any thrill. He was dead to all that. Having all pleasures at his disposal, he had no joy in life.

We all hoped great things. We had ambitions. We desired to shine, to outshine one another, to glorify our families, to burn our names in big deep letters upon the pages of history. Our parents were simple mortals; we wanted to become immortal. Our families were poor; we wanted to become rich. Those born in huts battled and worked to die in palaces, mourned by the whole world, brought to the grave with the fanfare of trumpets and the pomp of state.

But Simonides! He was a descendant of one of Greece's oldest houses. The race of Simonides had already produced great poets, great musicians,

musicians and watched from very near the most celebrated actresses and singers. The Simonides owned a palace on the Bosporus, a mansion in London, the palace of some old doge in Venice, and their home on the Boulevard St.-Germain was the showplace of the avenue of the French nobility.

When Aristides was eighteen, his father decided to enter politics in Athens. The boy was left to live in the Paris mansion in charge of a dozen servants and cooks. But he chose to live in a hotel not far from the Luxembourg gardens. He chose to live among us, amused by our aspiration and vivacity.

He drew a little closer to me; we were almost friends. Perhaps because I could speak his mother tongue? Or because I understood him better? One day Aristides inquired:

"How about passing your vacation in Greece as my guest?" There was nothing on earth I desired more, and I told him so. I had already visited Greece before, and longed to see again the placid, oily waters of the Ionian Sea, the dark, stretching greensward of the hills, thick with olive-groves.

"So it 's understood," he answered. "When school is over, you go with me to Athens."

The next few weeks I lived on wings. But a month passed, another month, and Simonides never repeated his invitation. Too proud to inquire, I was sure that the plan had somehow fallen through. Then one early morning Aristides suddenly asked:

"Have you made the necessary preparations for your voyage? We leave Monday of next week. We take the boat at Marseilles. I have made reservations on the train, a special

compartment. From Marseilles we leave on a boat going more or less directly to Piræus. I have written home that they put a piano in one of your rooms, so that you may be able to practise. Get ready, Adelphos."

It was a great surprise. I had given up hope of the voyage. up hope of the voyage. Preparations were the least difficult matter; a corduroy suit, a few other things, a dozen books, a music-bag, and a cane were all I possessed. I had studied on an allowance of sixty francs a month. One could not buy any luxuries with that sum.

On the morning we were to leave Paris I met him, as we had previously agreed, at his home on the Boulevard St.-Germain. When we arrived at the railroad station four of his servants were checking trunks and attending to the innumerable details of travel. One servant was to accompany him and see to his comfort, and another was to look after me. "He will be your man, English fashion," Aristides explained.

It humbled me when the blackfrocked old valet took charge of the frayed little satchel containing all my worldly goods.

"Aristides," I said, "do you think I was born a millionaire? I was born in corduroys."

He laughed, and slapped me on the shoulder.

"The Simonides don't care for such things. Don't bother. Don't bother. All will be

well."

My belle was at the railroad station. She had excused herself from work in a near-by millinery-shop to see me off, if she could not convince me to remain. For even at the station, a minute before the last bell, Mimi, the golden-haired little midinette, tried to

convince me not to leave Paris for that "heathen country," so far away from the Luxembourg, the Louvre, the creameries, and her lips. All I could do was to promise to come back to her. I also promised other things, and had her make promises which I doubted she could keep, before I tore myself away from her. Simonides, who was smilingly observing our leave-taking, had called out that the train was leaving. His amie had not come to see him off, but he did not care. He had no strong attachment for anybody or anything. He watched me as I put my head through the window when the train departed. I saw tears in his eyes when I sat down finally and exclaimed, putting aside the handkerchief I had waved:

"She can't see me any more."

"What a happy man you are!" he said, with the air of one who was old.

& 2

Two days later we were in Marseilles. I had by that time, as if to the manner born, become accustomed to "my man." One is so adaptable to new forms when young! The boat for Piræus was delayed twenty-four hours. I took advantage of the delay to roam through the port of Marseilles, to fill my nostrils with the scent of fried oil and heavy wine, the sweetish odor of packed figs and dates in burlap bags on the pavement of the wharves, and to inhale the spicy smells of tar, rope, and rubber, the symphony of odors dear to one born on a waterfront. It made me so communicative, so exuberant, that "my man" became alarmed, hired a taxi, and brought me almost forcibly back to the hotel. I was tremendously amused when we returned. My man was apologetic,

but he argued that Marseilles was a wicked city, and he was responsible for me to his master.

A suite of rooms had been engaged in advance for each of us. I tried to amuse myself and my host, but Aristides was bored. The fact that he was returning home or the voyage did not mean anything to him. The only thing he complained of, and it was the first time I had heard him complain, was that he had lost his favorite cigarette-holder on the train. His servant was sent to buy him a dozen new ones. Aristides looked them over, tried them, and threw them out of the window. None would do so well as that which he had lost; so he had the servant telegraph the stationmaster, asking him to institute search for the little wooden cigarette-holder.

Early the following morning we boarded the steamer. A new surprise for me; it was one of Aristides's father's passenger-boats, the last word in traveling luxury. Of course we were given the best cabins. There were other passengers on deck, but because of the deference shown to us by the captain and the crew, no one attempted to make our acquaintance, though I was still in my old corduroy suit. I gathered that one of the crew had given out a statement that we were Altesses traveling incognito. Even my advances were respectfully declined. Aristides laughed when I complained.

tides and me to the shore. In less than an hour we were at the wharf, where a splendid equipage, drawn by four magnificent black stallions, was waiting for us. The servants remained behind to attend to our trunks. Aristides slowly opened a letter the liveried coachman had handed to him, read it, refolded it neatly, and said, with just a hint of disappointment in his voice:

"Father could not come to meet us. He is in Thessaly. Elections, you know. Oh, did I ever tell you I have no mother? She died two years ago. I should have told you, I think."

The Simonides's palace in Athens was all I expected, and more. Wealth and good taste had for generations combined to build a house which internally and externally had no equal anywhere. The architecture was of the purest Byzantine. The interior echoed back to the last stages of NeoEgyptian culture; to the Alexandria of the days of Hypatia, when paganism, vanquished, strangled with the reflex movements of a dying eagle's flapping wings, was gasping away the last breaths of life. I did not feel humbled because of my modest corduroys. I had not time to think or brood about myself. There were too many new interests absorbing me, and I was only too willing to merge in the new surroundings. With Aristides acting as guide, I visited the ancient temples and monuments of the district. Every day was a holiday. On donkey-back we made excursions to the distant green mountains, thick with huge figtrees. Between groves of oranges and lemons played tame mountain-goats, mules, ewes with their lambs, and deer-limbed little horses.

"To-morrow we shall get ready for a trip to Alexandria," said Aristides one day. "You must see Alexandria before my father returns from Thessaly. When he comes back, he will take possession of you to explain everything in detail. He affects pride in his art treasures, just as he affects political ambition. He has neither of them, the dear old man. It's affectation. We Simonides have lived all our lives in the past. You are a lucky man. You still expect something, hope for something. Father contents himself, makes believe he does, with his affectation of art and politics. I have n't even that," he declared. His eyes

were humid with the sadness of his own life.

Strange, but I was most of the time absolutely unaware of Aristides's existence. Since he desired nothing, enjoyed nothing, and missed nothing, as a personality he ceased to exist for me. Knowing from which angle he looked at things and life, I always knew beforehand what he was going to When he kept quiet, I was grate

say.

ful.

It was as satisfactory as the harmony of non-existing dissonance. His very positiveness was to me as negative as static atmosphere on a gray summer morning.

When all the details for our trip to Alexandria had been attended to, a small package reached Aristides from Marseilles. It was the lost cigaretteholder. I expected him to show some emotion. He had been so troubled when he missed it, he surely would be happy to find his favorite holder again. Nonchalantly, he asked his valet to open the package, stuck a cigarette in the retrieved holder, and continued an interrupted conversation without the slightest show of emotion. That same day he had also received a letter from his amie. He did not even open the envelop. It annoyed me so that I could not withold the remark:

"You are made of wood, Aristides!" "I am old," he answered slowly, but without hesitation, in the ghostlike, colorless voice he affected most of the time.

An hour later, just as we were descending the broad staircase to enter the waiting carriage, a telegram was handed to Aristides by one of the servants. Standing with one foot on the carriage-step and the other on the wide granite step, cigarette-holder between his thin lips, he opened it slowly, after looking at the stamp for its origin.