Sejanus listened to the joyful words of Drusus and Nero without comment and then said farewell. As he turned away, he said to Agrippina in an undertone, “The gods sometimes elevate those whom they wish to destroy.” Chapter XII Psyche had passed her second month in solitude in the prison of the Praetorian Camp. Her first days had been lived under the crushing effects of her grief. Gradually the hope that throbs in the heart of youth gave her some consolation. Full of thankfulness for the warning of Gyges, which had sealed her lips concerning the writing on Gannon’s tunic, she concluded that she had nothing to fear. There were no proofs against her that could keep her under restraint for a great length of time. But the days passed slowly. Her cell was a rectangular room, with a bed in one corner. There were no openings except a small grating that looked towards the Campagna. For hours she would stand and look out of this small window upon the enormous sweep of cultivated land, bordered by the Sabine Mountains, that appeared to frown upon the all-powerful city of Rome. On clear days Tibur would sparkle amidst the purplish-green background of the mountains, like some little city seen in happy dreams. The Viae Tiburtina, Nomentana, and Praenestina ran through the farms and cultivated fields of the Campagna like large light-colored veins on an enormous leaf. But there were times when mountains, fields, and even the prison seemed to the captive Psyche to vanish in a cloud of oblivion. However, the breaking of the cloud would reveal plaintive and pleasant recollections of the past. Not as sensations are stimulated by the impulsations along the five different roads of the senses did these recollections come to her, but as beautiful and pure thoughts born from the sowing of seeds in solitude. She would think of her dear brother, the remembrance of whose words and acts became clearer since his death. The bright and happy face she saw, the ringing words of cheer she heard, the laugh that would irresistibly bring smiles to other lips, the quick movements that kept the watching eyes alert,--all these things were in her dreams of her brother. “Poor Gannon!” she would say to herself, “thy life was like the incessant tremble on a summer sea. Ah! poor, poor Gannon!” Her home-life had been an experience of unbroken peace. Her mother had been her only friend in childhood, maidenhood, and womanhood; and her father had found no pleasures outside of his own family. She recalled the happy evenings together when they would talk of art, beauty, and the glorious country of Greece. The songs that were sung after the evening meals would come floating into Psyche’s memory like sweet exhalations from rivers of melody.