If you're a
beast, you'll have beastly friends. Listen to the Pious
Parnesius on Friendship!'
'I am not pious,'Parnesius answered, 'but I know what
goodness means; and my friend, though he was without
hope, was ten thousand times better than I. Stop
laughing, Faun!'
'Oh, Youth Eternal and All-believing,' cried Puck, as
he rocked on the branch above. 'Tell them about your Pertinax.'
'He was that friend the Gods sent me - the boy who
spoke to me when I first came. Little older than myself,
commanding the Augusta Victoria Cohort on the tower
next to us and the Numidians. In virtue he was far my superior.'
'Then why was he on the Wall?' Una asked, quickly.
'They'd all done something bad. You said so yourself.'
'He was the nephew, his father had died, of a great rich
man in Gaul who was not always kind to his mother.
When Pertinax grew up, he discovered this, and so his
uncle shipped him off, by trickery and force, to the Wall.
We came to know each other at a ceremony in our Temple
in the dark. It was the Bull-Killing,'Parnesius explained to Puck.
'I see, said Puck, and turned to the children.
Pages:
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173