Dodson yielded a mournful obedience. In spite of the firm conviction that his poor friend was now hopelessly overthrown, such an imperious power seemed to reside in a face that was formerly the mansion of an exquisite gentleness, that he could not summon the resolution to resist. But even as the unhappy young man took the first page in his hand and his eyes met the ordered rows of firm but delicate writing with which it was covered, he knew how correct was his prophecy. Hardly a phrase, hardly a word that there was written addressed his reason in any aspect of coherence or good sense. There was a long pause, a crucifying silence, in which the poet, his aged father, and the unhappy reader confronted one another in passive bewilderment. The poet seemed to devour the face of his friend with his sightless eyes. “W-what shall I tell him?” said Dodson to the old man in the extremity of anguish. “Speak only the truth,” said the old man. “Let nought be concealed. Nature who has vouchsafed to him all things, will preserve the first of her sons from the stroke of joy.” “Oh, I can’t speak the truth,” said Dodson. “It would be worse than hitting him in the face.” “Can it wound Achilles to receive the affirmation of his quality?” said the old man, whose voice was like a knell. Dodson’s veins felt a sharper chill. “They are both mad,” he muttered, “hopelessly mad!” The old man took Dodson’s arm in a grip of which none could have suspected him to be capable; and his pale and wasted features had now become as imperious as those of the sightless poet. “You must tell him the truth,” said the white-haired man, whose countenance was so strangely transfigured, “you must deny nothing to one who is consumed by the divine hunger for recognition. It is meet that the creator should be told that his work is good. It is the crown of his superhuman labours that they should receive the sanction of those for whom they have wrought.” “You do not speak to me,” said the poet, in a voice that was rare and strange. “Is it, friend, that you are no longer----? No, I will not doubt one whom I love.” “Speak,” said the old man in the voice of a raven. “The days of Achilles are now few. Speak, that the faithful may render that which he needs.” Dodson felt his own silence to be destroying him. “I will speak,” he said in terror and despair. “I--I am no scholar, old boy, as you know. I don’t understand Greek; I know hardly a word of Latin; but I’ll just say this----” The unhappy Dodson clenched his hands in desperation. “I’ll just say this--to my mind there is nothing--there is nothing in the whole of the world----” The dying poet, whose eyes were sightless, quivered like a stricken bird. “Courage, Achilles!” he muttered faintly, pressing his frail hands to his heart. Then, stretching them forth, he turned his gaunt and grey face upon his friend. “Give to me those honest hands which I know to be trembling violently,” he said.