“O ye immortal Gods!” groaned Plotinus.

“Here she is!” exclaimed Porphyry, as a woman of masculine stature and bearing, with the remains of beauty not unskilfully patched, forced an entrance into the room.

“Plotinus,” she exclaimed, “behold the most impassioned of thy disciples.  Let us celebrate the mystic nuptials of Wisdom and Beauty.  Let the claims of my sex to philosophic distinction be vindicated in my person.”

“The question of the admission of women to share the studies and society of men,” rejoined Plotinus, “is one by no means exempt from difficulty.”

“How so?  I deemed it had been determined long ago in favour of Aspasia?”

“Aspasia,” said Plotinus, “was a very exceptional woman.”

“And am not I?”

“I hope, that is, I conceive so,” said Plotinus.  “But one may be an exceptional woman without being an Aspasia.”

“How so?  Am I inferior to Aspasia in beauty?”

“I should hope not,” said Plotinus ambiguously.

“Or in the irregularity of my deportment?”

“I should think not,” said Plotinus, with more confidence.

“Then why does the Plato of our age hesitate to welcome his Diotima?”

“Because,” said Plotinus, “you are not Diotima, and I am not Plato.”

“I am sure I am as much like Diotima as you are like Plato,” retorted the lady.  “But let us come to our own time.  Do I not hear that that creature Pannychis has obtained the freedom of the philosophers’ city, and the right to study therein?”

“She takes private lessons from Hermon, who is responsible for her.”

“The very thing!” exclaimed Leaena triumphantly.  “I take private lessons from thee, and thou art responsible for me.  Venus! what’s that?”

The exclamation was prompted by the sudden appearance of an enormous serpent, which, emerging from a chink in the wall, glided swiftly towards the couch of Plotinus.  He reached forward to greet it, uttering a cry of pleasure.

“My guardian, my tutelary daemon,” he exclaimed, “visible manifestation of AEsculapius!  Then I am not forsaken by the immortal gods.”

“Take away the monster,” cried Leaena, in violent agitation, “the nasty thing!  Plotinus, how can you?  Oh, I shall faint!  I shall die!  Take it away, I say.  You must choose between it and me.”

“Then, Madam,” said Plotinus, civilly but firmly, “I choose it.”

“Thank AEsculapius we are rid of her,” he added, as Leaena vanished from the apartment.

“I wish I knew that,” said Porphyry.

And indeed after no long time a note came up from Theocles, who was sure that Plotinus would not refuse him that privilege of instructing a female disciple which had been already, with such manifest advantage to philosophical research, accorded to his colleague Hermon.  No objection could well be made, especially as Plotinus did not foresee how many chambermaids, and pages, and cooks, and perfumers, and tiring women and bath attendants would be required, ere Leaena could feel herself moderately comfortable.  How unlike the modest Pannychis! who wanted but half a bed, which need not be stuffed with the down of hares or the feathers of partridges, without which sleep refused to visit Leaena’s eyelids.