IN the month of Choeak (from the middle of September to the middle of October), the waters of the Nile were highest, and began to fall slightly. In the gardens people gathered tamarinds, dates, olives; and trees blossomed a second time.
At this juncture his holiness Rameses XII. left his sun-bright palace in Memphis, and with a grand suite on some tens of stately barges sailed to Thebes, to thank the gods there for the bounteous inundation, and also to place offerings on the tombs of his eternally living ancestors.
The most worthy ruler took farewell of his heir very graciously; but the direction of state affairs during his absence he left with Herhor.
Rameses felt this proof of want of confidence so greatly that for three days he took no food and did not leave his villa; he only wept. Later he ceased to shave, and transferred himself to Sarah’s house, so as not to meet Herhor or annoy his own mother, whom he considered the cause of his failures.
On the following day Tutmosis visited him in this retreat, bringing two boats filled with musicians and dancers, and a third containing baskets of food and flowers, with pitchers of wine. But the prince commanded the musicians and dancers to depart, and taking Tutmosis to the garden, he said,—
“Of course my mother—may she live through eternity!—sent thee to separate me from the Jewess? Tell her worthiness that were Herhor to become not merely viceroy, but the son of my father, I should do that which pleases me. I know how to do it. To-day they wish to deprive me of Sarah, and to-morrow they would take my power from me; I will show them that I shall not renounce anything.”
The prince was irritated. Tutmosis shrugged his shoulders, and remarked finally,—
“As a whirlwind sweeps a bird into a desert, so does anger cast a man on the shores of injustice. How canst thou wonder if the priests are displeased because the heir to the throne has connected his life with a woman of another country and a strange religion? Sarah does not please them, especially since thou hast her alone. Hadst thou a number of various women, like all noble youths, they would not mind the Jewess. But have they done her harm? No. On the contrary, even some priest defended her against a raging crowd which it pleased thee to liberate from imprisonment.”
“But my mother?”
Tutmosis laughed.
“Thy worthy mother loves thee as her own eyes and heart. Of course Sarah does not please her, either, but dost thou know what her worthiness said once to me? This,—that I should entice Sarah from thee. What a jest on her part! To this I answered with a second jest: ‘Rameses has given me a brace of hunting dogs and two Syrian horses because he has grown tired of them; perhaps some day he will give me his mistress too, of course I shall have to take her with other things.’”
“Do not think of it. I would not give Sarah to any man, were it only for this, because of her my father has not appointed me viceroy.”
Tutmosis shook his head.
“Thou art greatly mistaken,” answered he, “so muchmistaken that I am terrified. Dost thou not really understand the causes of the disfavor? Every enlightened Egyptian knows them.”
“I know nothing.”
“So much the worse,” said the anxious Tutmosis. “Thou dost not know, then, that warriors, since the manœuvres, especially Greek warriors, drink thy health in every dramshop.”
“They got money to do so.”
“True; but not to cry out, with all the voice that is in them, that when thou shalt succeed to his holiness—may he live through eternity!—thou wilt begin a great war, after which there will be changes in Egypt.”
“What changes? And who is the man who during the life of the pharaoh may dare to speak of the plans of his successor?”
Now the prince grew gloomy.
“That is one thing, but I will tell thee another,” said Tutmosis, “for misfortunes, like hyenas, never come singly. Dost thou know that the lowest people sing songs about thee,—sing how thou didst free the attackers from prison, and what is worse, they repeat again, that, when thou shalt succeed his holiness, rents will be abolished. It must be added that when common people speak of injustice and rents, disturbances follow; and either a foreign enemy attacks our weakened state, or Egypt is divided into as many parts as there are nomarchs. Finally, judge for thyself, is it proper that any man’s name should be mentioned oftener than the pharaoh’s, and that any man should stand between the people and our lord? If thou permit, I will tell how priests look on this matter.”
“Of course, speak.”
“Well, a very wise priest who from the summit of the temple of Amon examines celestial movements, has thought out this statement: ‘The pharaoh is the sun, the heir to the throne the moon. When the moon follows the god of light from afar, we have brightness in the daytime and clearness at night. When the moon wishes to be too near the sun, it disappears itself and the nights are dark. But if the moon stands before the sun there is an eclipse, and in the world great terror—’”
“And all this babble,” interrupted Rameses, “goes to the ears of his holiness. Misfortune on my head! Would that I had never been the son of a pharaoh!”
“The pharaoh, as a god upon earth, knows everything; but he is too mighty to care for the drunken shouts of soldiers or the whispers of earth-tillers. He understands that every Egyptian would die for him, and thou first of all.”
“Thou hast spoken truth!” answered the anxious prince. “But in all this I see new vileness and deceit of the priests,” added he, rousing himself. “It is I, then, who hide the majesty of our lord, because I free the innocent from prison, or do not let my tenant torture earth-workers with unjust tribute. But when his worthiness Herhor manages the army, appoints leaders, negotiates with foreign princes, and directs my father to spend his time in prayers—”
Tutmosis covered his ears, and, stamping, cried,—
“Be silent! be silent! every word of thine is blasphemy. His holiness alone directs the state, and whatever is done on earth proceeds from his will. Herhor is a servant of the pharaoh and does what his lord enjoins on him. If thou wilt convince thyself—oh, that my words be not ill understood—”
The prince grew so gloomy that Tutmosis broke off the conversation and took farewell of his friend at the earliest. When he sat down in his boat, which was furnished with a baldachin and curtains, he drew a deep breath and draining a large goblet of wine, thought,—
“Brr! I thank the gods for not giving me such a character as that which Rameses has. He is a most unhappy man in the happiest conditions. He might have the most beautiful women in Memphis, but he sticks to one to annoy his mother. Meanwhile it is not his mother that he annoys, but all the virtuous virgins and faithful wives who are withering from sadness that the heir to the throne, and moreover a youth of great comeliness, does not snatch from them virtue or force them to unfaithfulness. He might not only drink but even swim in the best wine; meanwhile he prefers the wretched camp beer, and bread rubbed with garlic. Whence came these low inclinations? I cannot imagine. Or was it that the worthy Nikotris in her critical period looked at workmen while they were eating?
“He might do nothing from daylight till darkness. If he wished, the most famous lords, with their wives, sisters, and daughters, would serve food to him. He not only stretches forth his own hands to take food, but, to the torment of our noble youths, he washes himself, dresses himself, and his barber spends whole days in snaring birds and thus wastes his abilities.
“O Rameses, Rameses!” sighed the exquisite. “Is it possible that fashion should be developed in the time of such a prince? We wear the same aprons from one year to another, and we retain wigs, only thanks to court dignitaries, for Rameses will not wear any wig. This is a great offence to the whole order of nobles. And all brought about by cursed politics, brr! Oh, how happy I am that I need not divine what they are thinking of in Tyre or Nineveh; break my head over wages for the army; calculate how many people have been added to Egypt or taken from it, and what rents must be collected. It is a terrible thing to say to one’s self, ‘My tenant does not pay what I need and expend, but what the increase of the Nile permits.’”
Thus meditated the exquisite Tutmosis, while he strengthened his anxious soul with golden wine. Before the boat had sailed up to Memphis, heavy sleep had mastered him in such wise that his slaves had to carry their lord to the litter.
After the departure of Tutmosis, which resembled a flight, the heir fell to thinking deeply; he even felt fear.
Rameses was a sceptic. As a pupil of the priests, and a member of the highest aristocracy, he knew that when certain priests had fasted many months and mortified their senses they summoned spirits, while others spoke of spirits as a fancy, a deception. He had seen, too, that Apis, the sacred bull before which all Egypt fell prostrate, received at times heavy blows of a cane from inferior priests, who gave the beast food and brought cows to him.
He understood, finally, that his father, Rameses XII., who for the common crowd was a god who lived through eternity, and the all-commanding lord of this world, was really just such a person as others, only a little more weakly than ordinary old men, and very much limited in power by the priestly order.
The prince saw all this, and jeered in his soul and even in public at many things. But all his infidelity fell before the actual truth,—that no one was permitted to trifle with the titles of the pharaoh.
Rameses knew the history of his country, and he remembered that in Egypt many things were forgiven the mighty. A great lord might ruin a canal, kill a man in secret, revile the gods privately, take presents from ambassadors of foreign states, but two sins were not forgiven,—the betrayal of priestly secrets, and treason to the pharaoh. A man who committed one or the other disappeared, sometimes after a year, from among his friends and servants. But where he had been put or what had been done with him, no one even dared to mention.
Rameses felt that he was on an incline of this sort from the time that the army and the people began to mention his name and speak of certain plans of his,—changes in the state, future wars. Thinking of this, the prince felt as if a nameless crowd of rebels and unfortunates were pushing him violently to the point of the highest obelisk, from which he must tumble down and be crushed into jelly.
Later on, when, after the longest life of his father possible, he became pharaoh, he would have the right and the means to accomplish many deeds of which no one in Egypt could even think without terror. But to-day he must in truth have a care, lest they declare him a traitor and a rebel against the fundamental laws of Egypt. In that state there was one visible ruler,—the pharaoh. He governed, he desired, he thought for all, and woe to the man who dared to doubt audibly the all-might of the sovereign, or mention plans of his own, or even changes in general.
Plans were made in one place alone,—in that hall where the pharaoh listened to advice from his aiding council, and expressed to it his own opinions. No changes could come save from that place. There burned the only visible lamp of political wisdom, the light of which illuminated Egypt. But touching that light, it was safer to be silent.
All these considerations flew through the prince’s head with the swiftness of a whirlwind while he was sitting on the stone bench under the chestnut-tree in Sarah’s garden, and looking at the landscape there around him.
The water of the Nile had fallen a little, and had begun to grow as transparent as a crystal. But the whole country looked yet like an arm of the sea thickly dotted with islands on which rose buildings, gardens, and orchards, while here and there groups of great trees served as ornament.
Around all these islands were well-sweeps, with buckets by which bronze-hued naked men with dirty breech clouts raised water from the Nile and poured it into higher reservoirs. One such place was in the prince’s mind especially. That was a steep eminence on the side of which three men were working at three well-sweeps. One poured water from the river into the lowest well; another drew from the lowest and raised water two yards higher to a middle place; the third raised water from the middle to the highest place. There some people, also naked, drew water in buckets, and irrigated beds of vegetables, or watered trees from sprinkling-pots.
The movement of the sweeps going down and rising, the turn of the buckets, the gushing of the pots was so rhythmic that the men who caused it might be thought automatons. No one of them spoke to his neighbor, no man changed place or looked about him; he merely bent and rose in one single method from daylight until evening, from one month to another, and doubtless he had worked thus from childhood and would so work till death took him.
“And creatures such as these,” thought the prince, as he looked at their toil, “desire me to realize their imaginings. What change in the state can they wish? Is it that he who draws from the lowest well should go to the highest, or instead of pouring from a bucket should sprinkle trees with a watering-pot?”
Anger rose to his head, and humiliation crushed him because he, the heir to the throne, thanks to the fables of creatures like those who nodded all their lives over wells of dirty water, was not now the vice-pharaoh.
At that moment he heard a low rustle among the trees, and delicate hands rested on his shoulder.
“Well, Sarah?” asked the prince, without turning his head.
“Thou art sad, my lord. Moses was not so delighted at sight of the promised land as I was at those words of thine:‘I am coming to live with thee.’ But thou art a day and a night here, and I have not seen thy smile yet. Thou dost not even speak to me, but movest about in gloom, and at night thou dost not fondle me, but only sighest.”
“I have trouble.”
“Tell me what it is. Grief is like a treasure given to be guarded. As long as we guard it ourselves even sleep flees away, and we find relief only when we put some one else to watch for us.”
Rameses embraced Sarah, and seated her on the bench at his side.
“When an earth-tiller,” said he, smiling, “is unable to bring in all his crops from the field before the overflow, his wife helps him. She helps him to milk cows too, she takes out food to the field for him, she washes the man on his return from labor. Hence the belief has come that woman can lighten man’s troubles.”
“Dost thou not believe this, lord?”
“The cares of a prince,” answered Rameses, “cannot be lightened by a woman, even by one as wise and powerful as my mother.”
“In God’s name, what are thy troubles? Tell me,” insisted Sarah, drawing up to the shoulder of Prince Rameses. “According to our traditions, Adam left Paradise for Eve; and he was surely the greatest king in the most beautiful kingdom.”
The prince became thoughtful.
“Our sages also teach,” said he, “that man has often abandoned dignities for woman, but it has not been heard that any man ever achieved something great through a woman; unless he was a leader to whom a pharaoh gave his daughter, with a great dowry and high office. But a woman cannot help a man to reach a higher place or even help him out of troubles.”
“This may be because she does not love as I do,” whispered Sarah.
“Thy love for me is wonderful, I know that. Never hast thou asked for gifts, or favored those who do not hesitate to seek success even under the beds of princes’ favorites. Thou art milder than a lamb, and as calm as a night on the Nile. Thy kisses are like perfume from the land of Punt, and thyembrace as sweet as the sleep of a wearied laborer. I have no measure for thy beauty, or words for thy attractions. Thou art a marvel among women; women’s lips are rich in trouble and their love is very costly. But with all thy perfection how canst thou ease my troubles? Canst thou cause his holiness to order a great expedition to the East and name me to command it? Canst thou give me the army corps in Memphis, for which I asked, or wilt thou, in the pharaoh’s name, make me governor of Lower Egypt? Or canst thou bring all subjects of his holiness to think and feel as I, his most devoted subject?”
Sarah dropped her hands on her knees, and whispered sadly, “True, I cannot do those things—I can do nothing.”
“Thou canst do much. Thou canst cheer me,” replied Rameses, smiling. “I know that thou hast learned to dance and sing. Take off those long robes, therefore, which become priestesses guarding fire, and array thyself in transparent muslin, as Phœnician dancers do. And so dance and fondle me as they.”
Sarah seized his hands and cried with flaming eyes,—
“Hast thou to do with outcasts such as these? Tell me—let me know my wretchedness; send me then to my father, send me to our valley in the desert. Oh, that I had never seen thee in it!”
“Well, well, calm thyself,” said the prince, toying with her hair. “I must of course see dancers, if not at feasts, at royal festivals, or during services in temples. But all of them together do not concern me as much as thou alone; moreover, who among them could equal thee? Thy body is like a statue of Isis, cut out of ivory, and each of those dancers has some defect. Some are too thick; others have thin legs or ugly hands; still others have false hair. Who of them is like thee? If thou wert an Egyptian, all our temples would strive to possess thee as the leader of their chorus. What do I say? Wert thou to appear now in Memphis in transparent robes, the priests would be glad if thou wouldst take part in processions.”
“It is not permitted us daughters of Judah to wear immodest garments.”
“Nor to dance or sing? Why didst thou learn, then?”
“Our women dance, and our virgins sing by themselves for the glory of the Lord, but not for the purpose of sowing fieryseeds of desire in men’s hearts. But we sing. Wait, my lord, I will sing to thee.”
She rose from the bench and went toward the house. Soon she returned followed by a young girl with black, frightened eyes, who was bearing a harp.
“Who is this maiden?” asked the prince. “But wait I have seen that look somewhere. Ah! when I was here the last time a frightened girl looked from the bushes at me.”
“This is Esther, my relative and servant,” answered Sarah. “She has lived with me a month now, but she fears thee, lord, so she runs away always. Perhaps she looked at thee sometime from out the bushes.”
“Thou mayst go, my child,” said the prince to the maiden, who seemed petrified, and when she had hidden behind the bushes, he asked,—
“Is she a Jewess too? And this guard of thy house, who looks at me as a sheep at a crocodile?”
“That is Samuel the son of Esdras; he also is a relative. I took him in place of the black man to whom thou hast given freedom. But hast thou not permitted me to choose my servants?”
“That is true. And so also the overseer of the workmen is a Jew, for he has a yellow complexion and looks with a lowliness which no Egyptian could imitate.”
“That,” answered Sarah, “is Ezechiel, the son of Reuben, a relative of my father. Does he not please thee, my lord? These are all thy very faithful servants.”
“Does he please me,” said the prince, dissatisfied, drumming with his fingers on the bench. “He is not here to please me, but to guard thy property. For that matter, these people do not concern me. Sing, Sarah.”
Sarah knelt on the grass at the prince’s feet, and playing a few notes as accompaniment, began,—
“Where is he who has no care? Who is he who in lying down to slumber has the right to say: This is a day that I have spent without sorrow? Where is the man who lying down for the grave, can say: My life has passed without pain, without fear, like a calm evening on the Jordan.
“But how many are there who moisten their bread with tears daily, and whose houses are filled with sighing.
“A wail is man’s earliest speech on this earth, and a groan his farewell to it. Full of suffering does he come into life, full of sorrow does he go to his resting-place, and no one asks him where he would like to be.
“Where is that offspring of man who has not tasted the bitterness of being? Is it the child which death has snatched from its mother, or is it the babe whose mother’s breast was drained by hunger ere the little one could place lips to it?
“Where is the man who is sure of his fate, the man who can look with unfailing eye at the morrow? Does he who toils on the field know that rain is not under his power, and that not he shows its way to the locust swarm? Does the merchant who gives his wealth to the winds, which come he knows not whence, and his life to the waves on that abyss which swallows all, and returns nothing?
“Where is the man without dread in his spirit? Is it the hunter who chases the nimble deer and on the road meets a lion which mocks at his arrows? Is it the warrior who goes forth to gain glory with toiling, and meets a forest of sharp lances and bronze swords which are thirsting for his life blood? Is it the great king who under his purple puts on heavy armor, who spies out with sleepless eye the treachery of overpowering neighbors, and seizes with his ear the rustle of the curtain lest treason overturn him in his own tent?
“For this reason men’s hearts in all places and at all times are overflowing with sadness. In the desert the lion and the scorpion are his danger, in the cave lurks the dragon, among flowers the poisonous serpent. In the sunshine a greedy neighbor is thinking how to decrease his land, in the night the active thief is breaking through the door to his granary. In childhood he is incompetent, in old age stripped of strength. When full of power, he is surrounded by perils, as a whale is surrounded by abysses of water.
“Therefore, O Lord, my Creator, to Thee the tortured human soul turns itself. Thou hast brought it into a world full of ambushes, Thou hast grafted into it the terror of extinction. Thou hast barred before it all roads of peace, save the one road which leads to Thee. And as a child which cannot walk grasps its mother’s skirt lest it fall, so wretched man stretches forth his hands toward Thy tenderness, and struggles out of uncertainty.”
Sarah was silent; the prince fell into meditation, and then said,—
“Ye Jews are a gloomy nation. If men in Egypt believed as thy song teaches, no one would laugh on the banks of the Nile. The wealthy would hide in underground temples through terror, and the people, instead of working, would flee to caves, look out and wait for mercy which would never come to them.
“Our world is different: in it a man may have everything, but he himself must do everything. Our gods help no idleness. They come to the earth only when a hero dares a deed which is superhuman and when he exhausts every power present. Such was the case with Rameses the Great when he rushed among two thousand five hundred hostile chariots, each of which carried three warriors. Only then did Amon the eternal father reach his hand down and end the battle with victory. But if instead of fighting he had waited for the aid of your God, long ago would the Egyptians have been moving along the Nile, each of them bearing a brick and a bucket, while the vile Hittites would be masters going around with clubs and papyruses.
“Therefore, Sarah, thy charms will scatter my sorrows sooner than thy song. If I had acted as your Jewish song teaches, and waited for divine assistance, wine would have flowed away from my lips, and women would have fled from my household.
“Above all, I could not be the pharaoh’s heir any more than my brothers, one of whom does not leave his room without leaning on two slaves, while the other climbs along tree trunks.”
THE next day Rameses sent his black men with commands to Memphis, and about midday came a great boat toward Sarah’s house from the direction of the city. The boat was filled with Greek soldiers in lofty helmets and gleaming breastplates.
At command sixteen men armed with shields and short darts landed and stood in two ranks. They were ready to march to the house, when a second messenger from the prince detainedthem. He commanded the soldiers to remain at the shore, and summoned only their leader, Patrokles.
They halted and stood without movement, like two rows of columns covered with glittering armor. After the messenger went Patrokles in a helmet with plumes, wearing a purple tunic over which he had gilded armor ornamented on the breast with the picture of a woman’s head bristling with serpents instead of hair.
The prince received the famous general at the garden gate. He did not smile as usual, did not even answer the low bow of Patrokles, but said coldly,—
“Worthiness, tell the Greek warriors that I will not review them until their lord, his holiness, appoints me leader a second time. They have lost that honor by uttering in dramshops shouts worthy of drunkards. These shouts offend me. I call attention also to this, worthiness, that the Greek regiments do not show sufficient discipline. In public places the soldiers of this corps discuss politics and a certain possible war. This looks like treason to the state. Only the pharaoh and members of his supreme council may speak of such matters. But we, soldiers and servants of our lord, whatever position we occupy, may only execute the commands of our most gracious ruler, and be silent at all times. I beg thee to communicate these considerations to my regiments, and I wish all success to thee, worthiness.”
“It will be as commanded, worthiness,” answered the Greek.
He turned on his heel, and standing erect moved with a rattle toward the boat. He knew about these discussions of the soldiers in the dramshops, and understood straightway that something disagreeable had happened to the heir, whom the troops worshipped. Therefore, when he had reached the handful of armed men on the bank, he assumed a very angry mien, and, waving his hands with rage, cried,—
“Valiant Greek soldiers! mangy dogs, may the leprosy consume you! If, from this time on, any Greek mentions the name of the heir to the throne in a dramshop, I will break a pitcher on his head, cram the pieces down his throat, and then drive him out of the regiment! One and another of you will herd swine for Egyptian earth-workers, and hens will lay eggsin your helmets. Such is the fate waiting for stupid soldiers who know not how to keep their tongues quiet. And now—to the left! to the rear! turn! and march to the boat, may the plague strike you! A soldier of his holiness should drink first of all to the health of the pharaoh and the prosperity of the worthy minister of war, Herhor,—may they live through eternity!”
“May they live through eternity!” repeated the soldiers.
All took their places in the boat, looking gloomy. But when near Memphis Patrokles smoothed out his wrinkled forehead and commanded them to sing the song of that priest’s daughter who so loved soldiers that she put a doll in her bed and passed the whole night in the booth of the sentries. Keeping time to this song, they always marched best, and moved the oars with most nimbleness.
In the evening another boat approached Sarah’s dwelling, out of which came the chief steward of the prince’s property.
Rameses received this official at the garden gate also. Perhaps he did this through sternness, or perhaps not to constrain the man to enter the house of his mistress and a Jewess.
“I wished,” said the heir, “to see thee and to say that among my people certain improper conversations circulate concerning decrease of rent, or something of that kind. I wish those people to know that I will not decrease rents. But should any man in spite of warnings persist in his folly and talk about rents, he will receive blows of canes.”
“Perhaps it would be better if he paid a line,—an uten or a drachma, whatever is commanded, worthiness,” said the chief steward.
“Yes; but the worst offender might be beaten.”
“I make bold to offer a remark, worthiness,” said the steward in a low tone, inclining continually, “that the earth-workers, roused by some unknown person, really did talk for a time about decrease of rent. But some days ago they ceased on a sudden.”
“In that case we might withhold the blows of canes,” said Rameses.
“Unless as preventive means,” put in the steward.
“Would it not be too bad to spoil the canes?”
“We shall never lack articles of that sort.”
“But with moderation in every case. I do not wish it to go to his holiness that I torture men without need. For rebellious conversation we must beat and take fines in money, but when there is no cause for punishment we may be magnanimous.”
“I understand,” answered the steward, looking into the eyes of Rameses.
“Let them cry out as much as they like if they do not whisper blasphemy.”
These talks with Patrokles and the steward were reported throughout Egypt.
After the steward’s departure, the prince yawned and looking around with a tired glance, he said to himself,—
“I have done all I could, but now, if I can, I will do nothing.”
At that moment, from the direction of the outhouses, low groans and the sound of frequent blows reached the prince. Rameses turned his head, and saw that the overseer of the workmen, Ezechiel, son of Reuben, was beating some subordinate with a cane, pacifying him meanwhile,—
“Be quiet! be silent, low beast!”
The beaten workman, lying on the ground, closed his mouth with his hand so as not to cry.
At first the prince rushed like a panther toward the outhouses. Suddenly he halted.
“What am I to do?” whispered he. “This is Sarah’s place, and the Jew is her relative.”
He bit his lips, and disappeared among the trees, the more readily since the flogging was finished.
“Is this the management of the humble Jews?” thought Rameses. “Is this the way? That man looks at me as a frightened dog might, but he beats the workmen. Are the Hebrews all like him?”
And for the first time the thought was roused in the prince’s soul, that under the guise of kindness Sarah, too, might conceal falsehood.
Certain changes had indeed taken place in Sarah; above all, moral changes.
From the moment when she met Rameses in the valley of thedesert he had pleased her, but that feeling grew silent immediately beneath the influence of the stunning news that the shapely youth was a son of the pharaoh and heir to the throne of Egypt. When Tutmosis bargained with Gideon to take her to the prince’s house, Sarah fell into a state of bewilderment.
She would not renounce Rameses for any treasure, nor at the cost of life, but one could not say that she loved him at that time. Love demands freedom and time to give forth its most beautiful blossoms; neither freedom nor time had been left to her. She made the acquaintance of the prince on a certain day; the following day they took her away almost without consulting her wishes, and bore her to that villa opposite Memphis. In a couple of days she became the prince’s favorite, astonished, frightened, not understanding what had taken place with her.
Moreover, before she could make herself used to the new impressions, the Jewess was disturbed by ill-will from surrounding people; then the visit of unknown ladies; finally, that attack on the villa.
Then, because Rameses took her part and wished to rush on the rioters, she was still more terrified. She lost presence of mind at the thought that she was in the hands of a man of such power and so violent, who, if it suited him, had the right to shed blood, to slay people.
Sarah fell into despair for the moment: it seemed to her that she would go mad. She heard the terrible commands of the prince who summoned the servants to arms. But at that very moment a slight thing took place, one little word was heard which sobered Sarah, and gave a new turn to her feelings.
The prince, thinking that she was wounded, drew the bandage from her head; but when he saw the bruise, he cried,—
“That is only a blue spot! How that blue spot changes the face!”
At these words Sarah forgot pain and fear. New alarm seized her: so she had changed to such a degree that it astonished the prince, but he was only astonished.
The blue spot disappeared in a couple of days, but feelings unknown up to that time remained in Sarah’s soul and increased there. She began to be jealous of the prince, and to fear that he would reject her.
And still another anxiety tortured the Jewess. She felt herself a servant, a slave in respect to Rameses. She was and wished to be his faithful servant, his devoted slave, as inseparable as his shadow, but at the same time she desired that he, at least when he fondled her, should not treat her as though he were lord and master.
She was his indeed, but he was hers also. Why does he not show, then, that he belonged to her, even in some degree? But with every word and motion he makes her understand that a certain gulf is between them. What kind of gulf? Has she not held him in her embraces? Has he not kissed her lips and bosom?
A certain day the prince came to her with a dog. He stayed only a couple of hours; but during that entire interval the dog lay at his feet in Sarah’s place, and when she wished to sit there the dog growled. And the prince laughed and thrust his fingers into the hair of that unclean creature, as he had into her hair. And the dog looked into the prince’s eyes just as she had,—with this difference, perhaps, that he looked with more confidence.
She could not pacify herself, and she hated the clever beast which was taking a part of the tenderness due to her, paying no attention whatever to her, and bearing itself with an intimacy towards its lord that she did not dare to claim. She would have been unable to have such an indifferent mien, or to look in another direction if the prince’s hand had rested on her head.
Not long before this incident the prince mentioned dancers a second time. Then Sarah burst out angrily,—
“How did he permit himself to be familiar with those naked, shameless women? And Jehovah looking down from high heaven did not hurl His thunders at those monstrous creatures!”
It is true that Rameses told her that she was dearer than all else to him, but these words did not pacify Sarah; they only produced this effect,—that she determined not to think of aught beyond her love.
What would come on the morrow? Never mind. And when at the feet of the prince she sang that hymn about those sufferings which pursue mankind from the cradle to the grave, she described in it the state of her own soul, and her last hope, which was Jehovah.
That day Rameses was with her; hence she had enough, she had all the happiness which life could give. But just there began for Sarah the greatest bitterness.
The prince lived under one roof with her, he walked with her in the garden, and sometimes went out on the Nile in a boat with her. But he was not more accessible by the width of one hair than when he was on the other side of the river, within the limits of the pharaoh’s palace.
He was with her, but his mind was in some other place, Sarah could not even divine where. He embraced her, or toyed with her hair, but he looked toward the city, at those immense many-colored pylons of the pharaoh’s palace, or at some unknown object.
At times he did not even answer her questions, or he looked at her suddenly as if roused from sleep, or as if he wondered that he saw her there beside him.
THUS seemed those moments of approach between Sarah and her princely lover, which were rare enough withal. For after he had given those commands to Patrokles and the steward, Rameses spent the greater part of the day away from the villa, generally in a boat or sailing on the Nile. He caught with a net fish which swam in thousands in the blessed river, or he went into swamps, and hidden among lofty lotus stems brought down with arrows wild birds, which circling in noisy flocks were as numerous as flies are. But even at those times ambitious thoughts did not desert him; so he turned the hunting into a kind of predicting or soothsaying. More than once, when he saw a flock of yellow geese upon the water, he drew his bow and said, “If I hit I shall be like Rameses the Great.”
The arrow made a low whistle, and the stricken bird, fluttering its wings, gave out cries so painful that there was a movement in the whole swampy region. Clouds of geese, ducks, and storks rose in the air, and making a great circle above their dying comrade, dropped down to other places.
When there was silence again, the prince pushed his boatfarther, with caution guiding himself by the movement of reeds or the broken calls of birds, and when in the green growth he saw a spot of clear water and a new flock, he drew his bow again, and said,—
“If I hit I shall be pharaoh; if I miss—”
This time the arrow struck the water, and bounding a number of times along its surface, disappeared among lotuses. The excited prince sent more and more arrows, killing birds or only frightening flocks of them. From the villa they knew where he was by the noisy cloud of birds which rose from time to time and circled above the boat in which he was sailing.
When toward evening he returned to the villa wearied, Sarah waited on the threshold with a bronze basin, a pitcher of light wine, and a garland of roses. The prince smiled at her, stroked her face, but looking into her eyes, which were full of tenderness, he thought,—
“Would she beat Egyptian people, like her relatives who look frightened all the time? Oh, my mother is right not to trust Jews, though Sarah may be different from others.”
Once, returning unexpectedly, he saw in the space before the villa a crowd of naked children playing joyously. All were yellow, and at sight of him they vanished with cries like wild geese from a swampy meadow. Before he reached the terrace they were gone, not a trace was left.
“Who are those little things,” asked he, “who rushed away from me?”
“Those are children of my servants,” replied Sarah.
“Of Jews?”
“Of my brothers.”
“Gods, what a numerous people!” laughed Rameses. “And who is that again?” added he, pointing to a man who looked timidly from beyond the wall.
“That is Aod, son of Barak, my relative. He wants to serve thee, lord. May I take him?”
The prince shrugged his shoulders.
“This is thy place,” answered he; “take those who please thee. But if these people increase so, they will soon master Memphis.”
“Thou canst not endure my brethren,” whispered Sarah, as she dropped to his feet frightened.
The prince looked at her with astonishment.
“I do not even think of them,” answered he, proudly.
These little happenings, which fell on Sarah’s soul like drops of fire, did not change Rameses with regard to her. He was kind and as fond as he had been, though his eyes turned more frequently to the other bank of the river, and rested on the mighty pylons of his father’s palace.
Soon he discovered that others were yearning because he was in a banishment of his own choosing. A certain day from the opposite shore a stately royal barge pushed out into the river; it crossed the Nile from Memphis, and then circled near the prince’s villa, so near that Rameses could recognize the persons in it. In fact he recognized beneath the purple baldachin his mother among court ladies, and opposite, on a low stool, the vice-pharaoh, Herhor. They did not look toward the villa, it is true, but the prince divined that they saw him.
“Ha! ha!” thought he. “My worthy mother and his worthiness the minister would be glad to entice me hence before his holiness returns to Memphis.”
The month Tobi (the end of October and beginning of November) came. The Nile had fallen a distance equalling the stature of a man, and one-half in addition, uncovering daily new strips of black clammy earth. Wherever the water withdrew a narrow plough appeared drawn by two oxen. Behind the plough went a naked ploughman, at the side of the oxen a driver with a short club, and behind him a sower, who, wading to his ankles in earth, carried wheat in an apron, and scattered it almost in handfuls.
The most beautiful season of the year was beginning in Egypt,—the winter. Heat did not go beyond 70° Fahrenheit; the earth was covered quickly with emerald green, from out which sprang narcissus and violets. The odor of them came forth oftener and oftener amid the odor of earth and water.
A number of times the barge bearing the worthy lady Nikotris and the vice-pharaoh Herhor appeared near Sarah’s dwelling. Each time the prince saw his mother conversing with the minister joyously, and convinced himself that they refrained ostentatiously from looking toward him, as if to show indifference.
“Wait!” whispered he, in anger, “I will show you that life does not annoy me, either.”
So when one day, shortly before sunset, the queen’s gilded barge appeared with a purple tent having ostrich plumes on each of its four corners, Rameses gave command to prepare a boat for two persons, and told Sarah that he would sail with her.
“O Jehovah!” cried she, clasping her hands. “But thy mother is there, and the viceroy!”
“But in this boat will be the heir to the throne. Take thy harp, Sarah.”
“And the harp, too?” cried Sarah. “But if her worthiness were to speak to thee! I should throw myself into the river.”
“Be not a child,” replied Rameses, laughing. “My mother and his worthiness love songs immensely. Thou mayest even win their favor if thou sing some splendid song of the Hebrews. Let there be love in it.”
“I know no song of that kind,” answered Sarah, in whom the prince’s words had roused hope of some sort. Her song might please those powerful rulers, and then what?
On the royal barge they saw that the heir to the throne was sitting in a simple boat and rowing.
“Dost thou see, worthiness,” whispered the queen to the minister, “that he is rowing toward us with his Jewess?”
“The heir has borne himself with such correctness toward his warriors and his people, and has shown so much compunction in withdrawing from the limits of the palace, that his mother may forgive small errors,” answered Herhor.
“Oh, if he were not sitting in that boat, I would give command to break it!” said the worthy lady.
“For what reason?” asked the minister. “The prince would be no descendant of high priests and pharaohs if he did not break through restraints which the law, alas, puts on him, or perhaps our mistaken customs. He has given proof in every case that in serious junctures he is able to command himself. He is even able to recognise his errors,—a rare power and priceless in an heir to the throne of Egypt. The very fact that the prince wishes to rouse our curiosity with his favorite shows that the position in which he finds himself pains him; besides, his reasons are among the noblest.”
“But the Jewess!” whispered the lady, crushing her feather fan between her fingers.
“At present I am quite at rest regarding her,” continued Herhor. “She is shapely, but dull; she never thinks of using influence on the prince, nor could she do so. Shut up in a cage which is not over-costly, she takes no gifts, and will not even see any one. In time, perhaps, she might learn to make use of her position even to the extent of decreasing the heir’s treasury by some talents. Before that day comes, however, Rameses will be tired of her.”
“May the all-knowing Amon speak through thy mouth,” said the lady.
“The prince, I am sure of this, has not grown wild over a favorite, as happens often to young lords in Egypt. One keen, intriguing woman may strip a man of property and health, nay, bring him to the hall of judgment. The prince is amused with her as a grown-up man might be amused with a slave girl. And Sarah is pregnant.”
“Is that true?” cried the queen. “How dost thou know?”
“It is not known to his worthiness the heir, or even to Sarah,” said Herhor, smiling. “We must know everything. This secret, however, was not difficult to get at. With Sarah is her relative Tafet, an incomparable gossip.”
“Have they summoned a physician already?”
“Sarah knows nothing of this, I repeat, but the worthy Tafet, from fear lest the prince might grow indifferent to her foster child, would be glad to twist the neck of this secret. But we do not let her. That will be the prince’s child also.”
“But if it is a son? Thou knowest that he may make trouble,” put in the lady.
“All is foreseen,” replied Herhor. “If the child is a daughter, we will give her a dowry and the education proper for young ladies of high station. If a son, he will become a Jew—”
“Oh, my grandson, a Jew!”
“Do not take thy heart too soon from him. Our envoys declare that the people of Israel are beginning to desire a king. Before the child matures their desires will ripen, and then—we may give them a ruler, and of good blood indeed.”
“Thou art like an eagle which takes in East and West at aglance,” said the queen, eying the minister with amazement. “I feel that my repulsion for this maiden begins to grow weaker.”
“The least drop of the pharaoh’s blood should raise itself above nations, like a star above the earth,” added Herhor.
At that moment the heir’s boat moved at a few tens of paces from the royal barge, and the queen, shielded by her fan, looked at Sarah through its feathers.
“In truth the girl is shapely,” whispered Queen Nikotris.
“Thou art saying those words for the second time, worthy lady.”
“So thou hast noted that?” laughed her worthiness.
Herhor dropped his eyes.
In the boat was heard a harp, and Sarah began a hymn, with trembling voice,—
“How great is Jehovah, O Israel! how great is Jehovah, thy God.”
“A most beautiful voice,” whispered the queen.
The high priest listened with attention.
“His days have no beginning,” sang Sarah, “and His dwelling has no limit. The eternal heavens change beneath His eye, like a garment which a man puts on his body and then casts away from him. The stars flash up, and are quenched, like sparks from fuel, and the earth is like a brick which a traveller touches once with his foot while going ever farther.
“How great is thy Lord, O Israel! There is no being who can say to Him, ‘Do this!’ there is no womb which could have given birth to Him. He created the bottomless deeps above which He moves when He wishes. He brings light out of darkness, and from the dust of the earth He creates living things which have voices.
“For Him savage lions are as locusts, the immense elephant He looks on as nothing, before Him the whale is as weak as an infant.
“His tricolored bow divides the heavens into two parts and rests on the ends of the earth plain. Where are the gates which could equal Him in loftiness? Nations are in terror at the thunder of His chariot, and there is naught beneath the sun which could stand His flashing arrows.
“His breath is the north wind at midnight, which freshens trees when withering, His anger is like the chamsin which burns what it touches.
“When He stretches His hands above the waters, they are petrified. He pours the sea into new places, as a woman pours out leaven. He rends the earth as if it were old linen, and clothes in silvery snow the naked tops of mountains.
“In a grain of wheat He hides one hundred other grains, and causes birds to incubate. From the drowsy chrysalis He leads to life a golden butterfly, and makes men’s bodies wait in tombs until the day of resurrection.”
The rowers, absorbed in the song, raised their oars, and the purple barge dropped slowly down with the sweep of the river. All at once Herhor rose, and commanded,—
“Turn now toward Memphis!”
The oars fell; the barge turned where it stood, and raised the water with noise. After it followed Sarah’s hymn decreasing gradually,—
“He sees the movement of hearts, the silent hidden ways on which pass the innermost thoughts in men’s breasts. But no man can gaze into His heart and spy out His purposes.
“Before the gleam of His garments mighty spirits hide their faces. Before His glance the gods of great cities and nations turn aside and shrink like withering leaves.
“He is power, He is life, He is wisdom. He is thy Lord, thy God, O Israel!”
“Why command, worthiness, to turn away our barge?” asked the worthy Nikotris.
“Lady, dost thou know that hymn?” asked Herhor, in a language understood by priests alone. “That stupid girl is singing in the middle of the Nile a prayer permitted only in the most secret recesses of our temples.”
“Is that blasphemy then?”
“There is no priest in the barge except me,” replied the minister. “I have not heard the hymn, and if I had I should forget it. Still I am afraid that the gods will lay hands on that girl yet.”
“But whence does she know that awful prayer, for Rameses could not have taught it to her?”
“The prince is not to blame. But forget not, lady, that the Jews have taken from our Egypt many such treasures. That is why, among all nations on earth, we consider them alone as sacrilegious.”
The queen seized the hand of the high priest.
“But my son—will no evil strike him?” whispered she, looking into his eyes.
“I say, worthiness, that no evil will happen to any one. I heard not the hymn, and I know nothing. The prince must be separated from that Jewess.”
“But separated mildly; is that not the way?” asked the mother.
“In the mildest way possible and the simplest, but separation is imperative. It seemed to me,” continued the high priest, as if to himself, “that I foresaw everything. Everything save an action for blasphemy, which threatens the heir while he is with that strange woman.”
Herhor thought awhile, and added,—
“Yes, worthy lady! It is possible to laugh at many of our prejudices; still the son of a pharaoh should not be connected with a Jewess.”
SINCE the evening when Sarah sang in the boat, the royal barge had not appeared on the Nile, and Prince Rameses was annoyed in real earnest.
The month Mechir (December) was approaching. The waters decreased, the land extended more widely each day, the grass became higher and thicker, and in the grass flashed up flowers of the most varied hues and of incomparable odor. Like islands in a green sea appeared, in the course of a single day, flowery places, as it were white, azure, yellow, rosy, or many-colored carpets from which rose an intoxicating odor. Still the prince was wearied, and even feared something. From the day of his father’s departure he had not been in the palace, and no one from the palace had come to him, save Tutmosis, who since the last conversation had vanished like a snake in thegrass. Whether they respected the prince’s seclusion, or desired to annoy him, or simply feared to pay him a visit because he had been touched by disfavor, Rameses had no means of knowing.
“My father may exclude me from the throne, as he has my elder brothers,” thought the heir sometimes; and sweat came out on his forehead, while his feet became cold.
“What would he do in that case?”
Moreover Sarah was ill, thin, pale, her great eyes sank; at times she complained of faintness which attacked her in the morning.
“Surely some one has bewitched the poor thing,” groaned the cunning Tafet, whom the prince could not endure for her chattering and very bad management.
A couple of times, for instance, the heir noticed that in the evening Tafet sent off to Memphis immense baskets with food, linen, even vessels. Next day she complained in heaven-piercing accents that flour, wine, and even vessels were lacking. Since the heir had come to the villa ten times more of various products had been used there than formerly.
“I am certain,” thought Rameses, “that that chattering termagant robs me for her Jews, who vanish in the daytime but are prowling around in the night, like rats in the nastiest corners!”
The prince’s only amusement in these days was to look at the date harvest. A naked man took his place at the foot of a high palm without side branches, surrounded the trunk and himself with a circular rope which resembled the hoop of a barrel. Then he raised himself on the tree by his heels, his whole body bent backward, but the hoop-like rope held him by squeezing his body to the tree. Next he shoved the flexible hoop up the trunk some inches, raised himself by his heels again, then shoved the rope up. In this way he climbed, exposed meanwhile to the peril of breaking his neck, till he reached the top, where grew a crown of great leaves and dates.
The prince was not alone when he saw these gymnastics; Jewish children also were spectators. At first there was no trace of them. Then among bushes and from beyond the wall curly heads and black gleaming eyes appeared. Afterward, whenthey saw that the prince did not drive them away, these children came out each from a hiding-place and approached the tree gradually. The most daring among the girls picked up a beautiful date which she brought to Rameses. One of the boys ate the smallest date, and then the children began to eat and to give the prince fruit. At first they brought him the best, then inferior dates, finally some that were spoilt altogether.
The future ruler of the world fell to thinking, and said to himself,—
“They crawl in at all points, and will treat me always in this way: they will give the good as a bait, and what is spoiled out of gratitude.”
He rose and walked away gloomily; but the children of Israel rushed, like a flock of birds, at the labor of the Egyptian, who high above their heads was singing unmindful of his bones and of this, that he was harvesting not for his own use.
Sarah’s undiscovered disease, her frequent tears, her vanishing charms, and above all the Jews, who, ceasing to hide, managed the place with increasing tumult, disgusted Rameses to the utmost degree with that beautiful corner. He sailed no more in a boat, he neither hunted nor watched the date harvest, but wandered gloomily through the garden, or looked from his roof at the palace. He would never go back to that palace unless summoned, and now he thought of a trip to his lands near the sea, in Lower Egypt.
In such a state of mind was he found by Tutmosis, who on a certain day came in a ceremonial barge to the heir with a summons from the pharaoh.
“His holiness is returning from Thebes, and wishes the heir to go forth and meet him.”
The prince trembled, he grew pale and crimson, when he read the gracious letter of his lord and ruler. He was so moved that he did not notice his adjutant’s new immense wig, which gave out fifteen different perfumes, he did not see his tunic and mantle, more delicate than mist, nor his sandals with gold rings as ornaments.
After some time Rameses recovered, and inquired without looking at Tutmosis,—
“Why hast thou not been here for such a period? Did the disfavor into which I have fallen alarm thee?”
“Gods!” cried the exquisite. “When wert thou in disfavor, and in whose? Every courier of his holiness inquired for thy health; the worthy lady, Nikotris, and his worthiness Herhor have sailed toward this villa repeatedly, thinking that thou wouldst make a hundred steps toward them after they had made a couple of thousand toward thee. I say nothing of the troops. In time of review the warriors of thy regiments are as silent as palm-trees, and do not go from the barracks. As to the worthy Patrokles, he drinks and curses all day from vexation.”
So the prince had not been in disfavor, or if he had been the disfavor was ended. This thought acted on Rameses like a goblet of good wine. He took a bath quickly, anointed his body, put on fresh linen, a new kaftan, a helmet with plumes, and then went to Sarah.
Sarah screamed when she saw the prince arrayed thus. She rose up, and seizing him around the neck, whispered,—
“Thou art going, my lord! Thou wilt not come back to me.”
“Why not?” wondered the heir. “Have I not gone away often and returned afterward?”
“I remember thee dressed in just this way—over there in our valley,” said Sarah. “Oh, where are those hours! So quickly have they passed, and so long is it since they vanished.”
“But I will return and bring the most famous physician.”
“What for?” inquired Tafet. “She is well, my dear chick—she needs only rest. But Egyptian physicians would bring real sickness.”
The prince did not look at the talkative woman.
“This was my pleasantest month with thee,” said Sarah, nestling up to Rameses, “but it has not brought happiness.”
The trumpets sounded on the royal barge, repeating a signal given higher up on the river.
Sarah started.
“Dost thou hear, lord, that terrible outburst? Thou hearest and smilest, and, woe to me, thou art tearing away from my embraces. When trumpets call nothing can hold thee, least of all thy slave, Sarah.”
“Wouldst thou have me listen forever to the cackling of hens in the country?” interrupted the prince, now impatient. “Be well, and wait for me joyously.”
Sarah let him go from her grasp, but she had such a mournful expression that Rameses grew mild and stroked her.
“Only be calm. Thou fearest the sound of our trumpets. But were they ill-omened the first day?”
“My lord,” answered Sarah, “I know that over there they will keep thee, so grant me this one, this last favor. I will give thee,” continued she, sobbing, “a cage of pigeons. They were hatched out and reared here; hence, as often as thou rememberest thy servant, open the cage and set one of them free; it will bring me tidings of thee, and I will kiss and fondle it as—as— But go now!”
The prince embraced her and went to the barge, telling his black attendant to wait for the pigeons.
At sight of the heir, drums and fifes sounded, and the garrison raised a loud shout of welcome. When he found himself among warriors, the prince drew a deep breath, and stretched out his arms, like a man liberated from bondage.
“Well,” said he to Tutmosis, “women have tormented me, and those Jews— O Cyrus! command to roast me on a slow fire at once, but put me not in the country a second time.”
“So it is,” confirmed Tutmosis; “love is like honey. It must be taken by sips, a man must not swim in it. Brr! shudders pass over me when I think that thou hast passed nearly two months fed on kisses in the evening, dates in the morning, and asses’ milk at midday.”
“Sarah is a very good girl,” said Rameses.
“I do not speak of her, but of those Jews who have settled down at that villa like papyrus in swamp land. Dost thou see, they are looking out at thee yet, and perhaps are sending greetings,” said the flatterer.
The prince turned to another side with displeasure, and Tutmosis winked joyfully at the officers, as if to tell them that Rameses would not leave their society very soon this time.
The higher they ascended the Nile the denser on both banks were spectators, the more numerous were boats on the river,and the more did flowers, garlands, and bouquets float down; these had been thrown at the barge of the pharaoh.
About five miles above Memphis there were multitudes of people with banners, with statues of gods, and with music; an immense roar was heard, like the sound of a tempest.
“There is his holiness!” cried Tutmosis, delighted.
One spectacle was presented to the eyes of the onlookers: in the middle of a broad bend in the river sailed the great barge of the pharaoh, rising in front like the breast of a swan. At the right and left sides of it, like two giant wings, pushed forward the countless boats of his subjects, and in the rear, like a rich fan, stretched the retinue of the ruler of Egypt.
Every one living shouted, sang, clapped hands, and threw flowers at the feet of the lord whom no one even saw. It was enough that under that gilded canopy and those ostrich plumes waved a ruddy blue flag, denoting that the pharaoh was present.
The people in the boats were as if drunk, the people on the shore as if mad. Every moment some boat struck or overturned a boat and some man fell into the water, out of which luckily the crocodiles had fled, frightened by the unparalleled uproar. On the banks men ran into one another, for no one paid heed to his neighbor, his father, or his child, but fixed his wild eyes on the gilded beak of the barge and the tent of the pharaoh. Even people who were trampled, whose ribs the wild crowd broke stupidly, and whose joints they put out, had no cry save this,—
“May he live through eternity, O our ruler!—Shine on, thou the sun of Egypt!”
The madness of greeting spread to the barge of Rameses: officers, soldiers, and oarsmen pressed into one throng and strove to outshout one another. Tutmosis, forgetting the heir to the throne, clambered up on the prow, and almost flew into the water.
Meanwhile a trumpet sounded from the pharaoh’s barge, and soon after one answered from the barge of Rameses. A second signal, and the barge of the heir touched the great barge of the pharaoh.
Some official called to Rameses. From barge to barge theyextended a gangway of cedar with carved railings, and the prince found himself next in the embrace of his father.
The presence of the pharaoh, or the storm of shouts roaring about him, so stunned Prince Rameses that he could not utter a syllable. He fell at his father’s feet, and the lord of the world pressed the heir to his sacred bosom.
A moment later the side walls of the tent rose, and all the people on both banks of the Nile saw their ruler on a throne, and on the high step of it Rameses kneeling, with his head on the breast of his father.
Such silence followed that the rustling of banners on the barges was audible. Then on a sudden burst forth one immense roar, greater than all which had preceded. With this the Egyptian people honored the reconciliation of son and father; they greeted their present, and saluted their future ruler.
If any man had reckoned on dissensions in the sacred family of the pharaoh, he might convince himself then that the new royal branch held to its parent trunk firmly.
His holiness looked very ill. After the tender greeting of his son, he commanded him to sit at the side of the throne.
“My soul was rushing forth toward thee, Rameses,” said he, “and all the more ardently the better were the tidings which I had of thee. To-day I see not only that thou hast the heart of a lion, but that thou art a man full of prudence, who knows how to estimate his own acts, who is able to restrain himself, and who feels for the interests of Egypt.”
When the prince, filled with emotion, was silent and kissed his father’s feet, the pharaoh continued,—
“Thou hast done well to renounce command of the Greek regiments, because from this day the corps in Memphis is thine, thou art its commander.”
“My father!” whispered the heir, trembling.
“Besides, in Lower Egypt, which is open on three sides to attacks of hostile nations, I need a wise, active man, who will watch all things round him, weigh them well in his heart, and act promptly. For this reason I appoint thee my lieutenant in that half of the kingdom.”