The whole party had sat during some long and anxious minutes, listening
to the appalling thunder-claps, when Orpheus rushed into the banqueting-
room, with the same frenzied and terror-stricken haste as before, among
the revellers, crying: "It is the end-all is over! The world is falling
asunder! Fire is come down from heaven! The earth is in flames already
--I saw it with my own eyes! I have come down from the roof. . . .

"Father! Where is my father?"

At this news the company started up in fresh alarm, Pappus, the
mathematician, cried out: "The conflagration has begun! Flame and fire
are falling from the skies!"

"Lost-lost!" wailed Eunapius; while Porphyrius hastily felt in the folds
of his purple garment, took out a small crystal phial and went, pale but
calm, up to the high-priest. He laid his hand on the arm of the friend
whom he had looked up to all his life with affectionate admiration, and
said with an expression of tender regret:

"Farewell. We have often disputed over the death of Cato--you
disapproving and I approving it. Now I follow his example. Look--there
is enough for us both."

He hastily put the phial to his mouth, and part of the liquid had passed
his lips before Olympius understood the situation and seized his arm.
The effect of the deadly fluid was instantly manifest; but Porphyrius had
hardly lost consciousness when Apuleius had rushed to his side. The
physician had succumbed to the universal panic and resigned himself
doggedly to Fate; but as soon as an appeal was made to his medical skill
and he heard a cry for help, he had thrown off the wrapper from his head