CHAPTER XLVIII

[22]It is curious that the theory of shades, on which very likely the uncommon care of the Egyptians for the dead was built, has revived in our times in Europe. Adolf d’Assier explains it minutely in a pamphlet “Essai sur l’humanité posthume et le spiritisme, par un positiviste.”

[22]It is curious that the theory of shades, on which very likely the uncommon care of the Egyptians for the dead was built, has revived in our times in Europe. Adolf d’Assier explains it minutely in a pamphlet “Essai sur l’humanité posthume et le spiritisme, par un positiviste.”

Not greatly pleased by this end of his explanation, the holy Mentezufis took leave of the viceroy. After the priest had gone, Tutmosis entered.

“The Greeks are raising the pile for their chief,” said he, “and a number of Libyan women have agreed to wail at the funeral ceremony.”

“We shall be present,” answered Rameses. “Dost thou know that my son is killed?—such a little child. When I carried him he laughed and held out his little hands to me. What wickedness may be in the human heart is beyond comprehension. If that vile Lykon had attempted my life I could understand, even forgive him. But to slay a little child—”

“But have they told thee of Sarah’s devotion?” inquired Tutmosis.

“She was, as I think, the most faithful of women, and I did not treat her justly. But how is it,” cried the prince, striking his fist on the table, “that they have not seized that wretch Lykon to this moment? The Phœnicians swore to me, and I promised a reward to the chief of police. There must be some secret in this matter.”

Tutmosis approached the prince, and whispered,—

“A messenger from Hiram has been with me. Hiram, fearing the anger of the priests, is hiding before he leaves Egypt. Hiram has heard, from the chief of police in Pi-Bast perhaps, that Lykon was captured— But quiet!” added the frightened Tutmosis.

The prince fell into anger for a moment, but soon mastered himself.

“Captured?” repeated he. “Why should that be a secret?”

“It is, for the chief of police had to yield him up to the holy Mefres at his command in the name of the supreme council.”

“Aha! aha!” repeated the heir. “So the revered Mefres and the supreme council need a man who resembles me so much? Aha! They are to give my son and Sarah a beautiful funeral, and embalm their remains. But the murderer they will secrete safely. Aha!

“And the holy Mentezufis is a great sage. He told me to-day all the secrets of life beyond the grave; he explained to me the whole funeral ritual, as if I were a priest at least of thethird degree. But touching the seizure of Lykon, the hiding of that murderer by Mefres, not a word! Evidently the holy fathers are more occupied by minute secrets of the heir to the throne than with the great secrets of future existence. Aha!”

“It seems to me, lord, that thou shouldst not wonder at that,” interrupted Tutmosis. “Thou knowest that the priests suspect thee of ill-will, and are on their guard. All the more—”

“What, all the more?”

“Since his holiness is very ill. Very.”

“Aha! my father is ill, and I meanwhile at the head of the army must watch the desert lest the sand should run out of it. It is well that thou hast reminded me of this! Yes, his holiness must be very ill, since the priests are so tender toward me. They show me everything and speak of everything, except this, that Mefres has secreted Lykon.

“Tutmosis,” said the prince on a sudden, “dost thou think to-day that I can reckon on the army?”

“We will go to death, only give the order.”

“And dost thou reckon on the nobles?”

“As on the army.”

“That is well. Now we may render the rites to Patrokles.”

IN the course of those few months, during which Prince Rameses had fulfilled the duties of viceroy of Lower Egypt, his holiness the pharaoh had failed in health continually. The moment was approaching in which the lord of eternity, who roused delight in human hearts, the sovereign of Egypt, and of all lands on which the sun shone, had to occupy a place at the side of his revered ancestors in the Libyan catacombs which lie on the other side of the city Teb.

Not over advanced in age was this potentate, the equal of the gods, he who gave life to his subjects, and had power to take from husbands their wives whenever his heart so desired. But thirty and some years of rule had so wearied him that he wished, of his own accord, to rest and regain youth and beautyin that kingdom of the west, where each pharaoh reigns without care through eternity over people who are so happy that no man of them has ever wished to return to this earth from that region.

Half a year earlier the holy lord had exercised every activity connected with his office, on which rested the safety and prosperity of all visible existence.

Barely had the cocks crowed in the morning when the priests roused the sovereign with a hymn in honor of the rising sun. The pharaoh rose from his bed and bathed in a gilded basin containing water fragrant with roses. Then his divine body was rubbed with priceless perfumes amid the murmur of prayers, which had the power of expelling evil spirits.

Thus purified and incensed by prophets, the lord went to a chapel, removed a clay seal from the door and entered the sanctuary unattended, where on a couch of ivory lay the miraculous image of Osiris. This image had the wondrous quality that every night the hands, feet and head fall from it. These on a time had been cut off by the evil god Set; but after the prayer of the pharaoh all the members grew on without evident reason.

When his holiness convinced himself that Osiris was sound again he took the statue from the couch, bathed it, dressed it in precious garments, and putting it on a malachite throne burnt incense before it. This ceremony was vastly important, for if any morning the divine members would not grow together it would signify that Egypt, if not the whole world, was threatened by measureless misfortune.

After the resurrection and restoration of the god, his holiness opened the door of the chapel, so that through it blessings might flow forth to the country. Then he designated the priests, who all that day were to guard the sanctuary, not so much against the ill-will, as the frivolity of people. For more than once it happened that a careless mortal who had gone too near that most holy place received an invisible blow which deprived him of consciousness or of life, even.

After he had finished divine service, the lord went, surrounded by chanting priests to a great hall of refection, where stood asmall table and an armchair for him and nineteen other tables before nineteen statues which represented the nineteen preceding dynasties. When the sovereign had seated himself youths and maidens came in with silver plates, on which were meat and cakes, also pitchers of wine. The priest, the inspector of the dishes, tasted what was on the first dish, and what was in the first pitcher, then, on his knees, he gave these to the pharaoh, but the other plates and pitchers were placed before the statues of the pharaoh’s ancestors. When the sovereign had satisfied his hunger and left the hall princes or priests had the right to eat food intended for the ancestors.

From the hall of refection the lord betook himself to the grand hall of audience. There the highest dignitaries of state, and the nearest members of the family prostrated themselves before him, after that the minister, Herhor; the chief treasurer, the supreme judge, and the supreme chief of police made reports to him. The reading was varied by religious music and dancing, during which wreaths and flowers were cast on the throne of the pharaoh.

After the audience his holiness betook himself to a side chamber and reposing on a couch slumbered lightly for a time; then he offered wine and incense to the gods, and narrated to the priests his dreams, from which those sages made the final disposition in affairs which his holiness was to settle.

But sometimes, when there were no dreams, or when the interpretation of them seemed inappropriate to the pharaoh, his holiness smiled and commanded kindly to act in this way or that in given cases. This command was law which no one might change except in the execution perhaps of details.

In hours after dinner his holiness, borne in a litter, showed himself in the court to his faithful guard, and then he ascended to the roof and looked toward the four quarters of the earth, to impart to them his blessing. At that moment on the summits of pylons banners appeared, and mighty sounds came from trumpets. Whoso heard these sounds in the city or the country, an Egyptian or a stranger, fell on his face so that a portion of supreme grace might descend on him.

At that moment it was not permitted to strike man, or beast: a stick raised over a man’s back dropped of itself. Ifa criminal sentenced to death, declared that the sentence was read to him at the time when the lord of earth and heaven had appeared, his punishment was lessened. For before the pharaoh went might, and behind him followed mercy.

When he had made his people happy, the ruler of all things beneath the sun entered his gardens among palms and sycamores, there he sat a longer time than elsewhere, receiving homage from his women and looking at the amusements of the children of his household. When one of them arrested his attention by beauty or adroitness he called it up, and made inquiry,—

“Who art thou, my little child?”

“I am Prince Binotris, the son of his holiness,” answered the little boy.

“And what is thy mother’s name?”

“My mother is the lady Ameses, a woman of his holiness.”

“What dost thou know?”

“I know how to count to ten and to write: ‘May he live through eternity our god and father, his holiness the pharaoh Rameses!’”

The lord of eternity smiled benignly and touched with his delicate, almost transparent, hand the curly head of the sprightly little boy. Then the child became a prince really, though the smile of his holiness was ever enigmatical. But whoso had been touched by the divine hand was not to know misfortune in life and had to be raised above others.

The sovereign dined in another hall of refection and shared his meal with the gods of all the divisions of Egypt, gods whose statues were ranged along the walls there. Whatever the gods did not eat went to the priests and higher court dignitaries.

Toward evening his holiness received a visit from Lady Nikotris, the mother to the heir to the throne of Egypt; looked at religious dances and heard a concert. After that he went again to the bath and, thus purified, entered the chapel of Osiris to undress and lay to sleep the marvellous divinity. When he had finished this he closed and sealed the chapel door and then, surrounded by a procession of priests, the pharaoh went to his bedchamber.

In an adjoining apartment the priests offered up, till thefollowing sunrise, silent prayers to the soul of the pharaoh, which found itself among gods during the sleep of the sovereign. They laid before it their prayers for a favorable transaction of current state business, for guardianship over the boundaries of Egypt, and over the tombs of the pharaohs, so that no thief might dare to enter in and disturb the endless rest of those potentates. But the prayers of the priests, because of night weariness, surely, were not always effectual, for state difficulties increased, and sacred tombs were robbed, not only of costly objects, but even of the mummies of sovereigns.

This was because various foreigners had settled in the country and unbelievers from whom the people learned to disregard the gods of Egypt and the most sacred places.

The repose of the lord of lords was interrupted exactly at midnight. At that hour the astrologers roused his holiness and informed him in what mansion the moon was, what planets were shining above the horizon, what constellations were passing the meridian and whether in general something peculiar had taken place in heavenly regions. For sometimes clouds appeared or stars fell in greater number than usual, or a fiery ball flew over Egypt.

The lord listened to the report of the astrologers. In case of any unusual phenomenon he pacified them concerning the safety of the world, and commanded to write down all observations on appropriate tablets, which were sent every month to priests of the temple of the Sphinx, the greatest sages in Egypt. Those men drew conclusions from those tablets, but the most important they declared to no one, unless to their colleagues the Chaldean priests in Babylon.

After midnight his holiness might sleep till the morning cock-crow if he thought proper.

Such a pious and laborious life had been led, not more than half a year ago, by this kind, divine person, the distributor of protection, life, and health, who watched day and night over the earth and the sky, over the world both visible and invisible. But for the last half year his eternally living soul had begun to be more and more wearied with earthly questions, and with its bodily envelope. There were long days when he ate nothing,and nights during which he had no sleep whatever. Sometimes during an audience, there appeared on his mild face an expression of deep pain, while oftener and oftener, he fainted.

The terrified Queen Nikotris, the most worthy Herhor and the priests, asked the sovereign repeatedly whether anything pained him. But the lord shrugged his shoulders, and was silent, fulfilling always his burdensome duties.

Then the court physicians began imperceptibly to give the most powerful remedies to restore strength to him. They mixed in his wine and food at first the ashes of a burnt horse and a bull; later of a lion, a rhinoceros, and an elephant; but these strong remedies seemed to have no effect whatever. His holiness fainted so frequently that they ceased to read reports to him.

On a certain day the worthy Herhor with the queen and the priests, fell on their faces; they implored the lord to permit them to examine his divine body. He consented. The physicians examined and struck him, but found no worse sign than great emaciation.

“What feelings dost thou experience, holiness?” inquired at last the wisest physician.

The pharaoh smiled.

“I feel,” replied he, “that it is time for me to return to my radiant father.”

“Thou canst not do that, holiness, without the greatest harm to thy people,” said Herhor, hurriedly.

“I leave you my son, Rameses, who is a lion and an eagle in one person. And in truth, if ye will obey him, he will prepare for Egypt such a fate as the world has not heard of since the beginning of ages.”

A chill passed through holy Herhor and the other priests at that promise. They knew that the heir to the throne was a lion and an eagle in one person, and that they must obey him. But they would have preferred to have for long years that kindly lord, whose heart, filled with compassion, was like the north wind which brings rain to the fields and coolness to mankind. Therefore they fell down all of them as one man to the pavement, groaning, and they lay prostrate till the pharaoh consented to let himself be treated.

Then the physicians took him out for a whole day to the gardens, among frequent pine-trees, they nourished him with chopped meat; they gave him strong herbs with milk and old wine. These effective means strengthened his holiness for something like a week yet; then a new faintness announced itself, and to overcome that they forced their lord to drink the fresh blood of calves descended from Apis.

But neither did this blood help for a long time, and they found it needful to turn for advice to the high priest of the temple of the wicked god Set.

Amid general fear, the gloomy priest entered the bedchamber of his holiness. He looked at the sick pharaoh and prescribed a dreadful remedy.

“It is needful,” said he, “to give the pharaoh blood of innocent children to drink; each day a full goblet.”

The priests and magnates in the chamber were dumb when they heard this prescription. Then they whispered that the children of earth-tillers were best for the purpose, since the children of priests and great lords lost their innocence even in infancy.

“It is all one to me whose children they are,” said the cruel priest, “if only his holiness has fresh blood given him daily.”

The pharaoh, lying on the bed with closed eyes, heard that gory counsel, and the whispers of the frightened courtiers. And when one of the physicians asked Herhor timidly if it were possible to take measures to seek proper children, Rameses XII. recovered. He fixed his wise eyes on those present,—

“The crocodile will not devour its own little ones,” said he, “a jackal or a hyena will give its life for its whelps, and am I to drink the blood of Egyptian infants, who are my children? Indeed, I never could have believed that any one would dare to prescribe means so unworthy.”

The priest of the evil god fell to the pavement, and explained that in Egypt no one had ever drunk the blood of infants but that the infernal powers returned health by it. Such means at least were used in Phœnicia and Assyria.

“Shame on thee!” replied the pharaoh, “for mentioning in the palace of Egyptian sovereigns disgusting subjects. Knowest thou not that Phœnicians and Assyrians arebarbarous? But among us the most unenlightened earth-tiller would not believe that blood, shed without cause, could be of service to any one.”

Thus spoke he who was equal to immortals. The courtiers covered their faces, spotted now with shame, and the high priest of Set went silently out of the chamber.

Then Herhor, to save the quenching life of the sovereign, had recourse to the last means, and told the pharaoh that in one of the Theban temples, Beroes, the Chaldean, lived in secret. He was the wisest priest of Babylon—a miracle-worker without equal.

“For thee, holiness,” said Herhor, “that sage is a stranger, and he has not the right to impart such important advice to the lord of Egypt. But, O Pharaoh, permit him to look at thee. I am sure that he will find a medicine to cure thy illness, and in no case will he offend thee by impious expressions.”

The pharaoh yielded this time also to persuasions from his faithful servitors. And in two days Beroes, summoned in some mysterious way, was sailing down toward Memphis.

The wise Chaldean, even without examining the pharaoh minutely, gave this counsel,—

“We must find a person in Egypt whose prayers reach the throne of the Highest. And if this person prays sincerely for the pharaoh, the sovereign will receive his health and live for long years in strength again.”

On hearing these words the pharaoh looked at the priests surrounding him, and said,—

“I see here holy men in such numbers that, if one of them thinks of me, I shall be in health again.” And he smiled imperceptibly.

“We are all only men,” interrupted Beroes; “hence our souls cannot always rise to the footstool of Him who existed before the ages. But, holiness, I will use an infallible method by which to find a man whose prayers have the utmost sincerity, and the highest effect.”

“Discover him, so that he may be a friend to me in my last hour of life,” said the pharaoh.

After this favorable answer the Chaldean desired a room with a single door, and unoccupied. And that same day, onehour before sunset, he asked that his holiness be borne into that chamber.

At the appointed hour four of the highest priests dressed the pharaoh in a robe of new linen, pronounced a great prayer above him,—this prayer expelled every evil power absolutely,—and seating him in a litter they bore him to that simple chamber where there was but one small table.

Beroes was there already, and, looking toward the east, was praying.

When the priests had left the chamber the Chaldean closed the heavy door, put a purple scarf on his arm and placed a glass globe of black color on the table before the pharaoh. In his left hand he held a sharp dagger of Babylonian steel, in his right a staff covered with mysterious signs, and with that staff he described in the air a circle about himself and the pharaoh. Then facing in turn the four quarters of the world, he whispered,—

“Amorul, Taneha, Latisten, Rabur, Adonai have pity on me and purify me, O heavenly Father, the compassionate and gracious. Pour down on thy unworthy servant thy sacred blessing, and extend thy almighty arm against stubborn and rebellious spirits, so that I may consider thy sacred work calmly.”

He stopped and turned to the pharaoh,—

“Mer-Amen-Rameses, high priest of Amon, dost thou distinguish a spark in that black globe?”

“I see a white spark which seems to move like a bee above a flower.”

“Mer-Amen-Rameses, look at that spark and take not thy eyes from it. Look neither to the right nor the left, look not on anything whatever which may come from the sides.”

And again he whispered,—

“Baralanensis, Baldachiensis, by the mighty princes Genio, Lachidae, the ministers of the infernal kingdom, I summon you, I call you through the strength of Supreme Majesty, by which I am gifted, I adjure, I command!”

At that place the pharaoh started up with aversion.

“Mer-Amen-Rameses, what seest thou?” asked the Chaldean.

“From beyond the globe rises some horrid head—reddishhair is standing on end; a face of greenish hue; the eye looking down so that only the white of it is visible; the mouth open widely, as if to shriek.”

“That is Terror!” cried Beroes, and he held his sharp dagger point above the globe.

Suddenly the pharaoh bent to the earth.

“Enough!” cried he, “why torment me thus? The wearied body seeks rest, the soul longs to be in the region of endless light. But not only will ye not let me die; ye are inventing new torments. Oh, I wish not—”

“What dost thou see?”

“From the ceiling every instant two spider legs lower themselves—they are terrible. As thick as palm trunks; shaggy with hooks at the ends of them. I feel that above my head is a spider of immense size, and he is binding me with a web of ship ropes.”

Beroes turned his dagger point upward.

“Mer-Amen-Rameses,” said he again, “look ever at the spark, and never at the sides. Here is a sign which I raise in thy presence,” whispered he. “Here am I mightily armed with Divine aid, I, foreseeing and unterrified, who summon you with exorcisms—Aye, Saraye, Aye, Saraye, Aye, Saraye—in the name of the all-powerful, the all-mighty and everlasting divinity.”

At that moment a calm smile appeared on the lips of the pharaoh.

“It seems to me,” said he, “that I behold Egypt—all Egypt. Yes! that is the Nile—the desert. Here is Memphis, there Thebes.”

Indeed he saw Egypt, all Egypt, but no larger than the path which extended through the garden of his palace. The wonderful picture had this trait, that when the Pharaoh turned more deliberate attention to any point of it, that point with its environments grew to be of real size almost.

The sun was going down, covering the earth with golden and purple light. Birds of the daytime were settling to sleep, the night birds were waking up in their concealments. In the desert hyenas and jackals were yawning, and the slumbering lion had begun to stretch his strong body and prepare to hunt victims.

The Nile fisherman drew forth his nets hastily, men were tying up at the shores the great transport barges. The wearied earth-worker removed from the sweep his bucket with which he had drawn water since sunrise; another returned slowly with the plough to his mud hovel. In cities they were lighting lamps, in the temples priests were assembling for evening devotions. On the highways the dust was settling down and the squeak of carts was growing silent. From the pylon summits shrill voices were heard calling people to prayer.

A moment later, the pharaoh saw with astonishment flocks of silvery birds over the earth everywhere. They were flying up out of palaces, temples, streets, workshops, Nile barges, country huts, even from the quarries. At first each of them shot upward like an arrow, but soon it met in the sky another silvery feathered bird, which stopped its way, striking it with all force and—both fell to the earth lifeless.

Those were the unworthy prayers of men, which prevented each other from reaching the throne of Him who existed before the ages.

The pharaoh strained his hearing. At first only the rustle of wings reached him, but soon he distinguished words also.

And now he heard a sick man praying for the return of his health, and also the physician, who begged that that same patient might be sick as long as possible. The landowner prayed Amon to watch over his granary and cow-house, the thief stretched his hands heavenward so that he might lead forth another man’s cow without hindrance, and fill his own bags from another man’s harvest.

Their prayers knocked each other down like stones which had been hurled from slings and had met in the air.

The wanderer in the desert fell on the sand and begged for a north wind, to bring a drop of rain to him, the sailor on the sea beat the deck with his forehead and prayed that wind might blow from the east a week longer. The earth-worker wished that swamps might dry up quickly after inundation; the needy fisherman begged that the swamps might not dry up at any time.

Their prayers killed each other and never reached the divine ears of Amon.

The greatest uproar reigned above the quarries where criminals, lashed together in chain gangs, split enormous rocks with wedges, wetted with water. There a party of day convicts prayed for the night, so that they might lie down to slumber; while parties of night toilers, roused by their overseers, beat their breasts, asking that the sun might not set at any hour. Merchants who purchased quarried and dressed stones prayed that there might be as many criminals in the quarries as possible, while provision contractors lay on their stomachs, sighing for the plague to kill laborers, and make their own profits as large as they might be.

So the prayers of men from the quarries did not reach the sky in any case.

On the western boundary the pharaoh saw two armies preparing for battle. Both were prostrate on the sand, calling on Amon to rub out the other side. The Libyans wished shame and death to Egyptians; the Egyptians hurled curses on the Libyans.

The prayers of these and of those, like two flocks of falcons, fought above the earth and fell dead in the desert. Amon did not even see them.

And whithersoever the pharaoh turned his wearied glance he saw the same picture everywhere. The laborers were praying for rest and decrease of taxes, scribes were praying that taxes might increase and work never be finished. The priests implored Amon for long life to Rameses XII. and death to Phœnicians, who interfered with their interests; the nomarchs implored the gods to preserve the Phœnicians and let Rameses XIII. ascend the throne at the earliest, for he would curb priestly tyranny. Lions, jackals, and hyenas were panting with hunger and desire for fresh blood; deer and rabbits slipped out of hiding-places, thinking to preserve wretched life a day longer, though experience declared that numbers of them must perish, even on that night, so that beasts of prey might not famish. So throughout the whole world reigned cross-purposes everywhere. Each wished that which filled others with terror; each begged for his own good, without asking if he did harm to the next man.

For this cause their prayers, though like silvery birds flyingheavenward, did not reach their destination. And the divine Amon, to whom no voice of the earth came at any time, dropped his hands on his knees, and sank ever deeper in meditation over his own divinity, while on the earth blind force and chance ruled without interruption.

All at once the pharaoh heard the voice of a woman,—“Rogue! Little rogue! come in, thou unruly, it is time for prayers.”

“This minute—this minute!” answered the voice of the little child.

The sovereign looked toward the point whence the voice came and saw the poor hut of a cattle scribe. The hut owner had finished his register in the light of the setting sun, his wife was grinding flour for a cake, and before the house, like a young kid, was running and jumping the six-year-old little boy, laughing, it was unknown for what reason.

The evening air full of sweetness had given him delight, that was evident.

“Rogue!—Little rogue! come here to me for a prayer,” repeated the woman.

“This minute! this minute!”

And again he ran with delight as if wild.

At last the mother, seeing that the sun was beginning to sink in the sands of the desert, put away her mill stones, and, going out, seized the boy, who raced around like a little colt. He resisted but gave way to superior force finally. The mother, drawing him to the hut as quickly as possible, held him with her hand so that he might not escape from her.

“Do not twist,” said she, “put thy feet under thee, sit upright, put thy hands together and raise them upward.—Ah, thou bad boy!”

The boy knew that he could not escape now; so to be free again as soon as possible he raised his eyes and hands heavenward piously, and with a thin squeaky voice, he said,—

“O kind, divine Amon, I thank thee, thou hast kept my papa to-day from misfortune, thou hast given wheat for cakes to my mamma. What more? Thou hast made heaven. I thank thee. And the earth, and sent down the Nile whichbrings bread to us. And what more? Aha, I know now! And I thank thee because out-of-doors it is so beautiful, and flowers are growing there, and birds singing and the palms give us sweet dates. For these good things which thou hast given us, may all love thee as I do, and praise thee better than I can, for I am a little boy yet and I have not learned wisdom. Well, is that enough, mamma?”

“Bad boy!” muttered the cattle scribe, bending over his register. “Bad boy! thou art giving honor to Amon carelessly.”

But the pharaoh in that magic globe saw now something altogether different. Behold the prayer of the delighted little boy rose, like a lark, toward the sky, and with fluttering wings it went higher and higher till it reached the throne where the eternal Amon with his hands on his knees was sunk in meditation on his own all-mightiness.

Then it went still higher, as high as the head of the divinity, and sang with the thin, childish little voice to him:

“And for those good things which thou hast given us may all love thee as I do.”

At these words the divinity, sunk in himself, opened his eyes—there came to the earth immense calm. Every pain ceased, every fear, every wrong stopped. The whistling missile hung in the air, the lion stopped in his spring on the deer, the stick uplifted did not fall on the back of the captive. The sick man forgot his pains, the wanderer in the desert his hunger, the prisoner his chains. The storm ceased, and the wave of the sea, though ready to drown the ship, halted. And on the whole earth such rest settled down that the sun, just hiding on the horizon, thrust up his shining head again.

The pharaoh recovered. He saw before him a little table, on the table a black globe, at the side of it Beroes the Chaldean.

“Mer-Amen-Rameses,” asked the priest, “hast thou found a person whose prayers reach the footstool of Him who existed before the ages?”

“I have.”

“Is he a prince, a noble, a prophet, or perhaps an ordinary hermit?”

“He is a little boy, six years old, who asked Amon for nothing, he only thanked him for everything.”

“But dost thou know where he dwells?” inquired the Chaldean.

“I know, but I will not steal for my own use the virtue of his prayer. The world, Beroes, is a gigantic vortex, in which people are whirled around like sand, and they are whirled by misfortune. That child with his prayer gives people what I cannot give: a brief space of peace and oblivion. Dost understand, O Chaldean?”

Beroes was silent.

AT sunrise of the twenty-first of Hator there came from Memphis to the camp at the Soda Lakes an order by which three regiments were to march to Libya to stand garrison in the towns, the rest of the Egyptian army was to return home with Rameses.

The army greeted this arrangement with shouts of delight, for a stay of some days in the wilderness had begun to annoy them. In spite of supplies from Egypt and from conquered Libya, there was not an excess of provisions; water in the wells dug out quickly, was exhausted; the heat of the sun burned their bodies, and the ruddy sand wounded their lungs and their eyeballs. The warriors were falling ill of dysentery and a malignant inflammation of the eyelids.

Rameses commanded to raise the camp. He sent three native Egyptian regiments to Libya, commanding the soldiers to treat people mildly and never wander from the camp singly. The army proper he turned toward Memphis, leaving a small garrison at the glass huts and in the fortress.

About nine in the morning, in spite of the heat, both armies were on the road; one going northward, the other toward the south.

The holy Mentezufis approached the heir then, and said,—

“It would be well, worthiness, couldst thou reach Memphis earlier. There will be fresh horses half-way.”

“Then my father is very ill?” cried out Rameses.

The priest bent his head.

The prince gave command to Mentezufis, begging him to change in no way commands already made, unless he counselled with lay generals. Taking Pentuer, Tutmosis, and twenty of the best Asiatic horsemen, he went himself on a sharp trot toward Memphis.

In five hours they passed half the journey; at the halt, as Mentezufis had declared, were fresh horses and a new escort. The Asiatics remained at that point, and after a short rest the prince with his two companions and a new escort went farther.

“Woe to me!” said Tutmosis. “It is not enough that for five days I have not bathed and know not rose perfumed oil, but besides I must make in one day two forced marches. I am sure that when we reach Memphis no dancer will look at me.”

“What! Art thou better than we?” asked the prince.

“I am more fragile,” said the exquisite. “Thou, prince, art as accustomed to riding as a Hyksos, and Pentuer might travel on a red-hot sword. But I am so delicate.”

At sunset the travellers came out on a lofty hill, whence they saw an uncommon picture unfolded before them. For a long distance the green valley of Egypt was visible, on the background of it, like a row of ruddy fires, the triangular pyramids stood gleaming. A little to the right of the pyramids the tops of the Memphis pylons, wrapped in a bluish haze, seemed to be flaming upward.

“Let us go; let us go!” said Rameses.

A moment later the reddish desert surrounded them again, and again the line of pyramids gleamed until all was dissolved in the twilight.

When night fell the travellers had reached that immense district of the dead, which extends for a number of tens of miles on the heights along the left side of the river.

Here during the Ancient Kingdom were buried, for endless ages, Egyptians,—the pharaohs in immense pyramids, princes and dignitaries in smaller pyramids, common men in mud structures. Here were resting millions of mummies, not only of people, but of dogs, cats, birds,—in a word, all creatures which, while they lived, were dear to Egyptians.

During the time of Rameses, the burial-ground of kings and great persons was transferred to Thebes; in the neighborhood of Memphis were buried only common persons and artisans from regions about there.

Among scattered graves, the prince and his escort met a number of people, pushing about like shadows.

“Who are ye?” asked the leader of the escort.

“We are poor servants of the pharaoh returning from our dead. We took to them roses, cakes, and beer.”

“But maybe ye looked into strange graves?”

“O gods!” cried one of the party, “could we commit such a sacrilege? It is only the wicked Thebans—may their hands wither!—who disturb the dead, so as to drink away their property in dramshops.”

“What mean those fires at the north there?” interrupted the prince.

“It must be, worthiness, that thou comest from afar if thou know not,” answered they. “To-morrow our heir is returning with a victorious army. He is a great chief! He conquered the Libyans in one battle. Those are the people of Memphis who have gone out to greet him with solemnity. Thirty thousand persons. When they shout—”

“I understand,” whispered the prince to Pentuer. “Holy Mentezufis has sent me ahead so that I may not have a triumphal entry. But never mind this time.”

The horses were tired, and they had to rest. So the prince sent horsemen to engage barges on the river, and the rest of the escort halted under some palms, which at that time grew between the Sphinx and the group of pyramids.

Those pyramids formed the northern limit of the immense cemetery. On the flat, about a square kilometre in area, overgrown at that time with plants of the desert, were tombs and small pyramids, above which towered the three great pyramids: those of Cheops, Chafre, and Menkere, and the Sphinx. These immense structures stand only a few hundred yards from one another. The three pyramids are in a line from northeast to southwest. East of this line and nearer the Nile is the Sphinx, near whose feet was the underground temple of Horus.

The pyramids, but especially that of Cheops, as a work ofhuman labor, astound by their greatness. This pyramid is a pointed stone mountain; its original height was thirty-five stories, or four hundred and eighty-one feet, standing on a square foundation each side of which was seven hundred and fifty-five feet. It occupied a little more than thirteen acres of area, and its four triangular walls would cover twenty acres of land. In building it, such vast numbers of stones were used that it would be possible to build a wall of the height of a man, a wall half a metre thick, and two thousand five hundred kilometres long.

When the attendants of the prince had disposed themselves under the wretched trees, some occupied themselves in finding water; others took out cakes, while Tutmosis dropped to the ground and fell asleep directly. But the prince and Pentuer walked up and down conversing.

The night was clear enough to let them see on one side the immense outline of the pyramids, on the other, the Sphinx, which seemed small in comparison.

“I am here for the fourth time,” said the heir, “and my heart is always filled with regret and astonishment. When a pupil in the higher school, I thought that, on ascending the throne, I would build something of more worth than the pyramid of Cheops. But to-day I am ready to laugh at my insolence when I think that the great pharaoh in building his tomb paid sixteen hundred talents (about ten million francs) for the vegetables alone which were used by the laborers. Where should I find sixteen hundred talents even for wages?”

“Envy not Cheops, lord,” replied the priest. “Other pharaohs have left better works behind: lakes, canals, roads, schools, and temples.”

“But may we compare those things with the pyramids?”

“Of course not,” answered Pentuer, hurriedly. “In my eyes and in the eyes of all the people, each pyramid is a great crime, and that of Cheops, the greatest of all crimes.”

“Thou art too much excited,” said the prince.

Pyramid of Cheops

“I am not. The pharaoh was building his immense tomb for thirty years; in the course of those years one hundred thousand people worked three months annually. And what good was there in that work? Whom did it feed, whom did it cure,to whom did it give clothing? At that work from ten to twenty thousand people perished yearly; that is, for the tomb of Cheops a half a million corpses were put into the earth. But the blood, the pain, the tears,—who will reckon them?

“Therefore, wonder not, lord, that the Egyptian toiler to this day looks with fear toward the west, when above the horizon the triangular forms of the pyramids seem bloody or crimson. They are witnesses of his sufferings and fruitless labor.

“And to think that this will continue till those proofs of human pride are scattered into dust! But when will that be? For three thousand years those pyramids frighten men with their presence; their walls are smooth yet, and the immense inscriptions on them are legible.”

“That night in the desert thy speech was different,” interrupted the prince.

“For I was not looking at these. But when they are before my eyes, as at present, I am surrounded by the sobbing spirits of tortured toilers, and they whisper, ‘See what they did with us! But our bones felt pain, and our hearts longed for rest from labor.’”

Rameses was touched disagreeably by this outburst.

“His holiness, my father,” said he, after a while, “presented these things to me differently; when we were here five years ago, the sacred lord told me the following narrative:

“During the reign of the pharaoh Tutmosis I., Ethiopian ambassadors came to negotiate touching the tribute to be paid by them. They were all arrogant people. They said that the loss of one war was nothing, that fate might favor them in a second; and for a couple of months they disputed about tribute.

“In vain did the wise pharaoh, in his wish to enlighten the men mildly, show our roads and canals to them. They replied that in their country they had water for nothing wherever they wanted it. In vain he showed them the treasures of the temples; they said that their country concealed more gold and jewels by far than were possessed by all Egypt. In vain did the lord review his armies before them, for they asserted that Ethiopia had incomparably more warriors than his holiness.The pharaoh brought those people at last to these places where we are standing and showed them those structures.

“The Ethiopian ambassadors went around the pyramids, read the inscriptions, and next day they concluded the treaty required of them.

“Since I did not understand the heart of the matter,” continued Rameses, “my holy father explained it.

“‘My son,’ said he, ‘these pyramids are an eternal proof of superhuman power in Egypt. If any man wished to raise to himself a pyramid he would pile up a small heap of stones and abandon his labor after some hours had passed, asking: “What good is this to me?” Ten, one hundred, one thousand men would pile up a few more stones. They would throw them down without order, and leave the work after a few days, for what good would it be to them?

“‘But when a pharaoh of Egypt decides, when the Egyptian state has decided to rear a pile of stones, thousands of legions of men are sent out, and for a number of tens of years they build, till the work is completed. For the question is not this: Are the pyramids needed, but this is the will of the pharaoh to be accomplished, once it is uttered.’ So, Pentuer, this pyramid is not the tomb of Cheops, but thewillof Cheops,—a will which had more men to carry it out than had any king on earth, and which was as orderly and enduring in action as the gods are.

“While I was yet at school they taught me that the will of the people was a great power, the greatest power under the sun. And still the will of the people can raise one stone barely. How great, then, must be the will of the pharaoh who has raised a mountain of stones only because it pleased him, only because he wished thus, even were it without an object.”

“Wouldst thou, lord, wish to show thy power in such fashion?” inquired Pentuer, suddenly.

“No,” answered the prince, without hesitation. “When the pharaohs have once shown their power, they may be merciful; unless some one should resist their orders.”

“And still this young man is only twenty-three years of age!” thought the frightened priest.

They turned toward the river and walked some time in silence.

“Lie down, lord,” said the priest, after a while; “sleep. We have made no small journey.”

“But can I sleep?” answered the prince. “First I am surrounded by those legions of laborers who, according to thy view, perished in building the pyramids— Just as if they could have lived forever had they not raised those structures! Then, again, I think of his holiness, my father, who is dying, perhaps, at this very moment. Common men suffer, common men spill their blood! Who will prove to me that my divine father is not tortured more on his costly bed than thy toilers who are carrying heated stones to a building?

“Laborers, always laborers! For thee, O priest, only he deserves compassion who bites lice. A whole series of pharaohs have gone into their graves; some died in torments, some were killed. But thou thinkest not of them; thou thinkest only of those whose service is that they begot other toilers who dipped up muddy water from the Nile, or thrust barley balls into the mouths of their milch cows.

“But my father—and I? Was not my son slain, and also a woman of my household? Was Typhon compassionate to me in the desert? Do not my bones ache after a long journey? Do not missiles from Libyan slings whistle over my head? Have I a treaty with sickness, with pain, or with death, that they should be kinder to me than to thy toilers?

“Look there: the Asiatics are sleeping, and quiet has taken possession of their breasts; but I, their lord, have a heart full of yesterday’s cares, and of fears for the morrow. Ask a toiling man of a hundred years whether in all his life he had as much sorrow as I have had during my power of a few months as commander and viceroy.”

Before them rose slowly from the depth of the night a wonderful shade. It was an object fifty yards long and as high as a house of three stories, having at its side, as it were, a five-storied tower of uncommon structure.

“Here is the Sphinx,” said the irritated prince, “purely priests’ work! Whenever I see this, in the day or the night time, the question always tortures me: What is this, and what is the use of it? The pyramids I understand: A mighty pharaoh wished to show his power, and, perhaps, which waswiser, wished to secure eternal life which no thief or enemy might take from him. But this Sphinx! Evidently that is our sacred priestly order, which has a very large, wise head and lion’s claws beneath it.

“This repulsive statue, full of double meaning, which seems to exult because we appear like locusts when we stand near it,—it is neither a man nor a beast nor a rock— What is it, then? What is its meaning? Or that smile which it has— If thou admire the everlasting endurance of the pyramids, it smiles; if thou go past to converse with the tombs, it smiles. Whether the fields of Egypt are green, or Typhon lets loose his fiery steeds, or the slave seeks his freedom in the desert, or Rameses the Great drives conquered nations before him, it has for all one and the same changeless smile. Nineteen dynasties have passed like shadows; but it smiles on and would smile even were the Nile to grow dry, and were Egypt to disappear under sand fields.

“Is not that monster the more dreadful that it has a mild human visage? Lasting itself throughout ages, it has never known grief over life, which is fleeting and filled with anguish.”

“Dost thou not remember, lord, the faces of the gods,” interrupted Pentuer, “or hast thou not seen mummies? All immortals look on transient things with the selfsame indifference. Even man does when nearing the end of his earth-life.”

“The gods hear our prayers sometimes, but the Sphinx never moves. No compassion on that face, a mere gigantic jeering terror. If I knew that in its mouth were hidden some prophecy for me, or some means to elevate Egypt, I should not dare to put a question. It seems to me that I should hear some awful answer uttered with unpitying calmness. This is the work and the image of the priesthood. It is worse than man, for it has a lion’s body; it is worse than a beast, for it has a human head; it is worse than stone, for inexplicable life is contained in it.”

At that moment groaning and muffled voices reached them, the source of which they could not determine.

“Is the Sphinx singing?” inquired the astonished prince.

“That singing is in the underground temple,” replied Pentuer. “But why are they praying at this night hour?”

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