er and rain as a message to warn his foes. If only they
might abstain from the last, worst crime of desecrating his image!

Nor was this the hope of the heathen only; on the contrary: Jews and
Christians no less dreaded the fall of the god and of his temple. He was
the pride, the monumental glory of the city of Alexander; the centre of
foundations and schools which benefited thousands. The learning which
was the boast of Alexandria dwelt under his protection; to the Serapeum
was attached a medical Faculty which enjoyed the reputation of being
the first in the world; from its observatory the course of the year
was forecast and the calendar was promulgated. An hour's slumber in its
halls brought prophetic dreams, and the future must remain undivined if
Serapis were to fall, for the god revealed it to his priests, not merely
by the courses and positions of the stars, but by many other signs;
and it was a delight and a privilege to look forward from the certain,
tangible present to the mysteries of the morrow.

Even Christian seers answered the questionings of their followers in
a way which portended the worst, and it was a grief to many of the
baptized to think of their native city without Serapis and the Serapeum,
just as we cannot bear to cut down a tree planted by the hand of an
ancestor, even though it may darken our home. The temple ought to be
closed, bloody sacrifices to the god should be prohibited--but his
image--the noblest work of Bryaxis--to mutilate, or even to touch that
would be a rash, a fateful deed, treason to the city and an outrage on
the world.

Thus thought the citizens; thus, too, thought the soldiers, who were
required by military discipline to draw the sword against the god in
whom many of them believed.

As the news spread that the troops were to attack the Serapeum early
next morning, thousands of spectators collected, and filled the temple
itself in breathless anxiety to watch the issue of the struggle.

The sky was as clear and blue as on any other fine day; but over the sea
to the north lay a light stratum of clouds--the harbingers perhaps of
the appalling blackness which the god would presently bring up against
his enemies.

The men who had defended the Serapeum were led away; it had been
determined in a council of war that they should be treated with
clemency, and Cynegius had proclaimed free and full pardon to every
prisoner who would swear never, for the future, to sacrifice to the g