_Hilarion_--"Yes! say they; for, while things are continually passing
around us, the sky, like eternity, remains unchangeable!"

_Antony_--"Nevertheless, it has a master."

_Hilarion_, pointing at the column--"That is Belus, the first ray, the
sun, the male!--the other, which is fruitful, is under him!"

Antony observes a garden lighted up with lamps. He is in the midst of
the crowd in an avenue of cypress-trees. To right and left little paths
lead towards huts erected in a wood of pomegranate-trees, which protect
lattices of reeds. The men, for the most part, have pointed caps with
laced robes, like the plumage of peacocks. There are people from the
North clad in bearskins; nomads in brown woollen cloaks; pale Gangarides
with long ear-rings; and the classes, like the nationalities, appear to
be confused, for sailors and stone-cutters jostle against princes
wearing tiaras of carbuncles and carrying large walking-sticks with
carved heads. All hurry forward with dilated nostrils, filled with the
same desire.

From time to time they got out of the way, in order to allow a long,
covered chariot, drawn by oxen, to pass, or perhaps it is an ass jolting
on his back a woman closely veiled, who also disappears in the direction
of the huts.

Antony is frightened. He desires to turn back. However, an inexpressible
curiosity leads him on.

Beneath the cypress-trees women are squatted in rows upon deerskins,
each of them having for a diadem a plait of cords. Some of them,
magnificently attired, address the passers-by in loud tones. The more
timid keep their features hidden between their hands, whilst, from
behind, a matron--no doubt, their mother--encourages them. Others, with
heads enveloped in black shawls, and the rest of their bodies quite
nude, seem, at a distance, like statues of flesh. As soon as a man
flings money on their knees, they rise. And one can hear kisses amid the
foliage, and sometimes a great, bitter cry.

_Hilarion_--"Those are the virgins of Babylon who prostitute themselves
to the goddess."

_Antony_--"What goddess?"

_Hilarion_--"There she is!"

And he shows Antony, at the very end of the avenue, on the threshold of
an illuminated grotto, a block of stone representing a woman.

_Antony_--"Infamy! What an abomination to give a sex to God!"

_Hilarion_--"You conceive Him, surely, as a living person!"

Once more Antony finds himself in darkness.

He perceives in the air a luminous circle placed