“Rome is a colossus built up of a thousand blocks; but among them a hundred and more be but loosely in their places, and are ready to drop away from the body of the foul monster—­sooner rather than later.  Our shout alone will shake them down, and they will fall on our side, we may choose the best for our own use.  Ere long—­a few months only—­the hosts will gather in the champaign country at the foot of Vesuvius, by land and by sea; Rome will open its gates wide to us who bring her back her old gods; the Senate will proclaim the emperor deposed and the Republic restored.  Theodosius will come out against us.  But the Idea for which we go forth to fight will hover before us, will stir the hearts of those soldiers and officers who would gladly—­ah! how gladly-sacrifice to the Olympian gods and who only kiss the wounds of the crucified Jew under compulsion.  They will desert from the labarum, which Constantine carried to victory, to our standards; and those standards are all there, ready for use; they have been made in this city and are lying hidden in the house of Apollodorus.  Heaven-sent daemons showed them in a vision to my disciple Ammonius, when he was full of the divinity and lost in ecstasy, and I have had them made from his instructions.”

“And what do they represent?”

“The bust of Serapis with the ‘modius’ on his head.  It is framed in a circle with the signs of the zodiac and the images of the great Olympian deities.  We have given our god the head of Zeus, and the corn-measure on his head is emblematic of the blessing that the husbandman hopes for.  The zodiac promises us a good star, and the figures representing it are not the common emblems, but each deeply significant.  The Twins, for instance, are the mariner’s divinities, Castor and Pollux; Hercules stands by the Lion whom he has subdued; and the Fishes are dolphins, which love music.  In the Scales, one holds the cross high in the air while the other is weighed down by Apollo’s laurel-wreath and the bolts of Zeus; in short, our standard displays everything that is most dear to the soul of a Greek or that fills him with devotion.  Above all, Nike hovers with the crown of victory.  If only fitting leaders are to be found at the centres of the movement, these standards will at once be sent out, and with them arms for the country-folk.  A place of meeting has already been selected in each province, the pass-word will be given, and a day fixed for a general rising.”

“And they will flock round you!” interrupted Karnis, “and—­I, my son, will not be absent.  Oh glorious, happy, and triumphant day!  Gladly will I die if only I may first live to see the smoking offerings sending up their fragrance to the gods before the open doors of every temple in Greece; see the young men and maidens dancing in rapt enthusiasm to the sound of lutes and pipes, and joining their voices in the chorus!  Then light will shine once more on the world, then life will once more mean joy, and death a departure from a scene of bliss.”