“‘Not yet--not yet; but you are coming out of the darkness into the light.’ And a sweet peace stole over me, and I felt a cool hand on my brow; and then I awoke, and it was not Ebba at all, but you, dearest lady--sweet mother--as I love to call you. It was a happy dream; and it is a happy awakening.” “It was a vision,” Terentia said, “for I do believe the temples are vanishing, and soon only the memory will be left. I say soon; it may not be in my life-time or in yours; but the end is coming, and the time of our nightly watches yonder is short. I hear a rumour to-day that an edict establishing Christianity will be published to-morrow, and then the old faiths will be seen like the phantom of your dream--vanishing--vanishing, and at last vanish away.” “And what will be the end?” Hyacintha asked; “what will come after?” “Nay, child; it is not given me to know, nor even dimly guess; but if there be a future at all, that future is not for us.” The sorrowful tone of Terentia’s voice seemed like the minor chord in the music of the young priestess’s soul. Vanishing--vanishing--vanished! Was everything to vanish?--life and youth and hope, and the sacred fire, and the Palladium, and the goddess herself--all to pass away, and leave no trace behind? Well, it was not for her to question, or cavil, or doubt. The daily service of the temple--the nightly watch--these were marked out for her--these were, at any rate, real and tangible. She would perform them zealously and faithfully, and make each day like a pearl, which should prove ere long a strong chain, uniting her with the Great Past, and so making a bond with all her predecessors who had kept their vow and their womanhood pure and undefiled. With that simplicity which is the outcome of the highest gifts, with that entire absence of self-consciousness which invariably marks those whose beauty is far beyond the ordinary type of fair women, Hyacintha Severa stands forth to command our love and admiration as a light that shone in a dark place--a star that trembled on the verge of dawn, the dawn of a holier and purer day, which was even then breaking over the world. The festival of the goddess Vesta had scarcely passed when a crowd assembled in the Forum to hear the proclamation, that henceforth the Christians were to be allowed freedom to worship their God without being interfered with; and from that time Christianity might be said to be established in Rome and the world. Great were the rejoicings in the Church. The hidden worship of the Catacombs became now open and to be heard and seen of all men. The orders of the Christian Church were enlarged, and bishops and priests and deacons were appointed to minister to the people. The sun had risen, at last, over the darkness of the heathen world, and in those early days was as yet but little clouded by the mists of earth, by those “superstitious vanities” which so grievously eclipsed the glory of the Church of Rome in succeeding generations.