“It would give us time, and that is what we want,’ replied Olympius.  “Everything is in preparation, but nothing is ready.  Alexandria, Athens, Antioch, and Neapolis are to be the centres of the outbreak.  The great Libanius is not a man of action, and even he approves of our scheme.  No less a man than Florentin has undertaken to recruit for our cause among the heathen officers in the army.  Messala, and the great Gothic captains Fraiut and Generid are ready to fight for the old gods.  Our army will not lack leaders. . .”

“Our army!” exclaimed Karnis in surprise.  “Is the matter so far advanced?”

“I mean the army of the future,” cried Olympius enthusiastically.  “It does not count a man as yet, but is already distributed into several legions.  The vigor of mind and body—­our learned youth on one hand and strong-armed peasantry on the other—­form the nucleus of our force.  Maximus could collect, in the utmost haste, the army which deprived Gratian of his throne and life, and was within a Hair-breadth of overthrowing Theodosius; and what was he but an ambitious rebel, and what tempted his followers but their hopes of a share in the booty?  But we—­ we enlist them in the name of the loftiest ideas and warmest desires of the human heart, and, as the prize of victory, we show them the ancient faith with freedom of thought—­the ancient loveliness of life.  The beings whom the Christians can win over—­a patch-work medley of loathsome Barbarians—­let them wear out their lives as they choose!  We are Greeks —­the thinking brain, the subtle and sentient soul of the world.  The polity, the empire, that we shall found on the overthrow of Theodosius and of Rome shall be Hellenic, purely Hellenic.  The old national spirit, which made the Greeks omnipotent against the millions of Darius and Xerxes, shall live again, and we will keep the Barbarians at a distance as a Patrician forbids his inferiors to count themselves as belonging to his illustrious house.  The Greek gods, Greek heroism, Greek art and Greek learning, under our rule shall rise from the dust—­all the more promptly for the stringent oppression under which their indomitable spirit has so long languished.”

“You speak to my heart!” cried Karnis.  “My old blood flows more swiftly already, and if I only had a thousand talents left to give. . .”

“You would stake them on the future Greek Empire,” said Olympius eagerly.  “And we have adherents without number who feel as you do, my trusty friend.  We shall succeed—­as the great Julian would have succeeded but for the assassins who laid him low at so early an age; for Rome. . .”

“Rome is still powerful.”