ard
that, in one of her metamorphoses, the divine Helen lived with the
magician, Simon, in the reign of the Emperor Tiberius. I thought,
however, that her perdition was involuntary, and that she was dragged
down by the angels in their fall.

ZENOTHEMIS. It is true, Hermodorus, that men who were not properly
initiated in the mysteries have imagined that the sad Eunoia was not a
party to her own downfall. But if it were as they assert Eunoia would
not be the expiating courtesan, the victim covered with stains of
all sorts, the bread steeped in the wine of our shame, the pleasant
offering, the meritorious sacrifice, the holocaust, the smoke of which
rises to God. If they were not voluntary, there would be no merit in her
sins.

CALLICRATES. Does anyone know, Zenothemis in what country, under what
name, in what adorable form, this ever-renascent Helen is living now?

ZENOTHEMIS. A man would have to be very wise indeed to discover such a
secret. And wisdom, Callicrates, is not given to poets, who live in the
rude world of forms and amuse themselves, like children, with sounds and
empty shows.

CALLICRATES. Beware of offending the gods, impious Zenothemis; the poets
are dear to them. The first laws were dictated in verse by the immortals
themselves, and the oracles of the gods are poems. Hymns have a pleasant
sound to celestial ears. Who does not know that the poets are prophets,
and that nothing is hidden from them? Being a poet myself, and crowned
with Apollo's laurel, I will make known to all the last incarnation of
Eunoia. The eternal Helen is close to us; she is looking at us, and we
are looking at her. You see that woman reclining on the cushions of her
couch--so beautiful and so contemplative--whose eyes shed tears, and
whose lips abound with kisses! It is she! Lovely as in the time of Priam
and the halcyon days of Asia, Eunoia is now called Thais.

PHILINA. What do you say, Callicrates? Our dear Thais knew Paris,
Menelaus, and the Achaians who fought before Ilion! Was the Trojan horse
big, Thais?

ARISTOBULUS. Who speaks of a horse?

"I have drunk like a Thracian!" cried Chereas and he rolled under the
table.

Callicrates, raising his cup, cried--

"If we drink like desperate men, we die unavenged!"

Old Cotta was asleep, and his bald head nodded slowly above his broad
shoulders.

For some time past Dorion had seemed to be greatly excited under his
philosophic cloak. He reeled up to the couch of Thais.