tween the several cities for the honour of their gods,
the bull, the crocodile, or the fish, had never ceased, all reverence
for those gods was dead. The sacred animals, in particular the bulls
Apis and Mnevis, were again waited upon by their priests as of old; but
it was a vain attempt. Not only was the Egyptian religion overthrown,
but the Thebaid, the country of that religion, was fallen too low to
be raised again. The people of Upper Egypt had lost all heart, not more
from the tyranny of the Roman government in the north than from the
attacks and settlement of the Arabs in the south. All changes in the
country, whether for the better or the worse, were laid to the charge
of these latter unwelcome neighbours; and when the inquiring traveller
asked to be shown the crocodile, the river-horse, and the other animals
for which Egypt had once been noted, he was told with a sigh that they
were seldom to be seen in the Delta since the Thebaid had been peopled
with the Blemmyes. Falsehood, the usual vice of slaves, had taken a deep
hold on the Egyptian character. A denial of their wealth was the means
by which they usually tried to save it from the Roman tax-gatherer; and
an Egyptian was ashamed of himself as a coward if he could not show
a back covered with stripes gained in the attempt to save his money.
Peculiarities of character often descend unchanged in a nation for many
centuries; and, after fourteen hundred years of the same slavery, the
same stripes from the lash of the tax-gatherer still used to be the
boast of the Egyptian peasant. Cyrene was already a desert; the only
cities of note in Upper Egypt were Koptos, Hermopolis, and Antinoopolis;
but Alexandria was still the queen of cities, though the large quarter
called the Bruchium had not been rebuilt; and the Serapeum, with its
library of seven hundred thousand volumes, was, after the capitol of
Rome, the chief building in the world.

This temple of Serapis was situated on a rising ground at the west end
of the city, and, though not built like a fortification, was sometimes
called the citadel of Alexandria. It was entered by two roads; that on
one side was a slope for carriages, and on the other a grand flight of a
hundred steps from the street, with each step wider than that below
it. At the top of this flight of steps was a portico, in the form of a
circular roof, upheld by four columns.

[Illustration: 231.jpg AN EGYPTIAN WATER-CARRIER]

Through this was the e