the chief philosopher of our age, and through him skilled in all the
learning of the Greeks. But forget not that I am an Oriental and--a woman.
This double nature works at my heart with more than all the power of the
schools. Who and what so strong as the divinity within?'

This is a poor record, my Curtius, of what fell from this extraordinary
woman. Would that I could set down the noble sentiments which, in the
midst of so much that I could not approve, came from her lips in a
language worthy of her great teacher! Would that I could transfer to my
pages the touching eloquence of the divine Julia, whose mind, I know not
how it is, moves in a higher world than ours. Sometimes, nay, many times,
her thoughts, strangely enough, raised up before me the image of the
Christian Probus, of whom I had till then scarcely thought since our
parting. For a long time was this interview continued--an interview to me
more stirring than any other of my life, and, owing to the part I was
obliged to take, almost painfully so. Much that I said could not but have
grated harshly upon the proud and ambitious spirit of Zenobia. But I
shrunk from nothing that in the least degree might tend to shake her in
the designs which now possess and agitate her, and which, as it seems to
me, cannot be carried out without great danger to the safety or existence
of her kingdom; though I cannot but say, that if a rupture should occur
between Palmyra and Rome, imprudence might indeed be charged upon
Zenobia, but guilt, deep guilt, would lie at the door of Aurelian. It was
a great aid that Julia, in all I said, was my ally. Her assent gave double
force to every argument I used; for Zenobia trusts her as a sister, I had
almost said, reveres her as a divinity. Beautiful it was to witness their
freedom and their love. The gods avert every calamity from their heads!

When we had in this manner, as I have said, a long time discoursed,
Zenobia, at length, rising from her seat, said to me, 'Now do we owe you