LETTER VII.

You will be glad to learn, my Curtius, .hat the time has now come, when I may with reason look for news from Isaac, or for his return. It was his agreement to write of his progress, so soon as he should arrive at Ecbatana. But since he would consume but a very few days in the accomplishment of his task, if, the gods helping, he should be able to accomplish it at all, I may see him even before I hear from him, and, O day thrice happy! my brother perhaps with him. Yet am I not without solicitude, even though Calpurnius should return. For how shall I meet him?-as a Persian, or a Roman ?-as a friend, or an enemy ? As a brother, I can never cease to love him; as a public enemy of Rome, I may be obliged to condemn him.

You have indeed gratified me by what you have said concerning the public works in which the emperor is now engaged. Would that the erection of temples and palaces might draw away his thoughts from the East. The new wall, of so much wider sweep, with which he is now enclosing the city, is well worthy the greatness of his genius. Yet do we, my Curtius, perceive in this rebuilding and strengthening of the walls of Rome, no indication of our country's decline? Were Rome vigorous and sound, as once, in her limbs. what were the need of this new defence about the heart? It is to me a confession of weakness, rather ther any evidence of greatness and strength. Aurelian

achieves more for Rome by the strictness of his disci pline, and his restoration of the ancient simplicity and severity among the troops, than he could by a triple wall about the metropolis. Rome will then already have fallen, when a Gothic army shall have penetrated so far as even to have seen her gates. The walls of Rome are her living and moving walls of flesh. Her old and crumbling ramparts of masonry, upon which we have so often climbed in sport, rolling down into the surrounding ditch huge masses, have ever been to me, when I have thought of them, pregnant signs of security and power.

The ambassadors, Petronius and Varro, early on the morning succeeding their interview with the Queen, departed for the city. They were soon followed by Zenobia and her train of counsellors and attendants. It had been before agreed that the princess, Fausta, and myself, should remain longer at the palace, for the purpose of visiting, as had been proposed, the aged Christian hermit, whose retreat is among the fastnesses of the neighboring mountains. I would rather have accompanied the Queen, seeing it was so certain that important interviews and discussions would take place, when they should be all returned once more to the city. I suppose this was expressed in my countenance. for the Queen, as she took her seat in the chariot, turned and said to me: We shall soon see you again in the city. A few hours in the mountains will be al that Julia will require; and sure I am that the wisdom of St. Thomas will more than repay you for what you may lose in Palmyra. Our topics will relate but to worldly aggrandizement-yours to more permanent interests.'

How great a pity that the love of glory has so fastened upon the heart of this wonderful woman; else might she live, and reign, and die the object of univer sa idolatry. But set as her heart is upon conquest and universal empire throughout the East, and of such marvellous power to subdue every intellect, even the strongest, to her will, I can see nothing before her but a short and brilliant career, ending in ruin, absolute and complete. Zenobia has not, or will not allow it to be seen that she has, any proper conception of the power of Rome. She judges of Rome by the feeble Valerian, and the unskilful Heraclianus, and by their standard measures such men as Aurelian, and Probus, and Carus. She may indeed gain a single battle, for her genius is vast, and her troops well disciplined and brave. But the loss of a battle would be to her the loss of empire, while to Rome it would be but as the sting of a summer insect. Yet this she does not or will not see. To triumph over Aurelian is, I believe, the vision that dazzles, deludes, and will destroy her.

No sooner had the Queen and her train departed, than, mounting our horses, we took our way, Julia, Fausta, and myself, through winding valleys and over rugged hills, toward the hermit's retreat. Reaching the base of what seemed an almost inaccessible crag, we found it necessary to leave our horses in the care of attendant slaves, and pursue the remainder of the way on foot. The hill which we now had to ascend, was thickly grown over with every variety of tree and bush, with here and there a mountain stream falling from rock to rock, and forcing its way to the valley be low. The sultry heat of the day compelled us frequer 'ly

pause, as we toiled up the side of the hill, seating ourselves, now beneath the dark shadows of a branching cedar or the long-lived terebinth, and now on the mossy banks of a descending brook. The mingled beauty and wildness of the scene, together with such companions, scon drove the Queen, Rome, and Palmyra, from my thoughts. I could not but wish that we might lose our way to the hermit's cave, that by such means our walk might be prolonged.

'Is it, I wonder,' said Fausta, 'the instruction of his religion which confines this Christian saint to these distant solitudes? What a singular faith it must be which should drive all who embrace it to the woods and rocks! What would become of our dear Palmyra, were it to be changed to a Christian city? The same event, I suppose, Julia, would change it to a desert.'

'I do not think christianity prescribes this mode of life, though I do not know but it may permit it,' replied the princess. But of this, the Hermit will inform us. He may have chosen this retreat on account of his extreme age, which permits him no longer to engage in the affairs of an active life.'

'I trust for the sake of christianity it is so,' added Fausta; for I cannot conceive of a true religion inculcating, or even permitting inactivity. What would become of the world, if it could be proved that the gods required us to pass our days in retired contem plation?'

'Yet it cannot be denied,' said Julia, that tl. greatest benefactors of mankind have been hose wh have in solitu le, and with patient labor, pursued truth

till they have discovered it, and then revealed it to shed its light and heat upon the world.'

For my part,' replied Fausta, 'I must think that they who have sowed and reaped, have been equal benefactors. The essential truths are instinctive and universal. As for the philosophers, they have, with few exceptions, been occupied as much about mere frivolities as any Palmyrene lady at her toilet. Still, I do not deny that the contemplative race is a useful one in its way. What I say is, that a religion which enjoined a solitary life as a duty, would be a very mischievous religion. And what is more, any such precept, fairly proved upon it, would annihilate all its claims to a divine origin. For certainly, if it were made a religious duty for one man to turn an idle, contemplative hermit, it would be equally the duty of every other, and then the arts of life by which we subsist would be forsaken. Any of the prevalent superstitions, if we may not call them religions, were better than this.'

I agree with you entirely,' said Julia; but my acquaintance with the Christian writings is not such as to enable me to say with confidence that they contain no such permission or injunction. Indeed some of them I have not even read, and much I do not fully understand. But as I have seen and read enough to believe firmly that christianity is a divine religion, my reason teaches me that it contains no precept such as we speak of.'

We had now, in the course of our walk, reached what we found to be a broad and level ledge, about half way to the summit of the hill. It was a spol