It travels about from province to province stopping in the chief towns to administer justice.

When an appeal is brought against the judgment of the court of justice belonging to any place--over which the Epistates of the district presides--the case is brought before the Chrematistoi, who are generally strangers alike to the accuser and accused; by them it is tried over again, and thus the inhabitants of the provinces are spared the journey to Alexandria or--since the country has been divided--to Memphis, where, besides, the supreme court is overburdened with cases.
"No former president of the Chrematistoi had ever enjoyed a higher reputation than Philotas.

Corruption no more dared approach him than a sparrow dare go near a falcon, and he was as wise as he was just, for he was no less deeply versed in the ancient Egyptian law than in that of the Greeks, and many a corrupt judge reconsidered matters as soon as it became known that he was travelling with the Chrematistoi, and passed a just instead of an unjust sentence.
"Cleopatra, the widow of Epiphanes, while she was living and acting as guardian of her sons Philometor and Euergetes--who now reign in Memphis and Alexandria--held Philotas in the highest esteem and conferred on him the rank of 'relation to the king'; but she was just dead when this worthy man took my father's cause in hand, and procured his release from prison.
"The scoundrel Eulaeus and his accomplice Lenaeus then stood at the height of power, for the young king, who was not yet of age, let himself be led by them like a child by his nurse.
"Now as my father was an honest man, no one but Eulaeus could be the rascal, and as the Chrematistoi threatened to call him before their tribunal the miserable creature stirred up the war in Caelo-Syria against Antiochus Epiphanes, the king's uncle.
"You know how disgraceful for us was the course of that enterprise, how Philometor was defeated near Pelusium, and by the advice of Eulaeus escaped with his treasure to Samothrace, how Philometor's brother Euergetes was set up as king in Alexandria, how Antiochus took Memphis, and then allowed his elder nephew to continue to reign here as though he were his vassal and ward.
"It was during this period of humiliation, that Eulaeus was able to evade Philotas, whom he may very well have feared, as though his own conscience walked the earth on two legs in the person of the judge, with the sword of justice in his hand, and telling all men what a scoundrel he was.
"Memphis had opened her gates to Antiochus without offering much resistance, and the Syrian king, who was a strange man and was fond of mixing among the people as if he himself were a common man, applied to Philotas, who was as familiar with Egyptian manners and customs as with those of Greece, in order that he might conduct him into the halls of justice and into the market-places; and he made him presents as was his way, sometimes of mere rubbish and sometimes of princely gifts.
"Then when Philometor was freed by the Romans from the protection of the Syrian king, and could govern in Memphis as an independent sovereign, Eulaeus accused the father of these two girls of having betrayed Memphis into the hands of Antiochus, and never rested till the innocent man was deprived of his wealth, which was considerable, and sent with his wife to forced labor in the gold mines of Ethiopia.
"When all this occurred I had already returned to my cage here; but I heard from my brother Glaucus--who was captain of the watch in the palace, and who learned a good many things before other people did--what was going on out there, and I succeeded in having the daughters of Philotas secretly brought to this temple, and preserved from sharing their parents' fate.

That is now five years ago, and now you know how it happens, that the daughters of a man of rank carry water for the altar of Serapis, and that I would rather an injury should be done to me than to them, and that I would rather see Eulaeus eating some poisonous root than fragrant peaches." "And is Philotas still working in the mines ?" asked the Roman, clenching his teeth with rage.
"Yes, Publius," replied the anchorite.

"A 'yes' that it is easy to say, and it is just as easy too to clench one's fists in indignation--but it is hard to imagine the torments that must be endured by a man like Philotas; and a noble and innocent woman--as beautiful as Hera and Aphrodite in one--when they are driven to hard and unaccustomed labor under a burning sun by the lash of the overseer.