“But it really is above all measure.  At Aelia Capitolina which Hadrian had decorated with several buildings, they refused to sacrifice to the statues of Zeus and Hera.  That is to say they scorn to do homage to me and my husband!”

“They are forbidden to worship any other divinity than their own God.  Aelia rose up on the very soil where their ruined Jerusalem had stood, and the statues of which you speak stand in their holy places.”

“What has that to do with us?”

“You know that even Caius—­[Caligula]—­could not reduce them by placing his statue in the Holy of Holies of their temple; and Petronius, the governor, had to confess that to subdue them meant to exterminate them.”

“Then let them meet with the fate they deserve, let them be exterminated!” cried Sabina.

“Exterminated?” asked the prefect.  “In Alexandria they constitute nearly half of the citizens, that is to say several hundred thousand of obedient subjects, exterminated!”

“So many?” asked the Empress in alarm.  “But that is frightful.  Omnipotent Jove! supposing that mass were to revolt against us!  No one ever told me of this danger.  In Cyrenaica, and at Salamis in Cyprus, they killed their fellow-citizens by thousands.”

“They had been provoked to extremities and they were superior to their oppressors in force.”

“And in their own land one revolt after another is organized.”

“By reason of the sacrifices of which we were speaking.”

“Tinnius Rufus is at present the legate in Palestine.  He has a horribly shrill voice—­but he looks like a man who will stand no trifling, and will know how to quell the venomous brood.”

“Possibly” replied Titianus.  “But I fear that he will never attain his end by mere severity; and if he should he will have depopulated his province.”

“There are already too many men in the empire.”

“But never enough good and useful citizens.”

“Outrageous contemners of the gods and useless citizens!”

“Here in Alexandria, where many have accommodated themselves to Greek habits of life and thought, and where all have adopted the Greek tongue, they are undoubtedly good citizens, and wholly devoted to Caesar.”

“Do they take part in the rejoicings?”

“Yes, as far as the Greek citizens will allow them.”

“And the arrangement of the water-fight?”

“That will not be given over to them, but Artemion will be permitted to supply the wild beasts for the games in the Amphitheatre.”

“And he was not avaricious about it?”

“So far from it that you will be astonished.  The man must know the secret of Midas, of turning stones into gold.”

“And are there many like him among your Jews?”

“A good number.”

“Then I wish that they would attempt a revolt, for if this led to the destruction of the rich ones, their gold, at any rate, would remain.”