than any one else that Constantine regarded the free Arian spirit as the most dangerous element in the political future of the empire, she had cunningly employed every artifice and innuendo that could tend to inflame his personal hatred of these religious dissenters. She affected to regard the riot in the streets of Rome as arising from the machinations of the Arian recusants. Knowing that Constantine had only once visited Rome since the overthrow of Maxentius, and that he disliked the place, she pretended to desire that he should fix his imperial residence at Rome, on the ground that Milan was inconveniently situated, and that both Nicomedia and Constantinople, being in the midst of vast Arian communities, were unsafe for him. She thought that the rioting in Rome gave her the opportunity to take some decisive step in accomplishing her long-cherished designs, and began more vehemently to press her insidious suggestions upon the gloomy soul of the atheist whom she knew to worship only himself. "If the stone wherewith these Arian strangers who are in the city marred the head of thy statue on the Via Sacra had smitten thee, thou wouldst have been slain at once." "But," said the emperor, dryly, passing his hand over his forehead, "I feel not the slightest pain from the blow." "The undirected mob is powerless against thee," she said; "but this infamous act is but the unguarded expression of a sentiment common to the millions of Armenia, and to large numbers of the Egyptians and Syrians, and to nearly all of the Goths." "What hath caused thee so much uneasiness from such a trifle as the throwing of a stone or two? The royal blood should despise such visionary fears." "But the guardsman, Pilus, who hath lately come from Illyricum, informeth me that in the garrison it is commonly reported that the heretic Arius saith that, if Christians could lawfully bear arms, the Arians of Armenia and the Goths alone could seat Licinius upon the throne of his father, and Crispus Cæsar upon thine." "But neither Licinius, nor Crispus, nor the Arians, cherish any such treasonable designs," said Constantine. "I fear lest thou art lulled into a false security. Ever anxious for thy safety and for thy glory, I have consulted auguries and oracles, and, although these things have no great weight with thee or with me as matters of religious faith, the oracles were always valuable portents to show the drift of popular opinion and desire; and no great statesman can afford to despise them, for that which the multitude long after doth sooner or later come to pass; and all the divinations portend calamity to thee and thy house from the Arians." "But Licinius is a boy, and Crispus Cæsar is quiet, modest, temperate, and unostentatious. He hath neither vices nor ambitions that require him to aspire higher than he already standeth."