ed towards the Serapeium. But he was not destined to arrive there as
soon as he had hoped to do. For ere he had gone half a mile, behold a
crowd advancing towards him blocking up the whole street.

The mass seemed endless. Thousands of torches flared above their heads,
and from the heart of the procession rose a solemn chant, in which
Philammon soon recognised a well-known Catholic hymn. He was half minded
to turn up some by-street, and escape meeting them. But on attempting
to do so, he found every avenue which he tried similarly blocked up by a
tributary stream of people; and, almost ere he was aware, was entangled
in the vanguard of the great column.

'Let me pass!'cried he in a voice of entreaty.

'Pass, thou heathen?'

In vain he protested his Christianity.

'Origenist, Donatist, heretic! Whither should a good Catholic be going
to-night, save to the Caesareum?'

'My friends, my friends, I have no business at the Caesareum!' cried he,
in utter despair. 'I am on my way to seek a private interview with the
patriarch, on matters of importance.'

'Oh, liar! who pretends to be known to the patriarch, and yet is
ignorant that this night he visits at the Caesareum the most sacred
corpse of the martyr Ammonius!'

'What! Is Cyril with you?'

'He and all his clergy.'

'Better so; better in public,' said Philammon to himself; and, turning,
he joined the crowd.

Onward, with chant and dirge, they swept out through the Sun-gate, upon
the harbour esplanade, and wheeled to the right along the quay, while
the torchlight bathed in a red glare the great front of the Caesareum,
and the tall obelisks before it, and the masts of the thousand ships
which lay in the harbour on their left; and last, but not least, before
the huge dim mass of the palace which bounded the esplanade in front,
a long line of glittering helmets and cuirasses, behind a barrier of
cables which stretched from the shore to the corner of the museum.

There was a sudden halt; a low ominous growl; and then the mob pressed
onward from behind, surged up almost to the barrier. The soldiers
dropped the points of their lances, and stood firm. Again the mob
recoiled; again surged forward. Fierce cries arose; some of the boldest
stooped to pick up stones: but, luckily, the pavement was too firm for
them....Another moment, and the whole soldiery of Alexandria would have
been fighting for life and death against fifty thousand Christians....

But Cyril had not f