he stars was fulfilled!

The sound--the shock, stunned the Athenian for several moments. When he
recovered, the light still illuminated the scene--the earth still slid
and trembled beneath! Ione lay senseless on the ground; but he saw her
not yet--his eyes were fixed upon a ghastly face that seemed to emerge,
without limbs or trunk, from the huge fragments of the shattered
column--a face of unutterable pain, agony, and despair! The eyes shut
and opened rapidly, as if sense were not yet fled; the lips quivered and
grinned--then sudden stillness and darkness fell over the features, yet
retaining that aspect of horror never to be forgotten!

So perished the wise Magician--the great Arbaces--the Hermes of the
Burning Belt--the last of the royalty of Egypt!

Chapter IX

THE DESPAIR OF THE LOVERS. THE CONDITION OF THE MULTITUDE.

GLAUCUS turned in gratitude but in awe, caught Ione once more in his
arms, and fled along the street, that was yet intensely luminous. But
suddenly a duller shade fell over the air. Instinctively he turned to
the mountain, and beheld! one of the two gigantic crests, into which the
summit had been divided, rocked and wavered to and fro; and then, with a
sound, the mightiness of which no language can describe, it fell from
its burning base, and rushed, an avalanche of fire, down the sides of
the mountain! At the same instant gushed forth a volume of blackest
smoke--rolling on, over air, sea, and earth.

Another--and another--and another shower of ashes, far more profuse than
before, scattered fresh desolation along the streets. Darkness once more
wrapped them as a veil; and Glaucus, his bold heart at last quelled and
despairing, sank beneath the cover of an arch, and, clasping Ione to his
heart--a bride on that couch of ruin--resigned himself to die.

Meanwhile Nydia, when separated by the throng from Glaucus and Ione, had
in vain endeavored to regain them. In vain she raised that plaintive
cry so peculiar to the blind; it was lost amidst a thousand shrieks of
more selfish terror. Again and again she returned to the spot where
they had been divided--to find her companions gone, to seize every
fugitive--to inquire of Glaucus--to be dashed aside in the impatience of
distraction. Who in that hour spared one thought to his neighbor?
Perhaps in scenes of universal horror, nothing is more horrid than the
unnatural selfishness they engender. At length it occurred to Nydia,
that as it had b