Thus passed twenty years; then there came a day when his fine fortune was exhausted, and a time when the Christian congregation strained every nerve to deal a death-blow to the abomination of desolation in their midst.  Again and again, and with increasing frequency, there were sanguinary riots between the Christians who forced their way into the theatre and the heathen audience, till at last a decree of the Emperor Theodosius prohibited the performance of heathen plays or music.

Now, the theatre at Tauromenium, for which Karnis had either given or advanced his whole inheritance, had ceased to exist, and the usurers who, when his own fortune was spent, had lent him moneys on the security of the theatre itself—­while it still flourished—­or on his personal security, seized his house and lands and would have cast him into the debtor’s prison if he had not escaped that last disgrace by flight.  Some good friends had rescued his family and helped them to follow him, and when they rejoined him he had begun his wanderings as a singer.  Many a time had life proved miserable enough; still, be had always remained true to his art and to the gods of Olympus.

Olympius had listened to his narrative with many tokens of sympathy and agreement, and when Karnis, with tears in his eyes, brought his story to a close, the philosopher laid his hand on his friend’s shoulder and drawing him towards him, exclaimed: 

“Well done, my brave old comrade!  We will both be faithful to the same good cause!  You have made sacrifices for it as I have; and we need not despair yet.  If we triumph here our friends in a thousand towns will begin to look up.  The reading of the stars last night, and the auguries drawn from this morning’s victims, portend great changes.  What is down to the ground to-day may float high in the air to-morrow.  All the signs indicate:  ‘A fall to the Greatest;’ and what can be greater than Rome, the old tyrant queen of the nations?  The immediate future, it is true, can hardly bring the final crash, but it is fraught with important consequences to us.  I dreamed of the fall of the Caesars, and of a great Greek Empire risen from the ruins, powerful and brilliant under the special protection of the gods of Olympus; and each one of us must labor to bring about the realization of this dream.  You have set a noble example of devotion and self-sacrifice, and I thank you in the name of all those who feel with us—­nay, in the name of the gods themselves whom I serve!  The first thing to be done now is to avert the blow which the Bishop intends shall strike us by the hand of Cynegius—­it has already fallen on the magnificent sanctuary of the Apamaean Zeus.  If the ambassador retires without having gained his purpose the balance will be greatly—­enormously, in our favor, and it will cease to be a folly to believe in the success of our cause.”

“Ah! teach us to hope once more,” cried the musician.  “That in itself is half the victory; still, I cannot see how this delay. . .”