Then suddenly
from a certain window on the north side of the Temple sprang out a flame
so bright that from where she stood upon the gate, Miriam could see
every detail of the golden tracery. A soldier mounted on the shoulders
of another and not knowing in his madness that he was a destroying
angel, had cast a torch into and fired the window. Up ran the bright,
devouring flame spreading outwards like a fan, so that within some few
minutes all that side of the Temple was but a roaring furnace. Meanwhile
the Romans were pressing through the Gate Nicanor in an unending stream,
till presently there was a cry of "Make way! Make way!"
Miriam looked down to see a man, bare-headed and with close-cropped
hair, white-robed also and unarmoured, as though he had risen from
his couch, riding on a great war-horse, an ivory wand in his hand and
preceded by an officer who bore the standard of the Roman Eagles. It was
Titus itself, who as he came shouted to the centurions to beat back the
legionaries and extinguish the fire. But who now could beat them back?
As well might he have attempted to restrain the hosts of Gehenna burst
to the upper earth. They were mad with the lust of blood and the lust of
plunder, and even to the voice of their dread lord they paid no heed.
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