Page:The Song of the Sirens.djvu/242

 those not so far off yielded to the spell of his masterful attitude, and the thrill of their submission communicated itself to the entire throng. Transfigured and sublime, his presence thralling the whole vast concourse, he stepped back half a pace. With each hand he seized the fasces from the nearest lictor to right and left of him. To the earth before the platform he hurled them. Through the stunned silence his voice bugled:

"If you want gold, begin on that: … or that!"

The stillness became as if no breathing thing but himself existed. Stepping back again he seized the two standards of the fourth legion.

"Or on that!" he called as he hurled the first, "or on that!" as he hurled the second.

Across the dazed hush his clarion voice carried far.

"Think what you are doing. The gold I shall turn into the treasury is no more yours to covet than the bullion on the fasces, the metal of your standards, or the gold of the eagles."

He seized and hurled the great gold eagle of the seventh legion.

"If you must and will have gold," he called, "begin on that!"

The tension snapped. A tenfold roar effaced the brief silence. It was a roar of weeping men, abashed, abased, brought back to their senses,