Lucio laughed heartily, and so did I,--she looked so mischievous and merry. "But there are two other owls in the cage"--I said--"What are their names?" She held up a little finger in playful warning. "Ah, that would be telling secrets!" she said--"They're all the 'Athenæum'--the holy Three,--a sort of literary Trinity. But why a trinity I do not venture to explain!--it is a riddle I must leave you to guess!" She moved on, and we followed across a velvety grass-plot bordered with bright spring-flowers, such as crocuses, tulips, anemones, and hyacinths, and presently pausing she asked--"Would you care to see my work-room?" I found myself agreeing to this proposition with an almost boyish enthusiasm. Lucio glanced at me with a slight half-cynical smile. "Miss Clare, are you going to name a pigeon after Mr Tempest?" he inquired--"He played the part of an adverse critic, you know--but I doubt whether he will ever do so again!" She looked round at me and smiled. "Oh, I have been merciful to Mr Tempest,"--she replied; "He is among the anonymous birds whom I do not specially recognise!" She stepped into the arched embrasure of an open window which fronted the view of the grass and flowers, and entering with her we found ourselves in a large room, octagonal in shape, where the first object that attracted and riveted the attention was a marble bust of the Pallas Athene whose grave impassive countenance and tranquil brows directly faced the sun. A desk strewn with papers occupied the left-hand side of the window-nook,--in a corner draped with olive-green velvet, the white presence of the Apollo Belvedere taught in his inscrutable yet radiant smile, the lesson of love and the triumphs of fame,--and numbers of books were about, not ranged in formal rows on shelves as if they were never read, but placed on low tables and wheeled stands, that they might be easily taken up and glanced at. The arrangement of the walls chiefly excited my interest and admiration, for these were divided into panels, and every panel had, inscribed upon it in letters of gold, some phrase from the philosophers, or some verse from the poets. The passage from Shelley which Mavis had recently quoted to us, occupied, as she had said, one panel, and above it hung a beautiful bas-relief of the drowned poet copied from the monument at Via Reggio. Another and broader panel held a fine engraving of Shakespeare, and under the picture appeared the lines-- "To thine own self be true, And it must follow as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man."