knowing only of two changes, the blaze of day and night the purifier,
blue, mysterious, ecstatic with starry being? Were not these enough
for him? Could the fire of the altar inspire more? Could he be
initiated deeper in the chambers of the temple than in those great
and lonely places where God and man are alone together? This was
my doing; resting in his tent when I crossed the desert, I had
spoken to him of that old wisdom which the priests of the inner
temple keep and hand down from one to the other; I blew to flame
the mystic fire which already smouldered within him, and filled
with the vast ambition of God, he left his tribe and entered the
priesthood as neophyte in the Temple of Isthar, below Ninevah.

I had sometimes to journey thither bearing messages from our high
priest, and so as time passed my friendship with Asur grew deep.
That last evening when I sat with him on the terrace that roofed
the temple, he was more silent than I had known him before to be;
we had generally so many things to speak of; for he told me all
his dreams, such vague titanic impulses as the soul has in the
fresh first years of its awakening, when no experience hinders
with memory its flights of aspiration, and no anguish has made
it wise. But that evening there was, I thought, something missing;
a curious feverishness seemed to have replaced the cool and hardy
purity of manner which was natural to him; his eyes had a strange
glow, fitful and eager; I saw by the starlight how restless his
fingers were, they intertwined, twisted, and writhed in and out.

We sat long in the rich night together; then he drew nearer to me
and leaned his head near my shoulder; he began to whisper incoherently
a wild and passionate tale; the man's soul was being tempted.