"Or, if you prefer it, a dream, the fulfilment of a dream. I believe in dreams."
"Of course," said the Tribune, smiling, "like all poets! I care more for waking thoughts."
"When I reached the army over yonder in Vindonissa, a lovely charming memory of a child rose vividly before me; a child equally bewitching in mind and person, whom I knew and loved here several years ago."
"A boy?"
"No, a girl."
"Ho, ho, pedagogue of the Emperor!" cried the Tribune, laughing.
Herculanus did not enter into the jest; he was silently watching Ausonius's every look.
"Oh, calm yourself! Bissula is a girl about twelve years old--that is--she was in those days. She and a Sarmatian boy brought to Arbor every week the fish her uncle had caught on the northern shore of the lake. And how delightfully she talked! Even her Barbarian Latin sounded sweetly from her cherry-red lips. We became the best of friends. I gave her--she would accept neither money nor costly jewels--trifling articles, especially seeds of fine Gallic fruit and flowers from Garumna for her little garden. She told me strange stories of the gods and fauns in the woods, the nymphs in the lakes and springs here in the country,--but she gave them different names,--and the mountain giants opposite, whose white heads glittered in the sunset light. And I--I--"
"You read the 'Mosella' to her, of course!" laughed Saturninus.
"Certainly. And the little Barbarian girl showed a better appreciation of it than the great Roman general. It was not the fish that pleased her best--"