fingers he clasped her arm lightly just above the wrist and asked,--
"Dost thou not divine what I say to thee, Lygia?"

"No," whispered she as answer, in a voice so low that Vinicius barely
heard it.

But he did not believe her, and, drawing her hand toward him more
vigorously, he would have drawn it to his heart, which, under the
influence of desire roused by the marvellous maiden, was beating like a
hammer, and would have addressed burning words to her directly had not
old Aulus appeared on a path set in a frame of myrtles, who said, while
approaching them,--"The sun is setting; so beware of the evening
coolness, and do not trifle with Libitina."

"No," answered Vinicius; "I have not put on my toga yet, and I do not
feel the cold."

"But see, barely half the sun's shield is looking from behind the hill.
That is a sweet climate of Sicily, where people gather on the square
before sunset and take farewell of disappearing Phœbus with a choral
song."

And, forgetting that a moment earlier he had warned them against
Libitina, he began to tell about Sicily, where he had estates and large
cultivated fields which he loved. He stated also that it had come to
his mind more than once to remove to Sicily, and live out his life there
in quietness. "He whose head winters have whitened has bad enough of
hoar frost. Leaves are not falling from the trees yet, and the sky
smiles on the city lovingly; but when the grapevines grow yellow-leaved,
when snow falls on the Alban hills, and the gods visit the Campania with