peaking, her companions have taken the dead body to
lower it into the sepulchre. It remains in their hands. It was only a
corpse of wax!

Antony experiences a kind of relief. The whole scene vanishes, and the
cell, the rocks, and the cross reappear! And now he distinguishes on the
other side of the Nile a woman standing in the middle of the desert.
She holds with her hand the end of a long black veil, which conceals her
figure; while she carries on her left arm a little child, which she is
suckling. At her side a huge ape is squatted on the sand. She lifts her
head towards the sky, and, in spite of the distance, her voice can be
heard.

_Isis_--"O Neith, beginning of things! Ammon, lord of eternity! Ptha,
demiurgus! Thoth, his intelligence! Gods of Amenthi! Special Triads of
the Nomes! Sparrow-hawks in the azure! Sphinxes on the outsides of
temples! Ibises standing between the horns of oxen! Planets!
Constellations! River-banks! Murmurs of wind! Reflections of light! Tell
me where to find Osiris!

"I have sought for him through all the water-courses and all the lakes,
and, farther still, in the Ph[oe]nician Byblos. Anubis, with ears erect,
jumped round me, barking, and with his nose scenting out the clumps of
tamarind. Thanks, good Cynocephalus, thanks!"

She gives the ape two or three friendly little slaps on the head.

"The hideous red-haired Typhon killed him and tore him to pieces. We
have found all his members. But I have not got that which made me
fruitful!"

She utters bitter lamentations.

_Antony_ is seized with rage. He casts pebbles at her insultingly:

"Impure one! begone, begone!"

_Hilarion_--"Respect her! This is the religion of your ancestors! You
have worn her amulets in your cradle!"

_Isis_--"In former times, when the summer returned, the inundation drove
to the desert the impure beasts. The dykes flew open; the boats dashed
against one another; the panting earth drank the stream till it was
glutted. O god! with horns of bull, thou didst stretch thyself upon my
breast, and the lowing of the eternal cow was heard!

"The new-sown crops, the harvests, the thrashing of corn, and the
vintages succeeded each other regularly in unison with the changes of
the seasons. In the nights, ever clear, the great stars shed forth their
beams. The days were steeped in an unchanging splendour. The sun and the
moon were seen like a royal pair on either side of the horizon.

"We were enthroned in a world mo