sufficient temples or marching on Jerusalem. The attempted coup fails; Esther is killed, but Abidan escapes. Jabaster is imprisoned and appears to commit suicide shortly afterwards. Soon after Alroy learns that Abidan has linked up with a Persian sultan and is reconquering his lands. On the eve of setting out at the head of his army, a number of bad omens occur including the disappearance of Solomon's sceptre. Alroy's army camp at Nebeuard and, expecting the imminent aid of Scherirah's army, realise they will need to fight the following day. That evening Alroy hears from a dying soldier who has saved his life in an ambush that Honain and Schirene killed Jabaster. Hopelessly outnumbered, Alroy's army fights bravely but when Scherirah's army eventually arrive, it turns out they have switched allegiance. Alroy flees with Schirene but they are captured a few days later in a surprise night-time attack. A prisoner in Baghdad, Alroy learns that Honain has negotiated a settlement such that Miriam is safe and that he could be banished with Schirene if he were to confess that he is an instrument of the devil and used sorcery to seduce her. Alroy refuses, so Honain arranges for Miriam to try to convince him. She fails and dies broken-hearted shortly afterwards. Alroy is then subjected to a show trial but refuses to admit he is in cahoots with the devil even though various witnesses including, to his dismay, Schirene testify that he is. The novel ends with Alroy being beheaded by the King of Karasmé but retaining a derisory smile on his face. Critical and popular reception Alroy was reasonably profitable for its author, who received a £300 advance from its publishers enabling him to pay off a debt to his father's landlord. Nevertheless reviews of the novel are mainly damning. Disraeli himself said that the first chapter made as much sense if read backwards and his biographer Robert Blake writes, "Most modern critics would attribute no [credit] whatever to Alroy which is written in a deplorable sort of poetry-prose and is perhaps the most unreadable of his romances". Charles Nickerson, in describing Alroy as an interesting failure as a novel, says it is "full of the most appalling rant" and "some engaging implausibilities", and has "a strain of resolute and humourless extravagance". The Jerusalem Post, however, is complimentary of the novel, saying that Disraeli "rediscovered the legend and gave