed respect."

"And you foun