her lover."

While her husband was still threatening and storming, Sirona had said to
herself, that she would rather die than live any longer with this man.
That she herself was not free from fault never occurred to her mind. He
who is punished more severely than he deserves, easily overlooks his own
fault in his feeling of the judge's injustice.

Phoebicius was right; neither Petrus nor Dorothea had it in their power
to protect her against him, a Roman citizen. If she could not contrive
to help her self she was a prisoner, and without air, light, and freedom
she could not live. During his last speech her resolution had been
quickly matured, and hardly had he turned his back and crossed the
threshold, than she hurried up to her bed, wrapped the trembling
greyhound in the coverlet, took it in her arms like a child, and ran into
the sitting-room with her light burden; the shutters were still open of
the window through which Hermas had fled into the open. With the help of
a stool she took the same way, let herself slip down from the sill into
the street, and hastened on without aim or goal--inspired only by the
wish to escape durance in the dark room, and to burst every bond that
tied her to her hated mate--up the church-hill and along the road which
lead over the mountain to the sea.

Phoebicius gave her a long start, for after having arranged her prison he
remained some time in the little room behind the kitchen, not in order to
give her time, collect his thoughts or to reflect on his future action,
but simply because he felt utterly exhausted.

The centurion was nearly sixty years of age, and his frame, originally a
powerful one, was now broken by every sort of dissipation, and could no