And he began whistling again, from sheer inability to express his feelings in cold, measured words. As he neared the house, the rich tenor voice of Caliphronas rang vibrating through the still air. His song was, as usual, one of those Greek fragments he was so fond of singing, and even the modern Greek tongue, debased as it was by centuries of foreign influences, sounded pliable and liquid as the vowelled words soared upward like swift-darting swallows. How bare and bleak seems the translation, bereft of its Hellenic sonorousness of speech!— “I will sail in a beakèd ship, impelled by rowers, Over the waters to westward, where Helios sinks nightly in splendor, And there in a hidden island of dreams Will I see ray belovèd smiling with starry eyes. Her arms will enfold me—oh, they will clasp me so closely, I will kiss her lips which burn like scarlet of sunset, Till the nest of our love will flow over—flow over, With delicate singing, and sighings of lover to lover.” Caliphronas was standing on the steps of the terrace, with his classic face uplifted to the serene sky, and, as he sang the song, with his hand resting lightly on the white marble vase near him, he looked the incarnation of blooming adolescence. “Ha!” he cried, as Roylands nimbly mounted the steps; “I was just wondering where you were. What have you been doing, Mr. Maurice?” “I have been talking to the Rector, and for the last few moments I have been watching you, my Attic nightingale. Modern costume spoils you, Caliphronas, as it would spoil any one, so hideous is it. You should be draped in white robes, bear an ivory lyre, and minister to Apollo the Far-Darter.” “Alas!” sighed the Greek, with sudden sadness in his eyes; “Pan is dead, and with him Apollo. I have been born too late, for my soul is Athenian, and longs for the plane-trees of Ilissus. But enough of this classicism, and tell me why you look so merry.” “Because I have made up my mind to go with you to Melnos.” Caliphronas smiled in an enigmatic manner, and sang two lines from his song,— “And there in a hidden island of dreams Will I see my belovèd smiling with starry eyes.” “What do those words mean?” asked Maurice abruptly. “Ah, that you will discover when we reach Melnos!” CHAPTER XI. THE CREED OF A MOTHER-IN-LAW.