Julian went into the little garden of the atrium. Under the blue sky a jet of water pulsed into the air, and in the midst of narcissus, acanthus-blossom, tulips, and myrrh, rose a bronze Hermes, winged and smiling like the rest of the cottage, and poised in the act of taking flight. Above the flowers, butterflies and bees playing in the sunshine chased each other, and in the shade of the porch Olympiodorus and his daughter Amaryllis, a pretty girl of some seventeen springs, were playing the Greek game of _kottabos_. On a slender column fixed in the earth, and oscillating like the scale of a balance, lay a little beam, which bore, slung from each end, a cup; under each cup stood an amphora full of water, crowned by a statuette in metal. The game consisted in throwing from a certain distance a few drops of wine, in as high a curve as possible, into one of the little cups, which, thus suddenly weighted, would descend and strike the statuette. "Play, play; it is your turn!" cried Amaryllis. "One, two, three!" Olympiodorus threw the contents of his goblet, and missed. He burst out into a boyish laugh. It was strange to see the tall grey-headed man so wholly absorbed in his game. The young girl, with a charming movement of her bare arm, threw back her mauve tunic and in her turn flung the liquid. The little cup of the _kottabos_ rang upon the statuette. Amaryllis began laughing and clapping her hands. Suddenly, on the threshold they saw Julian, and both rushed to welcome him. Amaryllis cried-- "Diophane! where art thou? Come and see what guest we've got to-day. Quick, quick!" Diophane ran from the kitchen. "Julian, my darling child!... Don't you think he is grown thinner? How long it is since we have seen you!..." And she added, radiant with good humour-- "You may well be merry, children, for this evening we shall have a real feast. I'm going to prepare crowns of fresh roses; I shall fry three perch, and make you cakes of gingerbread!" At this moment a young slave accosted Olympiodorus and whispered in his ear that a rich patrician lady of Cæsarea wished to see him, having something to discuss with the priest of Aphrodite. Olympiodorus followed the slave. Julian and Amaryllis went on with the game of _kottabos_. Presently a little twelve-year-old girl came shyly up to them. It was Psyche, the pale fair-haired and youngest child of Olympiodorus. She had great sad blue eyes, and, alone in the house, seemed a stranger to the cult of Aphrodite, and apart from the general gaiety. Keeping aloof from the rest, she would remain musing while others were laughing, and nobody knew what made her sad, or what gave her pleasure. Her father pitied her as one incurably sick, ruined by the evil eye or by the witchcrafts of his eternal enemies the Galileans, who had carried off the soul of his child in revenge.