CHAPTER VI.
THE HALL OF AUDIENCE When Elissa reached her chamber after the break up of the procession, she threw herself upon her couch, and burst into a passion of tears.
Well might she weep, for she had been false to her oath as a priestess, uttering as a message from the goddess that which she had learnt from the lips of man.

More, she could not rid herself of the remembrance of the scorn and loathing with which the Prince Aziel had looked upon her, or of the bitter insult of his words when he called her, "a girl of the groves, and a murderess of children." It chanced that, so far as Elissa was concerned, these charges were utterly untrue.

None could throw a slur upon her, and as for these rare human sacrifices, she loathed the very name of them, nor, unless forced to it, would she have been present had she guessed that any such offering was intended.
Like most of the ancient religions, that of the Phoenicians had two sides to it--a spiritual and a material side.

The spiritual side was a worship of the far-off unknown divinity, symbolised by the sun, moon and planets, and visible only in their majestic movements, and in the forces of nature.

To this Elissa clung, knowing no truer god, and from those forces she strove to wring their secret, for her heart was deep.