But at the same time he observed that the clouds, which had so often brought him good fortune, were dispersing, and this gave him fresh uneasiness.

Dazzled by the flood of sunshine which poured in at the window, he withdrew discontentedly into the room.
If this bright day were to bring disaster?
If the god disdained his offering?
But was not Apollo, perhaps, like the rest of the immortals, an idol of the fancy, living only in the imagination of men who had devised it?
Stern thinkers and pious folks, like the skeptics and the Christians, laughed the whole tribe of the Olympians to scorn.

Still, the hand of Phoebus Apollo had rested heavily on his shoulders in his dream.
His power, after all, might be great.

The god must have the promised sacrifice, come what might.

Bitter wrath rose up in his soul at this thought, as it had often done before, with the immortals, against whom he, the all-powerful, was impotent.