In the centre of this space stood an altar, and by it was placed the rude figure of a divinity carved in wood and painted.

On the head of this figure rose a crescent symbolical of the moon, and round its neck hung a chain of wooden stars.
It had four wings but no hands, and of these wings two were out-spread and two clasped a shapeless object to its breast, intended, apparently, to represent a child.

By these symbols Aziel knew that before him was an effigy sacred to the goddess of the Phoenicians, who in different countries passed by the various names of Astarte, or Ashtoreth, or Baaltis, and who in their coarse worship was at once the personification of the moon and the emblem of fertility.
Standing before this rude fetish, between it and the altar, whereon lay some flowers, and in such fashion that the moonlight struck full upon her, was a white-robed woman.

She was young and very beautiful both in shape and feature, and though her black hair streaming almost to the knees took from her height, she still seemed tall.

Her rounded arms were outstretched; her sweet and passionate face was upturned towards the sky, and even at that distance the watchers could see her deep eyes shining in the moonlight.