likrates the priest, she herself fell down and died.

* * * * *

I know not how long we remained thus. Many hours, I suppose. When at
last I opened my eyes, the other two were still outstretched upon
the floor. The rosy light yet beamed like a celestial dawn, and the
thunder-wheels of the Spirit of Life yet rolled upon their accustomed
track, for as I awoke the great pillar was passing away. There, too, lay
the hideous little monkey frame, covered with crinkled yellow parchment,
that once had been the glorious _She_. Alas! it was no hideous dream--it
was an awful and unparalleled fact!

What had happened to bring this shocking change about? Had the nature
of the life-giving Fire changed? Did it, perhaps, from time to time send
forth an essence of Death instead of an essence of Life? Or was it that
the frame once charged with its marvellous virtue could bear no more,
so that were the process repeated--it mattered not at what lapse of
time--the two impregnations neutralised each other, and left the body
on which they acted as it was before it ever came into contact with the
very essence of Life? This, and this alone, would account for the sudden
and terrible ageing of Ayesha, as the whole length of her two thousand
years took effect upon her. I have not the slightest doubt myself but
that the frame now lying before me was just what the frame of a woman
would be if by any extraordinary means life could be preserved in her
till she at length died at the age of two-and-twenty centuries.

But who can tell what had happened? There was the fact. Often since that
awful hour I have reflected that it requires no great imagination to see
the finger of Providence in the matter. Ayesha locked up in her living
tomb waiting from age to age for the coming of her lover worked but a
small change in the order of the World. But Ayesha strong and happy in
her love, clothed in immortal youth and goddess beauty, and the wisdom
of the centuries, would have revolutionised society, and even perchance
have changed the destiny of Mankind. Thus she opposed herself against
the eternal law, and, strong though she was, by it was swept back to
nothingness--swept back with shame and hideous mockery!

For some minutes I lay faintly turning these terrors over in my mind,
while my physical strength came back to me, which it quickly did in that
buoyant atmosphere. Then I bethought me of the others, and staggered
to my feet, to see if I could arouse them.