nd dug deep into
every field of Greek science, gaining, under his father's guidance, all
the knowledge of Egyptian horoscopy, which was not wholly lost even at
this late period.

In the midst of the contentious Christian sects of the capital, both
father and son remained heathen and worshippers of Isis; and when the old
priest died at an advanced age, Horapollo moved to Memphis where he led
the quiet and secluded life of a student, mingling only now and then with
the astronomers, astrologers, and calendar-makers at the observatory, or
visiting the alchemists' laboratories, where, even in Christian Egypt,
they still devoted themselves to attempts to transmute the baser into the
noble metals. Alchemists and star-readers alike soon detected the old
man's superior knowledge, and in spite of his acrid and often
offensively-repellent demeanor, took counsel of him on difficult
questions. His fame had even reached the Arabs, and, when it was
necessary to find the exact direction towards Mecca for the prayer niche
in Amru's new mosque, he was appealed to, and his decision was final.

Philippus had, some years since, been called to the old man's bedside in
sickness, and being then a beginner and in no great request, he had given
the best of his time and powers to the case. Horapollo had been much
attracted by the young physician's wide culture and earnest studiousness;
he had conceived a warm liking for him, the warmest perhaps that he had
ever felt for any fellow-human since the death of his own family. At last
the elder took the younger man into his heart with such overflowing
affection, that it seemed as though his spirit longed to make up now for
the stint of love it had hitherto shown. No father could have clung to
his son with more fervent devotion, and when a relapse once more brought
him to death's door he took Philippus wholly into his confidence,
unrolled before his eyes the scroll of his inner and outer life from its
beginnings, and made him his heir on condition that he should abide by
him to the end.

Philippus, who, from the first, had felt a sympathetic attraction to this
venerable and talented man, agreed to the bargain; and when he
subsequently became associated with the old man in his studies, assisting
him from time to time, Horapollo desired that he would help him to
complete a work he hoped to finish before he died. It was a treatise on
hieroglyphic writing, and was to interpret the various signs so far as