with the philosopher.

Caracalla had given orders that no one was to be admitted till the
negotiations with the Parthian ambassadors, which had begun an hour ago,
were brought to a conclusion. Philostratus well knew that the emperor
would interrupt the most important business if Melissa were announced,
but there was much that he would have the maiden lay to heart before he
led her to the monarch; while she wished for nothing so earnestly as that
the door which separated her from her terrible wooer might remain closed
to the end of time. When the chamberlain Adventus looked out from the
imperial apartments, she begged him to give her a little time before
announcing her.

The old man blinked consent with his dim eyes, but the philosopher took
care that Melissa should not be left to herself and the terrors of her
heart. He employed all the eloquence at his command to make her
comprehend what it meant to be an empress and the consort of the ruler of
the world. In flaming colors he painted to her the good she might do in
such a position, and the tears she might wipe away. Then he reminded her
of the healing and soothing influence she had over Caracalla, and that
this influence came doubtless from the gods, since it passed the bounds
of nature and acted so beneficently. No one might reject such a gift
from the immortals merely to gratify an ordinary passion. The youth
whose love she must give up would be able to comfort himself with the
thought that many others had had much worse to bear, and he would find no
difficulty in getting a substitute, though not so beautiful a one. On
the other hand, she was the only one among millions whose heart, obedient
to a heaven-sent impulse, had turned in pity toward Caracalla. If she
fled, she would deprive the emperor of the only being on whose love he
felt he had some claim. If she listened to the wooing of her noble