"I see it, I see it," murmured the sick man sinking back on his pillows,
unconscious.

Philippus was immediately called in, and, with him, little Mary came
weeping into the room. The physician's efforts to revive the sufferer
were presently successful; again the sick man opened his eyes, and spoke
more distinctly and loudly than before:

"There is a perfume of musk. It is the fragrance that heralds the Angel
of Death."

After this he lay still and silent for a long time. His eyes were
closed, but his brows were knit and showed that he was thinking with a
painful effort. At length, with a sigh, he said, almost inaudibly:
"So it was and so it is: The Greek oppressed my people with arbitrary
cruelty as if we were dogs; the Moslem, too, is a stranger, but he is
just. That which happened it was out of my power to prevent; and it is
well, it is very well that it turned out so.--Very well," he repeated
several times, and then he shivered and said with a groan:

"My feet are so cold! But never mind, never mind, I like to be cool."

The leech and the deaconess at once set to work to heat blocks of wood to
warm his feet; the sick man looked up gratefully and went on: "At church,
in the House of God, I have often found it deliciously cool and to-day it
is the Church that eases my death-bed by her pardon. Do you, my Son, be
faithful to her. No member of our house should ever be an apostate. As
to the new faith--it is overspreading land after land with incredible
power; ambition and covetousness are driving thousands into its fold.