but not ardent sunshine, he wandered by such unfrequented paths till a sound of voices broke upon his meditation, and he found himself in view of the Lateran.  Numbers of poor people were streaming away from the open space by the Pope’s palace, loud in angry talk, its purpose intelligible enough to any one who caught a few words.  Decius heard maledictions upon the Holy Father, mingled with curses no less hearty upon the Greeks who held Rome.

‘It was not thus,’ cried an old man, ’in the time of King Theodoric, heretic though he might be.  We had our bread and our hog’s flesh, prime quality both, and plenty for all.’

‘Ay,’ cried a woman, ’and our oil too.  Since these Greek dogs came, not a drop of oil has there been in my cruse.  Heretics, forsooth!  What better is the Holy Father who lets Christians die of hunger while he eats and drinks his fill?’

’Evil go with thee, O Vigilius!  The pest seize thee, O Vigilius!  May’st thou perish eternally, O Vigilius!’ shrilled and shouted all manner of voices, while fists were shaken towards the pontifical abode.

Decius hastened away.  The sight of suffering was painful to him, and the cries of the vulgar offended his ear; he felt indignant that these people should not be fed, as Rome for so many ages had fed her multitude, but above all, he dreaded uproar, confusion, violence.  His hurried pace did not relax until he was lost again amid a wilderness of ruins, where browsing goats and darting lizards were the only life.

Later in the day, when he sat alone in the peristyle, a visitor was introduced, whom he rose to welcome cordially and respectfully.  This was a man of some threescore years, vigorous in frame, with dry, wrinkled visage and a thin, grey beard that fell to his girdle.  As he approached, Decius saw that he was bleeding from a wound on the head and that his cloak was torn.

‘What means this, dear master?’ he exclaimed.  ’What has befallen you?’

‘Nothing worth your notice, gentle Decius,’ the philosopher replied, calmly and gravely.  ’Let us rather examine this rare treatise of Plotinus, which by good fortune I yesterday discovered among rubbish thrown aside.’

‘Nay,’ insisted Decius, ’but your wound must be washed and dressed; it may else prove dangerous.  I fear this was no accident?’

‘If you must know,’ answered the other with good-natured peevishness, ’I am accused of magic.  The honest folk who are my neighbours, prompted, I think it likely, by a certain senator who takes it ill that his son is my disciple, have shown me of late more attention than I care for, and to-day as I came forth, they pursued me with cries of “Sorcerer!” and the like, whereupon followed sticks and stones, and other such popular arguments.  It is no matter.  Plotinus begins—­’