'Nay, not at your sweet face is my anger excited, AEnone,' he said; 'but at that scurvy dog, Bassus. He should himself be a slave and the companion of slaves, were his true station meted out to him.' 'He with whom you passed the night?' suggested AEnone. 'Ay, he was one of us,' Sergius answered, taking a position nearer the table, and commencing to pick off a crumb of bread as the incentive to a more extended repast. 'He was with us, as there always will be some rude and unmannerly intruder in every company; but there were also others, the associates of Emilius. There was Sotus, the Egyptian, a learned astronomer, and Cyope, the renowned Greek dramatist, and Spoletius, who is now writing a history of the empire, and, if what he says is true, has already brought his work down to the time of the Emperor Nero--' 'And will carry it on until he reaches the present day! And will then, in their proper place, tell about your achievements, my lord!' exclaimed AEnone, a flush of expectation glowing upon her face, as she thought that here were her conjectures of the preceding evening about to be realized. 'Ay!' responded Sergius; 'I presume that he will speak of me and of what you dignify as my achievements, foolishly fond child; and therefore it was meet that I should not neglect the opportunity of being in his presence, in order that he might speak well of me rather than the reverse. Otherwise, you well know that I would have preferred to let revelling have the go-by, and to have come at once to gather you to my heart. But we men, whom the world calls celebrated, must be watchful, and learn to resign pleasure to duty, and guard our fame, or else it may go out like a wasted lamp, and leave it in the darkness of oblivion. We cannot spare our time to give free scope to our love, as though we were poor and unknown.' AEnone reproached herself for her suspicions. Surely she had done wrong in distrusting him for the coldness of his greeting. He may have meant nothing but love and kindness, and have been weighed down by cares and anxieties which she could not comprehend. Had he not said that something had made him angry? He, the great imperator, to have been ruffled by the conduct of a low comedian, whose company his interest obliged him to tolerate! She would yet be patient and wait.