And he spread out fresh slips of papyrus and again prepared his long quill.

Sah-luma smiled, as one who is tolerant of the whims of a hired buffoon,—­and, this time seating himself in his ebony chair, was about to commence dictating his Second Canto when Theos, yielding to his desire to speak aloud the idea that had just flashed across his brain said abruptly: 

“Has it ever seemed to thee, Sah-luma, as it now does to me, that there is a strange resemblance between thy imaginative description of the ideal ‘Nourhalma,’ and the actual charms and virtues of thy strayed singing-maid Niphrata?”

Sah-luma looked up, thoroughly astonished, and laughed.

“No!—­Verily I have not traced, nor can I trace the smallest vestige of a similarity!  Why, good Theos, there is none!—­not the least in the world,—­for this heroine of mine, Nourhalma, loves in vain, and sacrifices all, even her innocent and radiant life, for love, as thou wilt hear in the second half of the poem,—­moreover she loves one who is utterly unworthy of her faithful tenderness.  Now Niphrata is a child of delicate caprice ... she loves me,—­me, her lord,—­and methinks I am not negligent or undeserving of her devotion! ... again, she has no strength of spirit,—­her timorous blood would freeze at the mere thought of death,—­she is more prone to play with flowers and sing for pure delight of heart than perish for the sake of love!  ’Tis an unequal simile, my friend!—­ as well compare a fiery planet with a twinkling dewdrop, as draw a parallel between the heroic ideal maid ’Nourhalma’—­and my fluttering singing-bird, Niphrata!”

Theos sighed involuntarily,—­but forcing a smile, let the subject drop and held his peace, while Sah-luma, taking up the thread of his poetical narrative, went on reciting.  When the story began to ripen toward its conclusion he grew more animated, ... rising, he paced the room as he declaimed the splendid lines that now rolled gloriously one upon another like deep-mouthed billows thundering on the shore,—­his gestures were all indicative of the fervor of his inward ecstasy,—­his eyes flashed,—­his features glowed with that serene, proud light of conscious power and triumph that rests on the calm, wide brows of the sculptured Apollo,—­and Theos, leaning one arm in a half-sitting posture, contemplated him with a curious sensation of wistful eagerness and passionate pain, such as might be felt by some forgotten artist mysteriously permitted to come out of his grave and wander back to earth, there to see his once-rejected pictures hung in places of honor among the world’s chief treasures.