XVIII

AND we are told that Iarchas, the moment he saw  Apollonius, addressed him by name in the Greek tongue, and asked him for the letter which he brought from Phraotes, for he had already received this by dint of his foreknowledge ; and by way of parading the inspired character of his prescience, he told him before he set eyes on the epistle, that it was one letter short, namely of a delta ; and he began at once in a vulgar manner in that very first interview, like a man who has got wealth for the first time and does not know how to use it, to show off his superiority as a seer, by running off the names of Apollonius' father and mother, and telling him all about his family and upbringing and education, and about his periodical voyages abroad, and about his journey thither to himself, and about what he had done himself or said to his companions on the road. And next this wonderful author tells us that the " Brahmans, after anointing themselves together with Apollonius with an amber-like drug, took a bath, and then standing round as if in chorus, struck the earth with their staves, and the earth arched itself up and elevated them some two cubits into the air, so that they stood there levitated up in the air itself for some considerable length of time. And he relates that they drew down fire from the sun without any effort on their part and whenever they chose. And the miracle-monger adds another marvel to these, when he tells that there were four tripods like those of Pytho which wheeled themselves forth, moving of their own accord ; and he goes so far as to compare these to the tripods in Homer, and he says that there were set upon them cup-bearers to serve in the banquet, four in number and made of bronze. And in addition he tells us that the earth too strewed grass beneath them of her own accord and unasked. And of these tripods two, he says, ran with wine, and of the other two, the one supplied hot water and the other cold. And the cup-bearers of bronze drew for the guests in due mixture both the wine and the water, and pushed round the cups in a circle, just as they are handed round in a symposium.