burned so many a sacrifice, at length he spied a light blazing from the
windows of a great chapel by the sea. It was the Temple of Aphrodite,
the Queen of Love, and from the open door a sweet savour of incense and
a golden blaze rushed forth till they were lost in the silver of the
moonshine and in the salt smell of the sea. Thither the Wanderer went
slowly, for his limbs were swaying with weariness, and he was half in
a dream. Yet he hid himself cunningly in the shadow of a long avenue
of myrtles, for he guessed that sea-robbers were keeping revel in
the forsaken shrine. But he heard no sound of singing and no tread of
dancing feet within the fane of the Goddess of Love; the sacred plot
of the goddess and her chapels were silent. He hearkened awhile, and
watched, till at last he took courage, drew near the doors, and entered
the holy place. But in the tall, bronze braziers there were no faggots
burning, nor were there torches lighted in the hands of the golden men
and maids, the images that stand within the fane of Aphrodite. Yet, if
he did not dream, nor take moonlight for fire, the temple was bathed in
showers of gold by a splendour of flame. None might see its centre nor
its fountain; it sprang neither from the altar nor the statue of the
goddess, but was everywhere imminent, a glory not of this world, a fire
untended and unlit. And the painted walls with the stories of the loves
of men and gods, and the carven pillars and the beams, and the roof of
green, were bright with flaming fire!

At this the Wanderer was afraid, knowing that an immortal was at hand;
for the comings and goings of the gods were attended, as he had seen,
by this wonderful light of unearthly fire. So he bowed his head, and hid
his face as he sat by the altar in the holiest of the holy shrine, and
with his right hand he grasped the horns of the altar. As he sat there,
perchance he woke, and perchance he slept. However it was, it seemed
to him that soon there came a murmuring and a whispering of the myrtle