With the utter destruction of "Mystic Babylon," the vast religious system, (whose destruction we have seen,) there came a mighty impulse of commerce, and of consequent wealth to "Babylon the Great" the City. Apleon had made it his head-quarters. "_The kings of the earth lived wantonly with her_." Her wharves and warehouses--built on that wondrous Euphrates--were packed with "_merchandise of gold, silver, precious stones, of pearls, fine linen, purple, silk, scarlet, and all rare woods, and all manner of vessels of ivory, brass, iron, marble, cinnamon, odours, ointments, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, beasts, sheep, horses, chariots, slaves--and souls of men_." Her vessels traded with the whole world. Her liners, travelling at 100 miles per hour, were in easy touch of every land. Her pride in her Maritime and commercial power, was overwhelming: "How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously. . . . For she saith in her heart, I sit a queen!" Her aerial merchandise fleets, too, were amazing! * * * * * * The three months had brought great changes to the trio in whom we are specially interested--Ralph Bastin, George Bullen, and Rose, his young wife. Ralph, in quitting the editor's chair of the Courier, had received a handsome _doucier_, from Sir Archibald Carlyon, and this, at his special request, had been paid to him in the new paper currency of the time--there was a world-common currency, under the Apleon regime, as there was also a world-common code, weights and measures, etc. He had also contrived to turn his savings into the paper currency. George Bullen had done the same, though in the case of each of them it had not been easy work, for both were marked men. They knew themselves to be hated--and watched. Again and again they had narrowly escaped death, and each day they realized that it might be the last. The news of the wondrous enthusiasm of the world's peoples gathered in Babylon and Jerusalem, in their new worship of the golden images of Apleon, had stirred London, New York, Berlin, Paris--_atheistical_ Paris; and all other great world-centres, and in each city many images had been set up. Though neither Ralph Bastin, or George Bullen had now anything to do with journalism--they could not obtain work of any kind because of the absence of the "mark of the Beast" upon their foreheads. But both were journalists by nature, hence when they knew that the image of the Beast was to be set up in St. Paul's on a given Sunday, they determined to be present to see how far this basest of idolatry had really laid hold of London. The trio lived together in a little house, in a by-street in Bloomsbury. Rose would never allow her husband to go out without her; the times were too perilous, either for him to be in the streets, or for her to remain alone at home. In the actual language of Ruth, she had said to him:--