Hermon waved his hand as if brushing away a troublesome fly, exclaiming impatiently:  “The gods, always the gods!  I know by my own mother, Thyone, what you women are, though I was only seven years old when I was bereft of her by the same powers that you call good and wise, and who have also robbed me of my eyesight, my friend, and all else that was dear.  I thank you for your kind intention, and you, too, Daphne, for recalling the beautiful allegory.  How often we have argued over its meaning!  If we continued the discussion, perhaps it might pleasantly shorten the next few hours, which I dread as I do my whole future existence, but I should be obliged in the outset to yield the victory to you.  The great Herophilus is right when he transfers the seat of thought from the heart to the head.  What a wild tumult is raging here behind my brow, and how one voice drowns another!  The medley baffles description.  I could more easily count with my blind eyes the cells in a honeycomb than refute with my bewildered brain even one shrewd objection.  It seems to me that we need our eyes to understand things.  We certainly do to taste.  Whatever I eat and drink—­langustae and melons, light Mareotic wine and the dark liquor of Byblus my tongue can scarcely distinguish it.  The leech assures me that this will pass away, but until the chaos within merges into endurable order there is nothing better for me than solitude and rest, rest, rest.”

“We will not deny them to you,” replied Thyone, glancing significantly at Daphne.  “Proclus’s enthusiastic judgment was sincerely meant.  Begin by rejoicing over it in the inmost depths of your heart, and vividly imagining what a wealth of exquisite joys will be yours through your last masterpiece.”

“Willingly, if I can,” replied the blind man, gratefully extending his hand.  “If I could only escape the doubt whether the most cruel tyrant could devise anything baser than to rob the artist, the very person to whom it is everything, of his sight.”

“Yes, it is terrible,” Daphne assented.  “Yet it seems to me that a richer compensation for the lost gift is at the disposal of you artists than of us other mortals, for you understand how to look with the eyes of the soul.  With them you retain what you have seen, and illumine it with a special radiance.  Homer was blind, and for that very reason, I think, the world and life became clear and transfigured for him though a veil concealed both from his physical vision.”

“The poet!” Hermon exclaimed.  “He draws from his own soul what sight, and sight alone, brings to us sculptors.  And, besides, his spirit remained free from the horrible darkness that assailed mine.  Joy itself, Daphne, has lost its illuminating power within.  What, girl, what is to become of the heart in which even hope was destroyed?”

“Defend it manfully and keep up your courage,” she answered softly; but he pressed her hand firmly, and, in order not to betray how self-compassion was melting his own soul, burst forth impetuously:  “Say rather:  Crush the wish whose fulfilment is self-humiliation!  I will go back to Alexandria.  Even the blind and crippled can find ways to earn their bread there.  Now grant me rest, and leave me alone!”