Hannibal was early at my door to warn me of the hour of the morning meal,
Milo being still under the influences of the evening's potation. I was
shown to a different apartment from that in which we had supped, but
opening into it. It was a portico rather than a room, being on two sides
open to the shrubbery, with slender Ionic pillars of marble supporting the
ceiling, all joined together by the light interlacings of the most
gorgeous creeping plants. Their odors filled the air. A fountain threw up
in the most graceful forms its clear water, and spread all around an
agreeable coolness. Standing at those points where flights of steps led
down to the walks and plots of grass and flowers, which wound about the
palace, the eye wandered over the rich scene of verdure and blossom which
they presented, and then rested where it can never rest too often or too
long, upon the glittering shafts of the Temple of the Sun. This morning
prospect, from this single point, I thought was reward enough for my long
voyage and hot journey over the desert. It inspired more cheerful thoughts
than the same scene as I had seen it the evening before from the windows
of my chamber. I could not but draw omens of good from the universal smile
that beamed upon me from the earth and the heavens. Fausta's little hand
suddenly placed within mine, and the cheerful greeting of her voice, awoke
me from my dreamy state.

'Your countenance shows that you have slept well, Lucius,' said she; 'it
is bright as the morning itself. Your dreams must have been favorable. Or
else is it the wonder-working power of a Palmyrene air that has wrought so
with you since the last evening? Tell me, have you not slept as you never
slept in Rome?'

'I have slept well, indeed,' I replied, 'but I believe it was owing
rather to your harp and Jewish ode, than to any mysterious qualities of