midnight
Yet , the evening before , the council of priests had resolved that , on account of the rage of the merciless pestilence , the temple should not be adorned nor the procession be marshalled . In the afternoon many whose houses had been visited by the plague had remained absent , and now while he , the astrologer , had been watching the course of the stars , the pest had made its way into this sanctuary , else why had it been forsaken by the watchers and the other astrologers who had entered with him at sunset , and whose duty it was to watch through the night ? He again turned with tender solicitude to the sufferer , but instantly started to his feet , for the gates were flung wide open and the light of torches and lanterns streamed into the court . A swift glance at the sky told him that it was a little after midnight , yet his fears seemed to have been true -- the priests were crowding into the temples to prepare for the harvest festival to-morrow . But he was wrong . When had they ever entered the sanctuary for this purpose in orderly procession , solemnly chanting hymns ? Nor was the train composed only of servants of the deity .