‘Give me back some fifteen years of life,’ replied the Egyptian, ’before you can place me on an equality with Glaucus.  Happy should I be to receive his friendship; but what can I give him in return?  Can I make to him the same confidences that he would repose in me—­of banquets and garlands—­of Parthian steeds, and the chances of the dice? these pleasures suit his age, his nature, his career:  they are not for mine.’

So saying, the artful Egyptian looked down and sighed; but from the corner of his eye he stole a glance towards Ione, to see how she received these insinuations of the pursuits of her visitor.  Her countenance did not satisfy him.  Glaucus, slightly coloring, hastened gaily to reply.  Nor was he, perhaps, without the wish in his turn to disconcert and abash the Egyptian.

‘You are right, wise Arbaces,’ said he; ’we can esteem each other, but we cannot be friends.  My banquets lack the secret salt which, according to rumor, gives such zest to your own.  And, by Hercules! when I have reached your age, if I, like you, may think it wise to pursue the pleasures of manhood, like you, I shall be doubtless sarcastic on the gallantries of youth.’

The Egyptian raised his eyes to Glaucus with a sudden and piercing glance.

‘I do not understand you,’ said he, coldly; ’but it is the custom to consider that wit lies in obscurity.’  He turned from Glaucus as he spoke, with a scarcely perceptible sneer of contempt, and after a moment’s pause addressed himself to Ione.

‘I have not, beautiful Ione,’ said he, ’been fortunate enough to find you within doors the last two or three times that I have visited your vestibule.’

‘The smoothness of the sea has tempted me much from home,’ replied Ione, with a little embarrassment.

The embarrassment did not escape Arbaces; but without seeming to heed it, he replied with a smile:  ’You know the old poet says, that “Women should keep within doors, and there converse."’

‘The poet was a cynic,’ said Glaucus, ‘and hated women.’

’He spoke according to the customs of his country, and that country is your boasted Greece.’

’To different periods different customs.  Had our forefathers known Ione, they had made a different law.’

‘Did you learn these pretty gallantries at Rome?’ said Arbaces, with ill-suppressed emotion.

‘One certainly would not go for gallantries to Egypt,’ retorted Glaucus, playing carelessly with his chain.

‘Come, come,’ said Ione, hastening to interrupt a conversation which she saw, to her great distress, was so little likely to cement the intimacy she had desired to effect between Glaucus and her friend, ’Arbaces must not be so hard upon his poor pupil.  An orphan, and without a mother’s care, I may be to blame for the independent and almost masculine liberty of life that I have chosen:  yet it is not greater than the Roman women are accustomed to—­it