, and wood--many in the
latter material being larger than life; canopies, vestments, furniture,
utensils, all of ancient Pagan form, were heaped together, without
order or arrangement, on the floor, to a height of full fifteen feet.

There was something at once hideous and grotesque in the appearance of
the pile. The monstrous figures of the idols, with their rude carved
draperies and symbolic weapons, lay in every wild variety of position,
and presented every startling eccentricity of line, more especially
towards the higher portions of the mass, where they had evidently been
flung up from the ground by the hand that had raised the structure.

The draperies mixed among the images and the furniture were here coiled
serpent-like around them, and there hung down towards the ground,
waving slow and solemn in the breezes that wound through the temple
doorway. The smaller objects of gold and silver, scattered irregularly
over the mass, shone out from it like gleaming eyes; while the pile
itself, seen in such a place under a dusky light, looked like some
vast, misshapen monster--the gloomy embodiment of the bloodiest
superstitions of Paganism, the growth of damp airs and teeming ruin, of
shadow and darkness, of accursed and infected solitude!

Even in its position, as well as in the objects of which it was
composed, the pile wore an ominous and startling aspect; its crooked
outline, expanding towards the top, was bent over fearfully in the
direction of the doorway; it seemed as if a single hand might sway it
in its uncertain balance, and hurl it instantly in one solid mass to
the floor.

Many toilsome hours had passed away, long secret labour had been
expended in the erection of this weird and tottering structure; but it
was all the work of one hand. Night after night had the Pagan entered
the deserted temples in the surrounding streets, and pillaged them of
their contents to enrich his favoured shrine: the removal of the idols
from their appointed places, which would have been sacrilege in any
meaner man, was in his eyes the dread privilege of the high priest
alone.

He had borne heavy burdens, and torn asunder strong fastenings, and
journeyed and journeyed again for hours together over the same gloomy
streets, without loitering in his task; he had raised treasures and
images one above another; he had strengthened the base and heightened
the summit of this precious and sacred heap; he had repaired and
rebuilt, wh