“How?” and Sah-luma laughed musically..  “My simple friend, dost thou ask me such a babe’s question?"...  He sprang from his couch, and standing erect, pushed his clustering dark hair off his wide, bold brows. .  “Am I disfigured, aged, lame, or crooked-limbed? ...  Cannot these arms embrace?—­these lips engender kisses?—­these eyes wax amorous? ... and shall not one brief hour of love with me console the weariest maid that ever pined for passion? ...  Now, by my faith, how solemn is thy countenance! ...  Art thou an anchorite, good Theos, and wouldst thou have me scourge my flesh and groan, because the gods have given me youth and vigorous manhood?”

He drew himself up with an inimitable gesture of pride,—­his attitude was statuesque and noble,—­and Theos looked at him as he would have looked at a fine picture, with a sense of critically satisfied admiration.

“Most assuredly I am no anchorite, Sah-luma!” he said smiling slightly, yet with a touch of sorrow in his voice.  “But methinks the consolement thou wouldst offer to enamoured maids is far more dangerous than lasting!  Thy love to them means ruin,—­thy embraces shame,—­thy unthinking passion death!  What!—­wilt thou be a spendthrift of desire?—­wilt thou drain the fond souls of women as a bee drains the sweetness of flowers?—­wilt thou, being honey-cloyed, behold them droop and wither around thee, and wilt thou leave them utterly destroyed and desolate?  Hast thou no vestige of a heart, my friend? a poet-heart, to feel the misery of the world? ..the patient grief of all-appealing Nature, commingled with the dreadful, yet majestic silence of an unknown God? ...  Oh, surely, thou hast this supremest gift of genius, . . this loving, enduring, faithful, sympathetic heart! ... for without it, how shall thy fame be held long in remembrance? ... how shall thy muse-grown laurels escape decay?  Tell me! ...” and leaning forward he caught his friend’s hand in his eagerness..  “Thou art not made of stone, . . thou art human, . . thou art not exempt from mortal suffering ...”

“Not exempt—­no!” interposed Sah-luma thoughtfully ...  “But, as yet,—­I have never really suffered!”

“Never really suffered!"..  Theos dropped the hand he held, and an invisible barrier seemed to rise slowly up between him and his beautiful companion.  Never really suffered! ... then he was no true poet after all, if he was ignorant of sorrow!  If he could not spiritually enter into the pathos of speechless griefs and unshed tears,—­if he could not absorb into his own being the prayers and plaints of all Creation, and utter them aloud in burning and immortal language, his calling was in vain, his election futile!  This thought smote Theos with the strength of a sudden blow,—­he sat silent, and weighed with a dreary feeling of disappointment to which he was unable to give any fitting expression.