you pursue and the ambition that lurks in your heart. You desire to be linked with star or stream, forest tree or woodland flower, for ever; so that mankind, when they mark the star, or pluck the blossom, shall say, 'This is Livia, the washerwoman's daughter, who, for her sufferings on earth, was translated by the high gods and shines upon the sky, or smiles in the cyclamen, or strawberry.' But remember that you yourself are gone before these things happen. All that you will know is the suffering and sorrow, and there must come a time when you will endure the additional grief of perceiving that the sorrow was home-made. Thus you will vanish with the bitterest doubt whether your life of grief was not in vain; with the gravest fear that, after all, you may adorn no legend and win no posthumous honour of the gods. For Jupiter knows exceedingly well the difference between reality and make believe.

"You are making believe, my dear girl, and that road reaches no flower of earth, or star of heaven. Therefore consider whether a happy

home and a good husband are not better worth your pains than the futile renown of which you dream. Happiness is at your gates, and it is not a heroine but a fool who shuts the door on lawful happiness. I can speak impartially, for my altar robs no other of sacrifice or incense; therefore I say that your husband's god is good, kindly and powerful. You will do well to worship him and, indeed, the maiden whom Festus loved and courted, if she remained true to herself, would be content to adore the god of her husband. Time will prove this to you, and my hope is that the proof may not be withheld until it is too late. Let me see a bunch of black and gold ophrys on my altar to-morrow, so that I may know you have not forgotten what I tell you."

Then he went his way, after Livia had thanked him for his wisdom; though in truth she twisted it somewhat to suit her own dreams.

For now she began herself to see that the immortality of star, or wayside weed, was but a doubtful delight to a living woman. She

remembered that the joy of life, as expounded by Festus before they were married, had appealed to her exceedingly, and she came to suspect that present happiness might be better worth than future fame. She wondered, as we all so often wonder, whether there was any way to eat her cake and have it also; whether she might not get the best out of both worlds.

She forgot Faunus and set her mind upon Evander. For she believed that the way to Apollo led through him and that, with him, might dawn a brighter, temporal happiness than any that Festus could promise. Life would surely blossom with flowers and run over emerald grasses if walked beside Evander.

"What might have been!" he had said, and Livia returned home much heartened by the reflection that what might have been, might still be. Better, surely, to join the disciple of Apollo than link a dead name to a star after a lifetime of suffering with Festus. There were, of course, difficulties; but she

had set up for heroine, and where is the heroine who cannot conquer difficulties?

Thus Faunus certainly influenced her; but not in the direction he designed. It happens so with much advice, for we are lightning quick to pick from the mass of other people's wisdom what appears to chime with our own. we are extraordinarily dishonest in this matter and wrest advice from its context, or twist counsel far from the original bent.

And

VI

A SAD CHAPTER

HIS is a chapter so unhappy that it shall be as short as possible, for who loves to dwell on the sorrows of other people if he cannot lessen them? Art, a wise man said, is with us that we shall not perish of too much truth; then let Art be with us, to wipe the tears that truth so often brings, and so help us and save us from altogether weeping away our vitality and slight value to the world.

Frankly, Livia's life at this crisis was art, for we are all artists once, and our principal work, which is our own existence, though it may look fine enough to ourselves and our admirers, seldom satisfies any independent critic, or is lived in terms of sufficient distinction to make a masterpiece. Here and there