o had accidentally come to the border fortress, arrived at Tennis
on the galley of the commandant of Pelusium, and with him Proclus, the
grammateus of the Dionysian artists, the Lady Thyone, Daphne, and her
companion Chrysilla.

The old hero Philippus was detained in the fortress by the preparations
for war.

Althea had returned to Alexandria, and Philotas, who disliked her, had
gone there himself, as Chrysilla intimated to him that he could hope
for no success in his suit to her ward so long as Daphne had to devote
herself to the care of the blinded Hermon.

The epistrategus proceeded with great caution, but his efforts also
remained futile. He ordered a report to be made of all the vessels which
had entered the harbours and bays of the northeastern Delta, but those
commanded by Satabus and his sons gave no cause for investigation; they
had come into the Tanite arm of the Nile as lumber ships from Pontus,
and had discharged beams and planks for the account of a well-known
commercial house in Sinope.

Yet the official ordered the Owl's Nest to be searched. In doing this
he made himself guilty of an act of violence, as the island's right of
asylum still existed, and this incensed the irritable and refractory
Biamites the more violently, the deeper was the reverent awe with which
the nation regarded Tabus, who, according to their belief, was over a
hundred years old. The Biamites honoured her not only as an enchantress
and a leech, but as the ancestress of a race of mighty men. By molesting
this aged woman, and interfering with an ancient privilege, the
epistrategus lost the aid of the hostile fishermen, sailors, and
weavers. Any information from their ranks to him was regarded as
treachery; and, besides, his stay in Tennis could be but brief, as the
King, on account of the impending war, had summoned him back to the
capital.

On the third day after his arrival he left Tennis and sailed from Tanis
for Alexandria. He had had little time to attend to Thyone and her
guests.

Proclus, too, could not devote himself to them until after the departure
of the epistrategus, since he had gone immediately to Tanis, where,
as head of the Dionysian artists of all Egypt, he had been occupied in
attending to the affairs of the newly established theatre.

On his return to Tennis he had instantly requested to be conducted to
the Temple of Demeter, to inspect the blinded Hermon's rescued work.

He had entered the cella of the sanc