But Merodach, though he pointed his ears and neighed joyfully, scarcely wetted his muzzle in the marble basin; thereby affording a proof, had any been wanting, of his celebrated pedigree and stainless purity of breed. His young lord was not so abstemious. He looked about, indeed, for a drinking-vessel; but would have done very well without it, had not a shadow come between him and the sun as he was in the act of stooping to immerse face, lips, and nostrils in the sparkling water. With the ready instinct of one whose trade is war, he sprang erect, but bowed his head again in manly courtesy when he saw a girlish figure bending over him to dip her pitcher in the fountain.

"Drink, my lord," said a very sweet and gentle voice from the folds of a thin white veil. "When your thirst is quenched, your servant will take her payment in news from the army of the Great King."

He was young, bold, gallant, born under a Southern sun; but had Ashtaroth, Queen of Heaven, come down in person to accost him, with a pitcher of water in her hand, he must have drunk before he could utter a syllable in reply.

The girl watched him, while he emptied the vessel, with such tender interest as women take in the physical needs of one to whom they render aid, and refilled it forthwith, showing, perhaps not unconsciously, a lithe and graceful figure as she bent over the fountain.

"Thanks, maiden," said he. "You have put new life into a fainting man; for I have galloped over many a weary league of sand, and scarce drawn bridle since yesterday at noon."

"The poor horse!" answered the girl, laying a slender hand on Merodach's swelling neck. "But my lord comes doubtless from the camp, and has joyful tidings to bring, or he had never ridden so far and fast. What of the Great King? and O! what of Arbaces? Is he safe? Is he unhurt? Is he well?"

There was a tremble in her voice that denoted intense anxiety, and the pitcher in her hand shook till it overflowed.

Sarchedon marked her agitation with a sense of displeasure, unaccountable as it was unjust.

"The Great King," he answered, raising his right hand quickly to mouth and eyes while he named him—"the Great King has triumphed, as he must ever triumph when he mounts his war-chariot. The captain of the host is well in health, unwounded, though foremost in battle;—trusted by his lord, feared by the enemy, and honoured of all."

She clasped her pretty hands together in delight, while the pitcher, escaping from her grasp, poured its contents into the thirsty soil and rolled under Merodach's hoofs, eliciting from the horse a prolonged snort of astonishment and disgust.

"You are indeed a messenger of the gods!" said she—"welcome as the breeze at sundown; welcome as the rains of spring; welcome to the Great Queen and her people yonder in the city; but to none so welcome as you have been to me!"

"Indeed!" he answered in a cold, measured voice. "Have I then brought tidings of one so very dear to you?"

"None can ever be so dear," she exclaimed with a light laugh, musical and pleasant as the whisper of the rippling fountain—"none will ever love me so well—none shall I ever love half so dearly in return! Arbaces is my father, and every day since he mounted his chariot at the head of the Great King's captains have I watched here with my maidens, to catch the first gleam of his armour when he returns, to learn good tidings of him by the first messenger who rides hither from the camp. Not one has yet arrived but yourself, my lord. I say again, may all the host of heaven befriend you, for to me you are welcome as the dawn!"

It was unaccountable that his heart should have bounded so lightly at her speech, that his tone should have been so much softer while he replied:

"I am bearing tidings from a king to his queen,—from the conqueror of nations to his people in the greatest city of the earth. I have to relate how we slew and spared not, crushing and trampling down the enemy as an ox treads out the ripened corn; breaking their chariots of iron; taking their fenced cities by assault; capturing and bringing away men, women, and children by thousands and tens of thousands. All that I have to tell is of honour, glory, and victory. Yet I speak truth when I swear to you, maiden, by the light of morning, that whatever recompense it may please the Great Queen to bestow on the lowest of her servants, to have met you here to-day at the Well of Palms, and to have gladdened you with assurance of my lord your father's welfare, is to me the richest and brightest reward of all."

"You have noble triumphs to report," she answered hurriedly, and drawing her veil closer, as if he could see the blood rushing to her cheek behind its folds. "Great victories, but not without fierce warfare—many a broken shield and shivered spear, and deadly arrow quivering in its mark! And you, my lord—have you escaped scathless? Has this good horse borne you always unhurt and triumphant in the press of chariots?—Yes, I know it, in the hottest fore-front of the battle? O, it is dreadful to think of!—the wounded, the dying, the fallen steed, the pitiless conqueror—those we love, it may be, gasping out their lives on the trampled plain, and then to watch on the walls of the city, or here by the Well of Palms, for the horseman that never comes! Pardon me, my lord: I speak too freely. Let me give you to drink once more from the fountain; then will I gather my maidens about me, and depart in peace."

He took her hand in his own, nor did she withdraw it.

"You are not alone?" he asked. "The daughter of Arbaces does not travel unattended so much as a bowshot from the city walls?"

"My damsels are in those tents," she answered, "my camels are kneeling in the shade. I have no need of guards nor horsemen. Over many a league without the ramparts of Babylon her father's fame is a tower of defence for the daughter of Arbaces."

"The daughter of Arbaces!" he repeated. "Maiden, so long as I eat bread and drink water I will remember her by that name."

"And by her own," she added hurriedly. "The servant of my lord is called Ishtar. It was my mother's name, and Arbaces loved her well."

"Ishtar!" he murmured—and his rich low voice dwelt softly on the syllables—"Ishtar, the fair pure queen of night! 'twas well chosen, in good truth; for the moon shines ever gentle, mild, and gracious, like a true goddess."

"And changes, my lord, like a true woman!" laughed the girl; but continued in a graver and more respectful tone: "The day wears on—he who carries a king's tidings must be diligent on the way. I thank my lord for his favourable notice of his servant, and I bid him farewell."

Then she gathered her dress about her, recovered the pitcher, and walked away towards her tents, modest, stately, and graceful—a goddess in gesture, as in name.

She turned once, nevertheless, when he was busied adjusting the bridle in his horse's mouth, and drew her veil aside while he might have counted ten. The large serious eyes, the perfect oval, the pale delicate beauty of that young face haunted him, even to the towers and ramparts of haughty Babylon, even amidst the shouting crowds who thronged her brazen gates.

There is a spirit that, whether for good or evil, when it takes possession of the heart of man, must needs tear and rend, stanch and soothe, torture and perplex, or elevate and encourage, each and all in turn; but, be it a blessing or a curse, it fills the tenement, occupies the whole temple, and when it vanishes, leaves but bare walls and a riven altar to mark the sacred spot that it has scathed and blasted ere it passed away.

Merodach galloped on, swift, mettlesome, untiring, regardless of the many leagues he had traversed, as he was unconscious of the double burden that he bore.

Nearing the city, Sarchedon could not but admire the stupendous walls that frowned over him as he rode at a slower pace through scores of tents and lodges of wood or sun-dried bricks scattered through the richly cultivated