"But let us pass that over and come to what is your special concern.
I thought of you, reverend sir, to transcribe and put into Latin
some Greek MSS. of inestimable value. I confide in your knowledge
and in your zeal, and have no doubt that your young disciple cannot
but be of great help to you."

And addressing me specially he said:

"Yes, my son, I lay great hopes on you. They are based for a large
part on the education you have received. For, you have been brought
up, so to say, in the flames, under the mantel of the chimney
haunted by Salamanders. That is a very considerable circumstance."

Without interrupting his speech, he took up an armful of MSS. and
deposited them on the table.

"This," he said, showing a roll of papyrus, "comes from Egypt. It is
a book of Zosimus the Panopolitan, which was thought to be lost and
which I found myself in a coffin of a priest of Serapis.

"And what you see here," he added, showing us some straps of glossy
and fibrous leaves on which Greek letters traced with a brush were
hardly visible, "are unheard-of revelations, due, one to Gophar the
Persian, the other to John, the arch-priest of Saint Evagia.

"I should be very glad if you would occupy yourselves with these
works before any others. Afterwards we will study together the MSS.
of Synesius, Bishop of Ptolemy, of Olympiodorus and Stephanus, which
I discovered at Ravenna, in a vault where they have been locked up
since the reign of that ignoramus Theodosius who has been surnamed