whispered, loud enough for Dada's keen ears to catch the words: "Come
mother, come home at once. He has opened his eyes and called for you. The
physician says all danger is over."

The mother in her turn whispered to her friend in glad haste: "All is
well!" and hurried away with the girl. The friend she had left raised her
hands and eyes in thanksgiving, and Dada, too, smiled in sympathy and
pleasure. Had the God of the Christian heard her prayer with theirs.

Meanwhile the preacher had ended his preliminary prayer and began to
explain to his hearers that he had bidden them to the church in order to
warn them against foolish terrors, and to lead them into the frame of
mind in which the true Christian ought to live in these momentous times
of disturbance. He wished to point out to his brethren and sisters in the
Lord what was to be feared from the idols and their overthrow, what the
world really owed to the heathen, and what he expected from his
fellow-believers when the splendid and imminent triumph of the Church
should be achieved.

"Let us look back a little, my beloved," he said, after this brief
introduction. "You have all heard of the great Alexander, to whom this
noble city owes its existence and its name. He was a mighty instrument in
the hand of the Lord, for he carried the tongue and the wisdom of the
Greeks throughout all lands, so that, in the fulness of time, the
doctrine which should proceed from the only Son of God might be
understood by all nations and go home to all hearts. In those days every
people had its own idols by hundreds, and in every tongue on earth men
put up their prayers to the supreme Power which makes itself felt
wherever mortal creatures dwell. Here, by the Nile, after Alexander's
death, reigned the Ptolemies; and the Egyptian citizens of Alexandria
prayed to other gods than their Greek neighbors, so that they could never
unite in worshipping their divinities; but Philadelphus, the second
Ptolemy, a very wise man, gave them a god in common. In consequence of a
vision seen in a dream he had the divinity brought from Sinope, on the
shores of Pontus, to this town. This idol was Serapis, and he was raised
to the throne of divinity here, not by Heaven, but by a shrewd and
prudent man; a grand temple was built for him, which is to this day one
of the wonders of the world, and a statue of him was made, as beautiful
as any image ever formed by the hand of man. You have seen and know them
both,