the old man's enthusiasm; they gathered round him, and followed him at
once to the rooms where the weapons had been deposited for use.

Breastplates girt on to their bodies, and swords wielded in their hands
made soldiers of the sages at once, and inspired them with martial ardor.
Little was spoken among these heroes of "the mighty word." They were
bent on action. Olympius Had desired Apuleius to go into his private
room adjoining the hypostyle with Porphyrius, on whose senseless and
rigid state no treatment had as yet had any effect. Some of the temple-
servants carried the merchant down a back staircase, while Olympius
hastily and silently led his comrades in arms up the main steps into the
great halls of the temple.

Here the chivalrous host were doomed to surprise and disappointment
greater than the most hopeless of them was prepared to meet. Olympius
himself for a moment despaired; for his ecstatic adherents had during the
night turned to poltroons and tipplers, and the sacred precincts of the
sanctuary looked as if a battle had been fought and lost there. Broken
and bruised furniture, smashed instruments, garments torn and wet,
draggled wreaths, and faded flowers were strewn in every direction. The
red wine lay in pools like blood on the scarred beauties of the inlaid
pavement; here and there, at the foot of a column, lay an inert body--
whether dead or merely senseless who could guess?--and the sickening reek
of hundreds of dying lamps filled the air, for in the confusion they had
been left to burn or die as they might.

And how wretched was the aspect of the sobered, terror-stricken, worn-out
men and women. An obscure consciousness of having insulted the god and
incurred his wrath lurked in every soul. To many a one prompt death
would have seemed most welcome, and one man--a promising pupil of