“Nevertheless,” said the steward, “the Bishop has put out his hand to touch the sanctuary.  But our noble Olympius would not suffer the sacrilegious host to approach, and they had to retire with broken heads.  Serapis will not be mocked; he will stand though all else perish.  ‘Eternity,’ the priest tells us, ’is to him but as an instant, and while millions of generations bloom and fade, he is still and forever the same!’”

“Hail, all hail to the great god!” cried Orpheus with hands outstretched towards the temple.

“Yea, hail! for everlasting glory shall be his!” repeated his father.  “Great is Serapis, and his house and his image shall last. . .”

“Till the next full moon!” said a passer-by in a tone of sinister mockery, shaking his fist in the face, as it were, of the god.  Orpheus turned quickly to punish the prophet of evil; but he had disappeared in the crowd and the tide of men had borne him onwards.  “Till the next full moon!” murmured Agne, who had shuddered at her companion’s rapturous ejaculations, and she glanced uneasily at Orpheus; but by the time Herse addressed her a minute or two later she had controlled the expression of her features, and the matron’s heart was gladdened by her bright smile.  Nay, many a young Alexandrian, passing the group on foot or in a carriage, looked at her a second time, for that smile lent a mysterious charm to her pale, calm face.  Nor had it faded away when they had crossed the bridge and were nearing the shores of the lake, for an idea once conceived lingered long in Agne’s mind; and as she walked on in the bright glory of the morning’s sun her mind’s eye was fixed on a nocturnal scene—­on the full moon, high in the sky—­on the overthrow of the great idol and a glittering army among the marble ruins of the Serapeum.  Apostles and martyrs soared around, the Saviour sat enthroned in glory and triumph, while angels, cradled on the clouds that were his footstool, were singing beatific hymns which sounded clearly in her ear above the many-voiced tumult of the quays.  The vision did not vanish till she was desired to get into the boat.

Herse was a native of Alexandria and Karnis had passed some of the best years of his life there; but to Orpheus and Agne all was new, and even the girl, when once she had escaped from the crowd and noise which oppressed her, took an interest in the scene and asked a question now and then.  The younger man had not eyes enough to see all that claimed his attention and admiration.

There were the great sluice-gates at the entrance to the canal that joined the lake to the sea—­there, in a separate dock, lay the splendid imperial Nile-boats which served to keep up communication between the garrison of Alexandria and the military stations on the river—­there, again, were the gaudy barges intended for the use of the ‘comes’, the prefect and other high officials—­and there merchant-vessels of every size lay at anchor in countless number.  Long trains of many-colored