Serapis | Page 4

Ague. . . . Tell me, is she
handsome, tall?"
Herse had been watching her excitable husband with much satisfaction
and now answered his question: "Not a Hera--not a Muse--decidedly
not. Hardly above the middle height, slightly made, but not small, black
eyes, long lashes, dark straight eyebrows. I could hardly, like Orpheus,
call her beautiful. . ."
"Oh yes, mother.--Beautiful is a great word, and one my father has
taught me to use but rarely; but she--if she is not beautiful who
is?--when she raised her large dark eyes and threw back her head to
bring out her lament; tone after tone seemed to come from the bottom
of her heart and rise to the furthest height of heaven. Ah, if Agne could
learn to sing like that! 'Throw your whole soul into your singing.'--You
have told her that again and again. Now, Gorgo can and does. And she
stood there as steady and as highly strung as a bow, every note came
out with the ring of an arrow and went straight to the heart, as clear and
pure as possible."
"Be silent!" cried the old man covering his ears with his hands. "I shall
not close an eye till daylight, and then . . . Orpheus, take that
silver--take it all, I have no more--go early to market and buy
flowers--laurel branches, ivy, violets and roses. But no lotuses though
the market here is full of them; they are showy, boastful things with no
scent, I cannot bear them. We will go crowned to the Temple of the
Muses."
"Buy away, buy all you want!" said Herse laughing, as she showed her

husband some bright gold pieces. "We got that to-day, and if all is
well. . . . " Here she paused, pointed to the curtain, and went on again in
a lower tone: "It all depends of course, on Agne's playing us no trick."
"How so? Why? She is a good girl and I will. . ."
"No, no," said Herse holding him back. "She does not know yet what
the business is. The lady wants her. . ."
"Well?"
"To sing in the Temple of Isis."
Karnis colored. He was suddenly called from a lovely dream back to
the squalid reality. "In the Temple of Isis," he said gloomily. "Agne? In
the face of all the people? And she knows nothing about it?"
"Nothing, father."
"No? Well then, if that is the case . . . Agne, the Christian, in the
Temple of Isis--here, here, where Bishop Theophilus is destroying all
our sanctuaries and the monks outdo their master. Ah, children,
children, how pretty and round and bright a soap-bubble is, and how
soon it bursts. Do you know at all what it is that you are planning? If
the black flies smell it out and it becomes known, by the great Apollo!
we should have fared better at the hands of the pirates. And yet, and
yet.--Do you know at all how the girl . . . ?"
"She wept at the lady's singing," interrupted Herse eagerly, "and, silent
as she generally is, on her way home she said: 'To sing like that! She is
a happy girl!'"
Karnis looked up with renewed confidence.
"Ah!" he exclaimed, "that is my Agne. Yes, yes, she truly loves her
divine art. She can sing, she will sing! We will venture it, if you, I, all
of us die for it!
"Herse, Orpheus, what have we to lose? Our gods, too, shall have their

martyrs. It is a poor life that has no excitement. Our art--why, all I have
ever had has been devoted to it. I make no boast of having sacrificed
everything, and if gold and lands were again to be mine I would
become a beggar once more for the sake of art: We have always held
the divine Muse sacred, but who can keep up a brave heart when he
sees her persecuted! She may only be worshipped in darkness in these
days, and the Queen of Gods and men shuns the light like a moth, a bat,
an owl. If we must die let it be with and for Her! Once more let pure
and perfect song rejoice this old heart, and if afterwards . . . My
children, we have no place in this dim, colorless world. While the Arts
lived there was Spring on the earth. Now they are condemned to death
and it is Winter. The leaves fall from all the trees, and we piping birds
need groves to sing in. How often already has Death laid his hand on
our shoulder, every breath we draw is a boon of mercy--the extra length
given in by the weaver, the hour of grace granted by the hangman to his
victim! Our