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Updated: September 23, 2025
The stately beauty of Hypatia, the seductive fascination of Pelagia, the childlike nature of Philammon, the subtle cynicism of Raphael Aben-Ezra, the mighty audacity of the Goths, the fanaticism of Cyril, and the strange clash of three elements of civilisation, Graeco-Roman, Christian, Teutonic give us definite impressions, leave a permanent imprint on our thoughts.
But in the meanwhile, such meditations as these drove from her mind for that day both Athene, and the ode, and philosophy, and all things but Pelagia the wanton. In the meanwhile, Alexandrian politics flowed onward in their usual pure and quiet course.
Amid all that gorgeous pageant in which mediæval angels; were mixed with classic youths and flower-crowned; maidens, in such a medley of fantastic beauty as could never have been imagined save by a painter; who was one-third artist, one-third madman, and one-third seer amid all the marvels of that strange, uncanny culmination of the neo-Romantic movement in Art which had excited the admiration of one set of the London critics and the scorn of others, I had really and fully seen but one face the face of Isis, or Pelagia, or Eve, or Natura Benigna, or whosoever she was looking at me with those dear eyes of Winnie's which were my very life looking at me with the same bewitching, indescribable expression that they wore when she sat with her 'Prince of the Mist' on Snowdon.
Pelagia sprang towards her lover: Philammon caught her by the arm for one last despairing appeal: and in a moment, neither knew how, the Goth and the Greek were locked in deadly struggle, while Pelagia stood in silent horror, knowing that a call for help would bring instant death to her brother. It was over in a few seconds.
He asked eagerly and instinctively for Pelagia; of course she had not yet returned. For Wulf he was not within. And then he took his station close to the gateway, while his heart beat loud with hope and dread. At last the Goths appeared, forcing their way through the mob in a close column. There were no litters with them. Where, then, were Pelagia and her girls?
And Hypatia had not even promised her a heaven. The resurrection of the flesh was too carnal a notion for her refined and lofty creed. And so, his four months' dream swept away in a moment, he hurried back to his chamber, with one fixed thought before him the desert; a cell for Pelagia; another for himself.
A reasonable soul, capable of right or wrong at all? He hoped not .... He would trust not.... And still Pelagia danced on; and for a whole age of agony, he could see nothing in heaven or earth but the bewildering maze of those white feet, as they twinkled over their white image in the marble mirror.... At last it was over.
'But there is Pelagia in the way. 'Put her out of the way, then. 'Impossible. 'It was this morning; a week hence it may not be. I heard a promise made to-night which will do it, if there be the spirit of a Goth left in the poor besotted lad whom we know of. 'Oh, he is all right at heart; never fear him. But what was the promise? 'I will not tell till it is claimed.
And Philammon?.... Sufficient for the chapter, as for the day, is the evil thereof. Pelagia had passed that night alone in sleepless sorrow, which was not diminished by her finding herself the next morning palpably a prisoner in her own house. Her girls told her that they had orders they would not say from whom to prevent her leaving her own apartments.
But Pelagia kept her face still hidden in her hands, and rising, walked slowly back, crushed by the weight of some tremendous awe, across the orchestra, and up the slope; and vanished among the palms and oleanders, regardless of the applause and entreaties, and jeers, and threats, and curses, of that great multitude of sinful slaves.
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