And the strong man's passionate grief cut his children to the heart, though, since their mother's death, their father's rage and discontent had many a time ere now broken down into childish lamentation.
To-day no doubt the old man was in worse spirits than usual, for it was the day of the Nekysia--the feast of the dead kept every autumn; and he had that morning visited his wife's grave, accompanied by his daughter, and had anointed the tombstone and decked it with flowers.

The young people tried to comfort him; and when at last he was more composed and had dried his tears, he said, in so melancholy and subdued a tone that the angry blusterer was scarcely recognizable: "There--leave me alone; it will soon be over.

I will finish this gem to-morrow, and then I must do the Serapis I promised Theophilus, the high-priest.

Nothing can come of the Atlas.

Perhaps you meant it in all sincerity, Alexander; but since your mother left me, children, since then--my arms are no weaker than they were; but in here--what it was that shriveled, broke, leaked away--I can not find words for it.