366 HISTORICAL TALES.

the horses, they dragged her from her chariot, and
in the public street tore the clothing from her limbs.
She was then dragged into a neighboring church,
and in that sacred edifice killed by a blow from the
club of Peter the Reader, a savage leader in the
throng. Then the inhuman multitude flung them-
selves with murderous rage on the lifeless body, tore
it limb from limb, and with oyster-shells, of which
the neighboring sea-shore furnished an abundant
supply, went to such savage lengths as to scrape the
flesh from her bones. The remnants of her body
were cast into the flames and burned to ashes.

Cyril was never called to account for this brutal
murder, than which nothing more shocking is told
in the annals of savage tribes. In truth, heathenism
was at an end, and the power of the monks and
their leaders had become supreme. Hypatia died as
a sacrificial victim to the spirit of ancient philosophy,
and after her death philosophy and learning practi-
cally ceased to exist, until revived by the Arab con-
querors of Alexandria centuries later. We may,
therefore, with the death of this maiden victim to
the intolerance of the early Christian age, end our
stories from Greek history, which, indeed, had long
before ceased to exist, lost under the giant shadow
of imperial Rome.

THE END.