since the crime he
had committed. Besides, he preferred dreaming to talking, and the
exercise in the open air preserved him from listless lassitude.

In Memphis Hadrian was detained a whole month, for there he was expected
to visit the Egyptian temples with Sabina, who had arrived before him,
and to submit to many ceremonials invested with the regalia of the
Pharaohs. Sabina often felt as if she must faint when, crowned with the
ponderous vulture-headed fillet of the Queens of Egypt, weighed down with
long robes and golden ornaments, she was conducted with her husband, in
procession, through all the rooms, over the roof and finally into the
holiest place of some vast sanctuary. What senseless ceremonials they had
to go through in the course of these long circuits, and how many
sacrifices had they to attend! When she returned from these visitations
she was utterly exhausted, and indeed, it was no small exertion to
undergo so many fumigations with incense and so many aspersions, to
listen to so many litanies and hymns, to parade through such endless
halls and while being elevated to the rank of celestial beings, to be
crowned with so many crowns in turn and decorated with all kinds of
fillets and symbolic adornments.

Her husband set her a good example, however; through all the ceremonials
he displayed the whole grave majesty of his nature, and among the
Egyptians behaved as one of themselves. He even took pleasure in the
mystical lore of the priests, with whom he often held long conversations.

As at Memphis, so in all the principal temples of the great cities to the
southward, the Imperial pair accepted the homage of the hierarchy and the
honors due to divinity. Wherever Hadrian granted money for the extension
of a temple, he was required to perform the ceremony of laying a stone
with his own hand. But he always found time to hunt in the desert, to
manage the affairs of state, and to visit the most interesting monuments
of past times, and at Memphis especially, the city of the dead, with the
Pyramids, the great Sphinx, the Serapeum and the tombs of the Apis.

Before quitting the city he and his companions consulted the oracle of
the sacred bull. The fairest future was promised to Balbilla; the bull to
whom she had to offer a cake, with her face averted, had approved of her
gift and had touched her hand with his moist muzzle. Hadrian was left in
ignorance as to the sentence of the priests of Apis, for it was given to