ed him.

Though his blind eyes did not show him even the faintest outline of a
figure, he felt as if he was flooded with brilliant sunshine.

While the Proserpina was bearing him past the lighthouse, Gras told him
that they had now reached the great harbour, and at the same time he
heard the shouts, whistles, signals, and varying sounds of the landing
place with its crowded shipping, and of the capital.

His blood surged in his veins, and before his mind rose the vision of the
corn-flower blue sky, mirrored in the calm surface of the bluest of seas.
The pharos built by Sostratus towered in dazzling whiteness above the
tide, and before him rose the noble temple buildings, palaces, and
porticoes of the city of Alexandria, with which he was familiar, and
before and between them statue after statue of marble and bronze, the
whole flooded with radiant golden light.

True, darkness sometimes swallowed this wonderful picture, but an effort
of the will was sufficient to show it to him again.

"The Temple of Poseidon!" cried Gras. "The Proserpina is to land at the
foot of the steps." And now Hermon listened to the sounds from the shore,
whose hum and buzz transported him into the midst of the long-missed city
of commerce, knowledge, and arts.

Then the captain's shouts of command fell imperiously upon his ears, the
strokes of the oars ceased, their blades sank with a loud splash into the
water, and at the same instant from the temple steps Hermon was greeted
by the solemn notes of the chorus, from whose rhythm his own name rang
forth again and again like so many shouts of victory.

He thought his heart would fairly burst through his arched chest, and the
passionate violence of its throbbing did not lessen when Gras exclaimed:
"Half Alexandria has assembled to greet you. Ah, if you could only see
it! How the kerchiefs are waving! Laurel after laurel in every hand! All
the distinguished people in the capital have gathered on the sacred soil
of the Temple of Poseidon. There is Archias, too; there are the artists
and the famous gentlemen of the Museum, the members of the Ephebi, and
the priests of the great gods."

Hermon listened with his hand pressed on his breast, and while doing so
the power of his imagination showed the vast, harmoniously noble
structure of the many-pillared Temple of Poseidon, surrounded by as many
thousands as there were in reality hundreds. From all parts of the
sanctuary, even from the tops of the r