on Theos's mind,--a memory that with every second grew more
painfully distinct, ... HE HAD SEEN ZEPHORANIM BEFORE! Where,
he could not tell,--but he was as positive of it as that he
himself lived! ... and this inward conviction was accompanied by a
certain undefinable dread,--a vague terror and foreboding, though
he knew no actual cause for fear.

He had however no time to analyze his emotion,--for just then the
Herald-in-Waiting, having performed a backward evolution from the
throne to the threshold of the audience-chamber, beckoned
impatiently to Sah-luma, who at once stepped forward, bidding
Theos keep close behind him. The harp-bearer followed, . . and thus
all three approached the dais where the King still stood erect,
awaiting them. Zabastes the Critic glided in also, almost
unnoticed, and joined a group of courtiers at the furthest end of
the long, gorgeously lighted room, while at sight of the Laureate
the assembled officers saluted, and all conversation ceased. At
the foot of the throne Sah-luma paused, but made no obeisance,--
raising his glorious eyes to the monarch's face he smiled,--and
Theos beheld with amazement, that here it was not the Poet who
reverenced the King, but the King who reverenced the Poet!

What a strange state of things! he thought,--especially when the
mighty Zephoranim actually descended three steps of his flower-
strewn dais, and grasping Sah-luma's hands raised them to his lips
with all the humility of a splendid savage paying homage to his
intellectual conqueror! It was a scene Theos was destined never to
forget, and he gazed upon it as one gazes on a magnificently
painted picture, wherein two central figures fascinate and most
profoundly impress the beholder's imagination. He heard, with a