The embassage was, however, unsuccessful.

The king refused to give up the god.

The negotiations were continued for two years, but all in vain.

At length, on account of some failure in the regular course of the seasons on that coast, there was a famine there, which became finally so severe that the people of the city were induced to consent to give up their deity to the Egyptians in exchange for a supply of corn.
Ptolemy sent the corn and received the idol.

He then built the temple, which, when finished, surpassed in grandeur and magnificence almost every sacred structure in the world.
It was in this temple that the successive additions to the Alexandrian library were deposited, when the apartments of the Museum became full.
In the end there were four hundred thousand rolls or volumes in the Museum, and three hundred thousand in the Serapion.