Through worlds and through ages, where'er thy light glows,
Honour and thanks shall attend on thy ray.
Hesperus! Hesperus! &c.
[CHAPTER IV.]
THE YOUNG LOVERS.
It was more than an hour after the boat had reached the landing-place, and, fatigued with a long, bright, happy day, Ammian and Eudochia had sought the repose of hearts at ease; while Flavia, sitting with her daughter and Theodore in the small chamber near the great Corinthian hall in the palace of Diocletian, busied herself with manifold questions in regard to those friends of other years, in Constantinople and in Rome, from whom she had voluntarily separated herself, in order to lead her children up to years of free agency, at a distance from the luxury and corruption of either great metropolis. The anecdotes which he had to relate, the little traits and rumours which he had collected concerning those whom she had once loved dearly, seemed of greater interest to the Lady Flavia than even the news of more personal importance which he had told her. Yet that news imported that the cession of a portion of Illyria by Valentinian to Theodosius was completely defined--that the dwelling in which she had found a home, by the interest of Paulinus, was now fully transferred from the monarch of the West, who had shown a strong disposition to despoil her of her lands in distant provinces, to the chief of the Eastern empire, who, on the contrary, had hitherto given her kindly aid and protection; and that her possession of that sweet spot, near which many of the estates of her dead husband lay, was confirmed to her by the hand of Theodosius himself.
The lamp had been placed at her right hand, in order that she might peruse the letter of Paulinus; but still she had not proceeded to that task. What were the feelings which stayed her, it were difficult to say; but the open pages lay unread by her side; and though she more than once took them up, as if to begin, she laid them down again as often, and asked some new question. At length, as the moonlight found its way through the half-drawn curtains of the door, she once more raised the letter, saying, "Well, I will read it now," and her eye again fixed upon the first few words.
"Notwithstanding, gentle Flavia," so the epistle ran, "the desire I had expressed to keep hidden from my son and our sweet Ildica our hopes and purposes, yet feelings that I cannot well explain, but which I will now attempt to depict, have induced me, sure of your consent and approbation, to tell him, ere he left me--perhaps for the last time--that it was my wish and hope, if his own heart seconded my desire, that he should in his twentieth year choose the one we both so dearly love for his bride."
Flavia raised her eyes to her daughter and the son of Paulinus, who had, in the occupation which had just employed her, a fair excuse for speaking in low and gentle murmurs. They had farther drawn back the curtains, and were gazing from the door upon the moonbeams which lighted up the great hall; and a bright, warm smile upon the mother's face told that her own heart took kindly part in the fond feelings which were so busy in theirs. She turned to the letter again, however, without comment, and read on. "I am about," continued Paulinus, "to travel through the provinces, and the will of God may require that I shall never return. I know not why, but I have a sadness upon me. As the sun goes down, small objects cast long shadows; and I have fancied that I once, and only once, beheld a cold look in the eye of the emperor towards me, a triumphant smile on the countenance of Chrysapheus; yet if ever omens were infallible, they would be the smiles of our enemies and the coldness of our friends. Nevertheless, let me acknowledge all my weakness--weakness which philosophy cannot conquer, and which it were wisdom to conceal from any other eye than thine, oh, thou that hast been as a sister to my widowed heart, as a mother to my orphan children. Before any evil augury could be drawn from the looks of others, my own heart seemed to feel the coming on of fate. There has been a shadow on my spirit, an apprehension of coming evil, a sensation of neighbouring danger, such as domestic animals feel when near a lion, even without seeing it."
Flavia laid down the page, murmuring, "And is it so, Paulinus? alas, and is it so? Go forth, my children," she added, abruptly, seeing them still standing in the doorway; "you seem as if you longed to taste the moonlight air. Go forth! It is a grand sight to gaze upon the waters of the Adriatic from that noble portico. It expands the heart, it elevates the mind, it raises the soul to the God who made all things. Go forth, then, my children, I would willingly be alone."