thing to see Isaac. I wonder what curiosities he brings from the hand of
my brother. He will be welcome. I trust he brings some heads of our late
king and present queen, from drawings which I made and transmitted. I am
impatient to see them. Saw you anything of this sort about him?'

'Truly I did, and if by some ill chance I have not left them behind me, in
my preparations for a morning excursion, I can show you what you will like
to see. Ah! here it is: in this small casket I have, I presume, unless
Isaac shall have deceived me--but of which you will be a perfect
judge--some of your brother's art. Look, here are rings with heads of your
king and queen, such as you have just spoken of. Are they genuine?'

'No instrument but that which is guided by the hand of the elder
Demetrius ever did this work,' said he, slowly drawing out his words, as
he closely scrutinized the ring. 'The gold embossment might indeed have
been done by another, but not these heads, so true to the life, and of an
art so far beyond any ability of mine, that I am tempted sometimes to
think that he is in league with Vulcan. Gods! how that mouth of the Queen
speaks! Do we not hear it? Ah, Roman, give me the skill of Demetrius the
elder, and I would spit upon all the power of Aurelian.'

'You Greeks are a singular people. I believe that the idea of beauty is to
you food and clothing, and shelter and drink, more than all riches and all
power: dying on a desert island, a fragment of Phidias would be dearer to
you than a cargo of food.'

'That's a pretty conceit enough,' said he, 'and something near the truth,
as must be confessed.'

As we were thus idly discoursing, we became suddenly conscious of an