erary wit as it was of dry criticism; and Martial, the lively author
of the _Epigrams_, had fifty years before remarked that there were few
places in the world where he would more wish his verses to be repeated
than on the banks of the Nile.

Nothing could be lower than the poetic taste in Alexandria at this time.
The museum was giving birth to a race of poets who, instead of bringing
forth thoughts out of their own minds, found them in the storehouse of
the memory only. They wrote their patchwork poems by the help of Homer's
lines, which they picked from all parts of the Iliad and Odyssey and
so put together as to make them tell a new tale. They called themselves
Homeric poets.

Lucian, the author of the _Dialogues_, was at that time secretary to the
prefect of Egypt, and this philosopher found a broad mark for his
humour in the religion of the Egyptians, their worship of animals and
water-jars, their love of magic, the general mourning through the land
on the death of the bull Apis, their funeral ceremonies, their placing
of their mummies round the dinner-table as so many guests, and pawning a
father or a brother when in want of money.

[Illustration: 122.jpg A SNAKE-CHARMER]

So little had the customs changed that the young Egyptians of high birth
still wore their long hair tied in one lock, and hanging over the right
ear, as we see on the Theban sculptures fifteen centuries earlier. It
was then a mark of royalty, but had since been adopted by many families
of high rank, and continues to be used even in the twentieth century.

[Illustration: 123.jpg THE SIGN OF NOBILITY]

Before the end of this reign we meet with a strong proof of the spread
of Christianity in Egypt. The number of believers made it necessary for
the Bishop of Alexandria to appoint three bishops under him, to look
after the churches in three other cities; and accordingly Demetrius, who
then held that office, took upon himself the rank, if not the name, of
Patriarch of Alexandria. A second proof of the spread of Christianity
is the pagan philosophers thinking it necessary to write against it.
Celsus, an Epicurean of Alexandria, was one of the first to attack it.
Origen answered the several arguments of Celsus with skill and candour.
He challenges his readers to a comparison between the Christians and
pagans in point of morals, in Alexandria or in any other city. He
argues in the most forcible way that Christianity had overcome all
difficulties, a