ere no more than imitators of the works of a greater epoch,
unhappy in that no one at this period of indifference to beauty called
upon them to prove what they could do, or to put forth their highest
powers. Actors, again, from the neglected theatres, starving histrions,
to whom the stage was prohibited by the Emperor and Bishop, singers and
flute-players; hungry priests and temple-servitors expelled from the
closed sanctuaries; lawyers, scribes, ships' captains, artisans, though
but very few merchants, for Christianity had ceased to be the creed of
the poor, and the wealthy attached themselves to the faith professed by
those in authority.

One of the students had contrived to bring a girl with him, and several
others, seeing this, went back into the streets by the secret way and
brought in damsels of no very fair repute, till the crowd of men was
diversified by a considerable sprinkling of wreathed and painted
girls, some of them the outcast maids of various temples, and others
priestesses of higher character, who had remained faithful to the old
gods or who practised magic arts.

Among these women one, a tall and dignified matron in mourning robes,
was a conspicuous figure. This was Berenice, the mother of the young
heathen who had been ridden down and wounded in the skirmish near the
Prefect's house, and whose eyes Eusebius had afterwards closed. She had
come to the Serapeum expressly to avenge her son's death and then to
perish with the fall of the gods for whom he had sacrificed his young
life. But the mad turmoil that surrounded her was more than she could
bear; she stood, hour after hour, closely veiled and absorbed in her own
thoughts, neither raising her eyes nor uttering a word, at the foot of a
bronze statue of justice dispensing rewards and punishments.

Olympius had entrusted the command of the little garrison of armed men
to Memnon, a veteran legate of great experience, who had lost his left
arm in the war against the Goths. The high-priest himself was occupied
alternately in trying to persuade the hastily-collected force to
obey their leader, and in settling quarrels, smoothing difficulties,
suppressing insubordination, and considering plans with reference to
supplies for his adherents, and the offering of a great sacrifice at
which all the worshippers of Serapis were to assist. Karnis kept near
his friend, helping him so far as was possible; Orpheus, with others
of the younger men, had been ordered to