UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 57) 
 

 
 UARDA 
 
 m 
 
 A ROMANCE GIF ANCIENT EGYPT 
 
 Author of XHffi^Sum." etc. 
 
 % 
 
 FROM xakViERMAN B^*ft,ARA BELL. 
 
 AUTHORIZED EDITION. 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 WILLIAM S. GOTTSBERGER, PUBLISHER 
 11 MURRAY STREET 
 
 1880
 
 Copyright, 1880, by WILLIAM S. OOTTSBKRCKR. 
 
 Published by authority of the 
 
 AUTHOR AND OF BARON TAUCHNITZ. 
 
 PRESS OF 
 
 WILLIAM S. GCTTSBERGER 
 NEW YORK
 
 B 
 
 GEORG MORITZ EBERS, one of the first Egypto- l 
 legists living, was born the ist of March, 1837, in " ' ' 
 Berlin, became in 1856 a law-student at the University of 
 Gottingen, turned in 1856, during a severe illness at 
 Berlin, to the study of Oriental languages, particularly 
 the ancient Egyptian, under the guidance of Lepsius 
 and Brugsch. In 1868 designated Professor at the 
 University of Jena, he made in 1869 a great journey 
 through France, Spain, North-Africa, Egypt, Nubia, 
 and the Sinai-peninsula. After his return, he accepted 
 an invitation to fill the chair of Professor of Egyptian 
 language and archaeology at the University of Leipzig, 
 which he still holds. On a second journey to Egypt 
 in 1870, he discovered and acquired the so-called Ebers 
 Papyrus, the second in extent, and the first in preser- 
 vation of all the ancient Egyptian handwritings known 
 to us, containing a complete manual of Egyptian medi- 
 cine of the 1 6th Century, B.C. Of the Ebers Papyrus 
 the original of which is now the property of the 
 University Library of Leipzig Ebers has arranged a 
 publication of unequalled beauty, which was laid by 
 him before the congress of Orientalists in London in 
 1874. To enumerate here all Professor Ebers's dif- 
 ferent scientific works would require more space than 
 we can command, but we ought not to omit to state 
 that it is the rare combination of eminent scientific 
 knowledge with the ingenious gifts of a poet, from 
 which arose Professor Ebers's three fine novels: "An 
 Egyptian Princess," "Uarda," and "Homo Sum." 
 
 370073
 
 DEDICATION. 
 
 THOU knowest well from what this book arose. 
 When suffering seized and held me in its clasp 
 Thy fostering hand released me from its grasp, 
 
 And from amid the thorns there bloomed a rose. 
 Air, dew, and sunshine were bestowed by Thee, 
 And Thine it is ; without these lines from me.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 IN the winter of 1873 I spent some weeks in one 
 of the tombs of the Necropolis of Thebes in order to 
 study the monuments of that solemn city of the dead; 
 and during my long rides in the silent desert the germ 
 was developed whence this book has since grown. The 
 leisure of mind and body required to write it was 
 given me through a long but not disabling illness. 
 
 In the first instance I intended to elucidate this 
 story like my "Egyptian Princess" with numerous 
 and extensive notes placed at the end ; but I was led to 
 give up this plan from finding that it would lead me 
 to the repetition of much that I had written in the 
 notes to that earlier work. 
 
 The numerous notes to the former novel had a 
 threefold purpose. In the first place they served to 
 explain the text ; in the second they were a guarantee 
 of the care with which I had striven to depict the 
 archaeological details in all their individuality from the 
 records- of the monuments and of Classic Authors; and 
 thirdly I hoped to supply the reader who desired further 
 knowledge of the period with some guide to his studies. 
 
 In the present work I shall venture to content my- 
 self with the simple statement that I have introduced 
 nothing as proper to Egypt and to the period of 
 Rameses that cannot be proved by some authority ; the 
 numerous monuments which have descended to us from 
 
 Uarda, I. I
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 the time of the Rameses, in fact enable the enquirer 
 to understand much of the aspect and arrangement of 
 Egyptian life, and to follow it step by step through the 
 details of religious, public, and private life, even of 
 particular individuals. 
 
 Every part of this book is intelligible without the 
 aid of notes ; but, for the reader who seeks for further 
 enlightenment, I have added some foot-notes, and have 
 not neglected to mention such works as afford more 
 detailed information on the subjects mentioned in the 
 narrative. 
 
 The reader who wishes to follow the mind of the 
 author in this work should not trouble himself with the 
 notes as he reads, but merely at the beginning of each 
 chapter read over the notes which belong to the fore- 
 going one. Every glance at the foot-notes must neces- 
 sarily disturb and injure the development of the tale 
 as a work of art. The story stands here as it flowed 
 from one fount, and was supplied with notes only after 
 its completion. 
 
 A narrative of Herodotus combined with the Epos 
 of Pentaur, of which so many copies have been handed 
 down to us, forms the foundation of the story. 
 
 The treason of the Regent related by the Father 
 of history is referable perhaps to the reign of the third 
 and not of the second Rameses. But it is by no means 
 certain that the Halicarnassian writer was in this case 
 misinformed ; and in this fiction no history will be in- 
 culcated, only as a background shall I offer a sketch 
 of the time of Sesostris, from a picturesque point of 
 view, but with the nearest possible approach to truth. 
 It is true that to this end nothing has been neglected 
 that could be learnt from the monuments or the pa-
 
 PREFACE. 3 
 
 pyri ; still the book is only a romance, a poetic fiction, 
 in which I wish all the facts derived from history and all 
 the costume drawn from the monuments to be regarded 
 as incidental, and the emotions of the actors in the 
 story as what I attach importance to. 
 
 But I must be allowed to make one observation. 
 
 From studying the conventional mode of execution 
 of ancient Egyptian art which was strictly subject to 
 the hieratic laws of type and proportion we have ac- 
 customed ourselves to imagine the inhabitants of the 
 Nile-valley in the time of the Pharaohs as tall and 
 haggard men with little distinction of individual phy- 
 siognomy, and recently a great painter has sought to 
 represent them under this aspect in a modern picture. 
 
 This is an error; the Egyptians, in spite of their 
 aversion to foreigners and their strong attachment to 
 their native soil, were one of the most intellectual and 
 active people of antiquity ; and he who would repre- 
 sent them as they lived, and to that end copies the 
 forms which remain painted on the walls of the temples 
 and sepulchres, is the accomplice of those priestly cor- 
 rupters of art who compelled the painters and sculptors 
 of the Pharaonic era to abandon truth to nature in 
 favor of their sacred laws -of proportion. 
 
 He who desires to paint the ancient Egyptians with 
 truth and fidelity, must regard it in some sort as an act 
 of enfranchisement ; that is to say, he must release the 
 conventional forms from those fetters which were pecu- 
 liar to their art and altogether foreign to their real life. 
 Indeed, works of sculpture remain to us of the time of 
 the first pyramid, which represent men with the truth 
 of nature, unfettered by the sacred canon. We can 
 recall the so-called " Village Judge" of Bulaq, the " Scribe"
 
 4 PREFACE. 
 
 now in Paris, and a few figures in bronze in different 
 museums, as well as the noble and characteristic busts 
 of all epochs, which amply prove how great the variety 
 of individual physiognomy, and, with that, of individual 
 character was among the Egyptians. Alma Tadema in 
 London and Gustav Richterin Berlin have, as painters, 
 treated Egyptian subjects in a manner which the poet 
 recognizes and accepts with delight. 
 
 Many earlier witnesses than the late writer Flavius 
 Vopiscus might be referred to who show us the Egyp- 
 tians as an industrious and peaceful people, passionately 
 devoted it is true to all that pertains to the other 
 world, but also enjoying the gifts of life to the fullest 
 extent, nay sometimes to excess. 
 
 Real men, such as we see around us in actual life, 
 not silhouettes constructed to the old priestly scale such 
 as the monuments show us real living men dwelt by 
 the old Nile-stream ; and the poet who would represent 
 them must courageously seize on types out of the daily 
 life of modern men that surround him, without fear of 
 deviating too far from reality, and, placing them in their 
 own long past" time, color them only and clothe them 
 to correspond with it. 
 
 I have discussed the authorities for the conception 
 of love which I have ascribed to the ancients in the 
 preface to the second edition of the " Egyptian Princess." 
 
 With these lines I send Uarda into the world; and 
 in them I add my thanks to those dear friends in whose 
 beautiful home, embowered in green, bird-haunted woods 
 I have so often refreshed my spirit and recovered my 
 strength, where I now write the last words of this book. 
 
 RhcinboHcrhiitte, September it, 1876. 
 
 GEORG EBERS.
 
 U A R D A . 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 BY the walls of Thebes the old city of a hundred 
 gates the Nile spreads to a broad river ; the heights, 
 which follow the stream on both sides, here take a more 
 decided outline; solitary, almost cone-shaped peaks 
 stand out sharply from the level background of the 
 many-colored limestone hills, on which no palm-tree 
 flourishes and in which no humble desert-plant can 
 strike root. Rocky crevasses and gorges cut more 
 or less deeply into the mountain range, and up to its 
 ridge extends the desert, destructive of all life, with 
 sand and stones, with rocky cliffs and reef-like, desert 
 hills. 
 
 Behind the eastern range the desert spreads to the 
 Red Sea ; behind the western it stretches without limit, 
 into infinity. In the belief of the Egyptians beyond it 
 lay the region of the dead. 
 
 Between these two ranges of hills, which serve as 
 walls or ramparts to keep back the desert-sand, flows 
 the fresh and bounteous Nile, bestowing blessing and 
 abundance ; at once the father and the cradle of millions 
 of beings. On each shore spreads the wide plain of 
 black and fruitful soil, and in the depths many-shaped 
 creatures, in coats of mail or scales, swarm and find 
 subsistence.
 
 O UARDA. 
 
 The lotos floats on the mirror of the waters, ami 
 among the papyrus reeds by the shore water-fowl in- 
 numerable build their nests. Between the river and 
 the mountain-range lie fields, which after the seed-time 
 are of a shining blue-green, and towards the time of 
 harvest glow like gold. Near the brooks and water- 
 wheels here and there stands a shady sycamore ; and 
 date-palms, carefully tended, group themselves in groves. 
 The fruitful plain, watered and manured every year by 
 the inundation, lies at the foot of the sandy desert-hills 
 behind it, and stands out like a garden flower-bed from 
 the gravel-path. 
 
 In the fourteenth century before Christ for to so 
 remote a date we must direct the thoughts of the 
 reader impassable limits had been set by the hand of 
 man, in many places in Thebes, to the inroads of the 
 water; high dykes of stone and embankments protected 
 the streets and squares, the temples and the palaces, 
 from the overflow. 
 
 Canals that could be tightly closed up led from the 
 dykes to the land within, and smaller branch-cuttiiu 
 the gardens of Thebes. 
 
 On the right, the eastern bank of the Nile, rose the 
 buildings of the far-famed residence of the Pharaohs. 
 Close by the river stood the immense and gaudy 
 Temples of the city of Amon ; behind these and at a 
 short distance from the Eastern hills indeed at their 
 very foot and partly even on the soil of the desert were 
 the palaces of the King and nobles, and the shady 
 streets in which the high narrow houses of the citizens 
 stood in close rows. 
 
 Life was gay and busy in the streets of the 
 capital of the Pharaohs.
 
 UARDA. 7 
 
 The western shore of the Nile showed a quite dif- 
 ferent scene. Here too there was no lack of stately 
 buildings or thronging men; but while on the farther 
 side of the river there was a compact mass of houses, 
 and the citizens went cheerfully and openly about 
 their day's work, on this side there were solitary 
 splendid structures, round which little houses and huts 
 seemed to cling as children cling to the protection 
 of a mother. And these buildings lay in detached 
 groups. 
 
 Any one climbing the hill and looking down would 
 form the notion that there lay below him a number of 
 neighboring villages, each with its lordly manor house. 
 Looking from the plain up to the precipice of the 
 western hills, hundreds of closed portals could be seen, 
 some solitary, others closely ranged in rows; a great 
 number of them towards the foot of the slope, yet 
 more half-way up, and a few at a considerable height. 
 
 And even more dissimilar were the slow-moving, 
 solemn groups in the roadways on this side, and 
 the cheerful, confused throng yonder. There, on the 
 eastern shore, all were in eager pursuit of labor or 
 recreation, stirred by pleasure or by' grief, active in deed 
 and speech; here, in the west, little was spoken, a spell 
 seemed to check the footstep of the wanderer, a pale 
 hand to sadden the bright glance of every eye, and to 
 banish the smile from every lip. 
 
 And yet many a gaily-dressed bark stopped at the 
 shore, there was no lack of minstrel bands, grand 
 processions passed on to the western heights; but the 
 Nile boats bore the dead, the songs sung here were 
 songs of lamentation, and the processions consisted of 
 mourners following the sarcophagus.
 
 8 UARDA. 
 
 We are standing on the soil of the City of the 
 Dead of Thebes. 
 
 Nevertheless even here nothing is wanting for return 
 and revival, for to the Egyptian his dead died not. 
 He closed his eyes, he bore him to the Necropolis, to 
 the house of the embalmer, or Kolchytes, and then to 
 the grave ; but he knew that the souls of the departed 
 lived on ; that the justified absorbed into Osiris floated 
 over the Heavens in the vessel of the Sun ; that they 
 appeared on earth in the form they choose to take upon 
 them, and that they might exert influence on the cur- 
 rent of the lives of the survivors. So he took care to 
 give a worthy interment to his dead, above all to have 
 the body embalmed so as to endure long : and had 
 fixed times to bring fresh offerings for the dead of 
 flesh and fowl, with drink-offerings and sweet-smelling 
 essences, and vegetables and flowers. 
 
 Neither at the obsequies nor at the offerings 
 might the ministers of the gods be absent, and the 
 silent City of the Dead was regarded as a favored 
 sanctuary in which to establish schools and dwellings 
 for the learned. 
 
 So it came to pass that in the temples and on 
 the site of the Necropolis, large communities of priests 
 dwelt together, and close to the extensive embalming 
 houses lived numerous Kolchytes, who handed down 
 the secrets of their art from father to son. 
 
 Besides these there were other manufactories and 
 shops. In the former, sarcophagi of stone and of wood, 
 linen bands for enveloping mummies, and amulets for 
 decorating them, were made; in the latter, merchants 
 kept spices and essences, flowers, fruits, vegetables and 
 pastry for sale. Calves, gazelles, goats, geese and
 
 UARDA. 9 
 
 other fowl, were fed on enclosed meadow-plats, and 
 the mourners betook themselves thither to select what 
 they needed from among the beasts pronounced by the 
 priests to be clean for sacrifice, and to have them 
 sealed with the sacred seal. Many bought only part 
 of a victim at the shambles the poor could not even 
 do this. They bought only colored cakes in the 
 shape of beasts, which symbolically took the place of 
 the calves and geese which their means were unable 
 to procure. In the handsomest shops sat servants of 
 the priests, who received forms written on rolls of 
 papyrus which were filled up in the writing room of 
 the temple with those sacred verses which the departed 
 spirit must know and repeat to ward off the evil genius 
 of the deep, to open the gate of the under world, and 
 to be held righteous before Osiris and the forty-two 
 assessors of the subterranean court of justice. 
 
 What took place within the temples was concealed 
 from view, for each was surrounded by a high enclosing 
 wall with lofty, carefully-closed portals, which were 
 only opened when a chorus of priests came out to 
 sing a pious hymn, in the morning to Horus the rising 
 god, and in the evening to Turn the descending god.* 
 
 As soon as the evening hymn of the priests was 
 heard, the Necropolis was deserted, for the mourners 
 and those who were visiting the graves were required 
 by this time to return to their boats and to quit the 
 City of the Dead. Crowds of men who had marched 
 in the processions of the west bank hastened in disorder 
 
 * The course of the Sun was compared to that of the life of Man. He 
 rose as the child Horus, grew by midday to the hero Ra, who conquered 
 the Urxus snake for his diadem, and by evening was an old Man, Turn. Light 
 had been born of darkness, hence Turn was regarded as older than Horus and 
 the other gods of light.
 
 10 UARDA. 
 
 to the shore, driven on by the body of watchmen who 
 took it in turns to do this duty and to protect the 
 graves against robbers. The merchants closed their 
 booths, the embalmers and workmen ended their day's 
 work and retired to their houses, the priests returned 
 to the temples, and the inns were filled with guests, 
 who had come hither on long pilgrimages from a 
 distance, and who preferred passing the night in the 
 vicinity of the dead whom they had come to visit, 
 to going across to the bustling noisy city on the 
 farther shore. 
 
 The voices of the singers and of the wailing women 
 were hushed, even the song of the sailors on the num- 
 berless ferry boats from the western shore to Thebes 
 died away, its faint echo was now and then borne 
 across on the evening air, and at last all was still. 
 
 A cloudless sky spread over the silent City of the 
 Dead, now and then darkened for an instant by the 
 swiftly passing shade of a bat returning to its home in 
 a cave or cleft of the rock after flying the whole even- 
 ing near the Nile to catch flies, to drink, and so pre- 
 pare itself for the next day's sleep. From time to 
 time black forms with long shadows glided over the 
 still illuminated plain the Jackals, who at this hour 
 frequented the shore to slake their thirst, and often 
 fearlessly showed themselves in troops in the vicinity 
 of the pens of geese and goats. 
 
 It was forbidden to hunt these robbers, as they 
 were accounted sacred to the god Anubis,* the tutelary 
 
 * The jackal-headed god Anubis was the ion of Osiris and Ncphthys and 
 the jackal was sacred to him. In the earliest ages even he is prominent in the 
 nether world. He conducts the mummifying process, preserves the corpse, 
 guards the Necropolis, and, as Hermes Psychopompps (Hermanubis). opens 
 the way for the souls. According to Plutarch " He is the watch of the gods 
 as the dog is the watch of men."
 
 UARDA. 1 1 
 
 of sepulchres ; and indeed they did little mischief, for 
 they found abundant food in the tombs. 
 
 The remnants of the meat offerings from the altars 
 were consumed by them ; to the perfect satisfaction of the 
 devotees, who, when they found that by the following day 
 the meat had disappeared, believed that it had been ac- 
 cepted and taken away by the spirits of the underworld. 
 
 They also did the duty of trusty watchers, for they 
 were a dangerous foe for any intruder who, under the 
 shadow of the night, might attempt to violate a grave. 
 
 Thus on that summer evening of the year 1352 
 B. c., when we invite the reader to accompany us to 
 the Necropolis of Thebes after the priests' hymn had 
 died away, all was still in the City of the Dead. 
 
 The soldiers on guard were already returning from 
 their first round when suddenly, on the north side of 
 the Necropolis, a dog barked loudly; soon a second 
 took up the cry, a third, a fourth. The captain of the 
 watch called to his men to halt, and, as the cry of the 
 dogs spread and grew louder every minute, commanded 
 them to march towards the north. 
 
 The little troop had reached the high dyke which 
 divided the west bank of the Nile from a branch canal, 
 and looked from thence over the plain as far as the 
 river and to the north of the Necropolis. Once more 
 the word to " halt " was given, and as the guard per- 
 ceived the glare of torches in the direction where the 
 dogs were barking loudest, they hurried forward and 
 came up with the author of the disturbance near the 
 Pylon* of the temple erected by Seti I., the deceased 
 father of the reigning King Rameses II. 
 
 * The two pyramidal towers joined by a gateway which formed the 
 entrance to an Egyptian temple were called the Pylon.
 
 12 UARDA. 
 
 The moon was up, and her pale light flooded the 
 stately structure, while the walls glowed with the 
 ruddy smoky light of the torches which flared in the 
 hands of black attendants. 
 
 A man of sturdy build, in sumptuous dress, was 
 knocking at the brass-covered temple door with the 
 metal handle of a whip, so violently that the blows 
 rang far and loud through the night. Near him stood 
 a litter, and a chariot, to which were harnessed two 
 fine horses. In the litter sat a young woman, and in 
 the carriage, next to the driver, was the tall figure of 
 a lady. Several men of the upper classes and many 
 servants stood around the litter and the chariot. Few 
 words were exchanged; the whole attention of the 
 strangely lighted groups seemed concentrated on the 
 temple-gate. The darkness concealed the features of 
 individuals, but the mingled light of the moon and the 
 torches was enough to reveal to the gate-keeper, who 
 looked down on the party from a tower of the Pylon, 
 that it was composed of persons of the highest rank ; 
 nay, perhaps of the royal family. 
 
 He called aloud to the one who knocked, and 
 asked him what was his will. 
 
 He looked up, and in a voice so rough and im- 
 perious, that the lady in the litter shrank in horror as 
 its tones suddenly violated the place of the dead, he 
 cried out " How long are we to wait here for you 
 you dirty hound ? Come down and open the door 
 and then ask questions. If the torch-light is not 
 bright enough to show you who is waiting, I will score 
 our name on your shoulders with my whip, and teach 
 you how to receive princely visitors.' 
 
 While the purler muttered an unintelligible ;m>uer
 
 UARDA. 13 
 
 and came down the steps within to open the door, 
 the lady in the chariot turned to her impatient com- 
 panion and said in a pleasant but yet decided voice, 
 " You forget, Paaker, that you are back again in Egypt, 
 and that here you have to deal not with the wild 
 Schasu,* but with friendly priests of whom we have to 
 solicit a favor. We have always had to lament your 
 roughness, which seems to me very ill-suited to the 
 unusual circumstances under which we approach this 
 sanctuary." 
 
 Although these words were spoken in a tone rather 
 of regret than of blame, they wounded the sensibilities 
 of the person addressed ; his wide nostrils began to 
 twitch ominously, he clenched his right hand over the 
 handle of his whip, and, while he seemed to be bowing 
 humbly, he struck such a heavy blow on the bare leg 
 of a slave who was standing near to him, an old 
 Ethiopian, that he shuddered as if from sudden cold, 
 though knowing his lord only too well he let no 
 cry of pain escape him. Meanwhile the gate-keeper 
 had opened the door, and with him a tall young priest 
 stepped out into the open air to ask the will of the 
 intruders. 
 
 Paaker would have seized the opportunity of speak- 
 ing, but the lady in the chariot interposed and said : 
 
 " I am Bent-Anat, the daughter of the King, and 
 this lady in the litter is Nefert, the wife of the noble 
 Mena, the charioteer of my father. We were going in 
 company with these gentlemen to the north-west valley 
 of the Necropolis to see the new works there. You 
 know the narrow pass in the rocks which leads up the 
 gorge. On the way home I myself held the reins and 
 
 * A Semitic race of robbers in the east of Egypt.
 
 14 UAKUA. 
 
 I had the misfortune to drive over a girl who sat by 
 the road with a basket full of flowers, and to hurt her 
 to hurt her very badly I am afraid. The wife of 
 Mena with her own hands bound up the child^ and 
 then we carried her to her father's house he is a para- 
 schites* Pinem is his name. I know not whether he 
 is known to you." 
 
 "Thou hast been into his house, Princess?" 
 
 " Indeed, I was obliged, holy father," she replied, 
 " I know of course that I have defiled myself by crossing 
 the threshold of these people, but " 
 
 " But," cried the wife of Mena, raising herself in her 
 litter, " Bent-Anat can in a day be purified by thee or 
 by her house-priest, while she can hardly or perhaps 
 never restore the child whole and sound again to the 
 unhappy father." 
 
 " Still, the den of a paraschites is above every thing 
 unclean," said the chamberlain Penbesa, master of the 
 ceremonies to the princess, interrupting the wife of Mena, 
 "and I did not conceal my opinion when Bent-Anat 
 announced her intention of visiting the accursed hole in 
 person. I suggested," he continued, turning to the priest, 
 "that she should let the girl be taken home, and send 
 a royal present to the father." 
 
 "And the princess?" asked the priest. 
 
 " She acted, as she always does, on her own judg- 
 ment," replied the master of the ceremonk x 
 
 " And that always hits on the right course," cried 
 the wife of Mena. 
 
 Would to (iod it were so!" said the princess in a 
 subdued voice. Then she continued, addressing the 
 
 One who opened the bodies of the dead to prepare them for being cm- 
 
 i .1'.::.': :
 
 UARDA. 1 5 
 
 priest, " Thou knowest the will of the Gods and the 
 hearts of men, holy father, and I myself know that I 
 give alms willingly and help the poor even when there 
 is none to plead for them but their poverty. But after 
 what has occurred here, and to these unhappy people, it 
 is I who come as a suppliant." 
 
 " Thou ? " said the chamberlain. 
 
 " I," answered the princess with decision. The priest 
 who up to this moment had remained a silent witness 
 of the scene raised his right hand as in blessing and 
 spoke. 
 
 "Thou hast done well. The Hathors fashioned 
 thy heart* and the Lady of Truth guides it. Thou hast 
 broken in on our night-prayers to request us to send 
 a doctor to the injured girl ? " 
 
 " Thou hast said." 
 
 " I will ask the high-priest to send the best leech 
 for outward wounds immediately to the child. But 
 where is the house of the paraschites Pinem ? I do not 
 know it." 
 
 Northwards from the terrace of Hatasu, close to ; 
 but I will charge one of my attendants to conduct the 
 leech. Besides, I want to know early in the morning 
 how the child is doing. Paaker." 
 
 The rough visitor, whom AVC already know, thus 
 called upon, bowed to the earth, his arms hanging by his 
 sides, and asked : 
 
 * Hathor was Isis under a substantial form. She is the goddess of the 
 pure, light heaven, and bears the Sun-disk between cow-horns on a cow's head 
 or on a human head with cow's ears. She was named the Fair, and all the pure 
 joys of life are in her gift. Later she was regarded as a Muse who beautifies 
 life with enjoyment, love, song, and the dance. She appears as a good fairy by 
 the cradle of children and decides their lot in life. She bears many names ; 
 and several, generally seven, Hathors were represented, who personified the 
 attributes and influence of the goddess.
 
 I 6 UARDA 
 
 " What dost thou command ? " 
 
 " I appoint you guide to the physician," said the 
 princess. "It will be easy to the king's pioneer* to 
 find the little half-hidden house again besides, you 
 share my guilt, for," she added, turning to the priest, " I 
 confess that the misfortune happened because I would 
 try with my horse to overtake Paaker's Syrian racer, 
 which he declared to be swifter than the Egyptian 
 horses. It was a mad race." 
 
 " And Amon be praised that it ended as it did," 
 exclaimed the master of the ceremonies. " Paaker's 
 chariot lies dashed in pieces in the valley, and his best 
 horse is badly hurt." 
 
 " He will see to him when he has taken the phy- 
 sician to the house of the paraschites," said the prin- 
 cess. " Dost thou know, Penbesa thou anxious guardian 
 of a thoughtless girl that to-day for the first time I 
 am glad that my father is at the war in distant Sati- 
 land ? "** 
 
 " He would not have welcomed us kindly ! " said the 
 master of the ceremonies, laughing. 
 
 " But the leech, the leech ! " cried Bent-Anat. 
 " Paaker, it is settled then. You will conduct him, and 
 bring us to-morrow morning news of the wounded 
 girl." 
 
 Paaker bowed ; the princess bowed her head ; the 
 priest and his companions, who meanwhile had come 
 out of the temple and joined him, raised their hands 
 in blessing, and the belated procession moved towards 
 the Nile. 
 
 The title here rendered pioneer xvn that of an officer whose duties were 
 those at once of a scout and of a Quarter- Master General. In unknown and 
 comparatively savage countries it was an onerous post. Truntlator. 
 
 * Asia.
 
 UARDA. 17 
 
 Paaker remained alone with his two slaves; the 
 commission with which the princess had charged him 
 greatly displeased him. So long as the moonlight en- 
 abled him to distinguish the litter of Mena's wife, he 
 gazed after it; then he endeavored to recollect the 
 position of the hut of the paraschites. The captain of 
 the watch still stood with the guard at the gate of the 
 temple. 
 
 " Do you know the dwelling of Pinem the paraschites?" 
 asked Paaker. 
 
 "What do you want with him ?" 
 
 "That is no concern of yours," retorted Paaker. 
 
 "Lout!" exclaimed the captain, "left face and for- 
 wards, my men." 
 
 " Halt!" cried Paaker in a rage. " I am the king's 
 chief pioneer." 
 
 "Then you will all the more easily find the way 
 back by which you came. March." 
 
 The words were followed by a peal of many-voiced 
 laughter: the re-echoing insult so confounded Paaker 
 that he dropped his whip on the ground. The slave, 
 whom a short time since he had struck with it, humbly 
 picked it up and then followed his lord into the fore- 
 court of the temple. Both attributed the titter, which 
 they still could hear without being able to detect its 
 origin, to wandering spirits. But the mocking tones 
 had been heard too by the old gate-keeper, and the 
 laughers were better known to him than to the king's 
 pioneer; he strode with heavy steps to the door of 
 the temple through the black shadow of the pylon, and 
 striking blindly before him called out 
 
 Uarda, T. a
 
 1 8 UARDA. 
 
 " Ah ! you good-for-nothing brood of Seth.* You 
 gallows-birds and brood of hell I am coming." 
 
 The giggling ceased ; a few youthful figures appeared 
 in the moonlight, the old man pursued them panting, 
 and, after a short chase, a troop of youths fled back 
 through the temple gate. 
 
 The door-keeper had succeeded in catching one 
 miscreant, a boy of thirteen, and held him so tight by 
 the ear that his pretty head seemed to have grown in 
 a horizontal direction from his shoulders. 
 
 " I will take you before the school-master, you plague- 
 of-locusts, you swarm of bats!" cried the old man out of 
 breath. But the dozen of school-boys, who had availed 
 themselves of the opportunity to break out of bounds, 
 gathered coaxing round him, with words of repentance, 
 though every eye sparkled with delight at the fun they 
 had had, and of which no one could deprive them ; and 
 when the biggest of them took the old man's chin, and 
 promised to give him the wine which his mother was 
 to send him next day for the week's use, the porter let 
 go his prisoner who tried to rub the pain out of his 
 burning ear and cried out in harsher tones than be- 
 fore: 
 
 " You will pay me, will you, to let you off ! Do you 
 think I will let your tricks pass? You little know this 
 old man. I will complain to the Gods, not to the 
 school -master ; and as for your wine, youngster, I will 
 offer it as a libation, that heaven may forgive you." 
 
 The Typhon of the Greeks. The enemy of Osiris, of truth, good and 
 ly. Discord and strife in nature. Horns who fights against him for hi 
 cr Osiris, can throw htm and stun him, but never annihilate him.
 
 UARDA. 19 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE temple where, in the fore-court, Paaker was 
 waiting, and where the priest had disappeared to call 
 the leech, was called the " House of Seti " * and was 
 one of the largest in the City of the Dead. Only that 
 magnificient building of the time of the deposed royal 
 race of the reigning king's grandfather that temple 
 which had been founded by Thotmes III., and whose 
 gateway Amenophis III. had adorned with immense 
 colossal statues** exceeded it in the extent of its plan; 
 in every other respect it held the pre-eminence among 
 the sanctuaries of the Necropolis. Rameses I. had 
 founded it shortly after his accession, the better to se- 
 cure his possession of the throne of Egypt; and his yet 
 greater son Seti carried on the erection, in which the 
 service of the dead for the Manes of the members of 
 the new royal family was conducted, and the high festivals 
 held in honor of the Gods of the under-world. Great 
 sums had been expended for its establishment, for the 
 maintenance of the priesthood of its sanctuary, and the 
 support of the institutions connected with it. These 
 were intended to be equal to the great original founda- 
 tions of priestly learning at Heliopolis and Memphis ; 
 they were regulated on the same pattern, and with the 
 object of raising the new royal residence of upper 
 Egypt, namely Thebes, above the capitals of lower 
 Egypt in regard to philosophical distinction. 
 
 One of the most important of these foundations 
 
 * It is still standing, and known as the temple of Qurnah. 
 ** The well-known colossal statues, of which that which stands to the north 
 is the famous musical statue, or Pillar of Memnon.
 
 20 UARDA. 
 
 was a very celebrated school of learning. First there 
 was the high school, in which priests, physicians, judges, 
 mathematicians, astronomers, grammarians, and other 
 learned men, not only had the benefit of instruction, 
 but, subsequently, when they had won admission to the 
 highest ranks of learning, and attained the dignity of 
 "Scribes," were maintained at the cost of the king, and 
 enabled to pursue their philosophical speculations and 
 researches, in freedom from all care, and in the society 
 of fellow-workers of equal birth and identical interests. 
 
 An extensive library, in which thousands of papyrus- 
 rolls were preserved, and to which a manufactory of 
 papyrus was attached, was at the disposal of the learned ; 
 and some of them were intrusted with the education of 
 the younger disciples, who had been prepared in the 
 elementary school, which was also dependent on the 
 House or university of Seti. The lower school was 
 open to every son of a free citizen, and was often fre- 
 quented by several hundred boys, who also found night- 
 quarters there. The parents were of course required 
 either to pay for their maintenance, or to send due 
 supplies of provisions for the keep of their children at 
 school. 
 
 In a separate building lived the temple-boarders, 
 a few sons of the noblest families, who were brought up 
 by the priests at a great expense to their parents. 
 
 Seti I., the founder of this establishment, had had 
 his own son and successor, Rameses, educated hero. 
 
 The elementary schools were strictly ruled, and the 
 rod played so large a part in them, that a pedagogue 
 could record this saying : " The scholar's ears are at his 
 back : when he.is flogged then he hears." 
 
 Those youths who wished to pass up from the
 
 UARDA. 21 
 
 lower to the high school had to undergo an examination. 
 The student, when he had passed it, could choose a 
 master from among the learned of the higher grades, 
 who undertook to be his philosophical guide, and to 
 whom he remained attached all his life through, as a 
 client to his patron. He could obtain the degree of 
 "Scribe" and qualify for public office by a second 
 examination. 
 
 Near to these schools of learning there stood also 
 a school of art, in which instruction was given to students 
 who desired to devote themselves to architecture, sculp- 
 ture, or painting ; in these also the learner might choose 
 his master. 
 
 Every teacher in these institutious belonged to the 
 priesthood of the House of Seti. It consisted of more 
 than eight hundred members, divided into five classes, 
 and conducted by three so-called Prophets. 
 
 The first prophet was the high-priest of the House 
 of Seti, and at the same time the superior of all the 
 thousands of upper and under servants of the divin- 
 ities which belonged to the City of the Dead of 
 Thebes. 
 
 The temple of Seti proper was a massive structure 
 of lime-stone. A row of Sphinxes led from the Nile 
 to the surrounding wall, and to the first vast pro-pylon, 
 which formed the entrance to a broad fore-court, en- 
 closed on the two sides by colonnades, and beyond 
 which stood a second gateway. When he had passed 
 through this door, which stood between two towers, in 
 shape like truncated pyramids, the stranger came to a 
 second court resembling the first, closed at the farther 
 end by a noble row of pillars, which formed part of the 
 central temple itself.
 
 22 UARDA. 
 
 The innermost and last was dimly lighted by a few 
 lamps. 
 
 Behind the temple of Seti stood large square struc- 
 tures of brick of the Nile mud, which however had a 
 handsome and decorative effect, as the humble material 
 of which they were constructed was plastered with lime, 
 and that again was painted with colored pictures and 
 hieroglyphic inscriptions. 
 
 The internal arrangement of all these houses was 
 the same. In the midst was an open court, on to which 
 opened the doors of the rooms of the priests and philos- 
 ophers. On each side of the court was a shady, covered 
 colonnade of wood, and in the midst a tank with 
 ornamental plants. In the upper story were the apart- 
 ments for the scholars, and instruction was usually 
 given in the paved courtyard strewn with mats. 
 
 The most imposing was the house of the chief pro- 
 phets; it was distinguished by its waving standards 
 and stood about a hundred paces behind the temple 
 of Seti, between a well kept grove and a clear lake the 
 sacred tank of the temple; but they only occupied it 
 while fulfilling their office, while the splendid houses 
 which they lived in with their wives and children, lay 
 on the other side of the river, in Thebes proper. 
 
 The untimely visit to the temple could not remain 
 unobserved by the colony of sages. Just as ants 
 when a hand breaks in on their dwelling, hurry rest- 
 lessly hither and thither, so an unwonted stir had 
 agitated, not the school-boys only, but the teachers 
 and the priests. They collected in groups near the 
 outer walls, asking questions and hazarding guc 
 A messenger from the king had arrived the princess 
 Bent-Anat had been attacked by the Kolchytes and
 
 UARDA. 23 
 
 a wag among the school-boys who had got out, declared 
 that Paaker, the king's pioneer, had been brought into 
 the temple by force to be made to learn to write 
 better. As the subject of the joke had formerly been 
 a pupil of the House of Seti, and many delectable 
 stories of his errors in penmanship still survived in 
 the memory of the later generation of scholars, this 
 information was received with joyful applause ; and it 
 seemed to have a glimmer of probability, in spite of 
 the apparent contradiction that Paaker filled one of 
 the highest offices near the king, when a grave young 
 priest declared that he had seen the pioneer in the 
 forecourt of the temple. 
 
 The lively discussion, the laughter and shouting of 
 the boys at such an unwonted hour, was not unob- 
 served by the chief priest. 
 
 This remarkable prelate, Ameni the son of Nebket, 
 a scion of an old and noble family, was far more than 
 merely the independent head of the temple-brother- 
 hood, among whom he was prominent for his power 
 and wisdom; for all the priesthood in the length and 
 breadth of the land acknowledged his supremacy, 
 asked his advice in difficult cases, and never resisted 
 the decisions in spiritual matters which emanated 
 from the House of Seti that is to say, from Ameni. 
 He was the embodiment of the priestly idea ; and if at 
 times he made heavy nay extraordinary demands on 
 individual fraternities, they were submitted to, for it 
 was known by experience that the indirect roads which 
 he ordered them to follow all converged on one goal, 
 namely the exaltation of the power and dignity of the 
 hierarchy. The king appreciated this remarkable man, 
 and had long endeavored to attach him to the court,
 
 24 UARDA. 
 
 as keeper'of the royal seal ; but Ameni was not to be 
 induced to give up his apparently modest position ; for 
 he contemned all outward show and ostentatious titles ; 
 he ventured sometimes to oppose a decided re- 
 sistance to the measures of the Pharaoh,* and was not 
 minded to give up his unlimited control of the priests 
 for the sake of a limited dominion over what seemed 
 to him petty external concerns, in the service of a 
 king who was only too independent and hard to in- 
 fluence. 
 
 He regularly arranged his mode and habits of life 
 in an exceptional way. 
 
 Eight days out of ten he remained in the temple 
 entrusted to his charge ; two he devoted to his family, 
 who lived on the other bank of the Nile; but he let 
 no one, not even those nearest to him, know what 
 portion of the ten days he gave up to recreation. He 
 required only four hours of sleep. This he usually 
 took in a dark room which no sound could reach, and 
 in the middle of the day ; never at night, when the 
 coolness and quiet seemed to add to his powers of 
 work, and when from time to time he could give him- 
 self up to the study of the starry heavens. 
 
 All the ceremonials that his position required of 
 him, the cleansing, purification, shaving, and fasting he 
 fulfilled with painful exactitude, and the outer bespoke 
 the inner man. 
 
 Ameni was entering on his fiftieth year; his figure 
 was tall, and had escaped altogether the stoutness to 
 which at that age the Oriental is liable. The shape 
 
 * Pharaoh is the Hebrew form of the Egyptian Pcraa or Phrah. "The 
 great house," "sublime house" or "high K ate ' s 'he literal meaning. Author 
 A remnant of the idea seems to survive in the title " The Sublime Porte." 
 
 Trantltitr
 
 UARDA. 25 
 
 of his smoothly shaven head was symmetrical and of 
 a long oval; his forehead was neither broad nor high, 
 but his profile was unusually delicate, and his face 
 striking ; his lips were thin and dry, and his large and 
 piercing eyes, though neither fiery nor brilliant, and 
 usually cast down to the ground under his thick eye- 
 brows, were raised with a full, clear, dispassionate 
 gaze when it was necessary to see and to examine. 
 
 The poet of the House of Seti, the young Pentaur, 
 who knew these eyes, had celebrated them in song, 
 and had likened them to a well disciplined army 
 which the general allows to rest before and after the 
 battle, so that they may march in full strength to 
 victory in the fight. 
 
 The refined deliberateness of his nature had in it 
 much that was royal as well as priestly ; it was partly 
 intrinsic and born with him, partly the result of his 
 own mental self-control. He had many enemies, but 
 calumny seldom dared to attack the high character of 
 Ameni. 
 
 The high-priest looked up in astonishment, as the 
 disturbance in the court of the temple broke in on his 
 studies. 
 
 The room in which he was sitting was spacious 
 and cool ; the lower part of the walls was lined with 
 earthenware tiles, the upper half plastered and painted. 
 But little was visible of the masterpieces of the artists 
 of the establishment, for almost everywhere they were 
 concealed by wooden closets and shelves, in which 
 were papyrus rolls and wax tablets. A large table, a 
 couch covered with a panther's skin, a footstool in 
 front of it, and on it a crescent-shaped support for
 
 26 UARDA. 
 
 the head, made of ivory,* several seats, a stand with 
 beakers and jugs, and another with flasks of all sizes, 
 saucers, and boxes, composed the furniture of the 
 room, which was lighted by three lamps, shaped like 
 birds and filled with kiki oil.** 
 
 Ameni wore a fine pleated robe of snow-white 
 linen, which reached to his ankles, round his hips was 
 a scarf adorned with fringes, which in front formed 
 an apron, with broad, stiffened ends which fell to 
 his knees ; a wide belt of white and silver brocade con- 
 fined the drapery of his robe. Round his throat and 
 far down on his bare breast hung a necklace more 
 than a span deep, composed of pearls and agates, and 
 his upper arm was covered with broad gold bracelets. 
 He rose from the ebony seat with lion's feet, on which 
 he sat, and beckoned to a servant who squatted by 
 one of the walls of the sitting room. He rose and 
 without any word of command from his master, he 
 silently and carefully placed on the high-priest's bare 
 head a long and thick curled wig, and threw a leopard- 
 skin, with its head and claws overlaid with gold-leaf, 
 over his shoulders. A second servant held a metal 
 mirror before Ameni, in which he cast a look as he 
 settled the panther-skin and head-gear. 
 
 A third servant was handing him the crosier, the 
 insignia of his dignity as a prelate, when a priest 
 entered and announced the scribe Pentaur. 
 
 Ameni nodded, and the young priest who had 
 talked with the princess Bent-Anat at the temple-gate 
 came into the room. 
 
 * A support of crescent form on which the Egyptians rested their heads. 
 Many specimens were found in the catacombs, and similar objects are still used 
 in Nubia. 
 
 ** Castor oil, which was used in the lamps.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 Pentaur knelt and kissed the hand of the prelate, 
 who gave him his blessing, and in a clear sweet voice, 
 and rather formal and unfamiliar language as if he 
 were reading rather than speaking, said 
 
 " Rise, my son ; your visit will save me a walk at 
 this untimely hour, since you can inform me of what 
 disturbs the disciples in our temple. Speak." 
 
 " Little of consequence has occurred, holy father," 
 replied Pentaur. " Nor would I have disturbed thee at 
 this hour, but that a quite unnecessary tumult has been 
 raised by the youths ; and that the princess Bent-Anat 
 appeared in person to request the aid of a physician. 
 The unusual hour and the retinue that followed her " 
 
 " Is the daughter of the Pharaoh sick ?" asked the 
 prelate. 
 
 " No father. She is well even to wantonness, 
 since wishing to prove the swiftness of her horse 
 she ran over the daughter of the paraschites Pinem. 
 Noble-hearted as she is, she herself carried the sorely- 
 wounded girl to her house." 
 
 " She entered the dwelling of the unclean." 
 
 " Thou hast said." 
 
 " And she now asks to be purified ?" 
 
 " I thought I might venture to absolve her, father, 
 for the purest humanity led her to the act, which was 
 no doubt a breach of discipline, but " 
 
 " But," asked the high-priest in a grave voice, and 
 he raised his eyes which he hath hitherto kept fixed 
 on the ground. 
 
 " But," said the young priest, and now his eyes 
 fell, " which can surely be no crime. When Ra in his 
 golden bark sails across the heavens, his light falls as 
 freely and as bountifully on the hut of the despised
 
 28 UARDA. 
 
 poor as on the Palace of the Pharaohs ; and shall the 
 tender human heart withold its pure light which is 
 benevolence from the wretched, only because they 
 are base ?" 
 
 " It is the poet Pentaur that speaks," said the 
 prelate, " and not the priest to whom the privilege was 
 given to be initiated into the highest grade of the 
 sages, and whom I call my brother and my equal. 
 I have no advantage over you, young man, but perish- 
 able learning, which the past has won for you as much 
 as for me nothing but certain perceptions and ex- 
 periences that offer nothing new to the world, but 
 teach us, indeed, that it is our part to maintain all 
 that is ancient in living efficacy and practice. That 
 which you promised a few weeks since, I many years 
 ago vowed to the Gods; to guard knowledge as the 
 exclusive possession of the initiated. Like fire, it 
 serves those who know its uses to the noblest ends, 
 but in the hands of children and the people, the 
 mob, can never ripen into manhood it is a destroying 
 brand, raging and unextinguishable, devouring all 
 around it, and destroying all that has been built and 
 beautified by the past. And how can we remain " the 
 Sages' and continue to develop and absorb all learn- 
 ing within the shelter of our temples, not only without 
 endangering the weak, but for their benefit ? You 
 know and have sworn to act after that knowledge. To 
 bind the crowd to the faith and the institutions of 
 the fathers is your duty is the duty of every priest. 
 Times have changed, my son; under the old kings 
 the fire, of which I spoke figuratively to you the 
 poet was enclosed in brazen walls which the people 
 passed stupidly by. Now I see breaches in the old 

 
 UARDA. 29 
 
 fortifications; the eyes of the uninitiated have been 
 sharpened, and one tells the other what he fancies he 
 has spied, though half-blinded, through the glowing 
 rifts." 
 
 A slight emotion had given energy to the tones of 
 the speaker, and while he held the poet spell-bound 
 with his piercing glance he continued : 
 
 " We curse and expel any one of the initiated who 
 enlarges these breaches; we punish even the friend 
 who idly neglects to repair and close them with beaten 
 brass!" 
 
 " My father !" cried Pentaur, raising his head in 
 astonishment while the blood mounted to his cheeks. 
 
 The high-priest went up to him and laid both 
 hands on his shoulders. 
 
 They were of equal height and of equally sym- 
 metrical build; even the outline of their features was 
 similar. Nevertheless no one would have taken them 
 to be even distantly related ; their countenances were 
 so infinitely unlike in expression. 
 
 On the face of one were stamped a strong will 
 and the power of firmly guiding his life and com- 
 manding himself; on the other, an amiable desire to 
 overlook the faults and defects of the world, and tc^ 
 contemplate life as it painted itself in the transfiguring 
 magic-mirror of his poet's soul. Frankness and enjoy- 
 ment spoke in his sparkling eye, but the subtle smile 
 on his lips when he was engaged in a discussion, or 
 when his soul was stirred, betrayed that Pentaur, far 
 from childlike carelessness, had fought many a severe 
 mental battle, and had tasted the dark waters of 
 doubt. 
 
 At this moment mingled feelings were struggling
 
 30 UARDA. 
 
 in his soul. He felt as if he must withstand the 
 speaker; and yet the powerful presence of the other 
 exercised so strong an influence over his mind, long 
 trained to submission, that he was silent, and a pious 
 thrill passed through him when Ameni's hands were 
 laid on his shoulders. 
 
 " I blame you," said the high-priest, while he firm- 
 ly held the young man, "nay, to my sorrow I must 
 chastise you ; and yet," he said, stepping back and tak- 
 ing his right hand, " I rejoice in the necessity, for I love 
 you and honor you, as one whom the Unnameable 
 has blessed with high gifts and destined to great things. 
 Man leaves a weed to grow unheeded or roots it up : 
 but you are a noble tree, and I am like the gardener 
 who has forgotten to provide it with a prop, and who 
 is now thankful to have detected a bend that reminds 
 him of his neglect. You look at me enquiringly, and I 
 can see in your eyes that I seem to you a severe judge. 
 Of what are you accused ? You have suffered an in- 
 stitution of the past to be set aside. It does not matter 
 so the short-sighted and heedless think ; but I say 
 to you, you have doubly transgressed, because the 
 wrong-doer was the king's daughter, whom all look up 
 jto, great and small, and whose actions may serve as 
 an example to the people. On whom then must a 
 breach of the ancient institutions lie with the darkest 
 stain if not on the highest in rank? In a few days it 
 will be said the paraschites are men even as we are, 
 and the old law to avoid them as unclean is folly. And 
 will the reflections of the people, think you, end there, 
 when it is so easv for them to say that he who errs in 
 one point may as well fail in all ? In questions of faith, 
 my son, nothing i:> insignificant. If we open one tower
 
 UARDA. 31 
 
 to the enemy he is master of the whole fortress. In 
 these unsettled times our sacred lore is like a chariot 
 on the declivity of a precipice, and under the wheels 
 thereof a stone. A child takes away the stone, and the 
 chariot rolls down into the abyss and is dashed to 
 pieces. Imagine the princess to be that child, and the 
 stone a loaf that she would fain give to feed a beggar. 
 Would you then give it to her if your father and your 
 mother and all that is dear and precious to you were 
 in the chariot ? Answer not ! the princess will visit the 
 paraschites again to-morrow. You must await her in 
 the man's hut, and there inform her that she has trans- 
 gressed and must crave to be purified by us. For this 
 time you are excused from any further punishment. 
 Heaven has bestowed on you a gifted soul. Strive for 
 that which is wanting to you the strength to subdue, 
 to crush for One and you know that One all things 
 else even the misguiding voice of your heart, the 
 treacherous voice of' your judgment. But stay ! send 
 leeches to the house of the paraschites, and desire them 
 to treat the injured girl as though she were the queen 
 herself. Who knows where the man dwells ?" 
 
 " The princess," replied Pentaur, " has left Paaker, 
 the king's pioneer, behind in the temple to conduct the 
 leeches to the house of Pinem." 
 
 The grave high-priest smiled and said. " Paaker ! to 
 attend the daughter of a paraschites." 
 
 Pentaur half beseechingly and half in fun raised his 
 eyes which he had kept cast down. " And Pentaur," 
 he murmured, " the gardener's son ! who is to refuse 
 absolution to the king's daughter !" 
 
 " Pentaur, the minister of the Gods Pentaur, the 
 priest has not to do with the daughter of the king,
 
 32 VARDA. 
 
 but with the transgressor of the sacred institutions," 
 replied Ameni gravely. " Let Paaker know I wish to 
 speak with him." 
 
 The poet bowed low and quitted the room, the high- 
 priest muttered to himself: " He is not yet what he 
 should be, and speech is of no effect with him." 
 
 For a while he was silent, walking to and fro in 
 meditation ; then he said half aloud, " And the boy is 
 destined to great things. What gifts of the Gods doth 
 he lack ? He has the faculty of learning of thinking 
 of feeling of winning all hearts, even mine. He 
 keeps himself undefiled and separate " suddenly the 
 prelate paused and struck his hand on the back of a 
 chair that stood by him. " I have it ; he has not yet 
 felt the fire of ambition. We will light it for his pro- 
 fit and our own." 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 PENTAUR hastened to execute the commands of the 
 high-priest. He sent a servant to escort Paaker, who 
 was waiting in the forecourt, into the presence of Ameni 
 while he himself repaired to the physicians to impress 
 on them the most watchful care of the unfortunate 
 girl. 
 
 Many proficients in the healing arts* were brought 
 up in the house of Seti, but few used to remain after 
 passing the examination for the degree of Scribe. The 
 
 * What is here stated with regard to the medical schools is principally 
 derived from the medical writings of the Egyptians themselves, among which 
 the " Ebers Papyrus holds the first place, "Medical Papyrus I." of Berlin 
 the second, and a hieratic MS. in I-ondon which, like the first mentioned, 
 has come down to us from the i8th dynasty, takes the third. Also see 
 Herodotus II. 84. Diodoms I. 82.
 
 UARDA. 33 
 
 most gifted were sent to Heliopolis, where flourished, in 
 the great " Hall of the Ancients," the most celebrated 
 medical faculty of the whole country, whence they re- 
 turned to Thebes, endowed with the highest honors in 
 surgery, in ocular treatment, or in any other branch of 
 their profession, and became physicians to the king or 
 made a living by imparting their learning and by being 
 called in to consult on serious cases. 
 
 Naturally most of the doctors lived on the east bank 
 of the Nile, in Thebes proper, and even in private houses 
 with their families ; but each was attached to a priestly 
 college. 
 
 Whoever required a physician sent for him, not to 
 his own house, but to a temple. There a statement 
 was required of the complaint from which the sick 
 person was suffering, and it was left to the principal 
 of the medical staff of the sanctuary to select that 
 master of the healing art whose special knowledge 
 appeared to him to be suited for the treatment of the 
 case. 
 
 Like all priests, the physicians lived on the income 
 which came to them from their landed property, from 
 the gifts of the king, the contributions of the laity, and 
 the share which was given them of the state-revenues; 
 they expected- no honorarium from their patients, but 
 the restored sick seldom neglected making a present to 
 the sanctuary whence a physician had come to them, 
 and it was not unusual for the priestly leech to make 
 the recovery of the sufferer conditional on certain gifts 
 to be offered to the temple. 
 
 The medical knowledge of the Egyptians was, ac- 
 cording to every indication, very considerable; but it 
 was natural that physicians, who stood by the bed of 
 
 Uarda. I. i
 
 34 UARDA. 
 
 sickness as " ordained servants of the Divinity," should 
 not be satisfied with a rational treatment of the sufferer, 
 and should rather think that they could not dispense 
 with the mystical effects of prayers and vows. 
 
 Among the professors of medicine in the House of 
 Seti there were men of the most different gifts and bent 
 of mind ; but Pentaur was not for a moment in doubt 
 as to which should be entrusted with the treatment of 
 the girl who had been run over, and for whom he felt 
 the greatest sympathy. 
 
 The one he chose was the grandson of a celebrated 
 leech, long since dead, whose name of Nebsecht he 
 had inherited, and a beloved school-friend and old com- 
 rade of Pentaur. 
 
 This young man had from his earliest years shown 
 high and hereditary talent for the profession to which 
 he had devoted himself; he had selected surgery* for 
 his special province at Heliopolis, and would certainly 
 have attained the dignity of teacher there if an impedi- 
 ment in his speech had not debarred him from the viva 
 voce recitation of formulas and prayers. 
 
 This circumstance, which was deeply lamented by 
 his parents and tutors, was in fact, in the best opinions, 
 an advantage to him ; for it often happens that apparent 
 superiority does us damage, and that from apparent de- 
 fect springs the saving of our life. 
 
 Thus, while the companions of Nebsecht were em- 
 ployed in declaiming or in singing, he, thanks to his 
 fettered tongue, could give himself up to his inherited 
 and almost passionate love of observing organic life; and 
 
 * Among the six hermetic books of medicine mentioned by Clement of 
 Alexandria, was one devoted to surgical instruments ; otherwise the very badly- 
 set fractures found in some of the mummies do little honor to the Egyptian 
 surgeon*.
 
 UARDA. 35 
 
 his teachers indulged up to a certain point his innate 
 spirit of investigation, and derived benefit from his 
 knowledge of the human and animal structures, and 
 from the dexterity of his handling. 
 
 His deep aversion for the magical part of his pro- 
 fession would have brought him heavy punishment, nay 
 very likely would have cost him expulsion from the 
 craft, if he had ever given it expression in any form. 
 But Nebsecht's was the silent and reserved nature of 
 the learned man, who free from all desire of external 
 recognition, finds a rich satisfaction in the delights of 
 investigation; and he regarded every demand on him 
 to give proof of his capacity, as a vexatious but una- 
 avoidable intrusion on his unassuming but laborious 
 and fruitful investigations. 
 
 Nebsecht was dearer and nearer to Pentaur than 
 any other of his associates. 
 
 He admired his learning and skill ; and when the 
 slightly-built surgeon, who was indefatigable in his 
 wanderings, roved through the thickets by the Nile, the 
 desert, or the mountain range, the young poet-priest 
 accompanied him with pleasure and with great benefit 
 to himself, for his companion observed a thousand things 
 to which without him he would have remained for ever 
 blind; and the objects around him, which were known 
 to him only by -their shapes, derived connection and 
 significance from the explanations of the naturalist, 
 whose intractable tongue moved freely when it was re- 
 quired to expound to his friend the peculiarities of or- 
 ganic beings whose development he had been the first 
 to detect. 
 
 The poet was dear in the sight of Nebsecht, and he 
 loved Pentaur, who posessed all the gifts he lacked; 
 
 3 '
 
 36 UARDA. 
 
 manly beauty, childlike lightness of heart, the frankest 
 openness, artistic power, and the gift of expressing in 
 word and song every emotion that stirred his soul. 
 
 The poet was as a novice in the order in which 
 Nebsecht was master, but quite capable of understand- 
 ing its most difficult points; so it happened that Neb- 
 secht attached greater value to his judgment than to 
 that of his own colleagues, who showed themselves 
 fettered by prejudice, while Pentaur's decision always 
 was free and unbiassed. 
 
 The naturalist's room lay on the ground floor, and 
 had no living rooms above it, being under one of the 
 granaries attached to the temple. It was as large as a 
 public hall, and yet Pentaur, making his way towards the 
 silent owner of the room, found it everywhere strewed 
 with thick bundles of every variety of plant, with cages 
 of palm-twigs piled four or five high, and a number 
 of jars, large and small, covered with perforated paper. 
 Within these prisons moved all sorts of living creatures, 
 from the jerboa, the lizard of the Nile, and a light- 
 colored species of owl, to numerous specimens of frogs, 
 snakes, scorpions and beetles. 
 
 On the solitary table in the middle of the room, 
 near to a writing stand, lay bones of animals, with various 
 sharp flints and bronze knives. 
 
 In a corner of this room lay a mat, on which stood 
 a wooden head-prop, indicating that the naturalist was 
 in the habit of sleeping on it. 
 
 When Pentaur's step was heard on the threshold of 
 this strange abode, its owner pushed a rather large ob- 
 ject under the table, threw a cover over it, and hid a 
 sharp flint scalpel* fixed into a wooden handle, which 
 
 * The Egyptians seem to have preferred to use flint instruments for tur&i-
 
 UARDA. 37 
 
 he had just been using, in the folds of his robe as a 
 school-boy might hide some forbidden game from his 
 master. Then he crossed his arms, to give himself 
 the aspect of a man who is dreaming in harmless idle- 
 ness. 
 
 The solitary lamp, which was fixed on a high stand 
 near his chair, shed a scanty light, which, however, suf- 
 ficed to show him his trusted friend Pentaur, who had 
 disturbed Nebsecht in his prohibited occupations. Neb- 
 secht nodded to him as he entered, and, when he had 
 seen who it was, said: 
 
 "You need not have frightened me so!" Then he 
 drew out from under the table the object he had hidden 
 a living rabbit fastened down to 'a board and con- 
 tinued his interrupted observations on the body, which 
 he had opened and fastened back with wooden pins 
 while the heart continued to beat. 
 
 He took no further notice of Pentaur, who for some 
 time silently watched the investigator; then he laid his 
 hand on his shoulder and said: 
 
 " Lock your door more carefully, when you are busy 
 with forbidden things." 
 
 "They took they took away the bar of the door 
 lately," stammered the naturalist, "when they caught 
 me dissecting the hand of the forger Ptahmes." 
 
 "The mummy of the poor man will find its right 
 hand wanting," answered the poet. 
 
 " He will not want it out there." 
 
 " Did you bury the least bit of an image in his 
 grave?" 
 
 " Nonsense." 
 
 cal purposes, at any rate for the opening of bodies and for circumcision. Many 
 flint instruments have been found and preserved in Museums. 
 
 370073
 
 3 UARDA. 
 
 "You go very far, Nebsecht, and are not foreseeing. 
 'He who needlessly hurts an innocent animal shall be 
 served in the same way by the spirits of the nether- 
 world,' says the law ; but I see what you will say. You 
 hold it lawful to put a beast to pain, when you can 
 thereby increase that knowledge by which you alleviate 
 the sufferings of man, and enrich " 
 
 "And do not you?" 
 
 A gentle smile passed over Pentaur's face; he 
 leaned over the animal and said: 
 
 " How curious! the little beast still lives and breathes ; 
 a man would have long been dead under such treat- 
 ment. His organism is perhaps of a more precious, 
 subtle, and so more fragile nature?" 
 
 Nebsecht shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "Perhaps!" he said. 
 
 " I thought you must know." 
 
 "I how should I?" asked the leech. "I have told 
 you they would not even let me try to find out how 
 the hand of a forger moves." 
 
 " Consider, the scripture tells us the passage of the 
 soul depends on the preservation of the body." 
 
 Nebsecht looked up with his cunning little eyes and 
 shrugging his shoulders, said: 
 
 "Then no doubt it is so: however these things do 
 not concern me. Do what you like with the souls of 
 men; I seek to know something of their bodies, and 
 patch them when they are damaged as well as 
 may be." 
 
 "Nay Toth be praised,* at least you need net 
 deny that you are master in that art." 
 
 * Toth is the god of the learned and of physician*. The Ibis was sacred 
 to him, and he was usually represented as Ibis-headed. Ka created him " a
 
 UARDA. 39 
 
 "Who is master," asked Nebsecht, "excepting 
 God? I can do nothing, nothing at all, and guide 
 my instruments with hardly more certainty than a 
 sculptor condemned to work in the dark." 
 
 " Something like the blind Resu then," said Pentaur 
 smiling, " who understood painting better than all the 
 painters who could see." 
 
 "In my operations there is a 'better' and a 'worse;'" 
 said Nebsecht, "but there is nothing 'good.' " 
 
 "Then we must be satisfied with the 'better,' and 
 I have come to claim it," said Pentaur. 
 
 "Are you ill?" 
 
 " Isis be praised, I feel so well that I could uproot 
 a palm-tree, but I would ask you to visit a sick girl. 
 The princess Bent-Anat " 
 
 "The royal family has its own physicians." 
 
 "Let me speak! the princess Bent-Anat has run 
 over a young girl, and the poor child is seriously 
 hurt." 
 
 "Indeed," said the student reflectively. "Is she 
 over there in the city, or here in the Necropolis?" 
 
 " Here. She is in fact the daughter of a para- 
 schites." 
 
 "Of a paraschites ?" exclaimed Nebsecht, once 
 more slipping the rabbit under the table, "then I 
 will go." 
 
 "You curious fellow. I believe you expect to find 
 something strange among the unclean folk." 
 
 beautiful light to show the name of his evil enemy." Originally the Moon-god, 
 he became the lord of time and measure. He is the weigher, the philosopher 
 amone the gods, the lord of writing, of art and of learning. The Greeks called 
 him Hermes Trismegist us, i. r. threefold or "very great" which was, in fact, p 
 imitation of the Egyptians, whose name Toth or Techuti signified twofold, in 
 the same way "very great."
 
 40 UARDA. 
 
 "That is my affair; but I will go. What is the 
 man's name ?" 
 
 " Pinem." 
 
 "There will be nothing to be done with him," 
 muttered the student, "however who knows?" 
 
 With these words he rose, and opening a tightly 
 closed flask he dropped some strychnine* on the nose 
 and in the mouth of the rabbit, which immediately 
 ceased to breathe. Then he laid it in a box and 
 said, " I am ready." 
 
 "But you cannot go out of doors in this stained 
 dress." 
 
 The physician nodded assent, and took from a 
 chest a clean robe, which he was about to throw on 
 over the other; but Pentaur hindered him. "First 
 take off your working dress," he said laughing. " I will 
 help you. But, by Besa,** you have as many coats as 
 an onion." 
 
 Pentaur was known as a mighty laugher among 
 his companions, and his loud voice rung in the quiet 
 room, when he discovered that his friend was about 
 to put a third clean robe over two dirty ones, and 
 wear no less than three dresses at once. 
 
 Nebsecht laughed too, and said, "Now I know 
 why my clothes were so heavy, and felt so intolerably 
 hot at noon. While I get rid of my superfluous cloth- 
 ing, will you go and ask the high-priest if I have leave 
 to quit the temple." 
 
 " k He commissioned me to send a leech to the 
 
 * Strychnine was a poison well known to the Egyptians. 
 " The god of the toilet of the Egyptians. He was represented as a de- 
 formed pigmy. He led the women to conquest in love, and the men in war. 
 He was probably of Arab origin.
 
 UARDA. 41 
 
 paraschites, and added that the girl was to be treated 
 like a queen." 
 
 "Ameni? and did he know that we have to do 
 with a paraschites ?" 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 "Then I shall begin to believe that broken limbs 
 may be set with vows aye, vows! You know I cannot 
 go alone to the sick, because my leather tongue is 
 unable to recite the sentences or to wring rich offer- 
 ings for the temple from the dying. Go, while I un- 
 dress, to the prophet Gagabu and beg him to send the 
 pastophorus Teta, who usually accompanies me." 
 
 "I would seek a young assistant rather than that 
 blind old man." 
 
 " Not at all. I should be glad if he would stay at 
 home, and only let his tongue creep after me like an 
 eel or a slug. Head and heart have nothing to do 
 with his wordy operations, and they go on like an ox 
 treading out corn."* 
 
 "It is true;" said Pentaur; "just lately I saw the 
 old man singing out his litanies by a sick-bed, and all 
 the time quietly counting the dates, of which they had 
 given him a whole sack-full." 
 
 " He will be unwilling to go to the paraschites, 
 who is poor, and he would sooner seize the whole 
 brood of scorpions yonder than take a piece of bread 
 from the hand of the unclean. Tell him to come and 
 fetch me, and drink some wine. There stands three 
 days' allowance; in this hot weather it dims my sight. 
 
 * In Egypt, as in Palestine, beasts trod out the corn, as we leam from 
 many pictures in the catacombs, even in the remotest ages ; often with the ad- 
 dition of a weighted sledge, to the runners of which rollers are attached. It 
 is now called noreg.
 
 42 UARDA. 
 
 Does the paraschites live to the north or south of the 
 Necropolis ?" 
 
 "I think to the north. Paaker, the king's pioneer, 
 will show you the way." 
 
 " He!" exclaimed the student, laughing. "What day 
 in the calendar is this, then ?* The child of a para- 
 schites is to be tended like a princess, and a leech 
 have a noble to guide him, like the Pharaoh himself! 
 I ought to have kept on my three robes!" 
 
 "The night is warm," said Pentaur. 
 
 " But Paaker has strange ways with him. Only the 
 day before yesterday I was called to a poor boy whose 
 collar bone he had simply smashed with his stick. If 
 I had been the princess's horse I would rather have 
 trodden him down than a poor little girl." 
 
 "So would I," said Pentaur laughing, and left the 
 room to request the second prophet Gagabu, who was 
 also the head of the medical staff of the House of 
 Seti, to send the blind pastophorus** Teta, with his 
 friend as singer of the litany. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 PENTAUR knew where to seek Gagabu, for he him- 
 self had been invited to the banquet which the 
 prophet had prepared in honor of two sages who had 
 
 " Calendars have been preserved, the completes! is the papyrus Sallier IV., 
 which has been admirably treated by F. Chahas. Many days are noted as 
 lucky, unlucky, etc. In the temples many Calendars of feasts have been found, 
 the most perfect at Medinet Aim. ik-i i;iliered by Diimich. 
 
 ** The Pastophori were an order of priests to which the physicians 
 belonged.
 
 UARDA. 43 
 
 lately come to the House of Seti from the university 
 of Chennu.* 
 
 In an open court, surrounded by gaily-painted 
 wooden pillars, and lighted by many lamps, sat the 
 feasting priests in two long rows on comfortable arm- 
 chairs. Before each stood a little table, and servants 
 were occupied in supplying them with the dishes and 
 drinks, which were laid out on a splendid table in the 
 middle of the court. Joints of gazelle,** roast geese 
 and ducks, meat pasties, artichokes, asparagus and 
 other ^vegetables, and various cakes and sweetmeats 
 were carried to the guests, and their beakers well- 
 filled with the choice wines of which there was never 
 any lack in the lofts of the House of Seti.*** In the 
 spaces between the guests stood servants with metal 
 bowls, in which they might wash their hands, and 
 towels of fine linen. 
 
 When their hunger was appeased, the wine flowed 
 more freely, and each guest was decked with sweetly- 
 smelling flowers, whose odor was supposed to add to 
 the vivacity of the conversation. 
 
 Many of the sharers in this feast wore long, snow- 
 white garments, and were of the class of the Initiated 
 into the mysteries of the faith, as well as chiefs of the 
 different orders of priests of the House of Seti. 
 
 The second prophet, Gagabu, who was to-day 
 charged with the conduct of the feast by Ameni 
 
 * Chennu was situated on a bend of the Nile, not far from the Nubian 
 frontier ; it is now called Gebel Silsileh ; it was in very ancient times the seat of 
 a celebrated seminary. 
 
 ** Gazelles were tamed for domestic animals we find them in the rep- 
 resentations of the herds of the wealthy Egyptians and as slaughtered for 
 food. The banquet is described from the pictures of feasts which have been 
 found in the tombs. 
 
 *** Cellars maintain the mean temperature of the climate, and in Egypt ari. 
 hot. Wine is best preserved in shady and airy lofts.
 
 44 UARDA. 
 
 who on such occasions only showed himself for a few 
 minutes was a short, stout man with a bald and 
 almost spherical head. His features were those of a 
 man of advancing years, but well-formed, and his 
 smoothly shaven, plump cheeks were well-rounded. 
 His grey eyes looked out cheerfully and observantly, 
 but had a vivid sparkle when he was excited and 
 began to twitch his thick, sensual mouth. 
 
 Close by him stood the vacant, highly-ornamented 
 chair of the high-priest, and next to him sat the 
 priests arrived from Chennu, two tall, dark-colored 
 old men. The remainder of the company was arranged 
 in the order of precedency, which they held in the 
 priests' colleges, and which bore no relation to their 
 respective ages. 
 
 But strictly as the guests were divided with ref- 
 erence to their rank, they mixed without distinction 
 in the conversation. 
 
 " We know how to value our call to Thebes," said 
 the elder of the strangers from Chennu, Tuauf, whose 
 essays were frequently used in the schools; "for while, 
 on one hand, it brings us into the neighborhood of 
 the Pharaoh, where life, happiness, and safety flourish, 
 on the other it procures us the honor of counting 
 ourselves among your number; for, though the university 
 of Chennu in former times was so happy as to bring 
 up many great men, whom she could call her own, she 
 ran no longer compare with the House of Seti. Even 
 Heliopolis and Memphis are behind you; and if I, my 
 humble self, nevertheless venture boldly among you, it 
 is because I ascribe your success as much to the active 
 influence of the Divinity in your temple, which may 
 promote my acquirements and achievements, as to your
 
 UARDA. 45 
 
 great gifts and your industry, in which I will not be 
 behind you. I have already seen your high-priest 
 Ameni what a man! And who does not know thy 
 name, Gagabu, or thine, Meriapu?" 
 
 "And which of you," asked the other new-comer, 
 "may we greet as the author of the most beautiful 
 hymn to Amon, which was ever sung in the land of 
 the Sycamore? Which of you is Pentaur?" 
 
 " The empty chair yonder," answered Gagabu, point- 
 ing to a seat at the lower end of the table, "is his. 
 He is the youngest of us all, but a great future awaits 
 him." 
 
 " And his songs," added the elder of the strangers. 
 
 " Without doubt," replied the chief of the haruspices, 
 an old man with a large grey curly head, that seemed 
 too heavy for his thin neck, which stretched forward 
 perhaps from the habit of constantly watching for signs 
 while his prominent eyes glowed with a fanatical 
 gleam. "Without doubt the Gods have granted great 
 gifts to our young friend; but it remains to be proved 
 how he will use them. I perceive a certain freedom of 
 thought in the youth, which pains me deeply. Although 
 in his poems his flexible style certainly follows the pre- 
 scribed forms, his ideas transcend all tradition; and 
 even in the hymns intended for the ears of the people 
 I find turns of thought, which might well be called 
 treason to the mysteries which only a few months ago 
 he swore to keep secret. For instance he says and we 
 sing and the laity hear 
 
 " One only art Thou, Thou Creator of beings ; 
 And Thou only makest all that is created. 
 
 And again
 
 46 UARDA. 
 
 He is one only, Alone, without equal : 
 Dwelling alone in the holiest of holies."* 
 
 Such passages as these ought not to be sung in 
 public, at least in times like ours, when new ideas come 
 in upon us from abroad, like the swarms of locusts 
 from the East." 
 
 "Spoken to my very soul!" cried the treasurer of 
 the temple, " Ameni initiated this boy too early into the 
 mysteries." 
 
 "In my opinion, and I am his teacher," said Gaga- 
 bu, " our brotherhood may be proud of a member who 
 adds so brilliantly to the fame of our temple. The 
 people hear the hymns without looking closely at the 
 meaning of the words. I never saw the congregation 
 more devout, than when the beautiful and deeply-felt 
 song of praise was sung at the feast of the stairs.** 
 
 " Pentaur was always thy favorite," said the former 
 speaker. " Thou wouldst not permit in any one else 
 many things that are allowed to him. His hymns are 
 nevertheless to me and to many others a dangerous 
 performance ; and canst thou dispute the fact that we 
 have grounds for grave anxiety, and that things happen 
 and circumstances grow up around us which hinder us, 
 and at last may perhaps crush us, if we do not, while 
 there is yet time, inflexibly oppose them ?" 
 
 " Thou bringest sand to the desert, and sugar to 
 sprinkle over honey," exclaimed Gagabu, and his lips 
 began to twitch. " Nothing is now as it ought to be, 
 and there will be a hard battle to fight ; not with the 
 sword, but with this and this." And the impatient 
 
 * Hymn to Amon preserved in a papyrus roll at Bulaq, and deciphered by 
 Grehatit and I.. Stem. 
 
 ** A particularly solemn festival in honor of Amon-Chcm, held in the 
 temple of Mcdinct-Abu.
 
 UARDA. 47 
 
 man touched his forehead and his lips. " And who is 
 there more competent than my disciple ?" There is the 
 champion of our cause, a second cap of Hor, that over- 
 threw the evil one with winged sunbeams, and you 
 come and would clip his wings and blunt his claws ! 
 Alas, alas, my lords ! will you never understand that a 
 lion roars louder than a cat, and the suu shines brighter 
 than an oil-lamp ? Let Pentaur alone, I say ; or you will 
 do as the man did, who, for fear of the tooth-ache, had 
 his sound teeth drawn. Alas, alas ! in the years to come 
 we shall have to bite deep into the flesh, till the 
 blood flows, if we wish to escape being eaten up our- 
 selves ! 
 
 "The enemy is not unknown to us also," said the 
 elder priest frem Chennu, " although we, on the remote 
 southern frontier of the kingdom, have escaped many 
 evils that in the north have eaten into our body like a 
 cancer. Here foreigners are now hardly looked upon 
 at all as unclean and devilish."* 
 
 "Hardly?" exclaimed the chief of the haruspices; 
 " they are invited, caressed, and honored. Like dust, 
 when the simoon blows through the chinks of a wooden 
 house, they crowd into the houses and temples, taint 
 our manners and language ; nay, on the throne of the 
 successors of Ra sits a descendant " 
 
 " Presumptuous man !" cried the voice of the high- 
 priest, who at this instant entered the hall, " Hold your 
 tongue, and be not so bold as to wag it against him 
 who is our king, and wields the sceptre in this kingdom 
 as the Vicar of Ra." 
 
 The speaker bowed and was silent ; then he and all 
 the company rose to greet Ameni, who bowed to them 
 
 * "Typhonisch," belonging to Typhon or Seth. Translator,
 
 48 UARDA. 
 
 all with polite dignity, took his seat, and turning to 
 Gagabu asked him carelessly : 
 
 " I find you all in most unpriestly excitement ; what 
 has disturbed your equanimity ?" 
 
 " We were discussing the overwhelming influx of 
 foreigners into Egypt, and the necessity of opposing 
 some resistance to them." 
 
 "You will find me one of the foremost in the at- 
 tempt," replied Ameni. "We have endured much al- 
 ready, and news has arrived from the north, which 
 grieves me deeply." 
 
 " Have our troops sustained a defeat ?" 
 
 "They continue to be victorious, but thousands of 
 our countrymen have fallen victims in the fight or on 
 the march. Rameses demands fresh reinforcements. 
 The pioneer, Paaker, has brought me a letter from our 
 brethren who accompany the king, and delivered a 
 document from him to the Regent, which contains the 
 order to send to him fifty thousand fighting men ; and 
 as the whole of the soldier-caste and all the auxiliaries 
 are already under arms, the bondmen of the temple, 
 who till our acres, are to be levied, and sent into 
 Asia." 
 
 A murmur of disapproval arose at these words. The 
 chief of the haruspices stamped his foot, and Gagabu 
 asked : 
 
 "What do you mean to do?" 
 
 "To prepare to obey the commands of the king," 
 answered Ameni, " and to call the heads of the temples 
 of the city of Amon here without delay to hold a coun- 
 cil. Each must first in his holy of holies seek good 
 counsel of the Celestials. When we have come to a
 
 UARDA. 49 
 
 conclusion, we must next win the Viceroy over to our 
 side. Who yesterday assisted at his prayers ?" 
 
 "It was my turn," said the chief of the haruspices. 
 
 " Follow me to my abode, when the meal is over." 
 commanded Ameni. " But why is our poet missing from 
 our circle?" 
 
 At this moment Pentaur came into the hall, and 
 while he bowed easily and with dignity to the company 
 and low before Ameni, he prayed him to grant that the 
 pastophorus Teta should accompany the leech Nebsecht 
 to visit the daughter of the paraschites. 
 
 Ameni nodded consent and exclaimed: "They must 
 make haste. Paaker waits for them at the great gate, 
 and will accompany them in my chariot." 
 
 As soon as Pentaur had left the party of feasters, 
 the old priest from Chennu exclaimed, as he turned to 
 Ameni : 
 
 " Indeed, holy father, just such a one and no other 
 had I pictured your poet. He is like the Sun-god, and 
 his demeanor is that of a prince. He is no doubt of 
 noble birth." 
 
 " His father is a homely gardener," said the high- 
 priest, "who indeed tills the land apportioned to him 
 with industry and prudence, but is of humble birth and 
 rough exterior. He sent Pentaur to the school* at an early 
 age, and we have brought up the wonderfully gifted boy 
 to be what he now is." 
 
 "What office does he fill here in the temple?" 
 
 " He instructs the elder pupils of the high-school in 
 grammar and eloquence; he is also an excellent ob- 
 
 * It is certain from the papyri that people of the lower orders could be 
 received into the priesthood. Separate castes like those of the Hindoos were 
 unknown to the Egyptians 
 
 (Jar da. I. 4
 
 50 VARDA. 
 
 server of the starry heavens, and a most skilled inter- 
 preter of dreams," replied Gagabu. " But here he is 
 again. To whom is Paaker conducting our stammering 
 physician and his assistant?" 
 
 "To the daughter of the paraschites, who has been 
 run over," answered Pentaur. " But what a rough fellow 
 this pioneer is. His voice hurts my ears, and he spoke 
 to our leeches as if they had been his slaves." 
 
 "He was vexed with the commission the princess 
 had devolved on him," said the high-priest benevolent- 
 ly, "and his unamiable disposition is hardly mitigated 
 by his real piety." 
 
 " And yet," said an old priest, " his brother, who left 
 us some years ago, and who had chosen me for his 
 guide and teacher, was a particularly loveable and docile 
 youth." 
 
 "And his father," said Ameni. "was one of the 
 most superior, energetic, and withal subtle-minded of 
 men." 
 
 " Then he has derived his bad peculiarities from 
 his mother?" 
 
 " By no means. She is a timid, amiable, soft-hearted 
 woman." 
 
 "But must the child always resemble its parents?" 
 asked Pentaur. "Among the sons of the sacred bull, 
 sometimes not one bears the distinguishing mark of his 
 father." 
 
 " And if Paaker's father were indeed an Apis," said 
 Gagabu laughing, "according to your view the pioneer 
 himself belongs, alas! to the peasant's stable." 
 
 Pentaur did not contradict him, but said with a 
 smile: 
 
 "Since he left the school bench, where his school-
 
 UARDA. 5 1 
 
 fellows called him the wild ass on account of his un- 
 ruliness, he has remained always the same. He was 
 stronger than most of them, and yet they knew no 
 greater pleasure than putting him in a rage." 
 
 "Children are so cruel!" said Ameni. "They judge 
 only by appearances, and never enquire into the causes 
 of them. The deficient are as guilty in their eyes as 
 the idle, and Paaker could put forward small claims to 
 their indulgence. I encourage freedom and merriment," 
 he continued turning to the priests from Chennu, "among 
 our disciples, for in fettering the fresh enjoyment of 
 youth we lame our best assistant. The excrescences 
 on the natural growth of boys cannot be more surely or 
 painlessly extirpated than in their wild games. The 
 school-boy is the school-boy's best tutor." 
 
 " But Paaker," said the priest Meriapu, " was not 
 improved by the provocations of his companions. Con- 
 stant contests with them increased that roughness which 
 now makes him the terror of his subordinates and alie- 
 nates all affection." 
 
 "He is the most unhappy of all the many youths, 
 who were intrusted to my care," said Ameni, " and I 
 believe I know why, he never had a childlike disposi- 
 tion, even when in years he was still a child, and the 
 Gods had denied him the heavenly gift of good humor. 
 Youth should be modest, and he was assertive from 
 his childhood. He took the sport of his companions 
 for earnest, and his father, who was unwise only 
 as a tutor, encouraged him to resistance instead of 
 to forbearance, in the idea that he thus would be steeled 
 to the hard life of a Mohar."* 
 
 * The severe duties of the Mohar are well known from the papyrus of 
 Anastasi I. in the Brit. Mus., which has been ably treated by F. Chabas, 
 Voyage d'un Egyptien.
 
 52 UARDA. 
 
 " I have often heard the deeds of the Mohar spoken 
 of," said the old priest from Chennu, "yet I do not ex- 
 actly know what his office requires of him." 
 
 " He has to wander among the ignorant and insolent 
 people of hostile provinces, and to inform himself of 
 the kind and number of the population, to investigate 
 the direction of the mountains, valleys, and rivers, to 
 set forth his observations, and to deliver them to the 
 house of war,* so that the march of the troops may be 
 guided by them." 
 
 "The Mohar then must be equally skilled as a warrior 
 and as a Scribe." 
 
 "As thou sayest; and Paaker's father was not a hero 
 only, but at the same time a writer, whose close and 
 clear information depicted the country through which 
 he had travelled as plainly as if it were seen from a 
 mountain height. He was the first who took the title 
 of Mohar. The king held him in such high esteem, 
 that he was inferior to no one but the king himself, and 
 the minister of the house of war." 
 
 "Was he of noble race?" 
 
 " Of one of the oldest and noblest in the country. 
 His father was the noble warrior Assa," answered the 
 haruspex, "and he therefore, after he himself had at- 
 tained the highest consideration and vast wealth, es- 
 corted home the niece of the King Hor-em-heb, who 
 would have had a claim to the throne, as well as the 
 Regent, if the grandfather of the present Rameses had 
 not seized it from the old family by violence." 
 
 " Be careful of your words," said Ameni, interrupting 
 the rash old man. "Rameses I. was and is the grand- 
 
 * Corresponding to our minister of war. A person of the highest im- 
 portance even in the earliest times.
 
 UARDA. 53 
 
 father of our sovereign, and in the king's veins, from his 
 mother's side, flows the blood of the legitimate descen- 
 dants of the Sun-god." 
 
 " But fuller and purer in those of the Regent," the 
 haruspex ventured to retort. 
 
 " But Rameses wears the crown," cried Ameni, " and 
 will continue to wear it so long as it pleases the Gods. 
 Reflect! your hairs are grey, and seditious words are like 
 sparks, which are borne by the wind, but which, if they 
 fall, may set our home in a blaze. Continue your 
 feasting, my lords; but I would request you to speak 
 no more this evening of the king and his new decree. 
 You, Pentaur, fulfil my orders to-morrow morning with 
 energy and prudence." 
 
 The high-priest bowed and left the feast. 
 
 As soon as the door was shut behind him, the old 
 priest from Chennu spoke. 
 
 " What we have learned concerning the pioneer of 
 the king, a man who holds so high an office, surprises 
 me. Does he distinguish himself by a special acute- 
 ness ?" 
 
 " He was a steady learner, but of moderate ability." 
 
 " Is the rank of Mohar then as high as that of a 
 prince of the empire ?" 
 
 " By no means." 
 
 " How then is it ?" 
 
 " It is, as it is," interrupted Gagabu. " The son of 
 the vine-dresser has his mouth full of grapes, and the 
 child of the door-keeper opens the lock with words." 
 
 " Never mind," said an old priest who had hitherto 
 kept silence. " Paaker earned for himself the post of 
 Mohar, and possesses many praiseworthy qualities. He 
 is indefatigable and faithful, quails before no danger,
 
 54 UARDA. 
 
 and has always been earnestly devout from his boy- 
 hood. When the other scholars carried their pocket- 
 money to the fruit-sellers and confectioners at the 
 temple-gates, he would buy geese, and, when his 
 mother sent him a handsome sum, young gazelles, to 
 offer to the Gods on the altars. No noble in the land 
 owns a greater treasure of charms and images of the 
 Gods than he. To the present time he is the most 
 pious of men, and the offerings for the dead, which he 
 brings in the name of his late father, may be said to 
 be positively kingly." 
 
 "We owe him gratitude for these gifts," said the 
 treasurer, "and the high honor he pays his father, 
 even after his death, is exceptional and far-famed." 
 
 " He emulates him in every respect," sneered 
 Gagabu ; " and though he does not resemble him in 
 any feature, grows more and more like him. But un- 
 fortunately, it is as the goose resembles the swan, or the 
 owl resembles the eagle. For his father's noble pride 
 he has overbearing haughtiness; for kindly severity, 
 rude harshness ; for dignity, conceit ; for perseverance, 
 obstinacy. Devout he is, and we profit by his gifts. 
 The treasurer may rejoice over them, and the dates 
 off a crooked tree taste as well as those off a straight 
 one. But if I were the Divinity I should prize them 
 no higher than a hoopoe's crest; for He, who sees into 
 the heart of the giver alas ! what does he see ! Storms 
 and darkness are of the dominion of Seth, and in 
 there in there " and the old man struck his broad 
 breast " all is wrath and tumult, and there is not a 
 gleam of the calm blue heaven of Ra, that shines soft 
 and pure in the soul of the pious; no, not a spot as 
 large as this wheaten-cake."
 
 UARDA. 55 
 
 " Hast thou then sounded to the depths of his 
 soul ?" asked the haruspex. 
 
 " As this beaker !" exclaimed Gagabu, and he 
 touched the rim of an empty drinking-vessel. " For 
 fifteen years without ceasing. The man has been of 
 service to us, is so still, and will continue to be. Our 
 leeches extract salves from bitter gall and deadly 
 poisons ; and folks like these " 
 
 " Hatred speaks in thee," said the haruspex, inter- 
 rupting the indignant old man. 
 
 " Hatred !" he retorted, and his lips quivered. 
 " Hatred ?" and he struck his breast with his clenched 
 hand. " It is true, it is no stranger to this old 
 heart. But open thine ears, O haruspex, and all 
 you others too shall hear. I recognize two sorts of 
 hatred. The one is between man and man ; that I 
 have gagged, smothered, killed, annihilated with what 
 efforts, the Gods know. In past years I have cer- 
 tainly tasted its bitterness, and served it like a wasp, 
 which, though it knows that in stinging it must die, 
 yet uses its sting. But now I am old in years, that is 
 in knowledge, and I know that of all the powerful im- 
 pulses which stir our hearts, one only comes solely 
 from Seth, one only belongs wholly to the Evil one 
 and that is hatred between man and man. Covetous- 
 ness may lead to industry, sensual appetites may beget 
 noble fruit, but hatred is a devastator, and in the soul 
 that it occupies all that is noble grows not upwards 
 and towards the light, but downwards to the earth 
 and to darkness. Everything may be forgiven by the 
 Gods, save only hatred between man and man. But 
 there is another sort of hatred that is pleasing to the 
 Gods, and which you must cherish if you would not
 
 56 UARDA. 
 
 miss their presence in your souls ; that is, hatred for all 
 that hinders the growth of light and goodness and 
 purity the hatred of Horus for Seth. The Gods 
 would punish me if I hated Paaker whose father was 
 dear to me ; but the spirits of darkness would possess 
 the old heart in my breast if it were devoid of horror 
 for the covetous and sordid devotee, who would fain 
 buy earthly joys of the Gods with gifts of beasts and 
 wine, as men exchange an ass for a robe, in whose 
 soul seethe dark promptings. Paaker's gifts can no 
 more be pleasing to the Celestials than a cask of attar 
 of roses would please thee, haruspex, in which scorpions, 
 centipedes, and venomous snakes were swimming. I have 
 long led this man's prayers, and never have I heard 
 him crave for noble gifts, but a thousand times for the 
 injury of the men he hates." 
 
 " In the holiest prayers that come down to us from 
 the past," said the haruspex, " the Gods are entreated 
 to throw our enemies under our feet; and, besides, 
 I have often heard Paaker pray fervently for the bliss 
 of his parents." 
 
 " You are a priest and one of the initiated," cried 
 Gagabu, " and you know not or will not seem to 
 know that by the enemies for whose overthrow we 
 pray, are meant only the demons of darkness and the 
 outlandish peoples by whom Egypt is endangered ! 
 Paaker prayed for his parents ? Ay, and so will he for 
 his children, for they will be his future as his fore- 
 fathers are his past. If he had a wife, his offerings 
 would be for her too, for she would be the half of his 
 own present." 
 
 " In spite of all this," said the haruspex Septah, 
 " you are too hard in your judgment of Paaker, for
 
 UARDA. 57 
 
 although he was born under a lucky sign, the Hathors 
 denied him all that makes youth happy. The enemy 
 for whose destruction he prays is Mena, the king's 
 charioteer, and, indeed, he must have been of super- 
 human magnanimity or of unmanly feebleness, if he 
 could have wished well to the man who robbed him of 
 the beautiful wife who was destined for him." 
 
 " How could that happen ?" asked the priest from 
 Chennu. "A betrothal is sacred." 
 
 " Paaker," replied Septah, " was attached with all 
 the strength of his ungoverned but passionate and 
 faithful heart to his cousin Nefert, the sweetest maid 
 in Thebes, the daughter of Katuti, his mother's sister; 
 and she was promised to him to wife. Then his father, 
 whom he accompanied on his marches, was mortally 
 wounded in Syria. The king stood by his death-bed, 
 and granting his last request, invested his son with 
 his rank and office. Paaker brought the mummy of 
 his father home to Thebes, gave him princely inter- 
 ment, and then before the time of mourning was over, 
 hastened back to -Syria, where, while the king re- 
 turned to Egypt, it was his duty to reconnoitre the 
 new possessions. At last he could quit the scene 
 of war with the hope of marrying Nefert. He rode 
 his horse to death the sooner to reach the goal of 
 his desires ; but when he reached Tanis, the city of 
 Rameses, the news met him that his affianced cousin 
 had been given to another, the handsomest and bravest 
 man in Thebes the noble Mena. The more precious 
 a thing is that we hope to possess, the more we are 
 justified in complaining of him who contests our claim, 
 and can win it from us. Paaker's blood must have 
 been as cold as a frog's if he could have forgiven
 
 58 UARDA. 
 
 Mena instead of hating him, and the cattle he has 
 offered to the Gods to bring down their wrath on the 
 head of the traitor may be counted by hundreds." 
 
 "And if you accept them, knowing why they are 
 offered, you do unwisely and wrongly," exclaimed 
 Gagabu. " If I were a layman, I would take good care 
 not to worship a Divinity who condescends to serve the 
 foulest human ends for a reward. But the omni- 
 scient Spirit, that rules the world in accordance with 
 eternal laws, knows nothing of these sacrifices, which 
 only tickle the nostrils of the evil one. The treasurer 
 rejoices when a beautiful spotless heifer is driven in 
 among our herds. But Seth rubs his red hands* with 
 delight that he accepts it. My friends, I have heard 
 the vows which Paaker has poured out over our pure 
 altars, like hogwash that men set before swine. Pesti- 
 lence and boils has he called down on Mena, and 
 barrenness and heart-ache on the poor sweet woman ; 
 and I really cannot blame her for preferring a battle 
 horse to a hippopotamus a Mena to a Paaker." 
 
 " Yet the Immortals must have thought his re- 
 monstrances less unjustifiable, and have stricter views 
 as to the inviolable nature of a betrothal than you," 
 said the treasurer, "for Nefert, during four years of 
 married life, has passed only a few weeks with her wander- 
 ing husband, and remains childless. It is hard to me 
 to understand how you, Gagabu, who so often ab- 
 solve where we condemn, can so relentlessly judge 
 so great a benefactor to our temple." 
 
 "And I fail to comprehend," exclaimed the old 
 man, "how you you who so willingly condemn, can 
 
 Red was the color of Seth and Typhon. 'ITie evil one w named the Red, 
 ft far instance in the papyrus of Kberv Red-haired men were tyfhcnic.
 
 UARDA. 59 
 
 so weakly excuse this this call him what you 
 will." 
 
 " He is indispensable to us at this time'" said the 
 haruspex. 
 
 "Granted," said Gagabu, lowering his tone. "And 
 I think still to make use of him, as the high-priest 
 has done in past years with the best effect when 
 dangers have threatened us; and a dirty road serves 
 when he makes for the goal. The Gods themselves 
 often permit safety to come from what is evil; but 
 shall we therefore call evil good or say the hideous 
 is beautiful? Make use of the king's pioneer as you 
 will, but do not, because you are indebted to him for 
 gifts, neglect to judge him according to his imaginings 
 and deeds if you would deserve your title of the 
 Initiated and the Enlightened. Let him bring his 
 cattle into our temple and pour his gold into our 
 treasury, but do not defile your souls with the thought 
 that the offerings of such a heart and such a hand 
 are pleasing to the Divinity. Above all," and the voice 
 of the old man had a heart-felt impressiveness, " Above 
 all, do not flatter the erring man and this is what 
 you do with the idea that he is walking in the right 
 way ; for your, for our first duty, O my friends, is always 
 this to guide the souls of those who trust in us to good- 
 ness and truth." 
 
 "Oh, my master!" cried Pentaur, "how tender is 
 thy severity." 
 
 "I have shown the hideous sores of this man's 
 soul," said the old man, as he rose to quit the hall. 
 "Your praise will aggravate them, your blame will tend 
 to heal them. Nay, if you are not content to do your 
 duty, old Gagabu will come some day with his knife,
 
 60 UARDA. 
 
 and will throw the sick man down and cut out the 
 canker." 
 
 During this speech the haruspex had frequently 
 shrugged his shoulders. Now he said, turning to the 
 priests from Chennu 
 
 "Gagabu is a foolish, hot-headed old man, and you 
 have heard from his lips just such a sermon as the 
 young scribes keep by them when they enter on the 
 duties of the care of souls. His sentiments are ex- 
 cellent, but he easily overlooks small things for the 
 sake of great ones. Ameni would tell you that ten 
 souls, no, nor a hundred, do not matter when the safety 
 of the whole is in question." 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE night during which the Princess Bent-Anat 
 and her followers had knocked at the gate of the 
 House of Seti was past. 
 
 The fruitful freshness of the dawn gave way to 
 the heat, which began to pour down from the deep 
 blue cloudless vault of heaven. The eye could no 
 longer gaze at the mighty globe of light whose rays 
 pierced the fine white dust which hung over the 
 declivity of the hills that enclosed the city of the 
 dead on the west. The limestone rocks showed with 
 blinding clearness, the atmosphere quivered as if heated 
 over a flame; each minute the shadows grew shorter 
 and their outlines sharper. 
 
 All the beasts which we saw peopling the Necro- 
 polis in the evening had now withdrawn into their 
 lurking places; only man defied the heat of the summer
 
 UARDA. 6 1 
 
 day. Undisturbed he accomplished his daily work, 
 and only laid his tools aside for a moment, with a 
 sigh, when a cooling breath blew across the overflowing 
 stream and fanned his brow. 
 
 The harbor or dock where those landed who had 
 crossed from eastern Thebes was crowded with gay 
 barks and boats waiting to return. 
 
 The crews of rowers and steersmen who were at- 
 tached to priestly brotherhoods or noble houses, were 
 enjoying a rest till the parties they had brought across 
 the Nile drew towards them again in long processions. 
 
 Under a wide-spreading sycamore a vendor of 
 eatables, spirituous drinks, and acids for cooling the 
 water, had set up his stall, and close to him, a crowd 
 of boatmen and drivers shouted and disputed as they 
 passed the time in eager games at morra.* 
 
 Many sailors lay on the decks of the vessels, others 
 on the shore; here in the thin shade of a palm tree, 
 there in the full blaze of the sun, from whose burning 
 rays they protected themselves by spreading the cotton 
 cloths, which served them for cloaks, over their faces. 
 
 Between the sleepers passed bondmen and slaves, 
 brown and black, in long files one behind the other, 
 bending under the weight of heavy burdens, which 
 had to be conveyed to their destination at the temples 
 for sacrifice, or to the dealers in various wares. Builders 
 dragged blocks of stone, which had come from the 
 quarries of Chennu and Suan, on sledges to the site of a 
 new temple; laborers poured water under the run- 
 
 * In Latin " micare di?itis." A game still constantly played in the south 
 of Europe, and frequently represented by the Egyptians. The games depicted 
 in the monuments are collected by Minutoli, in the Leipziger Illustrirte Zeitung,
 
 62 UARDA. 
 
 ners, that the heavily loaded and dried wood should 
 not take fire. 
 
 All these working men were driven with sticks by 
 their overseers, and sang at their labor; but the 
 voices of the leaders sounded muffled and hoarse, 
 though, when after their frugal meal they enjoyed an 
 hour of repose, they might be heard loud enough. 
 Their parched throats refused to sing in the noontide 
 of their labor. 
 
 Thick clouds of gnats followed these tormented 
 gangs, who with dull and spirit-broken endurance suf- 
 fered alike the stings of the insects and the blows of 
 their driver. The gnats pursued them to the very heart 
 of the City of the Dead, where they joined themselves 
 to the flies and wasps, which swarmed in countless 
 crowds around the slaughter houses, cooks' shops, stalls 
 of fried fish, and booths of meat, vegetable, honey, 
 cakes and drinks, which were doing a brisk business 
 in spite of the noontide heat and the oppressive at- 
 mosphere heated and filled with a mixture of odors. 
 
 The nearer one got to the Libyan frontier, the 
 quieter it became, and the silence of death reigned in 
 the broad north-west valley, where in the southern 
 slope the father of the reigning king had caused his 
 tomb to be hewn, and where the stone-mason of the 
 Pharaoh had prepared a rock tomb for him. 
 
 A newly made road led into this rocky gorge, 
 whose steep yellow and brown walls seemed scorched 
 by the sun in many blackened spots, and looked like 
 a ghostly array of shades that had risen from the 
 tombs in the night and remained there. 
 
 At the entrance of this valley some blocks of stone 
 formed a sort of doorway, and through this, indifferent
 
 UARDA. 63 
 
 to the heat of the day, a small but brilliant troop of 
 men was passing. 
 
 Four slender youths as staff-bearers led the pro- 
 cession, each clothed only with an apron and a flowing 
 head-cloth of gold brocade; the mid-day sun played on 
 their smooth, moist, red-brown skins, and their supple 
 naked feet hardly stirred the stones on the road. 
 
 Behind them followed an elegant, two-wheeled 
 chariot, with two prancing brown horses bearing tufts 
 of red and blue feathers on their noble heads, and 
 seeming by the bearing of their arched necks and 
 flowing tails to express their pride in the gorgeous hous- 
 ings, richly embroidered in silver, purple, and blue and 
 golden ornaments, which they wore and even more 
 in their beautiful, royal charioteer, Bent- Anat, the daugh- 
 ter of Rameses, at whose lightest word they pricked 
 their ears, and whose little hand guided them with a 
 scarcely perceptible touch. 
 
 Two young men dressed like the other runners fol- 
 lowed the chariot, and kept the rays of the sun off the 
 face of their mistress with large fans of snow-white 
 ostrich feathers fastened to long wands. 
 
 By the side of Bent- Anat, so long as the road was 
 wide enough to allow of it, was carried Nefert, the wife 
 of Mena, in her gilt litter, borne by eight tawny bearers, 
 who, running with a swift and equally measured step, 
 did not remain far behind the trotting horses of the 
 princess and her fan-bearers. 
 
 Both the women, whom we now see for the first 
 time in daylight, were of remarkable but altogether 
 different beauty. 
 
 The wife of Mena had preserved the appearance 
 of a maiden; her large almond-shaped eyes had a
 
 64 UARDA. 
 
 dreamy surprised look out from under her long eye- 
 lashes, and her figure of hardly the middle-height had 
 acquired a little stoutness without losing its youthful 
 grace. No drop of Egyptian blood flowed in her veins, 
 as could be seen in the color of her skin, which was 
 of that fresh and equal hue which holds a medium 
 between golden yellow and bronze brown and which 
 to this day is so charming in the maidens of Abys- 
 sinia in her straight nose, her well-formed brow, in 
 her smooth but thick black hair, and in the fineness of 
 her hands and feet, which were ornamented with circles 
 of gold. 
 
 The maiden princess next to her had hardly 
 reached her nineteenth year, and yet something of a 
 womanly self-consciousness betrayed itself in her de- 
 meanor. Hfer stature was by almost a head taller 
 than that of her friend, her skin was fairer, her blue 
 eyes kind and frank, without tricks of glance, but clear 
 and honest, her profile was noble but sharply cut, and 
 resembled that of her father, as a landscape in the 
 mild and softening light of the moon resembles the 
 same landscape in the broad clear light of day. The 
 scarcely perceptible aquiline of her nose, she inherited 
 from her Semitic ancestors,* as well as the slightly 
 \\a\ing abundance of her brown hair, over which she 
 wore a blue and white striped silk kerchief; its care- 
 fully pleated folds were held in place by a gold ring, 
 from which in front a horned uraeus** raised its head 
 
 * Many portrait* have come down to us of Ramcscs : the finest is the noble 
 nutiie preserved at Turin. A likeness has been detected between its profile, 
 with its slightly aquiline nose, and that of Napoleon I 
 
 ** A venomous Egyptian serpent which was adopted as the symbol of 
 sovereign power, in consequence of its swift effects for life or death. It is 
 never wanting to the diadem of the Pharaohs.
 
 UARDA. 65 
 
 crowned with a disk of rubies. From her left temple 
 a large tress, plaited with gold thread, hung down to 
 her waist, the sign of her royal birth. She wore a 
 purple dress of fine, almost transparent stuff, that was 
 confined with a gold belt and straps. Round her 
 throat was fastened a necklace like a collar, made of 
 pearls and costly stones, and hanging low down on her 
 well-formed bosom. 
 
 Behind the princess stood her charioteer, an old 
 officer of noble birth. 
 
 Three litters followed the chariot of the princess, and 
 in each sat two officers of the court; then came a dozen 
 of slaves ready for any service, and lastly a crowd of 
 wand-bearers to drive off the idle populace, and of lightly 
 armed soldiers, who dressed only in the apron and 
 head-cloth each bore a dagger-shaped sword in his 
 girdle, an axe in his right hand, and in his left, in token 
 of free service, a palm-branch. 
 
 Like dolphins round a ship, little girls in long shirt- 
 shaped garments swarmed round the whole length of 
 the advancing procession, bearing water-jars on their 
 steady heads, and at a sign from any one who was 
 thirsty were ready to give him a drink. With steps 
 as light as the gazelle they often outran the horses, 
 and nothing could be more graceful than the action 
 with which the taller ones bent over with the water- 
 jars held in both arms to the drinker. 
 
 The courtiers, cooled and shaded by waving fans, 
 and hardly perceiving the noontide heat, conversed at 
 their ease about indifferent matters, and the princess 
 pitied the poor horses, who were tormented as they 
 ran, by annoying gad-flies; while the runners and 
 soldiers, the litter-bearers and fan-bearers, the girls 
 
 Uarda. 1. 5
 
 66 UARDA. 
 
 with their jars and the panting slaves, were compelled 
 to exert themselves under the rays of the mid-day 
 sun in the service of their masters, till their sinews 
 threatened to crack and their lungs to burst their 
 bodies. 
 
 At a spot where the road widened, and where, to 
 the right, lay the steep cross-valley where the last kings 
 of the dethroned race were interred, the procession 
 stopped at a sign from Paaker, who preceded the 
 princess, and who drove his fiery black Syrian horses 
 with so heavy a hand that the bloody foam fell from 
 their bits. 
 
 When the Mohar had given the reins into the hand 
 of a servant, he sprang from his chariot, and after the 
 usual form of obeisance said to the princess: 
 
 " In this valley lies the loathsome den of the people, 
 to whom thou, O princess, dost deign to do such high 
 honor. Permit me to go forward as guide to thy 
 party." 
 
 "We will go on foot," said the princess, "and leave 
 our followers behind here," 
 
 Paaker bowed, Bent-Anat threw the reins to her 
 charioteer and sprang to the ground, the wife of Mena 
 and the courtiers left their litters, and the fan-bearers 
 and chamberlains were about to accompany their mis- 
 tress on foot into the little valley, when she turned 
 round and ordered, " Remain behind, all of you. Only 
 Paaker and Nefert need go with me." 
 
 The princess hastened forward into the gorge, which 
 was oppressive with the noon-tide heat; but she mod- 
 erated her steps as soon as she observed that the 
 frailer Nefert found it difficult to follow her.
 
 UARDA. 67 
 
 At a bend in the road Paaker stood still, and with 
 him Bent-Anat and Nefert. Neither of them had spoken 
 a word during their walk. The valley was perfectly still 
 and deserted; on the highest pinnacles of the cliff, 
 which rose perpendicularly to the right, sat a long row 
 of vultures, as motionless as if the mid-day heat had 
 taken all strength out of their wings. 
 
 Paaker bowed before them as being the sacred 
 animals of the Great Goddess of -T, hebes,* and the two 
 women silently followed his example. 
 
 "There," said the Mohar, pointing to two huts close 
 to the left cliff of the valley, built of bricks made of 
 dried Nile-mud, "there, the neatest, -next the cave in the 
 rock." 
 
 Bent-Anat went towards the solitary hovel with a 
 beating heart; Paaker let the ladies go first. A few 
 Steps brought them to an ill-constructed fence of reeds, 
 palm-branches, briars and maize haulms, roughly thrown 
 together. A heart-rending cry of pain from within the 
 hut trembled in the air and arrested the steps of the 
 two women. Nefert staggered and clung to her stronger 
 companion, whose beating heart she seemed to hear. 
 Both stood a few minutes as if spell-bound, then the 
 princess called Paaker, and said: 
 
 "You go .first into the house." 
 
 Paaker bowed to the ground. 
 
 "Twill call the man out," he "said, "but how dare 
 we step over his threshold. Thou knowest such a 
 proceeding will defile us." 
 
 * She formed a triad with Amon and Chunsu under the name of Muth. 
 The great " Sanctuary of the kingdom " the temple of Karnak was dedi- 
 cated to them.
 
 68 UARDA. 
 
 Nefert looked pleadingly at Bent- Anat, but the prin- 
 cess repeated her command. 
 
 "Go before me; I have no fear of defilement." 
 
 The Mohar still hesitated. 
 
 ' Wilt thou provoke the Gods? and defile thyself?" 
 
 But the princess let him say no more; she signed 
 to Xefert, who raised her hands in horror and aversion ; 
 so, with a shrug of her shoulders, she left her com- 
 panion behind with $e Mohar, and stepped through an 
 opening in the hedge'into a little court, where lay two 
 brown goats; a donkey with his forelegs tied together 
 stood by, and a few hens were scattering the dust about 
 in a vain search for. food. 
 
 Soon she stood, alone, before the door of the 
 paraschites' hovel. No one perceived her, but she could 
 not take her eyes accustomed only to scenes of order 
 and splendor r from the gloomy but wonderfully 
 strange picture, which riveted her attention and her 
 sympathy. At last she went up to the doorway, which 
 was too low for her tall figure. Her heart shrunk 
 painfully within her, and she would have wished to 
 grow smaller, and, instead of shining in splendor, to 
 have found herself wrapped in a beggar's robe. 
 
 Could she step into this hovel decked with gold 
 and jewels as if in mockery ? like a tyrant who should 
 feast at a groaning table and compel the starving to 
 look on at the banquet. Her delicate perception made 
 her feel what trenchant discord her appearance offered 
 to all that surrounded her, and the discord pained her; 
 for she could not conceal from herself that misery 
 and external meanness were here entitled to give the 
 key-note and that her magnificence derived no especial 
 grandeur from contrast with all these modest acces-
 
 UARDA. 69 
 
 series, amid dust, gloom, and suffering, but rather be- 
 came disproportionate and hideous, like a giant among 
 pigmies. 
 
 She had already gone too far to turn back, or she 
 would willingly have done so. The longer she gazed 
 into the hut, the more deeply she felt the impotence of 
 her princely power, the nothingness of the splendid 
 gifts with which she approached it, and that she 
 might not tread the dusty floor of this wretched hovel 
 but in all humility, and to crave a pardon. 
 
 The room into which she looked was low but not 
 very small, and obtained from two cross lights a 
 strange and unequal illumination; on one side the light 
 came through the door, and on the other through an 
 opening in the time-worn ceiling of the room, which had 
 never before harbored so many and such different 
 guests. 
 
 All attention was concentrated on a group, which 
 was clearly lighted up from the doorway. 
 
 On the dusty floor of the room cowered an old 
 woman, with dark weather-beaten features and tangled 
 hair that had long been grey. Her black-blue cotton 
 shirt was open over her withered bosom, and showed a 
 blue star tattooed upon it. 
 
 In her lap she supported with her hands the head 
 of a girl, whose slender body lay motionless on a nar- 
 row, ragged mat. The little white feet of the sick girl 
 almost touched the threshold. Near to them squatted 
 a benevolent-looking old man, who wore only a coarse 
 apron, and sitting all in a heap, bent forward now and 
 then, rubbing the child's feet with his lean hands and 
 muttering a few words to himself. 
 
 The sufferer wore nothing but a short petticoat of
 
 70 UARDA. 
 
 coarse light-blue stuff. Her face, half resting on the 
 lap of the old woman, was graceful and regular in 
 form, her eyes were half shut like those of a child, 
 whose soul is wrapped in some sweet dream but 
 from her finely chiselled lips there escaped from time 
 to time a painful, almost convulsive sob. 
 
 An abundance of soft, but disordered reddish fair 
 hair, in which clung a few withered flowers, fell over 
 the lap of the old woman and on to the mat where 
 she lay. Her cheeks were white and rosy-red, and 
 when the young surgeon Nebsecht who sat by her 
 side, near his blind, stupid companion, the litany- 
 singer lifted the ragged cloth that had been thrown 
 over her bosom, which had been crushed by the 
 chariot wheel, or when she lifted her slender arm, it 
 was seen that she had the shining fairness of those 
 daughters of the north who not unfrequently came to 
 Thebes among the king's prisoners of war. 
 
 The two physicians sent hither from the House of 
 Seti sat on the left side of the maiden on a little 
 carpet. From time to time one or the other laid his 
 hand over the heart of the sufferer, or listened to her 
 breathing, or opened his case of medicaments, and 
 moistened the compress on her wounded breast with 
 a white ointment. 
 
 In a wide circle close to the wall of the room 
 crouched several women, young and old, friends of 
 the paraschites, who from time to time gave expression 
 to their deep sympathy by a piercing cry of lamentation. 
 One of them rose at regular intervals to fill the earthen 
 bowl by the side of the physician with fresh water. 
 As often as the sudden coolness of a fresh compress on 
 her hot bosom startled the sick girl, she opened her
 
 UARDA. 71 
 
 eyes, but always soon to close them again for a longer 
 interval, and turned them at first in surprise, and then 
 with gentle reverence, towards a particular spot. 
 
 These glances had hitherto been unobserved by 
 him to whom they were directed. 
 
 Leaning against the wall on the right hand side of 
 the room, dressed in his long, snow-white priest's robe, 
 Pentaur stood awaiting the princess. His head-dress 
 touched the ceiling, and the narrow streak of light, 
 which fell through the opening in the roof, streamed 
 on his handsome head and his breast, while all around 
 him was veiled in twilight gloom. 
 
 Once more the suffering girl looked up, and her 
 glance this time met the eye of the young priest, who 
 immediately raised his hand, and half-mechanically, in 
 a low voice, uttered the words of blessing; and then 
 once more fixed his gaze on the dingy floor, and 
 pursued his own reflections. 
 
 Some hours since he had come hither, obedient to 
 the orders of Ameni, to impress on the princess that 
 she had defiled herself by touching a paraschites, and 
 could only be cleansed again by the hand of the 
 priests. 
 
 He had crossed the threshold of the paraschites 
 most reluctantly, and the thought that he, of all men, 
 had been selected to censure a deed of the noblest 
 humanity, and to bring her who had done it to judg- 
 ment, weighed upon him as a calamity. 
 
 In his intercourse with his friend Nebsecht, Pentaur 
 had thrown off many fetters, and given place to many 
 thoughts that his master would have held sinful and 
 presumptuous; but at the same time he acknowledged 
 the sanctity of the old institutions, which were upheld
 
 72 UARDA. 
 
 by those whom he had learned to regard as the 
 divinely appointed guardians of the spiritual possessions 
 of God's people; nor was he wholly free from the pride 
 of caste and the haughtiness which, with prudent 
 intent, were inculcated in the priests. He held the 
 common man, who put forth his strength to win a 
 maintenance for his belongings by honest bodily labor 
 the merchant the artizan the peasant, nay even 
 the warrior, as far beneath the godly brotherhood who 
 strove for only spiritual ends; and most of all he 
 scorned the idler, given up to sensual enjoyments. 
 
 He held him unclean who had been branded by 
 the law; and how should it have been otherwise? 
 
 These people, who at the embalming of the dead 
 opened the body of the deceased, had become despised 
 for their office of mutilating the sacred temple of the 
 soul; but no paraschites chose his calling of his own 
 free will. It was handed down from father to son, and 
 he who was born a paraschites so he was taught 
 had to expiate an old guilt with which his soul had 
 long ago burdened itself in a former existence, within, 
 another body, and which had deprived it of absolution 
 in the nether world. It had passed through various 
 animal forms, and now began a new human course in 
 the body of a paraschites, once more to stand after 
 death in the presence of the judges of the under- 
 world. 
 
 Pentaur had crossed the threshold of the man he 
 despised with aversion ; the man himself, sitting at the 
 feet of the suffering girl, had exclaimed as he saw the 
 priest approaching the hovel : 
 
 " Yet another white robe ! Does misfortune cleanse 
 the unclean ?"
 
 UARDA. 73 
 
 Pentaur had not answered the old man, who on 
 his part took no further notice of him, while he rubbed 
 the girl's feet by order of the leech; and his hands im- 
 pelled by tender anxiety untiringly continued the same 
 movement, as the water-wheel in the Nile keeps up 
 without intermission its steady motion in the stream. 
 
 "Does misfortune cleanse the unclean?" Pentaur 
 asked himself. " Does it indeed possess a purifying 
 efficacy, and is it possible that the Gods, who gave to 
 fire the power of refining metals and to the winds 
 power to sweep the clouds from the sky, should desire 
 that a man made in their own image that a man 
 should be tainted from his birth to his death With an 
 indelible stain ?" 
 
 He looked at the face of the paraschites, and it 
 seemed to him to resemble that of his father. 
 
 This startled him! 
 
 And when he noticed how the woman, in whose 
 lap the girl's head was resting, bent over the injured 
 bosom of the child to catch her breathing, which she 
 feared had come to a stand-still with the anguish of 
 a dove that is struck down by a hawk he remembered 
 a moment in his own childhood, when he had lain 
 trembling with fever on his little bed. What then had 
 happened to him, or had gone on around him, he had 
 long forgotten, but one image was deeply imprinted 
 on his soul, that of the face of his mother bending 
 over him in deadly anguish, but who had gazed on 
 her sick boy not more tenderly, or more anxiously, 
 than this despised woman on her suffering child. 
 
 " There is only one utterly unselfish, utterly pure 
 and utterly divine love," said he to himself, "and that 
 is the love of Isis for Horus the love of a mother for
 
 74 UARDA. 
 
 her child. If these people were indeed so foul as to 
 defile every thing they touch, how would this pure, 
 this tender, holy impulse show itself even in them in 
 all its beauty and perfection ?" 
 
 "Still," he continued, "the Celestials have im- 
 planted maternal love in the breast of the lioness, of 
 the typhonic river-horse of the Nile." 
 
 He looked compassionately at the wife of the 
 paraschites. 
 
 He saw her dark face as she turned it away from 
 the sick girl. She had felt her breathe, and a smile 
 of happiness lighted up her old features; she nodded 
 first to the surgeon, and then with a deep sigh of 
 relief to her husband, who, while he did not cease the 
 movement of his left hand, held up his right hand in 
 prayer to heaven, and his wife did the same. 
 
 It seemed to Pentaur that he could see the souls 
 of these two, floating above the youthful creature in 
 holy union as they joined their hands; and again he 
 thought of his parents' house, of the hour when his 
 sweet, only sister died. His mother had thrown her- 
 self weeping on the pale form, but his father had 
 stamped his foot and had thrown back his head, 
 sobbing and striking his forehead with his fist. 
 
 "How piously submissive and thankful are these 
 unclean ones!" thought Pentaur; and repugnance for 
 the old laws began to take root in his heart. " Maternal 
 love may exist in the hyaena, but to seek and find God 
 pertains only to man, who has a noble aim. Up to the 
 limits of eternity and God is eternal! thought is 
 denied to animals; they cannot even smile. Even men 
 cannot smile at first, for only physical life an animal 
 soul dwells in them; but soon a share of the world's
 
 UARDA. 75 
 
 soul beaming intelligence works within them, and 
 first shows itself in the smile of a child, which is as 
 pure as the light and the truth from which it comes. 
 The child of the paraschites smiles like any other 
 creature born of woman, but how few aged men there 
 are, even among the initiated, who can smile as in- 
 nocently and brightly as this woman who has grown 
 grey under open ill-treatment." 
 
 Deep sympathy began to fill his heart, and he 
 knelt down by the side of the poor child, raised her 
 arm, and prayed fervently to that One who had created 
 the heavens and who rules the world to that One, 
 whom the mysteries of faith forbade him to name; 
 and not to the innumerable Gods, whom the people 
 worshipped, and who to him were nothing but incarna- 
 tions of the attributes of the One and only God of the 
 initiated of whom he was one who was thus brought 
 down to the comprehension of the laity. 
 
 He raised his soul to God in passionate emotion; 
 but he prayed, not for the child before him and for 
 her recovery, but rather for the whole despised race, 
 and for its release from the old ban, for the enlighten- 
 ment .of his own soul, imprisoned in doubts, and for 
 strength to fulfil his hard task with discretion. 
 
 The gaze of the sufferer followed him as he took 
 up his former position. 
 
 The prayer had refreshed his soul and restored 
 him to cheerfulness of spirit. He began to reflect 
 what in the princess's conduct he would have to com- 
 ment on. 
 
 He had not met Bent-Anat for the first time yester- 
 day; on the contrary, he had frequently seen her in 
 holiday processions, and at the high festivals in the
 
 76 UARDA. 
 
 Necropolis, and like all his young companions had ad- 
 mired her proud beauty admired it as the distant light 
 of the stars, or the evening-glow on the horizon. 
 
 Now he must approach this lady with words of 
 reproof. 
 
 He pictured to himself the moment when he must 
 advance to meet her, and could not help thinking of 
 his little tutor Chufu, above whom he towered by two 
 heads while he was still a boy, and who used to call 
 up his admonitions to him from below. It was true, 
 he himself was tall and slim, but he felt as if to-day 
 he were to play the part towards Bent-Anat of the 
 much-laughed-at little tutor. 
 
 His sense of the comic was touched, and asserted 
 itself at this serious moment, and with such melancholy 
 surroundings. Life is rich in contrasts, and a suscep- 
 tible and highly-strung human soul would break down 
 like a bridge under the measured tread of soldiers, if it 
 were allowed to let the burden of the heaviest thoughts 
 and strongest feelings work upon it in undisturbed 
 monotony; but just as in music every key-note has its 
 harmonies, so when we cause one chord of our heart 
 to vibrate for long, all sorts of strange notes respond 
 and clang, often those which we least expect. 
 
 Pentaur's glance flew round the one low, over-filled 
 room of the paraschites* hut, and like a lightning flash 
 the thought, "How will the princess and her train find 
 room here?" flew through his mind. 
 
 His fancy was lively, and vividly brought before 
 him how the daughter "of the Pharaoh with a crown 
 on her proud head would bustle into the silent chamber, 
 how the chattering courtiers would follow her, and how 
 the women by the walls, the physicians by the side of
 
 UARDA. 77 
 
 the sick girl, the, sleek white cat from the chest 
 where she sat, would rise and throng round her. 
 There must be frightful confusion. Then he imagined 
 how the smart lords and ladies would keep them- 
 selves far from the unclean, hold their slender hands 
 over their mouths and noses, and suggest to the 
 old folks how they ought to behave to the princess 
 who condescended to bless them with her presence. 
 The old woman must lay down the head that rested 
 in her bosom, the paraschites must drop the feet he so 
 anxiously rubbed, on the floor, to rise and kiss the 
 dust before Bent-Anat. Whereupon the "mind's eye" 
 of the young priest seemed to see it all the courtiers 
 fled before him, pushing each other, and all crowded 
 together into a corner, and at last the princess threw a 
 few silver or gold rings into the laps of the father and 
 mother, and perhaps to the girl too, and he seemed to 
 hear the courtiers all cry out: "Hail to the gracious 
 daughter of the Sun ! " to hear the joyful exclamations 
 of the crowd of women to see the gorgeous appari- 
 tion leave the hut of the despised people, and then to 
 see, instead of the lovely sick child who still breathed 
 audibly, a silent corpse on the crumpled mat, and in 
 the place of the two tender nurses at her head and 
 feet, two heart-broken, Iou4-lamenting wretches. 
 
 Pentaur's hot spirit was full of wrath. As soon as 
 the noisy cortege appeared actually in sight he would 
 place himself in the doorway, forbid the princess to 
 enter, and receive her with strong words. 
 
 She could hardly come hither out of human kind- 
 ness. , 
 
 "She wants variety," said he to himself, "something 
 new at Court; for there is little going on there now
 
 78 UARDA. 
 
 the king tarries with the troops in a distant country; 
 it tickles the vanity of the great to find themselves 
 once in a while in contact with the small, and it is 
 well to have your goodness of heart spoken of by the 
 people. If a little misfortune opportunely happens, it 
 is not worth the trouble to enquire whether the form 
 of our benevolence does more good or mischief to such 
 wretched people." 
 
 . He ground his teeth angrily, and thought no more 
 of the defilement which might threaten Bent-Anat from 
 the paraschites, but exclusively, on the contrary, on the 
 initiation which she might derive from the holy feelings 
 that were astir in this silent room. 
 
 Excited as he was to fanaticism, his condemning 
 lips could not fail to find vigorous and impressive 
 words. 
 
 He stood drawn to his full height and drawing his 
 breath deeply, like a spirit of light who holds his 
 weapon raised to annihilate a demon of darkness, and 
 he looked out into the valley to perceive from afar the 
 cry of the runners and the rattle of the wheels of the 
 gay train he expected. 
 
 And he saw the doorway darkened by a lowly, 
 bending figure, who, with folded arms, glided into the 
 room and sank down sileatly by the side of the sick 
 girl. The physicians and the old people moved as if 
 to rise; but she signed to them without opening her 
 lips, and with moist, oppressive eyes,- to keep their 
 places; she looked long and lovingly in the face of the 
 wounded girl, stroked her white arm, and turning to 
 the old woman softly whispered to her 
 
 "How pretty she is!" 
 
 The paraschites' wife nodded assent, and the girl
 
 UARDA. 79 
 
 smiled and moved her lips as though she had caught 
 the words and wished to speak. 
 
 Bent-Anat took a rose from her hair and laid it on 
 her bosom. 
 
 The paraschites, who had not taken his hands from 
 the feet of the sick child, but who had followed every 
 movement of the princess, now whispered, " May Hathor 
 requite thee, who gave thee thy beauty." 
 
 The princess turned to him and said, " Forgive the 
 sorrow, I have caused you." 
 
 The.old man stood up, letting the feet of the sick 
 girl fall, and asked in a clear loud voice 
 
 "Art thou Bent-Anat?" 
 
 "Yes, I am," replied the princess, bowing her head 
 low, and in so gentle a voice, that it seemed as though 
 she were ashamed of her proud name. 
 
 The eyes of the olcf man flashed. Then he said 
 softly but decisively 
 
 "Leave my hut then, it will defile thee." 
 
 " Not till you have forgiven me for that which I did 
 unintentionally." 
 
 "Unintentionally! I believe thee," replied the para- 
 schites. " The hoofs of thy horse became unclean when 
 they trod on this white breast. Look here " and he 
 lifted the cloth from the girl's bosom, and showed her 
 the deep red wound, " Look here here is the first rose 
 you laid on my grandchild's bosom, and the second 
 there it goes." 
 
 The paraschites raised his arm to fling the flower 
 through the door of his hut. But Pentaur had apr 
 preached him, and with a grasp of iron held the old 
 man's hand. 
 
 "Stay," he cried in an eager tone, moderated how-
 
 go UA.'DA. 
 
 ever for the sake of the sick girl. "The third rose, 
 which this noble hand has -offered you, your sick heart 
 and silly head have not even perceived. And yet you 
 must know it if only from your need, your longing for 
 it. The fair blossom of pure benevolence is laid. on 
 your child's heart, and at your very feet, by this proud 
 princess. Not with gold, but with humility. And who- 
 ever the daughter of Rameses approaches as her equal, 
 bows before her, even if he were the first prince in the 
 Land of Egypt. Indeed, the Gods shall not forget this 
 deed of Bent-Anat. And you forgive, if you desire to 
 be forgiven that guilt, which you bear as an inheritance 
 from your fathers, and for your own sins." 
 
 The paraschites bowed his head at these words, 
 and when he raised it the anger had vanished from his 
 well-cut features. He rubbed his wrist, which had been 
 squeezed by Pentaur's iron firrgers, and said in a tone 
 which betrayed all the bitterness of his feelings: 
 
 "Thy hand is hard, Priest, and thy words hit like 
 the strokes of a hammer. This fair lady is good and 
 loving, and I know that she did not drive her horse in- 
 tentionally over this poor girl, who is my grandchild and 
 not my daughter. If she were thy wife or the wife of 
 the leech there, or the child of the poor woman yonder, 
 who supports life by collecting the feet and feathers of 
 the fowls that are slaughtered for sacrifice, I would not 
 only forgive her, but console her for having made her- 
 self like to me ; fate would have made her a murderess 
 without any fault of her own, just as it stamped me as 
 unclean while I was still at my mother's breast. Aye 
 I would comfort her; and yet I am not very sensitive. 
 Ye holy three of Thebes! how should I be? Great and 
 small get out of my way that I may not touch them.
 
 UARDA. 8 1 
 
 and every day when I have done what it is my busi- 
 ness to do they throw stones at me. The fulfilment 
 of duty which brings a living to other men, which 
 makes their happiness, and at the same time earns 
 them honor, brings me every day fresh disgrace and pain- 
 ful sores. But I complain to no man, and must forgive for- 
 give forgive, till at last all that men do to me seems 
 quite natural and unavoidable, and I take it all like the 
 scorching of the sun in summer, and the dust that the 
 west wind blows into my face. It does not make me 
 happy, but what can I do ? I forgive all " 
 
 The voice of the paraschites had softened, and Bent- 
 Anat, who looked down on him with emotion, interrupted 
 him, exclaiming with deep feeling: 
 
 "And so you will forgive me? poor man!" 
 The old man looked steadily, not at at her, but at 
 Pentaur, while he replied: "Poor man! aye, truly, poor 
 man. You have driven me out of the world in which 
 you live, and so I made a world for myself in this hut. 
 I do not belong to you, and if I forget it, you drive me 
 out as an intruder nay as a wolf, who breaks into your 
 fold; but you belong just as little to me, only when 
 you play the wolf and fall upon me, I must bear it!" 
 
 "The princess came to your hut as a suppliant, 
 and with the wish of doing you some good," said 
 Pentaur. 
 
 " May the avenging Gods reckon it to her, when they 
 visit on her the crimes of her father against me ! Perhaps 
 it may bring me to prison, but it must come out. Seven 
 sons were . mine, and Rameses took them all from me 
 and sent them to death; the child of the youngest, this 
 girl, the light of my eyes, his daughter has brought to 
 
 Uarda. I, 6
 
 82 UARDA. 
 
 her death. Three of my boys the king left to die of 
 thirst by the Tenat,* which is to join the Nile to the Red 
 Sea, three were killed by the Ethiopians, and the last, 
 the star of my hopes, by this time is eaten by the hy- 
 aenas of the north." 
 
 At these words the old woman, in whoso lap the 
 head of the girl rested, broke out into a loud cry, in 
 which she was joined by all the other women. 
 
 The sufferer started up frightened, and opened her 
 eyes. 
 
 "For whom are you wailing?" she asked feebly. 
 
 "For your poor father," said the old woman. 
 
 The girl smiled like a child who detects some well- 
 meant deceit, and said: 
 
 "Was not my father here, with you? He is here, in 
 Thebes, and looked at me, and kissed me, and said 
 that he is bringing home plunder, and that a good time 
 is coming for you. The gold ring that he gave me I 
 was fastening into my dress, when the chariot passed 
 over me. I was just pulling the knots, when all grew 
 black before my eyes, and I saw and heard nothing 
 more. Undo it, grandmother, the ring is for you; I 
 meant to bring it to you. Yon must buy a beast for 
 sacrifice with it, and wine for grandfather, and eye-salve 
 for yourself, and sticks of mastic, which you have so 
 long had to do without." 
 
 The paraschites seemed to drink these words from 
 the mouth of his grandchild. Again he lifted his hand 
 in prayer, again Pentaur observed that his glance met 
 that of his wife, and a large, warm tear fell from his 
 
 laterally the "cutting" which, under Seti I., the father oC R.nncscs, wi 
 to 4m " Sue* Canal " : a representation of it U found on the northern outer 
 * of the temple of Kamak. It followed nearly the same direction as the 
 South. water ouul of Later*, and fertilized the land of Goshcn.
 
 UARDA. 83 
 
 old eyes on to his callous hand. Then he sank down, 
 for he thought the sick child was deluded by a dream. 
 But there were the knots in her dress. 
 
 With a trembling hand he untied them, and a gold 
 ring rolled out on the floor. 
 
 Bent-Anat picked it up, and gave it to the para- 
 schites. 
 
 "I came here in a lucky hour," she said, "for 
 you have recovered your son and your child will live." 
 
 "She will live," repeated the surgeon, who had re- 
 mained a silent witness of all that had occured. 
 
 "She will stay with us," murmured the old man, 
 and then said, as he approached the princess on his 
 knees, and looked up at her beseechingly with tearful 
 eyes: 
 
 " Pardon me as I pardon thee ; and if a pious wish 
 may not turn to a curse from the lips of the unclean, 
 let me bless thee." 
 
 " I thank you," said Bent-Anat, towards whom the old 
 man raised his hand in blessing. 
 
 Then she turned to Nebsecht, and ordered him to 
 take anxious care of the sick girl; she bent over her, 
 kissed her forehead, laid her gold bracelet by her side, 
 and signing to Pentaur left the hut with him. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 DURING the occurrence we have described, the king's 
 pioneer and the young wife of Mena were obliged to 
 wait for the princess. 
 
 The sun stood in the meridian, when Bent-Anat 
 had gone into the hovel of the paraschites. 
 
 6 *
 
 84 UARDA. 
 
 The bare limestone rocks on each side of the valley 
 and the sandy soil between, shone with a vivid white- 
 ness that hurt the eyes; not a hand's breath of shade 
 was anywhere to be seen, and the fan- bearers of the 
 two, who were waiting there, had, by command of the 
 princess, staid behind with the chariot and litters. 
 
 For a time they stood silently near each other, 
 then the fair Nefert said, wearily closing her almond- 
 shaped eyes 
 
 " How long Bent-Anat stays in the hut of the un- 
 clean! I am perishing here. What shall we do?" 
 
 "Stay!" said Paaker, turning his back on the lady; 
 and mounting a block of stone by the side of the gorge, 
 he cast a practised glance all round, and returned 
 to Nefert: "I have found a shady spot," he said, "out 
 there." 
 
 Mena's wife followed with her eyes the indication 
 of his hand, and shook her head. The gold ornaments 
 on her head-dress rattled gently as she did so, and a 
 cold shiver passed over her slim body in spite of the 
 mid-day heat. 
 
 "Sechet* is raging in the sky," said Paaker. " Let 
 us avail ourselves of the shady spot, small though 
 it be. At this hour of the day many are struck with 
 sickness." 
 
 " I know it," said Nefert, covering her neck with her 
 hand. Then she went towards two blocks of stone 
 which leaned against each other, and between them 
 
 *A jpddew with the head of a lionem or a cat, over which the Sun disk is 
 wajrfcuiid.Sh was the daughter of Ra, and in the form of the Uncut on 
 r lather's crown personified the murderous heat 'of the star of day She 
 CIM* man lo the hot and wild passion of love, and as a cat or lioness team 
 brning wounds in the limbs of the guilty in the nether world : drunkennew 
 and pleasure are her gift. She was also named Bast and Astarte after her 
 MMr-ohrWty among the Phoenicians.
 
 UARDA. 85 
 
 afforded the spot of shade, not many feet wide, which 
 Paaker had pointed out as a shelter from the sun. 
 
 Paaker preceded her, and rolled a flat piece of 
 limestone, inlaid by nature with nodules of flint, under 
 the stone pavilion, crushed a few scorpions which had 
 taken refuge there, spread his head-cloth over the 
 hard seat, and said, "Here you are sheltered." 
 
 Nefert sank down on the stone and watched the 
 Mohar, who slowly and silently paced backwards and 
 forward in front of her. This incessant to and fro of 
 her companion at last became unendurable to her 
 sensitive and irritated nerves, and suddenly raising her 
 head from her hand, on which she had rested it, she 
 exclaimed 
 
 " Pray stand still." 
 
 The pioneer obeyed instantly, and looked, as he 
 stood with his back to her, towards the hovel of the 
 paraschites. 
 
 After a short time Nefert said 
 
 "Say something to me!" 
 
 The Mohar turned his full face towards her, and 
 she was frightened at the wild fire that glowed in the 
 glance with which he gazed at her. 
 
 Nefert's eyes fell, and Paaker, saying: 
 
 "I would rather remain silent," recommenced his 
 walk, till Nefert called to him again and said, 
 
 "I know you are angry with me; but I was but a 
 child when I was betrothed to you. I liked you too, 
 and when in our games your mother called me your 
 little wife, I was really glad, and used to think how 
 fine it would be when I might call all your possessions 
 mine, the house you would have so splendidly restored 
 for me after your father's death, the noble gardens, the
 
 86 UARDA. 
 
 fine horses in their stables, and all the male and 
 female slaves!" 
 
 Paaker laughed, but the laugh sounded so forced 
 and scornful that it cut Nefert to the heart, and she 
 went on, as if begging for indulgence: 
 
 "It was said that you were angry with us; and 
 now you will take my words as if I had cared only 
 for your wealth; but I said, I liked you. Do you no 
 longer remember how I cried with you over your tales 
 of the bad boys in the school, and over your father's 
 severity? Then my uncle died; then you went to 
 Asia." 
 
 "And you," interrupted Paaker, hardly and drily, 
 " you broke your bethrothal vows, and became the wife 
 of the charioteer Mena. I know it all; of what use 
 is talking?" 
 
 " Because it grieves me that you should be angry, 
 and your good mother avoid our house. If only you 
 could know what it is when love seizes one, and one 
 can no longer even think alone, but only near, and 
 with, and in the very arms of another; when one's 
 beating heart throbs in one's very temples, and ever, 
 in one's dreams one sees nothing but one only." 
 
 "And do I not know it?" cried Paaker, placing 
 himself close before her with his arms crossed. " Do 
 I not know it? and you it was who taught me to 
 know it. When I thought of you, not blood, but 
 burning fire, coursed in my veins, and now you have 
 filled them with poison; and here in this breast, in 
 which your image dwelt, as lovely as that of Hathor 
 in her holy of holies, all is like that sea in Syria which 
 is called the Dead Sea, in which every thing that tries 
 to live presently dies and perishes."
 
 UARDA. 87 
 
 Paaker's eyes rolled as he spoke, and his voice 
 sounded hoarsely as he went on. 
 
 " But Mena was near to the king nearer than I, 
 and your mother " 
 
 " My mother!" Nefert interrupted the angry Mohar. 
 " My mother did not choose my husband. I saw him 
 driving the chariot, and to me he resembled the Sun 
 God, and he observed me, and .looked at me, and his 
 glance pierced deep into my heart like a spear; and 
 when, at the festival of the king's birthday, he spoke 
 to me, it was just as if Hathor had thrown round me 
 a web of sweet, sounding sunbeams. And it was the 
 same with Mena; he himself has told me so since I 
 have been his wife. For your sake my mother rejected 
 his suit, but I grew pale and dull with longing for him, 
 and he lost his bright spirit, and was so melancholy 
 that the king remarked it, and asked what weighed on 
 his heart for Rameses loves him as his own son. Then 
 Mena confessed to the Pharaoh that it was love that 
 dimmed his eye and weakened his strong hand; and 
 then the king himself courted me for his faithful 
 servant, and my mother gave way, and we were made 
 man and wife, and all the joys of the justified in the 
 fields of Aalu* are shallow and feeble by the side of 
 the bliss which we two have known not like mortal 
 men, but like the celestial gods." 
 
 Up to this point Nefert had fixed her large eyes 
 on the sky, like a glorified soul; but now her gaze 
 fell, and she said softly 
 
 * The fields of the blest, which were opened to glorified souls. In the 
 Book of the Dead it is shown that in them men linger, and sow and reap by 
 cool waters.
 
 88 LARDA. 
 
 "But the Cheta* disturbed our happiness, for the 
 king took Mena with him to the war. Fifteen times 
 did the moon rise upon our happiness, and then " 
 
 " And then the Gods heard my prayer, and accepted 
 my offerings," said Paaker, with a trembling voice, 
 "and tore the robber of my joys from you, and 
 scorched your heart and his with desire. Do you 
 think you can tell me anything I do not know ? Once 
 again for fifteen days was Mena yours, and now he 
 has not returned again from the war which is raging 
 hotly in Asia." 
 
 "But he will return," cried the young wife. 
 
 " Or possibly not," laughed Paaker. " The Cheta, 
 carry sharp weapons, and there are many vultures in 
 Lebanon, who perhaps at this hour are tearing his 
 flesh as he tore my heart." 
 
 Nefert rose at these words, her sensitive spirit 
 bruised as with stones thrown by a brutal hand, and 
 attempted to leave her shady* refuge to follow the 
 princess into the house of the paraschites; but her feet 
 refused to bear her, and she sank back trembling on 
 her stone seat. She tried to find words, but her tongue 
 was powerless. Her powers of resistance forsook her 
 in her unutterable and soul-felt distress heart-wrung, 
 forsaken and provoked. 
 
 A variety of painful sensations raised a hot vehe- 
 ment storm in her bosom, which checked her breath, 
 and at last found relief in a passionate and convulsive 
 weeping that shook her whole body. She saw nothing 
 more, she heard nothing more, she only. shed tears and 
 felt herself miserable. 
 
 An Aramaan race, according to Schroder 1 ! excellent judgment At the 
 M of our ttory th people* of western Aia had allied ihemielve* to them.
 
 UARDA. 89 
 
 Paaker stood over her in silence. 
 
 There are trees in the tropics, on which white 
 blossoms hang close by the withered fruit, there are 
 days when the pale moon shows itself near the clear 
 bright sun; and it is given to the soul of man to feel 
 love and hatred, both at the same time, and to direct 
 both to the same end. 
 
 Nefert's tears fell as dew, her sobs as manna on 
 the soul of Paaker, which hungered and thirsted for 
 revenge. Her pain was joy to him, and yet the sight 
 of her beauty filled him with passion, his gaze lingered 
 spell-bound on her graceful form; he would have given 
 all the bliss of heaven once, only once, to hold her in 
 his arms once, only once, to hear a word of love from 
 her lips. 
 
 After some minutes Nefert's tears grew less violent. 
 With a weary, almost indifferent gaze she looked ar 
 the Mohar, still standing before her, and said in a soft 
 tone of entreaty: 
 
 ' My tongue is parched, fetch me a little water." 
 
 "The princess may come out at any moment," re- 
 plied Paaker. 
 
 "But I am fainting," said Nefert, and began again 
 to cry gently. 
 
 Paaker shrugged his shoulders, and went farther 
 into the valley, which he knew as well as his father's 
 house; for in it was the tomb of his mother's ancestors, 
 in which, as a boy, he had put up prayers at every full 
 and new moon, and laid gifts on the altar. 
 
 The hut of the paraschites was prohibited to him, 
 but he knew that scarcely a hundred paces from the 
 spot where Nefert was sitting, lived an old woman of
 
 9 
 
 UARDA. 
 
 evil repute, in whose hole in the rock he could not 
 fail to find a drink of water. 
 
 He hastened forward, half intoxicated with all he 
 had seen and felt within the last few minutes. 
 
 The door, which at night closed the cave against 
 the intrusions of the plunder-seeking jackals, was wide 
 open, and the old woman sat outside under a ragged 
 piece of brown sail-cloth, fastened at one end to the 
 rock and at the other to two posts of rough wood. 
 She was sorting a heap of dark and light colored 
 roots, which lay in her lap. Near her was a wheel, 
 which turned in a high wooden fork. A wryneck 
 made fast to it by a little chain, and by springing from 
 spoke to spoke kept it in continual motion. A large 
 black cat crouched beside her, and smelt at some 
 ravens' and owls' heads, from which the eyes had not 
 long since been extracted. 
 
 Two sparrow-hawks sat huddled up over the door 
 of the cave, out of which came the sharp odor of 
 burning juniper-berries; this was intended to render 
 the various emanations rising from the different strange 
 substances, which were collected and preserved there, 
 innocuous. 
 
 As Paaker approached the cavern the old woman 
 called out to some one within 
 
 "Is the wax cooking?" 
 
 An unintelligible murmur was heard in answer. 
 
 "Then throw in the ape's eyes,* and the ibis- 
 feathers, and the scraps of linen with the black signs 
 on them. Stir it all a little; now put out the fire. 
 
 The enlcnce and mediums employed by the witches, according tn 
 pyna rod* which remain. I have availed myself of the Magic papyrus of 
 and of two in the Berlin collection, one of which is in Greek.
 
 UARDA. 91 
 
 Take the jug and fetch some water make haste, here 
 comes a stranger." 
 
 A sooty-black negro woman, with a piece of torn 
 colorless stuff hanging round her hips, set a large 
 clay jar on her grey woolly matted hair, and without 
 looking at him, went past Paaker, who was now close 
 to the cave. 
 
 The old woman, a tall figure bent with years, with 
 a sharply-cut and wrinkled face, that might once have 
 been handsome, made her preparations for receiving 
 the visitor by tying a gaudy kerchief over her head, 
 fastening her blue cotton garment round her throat, 
 and flinging a fibre mat over the birds' heads. 
 
 Paaker called out to her, but she feigned to be 
 deaf and not to hear his voice. Only when he stood 
 quite close to her, did she raise her shrewd, twinkling 
 eyes, and cry out: 
 
 "A lucky day! a white day that brings a noble 
 guest and high honor." 
 
 " Get up," commanded Paaker, not giving her any 
 greeting, but throwing a silver ring* among the roots 
 that lay in her lap, "and give me in exchange for 
 good money some water in a clean vessel." 
 
 " Fine pure silver," said the old woman, while she 
 held the ring, which she had quickly picked out from 
 the roots, close to her eyes; "it is too much for mere 
 water, and too little for my good liquors." 
 
 " Don't chatter, hussy, but make haste," cried Paaker, 
 taking another ring from his money-bag and throwing 
 it into her lap. 
 
 "Thou hast an open hand," said the old woman, 
 
 * The Egyptians had no coins before Alexander of Ptolemais, but used 
 metals for exchange, usually in the form of rings.
 
 g2 UAADA. 
 
 speaking in the dialect of the upper classes; "many 
 doors must be open to thee, for money is a pass-key 
 that turns any lock. Would'st thou have water for 
 thy good money? Shall it protect thee against noxious 
 beasts? shall it help thee to reach down a star? Shall 
 it guide thee to secret paths? It is thy duty to lead 
 the way. Shall it make heat cold, or cold warm? 
 Shall it give thee the power of reading hearts, or shall 
 it beget beautiful dreams? Wilt thou drink of the 
 water of knowledge and see whether thy friend or 
 thine enemy ha ! if thine enemy shall die ? Would'st 
 thou a drink to strengthen thy memory? Shall the water 
 make thee invisible? or remove the sixth toe from thy 
 left foot?" 
 
 "You know me?" asked Paaker. 
 
 "How should I?" said the old woman, "but my 
 eyes are sharp, and I can prepare good waters for great 
 and small." 
 
 "Mere babble!" exclaimed Paaker, impatiently 
 clutching at the whip in his girdle; "make haste, for 
 the lady for whom " 
 
 " Dost thou want the water for a lady ?" interrupted 
 the old woman. " Who would have thought it ? old men 
 certainly ask for my philters much oftener than young 
 ones, but I can serve thee." 
 
 With these words the old woman went into the 
 cave, and soon returned with a thin cylindrical flask 
 of alabaster in her hand. 
 
 "This is the drink," she said, giving the phial to 
 Paaker. " Pour half into water, and offer it to the lady. 
 If it does not succeed at first, it is certain the second 
 time. A child may drink the water and it will not 
 hurt him, or if an old man takes it, it makes him
 
 UARDA. 93 
 
 gay. Ah, I know the taste of it!" and she moistened 
 her lips with the white fluid. " It can hurt no one, but 
 I will take no more of it, or old Hekt will be tormented 
 with love and longing for thee; and that would ill 
 please the rich young lord, ha! ha! If the drink is in 
 vain I am paid enough, if it takes effect thou shalt 
 bring me three more gold rings; and thou wilt return, 
 I know it well." 
 
 Paaker had listened motionless to the old woman,, 
 and siezed the flask eagerly, as if bidding defiance to 
 some adversary; he put it in his money bag, threw a 
 few more rings at the feet of the witch, and once more 
 hastily demanded a bowl of Nile-water. 
 
 "Is my lord in such a Hurry?" muttered the old 
 woman, once more going into the cave. "He asks if I 
 know him ? him certainly I do ? but the darling ? who 
 can it be hereabouts? perhaps little Uarda at the 
 paraschites yonder. She is pretty enough; but she is 
 lying on a mat, run over and dying. We must see 
 what my lord means, He would have pleased me well 
 enough, if I were young; but he will reach the goal, 
 for he is resolute and spares no one." 
 
 While she muttered these and similar words, she 
 filled a graceful cup of glazed earthenware with filtered 
 Nile-water, which she poured out of a large porous 
 clay jar, and laid a laurel leaf, on which was scratched 
 two hearts linked together by seven strokes, on the 
 surface of the limpid fluid. Then she stepped out 
 into the air again. 
 
 As Paaker took the vessel from her hand, and 
 looked at tire laurel leaf, she said: 
 
 "This indeed binds hearts; three is the husband,
 
 94 
 
 r,v.<n.v. 
 
 four is the wife, seven is the indivisible. Chaach, 
 chachach, charcharachacha."* 
 
 The old woman sang this spell not without skill; 
 but the Mohar appeared not to listen to her jargon. 
 He descended carefully into the valley, and directed 
 his steps to the resting place of the wife of Mena. 
 
 By the side of a rock, which hid him from Nefert, 
 he paused, set the cup on a flat block of stone, and 
 drew the flask with the philter out of his girdle. 
 
 His fingers trembled, but a thousand voices within 
 seemed to surge up and cry 
 
 " Take it ! do it ! put in the drink ! now or never." 
 
 He felt like a solitary traveller, who finds on his 
 road the last will of a relation whose possessions he 
 had hoped for, but which disinherits him. Shall he 
 surrender it to the judge, or shall he destroy it. 
 
 Paaker was not merely outwardly devout; hitherto 
 he had in everything intended to act according to the 
 prescriptions of the religion of his fathers. Adultery 
 was a heavy sin; but had not he an older right to 
 Nefert than the king's charioteer? 
 
 He who followed the black arts of magic, should, 
 according to the law, be punished by death, and the 
 old woman had a bad name for her evil arts; but he 
 had not sought her for the sake of the philter. Was 
 it not possible that the Manes of his forefathers, that 
 the (iods themselves, moved by his prayers and offer- 
 ings, had put him in possession by an accident which 
 was almost a miracle of the magic potion whose 
 efficacy he never for an instant doubted? 
 
 I'aaker*s associates held him to be a man of quick 
 decision, and, in fact, in difficult cases he could act 
 
 Thb jargon i (bund in a magic-papyrua at Berlin.
 
 UARDA. 95 
 
 with unusual rapidity, but what guided him in these 
 cases, was not the swift- winged judgment of a pre- 
 pared and well-schooled brain, but usually only re- 
 sulted from the outcome of a play of question and 
 answer. 
 
 Amulets of the most various kinds hung round his 
 neck, and from his girdle, all consecrated by priests, 
 and of special sanctity or the highest efficacy. 
 
 There was the lapis lazuli eye, which hung to his 
 girdle by a gold chain; when he threw it on the 
 ground, so as to lie on the earth, if its engraved side 
 turned to heaven, and its smooth side lay on the 
 ground, he said "yes;" in the other case, on the con- 
 trary, "no." In his purse lay always a statuette of 
 the god Apheru,'* who opened roads; this he threw 
 down at cross roads, and followed the direction which 
 the pointed snout of the image indicated. He fre- 
 quently called into council the seal-ring of his deceased 
 father, an old family possession, which the chief 
 priest of Abydos had laid upon the holiest of the 
 fourteen graves of Osiris, and endowed with miraculous 
 power.** It consisted of a gold ring with a broad signet, 
 on which could be read the name of Thotmes III., who 
 had long since been deified, and from whom Paaker's 
 ancestors had derived it. If it were desirable to 
 cons.uk the ring, the Mohar touched with the point of 
 his bronze dagger the engraved sign of the name, 
 
 * A particular form of Anubis as was the jackal-headed local divinity of 
 Lykopolis, the modern Sint. 
 
 " Typhon cut the body of Osiris into fourteen pieces, and then strewed 
 them in Egypt. When Isis found one of them she erected a monument to her 
 husband. In later times none of these was reckoned more holy than that of 
 Abydos, whither also Egyptians of rank had their mummies conveyed to rest 
 in the vicinity of Osiris
 
 96 U>RDA. 
 
 below which were represented three objects sacred to 
 the Gods, and three that were, on the contrary, pro- 
 fane. If he hit one of the former, he concluded that 
 his father who was gone to Osiris concurred in his 
 design ; in the contrary case he was careful to postpone 
 it. Often he pressed the ring to his heart, and awaited 
 the first living creature that he might meet, regarding 
 it as a messenger from his father; if it came to him 
 from the right hand as an encouragement, if from the 
 left as a warning. 
 
 By degrees he had reduced these questionings to 
 a system. All that he found in nature he referred to 
 himself and the current of his life. It was at once 
 touching, and pitiful, to see how closely he lived with 
 the Manes of his dead. His lively, but not exalted 
 fancy, wherever he gave it play, presented to the eye 
 of his soul the image of his father and of an elder 
 brother who had died early, always in the same spot, 
 and almost tangibly distinct. 
 
 But he never conjured up the remembrance of the 
 beloved dead in order to think of them in silent 
 melancholy that sweet blossom of the thorny wreath 
 of sorrow; only for selfish ends. The appeal to the 
 Manes of his father he had found especially efficacious 
 in certain desires and difficulties; calling on the Manes 
 of his brother was potent in certain others; and so he 
 turned from one to the other with the precision of a 
 carpenter, who rarely doubts whether he should give 
 the preference to a hatchet or a saw. 
 
 These doings he held to be well pleasing to the 
 Gods, and as he was convinced that the spirits of his 
 dead had, after their justification, passed into Osiris 
 that is to say, as atoms forming part of the great
 
 UARDA. 97 
 
 world-soul, as this time had a share in the direction 
 of the universe he sacrificed to them not only in the 
 family catacomb, but also in the temples of the Necro- 
 polis dedicated to the worship of ancestors, and with 
 special preference in the House of Seti. 
 
 He accepted advice, nay even blame, from Ameni 
 and the other priests under his direction; and so lived 
 full of a virtuous pride in being one of the most 
 zealous devotees in the land, and one of the most 
 pleasing to the Gods, a belief on which his pastors 
 never threw any doubt. 
 
 Attended and guided at every step by supernatural 
 powers, he wanted no friend and no confidant. In 
 the field, as in Thebes, he stood apart, and passed 
 among his comrades for a reserved man, rough and 
 proud, but with a strong will. 
 
 He had the power of calling up the image of his 
 lost love with as much vividness as the forms of the 
 dead, and indulged in this magic, not only through a 
 hundred still nights, but in long rides and drives 
 through silent wastes. 
 
 Such visions were commonly followed by a vehe- 
 ment and boiling overflow of his hatred against the 
 charioteer, and a whole series of fervent prayers for 
 his destruction. 
 
 When Paaker set the cup of water for Nefert on 
 the flat stone and felt for the philter, his soul was so 
 full of desire that there was no room for hatred; still 
 he could not altogether exclude the idea that he 
 would commit a great crime by making use of a 
 magic drink. Before pouring the fateful drops into 
 the water, he would consult the oracle of the ring. 
 The dagger touched none of the holy symbols of the 
 
 Uarda. f. 7
 
 98 UARDA. 
 
 inscription on the signet, and in other circumstances 
 he would, without going any farther, have given up his 
 project. 
 
 But this time he unwillingly returned it to its 
 sheath, pressed the gold ring to his heart, muttered the 
 name of his brother in Osiris, and awaited the first 
 living creature that might come towards him. 
 
 He had not long to wait; from the mountain slope 
 opposite to him rose, with heavy, slow wing-strokes, 
 two light-colored vultures. 
 
 In anxious suspense he followed their flight, as 
 they rose, higher and higher. For a moment they 
 poised motionless, borne up by the air, circled round 
 each other, then wheeled to the left and vanished be- 
 hind the mountains, denying him the fulfilment of his 
 desire. 
 
 He hastily grasped the phial to fling it from him, 
 but the surging passion in his veins had deprived 
 him of his self-control. Nefert's image stood before him 
 as if beckoning him; a mysterious power clenched his 
 fingers close and yet closer round the phial, and with 
 the same defiance which he showed to his associates, 
 he poured half of the philter into the cup and ap- 
 proached his victim. 
 
 Nefert had meanwhile left her shady retreat and 
 come towards him. 
 
 She silently accepted the water he offered her, 
 and drank it with delight, to the very dregs. 
 
 "Thank you," she said, when she had recovered 
 breath after her eager draught. 
 
 "That has done me good! How fresh and acid the 
 water tastes; but your hand shakes, and you are heated 
 by your quick run for me poor man."
 
 UARDA. 
 
 99 
 
 With these words she looked at him with a peculiar 
 expressive glance of her large eyes, and gave him her 
 right hand, which he pressed wildly to his lips. 
 
 "That will do," she said smiling; "here conies the 
 princess with a priest, out of the hovel of the unclean. 
 With what frightful words you terrified me just now. 
 It is true I gave you just cause to be angry with me ; 
 but now you are kind again do you hear? and will 
 bring your mother again to see mine. Not a word. I 
 shall see, whether cousin Paaker refuses me obedi- 
 ence." 
 
 "She threatened him playfully with her finger, and 
 then growing grave she added, with a look that pierced 
 Paaker's heart with pain, and yet with ecstasy, "Let us 
 leave off quarrelling. It is so much better when people 
 are kind to each other." 
 
 After these words she walked towards the house of 
 the paraschites, while Paaker pressed his hands to his 
 breast, and murmured: 
 
 "The drink is working, and she will be mine. I 
 thank ye ye Immortals!" 
 
 But this thanksgiving, which hitherto he had never 
 failed to utter when any good fortune had befallen him, 
 to-day died on his lips. Close before him he saw the 
 goal of his desires ; there, under his eyes, lay the magic 
 spring longed for for years. A few steps farther, and he 
 might slake at its copious stream his thirst both for 
 love and for revenge. 
 
 While he followed the wife of Mena, and replaced 
 the phial carefully in his girdle, so as to lose no drop 
 of the precious fluid which, according to the prescription 
 of the old woman, he needed to use again, warning 
 voices spoke in his breast, to which he usually listened
 
 IOO UARDA. 
 
 as to a fatherly admonition; but at this moment he 
 mocked at them, and even gave outward expression to 
 the mood that ruled him for he flung up his right hand 
 like a drunken man, who turns away from the preacher 
 of morality on his way to the wine-cask; and yet passion 
 held him so closely ensnared, that the thought that he 
 should live through the swift moments which would 
 change him from an honest man into a criminal, hard- 
 ly dawned,darkly on his soul. He had hitherto dared 
 to indulge his desire for love and revenge in thought 
 only, and had left it to the Gods to act for themselves ; 
 now he had taken his cause out of the hand of the 
 Celestials, and gone into action without them, and in 
 spite of them. 
 
 The sorceress Hekt passed him ; she wanted to see 
 the woman for whom she had given him the philter. He 
 perceived her and shuddered, but soon the old woman 
 vanished among the rocks muttering. 
 
 " Look at the fellow with six toes. He makes himself 
 comfortable with the heritage of Assa." 
 
 In the middle of the valley walked Nefert and the 
 pioneer, with the princess Bent-Anat and Pentaur who 
 accompanied her. 
 
 When these two had come out of the hut of the 
 paraschites, they stood opposite each other in silence. 
 
 The royal maiden pressed her hand to her heart, 
 and, like one who is thirsty, drank in the pure air of 
 the mountain valley with deeply drawn breath; she felt 
 as if released from some overwhelming burden, as if 
 delivered from some frightful danger. 
 
 At last she turned to her companion, who gazed 
 earnestly at the ground. 
 
 "What an hour!" she said.
 
 UARDA. 1 01 
 
 Pentaur's tall figure did not move, but he bowed 
 his head in assent, as if he were in a dream. 
 
 Bent-Anat now saw him for the first time in full 
 daylight; her large eyes rested on him with admiration, 
 and she asked: 
 
 "Art thou the priest, who yesterday, after my first 
 visit to this house, so readily restored me to cleanness ?" 
 
 "I am he," replied Pentaur. 
 
 "I recognized thy voice, and I am grateful to thee, 
 for it was thou that didst strengthen my courage to 
 follow the impulse of my heart, in spite of my spiritual 
 guides, and to come here again. Thou wilt defend me 
 if others blame me." 
 
 "I came here to pronounce thee unclean." 
 
 "Then thou hast changed thy mind?" asked Bent- 
 Anat, and a smile of contempt curled her lips. 
 
 "I follow a high injunction, that commands us to 
 keep the old institutions sacred. If touching a paras- 
 chites, it is said, does not defile a princess, whom then 
 can it defile? for whose garment is more spotless than 
 hers?" 
 
 "But this is a good man with all his meanness," 
 interrupted Bent-Anat, "and in spite of the disgrace, 
 which is the bread of life to him as honor is to us. 
 May the nine great Gods forgive me! but he who is in 
 there is loving, pious and brave, and pleases me and 
 thou, thou, who didst think yesterday to purge away the 
 taint of his touch with a word what prompts thee to- 
 day to cast him with the lepers?" 
 
 "The admonition of an enlightened man, never to 
 give up any link of the old institutions; because 
 thereby the already weakened chain may be broken, 
 and fall rattling to the ground.' '
 
 101 UARDA. 
 
 "Then thou condemnest me to uncleanness for the 
 sake of an old superstition, and of the populace, but 
 not for my actions? Thou art silent? Answer me now, 
 if thou art such a one as I took thee for, freely and 
 sincerely; for it concerns the peace of my soul." 
 
 Pentaur breathed hard; and then from the depths 
 of his soul, tormented by doubts, these deeply-felt 
 words forced themselves as if wrung from him ; at first 
 softly, but louder as he went on. 
 
 "Thou dost compel me to say what I had better 
 not even think; but rather will I sin against obedience 
 than against truth, the pure daughter of the Sun, whose 
 aspect, Bent-Anat, thou dost wear. Whether the paras- 
 chites is unclean by birth or not, who am I that I 
 should decide ? But to me this man appeared as to 
 thee as one moved by the same pure and holy emo- 
 tions as stir and bless me and mine, and thee and 
 every soul born of woman ; and I believe that the im- 
 pressions of this hour have touched thy soul as well as 
 mine, not to taint, but to purify. If I am wrong, may 
 the many-named Gods forgive me, Whose breath lives 
 and works in the paraschites as well as in thee and me, 
 in Whom I believe, and to Whom I will ever address 
 my humble songs, louder and more joyfully, as I learn 
 that all that lives and breathes, that weeps and rejoices, 
 is the image of their sublime nature, and born to equal 
 joy and equal sorrow." 
 
 Pentaur had raised his eyes to heaven; now they 
 met the proud and joyful radiance of the princess' glance, 
 while she frankly offered him her hand. He humbly 
 kissed her robe, but she said : 
 
 " Nay not so. Lay thy hand in blessing on mine. 
 Thou art a man and a true priest. Now I can be satis-
 
 UARDA. 103 
 
 fied to be regarded as unclean, for my father also de- 
 sires that, by us especially, the institutions of the past 
 that have so long continued should be respected, for 
 the sake of the people. Let us pray in common to the 
 Gods, that these poor people may be released from the 
 old ban. How beautiful the world might be, if men 
 would but let man remain what the Celestials have 
 made him. But Paaker and poor Nefert are waiting in 
 the scorching sun come, follow me." 
 
 She went forward, but after a few steps she turned 
 round to him, and asked: 
 
 "What is thy name?" 
 
 "Pentaur." 
 
 "Thou then art the poet of the House of Seti?" 
 
 "They call me so." 
 
 Bent-Anat stood still a moment, gazing full at him 
 as at a kinsman whom we meet for the .first time face 
 to face, and said: 
 
 "The Gods have given thee great gifts, for thy 
 glance reaches farther and pierces deeper than that of 
 other men; and thou canst say in words what we can 
 only feel I follow thee willingly!" 
 
 Pentaur blushed like a boy, and said, while Paaker 
 and Nefert came nearer to them: 
 
 ' "Till to-day life lay before me as if in twilight; but 
 this moment shows it me in another light. I have seen 
 its deepest shadows; and," he added in a low tone 
 "how glorious its light can be."
 
 104 UARDA. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 AN hour later, Bent-Anat and her train of followers 
 stood before the gate of the House of Seti. 
 
 Swift as a ball thrown from a man's hand, a runner 
 had sprung forward and hurried on to announce the 
 approach of the princess to the chief priest. She stood 
 alone in her chariot, in advance of all her companions, 
 for Pentaur had found a place with Paaker. At the 
 gate of the temple they were met by the head of the 
 haruspices. 
 
 The great doors of the pylon were wide open, and 
 afforded a view into the forecourt of the sanctuary, 
 paved with polished squares of stone, and surrounded 
 on three sides with colonnades. The walls and archi- 
 traves, the pillars and the fluted cornice, which slightly 
 curved in over the court, were gorgeous with many- 
 colored figures and painted decorations. In the middle 
 stood a great sacrificial altar, on which burned logs of 
 cedar wood, whilst fragrant balls of Kyphi* were con- 
 sumed by the flames, filling the wide space with their 
 heavy perfume. Around, in semi-circular array, stood 
 more than a hundred white-robed priests, who all turned 
 to face the approaching princess, and sang heart-rend- 
 ing songs of lamentation. 
 
 Many of the inhabitants of the Necropolis had col- 
 lected on either side of the lines of sphinxes, between 
 which the princess drove up to the Sanctuary. But 
 
 Kyphi was a celebrated Egyptian incense. Recipes for its preparation 
 have been preserved in (he papyrus of Kbers, in the laboratories of the temples, 
 and tbtuhui. Parthry had three different varieties prepared by the chemist, 
 t. in Rerlin. Kyphi after the formula of UiosUrmdes was the best It 
 CMMMed of ram, wine, rad, galangac, juniper <>errics, the root of the 
 rush, Bsphalte, mastic, myrrh, Burgundy grapes, and honey.
 
 UARDA. 105 
 
 none asked what these songs of lamentation might sig- 
 nify, for about this sacred place lamentation and mystery 
 for ever lingered. "Hail to the child of Rameses!" 
 "All hail to the daughter of the Sun!" rang from a 
 thousand throats; and the assembled multitude bowed 
 almost to the earth at the approach f>f the royal 
 maiden. 
 
 At the pylon, the princess descended from her 
 chariot, and preceded by the chief of the haruspices, 
 who had gravely and silently greeted her, passed on to 
 the door of the temple. But as she prepared to cross 
 the forecourt, suddenly, without warning, the priests' 
 chant swelled to a terrible, almost thundering loudness, 
 the clear, shrill voice of the Temple scholars rising in 
 passionate lament, supported by the deep and threaten- 
 ing roll of the basses. 
 
 Bent-Anat started and checked her steps. Then 
 she walked on again. 
 
 But on the threshold of the door, Ameni, in full 
 pontifical robes, stood before her in the way, his crozier 
 extended as though to forbid her entrance. 
 
 "The advent of the daughter of Rameses in her 
 purity," he cried in loud and passionate tones, "augurs 
 blessing to this sanctuary; but this abode of the Gods 
 closes its portals on the unclean, be they slaves or 
 princes. In the name of the Immortals, from whom thou 
 art descended, I ask thee, Bent-Anat, art thou clean, 
 or hast thou, through the touch of the unclean, denied 
 thyself and contaminated thy royal hand?" 
 
 Deep scarlet flushed the maiden's cheeks, there was 
 a rushing sound in her ears as of a stormy sea surging 
 close beside her, and her bosom rose and fell in pas- 
 sionate emotion. The kingly blood in her veins boiled
 
 LARDA. 
 
 wildly ; she felt that an unworthy part had been assigned 
 to her in a carefully-premeditated scene; she forgot 
 her resolution to accuse herself of uncleanness, and 
 already her lips were parted in vehement protest against 
 the priestly assumption that so deeply stirred her to 
 rebellion, when Ameni, who placed himself directly 
 in front of the Princess, raised his eyes, and turned 
 them full upon her with all the depths of their indwell- 
 ing earnestness. 
 
 The words died away, and Bent-Anat stood silent, 
 but she endured the gaze, and returned it proudly and 
 defiantly. 
 
 The blue veins started in Ameni's forehead; yet he 
 repressed the resentment which was gathering like 
 thunder clouds in his soul, and said, with a voice that 
 gradually deviated more and more from its usual mod- 
 eration : 
 
 "For the second time the Gods demand through 
 me, their representative: Hast thou entered this holy 
 place in order that the Celestials may purge thee of 
 the defilement that stains thy body and soul ?" 
 
 " My father will communicate the answer to thee," 
 replied Bent-Anat shortly and proudly. 
 
 " Not to me," returned Ameni, "but to the Gods, in 
 whose name I now command thee to quit this sanctu- 
 ary, which is defiled by thy presence." 
 
 Bent-Anat's whole form quivered. " I will go " she 
 said with sullen dignity. 
 
 She turned to recross the gateway of the Pylon. 
 irst step her glance met the eye of the poet. 
 
 As one to whom it is vouchsafed to stand and gaze 
 at some great prodigy, so Pentaur had stood opposite 
 the royal maiden, uneasy and yet fascinated, agitated,
 
 UARDA. 107 
 
 yet with secretly uplifted soul. Her deed seemed to 
 him of boundless audacity, and yet one suited to her 
 true and noble nature. By her side, Ameni, his revered 
 and admired master, sank into insignificance; and when 
 she turned to leave the temple, his hand was raised in- 
 deed to hold her back, but as his glance met hers, his 
 hand refused its office, and sought instead to still the 
 throbbing of his overflowing heart. 
 
 The experienced priest, meanwhile, read the features 
 of these two guileless beings like an open book. A 
 quickly-formed tie, he felt, linked their souls, and the 
 look which he saw them exchange startled him. The 
 rebellious princess had glanced at the poet as though 
 claiming approbation for her triumph, and Pentaur's 
 eyes had responded to the appeal. 
 
 One instant Ameni paused. Then he cried: "Bent- 
 Anat!" 
 
 The princess turned to the priest, and looked at 
 him gravely and enquiringly. 
 
 Ameni took a step forward, and stood between her 
 and the poet. 
 
 "Thou wouldst challenge the Gods to combat," he 
 said sternly. "That is bold; but such daring it seems 
 to me has grown up in thee because thou canst count 
 on an ally, who stands scarcely farther from the Im- 
 mortals than I myself. Hear this: to thee, the mis- 
 guided child, much may be forgiven. But a servant of 
 the Divinity," and with these words he turned a threaten- 
 ing glance on Pentaur "a priest, who in the war of 
 free-will against law becomes a deserter, who forgets 
 his duty and his oath he will not long stand beside 
 thee to support thee, for he even though every God
 
 108 UARDA. 
 
 had blessed him with the richest gifts he is damned. 
 We drive him from among us, we curse him, we " 
 
 At these words Bent-Anat looked now at Ameni, 
 trembling with excitement, now at Pentaur standing 
 opposite to her. Her face was red and white by turns, 
 as light and shade chase each other on the ground when 
 at noon-day a palm-grove is stirred <by a storm. 
 
 The poet took a step towards her. 
 
 She felt that if he spoke it would be to defend all 
 that she had done, and to ruin himself. A deep 
 sympathy, a nameless anguish seized her soul, and 
 before Pentaur could open his lips, she had sunk slowly 
 down before Ameni, saying in low tones: 
 
 " I have sinned and defiled myself; thou hast said 
 it as Pentaur said it by the hut of the paraschites. 
 Restore me to cleanness, Ameni, for I am unclean." 
 
 Like a flame that is crushed out by a hand, so the 
 fire in the high-priest's eye was extinguished. Gracious- 
 ly, almost lovingly, he looked down on the princess, 
 blessed her and conducted her before the holy of holies, 
 there had clouds of incense wafted round her, anointed 
 her with the nine holy oils, and commanded her to re- 
 turn to the royal castle. 
 
 Yet, said he, her guilt was not expiated; she should 
 shortly learn by what prayers and exercises she might 
 attain once more to perfect purity before the Gods, 
 of whom he purposed to enquire in the holy place. 
 
 During all these ceremonies the priests stationed in 
 the forecourt continued their lamentations. 
 
 The people standing before the temple listened to the 
 priest's chant, and interrupted it from time to time with 
 ringing cries of wailing, for already a dark rumor of
 
 UARDA. 109 
 
 
 
 what was going on within had spread among the mul- 
 titude. 
 
 The sun was going down. The visitors to the 
 Necropolis must soon be leaving it, and Bent-Anat, for 
 whose appearance the people impatiently waited, would 
 not show herself. One and another said the princess 
 had been cursed, because she had taken remedies to 
 the fair and injured Uarda, who was known to many 
 of them. 
 
 Among the curious who had flocked together were 
 many embalmers, laborers, and humble folk, who lived 
 in the Necropolis. The mutinous and refractory tem- 
 per of the Egyptians, which brought such heavy suffer- 
 ing on them under their later foreign rulers, was 
 aroused, and rising with every minute. They reviled 
 the pride of the priests, and their senseless, worthless, 
 institutions. A drunken soldier, who soon reeled back 
 into the tavern which he had but just left, distinguished 
 himself as ring-leader, and was the first to pick up a 
 heavy stone to fling at the huge brass-plated temple- 
 gates. A few boys followed his example with shouts, 
 and law-abiding men even, urged by the clamor of 
 fanatical women, let themselves be led away to stone- 
 flinging and words of abuse. 
 
 Within the House of Seti the priests' chant went 
 on uninterruptedly; but at last, when the noise of the 
 crowd grew louder, the great gate was thrown open, 
 and with a solemn step Ameni, in full robes, and fol- 
 lowed by twenty pastophori who bore images of the 
 Gods and holy symbols on their shoulders Ameni 
 walked into the midst of the crowd. 
 
 All were silent.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 "Wherefore do you disturb our worship ?" he asked 
 loudly and calmly. 
 
 A roar of confused cries answered him, in which 
 the frequently repeated name of Bent-Anat could alone 
 be distinguished. 
 
 Ameni preserved his immoveable composure, and, 
 raising his crozier, he cried 
 
 "Make way for the daughter of Rameses, who 
 sought and has found purification from the Gods, who 
 behold the guilt of the highest as of the lowest among 
 you. They reward the pious, but they punish the 
 offender. Kneel down and let us pray that they may 
 forgive you, and bless both you and your children." 
 
 Ameni took the holy Sistrum* from one of the at- 
 tendant pastophori, and held it on high ; the priests 
 behind him raised a solemn hymn, and the crowd sank 
 on their knees ; nor did they move till the chant ceased 
 and the high-priest again cried out : 
 
 "The Immortals bless you by me their servant. 
 Leave this spot and make way for the daughter of. 
 Rameses." 
 
 With these words he withdrew into the temple, 
 and the patrol, without meeting with any opposition, 
 cleared the road guarded by Sphinxes which led to 
 the Nile. 
 
 As Bent-Anat mounted her chariot Ameni said : 
 "Thou art the child of kings. The house of thy 
 
 Codt Mv*,, n$miment "*^ h *. the E Wtnn* in the service of the 
 f "* CXtan , t J" M USC "'" S "iitarch describe, it cor-
 
 UARDA. Ill 
 
 father rests on the shoulders of the people. Loosen 
 the old laws which hold them subject, and the people 
 will conduct themselves like these fools." 
 
 Ameni retired. Bent-Anat slowly arranged the reins 
 in her hand, her eyes resting the while on the poet, 
 who, leaning against a door-post, gazed at her in 
 beatitude. She let her whip fall to the ground, that he 
 might pick it up and restore it to her, but he did not 
 observe it. A runner sprang forward and handed it 
 to the princess, whose horses started off, tossing them- 
 selves and neighing. 
 
 Pentaur remained as if spell-bound, standing by 
 the pillar, till the rattle of the departing wheels on 
 the flag-way of the Avenue of Sphinxes had altogether 
 died away, and the reflection of the glowing sunset 
 painted the eastern hills with soft and rosy hues. 
 
 The far-sounding clang of a brass gong roused the 
 poet from his ecstasy. It was the tomtom calling him 
 to duty, to the lecture on rhetoric which at this hour 
 he had to deliver to the young priests. He laid his 
 left hand to his heart, and pressed his right hand to 
 his forehead, as if to collect in its grasp his wandering 
 thoughts ; then silently and mechanically he went to- 
 wards the open court in which his disciples awaited 
 him. But instead of, as usual, considering on the way 
 the subject he was to treat, his spirit and heart were 
 occupied with the occurrences of the last few hours. 
 One image reigned supreme in his imagination, filling it 
 with delight it was that of the fairest woman, who, 
 radiant in her royal dignity and trembling with pride, 
 had thrown herself in the dust for his sake. He felt as 
 if her action had invested her whole being with a new 
 and princely worth, as if her glance had brought light
 
 112 UARDA. 
 
 to his inmost soul, he seemed to breathe a freer air, 
 to be borne onward on winged feet. 
 
 In such a mood he appeared before his hearers. 
 
 When he found himself confronting all the the well- 
 known faces, he remembered what it was he was 
 called upon to do. He supported himself against the 
 wall of the court, and opened the papyrus-roll handed 
 to him by his favorite pupil, the young Anana. It 
 was the book which twenty-four hours ago he had 
 promised to begin upon. He looked now upon the 
 characters that covered it, and felt that he was unable 
 to read a word. 
 
 \\ ith a powerful effort he collected himself, and 
 looking upwards tried to find the thread he had cut 
 at the end of yesterday's lecture, and intended to re- 
 sume to-day ; but between yesterday and to-day, as it 
 seemed to him, lay a vast sea whose roaring surges 
 stunned his memory and powers of thought. 
 
 His scholars, squatting cross-legged on reed mats 
 before him, gazed in astonishment on their silent 
 master who was usually so ready of speech, and looked 
 enquiringly at each other. A young priest whispered 
 to his neighbor, "He is praying " and Anana 
 noticed with silent anxiety the strong hand of his 
 teacher clutching the manuscript so tightly that the 
 slight material of which it consisted threatened to 
 split. 
 
 At last Pentaur looked down; he had found a 
 subject. While he was looking upwards his gaze fell 
 on the opposite wall, and the painted name of the 
 king with the accompanying title "the good God" met 
 his eye. Starting from these words he put this question
 
 UARDA. 113 
 
 to his hearers, " How do we apprehend the Goodness 
 of the Divinity?" 
 
 He challenged one priest after another to treat this 
 subject as if he were standing before his future con- 
 gregation. 
 
 Several disciples rose, and spoke with more or less 
 truth and feeling. At last it came- to Anana's turn, 
 who, in well-chosen words, praised the purpose-full 
 beauty of animate and inanimate creation, in which 
 the goodness of Amon,* of Ra,** and Ptah,*** as well 
 as of the other Gods, finds expression. 
 
 Pentaur listened to the youth with folded arms, 
 now looking at him enquiringly, now adding approba- 
 tion. Then taking up the thread of the discourse 
 when it was ended, he began himself to speak. 
 
 Like obedient falcons at the call of the falconer, 
 
 * Amon, that is to say, "the hidden one." He was the God of Thebes, which 
 was under his aegis, and after the Hyksos were expelled from the Nile-valley, 
 he was united with Ra of Heliopolis and endowed with the attributes of all the 
 remaining Gods. His nature was more and more spiritualized, till in the esoteric 
 
 which first enters on a higher order of existence through him. He was "benev- 
 olent," "beautiful," "without equal," and also was called the "annihilator 
 of evil" by which man expressed his reverence for the hidden power which 
 raises the good, and overthrows the wicked. He is recognized by the tall 
 double plume on his crown. He was represented with a ram's head as 
 Amon Chnem. 
 
 ** Ra, originally the Sun-God ; later his name was introduced into the 
 pantheistic mystic philosophy for that of the God who is the Universe. 
 
 *** Ptah is the Greek Hephaistos, the oldest of the Gods, the great maker 
 of the material for the creation, the "first beginner," by whose side the seven 
 Chnemu stand, as architects, to help him, and who was named "the lord of 
 truth," because the laws and conditions of being proceeded from him. He 
 created also the germ of light, he stood therefore at the head of the solar Gods, 
 and was called the creator of ice, from which, when he had cleft it, the sun 
 and the moon came forth. Hence his name "the opener." Memphis was the 
 centre of his worship, Apis his sacred animal. In the mysteries of the under- 
 world, and of immortality he appears usually under the name of Ptah Sokar 
 Osiris, who grants to the setting sun the power to rise again, as to the dead, 
 the power of resurrection. 
 
 Unrda. f, 8
 
 114 L'ARDA. 
 
 thoughts rushed down into his mind, and the divine 
 passion awakened in his breast glowed and shone 
 through his inspired language that soared every mo- 
 ment on freer and stronger wings. Melting into pathos, 
 exulting in rapture, he praised the splendor of nature; 
 and the words flowed from his lips like a limpid 
 crystal-clear stream as he glorified the eternal order or 
 things, and the incomprehensible wisdom and care ot 
 the Creator the One, who is one alone, and great and 
 without equal. 
 
 "So incomparable," he said in conclusion, "is the 
 home which God has given us. All that He the One 
 has created is penetrated with His own essence, and 
 bears witness to His Goodness. He who knows how to 
 find Him sees Him everywhere, and lives at every in- 
 stant in the enjoyment of His glory. Seek Him, and 
 when ye have found Him fall down and sing praises 
 before Him. But praise the Highest, not only in grati- 
 tude for the splendor of that which he has created, 
 but for having given us the capacity for delight in his 
 work. Ascend the mountain peaks and look on the 
 distant country, worship when the sunset glows with 
 rubies, and the dawn with roses, go out in the night- 
 time, and look at the stars as they travel in eternal, 
 unerring, immeasurable, and endless circles on silver 
 barks through the blue vault of heaven, stand by the 
 cradle of the child, by the buds of the flowers, and 
 see how the mother bends over the one, and the 
 bright dew-drops fall on the other. But would you 
 know where the stream of divine goodness is most 
 freely poured out, where the grace of the Creator be- 
 stows the richest gifts, and where His holiest altars 
 are prepared? In your own heart; so long as it is
 
 UARDA. 115 
 
 pure and full of love. In such a heart, nature is 
 reflected as in a magic mirror, on whose surface the 
 Beautiful shines in three-fold beauty. There the eye 
 can reach far away over stream, and meadow, and hill, 
 and take in the whole circle of the earth; there the 
 morning and evening-red shine, not like roses and 
 rubies, but like the very cheeks of the Goddess of 
 Beauty; there the stars circle on, not in silence, but 
 with the mighty voices of the pure eternal harmonies 
 of heaven; there the child smiles like an infant-god, 
 and the bud unfolds to magic flowers; finally, there 
 thankfulness grows broader and devotion grows deeper, 
 and we throw ourselves into the arms of a God, who 
 as I imagine his glory is a God to whom the 
 sublime nine great Gods pray as miserable and help- 
 less suppliants." 
 
 The tomtom which announced the end of the hour 
 interrupted him. 
 
 Pentaur ceased speaking with a deep sigh, and for 
 a minute not a scholar moved. 
 
 At last the poet laid the papyrus roll out of his 
 hand, wiped the sweat from his hot brow, and walked 
 slowly towards the gate of the court, which led into 
 the sacred grove of the temple. He had hardly crossed 
 the threshold when he felt a hand laid upon his 
 shoulder. 
 
 He looked round. Behind him stood Ameni. 
 
 "You fascinated your hearers, my friend," said the 
 high-priest, coldly; "it is a pity that only the harp was 
 wanting." 
 
 Ameni's words fell on the agitated spirit of the 
 poet like ice on the breast of a man in fever. He 
 knew this tone in his master's voice, for thus he was
 
 Il6 UARDA. 
 
 accustomed to reprove bad scholars and erring priests; 
 but to him he had never yet so spoken. 
 
 "It certainly would seem," continued the high- 
 priest, bitterly, "as if in your intoxication you had 
 forgotten what it becomes the teacher to utter in the 
 lecture-hall. Only a few weeks since you swore on m> 
 hands to guard the mysteries, and this day you have 
 offered the great secret of the Unnameable one, the 
 most sacred posession of the initiated, like some cheap 
 ware in the open market." 
 
 "Thou cuttest with knives," said Pentaur. 
 
 "May they prove sharp, and extirpate the un- 
 developed canker, the rank weed from your soul," cried 
 the high-priest. "You are young, too young; not like 
 the tender fruit-tree that lets itself be trained aright, 
 and brought to perfection, but like the green fruit on 
 the ground, which will turn to poison for the children 
 who pick it up yea even though it fall from a sacred 
 tree. Gagabu and I received you among us, against 
 the opinion of the majority of the initiated. We 
 gainsaid all those who doubted your ripeness because 
 of your youth; and you swore to me, gratefully and 
 enthusiastically, to guard the mysteries and the law. 
 To-day for the first time I set you on the battle-field 
 of life beyond the peaceful shelter of the schools. And 
 how have you defended the standard that it was in- 
 cumbent on you to uphold and maintain ? " 
 
 " I did that which seemed to me to be right and 
 true," answered Pentaur deeply moved. 
 
 "Right is the same for you as for us what the 
 law prescribes; and what is truth?" 
 
 "None has lifted her veil," said Pentaur, "but my 
 soul is the offspring of the soul-filled body of the All;
 
 UARDA. 117 
 
 a portion of the infallible spirit of the Divinity stirs in 
 my breast, and if it shows itself potent in me " 
 
 " How easily we may .mistake the flattering voice 
 of self-love for that of the Divinity!" 
 
 "Cannot the Divinity which works and speaks in 
 me as in thee as in each of us recognize himself 
 and his own voice?" 
 
 " If the crowd were to hear you," Ameni interrupted 
 him, "each would set himself on his little throne, 
 would proclaim the voice of the god within him as 
 his guide, tear the law to shreds, and let the frag- 
 ments fly to the desert on the east wind." 
 
 "I am one of the elect whom thou thyself hast 
 taught to seek and to find the One. The light which 
 I gaze on and am blest, would strike the crowd I do 
 not deny it with blindness " 
 
 "And nevertheless you blind our disciples with the 
 dangerous glare " 
 
 "I am educating them for future sages." 
 
 "And that with the hot overflow of a heart in- 
 toxicated with love!" 
 
 "Ameni!" 
 
 "I stand before you, uninvited, as your teacher, 
 who reproves you out of the law, which always 
 and everywhere is wiser than the the individual, whose 
 'defender' the king among his highest titles boasts 
 of being, and to which the sage bows as much as the 
 common man whom we bring up to blind belief I 
 stand before you as your father, who has loved you 
 from a child, and expected from none of his disciples 
 more than from you; and who will therefore neither 
 lose you nor abandon the hope he has set upon 
 you"
 
 Il8 UARDA. 
 
 "Make ready to leave our quiet house early to- 
 morrow morning. Vou have forfeited your office of 
 teacher. You shall now go into the school of life, and 
 make yourself fit for the honored rank of the initiated 
 which, by my error, was bestowed on you too soon. 
 You must leave your scholars without any leave-ta- 
 king, however hard it may appear to you. After the 
 star of Sothis* has risen come for your instructions. 
 You must in these next months try to lead the priest- 
 hood in the temple of Hatasu, and in that post to 
 win back my confidence which you have thrown away. 
 No remonstrance; to-night you will receive my bless- 
 ing, and our authority you must greet the rising sun 
 from the terrace of the new scene of your labors. 
 May the Unnameable stamp the law upon your soul!" 
 
 Ameni returned to his room. 
 
 He walked restlessly to and fro. 
 
 On a little table lay a mirror; he looked into the 
 clear metal pane, and laid it back in its place again, 
 as if he had seen some strange and displeasing coun- 
 tenance. 
 
 The events of the last few hours had moved him 
 deeply, and shaken his confidence in his unerring judg- 
 ment of men and things. 
 
 The priests on the other bank of the Nile were 
 Bent-Anat's counsellors, and he had heard the princess 
 spoken of as a devout and gifted maiden. Her in- 
 cautious breach of the sacred institutions had seemed 
 
 The holy star of I sis. Sinus or the dog star, whose course in the time of 
 fhe Pharaohs coincided with the exact Solar year, and served at a very early 
 date as a txindaooo for the reckoning of time among the Egyptians. 
 

 
 UARDA. 119 
 
 to him to offer a welcome opportunity for humiliating 
 a member of the royal family. 
 
 Now he told himself that he had undervalued this 
 young creature, that he had behaved clumsily, perhaps 
 foolishly, to her; for he did not for a moment conceal 
 from himself that her sudden change of demeanor 
 resulted much more from the warm flow of her sym- 
 pathy, or perhaps of her affection, than from any 
 recognition of her guilt, and he could not utilize her 
 transgression with safety to himself, unless she felt her- 
 self guilty. 
 
 Nor was he of so great a nature as to be wholly 
 free from vanity, and his vanity had been deeply 
 wounded by the haughty resistance of the princess. 
 
 When he commanded Pentaur to meet the princess 
 with words of reproof, he had hoped to awaken his 
 ambition through the proud sense of power over the 
 mighty ones of the earth. 
 
 And now? 
 
 How had his gifted admirer, the most hopeful of 
 all his disciples, stood the test. 
 
 The one ideal of his life, the unlimited dominion 
 of the priestly idea over the minds of men, and of 
 the priesthood over the king himself, had hitherto 
 remained unintelligible to this singular young man. 
 
 He must learn to understand it. 
 
 " Here, as the least among a hundred who are his 
 superiors, all the powers of resistance of his soaring 
 soul have been roused," said Ameni to himself. " In 
 the temple of Hatasu he will have to rule over the 
 inferior orders of slaughterers of victims and incense- 
 burners; and, by requiring obedience, will learn to
 
 120 URDA. 
 
 estimate the necessity of it. The rebel, to whom a 
 throne devolves, becomes a tyrant!" 
 
 "Pentaur's poet soul," so he continued to reflect 
 "has quickly yielded itself a prisoner to the charm of 
 Bent-Anat; and what woman could resist this highly- 
 favored being, who is radiant in beauty as Ra-Har- 
 machis, and from whose lips flows speech as sweet as 
 Techuti's. They ought never to meet again, for no tie 
 must bind him to the house of Rameses." 
 
 Again he paced to and fro, and murmured: 
 
 "How is this? Two of my disciples have towered 
 above their fellows, in genius and gifts, like palm-trees 
 above the under-growth. I brought them up to suc- 
 ceed me, to inherit my labors and my hopes. 
 
 "Mesu* fell away; and Pentaur may follow him. 
 
 " Must my aim be an unworthy one because it does 
 not attract the noblest? Not so. Each feels himself 
 made of better stuff than his companions in destiny, 
 constitutes his own law, and fears to see the great ex- 
 pended in trifles; but I think otherwise; like a brook 
 of ferruginous water from Lebanon, I mix with the 
 great stream, and tinge it with my color." 
 
 Thinking thus Ameni stood still. 
 
 Then he called to one of the so-called "holy 
 fathers," his private secretary, and said 
 
 "Draw up at once a document, to be sent to all 
 the priests'-colleges in the land. Inform them that the 
 daughter of Rameses has lapsed seriously from the law, 
 and defiled herself, and direct that public you hear 
 me, public prayers shall be put up for her purification 
 
 Mesu t the Egyptian name of Mnnc*. whom we may consider a a con- 
 Haponu-j of VMIMM, under wboM UOOCMOT the exodui of the Jcwi from 
 
 i ,
 
 UARDA. 121 
 
 in every temple. Lay the letter before me to be 
 signed within an hour. But no ! Give me your reed 
 and palette; I will myself draw up the instructions." 
 
 The "holy father" gave him writing materials, and 
 retired into the background. Ameni muttered : " The 
 King will do us some unheard-of violence! Well, this 
 Avriting may be the first arrow in opposition to his 
 lance." 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE moon was risen over the city of the living 
 that lay opposite the Necropolis of Thebes. 
 
 The evening song had died away in the temples, 
 that stood about a mile from the Nile, connected with 
 each other by avenues of spinxes and pylons; but in 
 the streets of the city life seemed only just really 
 awake. 
 
 The coolness, which had succeeded the heat of the 
 summer day, tempted the citizens out into the air, in 
 front of their doors or on the roofs and turrets of their 
 houses ; or at the tavern-tables, where they listened to 
 the tales of the story-tellers while they refreshed them- 
 selves with beer, wine, and the sweet juice of fruits. 
 Many simple folks squatted in circular groups on the 
 ground, and joined in the burden of songs which were 
 led by an appointed singer, to the sound of a tabor 
 and flute. 
 
 To the south of the temple of Amon stood the 
 king's palace, and near it, in more or less extensive 
 gardens, rose the houses of the magnates of the king- 
 dom, among which, one was distinguished by its 
 splendor and extent.
 
 122 UAVDA. 
 
 Paaker, the king's pioneer, had caused it to be 
 erected after the death of his father, in the place of 
 the more homely dwelling of his ancestors, when he 
 hoped to bring home his cousin, and install her as its 
 mistress. 
 
 A few yards further to the west was another stately 
 though older and less splendid house, which Mena, 
 the king's charioteer, had inherited from his father, 
 and which was inhabited by his wife Nefert and her 
 mother Katuti, while he himself, in the distant Syrian 
 land, shared the tent of the king, as being his body 
 guard. 
 
 Before the door of each house stood servants bear- 
 ing torches, and awaiting the long deferred return 
 home of their masters. 
 
 The gate, which gave admission to Paaker's plot of 
 ground through the wall which surrounded it, was 
 disproportionately, almost ostentatiously, high and dec- 
 orated with various paintings. On the right hand 
 and on the left, two cedar-trunks were erected as masts 
 to carry standards; he had had them felled for the 
 purpose on Lebanon, and forwarded by ship to Pelu- 
 sium on the north-east coast of Egypt. Thence they 
 were conveyed by the Nile to Thebes. 
 
 On passing through the gate one entered a wide, 
 paved courtyard,* at the sides of which walks ex- 
 tended, closed in at the back, and with roofs sup- 
 ported on slender painted wooden columns. Here 
 stood the pioneer's horses and chariots, here dwelt his 
 slaves, and here the necessary store of produce for the 
 month's requirements was kept. 
 
 The inheritance of Paaker it described from the beautiful pictures of 
 home* and building* in the tomb* of Td el Anurna (represented in Ixrpsiu*' 
 OWMMote of Egypt). To own a garden was considered particularly lucky. 

 
 UARDA. 123 
 
 In the farther wall of this store-court was a very 
 high doorway, that led into a large garden with rows 
 of well-tended trees and trellised vines, clumps of 
 shrubs, flowers, and beds of vegetables. Palms, syca- 
 mores, and acacia-trees, figs, pomegranates, and jasmine 
 throve here particularly well for Paaker's mother, Set- 
 chem, superintended the labors of the gardeners; and 
 in the large tank in the midst there was never any 
 lack of water for watering the beds and the roots of 
 the trees, as it was always supplied by two canals, 
 into which wheels turned by oxen poured water day 
 and night from the Nile-stream. 
 
 On the right side of this plot of ground rose the 
 one-storied dwelling house, its length stretching into 
 distant perspective, as it consisted of a single row of 
 living and bedrooms. Almost every room had its own 
 door, that opened into a veranda supported by colored 
 wooden columns, and which extended the whole length 
 of the garden side of the house. This building was 
 joined at a right angle by a row of store-rooms, in 
 which the garden-produce in fruits and vegetables, the 
 wine-jars, and the possessions of the house in woven 
 stuffs, skins, leather, and other property were kept. 
 
 In a chamber of strong masonry lay safely locked 
 up the vast riches accumulated by Paaker's father 
 and by himself, in gold and silver rings, vessels and 
 figures of beasts. Nor was there lack of bars of copper 
 and of precious stones, particularly of lapis-lazuli and 
 malachite. 
 
 In the middle of the garden stood a handsomely 
 decorated kiosk, and a chapel with images of the Gods; 
 in the background stood the statues of Paaker's ancestors
 
 124 UAilDA* 
 
 in the form of Osiris wrapped in mummy-cloths.* The 
 faces, which were likenesses, alone distinguished these 
 statues from each other. 
 
 The left side of the store-yard was veiled in gloom, 
 yet the moonlight revealed numerous dark figures 
 clothed only with aprons, the slaves of the king's 
 pioneer, who squatted on the ground in groups of five 
 or six, or lay near each other on thin mats of palm- 
 bast, their hard beds. 
 
 Not far from the gate, on the right side of the 
 court, a few lamps lighted up a group of dusky men, 
 the officers of Paaker's household, who wore short, 
 shirt-shaped, white garments, and who sat on a carpet 
 round a table hardly two feet high. They were eating 
 their evening-meal, consisting of a roasted antelope, 
 and large flat cakes of bread. Slaves waited on them, 
 and filled their earthen beakers with yellow beer. The 
 steward cut up the great roast on the table, offered 
 the intendant of the gardens a piece of antelope-leg, 
 and said: 
 
 The justified dead became Osiris : that is to say. attained to the fullest 
 (Henotis) with the divinity. The Osiris-myth has been restored in all 
 it* parts from the- literary remains of .he Egyptians. Plutarch records it in 
 detail. Omitting minor matter* it is as follows. IMS and Osiris reigned blissful 
 and benignant in the Nile valley : Typhon (Seth) induced Osiris to lay himself 
 in a cheat, locked it with his 70 companions, and set it on the Nile, which 
 carried k north, to the sea. It was cast on shore at Byblos. IMS sought it 
 f found it. and brought it back to Egypt While she was seeking f-r 
 , Typhon (buna the body, cut it into fourteen parts, and strewed 
 Ntt toe land. Horn* having meanwhile grown up, fights with 
 Typhon, and conquers him, and restores to his mother her husband, and to his 
 ng hi* apparent death had continued to reign in the under 
 
 ld hi* earthly throne ThU fanciful myth personified not only the cycle 
 ifc of 
 The 
 drought, the light of the sun from darkness; man passes through 
 
 of th vegetative ifc of the eart 
 the human soul The procreati 
 come from drought, the light o 
 
 the earth, but also the path of the sun, and the fate of 
 ve ower of nature, and the overflow of the Nile 
 
 to ifc, the principle of good comes from evil. Truth appears to he 
 JaattuinJ by lie* : yet each triumphs in the spring (the time of the mun ; 
 fane manias in the other world or in the day of retribution as Osiris 
 conquered through norm.
 
 UARDA. 125 
 
 " My arms ache ; the mob of slaves get more and 
 more dirty and refractory." 
 
 " I notice it in the palm-trees," said the gardener, 
 " you want so many cudgels that their crowns will soon 
 be as bare as a moulting bird." 
 
 " We should do as the master does," said the head- 
 groom, " and get sticks of ebony they last a hundred 
 years." 
 
 "At any rate longer than men's bones," laughed 
 the chief neat-herd, who had come in to town from 
 the pioneer's country estate, bringing with him animals 
 for sacrifices, butter and cheese. " If we were all to 
 follow the master's example, we should soon have none 
 but cripples in the servant's house." 
 
 " Out there lies the lad whose collar-bone he 
 broke yesterday," said the steward, " it is a pity, for 
 he was a clever mat-plaiter. The old lord hit softer." 
 
 " You ought to know !" cried a small voice, that 
 sounded mockingly behind the feasters. 
 
 They looked and laughed when they recognized 
 the strange guest, who had approached them unob- 
 served. 
 
 The new comer was a deformed little man about 
 as big as a five-year-old boy, with a big head and 
 oldish but uncommonly sharply-cut features. 
 
 The noblest Egyptians kept house-dwarfs for sport, 
 and this little wight served the wife of Mena in this 
 capacity. He was called Nemu, or " the dwarf," and 
 his sharp tongue made him much feared, though he 
 was a favorite, for he passed for a very clever 
 fellow and was a good tale-teller. 
 
 " Make room for me, my lords," said the little 
 man. " I take very little room, and your beer and
 
 1 26 UARDA. 
 
 roast is in little danger from me, for my maw is no 
 bigger than a fly's head." 
 
 " But your gall is as big as that of a Nile-horse," 
 cried the cook. 
 
 " It grows," said the dwarf laughing, " when a 
 turn-spit and spoon-wielder Jike you turns up. There 
 I will sit here." 
 
 " You are welcome," said the steward, " what do 
 you bring ?" 
 
 " Myself." 
 
 " Then you bring nothing great." 
 
 " Else I should not suit you either !" retorted the 
 dwarf. " But seriously, my lady mother, the noble 
 Katuti, and the Regent, who just now is visiting us, 
 sent me here to ask you whether Paaker is not yet 
 returned. He accompanied the princess and Nefert 
 to the City of the Dead, and the ladies are not yet 
 come in. We begin to be anxious, for it is already 
 late." 
 
 The steward looked up at the starry sky and 
 said : " The moon is already tolerably high, and my 
 lord meant to be home before sun-down." 
 
 " The meal was ready," sighed the cook. " I shall 
 have to go to work again if he does not remain out 
 all night." 
 
 " How should he ?" asked the steward. " He is 
 with the princess Bent-Anat" 
 
 "And my mistress," added the dwarf. 
 
 " What will they say to each other," laughed the 
 gardener ; " your chief litter-bearer declared that yester- 
 day on the way to the City of the Dead they did not 
 speak a word to each other." 
 
 "Can you blame the lord if he is angry with the
 
 UARDA. 127 
 
 lady who was betrothed to him, and then was wed to 
 another ? When I think of. the moment when he 
 learnt Nefert's breach of faith I turn hot and cold." 
 
 " Care the less for that," sneered the dwarf, " since 
 you must be hot in summer and cold in'winter." 
 
 " It is not evening all day," cried the head groom. 
 " Paaker never forgets an injury, and we shall live to 
 see him pay Mena high as he is for the affront 
 he has offered him. 
 
 " My lady Katuti,'' interrupted Nemu, " stores up 
 the arrears of her son-in-law." 
 
 " Besides, she has long wished to renew the old 
 friendship with your house, and the Regent too 
 preaches peace. Give me a piece of bread, steward. 
 I am hungry !" 
 
 " The sacks, into which Mena's arrears flow, seem 
 to be empty," laughed the cook. 
 
 " Empty ! empty ! much like your wit !" answered 
 the dwarf. "Give me a bit of roast meat, steward; 
 and you slaves bring me a drink of beer." 
 
 " You just now said your maw was no bigger than 
 a fly's head," cried the cook, " and now you devour 
 meat like the crocodiles in the sacred tank of Seeland.* 
 You must come from a world of upside-down, where 
 the men are as small as flies, and the flies as big as 
 the giants of the past." 
 
 " Yet, I might be much bigger," mumbled the 
 dwarf while he munched on unconcernedly, " perhaps 
 as big as your spite which grudges me the third bit of 
 meat, which the steward may Zefa** bless him with 
 
 * The modern Fayoum, where, in the temple of the God Sebek, sacred 
 crocodiles were kept and decorated, and expensively fed. 
 ** Zefa, the goddess of the inundation.
 
 128 UARDA. 
 
 great possessions ! is cutting out of the back of the 
 antelope." 
 
 " There, take it, you glutton, but let out your girdle," 
 said the steward laughing, "I had cut the slice for 
 myself, and admire your sharp nose." 
 
 " Ah noses," said the dwarf, " they teach the know- 
 ing better than any haruspex what is inside a man." 
 
 " How is that ?" cried the gardener. 
 
 "Only try to display your wisdom," laughed the 
 steward; for, if you want to talk, you must at last 
 leave off eating." 
 
 "The two may be combined," said the dwarf. 
 " Listen then ! A hooked nose, which I compare to a 
 vulture's beak, is never found together with a sub- 
 missive spirit. Think of the Pharaoh and all his 
 haughty race. The Regent, on the contrary, has a 
 straight, well-shaped, medium-sized nose, like the 
 statue of Amon in the temple, and he is an upright 
 soul, and as good as the Gods. He is neither over- 
 bearing nor submissive beyond just what is right ; he 
 holds neither with the great nor yet with the mean, 
 but with men of our stamp. There's the king 
 for us !" 
 
 "A king of noses!" exclaimed the cook, " I prefer 
 the eagle Rameses. But what do you say to the nose 
 of your mistress Nefert ?" 
 
 "It is delicate and slender and moves with every 
 thought like the leaves of flowers in a breath of wind, 
 and her heart is exactly like it." 
 
 " And Paaker ?" asked the head groom. 
 
 " He has a large short nose with wide open nostrils. 
 When Seth whirls up the sand, and a grain of it flies
 
 UARDA. 129 
 
 up his nose, he waxes angry so it is Paaker's nose, 
 and that only, which is answerable for all your blue 
 bruises. His mother Setchem, the sister of my lady 
 Katuti, has a little roundish soft " 
 
 " You pigmy," cried the steward interrupting the 
 speaker, " we have fed you and let you abuse people 
 to your heart's content, but if you wag your sharp 
 tongue against our mistress, I will take you by the 
 girdle and fling you to the sky, so that the stars may 
 remain sticking to your crooked hump." 
 
 At these words the dwarf rose, turned to go, and 
 said indifferently : " I would pick the stars carefully 
 off my back, and send you the finest of the planets 
 in return for your juicy bit of roast. But here come 
 the chariots. Farewell! my lords, when the vulture's 
 beak seizes one of you and carries you off to the war 
 in Syria, remember the words of the little Nemu who 
 knows men and noses." 
 
 The pioneer's chariot rattled through the high 
 gates into the court of his house, the dogs in their 
 leashes howled joyfully, the head groom hastened 
 towards Paaker and took the reins in his charge, the 
 steward accompanied him, and the head cook retired 
 into the kitchen to make ready a fresh meal for his 
 master. 
 
 Before Paaker had reached the garden-gate, from 
 the pylon of the enormous temple of Amon, was heard 
 first the far-sounding clang of hard-struck plates of 
 brass, and then the many-voiced chant of a solemn 
 hymn. 
 
 The Mohar stood still, looked up to heaven, called 
 
 t/arda, I. g
 
 130 UARDA. 
 
 to his servants- "The divine star Sothis is risen!" 
 threw himself on the earth, and lifted his arms to- 
 wards the star in prayer. 
 
 The slaves and officers immediately followed his 
 example. 
 
 No circumstance in nature remained unobserved 
 by the priestly guides of the Egyptian people. Every 
 phenomenon on earth or in the starry heavens was 
 greeted by them as the manifestation of a divinity, 
 and they surrounded the life of the inhabitants of the 
 Nile- valley from morning to evening from the be- 
 ginning of the inundation to the days of drought with 
 a web of chants and sacrifices, of processions and 
 festivals, which inseparably knit the human individual 
 \o the Divinity and its earthly representatives the 
 priesthood. 
 
 For many minutes the lord and his servants re- 
 mained on their knees in silence, their eyes fixed on 
 the sacred star, and listening to the pious chant of 
 the priests. 
 
 As it died away Paaker rose. All around him 
 still lay on the earth ; only one naked figure, strongly 
 lighted by the clear moonlight, stood motionless by a 
 pillar near the slaves' quarters. 
 
 The pioneer gave a sign, the attendants rose; but 
 Paaker went with hasty steps to the man who had 
 disdained the act of devotion, which he had so earn- 
 estly performed, and cried : 
 
 " Steward, a hundred strokes on the soles of the 
 feet of this scoffer." 
 
 The officer thus addressed bowed and said : " My 
 lord, the surgeon commanded the mat-weaver not to
 
 UARDA. 131 
 
 move, and he cannot lift his arm. He is suffering 
 great pain. Thou didst break his collar-bone yester- 
 day." 
 
 " It served him right !" said Paaker, raising his voice 
 so much that the injured man could not fail to hear it. 
 Then he turned his back upon him, and entered the 
 garden ; here he called the chief butler, and said : " Give 
 the slaves beer for their night draught to all of them, 
 and plenty." 
 
 A few minutes later he stood before his mother, 
 whom he found on the roof of the house, which was 
 decorated with leafy plants, just as she gave her two- 
 years'-old grand daughter, the child of her youngest son, 
 into the arms of her nurse, that she might take her 
 to bed. 
 
 Paaker greeted the worthy matron with reverence. 
 
 She was a woman of a friendly, homely aspect; 
 several little dogs were fawning at her feet." Her son 
 put aside the leaping favorites of the widow, whom 
 they amused through many long hours of loneliness, 
 and turned to take the child in his arms from those of 
 the attendant. But the little one struggled with such 
 loud cries, and could not be pacified, that Paaker set it 
 down on the ground, and involuntarily exclaimed: 
 
 " The naughty little thing !" 
 
 " She has been sweet and good the whole after- 
 noon," said his mother Setchem. " She sees you so 
 seldom." 
 
 ' " May be," replied Paaker ; " still I know this the 
 dogs love me, but no child will come to me." 
 
 " You have such hard hands." 
 
 " Take the squalling brat away," said Paaker to the 
 nurse. " Mother, I want to speak to you." 
 
 <>* .
 
 132 VARDA. 
 
 Setchem quieted the child, gave it many kisses, and 
 sent it to bed ; then she went up to her son, stroked 
 his cheeks, and said : 
 
 " If the little one were your own, she would go to 
 you at once, and teach you that a child is the greatest 
 blessing which the Gods bestow on us mortals." 
 
 Paaker smiled and said: "I know what you are 
 aiming at but leave it for the present, for I have 
 something important to communicate to you." 
 
 " Well ?" asked Setchem. 
 
 "To-day for the first time since you know when, 
 I have spoken to Nefert. The past may be forgotten. 
 You long for your sister; go to her, I have nothing more 
 to say against it." 
 
 Setchem looked at her son with undisguised aston- 
 ishment; her eyes which easily filled with tears, now 
 overflowed, and she hesitatingly asked : " Can I believe 
 my ears ; child, have you ? " 
 
 " I have a wish," said Paaker firmly," that you should 
 knit once more the old ties of affection with your rela- 
 tions; the estrangement has lasted long enough." 
 
 " Much too long !" cried Setchem. 
 
 The pioneer looked in silence at the ground, and 
 obeyed his mother's sign to sit down beside her. 
 
 " I knew," she said, taking his hand, " that this day 
 would bring us joy ; for I dreamt of your father in Osiris, 
 and when I was being carried to the temple, I was met, 
 first by a white cow, and then by a wedding procession. 
 The white ram of Amon, too, touched the wheat-cakes 
 that I offered him."* 
 
 It boded death to Gemunicu* when the Apii refused to eat out of his
 
 UARDA. 133 
 
 "Those are lucky presages," said Paaker in a tone 
 of conviction. 
 
 "And let us hasten to seize with gratitude that 
 which the Gods set before us," cried Setchem with joy- 
 ful emotion. " I will go to-morrow to my sister and tell 
 her that we shall live together in our old affection, and 
 share both good and evil; we are both of the same 
 race, and I know that, as order and cleanliness preserve 
 a house from ruin and rejoice the stranger, so nothing 
 but unity can keep up the happiness of the family and 
 its appearance before people. What is bygone is by- 
 gone, and let it be forgotten. There are many women 
 in Thebes besides Nefert, and a hundred nobles in the 
 land would esteem themselves happy to win you for a 
 son-in-law." 
 
 Paaker rose, and began thoughtfully pacing the 
 broad space, while Setchem went on speaking. 
 
 " I know," she said, " that I have touched a wound 
 in thy heart; but it is already closing, and it will heal 
 when you are happier even than the charioteer Mena, 
 and need no longer hate him. Nefert is good, but she 
 is delicate and not clever, and scarcely equal to the 
 management of so large a household as ours. Ere long 
 I too shall be wrapped in mummy-cloths, and then if 
 duty calls you into Syria some prudent housewife must 
 take my place. It is no small matter. Your grand- 
 father Assa often would say that a house well-conducted 
 in every detail was a mark of a family owning an un- 
 spotted name, and living with wise liberality and se- 
 cure solidity, in which each had his assigned place, his 
 allotted duty to fulfil, and his fixed rights to demand. 
 How often have I prayed to the Hathors that they may 
 send you a wife after my own heart."
 
 1 34 UARDA. 
 
 "A Setchem I shall never find!" said Paaker kiss- 
 ing his mother's forehead, "women of your sort are dy- 
 ing out." 
 
 "Flatterer!" laughed Setchem, shaking her finger at 
 her son. But it is true. Those who are now growing 
 up dress and smarten themselves with stuffs from Kaft,* 
 mix their language with Syrian words, and leave the 
 steward and housekeeper free when they themselves 
 ought to command. Even my sister Katuti, and Ne- 
 fert 
 
 " Nefert is different from other women," interrupted 
 Paaker, "and if you had brought her up she would 
 know how to manage a house as well as how to orna- 
 ment it." 
 
 Setchem looked at her son in surprise; then she 
 said, half to herself: "Yes, yes, she is a sweet child; it 
 is impossible for any one to be angry with her who 
 looks into her eyes. And yet I was cruel to her be- 
 cause you were hurt by her, and because but you 
 know. But now you have forgiven, I forgive her, 
 willingly; her and her husband." 
 
 Paaker's brow clouded, and while he paused in front 
 of his mother he said with all the peculiar harshness of 
 his voice : 
 
 " He shall pine away in the desert, and the hyaenas 
 of the North shall tear his unburied corpse." 
 
 At these words Setchem covered her face with her 
 veil, and clasped her hands tightly over the amulets 
 hanging round her neck. Then she said softly: 
 
 "How terrible you can be! I know well that you 
 hate the charioteer, for I have seen the seven arrows 
 over your couch over which is written ' Death to Mena.' 
 
 Phoenicia.
 
 UARDA. 135 
 
 That is a Syrian charm which a man turns against any 
 one whom he desires to destroy. How black you look ! 
 Yes, it is a charm that is hateful to the Gods, and that 
 gives the evil one power over him that uses it. Leave 
 it to them to punish the criminal, for Osiris withdraws 
 his favor from those who choose the fiend for their 
 ally." 
 
 "My sacrifices," replied Paaker, "secure me the 
 favor of the Gods; but Mena behaved to me like a 
 vile robber, and I only return to him the evil that be- 
 longs to him. Enough of this! and if you love me, never 
 again utter the name of my enemy before me. I have 
 forgiven Nefert and her mother that may satisfy 
 you." 
 
 Setchem shook her head, and said : " What will it 
 lead to ! The war cannot last for ever, and if Mena 
 returns the reconciliation of to-day will turn to all the 
 more bitter enmity. I see only one remedy. Follow 
 my advice, and let me find you a wife worthy of 
 you." 
 
 " Not now !" exclaimed Paaker impatiently. " In a 
 few days I must go again into the enemy's country, and 
 do not wish to leave my wife, like Mena, to lead the 
 life of a widow during my . existence. Why urge it ? 
 my brother's wife and children are with you that might 
 satisfy you." 
 
 " The Gods know how I love them," answered Set- 
 chem ; " but your brother Horus is the younger, and 
 you the elder, to whom the inheritance belongs. Your 
 little niece is a delightful plaything, but in your son I 
 should see at once the future stay of our race, the fu- 
 ture head of the family ; brought up to my mind and 
 your father's ; for all is sacred to me that my dead hus-
 
 136 UARDA. 
 
 band wished. He rejoiced in your early betrothal to 
 Nefert, and hoped that a son of his eldest son should 
 continue the race of Assa." 
 
 " It shall be by no fault of mine that any wish of 
 his remains unfulfilled. The stars are high, mother; 
 sleep well, and if to-morrow you visit Nefert and your 
 sister, say to them that the doors of my house are open 
 to them. But stay ! Katuti's steward has offered to sell 
 a herd of cattle to ours, although the stock on Mena's 
 land can be but small. What does this mean ?" 
 
 "You know my sister," replied Setchem. "She 
 manages Mena's possessions, has many requirements, 
 tries to vie with the greatest in splendor, sees the 
 governor often in her house, her son is no doubt ex- 
 travagant and so the most necessary things may often 
 be wanting." 
 
 Paaker shrugged his shoulders, once more embraced 
 his mother and left her. 
 
 Soon after, he was standing in the spacious room 
 in which he was accustomed to sit and to sleep when 
 he was in Thebes. The walls of this room were white- 
 washed and decorated with pious sentences in hiero- 
 glyphic writing, which framed in the door and the win- 
 dow openings into the garden. 
 
 In the middle of the farther wall was a couch in 
 the form of a lion. The upper end of it imitated a 
 lion's head, and the foot, its curling tail; a finely 
 dressed lion's skin was spread over the bed, and a head- 
 rest of ebony, decorated with pious texts, stood on a 
 high foot-step, ready for the sleeper. 
 
 Above the bed various costly weapons and whips 
 were elegantly displayed, and below them the seven
 
 UARDA. 137 
 
 arrows over which Setchem had read the words " Death 
 to Mena." They were written across a sentence which 
 enjoined feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, 
 and clothing the naked ; with loving-kindness, alike to 
 the great and the humble. 
 
 A niche by the side of the bed-head was closed 
 with a curtain of purple stuff, 
 
 In each corner of the room stood a statue ; three of 
 them symbolized the triad of Thebes Amon, Muth, 
 and Chunsu and the fourth the dead father of the 
 pioneer. In front of each was a small altar for offerings, 
 with a hollow in it, in which was an odoriferous essence. 
 On a wooden stand were little images of the Gods and 
 amulets in great number, and in several painted chests 
 lay the clothes, the ornaments and the papers of the 
 master. In the midst, of the chamber stood a table 
 and several stool-shaped seats. 
 
 When Paaker entered the room he found it lighted 
 with lamps, and a large dog sprang joyfully to meet 
 him. He let him spring upon him, threw him to the 
 ground, let him once more rush upon him, and then 
 kissed his clever head. 
 
 Before his bed an old negro of powerful build lay 
 in deep sleep. Paaker shoved him with his foot and 
 called to him as he awoke 
 
 " I am hungry." 
 
 The grey-headed black man rose slowly, and left 
 the room. 
 
 As soon as he was alone Paaker drew the philter 
 from his girdle, looked at it tenderly, and put it in a 
 box, in which there were several flasks of holy oils for 
 sacrifice. 
 
 He was accustomed every evening to fill the hoi-
 
 138 UARDA. 
 
 lows in the altars with fresh essences, and to prostrate 
 himself in prayer before the images of the Gods. 
 
 To-day he stood before the statue of his father, 
 kissed its feet, and murmured : " Thy will shall be 
 done. The woman whom thou didst intend for me 
 shall indeed be mine thy eldest son's." 
 
 Then he walked to and fro and thought over the 
 events of the day. 
 
 At last he stood still, with his arms crossed, and 
 looked defiantly at the holy images ; like a traveller 
 who drives away a false guide, and thinks to find the 
 road by himself. 
 
 His eye fell on the arrows over his bed ; he smiled, 
 and striking his broad breast with his fist, he ex- 
 claimed, "I I I " 
 
 His hound, who thought his master meant to call 
 him, rushed up to him. He pushed him off and said 
 
 "If you meet a hyaena in the desert, you fall 
 upon it without waiting till it is touched by my lance 
 and if the Gods, my masters, delay, I myself will 
 defend my right ; but thou," he continued turning to 
 the image of his father, " thou wilt support me." 
 
 This soliloquy was interrupted by the slaves who 
 brought in his meal. 
 
 Paaker glanced at the various dishes which the 
 cook had prepared for him, and asked : " How often 
 shall I command that not a variety, but only one large 
 dish shall be dressed for me ? And the wine ?" 
 
 " Thou art used never to touch it ?" answered the 
 old negro. 
 
 " But to-day I wish for some," said the pioneer. 
 " Bring one of the old jars of red wine of Kakem."* 
 
 A place not far from (he Pyramid "f Saqqarah in the Necropolis ot
 
 UARDA. 139 
 
 The slaves looked at each other in astonishment; 
 the wine was brought, and Paaker emptied beaker 
 after beaker. When the servants had left him, the 
 boldest among them said : " Usually the master eats 
 like a lion, and drinks like a midge, but to-day " 
 
 " Hold your tongue !" cried his companion, " and 
 come into the court, for Paaker has sent us out beer. 
 The Hathors must have met him." 
 
 The occurrences of the day must indeed have 
 taken deep hold on the inmost soul of the pioneer; 
 for he, the most sober of all the warriors of Rameses, 
 to whom intoxication was unknown, and who avoided 
 the banquets of his associates now sat at the mid- 
 night hours, alone at his table, and toped till his 
 weary head grew heavy. 
 
 He collected himself, went towards his couch and 
 drew the curtain which concealed the niche at the 
 head of the bed. A female figure, with the head-dress 
 and attributes of the Goddess Hathor, made of painted 
 limestone, revealed itself. 
 
 Her countenance had the features of the wife of 
 Mena. 
 
 The king, four years since, had ordered a sculptor 
 to execute a sacred image with the lovely features 
 of the newly-married bride of his charioteer, and 
 Paaker had succeeded in having a duplicate made. 
 
 He now knelt down on the couch, gazed on the 
 image with moist eyes, looked cautiously around to 
 see if he was alone, leaned forward, pressed a kiss to 
 the delicate, cold stone lips ; laid down and went to 
 
 Memphis, where, even in remote times, there must have been a wine-press, a* 
 the red wine of Kakem (Kochome?) is often mentioned.
 
 140 UARDA. 
 
 sleep without undressing himself, and leaving the lamps 
 to burn themselves out. 
 
 Restless dreams disturbed his spirit, and when the 
 dawn grew grey, he screamed out, tormented by a 
 hideous vision, so pitifully, that the old negro, who 
 had laid himself near the dog at the foot of his bed, 
 sprang up alarmed, and while the dog howled, called 
 him by his name to wake him. 
 
 Paaker awoke with a dull head-ache. The vision 
 which had tormented him stood vividly before his mind, 
 and he endeavored to retain it that he might sum- 
 mon a haruspex to interpret it. After the morbid 
 fancies of the preceding evening he felt sad and de- 
 pressed. 
 
 The morning-hymn rang into his room with a 
 warning voice from the temple of Amon ; he cast off 
 evil thoughts, and resolved once more to resign the 
 conduct of his fate to the Gods, and to renounce all 
 the arts of magic. 
 
 As he was accustomed, he got into the bath that 
 was ready for him. While splashing in the tepid water 
 he thought with ever increasing eagerness of Nefert 
 and of the philter which at first he had meant not to 
 offer to her, but which actually was given to her by 
 his hand, and which might by this time have begun 
 to exercise its charm. 
 
 Love placed rosy pictures hatred set blood-red 
 images before his eyes. He strove to free himself from 
 the temptations, which more and more tightly closed in 
 upon him, but it was with him as with a man who has 
 fallen into a bog, who, the more vehemently he tries 
 to escape from the mire, sinks the deeper. 
 
 As the sun rose, so rose his vital energy and his
 
 UARDA. 141 
 
 self-confidence, and when he prepared to quit his 
 dwelling, in his most costly clothing, he had arrived 
 once more at the decision of the night before, and had 
 again resolved to fight for his purpose, without and 
 if need were against the Gods. 
 
 The Mohar had chosen his road, and he never 
 turned back when once he had begun a journey. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 IT was noon : the rays of the sun found no way 
 into the narrow shady streets of the city of Thebes, 
 but they blazed with scorching heat on the broad 
 dyke-road which led to the king's castle, and which at 
 at this hour was usually almost deserted. 
 
 To-day it was thronged with foot-passengers and 
 chariots, with riders and litter-bearers. 
 
 Here and there negroes poured water on the road 
 ont of skins, but the dust was so deep, that, in spite 
 of this, it shrouded the streets and the passengers in a 
 dry cloud, which extended not only over the city, but 
 down to the harbor where the boats of the inhabi- 
 tants of the Necropolis landed their freight. 
 
 The city of the Pharaohs was in unwonted agita- 
 tion, for the storm-swift breath of rumor had spread 
 some news which excited both alarm and hope in the 
 huts of the poor as well as in the palaces of the 
 great. 
 
 In the early morning three mounted messengers 
 had arrived from the king's camp with heavy letter-* 
 bags, and had dismounted at the Regent's palace. 
 
 * The Egyptians were great letter-writers, and many of their letters have
 
 142 'JARDA. 
 
 As after a long drought the inhabitants of a village 
 gaze up at the black thunder-cloud that gathers above 
 their heads promising the refreshing rain but that 
 may also send the kindling lightning-flash or the destroy- 
 ing hail-storm so the hopes and the fears of the 
 citizens were centred on the news which came but 
 rarely and at irregular intervals from the scene of 
 war ; for there was scarcely a house in the huge city 
 which had not sent a father, a son, or a relative to 
 the fighting hosts of the king in the distant north- 
 east. 
 
 And though the couriers from the camp were 
 much oftener the heralds of tears than of joy ; though 
 the written rolls which they brought told more often 
 of death and wounds than of promotion, royal favors, 
 and conquered spoil, yet they were expected with soul- 
 felt longing and received with shouts of joy. 
 
 Great and small hurried after their arrival to the 
 Regent's palace, and the scribes who distributed 
 the letters and read the news which was intended 
 for public communication, and the lists of those 
 who had fallen or perished were closely besieged 
 with enquirers. 
 
 Man has nothing harder to endure than uncer- 
 tainty, and generally, when in suspense, looks forward 
 to bad rather than to good news. And the bearers of 
 ill ride faster than the messengers of weal. 
 
 The Regent Ani resided in a building adjoining 
 the king's palace. His business-quarters surrounded 
 
 come down to us. they also had established postmen, and had a word for 
 them in their language "fai chat." Maspero has treated the matter extremely 
 well in his paper "du genre epistolaire chez les ancicn* Egyptiens de 1'epoque 
 Pharaontque.
 
 UARDA. 143 
 
 an immensely wide court, and consisted of a great 
 number of rooms opening on to this court, in which 
 numerous scribes worked with their chief. On the 
 farther side was a large, veranda-like hall open at the 
 front, with a roof supported by pillars. 
 
 Here Ani was accustomed to hold courts of justice, 
 and to receive officers, messengers, and petitioners. 
 
 To-day he sat, visible to all comers, on a costly 
 throne in this hall, surrounded by his numerous fol- 
 lowers, and overlooking the crowd of people whom the 
 guardians of the peace* guided with long staves, ad- 
 mitting them in troops into the court of the " High 
 Gate," and then again conducting them out. 
 
 What he saw and heard was nothing joyful, for 
 from each group surrounding a scribe arose a cry of 
 woe. Few and far between were those who had to 
 tell of the rich booty that had fallen to their friends. 
 
 An invisible web woven of wailing and tears 
 seemed to envelope the assembly. 
 
 Here men were lamenting and casting dust upon 
 their heads, there women were rending their clothes, 
 shrieking loudly, and crying as they waved their veils : 
 "oh, my husband! oh, my father! oh, my brother!" 
 
 Parents who had received the news of the death of 
 their son fell on each other's neck weeping; old men 
 plucked out their grey hair and beard; young women 
 beat their forehead and breast, or implored the scribes 
 who read out the lists to let them see for themselves 
 the name of the beloved one who was for ever torn 
 from them. 
 
 The passionate stirring of a soul, whether it be the 
 result of joy or of sorrow, among us moderns covers its 
 
 * Presumably a kind of police. Trans!.
 
 144 UARDA. 
 
 features with a veil, which it had no need of among 
 the ancients. 
 
 Where the loudest laments sounded, a restless little 
 being might be seen hurrying from group to group ; it 
 was Nemu, Katuti's dwarf, whom we know. 
 
 Now he stood near a woman of the better class, 
 dissolved in tears because her husband had fallen in 
 the last battle. 
 
 " Can you read ?" he asked her ; " up there on the 
 architrave is the name of Rameses, with all his titles. 
 ' Dispenser of life,' he is called. Aye indeed ; he can 
 create widows ; for he has all the husbands killed." 
 
 Before the astonished woman could reply, he stood 
 by a man sunk in woe, and pulling his robe, said : 
 " Finer fellows than your son have never been seen in 
 Thebes. Let your youngest starve, or beat him to a 
 cripple, else he also will be dragged off to Syria ; for 
 Rameses needs much good Egyptian meat for the 
 Syrian vultures." 
 
 The old man, who had hitherto stood there in 
 silent despair, clenched his fist. The dwarf pointed 
 to the Regent, and said: "If he there wielded the 
 sceptre, there would be fewer orphans and beggars by 
 the Nile. To-day its sacred waters are still sweet, 
 but soon it will taste as salt as the north sea with all 
 the tears that have been shed on its banks." 
 
 It almost seemed as if the Regent had heard 
 these words, for he rose from his seat and lifted his 
 hands like a man who is lamenting. 
 
 Many of the bystanders observed this action ; and 
 loud cries of anguish filled the wide courtyard, which 
 was soon cleared by soldiers to make room for other 
 troops of people who were thronging in.
 
 UARDA. 145 
 
 While these gathered round the scribes, the Regent 
 Ani sat with quiet dignity on the throne, surrounded 
 by his suite and his secretaries, and held audiences. 
 
 He was a man at the close of his fortieth year 
 and the favorite cousin of the king. 
 
 Rameses I., the grandfather of the reigning monarch, 
 had deposed the legitimate royal family, and usurped 
 the sceptre of the Pharaohs. He descended from a 
 Semitic race who had remained in Egypt at the time 
 of the expulsion of the Hyksos,* and had distinguished 
 itself by warlike talents under Thotmes and Ameno- 
 phis. After his death he was succeeded by his son 
 Seti, who sought to earn a legitimate claim to the 
 throne by marrying Tuaa, the grand-daughter of Ameno- 
 phis III. She presented him with an only son, whom 
 he named after his father Rameses. This prince might 
 lay claim to perfect legitimacy through his mother, 
 who descended directly from the old house of sover- 
 eigns ; for in Egypt a noble family even that of the 
 Pharaohs might be perpetuated through women. 
 
 Seti proclaimed Rameses** partner of his throne, 
 so as to remove all doubt as to the validity of his posi- 
 tion. The young nephew of his wife Tuaa, the Regent 
 Ani, who was a few years younger than Rameses, he 
 caused to be brought up in the House of Seti, and 
 treated him like his own son, while the other members 
 
 * These were an eastern race who migrated from Asia into Egypt, con- 
 quered the lower Nile-valley, and ruled over it for nearly 500 years, till they 
 were driven out by the successors of the old legitimate Pharaohs, whose domin- 
 ion had been confined to upper Egypt. 
 
 ** Apparently even at his birth. According to an inscription at Abydos, 
 published by Mariette, and first interpreted by Maspero, Rameses boasts of 
 having been " King even in the egg." He is the Sesostris of the Greeks. His 
 surname Sesesu-Ra is preserved on the monuments. When the Greeks speak 
 of the great deeds of Sesostris, they include those of Seti and Rameses. 
 
 Uarda. I. 10
 
 UARDA. 
 
 of the dethroned royal family were robbed of their 
 possessions or removed altogether. 
 
 Ani proved himself a faithful servant to Seti, and 
 to his son, and was trusted as a brother by the warlike 
 and magnanimous Rameses, who however never dis- 
 guised from himself the fact that the blood in his 
 own veins was less purely royal than that which flowed 
 in his cousin's. 
 
 It was required of the race of the Pharaohs of 
 Egypt that it should be descended from the Sun-god 
 Ra, and the Pharaoh could boast of this high descent 
 only through his mother Ani through both parents. 
 
 But Rameses sat on the throne, held the sceptre 
 with a strong hand, and thirteen young sons promised 
 to his house the lordship over Egypt to all eternity. 
 
 When, after the death of his warlike father, he 
 went to fresh conquests in the north, he appointed 
 Ani, who had proved himself worthy as governor of 
 the province of Rush,* to the regency of the king- 
 dom. 
 
 A vehement character often over-estimates the man 
 who is endowed with a quieter temperament, into 
 whose nature he cannot throw himself, and whose ex- 
 cellences he is unable to imitate ; so it happened that 
 the deliberate and passionless nature of his cousin 
 impressed the fiery and warlike Rameses. 
 
 Ani appeared to be devoid of ambition, or the 
 spirit of enterprise ; he accepted the dignity that was 
 laid upon him with apparent reluctance, and seemed 
 a particularly safe person, because he had lost both 
 wife and child, and could boast of no heir. 
 
 He was a man of more than middle height; his 
 
 * Ethiopia.
 
 UARDA. 147 
 
 features were remarkably regular even beautifully- 
 cut, but smooth and with little expression. His clear 
 blue eyes and thin lips gave no evidence of the 
 emotions that filled his heart; on the contrary, his 
 countenance wore a soft smile that could adapt itself 
 to haughtiness, to humility, and to a variety of shades 
 of feeling, but which could never be entirely banished 
 from his face. 
 
 He had listened with affable condescension to the 
 complaint of a landed proprietor, whose cattle had 
 been driven off for the king's army, and had promised 
 that his case should be enquired into. The plundered 
 man was leaving full of hope; but when the scribe 
 who sat at the feet of the Regent enquired to whom 
 the investigation of this encroachment of the troops 
 should be entrusted, Ani said : " Each one must bring a 
 victim to the war ; it must remain among the things 
 that are done, and cannot be undone." 
 
 The Nomarch* of Suan, in the southern part of 
 the country, asked for funds for a necessary, new em- 
 bankment. The Regent listened to his eager rep- 
 resentation with benevolence, nay with expressions of 
 sympathy ; but assured him that the war absorbed all 
 the funds of the state, that the chests were empty; 
 still he felt inclined even if they had not failed to 
 sacrifice a part of his own income to preserve the 
 endangered arable land of his faithful province of 
 Suan, to which he desired greeting. 
 
 As soon as the Nomarch had left him, he com- 
 manded that a considerable sum should be taken out 
 of the Treasury, and sent after the petitioner. 
 
 From time to time in the middle of conversation, 
 
 * Chief of a Nome or district.
 
 148 UARUA. 
 
 he arose, and made a gesture of lamentation, to show 
 to the assembled mourners in the court that he sym- 
 pathized in the losses which had fallen on them. 
 
 The sun had already passed the meridian, when 
 a disturbance, accompanied by loud cries, took pos- 
 session of the masses of people, who stood round the 
 scribes in the palace court. 
 
 Many men and women were streaming together 
 towards one spot, and even the most impassive of the 
 Thebans present turned their attention to an incident 
 so unusual in this place. 
 
 A detachment of constabulary made a way through 
 the crushing and yelling mob, and another division of 
 Lybian police led a prisoner towards a side gate of 
 the court. Before they could reach it, a messenger 
 came up with them, from the Regent, who desired to 
 be informed as to what happened. 
 
 The head of the officers of public safety followed 
 him, and with eager excitement informed Ani, who 
 was waiting for him, that a tiny man, the dwarf of 
 the Lady . Katuti, had for several hours been going 
 about in the court, and endeavoring to poison the 
 minds of the citizens with seditious speeches. 
 
 Ani ordered that the misguided man should be 
 thrown into the dungeon; but so soon as the chief 
 officer had left him, he commanded his secretary to 
 have the dwarf brought into his presence before sun- 
 down. 
 
 While he was giving this order an excitement of 
 another kind sci/cd the assembled multitude. 
 
 As the sea parted and stood on the right hand 
 and on the left of the Hebrews, so that no wave wetted 
 the foot of the pursued fugitives, so the crowd of
 
 UARDA. 149 
 
 people of their own free will, but as if in reverent sub- 
 mission to some high command, parted and formed a 
 broad way, through which walked the high-priest of 
 the House of Seti, as, full robed and accompanied by 
 some of the " holy fathers," he now entered the court. 
 
 The Regent went to meet him, bowed before 
 him, and then withdrew to the b'ack of the hall with 
 him alone. 
 
 " It is nevertheless incredible," said Ameni, " that 
 our serfs are to follow the militia !" 
 
 " Rameses requires soldiers to conquer," replied 
 the Regent. 
 
 " And we bread to live," exclaimed the priest. 
 
 " Nevertheless I am commanded, at once, before the 
 seed time, to levy the temple serfs. I regret the order, 
 but the king is the will, and I am only the hand." 
 
 " The hand, which he makes use of to sequester 
 ancient rights, and to open a way to the desert over 
 the fruitful land." 
 
 " Your acres will not long remain unprovided for. 
 Rameses will win new victories with the increased 
 army, and the help of the Gods." 
 
 "The Gods! whom he insults!" 
 
 "After the conclusion of peace he will reconcile the 
 Gods by doubly rich gifts. He hopes confidently for 
 an early end to the war, and writes to me that after 
 the next battle he wins he intends to offer terms to 
 the Cheta. A plan of the king's is also spoken of to 
 marry again, and, indeed, the daughter of the Cheta 
 King Chetasar." 
 
 Up to this moment the Regent had kept his eyes 
 cast down. Now he raised them, smiling, as if he 
 would fain enjoy Ameni's satisfaction, and asked
 
 '5 
 
 UARDA. 
 
 " What dost thou say to this project ?" 
 
 " I say," returned Ameni, and his voice, usually so 
 stern, took a tone of amusement, " I say that Rameses 
 seems to think that the blood of thy cousin and of 
 his mother, which gives him his right to the throne, is 
 incapable of pollution." 
 
 " It is the blood of the Sun-god !" 
 
 " Which runs but half pure in his veins, but wholly 
 pure in thine." 
 
 The Regent made a deprecatory gesture, and 
 said softly, with a smile which resembled that of a 
 dead man : 
 
 " We are not alone." 
 
 " No one is here," said Ameni, " who can hear us ; 
 and what I say is known to every child." 
 
 " But if it came to the king's ears " whispered 
 Ani, " he" 
 
 " He would perceive how unwise it is to derogate 
 from the ancient rights of those on whom it is incum- 
 bent to prove the purity of blood of the sovereign of 
 this land. However, Rameses sits on the throne; may 
 life bloom for him, with health and strength !"* 
 
 The Regent bowed, and then asked : 
 
 " Do you propose to obey the demand of the Pha- 
 raoh without delay ?" 
 
 " He is the king. Our council, which will meet in 
 a few days, can only determine how, and not whether 
 we shall fulfil his command." 
 
 "You will retard the departure of the serfs, and 
 Rameses requires them at once. The bloody labor 
 of the war demands new tools." 
 
 A formula which even in private letters constantly follows the name of 
 the Pharaoh.
 
 UARDA. 151 
 
 " And the peace will perhaps demand a new master, 
 who understands how to employ the sons of the land 
 to its greatest advantage a genuine son of Ra." 
 
 The Regent stood opposite the high-priest, mo- 
 tionless as an image cast in bronze, and remained 
 silent; but Ameni lowered his staff before him as be- 
 fore a god, and then went into the fore part of the hall. 
 
 When Ani followed him, a soft smile played as 
 usual upon his countenance, and full of dignity he took 
 his seat on the throne. 
 
 " Art thou at an end of thy communications ?" he 
 asked the high-priest. 
 
 " It remains for me to inform you all," replied Ameni 
 with a louder voice, to be heard by all the assembled 
 dignitaries, " that the princess Bent-Anat yesterday 
 morning committed a heavy sin, and that in all the 
 temples in the land the Gods shall be entreated with 
 offerings to take her uncleanness from her." 
 
 Again a shadow passed over the smile on the 
 Regent's countenance. He looked meditatively on the 
 ground, and then said : 
 
 "To-morrow I will visit the House of Seti; till then 
 I beg that this affair may be left to rest." 
 
 Ameni bowed, and the Regent left the hall to 
 withdraw to a wing of the king's palace, in which he 
 dwelt. 
 
 On his writing-table lay sealed papers. He knew 
 that they contained important news for him; but he 
 loved to do violence to his curiosity, to test his resolu- 
 tion, and like an epicure to reserve the best dish till 
 the last. 
 
 He now glanced first at some unimportant letters. 
 
 A dumb negro, who squatted at his feet, burned the
 
 152 UARDA. 
 
 papyrus rolls which his master gave him in a brazier. 
 A secretary made notes of the short facts which Ani 
 called out to him, and the ground work was laid of 
 the answers to the different letters. 
 
 At a sign from his master this functionary quitted 
 the room, and Ani then slowly opened a letter 
 from the king, whose address : " To my brother Ani," 
 showed that it contained, not public, but private in- 
 formation. 
 
 On these lines, as he well knew, hung his future 
 life, and the road it should follow. 
 
 With a smile, that was meant to conceal even from 
 himself his deep inward agitation, he broke the wax 
 which sealed the short manuscript in the royal hand. 
 
 " What relates to Egypt, and my concern for my 
 country, and the happy issue of the war," wrote the 
 Pharaoh, " I have written to you by the hand of my 
 secretary; but these words are for the brother, who 
 desires to be my son, and I write to him myself. The 
 lordly essence of the Divinity which dwells in me, 
 readily brings a quick ' Yes ' or ' No ' to my lips, and it 
 decides for the best. Now you demand my daughter 
 Bent-Anat to wife, and I should not be Rameses if I 
 did not freely confess that before I had read the last 
 words of your letter, a vehement ' No ' rushed to my 
 lips. I caused the stars to be consulted, and the entrails 
 of the victims to be examined, and they were adverse 
 to your request ; and yet I could not refuse you, for 
 you arc dear to me, and your blood is royal as my 
 own. Even more royal, an old friend said, and warned 
 me against your ambition and your exaltation. Then 
 my heart changed, for I were not Seti's son if I allow 
 myself to injure a friend through idle apprehensions;
 
 U ARDA. 1 53 
 
 and he who stands so high that men fear that he may 
 try to rise above Rameses, seems to me to be worthy 
 of Bent-Anat. Woo her, and, should she consent freely, 
 the marriage may be celebrated on the day when I 
 return home. You are young enough to make a wife 
 happy, and your mature wisdom will guard my child 
 from misfortune. Bent-Anat shall know that her father, 
 and king, encourages your suit; but pray too to the 
 Hathors, that they may influence Bent-Anat's heart in 
 your favor, for to her decision we must both submit." 
 
 The Regent had changed color several times 
 while reading this letter. Now he laid it on the 
 table with a shrug of his shoulders, stood up, clasped 
 his hand behind him, and, with his eyes cast medita- 
 tively on the floor, leaned against one of the pillars 
 which supported the beams of the roof. 
 
 The longer he thought, the less amiable his ex- 
 pression became. "A pill sweetened with honey,* such 
 as they give to women," he muttered to himself. Then 
 he went back to the table, read the king's letter through 
 once more, and said : " One may learn from it how to 
 deny by granting, and at the same time not to forget 
 to give it a brilliant show of magnanimity. Rameses 
 knows his daughter. She is a girl like any other, and 
 will take good care not to choose a man twice as old 
 as herself, and who might be her father. Rameses 
 will ' submit ' I am to ' submit !' And to what ? to the 
 judgment and the choice of a wilful child !" 
 
 With these words he threw the letter so vehe- 
 mently on to the table, that it slipped off on to the 
 floor. 
 
 * Two recipes for pills are found in the papyri, one with honey for women, 
 and one without for men.
 
 154 UARDA. 
 
 The mute slave picked it up, and laid it carefully 
 on the table again, while his master threw a ball into 
 a silver bason. 
 
 Several attendants rushed into the room, and Ani 
 ordered them to bring to him the captive dwarf of the 
 Lady Katuti. His soul rose in indignation against the 
 king, who in his remote camp-tent could fancy he had 
 made him happy by a proof of his highest favor. 
 
 When we are plotting against a man we are in- 
 clined to regard him as an enemy, and if he offers us 
 a rose we believe it to be for the sake, not of the per- 
 fume, but of the thorns. 
 
 The dwarf Nemu was brought before the Regent 
 and threw himself on the ground at his feet. 
 
 Ani ordered the attendants to leave him, and said 
 to the little man : 
 
 " You compelled me to put you in prison. Stand up !" 
 
 The dwarf rose and said, " Be thanked for my 
 arrest too." 
 
 The Regent looked at him in astonishment; but 
 Nemu went on half humbly, half in fun, " I feared for 
 my life, but thou hast not only not shortened it, but 
 hast prolonged it ; for in the solitude of the dungeon 
 time seemed long, and the minutes grown to hoars." 
 
 " Keep your wit for the ladies," replied the Regent. 
 " l)id I not know that you meant well, and acted ii. 
 accordance with the Lady Katuti's fancy, I would 
 send you to the quarries." 
 
 "My hands," mumbled the dwarf, " could only break 
 stones for a game of draughts ; but my tongue is like 
 the water. whicR makes one peasant rich, and carries 
 away the fields of another." 
 
 " We shall know how to dam it up."
 
 UARDA. 155 
 
 " For my lady and for thee it will always flow the 
 right way," said the dwarf. " I showed the complain- 
 ing citizens who it is that slaughters their flesh and 
 blood, and from whom to look for peace and content. 
 I poured caustic into their wounds, and praised the 
 physician." 
 
 " But unasked and recklessly," interrupted Ani ; 
 " otherwise you have shown yourself capable, and I 
 am willing to spare you for a future time. But over- 
 busy friends are more damaging than intelligent 
 enemies. When I need your services I will call for 
 you. Till then avoid speech. Now go to your mis- 
 tress, and carry to Katuti this letter which has arrived 
 for her." 
 
 " Hail to Ani, the son of the Sun !" cried the dwarf 
 kissing the Regent's foot. " Have I no letter to carry 
 to my mistress Nefert ?" 
 
 " Greet her from me," replied the Regent. " Tell 
 Katuti I will visit her after the next meal. The king's 
 charioteer has not written, yet I hear that he is well. 
 Go now, and be silent and discreet." 
 
 The dwarf quitted the room, and Ani went into 
 an airy hall, in which his luxurious meal was laid out, 
 consisting of many dishes prepared with special care. 
 His appetite was gone, but he tasted of every dish, 
 and gave the steward, who attended on him, his opinion 
 of each. 
 
 Meanwhile he thought of the king's letter, of Bent- 
 Anat, and whether it would be advisable to expose 
 himself to a rejection on her part. 
 
 After the meal he gave himself up to his body- 
 servant, who carefully shaved, painted, dressed, and 
 decorated him, and then held the mirror before him.
 
 156 UARDA. 
 
 He considered the reflection with anxious observation, 
 and when he seated himself in his litter to be borne 
 to the house of his friend Katuti, he said to himself 
 that he still might claim to be called a handsome 
 man. 
 
 If he paid his court to Bent-Anat if she listened 
 to his suit what then ? 
 
 He would refer it to Katuti, who always knew how 
 to say a decisive word when he, entangled in a hun- 
 dred pros and cons, feared to venture on a final step. 
 
 By her advice he had sought to wed the prin- 
 cess, as a fresh mark of honor as an addition to his 
 revenues as a pledge for his personal safety. His 
 heart had never been more or less attached to her 
 than to any other beautiful woman in Egypt. Now 
 her proud and noble personality stood before his in- 
 ward eye, and he felt as if he must look up to it as 
 to a vision high out of his reach. It vexed him that 
 he had followed Katuti's advice, and he began to wish 
 his suit had been repulsed. Marriage with Bent-Anat 
 seemed to him beset with difficulties. His mood was 
 that of a man who craves some brilliant position, 
 though he knows that its requirements are beyond his 
 powers that of an ambitious soul to whom kingly 
 honors are offered on condition that he will never 
 remove a heavy crown from his head. If indeed an- 
 other plan should succeed, if and his eyes flashed 
 eagerly if fate set him on the seat of Rameses, then 
 the alliance with Bent-Anat would lose its terrors; 
 there would he be her absolute King and Lord and 
 Master, and no one could require him to account for 
 what he might be to her, or vouchsafe to her.
 
 UARDA. 157 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 DURING the events we have described the house 
 of the charioteer Mena had not remained free from 
 visitors. 
 
 It resembled the neighboring estate of Paaker, 
 though the buildings were less new, the gay paint on 
 the pillars and walls was faded, and the large garden 
 lacked careful attention. In the vicinity of the house 
 only, a few well-kept beds blazed with splendid flowers, 
 and the open colonnade, which was occupied by Katuti 
 and her daughter, was furnished with royal magnifi- 
 cence. 
 
 The elegantly carved seats were made of ivory, the 
 tables of ebony, and they, as well as the couches, had 
 gilt feet. The artistically worked Syrian drinking 
 vessels on the sideboard, tables, and consoles were of 
 many forms ; beautiful vases full of flowers stood every- 
 where; rare perfumes rose from alabaster cups, and 
 the foot sank in the thick pile of the carpets which 
 covered the floor. 
 
 And over the apparently careless arrangement of 
 these various objects there reigned a peculiar charm, 
 an indescribably fascinating something. 
 
 Stretched at full-length on a couch, and playing 
 with a silky-haired white cat, lay the fair Nefert 
 fanned to coolness by a negro-girl while her mother 
 Katuti nodded a last farewell to her sister Setchem 
 and to Paaker. 
 
 Both had crossed this threshold for the first time 
 for four years, that is since the marriage of Mena with
 
 1 58 UARDA. 
 
 Nefert, and the old enmity seemed now to have given 
 way to heartfelt reconciliation and mutual under- 
 standing. 
 
 After the pioneer and his mother had disappeared 
 behind the pomegranate shrubs at the entrance of the 
 garden, Katuti turned to her daughter and said : 
 
 " Who would have thought it yesterday ? I believe 
 Paaker loves you still." 
 
 Nefert colored, and exclaimed softly, while she 
 hit the kitten gently with her fan 
 
 " Mother !" 
 
 Katuti smiled. 
 
 She was a tall woman of noble demeanor, whose 
 sharp but delicately-cut features and sparkling eyes 
 could still assert some pretensions to feminine beauty. 
 She wore a long robe, which reached below her 
 ankles ; it was of costly material, but dark in color, 
 and of a studied simplicity. Instead of the ornaments 
 in bracelets, anklets, ear and finger-rings, in necklaces 
 and clasps, which most of the Egyptian ladies and 
 indeed her own sister and daughter were accustomed 
 to wear, she had only fresh flowers, which were never 
 wanting in the garden of her son-in-law. Only a plain 
 gold diadem, the badge of her royal descent, always 
 rested, from early morning till late at night, on her 
 high brow for a woman too high, though nobly formed 
 and confined the long blue-black hair, which fell 
 unbraided down her back, as if its owner contemned 
 the vain labor of arranging it artistically. But nothing 
 in her exterior was unpremeditated, and the unbe- 
 jewelled wearer of the diadem, in her plain dress, and 
 with her royal figure, was everywhere sure of being
 
 UARDA. 159 
 
 observed, and of finding imitators of her dress, and 
 indeed of her demeanor. 
 
 And yet Katuti had long lived in need ; aye at the 
 very hour when we first make her acquaintance, she 
 had little of her own, but lived on the estate of her 
 son-in-law as his guest, and as the administrator of his 
 possessions ; and before the marriage of her daughter 
 she had lived with her children in a house belonging 
 to her sister Setchem. 
 
 She had been the wife of her own brother,* who 
 had died young, and who had squandered the greatest 
 part of the possessions which had been left to him by 
 the new royal family, in an extravagant love of dis- 
 play. 
 
 When she became a widow, she was received as a 
 sister with her children by her brother-in-law, Paaker's 
 father. She lived in a house of her own, enjoyed the 
 income of an estate assigned to her by the old Mohar, 
 and left to her son-in-law the care of educating her 
 son, a handsome and overbearing lad, with all the 
 claims and pretensions of a youth of distinction. 
 
 Such great benefits would have oppressed and dis- 
 graced the proud Katuti, if she had been content with 
 them and in every way agreed with the giver. But 
 this was by no means the case; rather, she believed 
 that she might pretend to a more brilliant outward 
 position, felt herself hurt when her heedless son, while 
 he attended school, was warned to work more seriously, 
 as he would by and by have to rely on his own skill 
 
 * Marriages between brothers and sisters were allowed in ancient Egypt. 
 The Ptolemaic princes adopted this, which was contrary to the Macedonian 
 customs. When Ptolemy II. Philadelphus -married his sister Arsinoe, it seems 
 to have been thought necessary to excuse it by the relative positions of Venus 
 ind Saturn at that period, and the constraining influences of these planets.
 
 l6o UARDA. 
 
 and his own strength. And it had wounded her when 
 occasionally her brother-in-law had suggested economy, 
 and had reminded her, in his straightforward way, of 
 her narrow means, and the uncertain future of her 
 children. 
 
 At this she was deeply offended, for she ventured 
 to say that her relatives could never, with all their 
 gifts, compensate for the insults they heaped upon 
 her; and thus taught them by experience that we 
 quarrel with no one more readily than with the bene- 
 factor whom we can never repay for all the good he 
 bestows on us. 
 
 Nevertheless, when her brother-in-law asked the 
 hand of her daughter for his son, she willingly gave 
 her consent. 
 
 Nefert and Paaker had grown up together, and by 
 this union she foresaw that she could secure her own 
 future and that of her children. 
 
 Shortly after the death of the Mohar, the charioteer 
 Mena had proposed for Nefert's hand, but would have 
 been refused if the king himself had not supported the 
 suit of his favorite officer. After the wedding, she 
 retired with Nefert to Mena's house, and undertook, 
 while he was at the war, to manage his great estates, 
 which however had been greatly burthened with debt 
 by his father. 
 
 Fate put the means into her hands of indemnifying 
 herself and her children for many past privations, and 
 she availed herself of them to gratify her innate desire 
 to be esteemed and admired ; to obtain admission for 
 her son, splendidly equipped, into a company of 
 chariot-warriors of the highest class; and to sur- 
 round her daughter with princely magnificence.
 
 UARDA. l6l 
 
 \Vhen the Regent, who had been a friend of her 
 late husband, removed into the palace of the Pharaohs, 
 he made her advances, and the clever and decided 
 woman knew how to make herself at first agreeable, 
 and finally indispensable, to the vacillating man. 
 
 She availed herself of the circumstance that she, 
 as well as he, was descended from the old royal house to 
 pique his ambition, and to open to him a view, which 
 even to think of, he would have considered forbidden 
 as a crime, before he became intimate with her. 
 
 Ani's suit for the hand of the princess Bent-Anat 
 was Katuti's work. She hoped that the Pharoah 
 would refuse, and personally offend the Regent, and 
 so make him more inclined to tread the dangerous 
 road which she was endeavoring to smooth for him. 
 The dwarf Nemu was her pliant tool. 
 
 She had not initiated him into her projects by 
 any words; he however gave utterance to every im- 
 pulse of her mind in free language, which was punished 
 only with blows from a fan, and, only the day before, 
 had been so audacious as to say that if the Pharoah 
 were called Ani instead of Rameses, Katuti would be 
 not a queen but a goddess for she would then have not 
 to obey, but rather to guide, the Pharaoh, who indeed 
 himself was related to the Immortals. 
 
 Katuti did not observe her daughter's blush, for 
 she was looking anxiously out at the garden gate, and 
 said: 
 
 "Where can Nemu be! There must be some news 
 arrived for us from the army." 
 
 "Mena has not written for so long," Nefert said 
 softly. " Ah ! here is the steward ! " 
 
 Uarda. I. n
 
 162 UARDA. 
 
 Katuti turned to the officer, who had entered the 
 veranda through a side door 
 
 " What do you bring," she asked. 
 
 "The dealer Abscha," was the answer, "presses for 
 payment. The new Syrian chariot and the purple 
 cloth" 
 
 "Sell some corn," ordered Katuti. 
 
 "Impossible, for the tribute to the temples is not 
 yet paid, and already so much has been delivered to 
 the dealers that scarcely enough remains over for the 
 maintenance of the household and for sowing." 
 
 "Then pay with beasts." 
 
 "But, madam," said the steward sorrowfully, "only 
 yesterday, we again sold a herd to the Mohar; and the 
 water-wheels must be turned, and the corn must be 
 thrashed, and we need beasts for sacrifice, and milk, 
 butter, and cheese, for the use of the house, and dung 
 for firing."* 
 
 Katuti looked thoughtfully at the ground. 
 
 "It must be," she said presently. "Ride to 
 Hermonthis, and say to the keeper of the stud that 
 he must have ten of Mena's golden bays driven over 
 here." 
 
 "I have already spoken to him," said the steward, 
 "but he maintains that Mena strictly forbade him to 
 part with even one of the horses, for he is proud of 
 the stock. Only for the chariot of the lady Nefert " 
 
 "I require obedience," said Katuti decidedly and 
 cutting short the steward's words, "and I expect the 
 horses to-morrow." 
 
 * !" F-l?yP where there is so little wood, to this day the dried dung of 
 beasts is the commonest kind of fuel.
 
 UARDA. 163 
 
 " But the stud-master is a daring man, whom Mena 
 looks upon as indispensable, and he " 
 
 " I command here, and not the absent," cried Katuti 
 enraged, "and I require the horses in spite of the 
 former orders of my son-in-law." 
 
 Nefert, during this conversation, pulled herself up 
 from her indolent attitude. On hearing the last words 
 she rose from her couch, and said, with a decision 
 which surprised even her mother 
 
 "The orders of my husband must be obeyed. 
 The horses that Mena loves shall stay in their stalls. 
 Take this armlet that the king gave me; it is worth 
 more than twenty horses." 
 
 The steward examined the trinket, richly set with 
 precious stones, and looked enquiringly at Katuti. 
 She shrugged her shoulders, nodded consent, and 
 said 
 
 "Abscha shall hold it as a pledge till Mena's booty 
 arrives. For a year your husband has sent nothing of 
 importance." 
 
 When the steward was gone, Nefert stretched her- 
 self again on her couch and said wearily 
 
 " I thought we were rich." 
 
 "We might be," said Katuti bitterly; but as she 
 perceived that Nefert's cheeks again were glowing, she 
 said amiably, "Our high rank imposes great duties on 
 us. Princely blood flows in our veins, and the eyes of 
 the people are turned on the wife of the most brilliant 
 hero in the king's army. They shall not say that she 
 is neglected by her husband. How long Mena remains 
 away!" 
 
 "I hear a noise in the court," said Nefert. "The 
 Regent is coming."
 
 164 UARDA. 
 
 v Katuti turned again towards the garden. 
 A. breathless slave rushed in, and announced that 
 Bent-Anat, the daughter of the king, had dismounted 
 at the gate, and was approaching the garden with the 
 prince Rameri. 
 
 Nefert left her couch, and went with her mother 
 to meet the exalted visitors. 
 
 As the mother and daughter bowed to kiss the 
 robe of the princess, Bent-Anat signed them back 
 from her. "Keep farther from me," she said; "the 
 priests have not yet entirely absolved me from my 
 uncleanness." 
 
 "And in spite of them thou art clean in the sight 
 of Ra ! " exclaimed the boy who accompanied her, her 
 brother of seventeen, who was brought up at the House 
 of Seti, which however he was to leave in a few weeks 
 and he kissed her. 
 
 " I shall complain to Ameni of this wild boy," said 
 Bent-Anat smiling. " He would positively accompany 
 me. Your husband, Nefert, is his model, and I had no 
 peace in the house, for we came to bring you good 
 news." 
 
 " From Mena ? " asked the young wife, pressing her 
 hand to her heart. 
 
 "As you say," returned Bent-Anat. "My father 
 praises his ability, and writes that he, before all others, 
 will have his choice at the dividing of the spoil." 
 
 Nefert threw a triumphant glance at her mother, 
 and Katuti drew a deep breath. 
 
 P.ent Anal stroked Nefert's cheeks like those of 
 a child. Then she turned to Katuti, led her into 
 the garden, and begged her to aid her, who had so
 
 UARDA. 165 
 
 early lost her mother, with her advice in a weighty 
 matter. 
 
 " My father," she continued, after a few introductory 
 words, " informs me that the Regent Ani desires me 
 for his wife, and advises me to reward the fidelity of 
 the worthy man with my hand. He advises it, you 
 understand he does not command." 
 
 "And thou?" asked Katuti. 
 
 "And I," replied Bent-Anat decidedly, "must re- 
 fuse him." 
 
 " Thou must !" 
 
 Bent-Anat made a sign of assent and went on : 
 
 " It is quite clear to me. I can do nothing else." 
 
 " Then thou dost not need my counsel; since even 
 thy father, I well know, will not be able to alter thy 
 decision." 
 
 " No God even could alter this one !" said Bent- 
 Anat firmly. " But you are Ani's friend, and, as I 
 esteem him, I would save him this humiliation. En- 
 deavor to persuade him to give up his suit. I will 
 meet him as though I knew nothing of his letter to 
 my father." 
 
 Katuti looked down reflectively. Then she said 
 "The Regent certainly likes very well to pass his 
 hours of leisure with me gossiping or playing draughts, 
 but I do not know that I should dare to speak to him 
 of so grave a matter." 
 
 " Marriage-projects are women's affairs," said Bent- 
 Anat, smiling. 
 
 " But the marriage of a princess is a state event," 
 replied the widow. " In this case it is true the *uncle 
 only courts his niece, who is dear to him, and who he 
 
 * Among the Orientals and even the Spaniards it was and is common to 
 give the name of uncle to a parent's cousin. Note to Am. Edition.
 
 1 66 UARDA. 
 
 hopes will make the second half of his life the brightest. 
 Ani is kind and without severity. Thou would'st win 
 in him a husband, who would wait on thy looks, and 
 bow willingly to thy strong will." 
 
 Bent-Anat's eyes flashed, and she hastily exclaimed : 
 " That is exactly what forces the decisive irrevocable 
 ' No ' to my lips. Do you think that because I am as 
 proud as my mother, and resolute like my father, that 
 I wish for a husband whom I could govern and lead 
 as I would ? How little you know me ! I will be 
 obeyed by my dogs, my servants, my officers, if the 
 Gods so will it, by my children. Abject beings, who 
 will kiss my feet, I meet on every road, and can buy 
 by the hundred, if I wish it, in the slave market. I 
 may be courted twenty times, and reject twenty suitors, 
 but not because I fear that they might bend my pride 
 and my will ; on the contrary, because I feel them in- 
 creased. The man to whom I could wish to offer my 
 hand must be of a loftier stamp, must be greater, 
 firmer, and better than I, and I will flutter after the 
 mighty wing-strokes of his spirit, and smile at my own 
 weakness, and glory in admiring his superiority." 
 
 Katuti listened to the maiden with the smile by 
 which the experienced love to signify their superiority 
 over the visionary. 
 
 "Ancient times may have produced such men," 
 she said. " But if in these days thou thinkest to find 
 one, thou wilt wear the lock of youth,* till thou art 
 grey. Our thinkers are no heroes, and our heroes are 
 no sages. Here come thy brother and Nefert." 
 
 The lode of youth was a curl of hair which all the younger members of 
 princely (amities wore at the tide of the head The young Horus is represented 
 with it.
 
 UARDA. 167 
 
 " Will you persuade Ani to give up his suit !" said 
 the princess urgently. 
 
 " I will endeavor to do so, for thy sake," replied 
 Katuti. Then, turning half to the young Rameri and 
 half to his sister, she said : 
 
 " The chief of the House of Seti, Ameni, was in 
 his youth such a man as thou paintest, Bent-Anat. 
 Tell us, thou son of Rameses, that art growing up 
 under the young sycamores, which shall some day 
 over-shadow the land whom dost thou esteem the 
 highest among thy companions ? Is there one among 
 them, who is conspicuous above them all for a lofty 
 spirit and strength of intellect ?" 
 
 The young Rameri looked gaily at the speaker, 
 and said laughing : " We are all much alike, and do 
 more or less willingly what we are compelled, and by 
 preference every thing that we ought not." 
 
 "A mighty soul a youth, who promises to be a 
 second* Snefru, aThotmes, or even an Ameni? Dost thou 
 know none such in the House of Seti?" asked the widow. 
 
 " Oh yes !" cried Rameri with eager certainty. 
 
 "And he is ?" asked Katuti. 
 
 " Pentaur, the poet," exclaimed the youth. Bent- 
 Anat's face glowed with scarlet color, while her 
 brother went on to explain. 
 
 " He is noble and of a lofty soul, and all the Gods 
 dwell in him when he speaks. Formerly we used to 
 go to sleep in the lecture-hall ; but his words carry us 
 away, and if we do not take in the full meaning of his 
 thoughts, yet we feel that they are genuine and noble." 
 
 * The ist king of the 4th dynasty, who to a late date was held in high 
 honor, and of whom it is* said in several places that "the like has not been 
 seen since the days of Snefru." The monuments of his time are the earliest 
 which have generally come down to us.
 
 1 68 UARDA. 
 
 Bent-Anat breathed quicker at these words, and 
 her eyes hung on the boy's lips. 
 
 " You know him, Bent-Anat," continued Rameri. 
 " He was with you at the paraschites' house, and in the 
 temple-court when Ameni pronounced you unclean. He 
 is as tall and handsome as the God Menth,* and I 
 feel that he is one of those whom we can never forget 
 when once we have seen them. Yesterday, after you 
 had left the temple, he spoke as he never spoke be- 
 fore; he poured fire into our souls. Do not laugh, 
 Katuti, I feel it burning still. This morning we were 
 informed that he had been sent from the temple, who 
 knows where and had left us a message of farewell. 
 It was not thought at all necessary to communicate the 
 reason to us; but we know more than the masters 
 think. He did not reprove you strongly enough, Bent- 
 Anat, and therefore he is driven out of the House of 
 Scti. We have agreed to combine to ask for him to 
 be recalled ; Anana is drawing up a letter to the chief 
 Driest, which we shall all subscribe. It would turn out 
 badly for one alone, but they cannot be at all of us at 
 once. Very likely they will have the sense to recall 
 him. If not, we shall all complain to our fathers, and 
 they are not the meanest in the land." 
 
 " It is a complete rebellion," cried Katuti. "Take 
 care, you lordlings ; Ameni and the other prophets are 
 not to be trifled with." 
 
 " Nor we either." said Rameri laughing, " If Pen- 
 taur is kept in banishment, I shall appeal to my father 
 to place me at the school at Heliopolis or Chennu, 
 md the others will follow me. Come, Bent-Anat, I 
 must be back in the trap before sunset. Excuse me, 
 
 Menth, the Egyptian Cod of War.
 
 UARDA. 169 
 
 Katuti, so we call the school. Here comes your little 
 Nemu." 
 
 The brother and sister left the garden. 
 
 As soon as the ladies, who accompanied them, had 
 turned their backs, Bent-Anat grasped her brother's 
 hand with unaccustomed warmth, and said: 
 
 "Avoid all imprudence; but your demand is just, 
 and I will help you with all my heart." 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 As soon as Bent-Anat had quitted Mena's domain, 
 the dwarf Nemu entered the garden with a letter, and 
 briefly related his adventures; but in such a comical 
 fashion that both the ladies laughed, and Katuti, with 
 a lively gaiety, which was usually foreign to her, while 
 she warned him, at the same time praised his acute- 
 ness. She looked at the seal of the letter and said: 
 
 "This is a lucky day; it has brought us great things, 
 and the promise of greater things in the future." 
 
 Nefert came close up to her and said imploringly: 
 " Open the letter, and see if there is nothing in it from 
 him." 
 
 Katuti unfastened the wax, looked through the 
 letter with a hasty glance, stroked the cheek of her 
 child, and said: 
 
 "Perhaps your brother has written for him; I see 
 no line in his handwriting." 
 
 Nefert on her side glanced at the letter, but not to 
 read it, only to seek some trace of the well-known 
 handwriting of her husband. 
 
 Like all the Egyptian women of good family she
 
 lyo UARDA. 
 
 could read, and during the first two years of her mar- 
 ried life she had often very often had the oppor- 
 tunity of puzzling, and yet rejoicing, over the feeble 
 signs which the iron hand of the charioteer had 
 scrawled on the papyrus for her whose slender fingers 
 could guide the reed pen with firmness and decision. 
 
 She examined the letter, and at last said, with 
 tears in her eyes : 
 
 "Nothing! I will go to my room, mother." 
 Katuti kissed her and said, " Hear first what your 
 brother writes." 
 
 But Nefert shook her head, turned away in silence, 
 and disappeared into the house. 
 
 Katuti was not very friendly to her son-in-law, but 
 her heart clung to her handsome, reckless son, the 
 very image of her lost husband, the favorite of women, 
 and the gayest youth among the young nobles who 
 composed the chariot-guard of the king. 
 
 How fully he had written to-day he who wielded 
 the reed-pen so laboriously. 
 
 This really was a letter; while, usually, he only 
 asked in the fewest words for fresh funds for the 
 gratification of his extravagant tastes. 
 
 This time she might look for thanks, for not long 
 since he must have received a considerable supply, 
 which she had abstracted from the income of the pos- 
 sessions entrusted to her by her son-in-law. 
 She began to read. 
 
 The cheerfulness, with which she had met the 
 dwarf, was insincere, and had resembled the brilliant 
 colors of the rainbow, which gleam over the stagnant 
 waters of a bog. A stone falls into the pool, the
 
 UARDA. iyi 
 
 colors vanish, dim mists rise up, and it becomes foul 
 and clouded. 
 
 The news which her son's letter contained fell, in- 
 deed, like a block of stone on Katuti's soul. 
 
 Our deepest sorrows always flow from the same 
 source as might have filled us with joy, and those 
 wounds burn the fiercest which are inflicted by a 
 hand we love. 
 
 The farther Katuti went in the lamentably incor- 
 rect epistle which she could only decipher with diffi- 
 culty which her darling had written to her, the paler 
 grew her face, which she several times covered with 
 her trembling hands, from which the letter dropped. 
 
 Nemu squatted on the earth near her, and followed 
 all her movements. 
 
 When she sprang forward with a heart-piercing 
 scream, and pressed her forehead to a rough palm- 
 trunk, he crept up to her, kissed her feet, and exclaimed 
 with a depth of feeling that overcame even Katuti, 
 who was accustomed to hear only gay or bitter speeches 
 from the lips of her jester 
 
 " Mistress ! lady ! what has happened ? " 
 
 Katuti collected herself, turned to him, and tried to 
 speak; but her pale lips remained closed, and her eyes 
 gazed dimly into vacancy as though a catalepsy had 
 seized her. 
 
 " Mistress ! Mistress ! " cried the dwarf again, with 
 growing agitation. "What is the matter? shall I call 
 thy daughter?" 
 
 Katuti made a sign with her hand, and cried feebly : 
 "The wretches! the reprobates!" 
 
 Her breath began to come quickly, the blood 
 mounted to her cheeks and her flashing eyes; she trod
 
 172 UARDA. 
 
 upon the letter, and wept so loud and passionately, 
 that the dwarf, who had never before seen tears in 
 her eyes, raised himself timidly, and said in mild re- 
 proach: "Katuti!" 
 
 She laughed bitterly, and said with a trembling 
 voice : 
 
 "Why do you call my name so loud! it is dis- 
 graced and degraded. How the nobles and the ladies 
 will rejoice! Now envy can point at us with spiteful 
 joy and a minute ago I was praising this day! They 
 say one should exhibit one's happiness in the streets, 
 and conceal one's misery ; on the contrary, on the con- 
 trary! Even the Gods should not know of one's hopes 
 and joys, for they too are envious and spiteful ! " 
 
 Again she leaned her head against the palm-tree. 
 
 "Thou speakest of shame, and not of death," said 
 Nemu, " and I learned from thee that one should give 
 nothing up for lost excepting the dead." 
 
 These words had a powerful effect on the agitated 
 woman. Quickly and vehemently she turned upon the 
 dwarf saying. 
 
 "You are clever, and faithful too, so listen! but if 
 you were Amon himself there is nothing to be done " 
 
 " We must try," said Nemu, and his sharp eyes met 
 those of his mistress. 
 
 "Speak," he said, and trust me. Perhaps I can 
 IK of no use; but that I can be silent thou knowest." 
 
 "Before long the children in the streets will talk 
 of what this tells me," said Katuti, laughing with bitter- 
 ness, "only Ncfert must know nothing of what has 
 happened nothing, mind; what is that? the Regent 
 coming! quick, fly; tell him I am suddenly taken ill,
 
 UARDA. 173 
 
 very ill ; I cannot see him, not now ! No one is to be 
 admitted no one, do you hear ?" 
 
 The dwarf went. 
 
 When he came back after he had fulfilled his 
 errand, he found his mistress still in a fever of ex- 
 citement. 
 
 " Listen," she said ; "first the smaller matter, then 
 the frightful, the unspeakable. Rameses loads Mena 
 with marks of his favor. It came to a division of the 
 spoils of war for the year ; a great heap of treasure lay 
 ready for each of his followers, and the charioteer had 
 to choose before all the others." 
 
 " Well ?" said the dwarf. 
 
 " Well !" echoed Katuti. " Well ! how did the worthy 
 householder care for his belongings at home, how did 
 he seek to relieve his indebted estate ? It is disgrace- 
 ful, hideous ! He passed by the silver, the gold, the 
 jewels, with a laugh ; and took the captive daughter of 
 the Danaid princes, and led her into his tent." 
 
 " Shameful !" muttered the dwarf. 
 
 " Poor, poor Nefert !" cried Katuti, covering her 
 face with her hands. 
 
 "And what more ?" asked Nemu hastily. 
 
 " That," said Katuti, " that is but I will keep calm 
 quite calm and quiet. You know my son. He is 
 heedless, but he loves me and his sister more than 
 anything in the world. I, fool as I was, to persuade 
 him to economy, had vividly described our evil plight, 
 and after that disgraceful conduct of Mena he thought 
 of us and of our anxieties. His share of the booty 
 was small, and could not help us. His comrades threw 
 dice for the shares they had obtained he staked his to 
 win more for us. He lost all all and at last against
 
 1 74 UARDA. 
 
 an enormous sum, still thinking of us, and only of us, 
 he staked the mummy of his dead father.* He lost. If 
 he does not redeem the pledge before the expiration 
 of the third month, he will fall into infamy,** the 
 mummy will belong to the winner, and disgrace and 
 ignominy will be my lot and his." 
 
 Katuti pressed her hands on her face, the dwarf 
 muttered to himself, " The gambler and hypocrite !" 
 
 When his mistress had grown calmer, he said : 
 
 " It is horrible, yet all is not lost. How much is 
 the debt ?" 
 
 It sounded like a heavy curse, when Katuti replied, 
 " Thirty Babylonian talents."*** 
 
 The dwarf cried out, as if an asp had stung him. 
 " Who dared to bid against such a mad stake?" 
 
 "The Lady Hathor's son, Antef," answered Katuti, 
 " who has already gambled away the inheritance of his 
 fathers, in Thebes." 
 
 " He will not remit one grain of wheat of his claim," 
 cried the dwarf. "And Mena?" 
 
 " How could my son turn to him after what had 
 happened? The poor child implores me to ask the 
 assistance of the Regent." 
 
 " Of the Regent ?" said the dwarf, shaking his big 
 head. "Impossible!" 
 
 "I know, as matters now stand; but his place, his 
 name." 
 
 It was a king of the fourth dynasty, named Asychis by Herodotus, who 
 it B admitted was the first to pledge the mummies of his ancestors. " He who 
 stakes this pledge and fails to redeem the debt shall, after his death, rest 
 neither in his father's tomb nor in any other, and sepulture shall be denied to 
 hi* descendants." Herod, n. 136. 
 
 " Thit it would appear was the heaviest punishment which could fall on 
 an Egyptian Soldier. Diod. i. 78. 
 *** Z 6, 750 sterling.
 
 UARDA. 175 
 
 " Mistress," said the dwarf, and deep purpose rang 
 in the words, " do not spoil the future for the sake of 
 the present. If thy son loses his honor under King 
 Rameses, the future King, Ani, may restore it to him. 
 If the Regent now renders you all an important ser- 
 vice, he will regard you as amply paid when our efforts 
 have succeeded, and he sits on the throne. He lets 
 himself be led by thee now because thou hast no need 
 of his help, and dost seem to work only for his sake, 
 and for his elevation. As soon as thou hast appealed 
 to him, and he has assisted thee, all thy confidence 
 and freedom will be gone, and the more difficult he 
 finds it to raise so large a sum of money at once, 
 the angrier he will be to think that thou art making 
 use of him. Thou knowest his circumstances." 
 
 "He is in debt," said Katuti. "I know that." 
 
 "Thou should'st know it," cried the dwarf, "for 
 thou thyself hast forced him to enormous expenses. 
 He has won the people of Thebes with dazzling 
 festive displays; as guardian of Apis* he gave a large 
 donation to Memphis; he bestowed thousands on the 
 leaders of the troops sent into Ethiopia, which were 
 equipped by him; what his spies cost him at the 
 camp of the king, thou knowest. He has borrowed 
 sums of money from most of the rich men in the 
 country, and that is well, for so many creditors are so 
 many allies. The Regent is a bad debtor; but the 
 king Ani, they reckon, will be a grateful payer." 
 
 Katuti looked at the dwarf in astonishment. 
 
 "You know men!" she said. 
 
 * When Apis (the sacred bull) died under Ptolemy I. Spter, his keepers 
 spent not only the money which they had received for his maintenance, in his 
 obsequies, but borrowed 50 talents of silver (^11,250) from the king. In the 
 time of Diodorus 100 talents were spent for the same purpose.
 
 176 UARDA. 
 
 "To my sorrow!" replied Nemu. "Do not apply to 
 the Regent, and before thou dost sacrifice the labor 
 of years, and thy future greatness, and that of those 
 near to thee, sacrifice thy son's honor." 
 
 "And my husband's, and my own?" exclaimed 
 Katuti. " How can you know what that is ! Honor 
 is a word that the slave may utter, but whose meaning 
 he can never comprehend; you rub the weals that 
 are raised on you by blows; to me every finger pointed 
 at me in scorn makes a wound like an ashwood lance 
 with a poisoned tip of brass. Oh ye holy Gods! who 
 can help us?" 
 
 The miserable woman pressed her hands over her 
 eyes, as if to shut out the sight of her own disgrace. 
 
 The dwarf looked at her compassionately, and said 
 in a changed tone : 
 
 host thou remember the diamond which fell out 
 of Ncfert's handsomest ring? We hunted for it, and 
 could not find it. Next day, as I was going through 
 the room, I trod on something hard ; I stooped down 
 and found the stone. What the noble organ of sight, 
 the eye, overlooked, the callous despised sole of the 
 foot found ; and perhaps the small slave, Nemu, who 
 knows nothing of honor, may succeed in finding a 
 mode of escape which is not revealed to the lofty 
 soul of his mistress !' 
 
 " What are you thinking of?" asked Katuti. 
 
 " Escape," answered the dwarf. " Is it true that 
 thy sister Setchem has visited thee, and that you are 
 reconciled ?" 
 
 She offered me her hand, and I took it 1' 
 
 "Then go to her. Men are never more helpful 
 than after a reconciliation. The enmity they have
 
 UARDA. 177 
 
 driven out, seems to leave as it were a freshly-healed 
 wound which must be touched with caution ; and 
 Setchem is of thy own blood, and kind-hearted." 
 
 " She is not rich," replied Katuti. " Every palm in 
 her garden comes from her husband, and belongs to 
 her children." 
 
 " Paaker, too, was with you ?" 
 
 " Certainly only by the entreaty of his mother he 
 hates my son-in-law." 
 
 " I know it," muttered the dwarf, " but if Nefert 
 would ask him ?" 
 
 The widow drew herself up indignantly. She felt 
 that she had allowed the dwarf too much freedom, 
 and ordered him to leave her alone. 
 
 Nemu kissed her robe and asked timidly 
 
 " Shall I forget that thou hast trusted me, or am I 
 permitted to consider further as to thy son's safety ?" 
 
 Katuti stood for a moment undecided, then she 
 said 
 
 " You were clever enough to find what I carelessly 
 dropped ; perhaps some God may show you what I 
 ought to do. Now leave me." ' 
 
 " Wilt thou want me early to-morrow ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Then I will go to the Necropolis, and offer a 
 sacrifice." 
 
 " Go !" said Katuti, and went towards the house 
 with the fatal letter in her hand. 
 
 Nemu stayed behind alone ; he looked thoughtfully 
 at the ground, murmuring to himself. 
 
 " She must not lose her honor ; not at present, 
 or indeed all will be lost. What is this honor ? We 
 all come into the world without it, and most of us go 
 
 Uarda. I. la
 
 178 UARDA. 
 
 to the grave without knowing it, and very good folks 
 notwithstanding. Only a few who are rich and idle 
 weave it in with the homely stuff of their souls, as the 
 Kuschites* do their hair with grease and oils, till it 
 forms a cap of which, though it disfigures them, they 
 are so proud that they would rather have their ears 
 <ut off than the monstrous thing. I see, I see but 
 before I open my mouth I will go to my mother. 
 She knows more than twenty prophets." 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BEFORE the sun had risen the next morning, Nemu 
 got himself ferried over the Nile, with the small white 
 ass which Mena's deceased father had given him many 
 years before. He availed himself of the cool hour 
 which precedes the rising of the sun for his ride 
 through the Necropolis. 
 
 Well acquainted as he was with every stock and 
 stone, he avoided the high roads which led to the 
 goal of his expedition, and trotted towards the hill 
 which divides the valley of the royal tombs from the 
 plain of the Nile. 
 
 Before him opened a noble amphitheatre of lofty 
 lime-stone peaks, the background of the stately terrace- 
 temple which the proud ancestress of two kings of the 
 fallen family, the great Hata.su, had erected to their 
 memory, and to the Goddess Hathor. 
 
 Nemu left the sanctuary to his left, and rode up 
 the steep hill-path which was the nearest way from the 
 plain to the valley of the tombs. 
 
 TW moaumom show m (hat the ancient negroes of the upper Nile were 
 4f*oMd ID the** itpukivf fcihioM a their modem descendant, are.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 179 
 
 Below him lay a bird's eye view of the terrace- 
 building of Hatasu, and before him, still slumbering 
 in cool dawn, was the Necropolis with its houses and 
 temples and colossal statues, the broad Nile glistening 
 with white sails under the morning mist ; and, in the 
 distant east, rosy with the coming sun, stood Thebes 
 and her gigantic temples. 
 
 But the dwarf saw nothing of the glorious pano- 
 rama that lay at his feet; absorbed in thought, and 
 stooping over the neck of his ass, he let the panting 
 beast climb and rest at its pleasure. 
 
 When he had reached half the height of the hill, 
 he perceived the sound of footsteps coming nearer and 
 nearer to him. 
 
 The vigorous walker had soon reached him, and 
 bid him good morning, which he civilly returned. 
 
 The hill-path was narrow, and when Nemu ob- 
 served that the man who followed him was a priest, 
 he drew up his donkey on a level spot, and said 
 reverently 
 
 " Pass on, holy father ; for thy two feet carry thee 
 quicker than my four." 
 
 "A sufferer needs my help," replied the leech 
 Nebsecht, Pentaur's friend, whom we have already 
 seen in the House of Seti, and by the bed of the 
 paraschites' daughter; and he hastened on so as to 
 gain on the slow pace of the rider. 
 
 Then rose the glowing disk of the sun above the 
 eastern horizon, and from the sanctuaries below the 
 travellers rose up the pious many-voiced chant of 
 praise. 
 
 Nemu slipped off his ass, and assumed an attitude 
 of prayer; the priest did the same; but while the
 
 I So UARDA. 
 
 dwarf devoutly fixed his eyes on the new birth of the 
 Sun-God from the eastern range, the priest's eyes 
 wandered to the earth, and his raised hand fell to 
 pick up a rare fossil shell which lay on the path. 
 
 In a few minutes Nebsecht rose, and Nemu fol- 
 lowed him. 
 
 " It is a fine morning," said the dwarf; " the holy 
 fathers down there seem more cheerful to-day than 
 usual." 
 
 The surgeon laughed assent. " Do you belong to 
 the Necropolis ?" he said. " Who here keeps dwarfs ?" 
 
 " No one," answered the little man. " But I will 
 ask thee a question. Who that lives here behind the 
 hill is jof so much importance, that a leech from the 
 House of Seti sacrifices his night's rest for him ?" 
 
 "The one I visit is mean, but the suffering is 
 great," answered Nebsecht. 
 
 Nemu looked at him with admiration, and muttered, 
 
 M That is noble, that is " but he did not finish his 
 
 speech ; he struck his brow and exclaimed, " You are 
 going, by the desire of the Princess Bent-Anat, to the 
 child of the paraschites that was run over. I guessed 
 as much. The food must have an excellent after-taste, 
 if a. gentleman rises so early to eat it. How is the 
 poor child doing ?" 
 
 There was so much warmth in these last words 
 that Nebsecht, who had thought the dwarf's reproach 
 uncalled for, answered in a friendly tone 
 
 " Not so badly ; she may be saved." 
 
 "The Gods be praised!" exclaimed Nemu, while 
 the priest passed on. 
 
 Nebsecht went up and down the hillside at a re- 
 doubled pace, and had long taken his place by the
 
 UARDA. l8l 
 
 couch of the wounded Uarda in the hovel of the para- 
 shites, when Nemu drew near to the abode of his 
 Mother Hekt, from whom Paaker had received the 
 philter. 
 
 The old woman sat before the door of her cave. 
 
 Near her lay a board, fitted with cross pieces, be- 
 tween which a little boy was stretched in such a way 
 that they touched his head and his feet. 
 
 Hekt understood the art of making dwarfs; play- 
 things in human form were well paid for, and the child 
 on the rack, with his pretty little face, promised to be 
 a valuable article. 
 
 As soon as the sorceress saw some one approaching, 
 she stooped over the child, took him up board and all 
 in her arms, and carried him into the cave. Then she 
 said sternly: 
 
 " If you move, little one, I will flog you. Now let 
 me tie you." 
 
 "Don't tie me," said the child, "I will be good 
 and lie still." 
 
 "Stretch yourself out," ordered the old woman, 
 and tied the child with a rope to the board. " If you 
 are quiet, I'll give you a honey-cake by-and-bye, and 
 let you play with the young chickens." 
 
 The child was quiet, and a soft smile of delight 
 and hope sparkled in his pretty eyes. His little hand 
 caught the dress of the old woman, and with the 
 sweetest coaxing tone, which God bestows on the inno- 
 cent voices of children, he said: 
 
 "I will be as still as a mouse, and no one shall 
 know that I am here; but if you give me the honey- 
 cake you will untie* me for a little, and let me go to 
 Uarda."
 
 182 UARDA. 
 
 She is ill ! what do you want there ? " 
 
 "I would take her the cake," said the child, and 
 his eyes glistened with tears. 
 
 The old woman touched the child's chin with her 
 finger, and some mysterious power prompted her to 
 bend over him to kiss him. But before her lips had 
 touched his face she turned away, and said, in a hard 
 tone: 
 
 "Lie still! by and by we will see." Then she 
 stooped, and threw a brown sack over the child. She 
 went back into the open air, greeted Nemu, entertained 
 him with milk, bread and honey, gave him news of the 
 girl who had been run over, for he seemed to take 
 her misfortune very much to heart, and finally asked : 
 
 "What brings you here? The Nile was still narrow 
 when you last found your way to me, and now it has 
 been falling some time.* Are you sent by your mis- 
 tress, or do you want my help ? All the world is alike. 
 No one goes to see any one else unless he wants to 
 make use of him. What shall I give you ? " 
 
 " I want nothing," said the dwarf, " but " 
 
 "You are commissioned by a third person," said 
 the witch, laughing. " It is the same thing. Whoever 
 wants a thing for some one else only thinks of his own 
 interest." 
 
 "May be," said Nemu. "At any rate your words 
 show that you have not grown unwiser since I saw you 
 last and I am glad of it, for I want your advice." 
 
 Thn i. the beginning of November. The Nile begins slowly to rise 
 
 ' ** jjj"? ' .. e r rccn tne '5* **"! 20tn July it suddenly swells rapidly, and 
 
 * "" * October, not. as was formerly supposed, at the end of ?ep- 
 
 ib*r the inundation reaches its highest level. Heinrich Earth established 
 
 tf data beyond dispute. After the water has begun to sink it rises once 
 
 Mober and to a higher level than before. Then it soon (alls, at first 
 
 wly, but by degrees quicker and quicker.
 
 UARDA. 183 
 
 "Advice is cheap. What is going on out there?" 
 Nemu related to his mother shortly, clearly, and with- 
 out reserve, what was plotting in his mistress's house, 
 and the frightful disgrace with which she was threatened 
 through her son. 
 
 The old woman shook her grey head thoughtfully 
 several times : but she let the little man go on to the 
 end of his story without interrupting him. Then she 
 asked, and her eyes flashed as she spoke : 
 
 "And you really believe that you will succeed in 
 putting the sparrow on the eagle's perch Ani on the 
 throne of Rameses ?" 
 
 " The troops fighting in Ethiopia are for us," cried 
 Nemu. "The priests declare themselves against the 
 king, and recognize in Ani the genuine blood of Ra." 
 
 " That is much," said the old woman. 
 
 "And many dogs are the death of the gazelle," 
 said Nemu laughing. 
 
 " But Rameses is not a gazelle to run, but a 
 lion," said the old woman gravely. " You are playing 
 a high game." 
 
 ' We know it," answered Nemu. " But it is for 
 high stakes there is much to win." 
 
 "And all to lose," muttered the old woman, passing 
 her fingers round her scraggy neck. " Well, do as you 
 please it is all the same to me who it is sends the 
 young to be killed, and drives the old folks' cattle from 
 the field. What do they want with me ?" 
 
 " No one has sent me," answered the dwarf. " I 
 come of my own free fancy to ask you what Katuti 
 must do to save her son and her house from dis- 
 honor." 
 
 " Hm !" hummed the witch, looking at Nemu while
 
 184 UARDA. 
 
 she raised herself on her stick. " What has come to 
 you that you take the fate of these great people to 
 heart as if it were your own ?" 
 
 The dwarf reddened, and answered hesitatingly 
 
 " Katuti is a good mistress, and, if things go well with 
 her, there may be windfalls for you and me." 
 
 Hekt shook her head doubtfully. 
 
 "A loaf for you perhaps, and a crumb for me !" she 
 said. " There is more than that in your mind, and I 
 can read your heart as if you were a ripped up raven. 
 You are one of those who can never keej> their fingers 
 at rest, and must knead everybody's dough ; must push, 
 and drive and stir something. Every jacket is too tight 
 for you. If you were three feet taller, and the son of 
 a priest, you might have gone far. High you will go, 
 and high you will end ; as the friend of a king or on 
 the gallows." 
 
 The old woman laughed ; but Nemu bit his lips, 
 and said : 
 
 " If you had sent me to school, and if I were not 
 the son of a witch, and a dwarf, I would play with 
 men as they have played with me ; for I am cleverer 
 than all of them, and none of their plans are hi<l<kn 
 from me. A hundred roads Ue before me, when they 
 don't know whether to go out or in ; and where they 
 rush heedlessly forwards I see the abyss that they are 
 running to." 
 
 "And nevertheless you come to me?" said the old 
 woman sarcastically. 
 
 " I want your advice," said Nemu seriously. " Four 
 eyes sec more than one, and the impartial looker-on 
 sees dearer than the player ; besides you are bound to 
 help me,"
 
 UARDA. 185 
 
 The old woman laughed loud in astonishment. 
 " Bound!" she said, " I ? and to what if you please?" 
 
 " To help me," replied the dwarf, half in entreaty, 
 and half in reproach. " You deprived me of my growth, 
 and reduced me to a cripple." 
 
 " Because no one is better off than you dwarfs," 
 interrupted the witch. 
 
 Nemu shook his head, and answered sadly 
 
 " You have often said so and perhaps for many 
 others, who are born in misery like me perhaps you 
 are right; but for me you have spoilt my life; you 
 have crippled not my body only but my soul, and have 
 condemned me to sufferings that are nameless and un- 
 utterable." 
 
 The dwarf's big head sank on his breast, and with 
 his left hand he pressed his heart. 
 
 The old woman went up to him kindly. 
 
 " What ails you ?" she asked, " I thought it was well 
 with you in Mena's house." 
 
 " You thought so ?" cried the dwarf. " You who 
 show me as in a mirror what I am, and how mys- 
 terious powers throng and stir in me ? You made me 
 what I am by your arts ; you sold me to the treasurer 
 of Rameses, and he gave me to the father of Mena, 
 his brother-in-law. Fifteen years ago ! I was a young 
 man then, a youth like any other, only more passionate, 
 more restless, and fiery than they. I was given as a 
 plaything to the young Mena, and he harnessed me to 
 his little chariot, and dressed me out with ribbons and 
 feathers, and flogged me when I did not go fast enough. 
 How the girl for whom I would have given my life 
 the porter's daughter, laughed when I, dressed up in 
 motley, hopped panting in front of the chariot, and the
 
 1 86 IARDA. 
 
 young lord's whip whistled in my ears wringing the 
 sweat from my brow, and the blood from my broken 
 heart. Then Mena's father died, the boy went to 
 school, and I waited on the wife of his steward, whom 
 Katuti banished to Hermonthis. That was a time ! The 
 little daughter of the house made a doll of me, laid 
 me in the cradle, and made me shut my eyes and 
 pretend to sleep, while love and hatred, and great 
 projects were strong within me. If I tried to resist they 
 beat me with rods ; and when once, in a rage, I forgot 
 myself, and hit little Mertitefs hard, Mena, who came 
 in, hung me up in the store room to a nail by my 
 girdle, and left me to swing there; he said he had 
 forgotten to take me down again. The rats fell upon 
 me ; here are the scars, these little white spots here 
 look ! They perhaps will some day wear out, but the 
 wounds that my spirit received in those hours have 
 not yet ceased to bleed. Then Mena married Nefert, 
 and, with her, his mother-in-law, Katuti, came into the 
 house. She took me from the steward, I became in- 
 dispensable to her; she treats me like a man, she values 
 mv intelligence and listens to my advice, therefore I 
 will make her great, and with her, and through her, I 
 will wax mighty. If Ani mounts the throne, we will 
 guide him you, and I, and she! Rameses must fall, 
 and with him Mena, the boy who degraded my body 
 and |>oioned my soul !" 
 
 I hiring this speech the old woman had stood in 
 silence opposite the dwarf. Now she sat clown on her 
 rough wooden scat, and said, while she proceeded to 
 pluck a lapwing 
 
 * Now I understand you ; you wish to be revenged. 
 You hope to rise high, and I am to whet your knife,
 
 UARDA. 187 
 
 and hold the ladder for you. Poor little man ! there, 
 sit down drink a gulp of milk to cool you, and listen 
 to my advice. Katuti wants a great deal of money to 
 escape dishonor. She need only pick it up it lies 
 at her door." 
 
 The dwarf looked at the witch in astonishment. 
 
 "The Mohar Paaker is her sister Setchem's son. 
 Is he not ?" 
 
 "As you say." 
 
 " Katuti's daughter Nefert is the wife of your master 
 Mena, and another would like to tempt the neglected 
 little hen into his yard." 
 
 " You mean Paaker, to whom Nefert was promised 
 before she went after Mena." 
 
 " Paaker was with me the day before yesterday." 
 
 "With you?" 
 
 " Yes, with me, with old Hekt to buy a love philter. 
 I gave him one, and as I was curious I went after 
 him, saw him give the water to the little lady, and 
 found out her name." 
 
 "And Nefert drank the magic drink?" asked the 
 dwarf horrified. 
 
 "Vinegar and turnip juice," laughed the old witch. 
 " A lord who comes to me to win a wife is ripe for 
 any thing. Let Nefert ask Paaker for the money, and 
 the young scapegrace's debts are paid." 
 
 " Katuti is proud, and repulsed me severely when 
 I proposed this." 
 
 "Then she must sue to Paaker herself for the 
 money. Go back to him, make him hope that Nefert 
 is inclined to him, tell him what distresses the ladies, 
 and if he refuses, but only if he refuses, let him see 
 that you know something of the little dose."
 
 1 88 UARDA. 
 
 The dwarf looked meditatively on the ground, and 
 then said, looking admiringly at the old woman, " That 
 i> the right thing." 
 
 You will find out the lie without my telling you," 
 mumbled the witch ; " your business is not perhaps such 
 a bad one as it seemed to me at first. Katuti may 
 thank the ne'er do well who staked his father's corpse. 
 You don't understand me ? Well, if you are really the 
 shaq>est of them all over there, what must the others 
 be?" 
 
 " You mean that people will speak well of my mistress 
 for sacrificing so large a sum for the sake ?" 
 
 ' Whose sake ? why speak well of her ?" cried the 
 old woman impatiently. " Here we deal with other 
 things, with actual facts. There stands Paaker there 
 the wife of Mena. If the Mohar sacrifices a fortune 
 for Nefert, he will be her master, and Katuti will not 
 stand in his way ; she knows well enough why her 
 nephew pays for her. But some one else stops the 
 way, and that is Mena. It is worth while to get him 
 out of the way. The charioteer stands close to the 
 Pharaoh, and the noose that is flung at one may easily 
 fall round the neck of the other too. Make the Mohar 
 your ally, and it may easily happen that your rat-bites 
 may be |>aid for with mortal wounds, and Rameses 
 who, if you marched against him openly, might blow 
 vou to the ground, may be hit by a lance thrown 
 from an ambush. When the throne is clear, the weak 
 leg! of the Regent may succeed in clambering up to 
 it with the help of the priests. Here you sit open- 
 mouthed ; and I have told you nothing that you might 
 not have found out for yourself."
 
 UARDA. 189 
 
 " You are a perfect cask of wisdom !" exclaimed 
 the dwarf. 
 
 "And now you will go away," said Hekt, "and 
 reveal your schemes to your mistress and the Regent, 
 and they will be astonished at your cleverness. To-day 
 you still know that I have shown you what you have 
 to do ; to-mprrow you will have forgotten it; and the 
 day after to-morrow you will believe yourself possessed 
 by the inspiration of the nine great Gods. I know that; 
 but I cannot give anything for nothing. You live by 
 your smallness, another makes his living with his hard 
 hands, I earn my scanty bread by the thoughts of my. 
 brain. Listen ! when you have half won Paaker, and 
 Ani shows himself inclined to make use of him, then 
 say to him that I may know a secret and I do know 
 one, I alone which may make the Mohar the sport 
 of his wishes, and that I may be disposed to sell it." 
 
 " That shall be done ! certainly, mother," cried the 
 dwarf. " What do you wish for ?" 
 
 " Very little," said the old woman. " Only a permit 
 that makes me free to do and to practice whatever I 
 please, unmolested even by the priests, and to receive 
 an honorable burial after my death." 
 
 " The Regent will hardly agree to that ; for he 
 must avoid every thing that may offend the servants 
 of the Gods." 
 
 " And do every thing," retorted the old wom^an, " that 
 can degrade Rameses in their sight. Ani, do you 
 hear, need not write me a new license, but only renew 
 the old one granted to me by Rameses when I cured 
 his favorite horse. They burnt it with my other pos- 
 sessions,, when they plundered my house, and de-
 
 190 
 
 UARPA. 
 
 nounced me and my belongings for sorcery. The 
 permit of Rameses is what I want, nothing more." 
 
 " You shall have it," said the dwarf. " Good-by ; I 
 am charged to look into the tomb of our house, and 
 see whether the offerings for the dead are regularly 
 set out ; to pour out fresh essences and have various 
 things renewed. When Sechet has ceased to rage, and 
 it is coofer, I shall come by here again, for I should 
 like to call on the paraschites, and see how the poor 
 child is." 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 DURING this conversation two men had been busily 
 occupied, in front of the paraschites' hut, in driving 
 piles into the earth, and stretching a torn linen cloth 
 upon them. 
 
 One of them, old Pinem, whom we have seen, 
 tending his grandchild, requested the other from time 
 to time to consider the sick girl and to work less 
 noisily. , 
 
 After they had finished their simple task, and 
 spread a couch of fresh straw under the awning, they 
 too sat down on the earth, and looked at the hut before 
 which the surgeon Nebsecht was sitting waiting till the 
 sleeping girl should wake. 
 
 " Who is that ?" asked the leech of the old man, 
 pointing* to his young companion, a tall sunburnt 
 soldier with a bushy red beard. 
 
 " My son," replied the paraschites, " who is just 
 returned from Syria." 
 
 " Uarda's father ?" asked Nebsecht.
 
 UARDA. igi 
 
 The soldier nodded assent, and said with a rough 
 voice but not without cordiality 
 
 " No one could guess it by looking at us she is 
 so white and rosy. Her mother was a foreigner, and 
 she has turned out as delicate as she was. I am afraid 
 to touch her with my little finger and there comes a 
 chariot over the brittle doll, and does not quite crush 
 her, for she is still alive." 
 
 "Without the help of this holy father," said the 
 paraschites, approaching the surgeon, and kissing his 
 robe, " you would never have seen her alive again. 
 May the Gods reward thee for what thou hast done 
 for us poor folks !" 
 
 "And we can pay too," cried the soldier, slapping 
 a full purse that hung at his girdle. " We have taken 
 plunder in Syria, and I will buy a calf, and give it to 
 thy temple." 
 
 " Offer a beast of dough, rather," replied Nebsecht, 
 " and if you wish to show yourself grateful to me, give 
 the money to your father, so that he may feed and 
 nurse your child in accordance with my instructions." 
 
 " Hm," murmured the soldier ; he took the purse 
 from his girdle, flourished it in his hand, and said, as 
 he handed it to the paraschites : 
 
 " I should have liked to drink it ! but take it, father, 
 for the child and my mother." 
 
 While the old man hesitatingly put out his hand 
 for the rich gift, the soldier recollected himself and 
 said, opening the purse : 
 
 " Let me take out a few rings, for to-day I cannot 
 go dry. I have two or three comrades lodging in the 
 red Tavern. That is right. There, take the rest of 
 the rubbish."
 
 ig2 UARDA. 
 
 Nebsecht nodded approvingly at the soldier, and 
 he, as his father gratefully kissed the surgeon's hand, 
 exclaimed : 
 
 Make the little one sound, holy father! It is all 
 over with gifts and offerings, for I have nothing left ; 
 but there are two iron fists and a breast like the wall 
 of a fortress. If at any time thou dost want help, 
 call me, and I will protect thee against twenty enemies. 
 Thou hast saved my child good! Life for life. I 
 sign myself thy blood-ally there." 
 
 With these words he drew his poniard out of his 
 girdle. He scratched his arm, and let a few drops of 
 his blood run down on a stone at the feet of Nebsecht 
 " Look," he said. " There is my bond, Kaschta has 
 signed himself thine, and thou canst dispose of my life 
 as of thine own. What I have said, I have said." 
 
 " I am a man of peace," Nebsecht stammered, 
 " And my white robe protects me. But I believe our 
 patient is awake." 
 
 The physician rose, and entered the hut. 
 
 Uarda's pretty head lay on her grandmother's lap, 
 and her large blue eyes turned contentedly on the 
 priest. 
 
 " She might get up and go out into the air," said 
 the old woman. " She has slept long and soundly." 
 
 The surgeon examined her pulse, and her wound, 
 on which green leaves were laid. 
 
 " Excellent," he said ; " who gave you this healing 
 herb ?" 
 
 The old woman shuddered, and hesitated; but 
 Uarda said fearlessly ; "Old Hekt, who lives over there 
 in the black cave." 
 
 " The witch !" muttered Nebsecht. " But we will
 
 UARDA. 193 
 
 let the leaves remain ; if they do good, it is no matter 
 where they came from." 
 
 " Hekt tasted the drops thou didst give her," said 
 the old woman, " and agreed that they were good." 
 
 " Then we are satisfied with each other," answered 
 Nebsecht, with a smile of amusement. " We will carry 
 you now into the open air, little maid ; for the air in 
 here is as heavy as lead, and your damaged lung re- 
 quires lighter nourishment." 
 
 " Yes, let me go out," said the girl. " It is well 
 that thou hast not brought back the other with thee, 
 who tormented me with his vows." 
 
 " You mean blind Teta," said Nebsecht, " he will 
 not come again; but the young priest who soothed 
 your father, when he repulsed the princess, will visit 
 you. He is kindly disposed, and you should you 
 should" 
 
 " Pentaur will come ?" said the girl eagerly. 
 
 " Before midday. But how do you know his name ?" 
 
 " I know him," said Uarda decidedly. 
 
 The surgeon looked at her surprised. 
 
 " You must not talk any more," he said, " for your 
 cheeks are glowing, and the fever may return. We have 
 arranged a tent for you, and now we will carry you 
 into the open air." 
 
 " Not yet," said the girl. " Grandmother, do my 
 hair for me, it is so heavy." 
 
 With these words she endeavored to part her 
 mass of long reddish-brown hair with her slender 
 hands, and to free it from the straws that had got en- 
 tangled in it. 
 
 " Lie still," said the surgeon, in a warning voice. 
 
 " But it is so heavy," said the sick girl, smiling and 
 
 Uarda, I. 13
 
 1 94 UARDA. 
 
 showing Nebsecht her abundant wealth of golden hair 
 as if it were a fatiguing burden. " Come, grandmother, 
 and help me." 
 
 The old woman leaned over the child, and combed 
 her long locks carefully with a coarse comb made of 
 grey horn, gently disengaged the straws from the 
 golden tangle, and at last laid two thick long plaits on 
 her granddaughter's shoulders. 
 
 Nebsecht knew that every movement of the 
 wounded girl might do mischief, and his impulse was 
 to stop the old woman's proceedings, but his tongue 
 seemed spell-bound. Surprised, motionless, and with 
 crimson cheeks, he stood opposite the girl, and his 
 eyes followed every movement of her hands with 
 anxious observation. 
 
 She did not notice him. 
 
 When the old woman laid down the comb Uarda 
 drew a long breath. 
 
 "Grandmother," she said, " give me the mirror." 
 
 The old woman brought a shard of dimly glazed, 
 baked clay. The girl turned to the light, contemplated 
 the undefined reflection for a moment, and said : 
 
 "I have not seen a flower for so long, grand- 
 mother." 
 
 "Wait, child," she replied; she took from a jug 
 the rose, which the princess had laid on the bosom of 
 her grandchild, and offered it to her. Before Uarda 
 could take it, the withered petals fell, and dropped 
 upon her. The surgeon stooped, gathered them up, 
 and put them into the child's hand. 
 
 "How good you are!" she said; "I am called 
 Uarda like this flower and I love roses and the 
 fresh air. Will you carry me out now ?"
 
 UARDA. 195 
 
 Nebsecht called the paraschites, who came into 
 the hut with his son, and they carried the girl out 
 into the air, and laid her under the humble tent they 
 had contrived for her. The soldier's knees trembled 
 while he held the light burden of his daughter's 
 weight in his strong hands, and he sighed when he laid 
 her down on the mat. 
 
 " How blue the sky is !" cried Uarda. "Ah ! grand- 
 father has watered my pomegranate, I thought so ! and 
 there come my doves ! give me some corn in my 
 hand, grandmother. How pleased they are." 
 
 The graceful birds, with black rings round their 
 reddish-grey necks, flew confidingly to her, and took 
 the corn that she playfully laid between her lips. 
 
 Nebsecht looked on with astonishment at this 
 pretty play. He felt as if a new world had opened to 
 him, and some new sense, hitherto unknown to him, 
 had been revealed to him within his breast. He 
 silently sat down in front of the hut, and drew the pic- 
 ture of a rose on the sand with a reed-stem that he 
 picked up. 
 
 Perfect stillness was around him; the doves even 
 had flown up, and settled on the roof. Presently the 
 dog barked, steps approached ; Uarda lifted herself up 
 and said : 
 
 " Grandmother, it is the priest Pentaur." 
 
 " Who told you ?" asked the old woman. 
 
 " I know it," answered the girl decidedly, and in a 
 few moments a sonorous voice cried : " Good day to 
 you. How is your invalid ?" 
 
 Pentaur was soon standing by Uarda; pleased to 
 hear Nebsecht's good report, and with the sweet face 
 of the girl. He had some flowers in his hand, that a 
 
 13 *
 
 196 UARDA. 
 
 happy maiden had laid on the altar of the Goddess 
 Hathor, which he had served since the previous day, 
 and he gave them to the sick girl, who took them with 
 a blush, and held them between her clasped hands. 
 
 "The great Goddess whom I serve sends you 
 these," said Pentaur, "and they will bring you v heal- 
 ing. Continue to resemble them. You are pure and 
 fair like them, and your course henceforth may be like 
 theirs. As the sun gives life to the grey horizon, so you 
 bring joy to this dark hut. Preserve your innocence, 
 and wherever you go you will bring love, as flowers 
 spring in every spot that is trodden by the golden foot 
 of Hathor.* May her blessing rest upon you !" 
 
 He had spoken the last words half to the old 
 couple and half to Uarda, and was already turning to 
 depart when, behind a heap of maize-straw that lay 
 close to the awning over the girl, the bitter cry of a 
 rhild was heard, and a little boy came forward who 
 held, as high as he could reach, a little cake, of which 
 the dog, who seemed to know him well, had snatched 
 half. 
 
 How do you come here, Scherau ?" the paraschites 
 asked the weeping boy; the unfortunate child that 
 Hckt was bringing up as a dwarf. 
 
 1 wanted," sobbed the little one, "to bring the 
 cake to Uarda, She is ill I had so much " 
 
 " Poor child," said the paraschites, stroking the boy's 
 theregive it to Uarda." 
 
 Scherau went up to the sick girl, knelt down by her, 
 and whispered with streaming eyes : 
 
 " Take it ! It is good, and very sweet, and if I get 
 
 ld 7 "fled "the golden," particularly at Dcndera. 
 with the " golden Aphrodite.
 
 UARDA. 197 
 
 another cake, and Hekt will let me out, I will bring it 
 to you." 
 
 "Thank you, good little Scherau," said Uarda, 
 kissing the child. Then she turned to Pentaur and 
 said : 
 
 " For weeks he has had nothing but papyrus pith,* 
 and lotus-bread,* and now he brings me the cake 
 which grandmother gave old Hekt yesterday." 
 
 The child blushed all over, and stammered : 
 
 " It is only half but I did not touch it. Your dog 
 bit out this piece, and this." 
 
 He touched the honey with the tip of his finger, 
 and put it to his lips. " I was a long time behind the 
 straw there, for I did not like to come out because of 
 the strangers there." He pointed to Nebsecht and 
 Pentaur. " But now I must go home," he cried. 
 
 The child was going, but Pentaur stopped him, 
 seized him, lifted him up in his arms and kissed him ; 
 saying, as he turned to Nebsecht 
 
 " They Avere wise, who represented Horus the sym- 
 bol of the triumph of good over evil and of purity over 
 the impure in the form of a child. Bless you, my 
 little friend; be good, and always give away what you 
 have to make others happy. It will not make your 
 house rich but it will your heart !" 
 
 Scherau clung to the priest, and involuntarily raised 
 
 * According to Herodotus II. 92., Diodorus I. Ro., Pliny xm. 10. The 
 Egyptians eat the lower part of the stem of the papyrus, at any rate the pith 
 of it ; by preference when it had been dried in the oven. Herodotus also tells 
 us that "they pound the seeds of the lotus which resembles a poppy, and 
 make bread of it." As we see from the monuments that enormous quantities 
 of lotus plants grew on the banks of the Nile, the statement of Diodorus that 
 a child, till it was grown up, cost its parents no more than 20 drachmae about 
 15 shillings is quite credible. It is extraordinary that in spite of the great 
 utility of these plants, particularly of the papyrus, neither of them now occurs 
 in Egypt.
 
 198 CARD A. 
 
 his little hand to stroke Pentaur's cheek. An unknown 
 tenderness had filled his little heart, and he felt as if 
 he must throw his arms round the poet's neck and cry 
 upon his breast. 
 
 But Pentaur set him down on the ground, and he 
 trotted down into the valley. There he paused. The 
 sun was high in the heavens, and he must return to the 
 witch's cave and his board, but he would so much like 
 to go a little farther only as far as to the king's tomb, 
 which was quite near. 
 
 Close by the door of this tomb was a thatch of 
 palm-branches, and under this the sculptor Batau, a 
 very aged man, was accustomed to rest. The old man 
 was deaf, but he passed for the best artist of his time, 
 and with justice; he had designed the beautiful pic- 
 tures and hieroglyphic inscriptions in Seti's splendid 
 buildings at Abydos and Thebes, as well as in the tomb 
 of that prince, and he was now working at the decora- 
 tion of the walls in the grave of Rameses. 
 
 Schcrau had often crept close up to him, and thought- 
 fully watched him at work, and then tried himself to 
 make animal and human figures out of a bit of clay. 
 
 One day the old man had observed him. 
 
 The sculptor had silently taken his humble attempt 
 out of his hand, and had returned it to him with a 
 smile of encouragement. 
 
 From that time a peculiar tie had sprung up be- 
 tween the two. Scherau would venture to sit down by 
 the sculptor, and try to imitate his finished images. 
 Not a word was exchanged between them, but often 
 the deaf old man would destroy the boy's works, often 
 on the contrary improve them with a touch of his
 
 UARDA. 199 
 
 own hand, and not seldom nod at him to encourage 
 him. 
 
 When he staid away the old man missed his pupil, 
 and Scherau's happiest hours were those which he passed 
 at his side. 
 
 He was not forbidden to take some clay home with 
 him. There, when the old woman's back was turned, 
 he moulded a variety of images which he destroyed as 
 soon as they were finished. 
 
 While he lay on his rack his hands were left free, 
 and he tried to reproduce the various forms which lived 
 in his imagination, he forgot the present in his artistic 
 attempts, and his bitter lot acquired a flavor of the 
 sweetest enjoyment. 
 
 But to-day it was too late ; he must give up his visit 
 to the tomb of Rameses. 
 
 Once more he looked back at the hut, and then 
 hurried into the dark cave. f 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 PENTAUR also soon quitted the hut of the para- 
 schites. 
 
 Lost in meditation, he went along the hill-path 
 which led to the temple* which Ameni had put under 
 his direction. 
 
 He foresaw many disturbed and anxious hours in 
 the immediate future. 
 
 The sanctuary of which he was the superior, had been 
 
 * This temple is well proportioned, and remains in good preservation. 
 Copies of the interesting pictures discovered in it are to be found in the " Fleet 
 of an Egyptian queen " by Dumichen. Other details may be found in Lepsius 1 
 Monuments of Egypt.
 
 200 UARDA. 
 
 dedicated to her own memory, and to the goddess 
 Hathor, by Hatasu,* a great queen of the dethroned 
 dynasty. 
 
 The priests who served it were endowed with pe- 
 culiar chartered privileges, which hitherto had been 
 strictly respected. Their dignity was hereditary, going 
 down from father to son, and they had the right of 
 choosing their director from among themselves. 
 
 Now their chief priest Rui was ill and dying, and 
 Ameni, under whose jurisdiction they came, had, with- 
 out consulting them, sent the young poet Pentaur to fill 
 his place. 
 
 They had received the intruder most unwillingly, 
 and combined strongly against him when it became 
 evident that he was disposed to establish a severe rule 
 and to abolish many abuses which had become estab- 
 lished customs. 
 
 They had devolved the greeting of the rising sun 
 on the temple-servants; Pentaur required that the younger 
 ones at least should take part in chanting the morning 
 hymn, and himself led the choir. They had trafficked 
 with the offerings laid on the altar of the Goddess ; the 
 new master repressed this abuse, as well as the extor- 
 tions of which they were guilty towards women in sorrow, 
 who visited the temple of Hathor in greater number 
 than any other sanctuary. 
 
 The poet brought up in the temple of Seti to self- 
 control, order, exactitude, and decent customs, deeply 
 j>enetrated with a sense of the dignity of his position, 
 and accustomed to struggle with special zeal against 
 
 ?? J*"**T rf Tho * me I-i *tfe of her brother Thotmes II., and prede- 
 
 "** * MOOM brother Thounes III. An energetic woman who executed 
 
 ** 7*""^ **" oumd hcroelf to be represented with the helmet and beard-
 
 UARDA. 201 
 
 indolence of body and spirit was disgusted with the 
 slothful life and fraudulent dealings of his subordinates ; 
 and the deeper insight which yesterday's experience 
 had given him into the poverty and sorrow of human 
 existence, made him resolve with increased warmth that 
 he would awake them to a new life. 
 
 The conviction that the lazy herd whom he com- 
 manded was called upon to pour consolation into a 
 thousand sorrowing hearts, to dry innumerable tears, 
 and to clothe the dry sticks of despair with the fresh 
 verdure of hope, urged him to strong measures. 
 
 Yesterday he had seen how, with calm indifference, 
 they had listened to the deserted wife, the betrayed 
 maiden, to the woman, who implored the withheld bless- 
 ing of children, to the anxious mother, the forlorn 
 widow, and sought only to take advantage of sorrow, 
 to extort gifts for the Goddess, or better still for their 
 own pockets or belly. 
 
 Now he was nearing the scene of his new labors. 
 
 There stood the reverend building, rising stately 
 from the valley on four terraces handsomely and singularly 
 divided, and resting on the western side against the 
 high amphitheatre of yellow cliffs. 
 
 On the closely-joined foundation stones gigantic 
 hawks were carved in relief, each with the emblem of 
 life, and symbolized Horus, the son of the Goddess, 
 who brings all that fades to fresh bloom, and all that 
 dies to resurrection. 
 
 On each terrace stood a hall open to the east, and 
 supported on two and twenty archaic* pillars. On their 
 
 * Polygonal pillars, which were used first in tomb-building under the 
 i2th dynasty, and after the expulsion of t'ne Hyksos under the kings of the 
 1 7th and i8th, in public buildings; but under the subsequent races of kings 
 they ceased to be employed.
 
 2O2 UARDA. 
 
 inner walls elegant pictures and inscriptions in the finest 
 sculptured work recorded, for the benefit of posterity, 
 the great things that Hatasu had done with the help of 
 the Gods of Thebes. 
 
 There were the ships which she had to send to 
 Punt* to enrich Egypt with the treasures of the east; 
 there the wonders brought to Thebes from Arabia might 
 be seen ; there were delineated the houses** of the in- 
 habitants of the land of frankincense, and all the 
 fishes of the Red Sea, in distinct and characteristic out- 
 line.*** 
 
 On the third and fourth terraces were the small 
 adjoining rooms of Hatasu and her brothers Thotmes 
 II. and III., which were built against the rock, and en- 
 tered by granite doorways. In them purifications were 
 accomplished, the images of the Goddess worshipped, 
 and the more distinguished worshippers admitted to 
 confess. The sacred cows of the Goddess were kept 
 in a side-building. 
 
 As Pentaur approached the great gate of the ter- 
 race-temple, he became the witness of a scene which 
 filled him with resentment. 
 
 A woman implored to be admitted into the fore- 
 court, to pray at the altar of the Goddess for her hus- 
 band, who was very ill, but the sleek gate-keeper drove 
 her back with rough words. 
 
 " It is written up," said he, pointing to the inscrip- 
 
 Arabia : apparently abo the caul of cut Africa south of Egypt as for as 
 MM& The IBMM of the KMS fxiblUhcd by Marictte, of the southern nations 
 caaqMrad by TbuUau 111., mention* it. This li*t was found on the pylon of 
 dMM*pkof r 
 
 They **od a* pie* MM! were entered by ladders. 
 
 The (peoa are in many oues distinguishable Dr. Donitz h?i named
 
 UARDA. 203 
 
 tion over the gate, "only the purified may set their 
 foot across this threshold, and you cannot be purified 
 but by the smoke of incense." 
 
 " Then swing the censer for me," said the woman, 
 " and take this silver ring it is all I have." 
 
 "A silver ring!" cried the porter, indignantly. 
 " Shall the goddess be impoverished for your sake ! 
 The grains of Anta,* that would be used in purifying 
 you, would cost ten times as much." 
 
 " But I have no more," replied the woman, " my 
 husband, for whom I come to pray, is ill ; he cannot 
 work, and my children " 
 
 " You fatten them up and deprive the goddess of 
 her due," cried the gate-keeper. " Three rings down, 
 or I shut the gate." 
 
 " Be merciful," said the woman, weeping. " What 
 will become of us if Hathor does not help my hus- 
 band ?" 
 
 "Will our goddess fetch the doctor?" asked the 
 porter. " She has something to do besides curing sick 
 starvelings. Besides, that is not her office. Go to 
 Imhotep** or to Chunsu the counsellor,*** or to the 
 great Techuti herself, who helps the sick. There is no 
 quack medicine to be got here." 
 
 * An incense frequently mentioned. 
 
 ** The son of Ptah, named Asklepios by the Greeks. Memphis was the 
 chief city of his worship ; he is usually represented with a cap on, and a book 
 on his knee. There are fine statues of him at Berlin, the Louvre, and other 
 museums. A bronze of great beauty is in the possession of Pastor Haken at 
 Riga. 
 
 *** The third of the Triad of Thebes ; he is identical with Toth, and fre- 
 quently addressed as of good counsel for the healing of the sick. His great 
 Temple in Thebes (Karnak) is well preserved. In the time of the zoth dynasty 
 A. C. 1273 to 1095, his statue (according to a passage interpreted by E. de 
 Rong) was sent into Asia to cure the sister of the wife of Rameses All., an 
 Asiatic princess, who was possessed by devils.
 
 204 UARDA. 
 
 " I only want comfort in my trouble," said the 
 woman. 
 
 " Comfort !" laughed the gate-keeper, measuring the 
 comely young woman with his eye. " That you may 
 have cheaper." 
 
 The woman turned pale, and drew back from the 
 hand the man stretched out towards her. 
 
 At this moment Pentaur, full of wrath, stepped 
 between them. 
 
 He raised his hand in blessing over the woman, 
 who bent low before him, and said, "Whoever calls 
 fervently on the Divinity is near to him. You are pure. 
 Enter." 
 
 As soon as she had disappeared within the temple, 
 the priest turned to the gate-keeper and exclaimed : 
 
 " Is this how you serve the goddess, is this how 
 you take advantage of a heart-wrung woman ? Give 
 me the keys of this gate. Your office is taken from 
 you, and early to-morrow you go out in the fields, and 
 keep the geese of Hathor." 
 
 The porter threw himself on his knees with loud 
 outcries ; but Pentaur turned his back upon him, entered 
 the sanctuary, and mounted the steps which led to his 
 dwelling on the third terrace. 
 
 A few priests whom he passed turned their backs 
 upon him, others looked down at their dinners, eating 
 noisily, and making as if they did not see him. They 
 had combined strongly, and were determined to expel 
 the inconvenient intruder at any price. 
 
 Having reached his room, which had been splen- 
 didly decorated for his predecessor, Pentaur laid aside 
 his new insignia, comparing sorrowfully the past and 
 the present.
 
 UARDA. 205 
 
 To what an exchange Ameni had condemned 
 him! 
 
 Here, wherever he looked, he met with sulkiness 
 and aversion; while, when he walked through the 
 courts of the House of Seti, a hundred boys would 
 hurry towards him, and cling affectionately to his robe. 
 Honored there by great and small, his every word 
 had had its value ; and when each day he gave utter- 
 ance to his thoughts, what he bestowed came back to 
 him refined by earnest discourse with his associates 
 and superiors, and he gained new treasures for his 
 inner life. 
 
 " What is rare," thought he, " is full of charm ; and 
 yet how hard it is to do without what is habitual !" 
 
 The occurrences of the last few days passed be- 
 fore his mental sight. Bent-Anat's image appeared 
 before him, and took a more and more distinct and 
 captivating form. His heart began to beat wildly, the 
 blood rushed faster through his veins ; he hid his face 
 in his hands, and recalled every glance, every word 
 from her lips. 
 
 " I follow thee willingly," she had said to him be- 
 fore the hut of the paraschites. Now he asked him- 
 self whether he were worthy of such a follower. 
 
 He had indeed broken through the old bonds, but 
 not to disgrace the house that was dear to him, only 
 to let new light into its dim chambers. 
 
 " To do what we have earnestly felt to be right," 
 said he to himself, " may seem worthy of punishment 
 to men, but cannot before God." 
 
 He sighed and walked out into the terrace in a 
 mood of lofty excitement, and fully resolved to do
 
 206 UARDA. 
 
 here nothing but what was right, to lay the foundation 
 of all that was good. 
 
 " We men," thought he, " prepare sorrow when we 
 come into the world, and lamentation when we leave 
 it ; and so it is our duty in the intermediate time to 
 fight with suffering, and to sow the seeds of joy. 
 There are many tears here to be wiped away. To 
 work then !" 
 
 The poet found none of his subordinates on the 
 upper terrace. They had all met in the forecourt of 
 the temple, and were listening to the gate-keeper's 
 tale, and seemed to sympathize with his angry com- 
 plaint against whom Pentaur well knew. 
 
 With a firm step he went towards them and said : 
 
 "I have expelled this man from among us, for 
 he is a disgrace to us. To-morrow he quits the 
 temple." 
 
 The gate-keeper looked enquiringly at the priests. 
 
 Not one moved. 
 
 " Go back into your house," said Pentaur, going 
 closer to him. 
 
 The porter obeyed. 
 
 IVntaur locked the door of the little room, gave 
 the key to one of the temple servants, and said: 
 " Perform your duty, watch the man, and if he escapes 
 you will go after the geese to-morrow too. See, my 
 friends, how many worshippers kneel there before our 
 altars go and fulfil your office. I will wait in the 
 confessional to receive complaints, and to administer 
 comfort." 
 
 The priests separated and went to the votaries. 
 Pentaur once more mounted the steps, and sat down 
 in the narrow confessional which was closed by a
 
 UARDA. 207 
 
 curtain ; on its wall the picture of Hatasu was to be 
 seen, drawing the milk of eternal life from the udders 
 of the cow Hathor.* 
 
 He had hardly taken his place when a temple 
 servant announced the arrival of a veiled lady. The 
 bearers of her litter were thickly veiled, and she had re- 
 quested to be conducted to the confession chamber. 
 The servant handed Pentaur a token by which the high- 
 priest of the great temple of Amon, on the other bank 
 of the Nile, granted her the privilege of entering the 
 inner rooms of the temple with the Rechiu,** and to 
 communicate with all priests, even with the highest of 
 the initiated. 
 
 The poet withdrew behind a curtain, and awaited 
 the stranger with a disquiet that seemed to him all the 
 more singular that he had frequently found himself in 
 a similar position. Even the noblest dignitaries had 
 often been transferred to him by Ameni when they 
 had come to the temple to have their visions inter- 
 preted. 
 
 A tall female figure entered the still, sultry stone 
 room, sank on her knees, and put up a long and 
 absorbed prayer before the figure of Hathor. Pentaur 
 also, seen by no one, lifted his hands, and fervently 
 addressed himself to the omnipresent spirit with a 
 prayer for strength and purity. 
 
 Just as his arms fell the lady raised her head. 
 It was as though the prayers of the two souls had 
 united to mount upwards together. 
 
 The veiled lady rose and dropped her veil. 
 
 * A remarkably life-like figure in relief, in perfect preservation 
 ** Egyptians, who were admitted to the innermost chambers and the 
 highest grades of learning.
 
 208 UARDA. 
 
 It was Bent-Anat. 
 
 In the agitation of her soul she had sought the 
 goddess Hathor, who guides the beating heart of 
 woman and spins the threads which bind man and 
 wife. 
 
 " High mistress of heaven ! many-named and beau- 
 tiful!" she began to pray aloud, "golden Hathor! who 
 knowest grief and ecstasy the present and the future 
 draw near to thy child, and guide the spirit of thy 
 servant, that he may advise me well. I am the daughter 
 of a father who is great and noble and truthful as one 
 of the Gods. He advises me he will never compel 
 me to yield to a man whom I can never love. Nay, 
 another has met me, humble in birth but noble in 
 spirit and in gifts '' 
 
 Thus far, Pentaur, incapable of speech, had over- 
 heard the princess. 
 
 Ought he to remain concealed and hear all her 
 secret, or" should he step forth and show himself to 
 her ? His pride called loudly to him : " Now she will 
 speak your name ; you are the chosen one of the 
 fairest and noblest." But another voice to which 
 he had accustomed himself to listen in severe self- 
 discipline made itself heard, and said " Let her say 
 nothing in ignorance, that she need be ashamed of if 
 she knew." 
 
 He blushed for her; he opened the curtain and 
 went forward into the presence of Bent-Anat. 
 
 The Princess drew back startled. 
 
 "Art thou Pentaur," she asked, "or one of the 
 Immortals?" 
 
 " I am Pentaur," he answered firmly, " a man with 
 all the weakness of his race, but with a desire for
 
 UARD^. 209 
 
 what is good. Linger here and pour out thy soul to 
 our Goddess; my whole life shall be a prayer for 
 thee." 
 
 The poet looked full at her ; then he turned quickly, 
 as if to avoid a danger, towards the door of the con- 
 fessional. 
 
 Bent-Anat called his name, and he stayed his 
 steps. 
 
 " The daughter of Rameses," she said, " need offer 
 no justification of her appearance here, but the maiden 
 Bent-Anat," and she colored as she spoke, " expected 
 to find, not thee, but the old priest Rui, and she de- 
 sired his advice. Now leave me to pray." 
 
 Bent-Anat sank on her knees, and Pentaur went 
 out into the open air. 
 
 When the princess too had left the confessional, 
 loud voices were heard on the south side of the terrace 
 on which they stood. 
 
 She hastened towards the parapet. 
 
 " Hail to Pentaur !" was shouted up from below. 
 
 The poet rushed forward, and placed himself near 
 the princess. Both looked down into the valley, and 
 could be seen by all. , 
 
 " Hail, hail ! Pentaur," was called doubly loud, 
 " Hail to our teacher ! come back to the House of Seti. 
 Down with the persecutors of Pentaur down with 
 our oppressors !" 
 
 At the head of the youths, who, so soon as they 
 had found out whither the poet had been exiled, had 
 escaped to tell him that they were faithful to him, 
 stood the prince Rameri, who nodded triumphantly to 
 his sister, and Anana stepped forward to inform the 
 
 Uarda. I. 14
 
 210 UARDA. 
 
 honored teacher in a solemn and well-studied speech, 
 that, in the event of Ameni refusing to recall him, they 
 had decided requesting theii fathers to place them at 
 another school. 
 
 The young sage spoke well, and Bent-Anat fol- 
 lowed his words, not without approbation; but Pen- 
 taur's face grew darker, and before his favorite dis- 
 ciple had ended his speech he interrupted him sternly. 
 
 His voice was at first reproachful, and then com- 
 plaining, and, loud as he spoke, only sorrow rang in 
 his tones, and not anger. 
 
 " In truth," he concluded, " every .word that I have 
 spoken to you I could but find it in me to regret, if 
 it has contributed to encourage you to this mad act. 
 You were born in palaces ; learn to obey, that later you 
 may know how to command. Back to your school ! 
 You hesitate ? Then I will come out against you with 
 the watchman, and drive you back, for you do me ;md 
 yourselves small honor by such a proof of affection. 
 Go back to the school you belong to." 
 
 The school-boys dared make no answer, but sur- 
 prised and disenchanted turned to go home. 
 
 Bent-Anat cast. down her eyes as she met those of 
 her brother, who shrugged his shoulders, and then she 
 looked half shyly, half respectfully, at the poet ; but 
 soon again her eyes turned to the plain below, for thick 
 dust-clouds whirled across it, the sound of hoofs and 
 the rattle of wheels became audible, and at the same 
 moment the chariot of Septah, the chief haruspex, and 
 a vehicle with the heavily-armed guard of the House 
 of Seti, stopped near the terrace. 
 
 The angry old man sprang quickly to the ground,
 
 UARDA. 211 
 
 called the host of escaped pupils to him in a stern 
 voice, ordered the guard to drive them back to the 
 school, and hurried up to the temple gates like a 
 vigorous youth. The priests received him with the 
 deepest reverence, and at once laid their complaints 
 before him. 
 
 He heard them willingly, but did not let them dis- 
 cuss the matter ; then, though with some difficulty, he 
 quickly mounted the steps, down which Bent-Anat came 
 towards him. 
 
 The princess felt that she would divert all the 
 blame and misunderstanding to herself, if Septah re- 
 cognized her; her hand involuntarily reached for her 
 veil, but she drew it back quickly, looked with quiet 
 dignity into the old man's eyes, which flashed with 
 anger, and proudly passed by him. The haruspex 
 bowed, but without giving her his blessing, and 
 when he met Pentaur on the second terrace, ordered 
 that the temple should be cleared of worshippers. 
 
 This was done in a few minutes, and the priests 
 were witnesses of the most painful scene which had 
 occurred for years in their quiet sanctuary. 
 
 The head of the haruspices of the House of Seti 
 was the most determined adversary of the poet who 
 had so early been initiated into the mysteries, and 
 whose keen intellect often shook those very ramparts 
 which the zealous old man had, from conviction, 
 labored to strengthen from his youth up. The vexa- 
 tious occurrences, of which he had been a witness at 
 the House of Seti, and here also but a few minutes 
 since, he regarded as the consequence of the unbridled 
 license of an ill-regulated imagination, and in stern lan- 
 
 14 *
 
 212 UARDA. 
 
 guage he called Pentaur to account for the " revolt " of 
 the school-boys. 
 
 " And besides our boys," he exclaimed, " you have 
 led the daughter of Rameses astray. She was not yet 
 purged of her uncleanness, and yet you tempt her to 
 an assignation, not even in the stranger's quarters 
 but in the holy house of this pure Divinity." 
 
 Undeserved praise is dangerous to the weak ; unjust 
 blame may turn even the strong from the right way. 
 
 Pentaur indignantly repelled the accusations of the 
 old man, called them unworthy of his age, his position, 
 and his name, and for fear that his anger might carry 
 him too far, turned his back upon him ; but the harus- 
 pex ordered him to remain, and in his presence ques- 
 tioned the priests, who unanimously accused the poet 
 of having admitted to the temple another unpurified 
 woman besides Bent-Anat, and of having expelled the 
 gate-keeper and thrown him into prison for opposing 
 the crime. 
 
 The haruspex ordered that the "ill-used man" 
 should be set at liberty. 
 
 Pentaur resisted this command, asserted his right 
 to govern in this temple, and with a trembling voice 
 requested Septah to quit the place. 
 
 The haruspex showed him Ameni's ring, by which, 
 during his residence in Thebes, he made him his pleni- 
 potentiary, degraded Pentaur from his dignity, but 
 ordered him not to quit the sanctuary till further notice, 
 and then finally departed from the temple of Hatasu. 
 
 Pentaur had yielded in silence to the signet of his 
 chief, and returned to the confessional in which he 
 had met Bent-Anat. He felt his soul shaken to its 
 very foundations, his thoughts were confused, his feel-
 
 UARDA. 213 
 
 ings struggling with each other ; he shivered, and when 
 he heard the laughter of the priests and the gate- 
 keeper, who were triumphing in their easy victory, he 
 started and shuddered like a man who in passing a 
 mirror should see a brand of disgrace on his brow. 
 
 But by degrees he recovered himself, his spirit 
 grew clearer, and when he left the little room to look 
 towards the east where, on the farther shore, rose the 
 palace where Bent-Anat must be a deep contempt 
 for his enemies filled his soul, and a proud feeling of 
 renewed manly energy. He did not conceal from him- 
 self that he had enemies ; that a time of struggle was 
 beginning for him ; but he looked forward to it like a 
 young hero to the morning of his first battle. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE afternoon shadows were already growing long, 
 when a splendid chariot drew up to the gates of the 
 terrace-temple. Paaker, the chief pioneer, stood up in 
 it, driving his handsome and fiery Syrian horses. Be- 
 hind him stood an Ethiopian slave, and his big dog 
 followed the swift team with his tongue out. 
 
 As he approached the temple he heard himself 
 called, and checked the pace of his horses. A tiny 
 man hurried up to him, and, as soon as he had re- 
 cognized in him the dwarf Nemu, he cried angrily : 
 
 " Is it for you, you rascal, that I stop my drive ? 
 What do you want ?" 
 
 "To crave," said the little man, bowing humbly, 
 "that, when thy business in the city of the dead is 
 finished, thou wilt carry me back to Thebes."
 
 214 UARDA. 
 
 "You are Mena's dwarf?" asked the pioneer. 
 
 " By no means," replied Nemu. " I belong to his 
 neglected wife, the lady Nefert. I can only cover the 
 road very slowly with my little legs, while the hoofs of 
 your horses devour the way as a crocodile does his 
 prey." 
 
 " Get up !" said Paaker. " Did you come here on 
 foot ?" 
 
 " No, my lord," replied Nemu, " on an ass ; but a 
 demon entered into the beast, and has struck it with 
 sickness. I had to leave it on the road. The beasts 
 of Anubis will have a better supper than we to-night." 
 
 "Things are not done handsomely then at your 
 mistress's house ?" asked Paaker. 
 
 " We still have bread," replied Nemu, " and the Nile 
 is full of water. Much meat is not necessary for wo- 
 men and dwarfs, but our last cattle take a form which 
 is too hard for human teeth." 
 
 The pioneer did not understand the joke, and 
 looked enquiringly at the dwarf. 
 
 " The form of money," said the little man, " and 
 that cannot be chewed; soon that will be gone too, 
 and then the point will be to find a recipe for making 
 nutritious cakes out of earth, water, and palm-leaves. 
 It makes very little difference to me, a dwarf does not 
 need much but the poor tender lady!" 
 
 Paaker touched his horses with such a violent 
 stroke of his whip that they reared high, and it took 
 all his strength to control their spirit. 
 
 "The horses' jaws will be broken," muttered the 
 slave behind. " What a shame with such fine beasts !" 
 
 " Have you to pay for them ?" growled Paaker. 
 Then he turned again to the dwarf, and asked
 
 UARDA. 215 
 
 " Why does Mena let the ladies want ?" 
 
 " He no longer cares for his wife," replied the dwarf, 
 casting his eyes down sadly. "At the last division of 
 the spoil he passed by the gold and silver, and took 
 a foreign woman into his tent. Evil demons have 
 blinded him, for where is there a woman fairer than 
 Nefert ?" 
 
 " You love your mistress." 
 
 "As my very eyes!" 
 
 During this conversation they had arrived at the 
 terrace-temple. Paaker threw the reins to the slave, 
 ordered him to wait with Nemu, and turned to the 
 gate-keeper to explain to him, with the help of a hand- 
 ful of gold, his desire of being conducted to Pentaur, 
 the chief of the temple. 
 
 The gate-keeper, swinging a censer before him 
 with a hasty action, admitted him into the sanctuary. 
 
 " You will find him on the third terrace," he said, 
 "but he is no longer our superior." 
 
 " They said so in the temple of Seti, whence I have 
 just come," replied Paaker. 
 
 The porter shrugged his shoulders with a sneer, and 
 said : " The palm-tree that is quickly set up falls down 
 more quickly still." Then he desired a servant to con- 
 duct the stranger to Pentaur. 
 
 The poet recognized the Mohar at once, asked his 
 will, and learned that he was come to have a wonderful 
 vision interpreted by him. 
 
 Paaker explained before relating his dream, that 
 he did not ask this service for nothing; and when the 
 priest's countenance darkened he added: 
 
 " I will send a fine beast for sacrifice to the Goddess 
 if the interpretation is favorable."
 
 2l6 UARTM. 
 
 " And in the opposite case ?" asked Pentaur, who, in 
 the House of Seti, never would have anything whatever 
 to do with the payments of the worshippers or the offer- 
 ings of the devout. 
 
 " I will offer a sheep," replied Paaker, who did not 
 perceive the subtle irony that lurked in Pentaur's words, 
 and who was accustomed to pay for the gifts of the 
 Divinity in proportion to their value to himself. 
 
 Pentaur thought of the verdict which Gagabu, only 
 two evenings since, had passed on the Mohar, and it 
 occurred to him that he would test how far the man's 
 superstition would lead him. So he asked, while he 
 suppressed a smile : 
 
 " And if I can foretell nothing bad, but also nothing 
 actually good ?" 
 
 "An antelope, and four geese," answered Paaker 
 promptly. 
 
 " But if I were altogether disinclined to put myself 
 at your service ?" asked Pentaur. " If I thought it un- 
 worthy of a priest to let the Gods be paid in proportion 
 to their favors towards a particular person, like cor- 
 rupt officials ; if I now showed you you and I have 
 known you from a school-boy, that there are things that 
 cannot be bought with inherited wealth ?" 
 
 The pioneer drew back astonished and angry, but 
 Pentaur continued calmly 
 
 " I stand here as the minister of the Divinity ; and 
 nevertheless, I see by your countenance, that you were 
 on the point of lowering yourself by showing to me 
 your violent and extortionate spirit. 
 
 "The Immortals send us dreams, not to give us a 
 foretaste of joy or caution us against danger, but to re- 
 mind us so to prepare our souls that we may submit
 
 UARDA. 217 
 
 quietly to suffer evil, and with heartfelt gratitude accept 
 the good; and so gain from each profit for the inner 
 life. I will not interpret your dream ! Come without 
 gifts, but with a humble heart, and with longing for in- 
 ward purification, and I will pray to the Gods that they 
 may enlighten me, and give you such interpretation of 
 even evil dreams that they may be fruitful in bless- 
 ing. 
 
 Leave me, and quit the temple!" 
 
 Paaker ground his teeth with rage; but he con- 
 trolled himself, and only said as he slowly withdrew . 
 
 "If your office had not already been taken from 
 you, the insolence with which you have dismissed me 
 might have cost you your place. We shall meet again, 
 and then you shall learn that inherited wealth in the 
 right hand is worth more than you will like." 
 
 "Another enemy!" thought the poet, when he found 
 himself alone and stood erect in the glad consciousness 
 of having done right. 
 
 During Paaker's interview with the poet, the dwarf 
 Nemu had chatted to the porter, and had learned 
 from him all that had previously occurred. 
 
 Paaker mounted his chariot pale with rage, and 
 whipped on his horses before the dwarf had clambered 
 up the step; but the slave seized the little man, and 
 set him carefully on his feet behind his master. 
 
 "The villian, the scoundrel! he shall repent it 
 Pentaur is he called! the hound!" muttered the pioneer 
 to himself. 
 
 The dwarf lost none of his words, and when he 
 caught the name of Pentaur he called to the pioneer, 
 and said
 
 2l8 UARDA. 
 
 " They have appointed a scoundrel to be the supe- 
 rior of this temple; his name is Pentaur. He was ex- 
 pelled from the temple of Seti for his immorality, and 
 now he has stirred up the younger scholars to rebellion, 
 and invited unclean women into the temple. My lips 
 hardly dare repeat it, but the gate-keeper swore it was 
 true that the chief haruspex from the House of Seti 
 found him in conference with Bent-Anat, the king's 
 daughter, and at once deprived him of his office." 
 
 "With Bent-Anat?" replied the pioneer, apd muttered, 
 before the dwarf could find time to answer, "Indeed, 
 with Bent-Anat!" and he recalled the day before yester- 
 day, when the princess had remained so long with the 
 priest in the hovel of the paraschites, while he had 
 talked to Nefert and visited the old witch. 
 
 "I should not care to be in the priest's skin," ob- 
 served Nemu, "for though Rameses is far away, the 
 Regent Ani is near enough. He is a gentleman who 
 seldom pounces, but who will not let the doves be 
 seized out of his own nest." 
 
 Paaker looked enquiringly at Nemu. 
 
 "I know," said the dwarf, "Ani has asked Rame- 
 ses' consent to marry his daughter." 
 
 " He has already asked it," continued the dwarf as 
 Paaker smiled incredulously, "and the king is not dis- 
 inclined to give it. He likes making marriages as 
 thou must know pretty well." 
 
 " I ?" said Paaker, surprised. 
 
 " He forced Katuti to give her daughter as wife to 
 the charioteer. That I know from herself. She can 
 prove it to thee." 
 
 Paaker shook his head in denial, but the dwarf con- 
 tinued eagerly, "Yes, yes! Katuti would have had thee
 
 UARDA. 219 
 
 for her son-in-law, and it was the king, not she, who 
 broke off the betrothal. Thou must at the same time 
 have been inscribed in the black books of the 'high 
 gate,' for Rameses used many hard names for thee. 
 One of us is like a mouse behind the curtain, which 
 knows a good deal." 
 
 Paaker suddenly brought his horses to a stand-still, 
 threw the reins to the slave, sprang from the chariot, 
 called the dwarf to his side, and said : 
 
 "We will walk from here to. the river, and you 
 shall tell me all you know; but if an untrue word 
 passes your lips I will have you eaten by my dogs." 
 
 "I know thou canst keep thy word," gasped the 
 little man. " But go a little slower if thou wilt, for I 
 am quite out of breath. Let Katuti herself tell thee 
 how it all came about. Rameses compelled her to give 
 her daughter to the charioteer. I do not know what he 
 said of thee, but it was not complimentary. My poor 
 mistress ! she let herself be caught by the dandy, the 
 ladies' man and now she may weep and wail. When 
 I pass the great gates of thy house with Katuti, she 
 often sighs and complains bitterly. And with good 
 reason, for it soon will be all over with our noble es- 
 tate, and we must seek a republic far away among the 
 Amu* in the low lands; for the nobles will soon avoid 
 us as outcasts. Thou mayst be glad that thou hast 
 not linked thy fate to ours; but I have a faithful heart, 
 and will share my mistress's trouble." 
 
 "You speak riddles," said Paaker, "what have they 
 to fear?" 
 
 * A Semitic tribe, who at the time of our story peopled the eastern delta. 
 See ".lEgypten und die Biicher Moses," Ebers, and the second edition of 
 " Histoire de 1'Egypte" by Brugsch. The name Bi-amites comes from the old 
 name Amu.
 
 220 UARDA. 
 
 The dwarf now related how Nefert's brother had 
 gambled away the mummy of his father, how enor. 
 inous was the sum he had lost, and that degradation 
 must overtake Katuti, and her daughter with her. 
 
 Who can save them," he whimpered. " Her shame- 
 less husband squanders his inheritance and his prize- 
 money. Katuti is poor, and the little words "Give 
 me!' scare away friends as the cry of a hawk scares 
 the chickens. My poor mistress!" 
 
 " It is a large sum," muttered Paaker to himself. 
 
 "It is enormous!" sighed the dwarf, "and where is 
 it to be found in these hard times? It would have 
 been different with us, if ah if . And it would be a 
 form of madness which I do not believe in, that Nefert 
 should still care for her braggart husband. She thinks 
 as much of thee as of him." 
 
 Paaker looked at the dwarf half incredulous and half 
 threatening. 
 
 "Ay of thee," repeated Nemu. "Since our ex- 
 cursion to the Necropolis the day before yesterday it 
 was she speaks only of thee, praising thy ability, and 
 thy strong manly spirit. It is as if some charm^bliged 
 her to think of thee." 
 
 The pioneer began to walk so fast that his small 
 companion once more had to ask him to moderate his 
 steps. 
 
 They gained the shore in silence, where Paaker's 
 boat was waiting, which also conveyed his chariot. 
 He lay down in the little cabin, called the dwarf to 
 him, and said: 
 
 "I am Katuti's nearest relative; we are now recon- 
 ciled ; why does she not turn to me in her difficulty ?" 
 
 " Because she is proud, and thy blood flows in her
 
 UARDA. 221 
 
 veins. Sooner would she die with her child she said 
 so than ask thee, against whom she sinned, for an 
 alms." 
 
 " She did think of me then ?" 
 
 " At once ; nor did she doubt thy generosity. She 
 esteems thee highly I repeat it ; and if an arrow from 
 a Chela's bow or a visitation of the Gods attained 
 Mena, she would joyfully place her child in thine arms, 
 and Nefert believe me has not forgotten her play-fellow. 
 The day before yesterday, when she came home from 
 the Necropolis, and before the letter had come from 
 the camp, she was full of thee nay called to thee in 
 her dreams ; I know it from Kandake, her black maid." 
 
 The pioneer looked down and said : 
 
 " How extraordinary ! and the same night I had a 
 vision in which your mistress appeared to me; the 
 insolent priest in the temple of Hathor should have 
 interpreted it to me." 
 
 " And he refused ? the fool ! but other folks under- 
 stand dreams, and I am not the worst of them Ask 
 thy servant. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred my 
 interpretations come true. How was the vision ?" 
 
 " I stood by the Nile," said Paaker, casting down 
 his eyes and drawing lines with his whip through the 
 wool of the cabin rug. "The water was still, and I 
 saw Nefert standing on the farther bank, and beckon- 
 ing to me. I called to her, and she stepped on the 
 water, which bore her up as if it were this carpet. She 
 went over the water dry-foot as if it were the stony 
 wilderness. A wonderful sight ! She came nearer to me, 
 and nearer, and already I had tried to take her hand, 
 when she ducked under like a swan. I went into the 
 water to seize her, and when she came up again I
 
 222 UARDA. 
 
 clasped her in my arms; but then the strangest thing 
 happened she flowed away, she dissolved like the 
 snow on the Syrian hills, when you take it in your 
 hand, and yet it was not the same, for her hair turned 
 to water-lilies, and her eyes to blue fishes that swam 
 away merrily, and her lips to twigs of coral that sank 
 at once, and from her body grew a crocodile, with a 
 head like Mena, that laughed and gnashed its teeth at 
 me. Then I was seized with blind fury ; I threw my- 
 self upon him with a drawn sword, he fastened his 
 teeth in my flesh, I pierced his throat with my weapon; 
 the Nile was dark with our streaming blood, and so 
 We fought and fought it lasted an eternity till I 
 awoke." 
 
 Paaker drew a deep breath as he ceased speaking ; 
 as if his wild dream tormented him again. 
 
 The dwarf had listened with eager attention, but 
 several minutes passed before he spoke. 
 
 " A strange dream," he said, " but the interpretation 
 as to the future is not hard to find. Nefert is striving 
 to reach thee, she longs to be thine, but if thou dost 
 fancy that she is already in thy grasp she will elude 
 thee ; thy hopes will melt like ice, slip away like sand, 
 if thou dost not know how to put the crocodile out of 
 the way." 
 
 At this moment the boat struck the landing-place, 
 The pioneer started up, and cried, " We have reached 
 the end '." 
 
 " We have reached the end," echoed the little man 
 with meaning. "There is only a narrow bridge to 
 step over." 
 
 When they both stood on the shore, the dwarf said,
 
 UARDA. 
 
 223 
 
 "I have to thank thee for thy hospitality, and 
 when I can serve thee command me." 
 
 " Come here," cried the pioneer, and drew Nemu 
 away with him under the shade of a sycamore veiled 
 in the half light of the departing sun. 
 
 ''What do you mean by a bridge which we must 
 step over ? I do not understand the flowers of speech, 
 and desire plain language." 
 
 The dwarf reflected for a moment, and then asked 
 
 " Shall I say nakedly and openly what I mean, and 
 will you not be angry ? " 
 
 "Speak I" 
 
 " Mena is the crocodile. Put him out of the world, 
 and you will have passed the bridge ; then Nefert will 
 be thine if thou wilt listen to me." 
 
 "What shall I do?" 
 
 " Put the charioteer out of the world." 
 
 Paaker's gesture seemed to convey that that was a 
 thing that had long been decided on, and he turned 
 his face, for a good omen, so that the rising moon 
 should be on his right hand. 
 
 The dwarf went on. 
 
 " Secure Nefert, so that she may not vanish like her 
 image in the dream, before you reach the goal ; that is 
 to say, ransom the honor of your future mother and 
 wife, for how could you take an outcast into your 
 house ?" 
 
 Paaker looked thoughtfully at the ground. 
 
 " May I inform my mistress that thou wilt save her?" 
 asked Nemu. " I may ? Then all will be well, for he 
 who will devote a fortune to love will not hesitate to 
 devote a reed lance with a brass point to it to his love 
 and his hatred together."
 
 224 UARDA. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE -sun had set, and darkness covered the City of 
 the Dead ; but the moon shone above the valley of the 
 kings' tombs, and the projecting masses of the rocky 
 walls of the chasm threw sharply-defined shadows. 
 A weird silence lay upon the desert, where yet far more 
 life was stirring than in the noonday hour, for now bats 
 darted like black silken threads through the night air, 
 owls hovered aloft on wide-spread wings, small troops 
 of jackals slipped by, one following the other up the 
 mountain slopes. From time to time their hideous 
 yell, or the whining laugh of the hyena, broke the 
 stillness of the night. 
 
 Nor was human life yet at rest in the valley of 
 tombs. A faint light glimmered in the cave-of the sor- 
 ceress Hekt, and in front of the paraschites' hut a fire 
 was burning, which the grandmother of the sick Uarda 
 now and then fed with pieces of dry manure. Two 
 men were seated in front of the hut, and gazed in 
 silence on the thin flame, whose impure light was al- 
 most quenched by the clearer glow of the moon ; whilst 
 the third, Uarda's father, disembowelled a large ram, 
 whose head he had already cut off. 
 
 " How the jackals howl !" said the old paraschites, 
 drawing as he spoke the torn brown cotton cloth, which 
 he had put on as a protection against the night air 
 and the dew, closer round his bare shoulders. 
 
 " They scent the fresh meat, answered the physician,
 
 UARDA. 
 
 225 
 
 Nebsecht. " Throw them the entrails, when you have 
 done; the legs and back you can roast. Be careful 
 how you cut out the heart the heart, soldier. There 
 it is ! What a great beast." 
 
 Nebsecht took the ram's heart in his hand, and 
 gazed at it with the deepest attention, whilst the old 
 paraschites watched him anxiously. At length* 
 
 " I promised," he said, " to do for you what you 
 wish, if you restore the little one to health ; but you 
 ask for what is impossible." 
 
 " Impossible ?" said the physician, " why, impossible ? 
 You open the corpses, you go in and out of the house 
 of the embalmer. Get possession of one of the canopi,* 
 lay this heart in it r and take out in its stead the heart 
 of a human being. No one no one will notice it. 
 Nor need you do it to-morrow, or the day after to- 
 morrow even. Your son can buy a ram to kill every 
 day with my money till the right moment comes. Your 
 granddaughter will soon grow strong on a good meat- 
 diet. Take courage!" 
 
 " I am not afraid of the danger," said the old man, 
 " but how can I venture to steal from a dead man his 
 life in the other world? And then in shame and 
 misery have I lived, and for many a year no man has 
 numbered them for me have I obeyed the command- 
 ments, that I may be found righteous in that world to 
 
 * Vases of clay, limestone, or alabaster, which were used for the preserva- 
 tion of the intestines of the embalmed Egyptians, and represented the four 
 genii of death, Amset, Hapi, Tuamutef, and Khebsennuf. Instead of the 
 cover, the head of the genius to which it was dedicated, was placed on each 
 kanopus. Amset (under the protection of Isis) has a human head, Hapi (pro- 
 tected by Nephthys) an ape's head, Tuamutef (protected by Neith) a jackal's 
 head, and Khebsennuf (protected by Selk) a sparrow-hawk's head. In one of 
 the Christian Coptic Manuscripts, the four archangels are invoked in the place 
 of these genii. 
 
 Uarda. T. 15
 
 226 UARDA. 
 
 come, and in the fields of Aalu, and in the Sun-bark 
 find compensation for all that I have suffered here. 
 You are good and friendly. Why, for the sake of a 
 whim, should you sacrifice the future bliss of a man, 
 who in all his long life has never known happiness, 
 and who has never done you any harm ?" 
 
 " What I want with the heart," replied the physician, 
 "you cannot understand, but in procuring it for me, 
 you will be furthering a great and useful purpose. I 
 have no whims, for I am no idler. And as to what 
 concerns your salvation, have no anxiety. I am a 
 priest, and take your deed and its consequences upon 
 myself; upon myself, do you understand ? I tell you, 
 as a priest, that what I demand of you is right, and if 
 the judge of the dead shall enquire, ' Why didst thou 
 take the heart of a human being out of the Kanopus?' 
 then reply reply to him thus, ' Because Nebsecht, the 
 priest, commanded me, and promised himself to answer 
 for the deed.' " 
 
 The old man gazed thoughtfully on the ground, 
 and the physician continued still more urgently : 
 
 " If you fulfil my wish, then then I swear to 
 you that, when you die, I will take care that your 
 mummy is provided with all the amulets, and I 
 myself will write you a book of the Entrance into 
 Day,* and have it wound within your mummy-cloth, as 
 is done with the great.** That will give you power 
 over all demons, and you will be admitted to the hall 
 of the twofold justice, which punishes and rewards, and 
 your award will be bliss." 
 
 The firrt lection of the to-called Book of the Dead is thus entitled. 
 The Books of the Dead are often found amongst the cloths, (by the leg 
 or under the am), or die in the coffin under, or near, the mummy.
 
 UARDA. 227 
 
 " But the theft of a heart will make the weight of 
 my sins heavy, when my own heart is weighed," sighed 
 the old man. 
 
 Nebsecht considered for a moment, and then said: 
 " I will give you a written paper, in which I will certify 
 that it was I who commanded the theft. You will sew 
 it up in a little bag, carry it on your breast, and have 
 it laid with you in the grave. Then when Techuti, 
 the agent of the soul, receives your justification before 
 Osiris and the judges of the dead,* give him the 
 writing. He will read it aloud, and you will be ac- 
 counted just." 
 
 " I am not learned in writing," muttered the para- 
 schites with a slight mistrust that made itself felt in his 
 voice. 
 
 " But I swear to you by the nine great Gods, that 
 I will write nothing on the paper but what I have 
 promised you. I will confess that I, the priest Nebsecht, 
 commanded you to take the heart, and that your guilt 
 is mine." 
 
 " Let me have the writing then," murmured the old 
 man. 
 
 The physician wiped the perspiration from his 
 forehead, and gave the paraschites his hand. " To-mor- 
 row you shall have it," he said, " and I will not leave 
 your granddaughter till she is well again." 
 
 * The vignettes of Chapter 125 of the Book of the Dead represent the 
 Last Judgment of the Egyptians. Under a canopy Osiris sits enthroned as 
 Chief Judge, 42 assessors assist him. In the hall stand the scales; the dog- 
 headed ape, the animal sacred to Toth, guides the balance. In one scale lies 
 the heart of the dead man, in the other the image of the goddess of Truth, 
 who introduces the soul into the hall of justice Toth writes the record. The 
 soul affirms that it has not committed 42 deadly sins, and if it obtains credit, it 
 is named "maa cheru," t. e., "the truth-speaker," and is therewith declared 
 blessed. It now receives its heart back, and grows into a new and divine life. 
 
 IS*
 
 228 UARDA. 
 
 The soldier engaged in cutting up the ram, had 
 heard nothing of this conversation. Now he ran a 
 wooden spit through the legs, and held them over the 
 fire to roast them. The jackals howled louder as the 
 smell of the melting fat filled the air, and the old man, 
 as he looked on, forgot the terrible task he had under- 
 taken. For a year past, no meat had been tasted in 
 his house. 
 
 The physician Nebsecht, himself eating nothing but 
 a piece of bread, looked on at the feasters. They tore 
 the meat from the bones, and the soldier, especially, 
 devoured the costly and unwonted meal like some 
 ravenous animal. He could be heard chewing like a 
 horse in the manger, and a feeling of disgust filled 
 the physician's soul. 
 
 " Sensual beings," he murmured to himself, " animals 
 with consciousness ! And yet human beings. Strange! 
 They languish bound in the fetters of the world of 
 sense, and yet how much more ardently they desire 
 that which transcends sense than we how much more 
 real it is to them than to us !" 
 
 "Will you have some meat?" cried the soldier, 
 who had remarked that Nebsecht's lips moved, and 
 tearing a piece of meat from the bone of the joint he 
 was devouring, he held it out to the physician. 
 Nebsecht shrank back ; the greedy look, the glistening 
 teeth, the dark, rough features of the man terrified 
 him. And he thought of the white and fragile form 
 of the sick girl lying within on the mat, and a ques- 
 tion escaped his lips. 
 
 " Is the maiden, is Uarda, your own child ?" he 
 said.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 22} 
 
 The soldier struck himself on the breast. "So 
 sure as the king Rameses is the son of Seti," he answered. 
 
 The men had finished their meal, and the flat 
 cakes of bread which the wife of the paraschites gave 
 them, and on which they had wiped their hands from the 
 fat, were consumed, when the soldier, in whose slow 
 brain the physician's question still lingered, said, sigh- 
 ing deeply: 
 
 " Her mother was a stranger; she laid the white 
 dove in the raven's nest." 
 
 "Of what country was your wife a native?" asked 
 the physician. 
 
 " That I do not know," replied the soldier. 
 
 " Did you never enquire about the family of your 
 own wife?" 
 
 " Certainly I did : but how could she have answered 
 me? But it is a long and strange story." 
 
 "Relate it to me," said Nebsecht, "the night is 
 long, and I like listening better than talking. But 
 first I will see after our patient." 
 
 When the physician had satisfied himself that 
 Uarda was sleeping quietly and breathing regularly, 
 he seated himself again by the paraschites and his son, 
 and the soldier began : 
 
 " It all happened long ago. King Seti still lived, 
 but Rameses already reigned in his stead, when I 
 came home from the north. They had sent me to 
 the workmen, who were building the fortifications in 
 Zoan, the town of Rameses.* I was set over six 
 men, Amus,** of the Hebrew race, over whom 
 
 * The Rameses of the Bible. Exodus I. n. 
 ** Semites.
 
 230 UARDA. 
 
 Rameses kept such a tight hand.* Amongst the work- 
 men there were sons of rich cattle-holders, for in 
 levying the people it was never: 'What have you?' 
 but 'Of what race are you?' The fortifications and 
 the canal which was to join the Nile and the Red Sea 
 had to be completed, and the king, to whom be long 
 life, health, and prosperity, took the youth of Egypt 
 with him to the wars, and left the work to the Amus, 
 who are connected by race with his enemies in the 
 east. One lives well in Goshen, for it is a fine 
 country, with more than enough of corn and grass 
 and vegetables and fish and fowls, and I always had 
 of the best, for amongst my six people were two 
 mother's darlings, whose parents sent me many a piece 
 of silver. Every one loves his children, but the Hebrews 
 love them more tenderly than other people. We had 
 daily our appointed tale of bricks to deliver, and 
 when the sun burnt hot, I used to help the lads, and 
 I did more in an hour than they did in three, for I 
 am strong and was still stronger then than I am now. 
 
 "Then came the time when I was relieved. I 
 was ordered to return to Thebes, to the prisoners of 
 war who were building the great temple of Amon 
 over yonder, and as I had brought home some money, 
 and it would take a good while to finish the great 
 dwelling of the king of the Gods, I thought of taking 
 a wife ; but no Egyptian. Of daughters of paraschites 
 there were plenty ; but I wanted to get away out of my 
 father's accursed caste, and the other girls here, as I 
 knew, were afraid of our uncleanness. In the low 
 
 * For ." * xounl of the ra of the Jews in Egypt, MX Ch?bas, Mc- 
 ", vtgypten und die Richer MOMS, alto Durch Cozen zum
 
 UARDA. 231 
 
 country I had done better, and many an Amu and 
 Schasu woman had gladly come to my tent. From 
 the beginning I had set my mind on an Asiatic. 
 
 " Many a time maidens taken prisoners in war were 
 brought to be sold, but either they did not please me, 
 or they were too dear. Meantime my money melted 
 away, for we enjoyed life in the time of rest which 
 followed the working hours. There were dancers too 
 in plenty, in the foreign quarter. 
 
 "Well, it was just at the time of the holy feast of 
 Amon-Chem, that a new transport of prisoners of 
 war arrived, and amongst them many women, who 
 were sold publicly to the highest bidder. The young 
 and beautiful ones were paid for high, but even the 
 older ones were too dear for me. 
 
 " Quite at the last a blind woman was led forward, 
 and a withered-looking woman who was dumb, as the 
 auctioneer, who generally praised up the merits of the 
 prisoners, informed the buyers. The blind woman had 
 strong hands, and was bought by a tavern-keeper, for 
 whom she turns the handmill to this day; the dumb 
 woman held a child in her arms, and no one could 
 tell whether she was young or old. She looked as 
 though she already lay in her coffin, and the little one 
 as though he would go under the grass before her. 
 And her hair was red, burning red, the very color 
 of Typhon. Her white pale face looked neither bad 
 nor good, only weary, weary to death. On her withered 
 white arms blue veins ran like dark cords, her hands 
 hung feebly down, and in them hung the child. If 
 a wind were to rise, I thought to myself, it would blow 
 her away, and the little one with her.
 
 232 UARDA. 
 
 " The auctioneer asked for a bid. All were silent, 
 for the dumb shadow was of no use for work; she was 
 half-dead, and a burial costs money. 
 
 "So passed several minutes. Then the auctioneer 
 stepi>ed up to her, and gave her a blow with his whip, 
 that she might rouse herself up, and appear less 
 miserable to the buyers. She shivered like a person 
 in a fever, pressed the child closer to her, and looked 
 round at every one as though seeking for help and me 
 full in the face. What happened now was a real 
 wonder, for her eyes were bigger than any that I ever 
 saw, and a demon dwelt in them that had power over 
 me and ruled me to the end, and that day it be- 
 witched me for the first time. 
 
 " It was not hot and I had drunk nothing, and yet 
 I acted against my own will and better judgment when, 
 as her eyes fell upon me, I bid all that I possessed 
 in order to buy her. I might have had her cheaper! 
 My companions laughed at me, the auctioneer shrugged 
 his shoulders as he took my money, but I took the child 
 on my arm, helped the woman up, carried her in a 
 boat over the Nile, loaded a stone-cart with my miser- 
 able property, and drove her like a block of lime home 
 to the old people. 
 
 " My mother shook her head, and my father looked 
 as if he thought me mad ; but neither of them said a 
 word. They made up a bed for her, and on my spare 
 nights I built that ruined thing hard by it was a 
 tidy hut once. Soon my mother grew fond of the 
 < hild. It was quite small, and we called it Pennu* 
 because it was so pretty, like a little mouse. I kept 
 away from the foreign quarter, and saved my wages, 
 
 * Pennu to the name tor the mouse In old Egyptian.
 
 UARDA. 233 
 
 and bought a goat, which lived in front of our door 
 when I took the woman to her own hut. 
 
 " She was dumb, but not deaf, only she did not 
 understand our language ; but the demon in her eyes 
 spoke for her and understood what I said. She com- 
 prehended everything, and could say everything with 
 her eyes ; but best of all she knew how to thank one. 
 No high-priest who at the great hill festival praises the 
 Gods in long hymns for their gifts can return thanks 
 so earnestly with his lips as she with her dumb eyes. 
 And when she wished to pray, then it seemed as 
 though the demon in her look was mightier than 
 ever. 
 
 " At first I used to be impatient enough when she 
 leaned so feebly against the wall, or when the child 
 cried and disturbed my sleep; but she had only to 
 look up, and the demon pressed my heart together and 
 persuaded me that the crying was really a song. Pennu 
 cried more sweetly too than other children, and he 
 had such soft, white, pretty little fingers. 
 
 " One day he had been crying for a long time. At 
 last I bent down over him, and was going to scold him. 
 but he seized me by the beard. It was pretty to see ! 
 Afterwards he was for ever wanting to pull me about, 
 and his mother noticed that that pleased me, for when 
 I brought home anything good, an egg or a flower or 
 a cake, she used to hold him up and place his little 
 hands on my beard. 
 
 " Yes, in a few months the woman had learnt to 
 hold him up high in her arms, for with care and 
 quiet she had grown stronger. White she always re- 
 mained and delicate, but she grew younger and more
 
 234 
 
 UARDA. 
 
 beautiful from day to day ; she can hardly have num- 
 bered twenty years when I bought her. What she was 
 called I never heard ; nor did we give her any name. 
 She was ' the woman,' and so we called her. 
 
 " Eight moons passed by, and then the little Mouse 
 died. I wept as she did, and as I bent over the little 
 corpse and let my tears have free course, and thought 
 now he can never lift up his pretty little finger to you 
 again ; then I felt for the first time the woman's soft 
 hand on my cheek. She stroked my rough beard as 
 a child might, and with that looked at me so grate- 
 fully that I felt as though king Pharaoh had all 
 at once made me a present of both Upper and Lower 
 Egypt. 
 
 When the Mouse was buried she got weaker again, 
 but my mother took good care of her. I lived with 
 her, like a father with his child. She was always 
 friendly, but if I approached her, and tried to show 
 her any fondness, she would look at me, and the demon 
 in her eyes drove me back, and I let her alone. 
 
 "She grew healthier and stronger and more and 
 more beautiful, so beautiful that I kept her hidden, 
 and was consumed by the longing to make her my 
 wife. A good housewife she never became, to be 
 sure ; her hands were so tender, and she did not even 
 know how to milk the goat. My mother did that and 
 everything else for her. 
 
 ' In the day rime she stayed in her hut and worked, 
 for she was very skillful at woman's work, and wove 
 lace as fine as cobwebs, which my mother sold that 
 she might bring home perfumes with the proceeds. 
 She was very fond of them, and of flowers too ; and 
 Uarda in there takes after her.
 
 UARDA. 235 
 
 " In the evening, when the folk from the other side 
 had left the City of the Dead, she would often walk 
 up and down the valley here, thoughtful and often 
 looking up at the moon, which she was especially 
 fond of. 
 
 " One evening in the winter-time I came home. It 
 was already dark, and I expected to find her in front 
 of the door. All at once, about a hundred steps be- 
 hind old Hekt's cave, I heard a troop of jackals bark- 
 ing so furiously that I said to myself directly they had 
 attacked a human being, and I knew too who it was, 
 though no one had told me, and the woman could not 
 call or cry out. Frantic with terror, I tore a firebrand 
 from the hearth and the stake to which the goat was 
 fastened out of the ground, rushed to her help, drove 
 away the beasts, and carried her back senseless to the 
 hut. My mother helped me, and we called her back 
 to life. When we were alone, I wept like a child for 
 joy at her escape,- and she let me kiss her, and then 
 she became my wife, three years after I had bought 
 her. 
 
 " She bore me a little maid, that she herself named 
 Uarda ; for she showed us a rose, and then pointed to 
 the child, and we understood her without words. 
 
 " Soon afterwards she died. 
 
 " You are a priest, but I tell you that when I am 
 summoned before Osiris, if I am admitted amongst 
 the blessed, I will ask whether I shall meet my wife, 
 and if the doorkeeper says no, he may thrust me back, 
 and I will go down cheerfully to the damned, if I find 
 her again there." 
 
 " And did no sign ever betray her origin ? " asked 
 the physician.
 
 236 UARDA. 
 
 The soldier had hidden his face in his hands ; he 
 was weeping aloud, and did not hear the question. 
 But the paraschites answered : 
 
 " She was the child of some great personage, for in 
 her clothes we found a golden jewel with a precious 
 stone inscribed with strange characters. It is very 
 costly, and my wife is keeping it for the little one." 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 IN the earliest glimmer of dawn the following day, 
 the physician Nebsecht having satisfied himself as to 
 the state of the sick girl, left the paraschites' hut and 
 made his way in deepest thought to the Terrace Temple 
 of Hatasu, to find his friend Pentaur and compose the 
 writing which he had promised to the old man. 
 
 As the sun arose in radiance he reached the sanctu- 
 ary. He expected to hear the morning song of the 
 priests, but all was silent. He knocked and the porter, 
 still half-asleep, opened the door. 
 
 Nebsecht enquired for the chief of the Temple. 
 
 " He died in the night," said the man yawning. 
 
 " What do you say ? " cried the physician in sudden 
 terror, " who is dead ?" 
 
 " Our good old chief, Rui." 
 
 Nebsecht breathed again, and asked for Pentaur. 
 
 " You belong to the House of Seti," said the door- 
 keeper, " and you do not know that he is deposed 
 from his office ? The holy fathers have refused to 
 celebrate the birth of Ra with him. He sings for him- 
 self now, alone up on the watch-tower. There you 
 will find him."
 
 UARDA. 
 
 2 37 
 
 Nebsecht strode quickly up the stairs. Several of 
 the priests placed themselves together in groups as 
 soon as they saw him, and began singing. He paid 
 no heed to them, however, but hastened on to the 
 uppermost terrace, where he found his friend occupied 
 in writing. 
 
 Soon he learnt all that had happened, and wrath- 
 fully he cried: "You are too honest for those wise 
 gentlemen in the House of Seti, and too pure and 
 zealous for the rabble here. I knew it, I knew what 
 would come of it if they introduced you to the myste- 
 ries. For us initiated there remains only the choice 
 between lying and silence." 
 
 "The old error!" said Pentaur, "we know that the 
 Godhead is One, we name it, ' The All,'* ' The Veil of 
 the All,' or simply ' Ra.' But under the name Ra we 
 understand something different than is known to the 
 common herd; for to us, the Universe is God, and in 
 each of its parts we recognize a manifestation of that 
 highest being without whom nothing is, in the heights 
 above or in the depths below." 
 
 " To me you can say everything, for I also am ini- 
 tiated," interrupted Nebsecht. 
 
 * The sacred text repeatedly calls God the "One," the "only One." The 
 pantheistic teaching of the Mysteries is most clearly expressed in those texts 
 which are found in almost all the Kings' tombs in Thebes, and on the walls of 
 the entrance halls. They have been collected, and contain praises to Ra, 
 whose 75 principal manifestations are invoked. These texts and the pantheism 
 in the esoteric teaching of the Egyptians are excellently and comprehensively 
 treated by E. Naville in "La Litanie du Soleil." The Text of the Book of 
 Death, the Hymn to the Sun preserved at Bulaq, and treated by Stem and 
 Grbaut, the inscriptions on the sarcophagi and on the walls of the Temple of 
 Ptolemy, and second in order to these, Plutarch's Treatise on I sis and Osiris, 
 the Egyptian Mysteries of Jamblichus. and the Discourse of Hermes Tnsmegistus 
 on the Human Soul, are the principal sources for the study of the secret teach- 
 ing of the Egyptians. The views brought forward and developed in these dis- 
 courses seem first to have come to perfection in the new kingdom. The Egyp- 
 tian religion proceeded from a comparatively rude Sun and Nile worship.
 
 238 UARDA. 
 
 " But neither from the laity do I withhold it," cried 
 Pentaur, " only to those who are incapable of under- 
 standing the whole, do I show the different parts. Am 
 I a liar if I do not say, ' I speak,' but ' my mouth speaks,' 
 if I affirm, 'Your eye sees,' when it is you yourself 
 who are the seer. When the light of the only One 
 manifests itself, then I fervently render thanks to him 
 in hymns, and the most luminous of his forms I name 
 Ra. When I look upon yonder green fields, I call 
 upon the faithful to give thanks to Rennut,* that is, 
 that active manifestation of the One, through which 
 the corn attains to its ripe maturity. Am I filled with 
 wonder at the bounteous gifts with which that divine 
 stream whose origin is hidden, blesses our land, then 
 I adore the One as the God Hapi,** the secret one. 
 Whether we view the sun, the harvest, or the Nile, 
 whether we contemplate with admiration the unity and 
 harmony of the visible or invisible world, still it is 
 always with the Only, the All-embracing One we have 
 to do, to whom we also ourselves belong as those 
 of his manifestations in which he places his self- 
 consciousness. The imagination of the multitude is 
 limited " 
 
 "And so we lions,*** give them the morsel that 
 we can devour at one gulp, finely chopped up, and 
 diluted with broth as if for the weak stomach of a 
 sick man." 
 
 " Not so ; we only feel it our duty to temper and 
 sweeten the sharp potion, which for men even is almost 
 
 GoddeM of the harvest 
 - The Nile. 
 
 in many place*. " " "" ' *
 
 UARDA. 239 
 
 too strong, before we offer it to the children, the babes 
 in spirit. The sages of old veiled indeed the highest 
 truths in allegorical forms, in symbols, and finally in a 
 beautiful and richly-colored mythos, but they brought 
 them near to the multitude shrouded it is true but 
 still discernible." 
 
 " Discernible ?" said the physician, " discernible ? 
 Why then the veil ?" 
 
 "And do you imagine that the multitude could 
 look the naked truth in the face,* and not despair ?" 
 
 " Can I, can any one who looks straight forward, 
 and strives to see the truth and nothing but the truth ?" 
 cried the physician. " We both of us know that things 
 only are, to us, such as they picture themselves in the 
 prepared mirror of our souls. I see grey, grey, and 
 white, white, and have accustomed myself in my yearn- 
 ing after knowledge, not to attribute the smallest part 
 to. my own idiosyncrasy, if such indeed there be 
 existing in my empty breast. You look straight on- 
 wards as I do, but in you each idea is transfigured, for 
 in your soul invisible shaping powers are at work, which 
 set the crooked straight, clothe the commonplace with 
 charm, the repulsive with beauty. You are a poet, an 
 artist; I only seek for truth." 
 
 " Only ?" said Pentaur, " it is just on account of that 
 effort that I esteem you so highly, and, as you al- 
 ready know, I also desire nothing but the truth." 
 
 " I know, I know," said the physician nodding, "but 
 our ways run side by side without ever touching, and 
 our final goal is the reading of a riddle, of which 
 
 * In Sais the statue of Athene (Neith) has the following inscription : " I 
 am the All, the Past, the Present, and the Future, my veil has no mortal yet 
 lifted."
 
 240 UARDA. 
 
 there are many solutions. You believe yourself 'to have 
 found the right one, and perhaps none exists." 
 
 " Then let us content ourselves with the nearest and 
 the most beautiful," said Pentaur. 
 
 " The most beautiful ?" cried Nebsecht indignantly. 
 " Is that monster, whom you call God, beautiful the giant 
 who for ever regenerates himself that he may devour 
 himself again ? God is the. All, you say, who suffices 
 to himself. Eternal he is and shall be, because all that 
 goes forth from him is absorbed by him again, and 
 the great niggard bestows no grain of sand, no ray of 
 light, no breath of wind, without reclaiming it for his 
 household, which is ruled by no design, no reason, no 
 goodness, but by a tyrannical necessity, whose slave he 
 himself is. The coward hides behind the cloud of 
 incomprehensibility, and can be revealed only by him- 
 self I would I could strip him of the veil ! Thus I 
 see the thing that you call God !" 
 
 "A ghastly picture," said Pentaur, "because you 
 forget that we recognize reason to be the essence 
 of the All, the penetrating and moving power of the 
 universe which is manifested in the harmonious work- 
 ing together of its parts, and in ourselves also, since 
 we are formed out of its substance, and inspired with 
 its soul." 
 
 "Is the warfare of life in any way reasonable?" 
 asked Nebsecht. " Is this eternal destruction in order to 
 build up again especially well-designed and wise? And 
 with this introduction of reason into the All, you pro- 
 vide yourself with a self-devised ruler, who terribly re- 
 sembles the gracious masters and mistresses that you 
 exhibit to the people."
 
 UARDA. 241 
 
 " Only apparently," answered Pentaur, "only because 
 that which transcends sense is communicable through 
 the medium of the senses alone. When God manifests 
 himself as the wisdom of the world, we call him ' the 
 Word.' ' He, who covers his limbs with names,'* as the 
 sacred Text expresses itself, is the power which gives 
 to things their distinctive forms; the scarabaeus 'which 
 enters life as its own son'** reminds us of the ever 
 self-renewing creative power which causes you to call 
 our merciful and benevolent God a monster, but which 
 you can deny as little as you can the happy choice of 
 the type; for, as you know, there are only male sca- 
 rabei, and this animal reproduces itself." 
 
 Nebsecht smiled. " If all the doctrines of the mys- 
 teries," he said, "have no more truth than this happily 
 chosen image, they are in a bad way. These beetles have 
 for years been my friends and companions. I know their 
 family life, and I can assure you that there are males 
 and females amongst them as amongst cats, apes, and 
 human beings. Your 'good God' I do not know, and 
 what I least comprehend in thinking it over quietly is 
 the circumstance that you distinguish a good and evil 
 principle in the world. If the All is indeed God, if 
 God as the scriptures teach, is goodness, and if besides 
 him is nothing at all, where is a place to be found for 
 evil ? " 
 
 "You talk like a school-boy," said Pentaur indig- 
 nantly. "All that is, is good and reasonable in itself, 
 but the infinite One, who prescribes his own laws and 
 his own paths, grants to the finite its continuance 
 through continual renewal, and in the changing forms 
 
 * From inscriptions at Abydos, and the Praises of Ra at Biban el Muluk. 
 ** From the same Texts. 
 Uarda. I. 16
 
 242 UARDA. 
 
 of the finite progresses for evermore. What we call 
 evil, darkness, wickedness, is in itself divine, good, 
 reasonable, and clear; but it appears in another light 
 to our clouded minds, because we perceive the way 
 only and not the goal, the details only, and not the 
 whole. Even so, superficial listeners blame the music, 
 in which a discord is heard, which the harper has only 
 evoked from the strings that his hearers may t more 
 deeply feel the purity of the succeeding harmony; even 
 so, a fool blames the painter who has colored his 
 board with black, and does not wait for the completion 
 of the picture which shall be thrown into clearer relief 
 by the dark background; even so, a child chides the 
 noble tree, whose fruit rots, that a new life may spring 
 up from its kernel. Apparent evil is but an antechamber 
 to higher bliss, as every sunset is but veiled by night, 
 and will soon show itself again as the red dawn of a 
 new day." 
 
 "How convincing all that sounds!" answered the 
 physician, "all, even the terrible, wins charm from your 
 lips; but I could invert your proposition, and declare 
 that it is evil that rules the world, and sometimes gives 
 us one drop of sweet content, in order that we may 
 more keenly feel the bitterness of life. You see har- 
 mony and goodness in everything. I have observed 
 that passion awakens life, that all existence is a conflict, 
 that one being devours another." 
 
 "And do you not feel the beauty of visible creation, 
 and does not the immutable law in everything fill you 
 with admiration and humility?" 
 
 "For beauty," replied Nebsecht, "I have never 
 sought; the organ is somehow wanting in me to under- 
 stand it of myself, though I willingly allow you to
 
 UARDA. 243 
 
 mediate between us. But of law in nature I fully ap- 
 preciate the worth, for that is the veritable soul of the 
 universe. You call the One 'Temt,' that is to say the 
 total the unity which is reached by the addition of 
 many units; and that pleases me, for the elements of 
 the universe and the powers which prescribe the paths 
 of life are strictly denned by measure and number 
 but irrespective of beauty or benevolence." 
 
 "Such views," cried Pentaur troubled, "are the re- 
 sult of your strange studies. You kill and destroy, in 
 order, as you yourself say, to come upon the track of 
 the secrets of life. Look out upon nature, develop 
 the faculty which you declare to be wanting in you, 
 and the beauty of creation will teach you without my 
 assistance that you are praying to a false god." 
 
 "I do not pray," said Nebsecht, "for the law which 
 moves the world is as little affected by prayers as the 
 current of the sands in your hour-glass. Who tells you 
 that I do not seek to come upon the track of the first 
 beginning of things ? I proved to you just now that I 
 know more about the origin of Scarabei than you do. 
 I have killed many an animal, not only to study its 
 organism, but also to investigate how it has built up 
 its form. But precisely in this work my organ for 
 beauty has become blunt rather than keen. I tell you 
 that the beginning of things is not more attractive to 
 contemplate than their death and decomposition." 
 
 Pentaur looked at the physician enquiringly. 
 
 "I also for once," continued Nebsecht, "will speak 
 in figures. Look at this wine, how pure it is, how 
 fragrant; and yet it was trodden from the grape by 
 the brawny feet of the vintagers. And those full ears 
 
 16 *
 
 244 UARDA. 
 
 of corn ! They gleam golden yellow, and will yield us 
 snow-white meal when they are ground, and yet they 
 grew from a rotting seed. Lately you were praising 
 to me the beauty of the great Hall of Columns nearly 
 completed in the Temple of Amon over yonder in 
 Thebes.* How posterity will admire it! I saw that 
 Hall arise. There lay masses of freestone in wild con- 
 fusion, dust in heaps that took away my breath, and 
 three months since I was sent over there, because 
 above a hundred workmen engaged in stone-polishing 
 under the burning sun had been beaten to death. 
 Were I a poet like you, I would show you a hundred 
 similar pictures, in which you would not find much 
 beauty. In the meantime, we have enough to do in 
 observing the existing order of things, and investigating 
 the laws by which it is governed." 
 
 "I have never clearly understood your efforts, and 
 have difficulty in comprehending why you did not turn 
 to the science of the haruspices," said Pentaur. " Do 
 you then believe that the changing, and owing to the 
 conditions by which they are surrounded the depen- 
 dent life of plants and animals is governed by law, 
 rule, and numbers like the movement of the stars?" 
 
 "What a question! Is the strong and mighty hand, 
 which compels yonder heavenly bodies to roll onward 
 in their carefully-appointed orbits, not delicate enough 
 to prescribe the conditions of the flight of the bird, 
 and the beating of the human heart?" 
 
 "There we are again with the heart," said the poet 
 smiling, "are you any nearer your aim?" 
 
 Begun by Raroeie* I. continued by Seti I., completed by Rameses II. 
 The remain* of this immense hall, with it* 134 columns, have not their equal in 
 OM world
 
 UARDA. 245 
 
 The physician became very grave. " Perhaps to- 
 morrow even," he said, " I may have what I need. You 
 have your palette there with red and black color, 
 and a writing reed. May I use this sheet of papyrus ?" 
 
 " Of course ; but first tell me . . . ." 
 
 " Do not ask ; you would not approve of my scheme, 
 and there would only be a fresh dispute." 
 
 " I think," said the poet, laying his hand on his 
 friend's shoulder, " that we have no reason to fear dis- 
 putes. So far they have been the cement, the refresh- 
 ing dew of our friendship." 
 
 " So long as they treated of ideas only, and not of 
 deeds." 
 
 "You intend to get possession of a human heart!" 
 cried the poet. " Think of what you are doing ! The 
 heart is the vessel of that effluence of the universal 
 soul, which lives in us." 
 
 " Are you so sure of that ?" cried the physician with 
 some irritation, " then give me the proof. Have you 
 ever examined a heart, has any one member of my 
 profession done so ? The hearts of criminals and 
 prisoners of war even are declared sacred from touch, 
 and when we stand helpless by a patient, and see our 
 medicines work harm as often as good, why is it? 
 Only because we physicians are expected to work as 
 blindly as an astronomer, if he were required to 
 look at the stars through a board. At Heliopolis I 
 entreated the great Urma* Rahotep, the truly learned 
 chief of our craft, and who held me in esteem, to allow 
 me to examine the heart of a dead Amu ; but he re- 
 fused me, because the great Sechet** leads virtuous 
 
 * High-priest of Heliopolis. ** The lion-headed goddess.
 
 246 UARDA. 
 
 Semites also into the fields of the blessed. And then 
 followed all the old scruples : that to cut up the heart 
 of a beast even is sinful, because it also is the 
 vehicle of a soul, perhaps a condemned and miserable 
 human soul, which before it can return to the One, 
 must undergo purification by passing through the bodies 
 of animals. I was not satisfied, and declared to him 
 that my great-grandfather Nebsecht, before he wrote his 
 treatise on the heart,* must certainly have examined 
 such an organ. Then he answered me that the divinity 
 had revealed to him what he had written, and there- 
 fore his work had been accepted amongst the sacred 
 writings of Toth, which stood fast and unassailable as 
 the laws of the world ; he wished to give me peace 
 for quiet work, and I also, he said, might be a chosen 
 spirit, the divinity might perhaps vouchsafe revela- 
 tions to me too. I was young at that time, and spent 
 my nights in prayer, but I only wasted away, and my 
 spirit grew darker instead of clearer. Then I killed in 
 secret first a fowl, then rats, then a rabbit, and cut up 
 their hearts, and followed the vessels that lead out of 
 them, and know little more now than I did at first ; but 
 I must get to the bottom of the truth, and I must have 
 a human heart." 
 
 " What will that do for you ?" asked Pentaur ; " you 
 cannot hope to perceive the invisible and the infinite 
 with your human eyes ?" 
 
 " Do you know my great-grandfather's treatise ?" 
 " A little," answered the poet ; " he said that wher- 
 ever he laid his finger, whether on the head, the hands, 
 or the stomach, he everywhere met with the heart. 
 
 * This treatise form* the most interesting section of the papyrus Ebers, 
 Published by W. Engelmann, Leipzig.
 
 UARDA. 247 
 
 because its vessels go into all the members, and the 
 heart is the meeting point of all these vessels. Then 
 Nebsecht proceeds to state how these are distributed 
 in the different members, and shows is it not so ? 
 that the various mental states, such as anger, grief, 
 aversion, and also the ordinary use of the word heart, 
 declare entirely for his view." 
 
 "That is it. We have already discussed it, and 
 I believe that he is right, so far as the blood is con- 
 cerned, and the animal sensations. But the pure and 
 luminous intelligence in us that has another seat," 
 and the physician struck his broad but low forehead 
 with his hand. " I have observed heads by the hundred 
 down at the place of execution, and I have also re- 
 moved the top of the skulls of living animals. But 
 now let me write, before we are disturbed."* 
 
 The physician took the reed, moistened it with 
 black color prepared from burnt papyrus, and in 
 elegant hieratic characters** wrote the paper for the 
 paraschites, in which he confessed to having impelled 
 him to the theft of a heart, and in the most binding 
 
 * Human brains are prescribed for a malady of the eyes in the Ebcrs 
 papyrus. Herophilus, one of the first scholars of the Alexandrine Museum 
 studied not only the bodies of executed criminals, but made his experiments 
 also on living malefactors. He maintained that the four cavities of the human 
 brain are the seat of the soul. 
 
 '** At the time of our narrative the Egyptians had two kinds of writing the 
 hieroglyphic, which was generally used for monumental inscriptions, and in 
 which the letters consisted of conventional representations of various objects, 
 mathematical and arbitrary symbols, and the hieratic, used for writing on papy- 
 rus, and in which, whh the view of saving time, the written pictures under- 
 went so many alterations and abbreviations that the originals could hardly he 
 recognized. In the 8th century there was a further abridgment of the hieratic 
 writing, which was called the demotic, or people's writing, and was used in 
 commerce. Whilst the hieroglyphic and hieratic writings laid the foundations 
 of the old sacred dialect, the demotic letters were only used to write the 
 spoken language of the people. E. de Rough's Chrestomathie Egyptienne. 
 H. Brugsch's Hieroglyphische Grammatik. Le Page Renouf 's shorter hiero- 
 glyphical grammar.
 
 248 UARDA. 
 
 manner declared himself willing to take the old man's 
 guilt upon himself before Osiris and the judges of 
 the dead. 
 
 When he had finished, Pentaur held out his hand 
 for the paper, but Nebsecht folded it together, placed 
 it in a little bag in which lay an amulet that his dying 
 mother had hung round his neck, and said, breathing 
 deeply : 
 
 " That is done. Farewell, Pentaur." 
 
 But the poet held the physician back ; he spoke to 
 him with the warmest words, and conjured him to 
 abandon his enterprise. His prayers, however, had no 
 power to touch Nebsecht, who only strove forcibly to 
 disengage his finger from Pentaur's strong hand, which 
 held him as in a clasp of iron. The excited poet did 
 not remark that he was hurting his friend, until after 
 a new and vain attempt at freeing himself, Nebsecht 
 cried out in pain, " You are crushing my finger !" 
 
 A smile passed over the poet's face, he loosened 
 his hold on the physician, and stroked the reddened 
 hand like a mother who strives to divert her child 
 from pain. 
 
 " Don't be angry with me, Nebsecht," he said, "you 
 know my unlucky fists, and to-day they really ought 
 to hold you fast, for you have too mad a purpose on 
 hand." 
 
 " Mad ?" said the physician, whilst he smiled in his 
 turn. " It may be so ; but do you not know that we 
 Egyptians all have a peculiar tenderness for our follies, 
 and are ready to sacrifice house and land to them ?" 
 
 "Our own house and our own land," cried the 
 poet : and then added seriously, " but not the existence, 
 not the happiness of another."
 
 UARDA. 
 
 2 49 
 
 " Have I not told you that I do not look upon the 
 heart as the seat of our intelligence ? So far as I am 
 concerned, I would as soon be buried with a ram's 
 heart as with my own." 
 
 " I do not speak of the plundered dead, but of the 
 living," said the poet. " If the deed of the paraschites 
 is discovered, he is undone, and you would only have 
 saved that sweet child in the hut behind there, to 
 fling her into deeper misery." 
 
 Nebsecht looked at the other with as much astonish- 
 ment and dismay, as if he had been awakened from 
 sleep by bad tidings. Then he cried : " All that I have, 
 I would share with the old man and Uarda." 
 
 " And who would protect her ?" 
 
 " Her father." 
 
 " That rough drunkard who to-morrow or the day 
 after may be sent no one knows where." 
 
 " He is a good fellow," said the physician inter- 
 rupting his friend, and stammering violently. "But 
 who would do anything to the child? She is so- 
 so .... She is so charming, so perfectly sweet and 
 lovely." 
 
 With these last words he cast down his eyes and 
 reddened like a girl. 
 
 " You understand that," he said, " better than I do; 
 yes, and you also think her beautiful ! Strange ! you 
 must not laugh if I confess I am but a man like 
 every one else when I confess, that I believe I have 
 at length discovered in myself the missing organ for 
 beauty of form not believe merely, but truly have dis- 
 covered it, for it has not only spoken, but cried, raged, 
 till I felt a rushing in my ears, and for the first time 
 was attracted more by the sufferer than by suffering.
 
 250 UARDA. 
 
 I have sat in the hut as though spell-bound, and 
 gazed at her hair, at her eyes, at how she breathed. 
 They must long since have missed me at the House of 
 Seti, perhaps discovered all my preparations, when 
 seeking me in my room ! For two days and nights I 
 have allowed myself to be drawn away from my work, 
 for the sake of this child. Were I one of the laity, 
 whom you would approach, I should say that demons 
 had bewitched me. But it is not that," and with 
 these words the physician's eyes flamed up " it is not 
 that ! The animal in me, the low instincts of which the 
 heart is the organ, and which swelled my breast at her 
 bedside, they have mastered the pure and fine emotions 
 here here in this brain ; and in the very moment when 
 I hoped to know as the God knows whom you call the 
 Prince of knowledge, in that moment I must learn that 
 the animal in me is stronger than that which I call 
 my God." 
 
 The physician, agitated and excited, had fixed 
 his eyes on the ground during these last words, and 
 hardly noticed the poet, who listened to him wonder- 
 ing and full of sympathy. For a time both were silent; 
 then Pentaur laid his hand on his friend's hand, and 
 said cordially : 
 
 " My soul is no stranger to what you feel, and 
 heart and head, if I may use your own words, have 
 known a like emotion. But I know that what we feel, 
 although it may be foreign to our usual sensations, is 
 loftier and more precious than these, not lower. Not 
 the animal, Nebsecht, is it that you feel in yourself, but 
 God. Goodness is the most beautiful attribute of the 
 divine, and you have always been well-disposed towards 
 great and small ; but I ask you, have you ever before
 
 UARDA. . 2CI 
 
 felt so irresistibly impelled to pour out an ocean of 
 goodness on another being, whether for Uarda you 
 would not more joyfully and more self-forgetfully sacri- 
 fice all that you have, and all that you are, than to 
 father and mother and your oldest friend ?" 
 
 Nebsecht nodded assentingly. 
 
 " Well then," cried Pentaur, " follow your new and 
 godlike emotion, be good to Uarda and do not sacrifice 
 her to your vain wishes. My poor friend ! With your 
 enquiries into the secrets of life, you have never looked 
 round upon itself, which spreads open and inviting 
 before our eyes. Do you imagine that the maiden 
 who can thus inflame the calmest thinker in Thebes, 
 will not be coveted by a hundred of the common herd 
 when her protector fails her? Need I tell you that 
 amongst the dancers in the foreign quarter nine out 
 of ten are the daughters of outlawed parents ? Can 
 you endure the thought that by your hand innocence 
 may be consigned to vice, the rose trodden under foot 
 in the mud? Is the human heart that you desire, 
 worth an Uarda ? Now go, and to-morrow come again 
 to me your friend who understands how to sympathize 
 with all you feel, and to whom you have approached 
 so much the nearer to-day that you have learned to 
 share his purest happiness." 
 
 Pentaur held out his hand to the physician, who 
 held it some time, then went thoughtfully and lingering- 
 ly, unmindful of the burning glow of the mid-day sun, 
 over the mountain into the valley of the king's graves 
 towards the hut of the paraschites. 
 
 Here he found the soldier with his daughter. 
 " Where is the old man ?" he asked anxiously. 
 
 " He has gone to his work in the house of the em-
 
 252 UARDA. 
 
 balmer," was the answer. " If anything should happen 
 to him he bade me tell you not to forget the writing 
 and the book. He was as though out of his mind 
 when he left us, and put the ram's heart in his bag 
 and took it with him. Do you remain with the little 
 one; my mother is at work, and I must go with the 
 prisoners of war to Harmon tis."* r 
 
 O 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 WHILE the two friends from the House of Seti were 
 engaged in conversation, Katuti restlessly paced the 
 large open hall of her son-in-law's house, in which we 
 have already seen her. A snow-white cat followed her 
 steps, now playing with the hem of her long plain 
 dress, and now turning to a large stand on which the 
 dwarf Nemu sat in a heap; where formerly a silver 
 statue had stood, which a few months previously had 
 been sold. 
 
 He liked this place, for it put him in a position to 
 look into the eyes of his mistress and other full grown 
 people. 
 
 " If you have betrayed me ! If you have deceived 
 me!" said Katuti with a threatening gesture as she 
 passed his perch. 
 
 " Put me on a hook to angle for a crocodile if I 
 have. But I am curious to know how he will offer 
 you the money." 
 
 " You swore to me," interrupted his mistress with 
 feverish agitation, " that you had not used my name in 
 asking Paaker to save us ?" 
 
 * The Erment of to-day, the nearest town to the south of Thebes, at a 
 day's journey from that citv.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 253 
 
 " A thousand times I swear it," said the little man. 
 " Shall I repeat all our conversation ? I tell thee he 
 will sacrifice his land, and his house great gate and 
 all, for one friendly glance from Nefert's eyes." 
 
 " If only Mena loved her as he does !" sighed the 
 widow, and then again she walked up and down the 
 hall in silence, while the dwarf looked out at the gar- 
 den entrance. Suddenly she paused in front of Nemu, 
 and said so hoarsely that Nemu shuddered 
 
 " I wish she were a widow." 
 
 The little man made a gesture as if to protect 
 himself from the evil eye, but at the same instant he 
 slipped down from his pedestal, and exclaimed 
 
 " There is a chariot, and I hear his big dog bark- 
 ing. It is he. Shall I call Nefert ?" 
 
 " No !" said Katuti in a low voice, and she clutched 
 at the back of a chair as if for support. 
 
 The dwarf shrugged his shoulders, and slunk be- 
 hind a clump of ornamental plants, and a few minutes 
 later Paaker stood in the presence of Katuti, who 
 greeted him with quiet dignity and self-possession. 
 
 Not a feature of her finely-cut face betrayed her 
 inward agitation, and after the Mohar had greeted her 
 she said with rather patronizing friendliness : 
 
 "I thought that you would come. Take a seat. 
 Your heart is like your father's; now that you are 
 friends with us again it is not by halves." 
 
 Paaker had come to offer his aunt the sum which 
 was necessary for the redemption of her husband's 
 mummy. He had doubted for a long time whether 
 he should not leave this to his mother, but re- 
 serve partly and partly vanity had kept him from 
 doing so.
 
 254 UARDA. 
 
 He would have preferred to send the gold, which 
 he had resolved to give away, by the hand of one of 
 his slaves, like a tributary prince. But that could not 
 be done ; so he put on his finger a ring set with a 
 valuable stone, which king Seti had given to his 
 father, and added various clasps and bracelets to his 
 dress. 
 
 When, before leaving the house, he looked at him- 
 self in a mirror, he said to himself with some satisfac- 
 tion, that he, as he stood, was worth as much as the 
 whole of Mena's estates. 
 
 Since his conversation with Nemu, and the dwarf's 
 interpretation of his dream, the path which he must 
 tread to reach his aim had been plain before him. 
 Nefert's mother must be won with the gold which 
 would save her from disgrace, and Mena must be sent 
 to the other world. He relied chiefly on his own reck- 
 less obstinacy which he liked to call firm determina- 
 tion N emu's cunning, and the love-philter. 
 
 He now approached Katuti with the certainty of 
 success, like a merchant who means to acquire some 
 costly object, and feels that he is rich enough to pay 
 for it. But his aunt's proud and dignified manner 
 confounded him. 
 
 He had pictured her quite otherwise, spirit-broken, 
 and suppliant; and he had expected, and hoped to 
 earn, Nefert's thanks as well as her mother's by his 
 generosity. Mena's pretty wife was however absent, 
 and Katuti did not send for her even after he had en- 
 quired after her health. 
 
 The widow made no advances, and some time 
 passed in indifferent conversation, till Paaker abruptly 
 informed her that he had heard of her son's reckless
 
 UARDA. 
 
 2 55 
 
 conduct, and had decided, as being his mother's 
 nearest relation, to preserve her from the degradation 
 that threatened her. For the sake of his bluntness, 
 which she took for honesty, Katuti forgave the magni- 
 ficence of his dress, which under the circumstances 
 certainly seemed ill-chosen; she thanked him with 
 dignity, but warmly, more for the sake of her children 
 than for her own ; for life she said was opening before 
 them, while for her it was drawing to its close. 
 
 " You are still at a good time of life," said Paaker. 
 
 " Perhaps at the best," replied the widow, " at any 
 rate from my point of view ; regarding life as I do as 
 a charge, a heavy responsibility." 
 
 "The administration of this involved estate must 
 give you many anxious hours that I understand." 
 
 Katuti nodded, and then said sadly : 
 
 " I could bear it all, if I were not condemned to 
 see my poor child being brought to misery without 
 being able to help her or advise her. You once would 
 willingly have married her, and I ask you, was there 
 a maiden in Thebes nay in all Egypt to compare 
 with her for beauty? Was she not worthy to be 
 loved, and is she not so still? Does she deserve 
 that her husband should leave her to starve, neglect 
 her, and take a strange woman into his tent as if he 
 had repudiated her? I see what you feel about it! 
 You throw all the blame on me. Your heart says: 
 Why did she break off our betrothal,' and your right 
 feeling tells you that you would have given her a 
 happier lot." 
 
 With these words Katuti took her nephew's hand, 
 and went on with increasing warmth. 
 
 " We know you to-day for the most magnanimous
 
 256 UARDA. 
 
 man in Thebes, for you have requited injustice with 
 an immense benefaction ; but even as a boy you were 
 kind and noble. Your father's wish has alway been 
 dear and sacred to me, for during his lifetime he al- 
 ways behaved to us as an affectionate brother, and I 
 would sooner have sown the seeds of sorrow for my- 
 self than for your mother, my beloved sister. I brought 
 up my child I guarded her jealously for the young 
 hero who was absent, proving his valor in Syria for 
 you and for you only. Then your father died, my sole 
 stay and protector." 
 
 " I know it all !" interrupted Paaker looking gloom- 
 ily at the floor. 
 
 "Who should have told you?" said the widow. 
 " For your mother, when that had happened which 
 seemed incredible, forbid us her house, and shut her 
 ears. The king himself urged Mena's suit, for he loves 
 him as his own son, and when I represented your 
 prior claim he commanded^ and who may resist the 
 commands of the sovereign of two worlds, the Son of 
 Ra ? Kings have short memories ; how often did your 
 father hazard his life for him, how many wounds had 
 he received in his service. For your father's sake he 
 might have spared you such an affront, and such 
 pain." 
 
 " And have I myself served him, or not ?" asked 
 the pioneer flushing darkly. 
 
 " He knows you less," returned Katuti apologeti- 
 cally. Then she changed her tone to one of sympathy, 
 and went on : 
 
 " How was it that you, young as you were, aroused 
 his dissatisfaction, his dislike, nay his "
 
 UARDA. 
 
 2 57 
 
 " His what ?" asked the pioneer, trembling with ex- 
 citement. 
 
 " Let that pass !" said the widow soothingly. " The 
 favor and disfavor of kings are as those of the Gods. 
 Men rejoice in the one or bow to the other." 
 
 " What feeling have I aroused in Rameses besides 
 dissatisfaction, and dislike ? I insist on knowing !" said 
 Paaker with increasing vehemence. 
 
 "You alarm me," the widow declared. "And in 
 speaking ill of you, his only motive was to raise his 
 favorite in Nefert's estimation." 
 
 "Tell me what he said!" cried the pioneer; cold 
 drops stood on his brown forehead, and his glaring 
 eyes showed the white eye-balls. 
 
 Katuti quailed before him, and drew back, but he 
 followed her, seized her arm, and said huskily : 
 
 " What did he say ?" 
 
 " Paaker !" cried the widow in pain and indigna- 
 tion. " Let me go. It is better for you that I should 
 not repeat the words with which Rameses sought to 
 turn Nefert's heart from you. Let me go, and re- 
 member to whom you are speaking." 
 
 But Paaker gripped her elbow the tighter, and ur- 
 gently repeated his question. 
 
 " Shame upon you !" cried Katuti, " you are hurting 
 me; let me go! You will not till you have heard 
 what he said ? Have your own way then, but the 
 words are forced from me! He said that if he did 
 not know your mother Setchem for an honest woman, 
 he never would have believed you were your father's 
 son for you were no more like him than an owl to an 
 eagle." 
 
 Uarda. I. 1 1
 
 258 UARDA. 
 
 Paaker took his hand from Katuti's arm. " And so 
 and so " he muttered with pale lips. 
 
 " Nefert took your part, and I top, but in vain. 
 Do not take the words too hardly. Your father was a 
 man without an equal, and Rameses cannot forget that 
 we are related to the old royal house. His grand- 
 father, his father, and himself are usurpers, and there 
 is one now living who has a better right to the throne 
 than he has." 
 
 " The Regent Ani !" exclaimed Paaker decisively. 
 
 Katuti nodded, she went up to the pioneer and 
 said in a whisper: 
 
 " I put myself in your hands, though I know they 
 may be raised against me. But you are my natural 
 ally, for that same act of Rameses that disgraced and 
 injured you, made me a partner in the designs of Ani. 
 The king robbed you of your bride, me of my daugh- 
 ter. He filled your soul with hatred for your arrogant 
 rival, and mine with passionate regret for the lost hap- 
 piness of my child. I feel the blood of Hatasu in my 
 veins, and my spirit is high enough to govern men. 
 It was I who roused the sleeping ambition of the 
 Regent I who directed his gaze to the throne to 
 which he was destined by the Gods. The ministers 
 of the Gods, the priests, are favorably disposed to us ; 
 we have " 
 
 At this moment there was a commotion in the gar- 
 den, and a breathless slave rushed in exclaiming : 
 
 " The Regent is at the gate !" 
 
 Paaker stood in stupid perplexity, but he collected 
 himself with an effort and would have gone, but Katuti 
 detained him. 
 
 " I will go forward to -meet Ani," she said. " He
 
 UARDA. 250 
 
 will be rejoiced to see you, for he esteems you highly 
 and was a friend of your father's." 
 
 As soon as Katuti had left the hall, the dwarf 
 Nemu crept out of his hiding-place, placed himself in 
 front of Paaker, and asked boldly : 
 
 "Well? Did I give thee good advice yesterday, 
 or no ?" 
 
 But Paaker did not answer him, he pushed him 
 aside with his foot, and walked up and down in deep 
 thought. 
 
 Katuti met the Regent half way down the garden. 
 He 'held a manuscript roll in his hand, and greeted 
 her from afar with a friendly wave of his hand. 
 
 The widow looked at him with astonishment. 
 
 It seemed to her that he had grown taller and 
 younger since the last time she had seen him. 
 
 " Hail to your highness !" she cried, half in joke 
 half reverently, and she raised her hands in supplica- 
 tion, as if he already wore the double crown of Upper 
 and Lower Egypt. " Have the nine* Gods met you ? 
 have the Hathors kissed you in your slumbers ? This 
 is a white day a lucky day I read it in your face !" 
 
 " That is reading a cipher !" said Ani gaily, but with 
 dignity. " Read this despatch." 
 
 Katuti took the roll from his hand, read it through, 
 and then returned it. 
 
 "The troops you equipped have conquered the 
 allied armies of the Ethiopians," she said gravely, 
 
 * The Egyptians commonly classed their Gods in Triads, and 3> f3"?l 
 but also sometimes in groups of 8, n and 15. Tn the tale of "The Two I 
 the Holy Nine meet Batau, and make a wife for him. 
 
 17 '
 
 260 UARDA. 
 
 " and are bringing their prince in fetters to Thebes, 
 with endless treasure, and ten thousand prisoners! The 
 Gods be praised !" 
 
 " And above all things I thank the Gods that my 
 general Scheschenk my foster-brother and friend is 
 returning well and unwounded from the war. I think, 
 Katuti, that the figures in our dreams are this day tak- 
 ing forms of flesh and blood !" 
 
 "They are growing to the stature of heroes!" cried 
 the widow. " And you yourself, my lord, have been 
 stirred by the breath of the Divinity. You walk like 
 the worthy son of Ra, the courage of Menth beams in 
 your eyes, and you smile like the victorious Horus." 
 
 " Patience, patience my friend," said Ani, moder- 
 ating the eagerness of the widow; "now, more than 
 ever, we must cling to my principle of over-estimating 
 the strength of our opponents, and underrating our 
 own. Nothing has succeeded on which I had counted, 
 and on the contrary many things have justified my 
 fears that they would fail. The beginning of the end 
 is hardly dawning on us." 
 
 " But successes, like misfortunes, never come singly," 
 replied Katuti. 
 
 " I agree with you," said Ani. " The events of life 
 seem to me to fall in groups. Every misfortune brings 
 its fellow with it like every piece of luck. Can you 
 tell me of a second success ?" 
 
 Women win no battles," said the widow smiling. 
 " But they win allies, and I have gained a powerful 
 one.' 1 
 
 " A God or an army ?" asked Ani. 
 
 " Something between the two," she replied. " Paaker, 
 the king's chief pioneer, has joined us;" and she briefly
 
 UARDA. 261 
 
 related to Ani the history of her nephew's love and 
 hatred. 
 
 Ani listened in silence; then he said with an ex- 
 pression of much disquiet and anxiety : 
 
 "This man is a follower of Rameses, and must 
 shortly return to him. Many may guess at our projects, 
 but every additional person who knows them may be- 
 come a traitor. You are urging me, forcing me, for- 
 ward too soon. A thousand well-prepared enemies 
 are less dangerous than one untrustworthy ally " 
 
 " Paaker is secured to us," replied Katuti positively. 
 
 " Who will answer for him ?" asked Ani. 
 
 "His life shall be in your hand," replied Katuti 
 gravely. " My shrewd little dwarf Nemu knows that 
 he has committed some secret crime, which the law 
 punishes by death." 
 
 The Regent's countenance cleared. 
 
 " That alters the matter," he said with satisfaction. 
 
 " Has he committed a murder ?" 
 
 " No," said Katuti, " but Nemu has sworn to reveal 
 to you alone all that he knows. He is wholly devoted 
 to us." 
 
 " Well and good," said Ani thoughtfully, " but he 
 too is imprudent much too imprudent. You are like 
 a rider, who to win a wager urges his horse to leap 
 over spears. If he falls on the points, it is he that 
 suffers ; you let him lie there, and go on your way." 
 
 "Or are impaled at the same time as the noble 
 horse," said Katuti gravely. " You have more to win, 
 and at the same time more to lose than we ; but 
 meanest clings to life; and I must tell you, Ani, that 
 work for you, not to win any thing through youi 
 cess, but because you are as dear to me as a brother,
 
 262 UARDA. 
 
 and because I see in you the embodiment of my 
 father's claims which have been trampled on." 
 
 Ani gave her his hand and asked : 
 
 " Did you also as my friend speak to Bent-Anat ? 
 Do I interpret your silence rightly ?" 
 
 Katuti sadly shook her head ; but Ani went on : 
 " Yesterday that would have decided me to give her 
 up; but to-day my courage has risen, and if the 
 Hathors be my friends I may yet win her." 
 
 With these words he went in advance of the widow 
 into the hall, where Paaker was still walking uneasily 
 up and down. 
 
 The pioneer bowed low before the Regent, who 
 returned the greeting with a half-haughty, half-familiar 
 wave of the hand, and when he had seated himself in 
 an arm-chair politely addressed Paaker as the son of a 
 friend, and a relation of his family. 
 
 "All the world," he said, "speaks of your reckless 
 courage. Men like you are rare; I have none such 
 attached to me. I wish you stood nearer to me; but 
 Rameses will not part with you, although although 
 In point of fact your office has two aspects; it requires 
 the daring of a soldier, and the dexterity of a scribe. 
 No one denies that you have the first, but the second 
 the sword and the reed-pen are very different 
 weapons, one requires supple fingers, the other a sturdy 
 fist. The king used to complain of your reports is he 
 better satisfied with them now ?" 
 
 " I hope so," replied the Mohar ; " my brother Horus 
 is a practised writer, and accompanies me in my 
 journeys." 
 
 "That is well," said Ani. " If I had the manage- 
 ment of affairs I should treble your staff, and give you
 
 UARDA. 
 
 263 
 
 four five six scribes under you, who should be en- 
 tirely at your command, and to whom you could give 
 the materials for the reports to be sent out. You.- 
 office demands that you should be both brave and cir- 
 cumspect ; these characteristics are rarely united ; but 
 there are scriveners by hundreds in the temples." 
 
 " So it seems to me," said Paaker. 
 
 Ani looked down meditatively, and continued 
 " Rameses is fond of comparing you with your father. 
 That is unfair, for he who is now with the justified 
 was without an equal; at once the bravest of heroes 
 and the most skilful of scribes. You are judged un- 
 justly ; and it grieves me all the more that you belong, 
 through your mother, to my poor but royal house. We 
 will see whether I cannot succeed in putting you in the 
 right place. For the present you are required in Syria 
 almost as soon as you have got home. You have shown 
 that you are a man who does not fear death, and 
 who can render good service, and you might now enjoy 
 your wealth in peace with your wife." 
 
 " I am alone," said Paaker. 
 
 " Then, if you come home again, let Katuti seek 
 you out the prettiest wife in Egypt," said the Regent 
 smiling. " She sees herself every day in her mirror, and 
 must be a connoisseur in the charms of women." 
 
 Ani rose with these words, bowed to Paaker with 
 studied friendliness, gave his hand to Katuti, and said 
 as he left the hall : 
 
 "Send me to-day the the handkerchief by the 
 dwarf Nemu." 
 
 When he was already in the garden, he turned 
 once more and said to Paaker :
 
 264 UARDA. 
 
 " Some friends are supping with me to-day ; pray 
 let me see you too." 
 
 The pioneer bowed; he dimly perceived that he 
 was entangled in invisible toils. Up to the present 
 moment he had been proud of his devotion to his 
 calling, of his duties as Mohar; and now he had dis- 
 covered that the king, whose chain of honor hung 
 round his neck, undervalued him, and perhaps only 
 suffered him to fill his arduous and dangerous post 
 for the sake of his father, while he, notwithstanding 
 the temptations offered him in Thebes by his wealth, 
 had accepted it willingly and disinterestedly. He knew 
 that his skill with the pen was small, but that was no 
 reason why he should be despised ; often had he wished 
 that he could reconstitute his office exactly as Ani had 
 suggested, but his petition to be allowed a secretary 
 had been rejected by Rameses. What he spied out, 
 he was told was to be kept secret, and no one could 
 be responsible for the secrecy of another. 
 
 As his brother Horus grew up, he had followed him 
 as his obedient assistant, even after he had married a 
 wife, who, with her child, remained in Thebes under 
 the care of Setchem. 
 
 He was now filling Paaker's place in Syria during 
 his absence; badly enough, as the pioneer thought, and 
 yet not without credit ; for the fello'w knew how to 
 write smooth words with a graceful pen. 
 
 Paaker, accustomed to solitude, became absorbed 
 in thought, forgetting everything that surrounded him ; 
 even the widow herself, who had sunk on to a couch, 
 and was observing him in silence. 
 
 He gazed into vacancy, while a crowd of sensations 
 rushed confusedly through his brain. He thought him-
 
 UARDA. 
 
 265 
 
 self cruelly ill-used, and he felt too that it was in- 
 cumbent on him to become the instrument of a ter- 
 rible fate to some other person. All was dim and 
 chaotic in his mind, his love merged in his hatred; 
 only one thing was clear and unclouded by doubt, 
 and that was his strong conviction that Nefert would 
 be his. 
 
 The Gods indeed were in deep disgrace with him. 
 How much he had expended upon them and with 
 Avhat a grudging hand they had rewarded him; he 
 knew of but one indemnification for his wasted life, 
 and in that he believed so firmly that he counted on 
 it as if it were capital which he had invested in sound 
 securities. But at this moment his resentful feelings 
 embittered the sweet dream of hope, and he strove in 
 vain for calmness and clear-sightedness ; wnen such 
 cross-roads as these met, no amulet, no divining rod 
 could guide him ; here he must think for himself, and 
 beat his own road before he could walk in it ; and yet 
 he could think out no plan, and arrive at no decision. 
 
 He grasped his burning forehead in his hands, and 
 started from his brooding reverie, to remember where 
 he was, to recall his conversation with the mother of 
 the woman he loved, and her saying that she was 
 capable of guiding men. 
 
 "She perhaps may be able to think for me," he 
 muttered to himself. "Action suits me better." 
 
 He slowly went up to her and said : 
 
 "So it is settled then we are confederates." 
 
 "Against Rameses, and for Ani,"she replied, giving 
 him her slender hand. 
 
 " In a few days I start for Syria, meanwhile you 
 can make up your mind what commissions you have
 
 266 UARDA. 
 
 to give me. The money for your son shall be con- 
 veyed to you to-day before sunset. May I not pay 
 my respects to Nefert ?" 
 
 " Not now, she is praying in the temple." 
 
 " But to-morrow ? " 
 
 " Willingly, my dear friend. She will be delighted 
 to see you, and to thank you." 
 
 "Farewell, Katuti." 
 
 " Call me mother," said the widow, and she waved 
 her veil to him as a last farewell. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 As soon as Paaker had disappeared behind the 
 shrubs, Katuti struck a little sheet of metal, a slave 
 appeared, and Katuti asked her whether Nefert had 
 returned from the temple. 
 
 " Her litter is just now at the side gate," was the 
 answer. 
 
 " I await her here," said the widow. The slave 
 went away, and a few minutes later Nefert entered 
 the hall. 
 
 "You want me?" she said; and after kissing her 
 mother she sank upon her couch. " I am tired," she 
 exclaimed, " Nemu, take a fan and keep the flies 
 off me." 
 
 The dwarf sat down on a cushion by her couch, 
 and began to wave the semi-circular fan of ostrich- 
 feathers; but Katuti put him aside and said : 
 
 "You can leave us for the present; we want to 
 speak to each other in private." 
 
 The dwarf shrugged his shoulders and got up, but
 
 UARDA. 267 
 
 Nefert looked at her mother with an irresistible ap- 
 peal. 
 
 " Let him stay," she said, as pathetically as if her 
 whole happiness depended upon it. " The flies torment 
 me so, and Nemu always holds his tongue." 
 
 She patted the dwarf's big head as if he were a 
 large dog, and called the white cat, which with a grace- 
 ful leap sprang on to her shoulder and stood there 
 with its back arched, to be stroked by her slender 
 fingers. 
 
 Nemu looked enquiringly at his mistress, but Ka- 
 tuti turned to her daughter, and said in a warning 
 voice : 
 
 " I have very serious things to discuss with you." 
 
 "Indeed?" said her daughter, "but I cannot be 
 stung by the flies all the same. Of course, if you 
 wish it " 
 
 " Nemu may stay then," said Katuti, and her voice 
 had the tone of that of a nurse who gives way to 
 a naughty child. " Besides, he knows what I have to 
 talk about." 
 
 " There now !" said Nefert, kissing the head of the 
 white cat, and she gave the fan back to the dwarf. 
 
 The widow looked at her daughter with sincere 
 compassion, she went up to her and looked for the 
 thousandth time in admiration at her pretty face. 
 
 " Poor child," she sighed, " how willingly I would 
 spare you the frightful news which sooner or later you 
 must hear must bear. Leave off your foolish play 
 with the cat, I have things of the most hideous gravity 
 to tell you." 
 
 " Speak on," replied Nefert. " To-day I cannot 
 the worst. Mena's star, the haruspex told me, stands
 
 268 UARDA. 
 
 under the sign of happiness, and I enquired of the 
 oracle in the temple of Besa, and heard that my hus- 
 band is prospering. I have prayed in the temple till 
 I am quite content. Only speak ! I know my brother's 
 letter from the camp had no good news in it; the 
 evening before last I saw you had been crying, and 
 yesterday you did not look well; even the pome- 
 granate flowers in your hair did not suit you." 
 
 " Your brother," sighed Katuti, " has occasioned me 
 great trouble, and we might through him have suffered 
 deep dishonor " 
 
 " We dishonor ?" exclaimed Nefert, and she 
 nervously clutched at the cat. 
 
 " Your brother lost enormous sums at play ; to 
 recover them he pledged the mummy of your father " 
 
 " Horrible !" cried Nefert. " We must appeal at 
 once to the king ; I will write to him myself; for Mena's 
 sake he will hear me. Rameses is great and noble, 
 and will not let a house that is faithfully devoted to 
 him fall into disgrace through the reckless folly of a 
 boy. Certainly I will write to him." 
 
 She said this in a voice of most childlike con- 
 fidence, and desired Nemu to wave the fan more 
 gently, as if this concern were settled. 
 
 In Katuti's heart surprise and indignation at the 
 unnatural indifference of her daughter were struggling 
 together; but she withheld all blame, and said care- 
 lessly : 
 
 " We are already released, for my nephew Paaker, 
 as soon as he heard what threatened us, offered me 
 his help; freely and unprompted, from pure goodness 
 of heart and attachment." 
 
 ' How good of Paaker!" cried Nefert. "He was so
 
 UARDA. 
 
 26 9 
 
 fond of me, and you know, mother, I always stood up 
 for him. No doubt it was for my sake that he be- 
 haved so generously !" 
 
 The young wife laughed, and pulling the cat's face 
 close to her own, held her nose to its cool little nose, 
 stared into its green eyes, and said, imitating childish 
 talk: 
 
 " There now, pussy how kind people are to your 
 little mistress." 
 
 Katuti was vexed at this fresh outburst of her 
 daughter's childish impulses. 
 
 " It seems to me," she said, " that you might leave 
 off playing and trifling when I am talking of such 
 serious matters. I have long since observed that the 
 fate of the house to which your father and mother be- 
 long is a matter of perfect indifference to you ; and yet 
 you would have to seek shelter and protection under 
 its roof if your husband " 
 
 " Well, mother ?" asked Nefert raising herself, and 
 breathing more quickly. 
 
 As soon as Katuti perceived her daughter's agitation 
 she regretted that she had not more gently led up to 
 the news she had to break to her; for she loved her 
 daughter, and knew that it would give her keen pain. 
 
 So she went on more sympathetically 
 
 "You boasted in joke that people are good to 
 you, and it is true ; you win hearts by your mere being 
 by only being what you are. And Mena too loved 
 you tenderly ; but ' absence,' says the proverb, ' is the 
 one real enemy,' and Mena " 
 
 " What has Mena done ?" Once more Nefert inter- 
 rupted her mother, and her nostrils quivered. 
 
 " Mena," said Katuti, decidedly, " has violated the
 
 270 UARDA. 
 
 truth and esteem which he owes you he has trodden 
 them under foot, and " 
 
 " Mena ?" exclaimed the young wife with flashing 
 eyes ; she flung the cat on the floor, and sprang from 
 her couch. 
 
 Yes Mena," said Katuti firmly. " Your brother 
 writes that he would have neither silver nor gold for 
 his spoil, but took the fair daughter of the prince of 
 the Danaids into his tent. The ignoble wretch !" 
 
 " Ignoble wretch !" cried Nefert, and two or three 
 times she repeated her mother's last words. Katuti 
 drew back in horror, for her gentle, docile, childlike 
 daughter stood before her absolutely transfigured beyond 
 all recognition^ 
 
 She looked like a beautiful demon of revenge ; her 
 eyes sparkled, her breath came quickly, her limbs 
 quivered, and with extraordinary strength and rapidity 
 she seized the dwarf by the hand, led him to the door 
 of one of the rooms which opened out of the hall, threw 
 it open, pushed the little man over the threshold, and 
 closed it sharply upon him ; then with white lips she 
 came up to her mother. 
 
 "An ignoble wretch did you call him?" she cried' 
 out with a hoarse husky voice, " an ignoble wretch ! 
 Take back your words, mother, take back your words, 
 or" 
 
 Katuti turned paler and paler, and said sooth- 
 ingly : 
 
 " The words may sound hard, but he has broken 
 faith with you, and openly dishonored you." 
 
 " And shall I believe it ?" said Nefert with a scorn- 
 ful laugh. " Shall I believe it, because a scoundrel has 
 written it, who has pawned his father's body and the
 
 UARDA. 2*! 
 
 honor of his family; because it is told you by that 
 noble and brave gentleman ! why a box on the ears 
 from Mena would be the death of him. Look at me, 
 mother, here are my eyes, and if that table there were 
 Mena's tent, and you were Mena, and you took the 
 fairest woman living by the hand and led her into it, 
 
 and these eyes saw it aye, over and over again I 
 
 would laugh at it as I laugh at it now; and I should 
 say, ' Who knows what he may have to give her, or to 
 say to her,' and not for one instant would I doubt his 
 truth ; for your son is false and Mena is true. Osiris 
 broke faith with Isis* but Mena may be favored 
 by a hundred women he will take none to his tent 
 but me !" 
 
 " Keep your belief," said Katuti bitterly, " but leave 
 me mine." 
 
 " Yours ?" said Nefert, and her flushed cheeks turned 
 pale again. ".What do you believe ? You listen to the 
 Avorst and basest things that can be said of a man who 
 has overloaded you with benefits ! A wretch, bah ! an 
 ignoble wretch ? Is that what you call a man who lets 
 you dispose of his estate as you please !" 
 
 " Nefert," cried Katuti angrily, " I will" 
 
 " Do what you will," interrupted her indignant 
 daughter, "but do not vilify the generous man who 
 has never hindered you from throwing away his property 
 on your son's debts and your own ambition. Since the 
 day before yesterday I have learned that we are not 
 rich; and I have reflected, and I have asked myself 
 what has become of our corn and our cattle, of our 
 sheep and the rents from the farmers. The wretch's 
 estate was not so contemptible ; but I tell you plainly I 
 
 * See Plutarch, Isis and Osiris.
 
 272 UARDA. 
 
 should be unworthy to be the wife of the noble Mena 
 if I allowed any one to vilify his name under his own 
 roof. Hold to your belief, by all means, but one of us 
 must quit this house you or I." 
 
 At these words Nefert broke into passionate sobs, 
 threw herself on her knees by her couch, hid her face 
 in the cushions, and wept convulsively and without in- 
 termission. 
 
 Katuti stood behind her, startled, trembling, and 
 not knowing what to say. Was this her gentle, dreamy 
 daughter ? Had ever a daughter dared to speak thus 
 to her mother ? But was she right or was Nefert ? This 
 question was the pressing one ; she knelt down by the 
 side of the young wife, put her arm round her, drew 
 her head against her bosom, and whispered pitifully : 
 
 " You cruel, hard-hearted child ; forgive your poor, 
 miserable mother, and do not make the measure of her 
 wretchedness overflow." . 
 
 Then Nefert rose, kissed her mother's hand, and 
 went silently into her own room. 
 
 Katuti remained alone; she felt as if a dead hand 
 held her heart in its icy grasp, and she muttered to 
 herself 
 
 " Ani is right nothing turns to good excepting that 
 from which we expect the worst." 
 
 She held her hand to her head, as if she had heard 
 something too strange to be believed. Her heart went 
 after her daughter, but instead of sympathizing with her 
 she collected all her courage, and deliberately recalled 
 all the reproaches that Nefert had heaped upon her. 
 She did not spare herself a single word, and finally she 
 murmured to herself: "She can spoil every thing. For 
 Mena's sake she will sacrifice me and the whole world;
 
 UARDA. 
 
 273 
 
 Mena and Rameses are one, and if she discovers what 
 AVC are plotting she will betray us without a moment's 
 hesitation. Hitherto all has gone on without her see- 
 ing it, but to-day something has been unsealed in her 
 an eye, a tongue, an ear, which have hitherto been 
 closed. She is like a deaf and dumb person, who by 
 a sudden fright is restored to speech and hearing. My 
 favorite child will become the spy of my actions, and 
 my judge." 
 
 She gave no utterance to the last words, but she 
 seemed to hear them with her inmost ear; the voice 
 that could speak to her thus, startled and frightened 
 her, and solitude was in itself a torture; she called the 
 dwarf, and desired him to have her litter prepared, as 
 she intended going to the temple, and visiting the wounded 
 who had been sent home from Syria. 
 
 "And the handkerchief for the Regent?" asked the 
 little man. 
 
 "It was a pretext," said Katuti. "He wishes to 
 speak to you about the matter which you know of with 
 regard to Paaker. What is it ? " 
 
 " Do not ask," replied Nemu, " I ought not to betray 
 it. By Besa, who protects us dwarfs, it is better that 
 thou shouldst never know it." 
 
 " For to-day I have learned enough that is new to 
 me," retorted Katuti. " Now go to Ani, and if you are 
 able to throw Paaker entirely into his power good I 
 will give but what have I to give away? I will be 
 grateful to you; and when we have gained our end I 
 will set you free and make you rich." 
 
 Nemu kissed her robe, and said in a low voice: 
 
 "What is the end?" 
 
 18 
 
 Uarda. I.
 
 274 UARDA. 
 
 "You know what Ani is striving for," answered the 
 widow. "And I have but one wish!" 
 
 "And that is?" 
 
 "To see Paaker in Mena's place." 
 
 "Then our wishes are the same," said the dwarf 
 and he left the Hall. 
 
 Katuti looked after him and muttered : 
 
 " It must be so. For if every thing remains as it was 
 and Mena comes home and demands a reckoning it 
 is not to be thought of ! It must not be!" 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 As Nemu, on his way back from his visit to Ani, 
 approached his mistress's house, he was detained by a 
 boy, who desired him to follow him to the stranger's 
 quarter. Seeing him hesitate, the messenger showed 
 him the ring of his mother Hekt, who had come into 
 the town on business, and wanted to speak with him. 
 
 Nemu was tired, for he was not accustomed to walk- 
 ing; his ass was dead, and Katuti could not afford to 
 give him another. Half of Mena's beasts had been 
 sold, and the remainder barely sufficed for the field- 
 labor. 
 
 At the corners of the busiest streets, and on the 
 market-places, stood boys with asses which they hired 
 out for a small sum;* but Nemu had parted with his 
 last money for a garment and a new -wig, so that he 
 
 * In the streets of modern Egyptian towns asses stand saddled for hire. 
 On the monuments only foreigners are represented as riding on asses, but 
 these beasts are mentioned in almost every list of the possessions of the nobles, 
 even in very early times, and the number is often considerable. There is a 
 picture extant of a rich old man who rides on a seat supported on the backs of 
 two donkeys. Lepsius, Denkmalcr, part u. 126.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 275 
 
 might appear worthily attired before the Regent. In 
 former times his pocket had never been empty, for 
 Mena had thrown him many a ring of silver, or even of 
 gold, but his restless and ambitious spirit wasted no 
 regrets on lost luxuries. He remembered those years 
 of superfluity with contempt, and as he puffed and 
 panted on his way through the dust, he felt himself 
 swell with satisfaction. 
 
 The Regent had admitted him to a private inter- 
 view, and the little man had soon succeeded in rivet- 
 ing his attention; Ani had laughed till the tears rolled 
 down his cheeks at Nemu's description of Paaker's wild 
 passion, and he had proved himself in earnest over the 
 dwarfs further communications, and had met his de- 
 mands half-way. Nemu felt like a duck hatched on 
 dry land, and put for the first time into water; like a 
 bird hatched in a cage, and that for the first time is 
 allowed to spread its wings and fly. He would have 
 swum or have flown willingly to death if circumstances 
 had not set a limit to his zeal and energy. 
 
 Bathed in sweat and coated with dust, he at last 
 reached the gay tent in the stranger's quarter,* where 
 the sorceress Hekt was accustomed to alight when she 
 came over to Thebes. 
 
 He was considering far-reaching projects, dreaming 
 of possibilities, devising subtle plans rejecting them 
 as too subtle, and supplying their place with others 
 more feasible and less dangerous; altogether the little 
 diplomatist had no mind for the motley tribes which 
 here surrounded him. He had passed the temple in 
 
 * Herodotus mentions the Tyrian quarter of Memphis, which lay south- 
 wards from the temple of Ptah, and in which ^Eirrf A^gOOtrTf, ' 
 foreign Aphrodite, was worshipped. Brugsch has identified it 
 of the city called the "world of life." 
 
 18
 
 276 UARDA. 
 
 which the people of Kaft adored their goddess Astarte,* 
 and the sanctuary of Seth, where they sacrificed to 
 Baal,** without letting himself be disturbed by the 
 dancing devotees or the noise of cymbals and music 
 which issued from their enclosures. The tents and 
 slightly-built wooden houses of the dancing girls did 
 not tempt him. Besides their inhabitants, who in 
 the evening tricked themselves out in tinsel finery to 
 lure the youth of Thebes into extravagance and folly, 
 and spent their days in sleeping till sun-down, only the 
 gambling booths drove a brisk business; and the guard 
 of police had much trouble to restrain the soldier, who 
 had staked and lost all his prize money, or the sailor, 
 who thought himself cheated, from such outbreaks of 
 rage and despair as must end in bloodshed. Drunken 
 men lay in front of the taverns, and others were doing 
 their utmost, by repeatedly draining their beakers, to 
 follow their example. 
 
 Nothing was yet to be seen of the various musicians, 
 jugglers, fire-eaters, serpent-charmers, and conjurers, 
 who in the evening displayed their skill in this part of 
 the town, which at all times had the aspect of a never- 
 * 
 
 * Astarte, the great goddess of the Phoenicians, frequently appears on the 
 monuments as Sechet At K/lfu she is represented with the lioness-head, and 
 drives a chariot drawn by horses. Her name frequently occurs in papyri of 
 the time of our story with that of Ramescs II., as well as of a favorite horse 
 and dog of the king's. 
 
 ** According to the papyrus Sallicr I., the Hyksos-king Apepi-Apophis 
 "chose Seth for his lord, and worshipped no other god in Egypt' In later 
 times the Semitic god Baal was called Seth hy the Egyptians themselves, as 
 we learn from the treaty of peace of Raines-s II. with the Cheta, found at 
 Karnak, in which on one side the Seth of the Cheta (a different god), and 
 Astarte are invoked, and on the other the Egyptian gods. The form " Sutech" 
 occurs with "Seth. 
 
 lately by 
 
 k exhaustively treated by Movers.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 277 
 
 ceasing fair. But these delights, which Nemu had passed 
 a thousand times, had never had any temptation for 
 him. Women and gambling were not to his taste; that 
 which could be had simply for the taking, without 
 trouble or exertion, offered no charms to his fancy; he 
 had no fear of the ridicule of the dancing-women, and 
 their associates indeed, he occasionally sought them, 
 for he enjoyed a war of words, and he was of opinion 
 that no one in Thebes could beat him at having the 
 last word. Other people, indeed, shared this opinion, 
 and not long before Paaker's steward had said of 
 Nemu: 
 
 " Our tongues are cudgels, but the little one's is a 
 dagger." 
 
 The destination of the dwarf was a very large and 
 gaudy tent, not in any way distinguished from a dozen 
 others in its neighborhood. The opening which led 
 into it was wide, but at present closed by a hanging of 
 coarse stuff. 
 
 Nemu squeezed himself in between the edge of the 
 tent and the yielding door, and found himself in an al- 
 most circular tent with many angles, and with its 
 cone-shaped roof supported on a pole by way of a 
 pillar. 
 
 Pieces of shabby carpet lay on the dusty soil 
 was the floor of the tent, and on these squatted some 
 gaily-clad girls, whom an old woman was busily en- 
 gaged in dressing. She painted the finger and toe- 
 nails of the fair ones with orange-colored 
 blackened their brows and eye-lashes with Mestem* i 
 give brilliancy to their glance, painted their cheeks wit 
 white and red, and anointed their hair with scenl 
 
 * Antimony.
 
 278 UARDA. 
 
 It was very hot in the tent, and riot one of the girls 
 spoke a word; they sat perfectly still before the old 
 woman, and did not stir a finger, excepting now and 
 then to take up one of the porous clay pitchers, which 
 stood on the ground, for a draught of water, or to put a 
 pill of Kyphi between their painted lips. 
 
 Various musical instruments leaned against the walls 
 of the tent, hand-drums, pipes and lutes and four tam- 
 bourines lay on the ground ; on the vellum of one slept 
 a cat, whose graceful kittens played with the bells in 
 the hoop of another. 
 
 An old negro-woman went in and out of the little 
 back-door of the tent, pursued by flies and gnats, 
 while she cleared away a variety of earthen dishes with 
 the remains of food pomegranate-peelings, bread- 
 crumbs, and garlic-tops which had been lying on one 
 of the carpets for some hours since the girls had finished 
 their dinner. 
 
 Old Hekt sat apart from the girls on a painted 
 trunk, and she was saying, as she took a parcel from her 
 wallet : 
 
 " Here, take this incense, and burn six seeds of it, 
 and the vermin will all disappear " she pointed to the 
 flies that swarmed round the platter in her hand. " If 
 you like I will drive away the mice too and draw the 
 snakes out of their holes better than the priests."* 
 
 " Keep your magic to yourself," said a girl in a husky 
 voice. " Since you muttered your words over me, and 
 gave me that drink to make me grow slight and lissom 
 again, I have been shaken to pieces with a cough at 
 night, and turn faint when I am dancing." 
 
 * Recipes for exterminating noxious creatures are found in the papyrus 
 in my possession.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 279 
 
 " But look how slender you have grown," answered 
 Hekt, " and your cough will soon be well." 
 
 " When I am dead," whispered the girl to the old 
 woman. " I know that most of us end so." 
 
 The witch shrugged her shoulders, and perceiving 
 the dwarf she rose from her seat. 
 
 The girls too noticed the little man, and set up the 
 indescribable cry, something like the cackle of hens, 
 which is peculiar to Eastern women when something 
 tickles their fancy. Nemu was well known to them, 
 for his mother always stayed in their tent whenever 
 she came to Thebes, and the gayest of them cried 
 out: 
 
 " You are grown, little man, since the last time you 
 were here." 
 
 " So are you," said the dwarf sharply ; " but only as 
 far as big words are concerned." 
 
 " And you are as wicked as you are small," retorted 
 the girl. 
 
 " Then my wickedness is small too," said the dwarf 
 laughing, " for I am little enough ! Good morning, girls 
 may Besa help your beauty. Good day, mother 
 you sent for me ?" 
 
 The old woman nodded ; the dwarf perched himself 
 on the chest beside her, and they began to whisper to- 
 gether. 
 
 "How dusty and tired you are," said Hekt. 
 do believe you have come on foot in the burning 
 sun." 
 
 My ass is dead," replied Nemu, " and . 
 money to hire a steed." 
 
 "A foretaste of future splendor," said the old
 
 280 UARDA. 
 
 woman with a sneer. " What have you succeeded in 
 doing ?" 
 
 " Paaker has saved us," replied Nemu, " and I have 
 just come from a long interview with the Regent." 
 
 Well ?" 
 
 " He will renew your letter of freedom, if you will 
 put Paaker into his power." 
 
 " Good good. I wish he would make up his mind 
 to come and seek me in disguise, of course. I 
 would " 
 
 " He is very timid, and it would not be wise to 
 suggest to him anything so unpracticable." 
 
 " Hm " said Hekt, " perhaps you are right, for 
 when we have to demand a good deal it is best only 
 to ask for what is feasible. One rash request often 
 altogether spoils the patron's inclination for granting 
 favors." 
 
 " What else has occurred ?" 
 
 " The Regent's army has conquered the Ethiopians, 
 and is coming home with rich spoils." 
 
 " People may be bought with treasure," muttered 
 the old woman, " good good !" 
 
 " Paaker's sword is sharpened ; I would give no 
 more for my master's life, than I have in my pocket 
 and you know why I came on foot through the dust." 
 
 " Well, you can ride home again," replied his mother, 
 giving the little man a small silver ring. " Has the 
 pioneer seen Nefert again ?" 
 
 "Strange things have happened," said the dwarf, 
 and he told his mother what had taken place between 
 Katuti and Nefert. Nemu was a good listener, and 
 had not forgotten a word of what he had heard.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 The old woman listened to his story with the most 
 eager attention. 
 
 " Well, well," she muttered, " here is another extra- 
 ordinary thing. What is common to all men is gener- 
 ally disgustingly similar in the palace and in the 
 hovel. Mothers are everywhere she-apes, who with 
 pleasure let themselves be tormented to death by their 
 children, who repay them badly enough, and the wives 
 generally open their ears wide if any one can tell them 
 of some misbehavior of their husbands ! But that is 
 not the way with your mistress." 
 
 The old woman looked thoughtful, and then she 
 continued : 
 
 " In point of fact this can be easily explained, and 
 is not at all more extraordinary than it is that those 
 tired girls should sit yawning. You told me once that 
 it was a pretty sight to see the mother and daughter 
 side by side in their chariot when they go to a festival 
 or the Panegyrai ; Katuti, you said, took care that the 
 colors of their dresses and the flowers in their hair 
 should harmonize. For which of them is the dress 
 first chosen on such occasions?" 
 
 " Always for the lady Katuti, who never wears any 
 but certain colors," replied Nemu quickly. 
 
 " You see," said the witch laughing, " indeed it 
 must be so. That mother always thinks of herself first, 
 and of the objects she wishes to gain ; but they hang 
 high, and she treads down every thing that is in her 
 way even her own child to reach them. She will 
 contrive that Paaker shall be the ruin of Mena, as sure 
 as I have ears to hear with, for that woman is capable 
 of playing any tricks with her daughter, and would
 
 282 UARDA. 
 
 marry her to that lame dog yonder if it would advance 
 her ambitious schemes." 
 
 " But Nefert !" said Nemu. " You should have seen 
 her. The dove became a lioness." 
 
 " Because she loves Mena as much as her mother 
 loves herself," answered Hekt. " As the poets say, ' she 
 is full of him.' It is really true of her, there is no 
 room for any thing else. She cares for one only, and 
 woe to those who come between him and her!" 
 
 " I have seen other women in love," said Nemu, 
 " but" 
 
 " But," exclaimed the old witch with such a sharp 
 laugh that the girls all looked up, " they behaved dif- 
 ferently to Nefert I believe you, for there is not one 
 in a thousand that loves as she does. It is a sickness that 
 gives raging pain like a poisoned arrow in an open 
 wound, and devours all that is near it like a fire-brand, 
 and is harder to cure than the disease which is killing 
 that coughing wench. To be possessed by that demon 
 of anguish is to suffer the torture of the damned or 
 else," and her voice sank to softness, " to be more blest 
 than the Gods, happy as they are. I know I know 
 it all ; for I was once one of the possessed, one of a 
 thousand, and even now " 
 
 ' Well ?" asked the dwarf. 
 
 " Folly !" muttered the witch, stretching herself as 
 if awaking from sleep. " Madness ! He is long since 
 dead, and if he were not it would be all the same to 
 me. All men are alike, and Mena will be like the 
 rest." 
 
 " But Paaker surely is governed by the demon you 
 describe ?" asked the dwarf. 
 
 " May be," replied his mother ; " but he is self-willed
 
 UARDA. 283 
 
 to madness. He would simply give his life for the 
 thing because it is denied him. If your mistress Nefert 
 were his, perhaps he might be easier; but what is the 
 use of chattering ? I must go over to the gold tent, 
 where everyone goes now who has any money in their 
 purse, to speak to the mistress " 
 
 " What do you want with her ?" interrupted Nemu. 
 
 " Little Uarda over there," said the old woman, 
 "will soon be quite well again. You have seen her 
 lately; is she not grown beautiful, wonderfully beauti- 
 ful ? Now I shall see what the good woman will offer 
 me if I take Uarda to her ? the girl is as light-footed 
 as a gazelle, and with good training would learn to 
 dance in a very few weeks." 
 
 Nemu turned perfectly white. 
 
 " That you shall not do," said he positively. 
 
 " And why not ?" asked the old woman, "if it pays 
 well." 
 
 " Because I forbid it," said the dwarf in a choked 
 voice. 
 
 " Bless me," laughed the woman ; " you want to play 
 my lady Nefert, and expect me to take the part of 
 her mother Katuti. But, seriously, having seen the 
 child again, have you any fancy for her ?" 
 
 " Yes," replied Nemu. " If we gain our end, Katuti 
 will make me tree, and make me rich. Then I will 
 buy Pinem's grandchild, and take her for my wife. 
 will build a house near the hall of justice, and giv 
 the complainants and defendants private advice, like 
 the hunch-back Sent, who now drives through t 
 streets in his own chariot." 
 
 " Hm " said his mother, " that might have < 
 very well, but perhaps it is too late. When the child
 
 284 UARDA. 
 
 had fever she talked about the young priest who was 
 sent from the House of Set! by Ameni. He is a fine 
 tall fellow, and took a great interest in her; he is a 
 gardener's son, named Pentaur." 
 
 " Pentaur ?" said the dwarf. " Pentaur ? He has the 
 haughty air and the expression of the old Mohar, and 
 would be sure to rise ; but they are going to break his 
 proud neck for him." 
 
 " So much the better," said the old woman. " Uarda 
 would be just the wife for you, she is good and steady, 
 and no one knows " 
 
 " What ?" said Nemu. 
 
 " Who her mother was for she was not one of us. 
 She came here from foreign parts, and when she died 
 she left a trinket with strange letters on it. We must 
 show it to one of the prisoners of war, after you have 
 got her safe ; perhaps they could make out the queer 
 inscription. She comes of a good stock, that I am 
 certain ; for Uarda is the very living image of her 
 mother, and as soon as she was born, she looked like 
 the child of a great man. You smile, you idiot ! Why 
 thousands of infants have been in my hands, and if 
 one was brought to me wrapped in rags I could tell if 
 its parents were noble or base-born. The shape of the 
 foot shows it and other marks. Uarda may stay where 
 she is, and I will help you. If anything new occurs let 
 me know." 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 WHEN Nemu, riding on an ass this time, reached 
 home, he found neither his mistress nor Nefert within.
 
 UARDA. 285 
 
 The former was gone, first to the temple, and then 
 into the town ; Nefert, obeying an irresistible impulse, 
 had gone to her royal friend Bent-Anat. 
 
 The king's palace was more like a little town 
 than a house.* The wing in which the Regent resided, 
 and which we have already visited, lay away from the 
 river; while the part of the building which was used 
 by the royal family commanded the Nile. 
 
 It offered a splendid, and at the same time a pleasing 
 prospect to the ships which sailed by at its foot, for it 
 stood, not a huge and solitary mass in the midst of 
 the surrounding gardens, but in picturesque groups of 
 various outline. On each side of a large structure, 
 which contained the state rooms and banqueting hall, 
 three rows of pavilions of different sizes extended in 
 symmetrical order. They were connected with each 
 other by colonnades, or by little bridges, under which 
 flowed canals, that watered the gardens and gave the 
 palace-grounds the aspect of a town built on islands. 
 
 The principal part of the castle of the Pharaohs 
 was constructed of light Nile-mud bricks and elegantly 
 carved woodwork, but the extensive walls which sur- 
 rounded it were ornamented and fortified with towers. 
 in front of which heavily armed soldiers stood on 
 guard. 
 
 The walls and pillars, the galleries and colonnades, 
 even the roofs, blazed in many colored paints, and 
 at every gate stood tall masts, from which red and 
 
 * The view accepted by many writers, that the temples 
 king's palace, is erroneous. In the best- preserved temples, as 
 Edfu, we know the purpose of the several rooms, and they were aU < 
 the service of the gods. We learn from the monuments that the king* 
 habited extensive buildings surrounded by gardens, and < 
 materials. The palaces resembled, in fact, the houses of the noWes, bu 
 on a larger scale.
 
 286 UARDA. 
 
 blue flags fluttered when the king was residing there. 
 Now they stood up with only their brass spikes, which 
 were intended to intercept and conduct the lightning. 
 
 To the right of the principal building, and entirely 
 surrounded with thick plantations of trees, stood the 
 houses of the royal ladies, some mirrored in the lake 
 which they surrounded at a greater or less distance. 
 In this part of the grounds were the king's store-houses 
 in endless rows, while behind the centre building, in 
 which the Pharaoh resided, stood the barracks for his 
 body-guard and the treasuries. The left wing was 
 occupied by the officers of the household, the innumer- 
 able servants and the horses and chariots of the sovereign. 
 
 In spite of the absence of the king himself, brisk 
 activity reigned in the palace of Rameses, for a 
 hundred gardeners watered the turf, the flower-borders, 
 the shrubs and trees; companies of guards passed 
 hither and thither; horses were being trained and 
 broken ; and the princess's wing was as full as a bee- 
 hive of servants and maids, officers and priests. 
 
 Nefert was well known in this part of the palace. 
 The gate-keepers let her litter pass unchallenged, with 
 low bows ; once in the garden, a lord in waiting re- 
 ceived her, and conducted her to the chamberlain, 
 who, after a short delay, introduced her into the sitting- 
 room of the king's favorite daughter. 
 
 Bent-Anat's apartment was on the first floor of the 
 pavilion, next to the king's residence. Her dead moth- 
 er had inhabited these pleasant rooms, and when the 
 princess was grown up it made the king happy to feel 
 that she was near him ; so the beautiful house of the 
 wife who had too early departed, was given up to her, 
 and at the same time, as she was his eldest daughter,
 
 UARDA. 287 
 
 many privileges were conceded to her, which hitherto 
 none but queens had enjoyed. 
 
 The large room, in which Nefert found the prin- 
 cess, commanded the river. A doorway, closed with 
 light curtains, opened on to a long balcony with a 
 finely worked balustrade of copper-gilt, to which clung 
 a climbing rose with pink flowers. 
 
 When Nefert entered the room, Bent-Anat was just 
 having the rustling curtain drawn aside by her waiting 
 women ; for the sun was setting, and at that hour she 
 loved to sit on the balcony, as it grew cooler, and 
 watch with devout meditation the departure of Ra, 
 who, as the grey-haired Turn, vanished behind the 
 western horizon of the Necropolis in the evening to 
 bestow the blessing of light on the under-world. 
 
 Nefert's apartment was far more elegantly appointed 
 than the princess's; her mother and Mena had sur- 
 rounded her with a thousand pretty trifles. Her carpets 
 were made of sky-blue and silver brocade from Da- 
 mascus, the seats and couches were covered with stuff 
 embroidered in feathers by the Ethiopian women, which 
 looked like the breasts of birds. The images of the 
 Goddess Hathor, which stood on the house-altar, were 
 of an imitation of emerald, which was called Mafkat, 
 and the other little figures, which were placed near 
 their patroness, were of lapis-lazuli, malachite, agate 
 and bronze, over laid with gold. On her toilet-table 
 stood a collection of salve-boxes, and cups of ebony 
 and ivory finely carved, and everything was arranged 
 with the utmost taste, and exactly suited Nefert her- 
 self. 
 
 Bent-Anat's room also suited the owner. 
 
 It was high and airy, and its furniture consisted in
 
 288 UARDA. 
 
 costly but simple necessaries; the lower part of the 
 wall was lined with cool tiles of white and violet 
 earthenware, on each of which was pictured a star, 
 and which, all together, formed a tasteful pattern. 
 Above these the walls were covered with a beautiful 
 dark green material brought from Sais, and the same 
 stuff was used to cover the long divans by the wall. 
 Chairs and stools, made of cane, stood round a very 
 large table in the middle of this room, out of which 
 several others opened; all handsome, comfortable, and 
 harmonious in aspect, but all betraying that their mis- 
 tress took small pleasure in trifling decorations. But 
 her chief delight was in finely-grown plants, of which 
 rare and magnificent specimens, artistically arranged 
 on stands, stood in the corners of many of the rooms. 
 In others there were tall obelisks of ebony, which bore 
 saucers for incense, which all the Egyptians loved, and 
 which was prescribed by their physicians to purify 
 and perfume their dwellings. Her simple bed-room 
 would have suited a prince who loved floriculture, quite 
 as \vc-ll as a princess. 
 
 Before all things Bent-Anat loved air and light. 
 The curtains of her windows and doors w re only 
 closed when the position of the sun absolutely required 
 it ; while in Nefert's rooms, from morning till evening, 
 a dim twilight was maintained. 
 
 The princess went affectionately towards the chario- 
 teer's wife, who bowed low before her at the threshold ; 
 she took her chin with her right hand, kissed her deli- 
 cate narrow forehead, and said . 
 
 " Sweet creature ! At last you have come uninvited 
 to see lonely me ! It is the first time since our men 
 went away to the war. If Rameses' daughter com-
 
 UARDA. 
 
 289 
 
 mands there is no escape, and you come; but of your 
 own free will " 
 
 Nefert raised her large eyes, moist with tears, with 
 an imploring look, and her glance was so pathetic, 
 that Bent-Anat interrupted herself, and taking both her 
 hands, exclaimed: 
 
 "Do you know who must have eyes exactly like 
 yours ? I mean the Goddess from whose tears, when 
 they fall on the earth, flowers spring." 
 
 Nefert's eyes fell and she blushed deeply. 
 
 "I wish," she murmured, "that my eyes might close 
 for ever, for I am very unhappy." And two large tears 
 rolled down her cheeks. 
 
 "What has happened to you, my darling?" asked 
 the princess sympathetically, and she drew her towards 
 her, putting her arm round her like a sick child. 
 
 Nefert glanced anxiously at the chamberlain, and 
 the ladies in waiting who had entered the room with 
 her, and Bent-Anat understood the look; she requested 
 her attendants to withdraw, and when she was alone 
 with her sad little friend "Speak now," she said. 
 " What saddens your heart ? how comes this melancholy 
 expression on your dear baby face? Tell me, and I 
 will comfort you, and you shall be my bright thought- 
 less plaything once more." 
 
 "Thy plaything!" answered Nefert, and a flash of 
 displeasure sparkled in her eyes. "Thou art right to 
 call me so, for I deserve no better name. I have sub- 
 mitted all my life to be nothing but the plaything of 
 others." 
 
 "But, Nefert, I do not know you again," cried Bent- 
 Anat. "Is this my gentle amiable dreamer?" 
 
 "That is the word I wanted," said Nefert in a low 
 
 Uarda. I. '9
 
 290 UARDA. 
 
 tone. "I slept, and dreamed, and dreamed on till 
 Mena awoke me; and when he left me I went to sleep 
 r.gain, and for two whole years I have lain dreaming; 
 but to-day I have been torn from my dreams so sud- 
 denly and roughly, that I shall never find any rest 
 again." 
 
 While she spoke, heavy tears fell slowly one after 
 another over her cheeks. 
 
 Bent-Anat felt what she saw and heard as deeply 
 as if Nefert were her own suffering child. She lovingly 
 drew the young wife down by her side on the divan, 
 and insisted on Nefert's letting her know all that 
 troubled her spirit. 
 
 Katuti's daughter had in the last few hours felt like 
 one born blind, and who suddenly receives his sight. 
 He looks at the brightness of the sun, and the mani- 
 fold forms of the creation around him, but the beams 
 of the day-star blind his eyes, and the new forms, 
 which he has sought to guess at in his mind, and 
 which throng round him in their rude reality, shock 
 him and pain him. To-day, for the first time, she had 
 asked herself wherefore her mother, and not she her- 
 self, was called upon to control the house of which 
 she nevertheless was called the mistress, and the an- 
 swer had rung in her ears: "Because Mena thinks you 
 incapable of thought and action." He had often called 
 her his little rose, and she felt now that she was neither 
 more nor less than a flower that blossoms and fades, 
 and only charms the eye by its color and beauty. 
 
 "My mother," she said to Bent-Anat, "no doubt 
 loves me, but she has managed badly for Mena, very 
 badly; and I, miserable idiot, slept and dreamed of 
 Mena, and saw and heard nothing of what was happen-
 
 UARDA. 
 
 291 
 
 ing to his to our inheritance. Now my mother is 
 afraid of my husband, and those whom we fear, says 
 my uncle, we cannot love, and we are always ready to 
 believe evil of those we do not love. So she lends an 
 ear to those people who blame Mena, and say of him 
 that he has driven me out of his heart, and has taken 
 a strange woman to his tent. But it is false and a lie; 
 and I cannot and will not countenance my own mother 
 even, if she embitters and mars what is left to me 
 what supports me the breath and blood of my life 
 my love, my fervent love for my husband." 
 
 Bent-Anat had listened to her without interrupt- 
 ing her; she sat by her for a time in silence. Then 
 she said: 
 
 " Come out into the gallery; then I will tell you what 
 I think, and perhaps Toth may pour some helpful counsel 
 into my mind. I love you, and I know you well, and 
 though I am not wise, I have my eyes open and a 
 strong hand. Take it, come with me on to the bal- 
 cony." 
 
 A refreshing breeze met the two women as they 
 stepped out into the air. It was evening, and a re- 
 viving coolness had succeeded the heat of the day. 
 The buildings and houses already cast long shadows, 
 and numberless boats, with the visitors returning from 
 the Necropolis, crowded the stream that rolled its 
 swollen flood majestically northwards. 
 
 Close below lay the verdant garden, which senl 
 odors from the rose beds up to the princess's 
 cony. A famous artist had laid it out in the t 
 Hatasu, and the picture which he had in his mind, 
 when he sowed the seeds and planted the young shoe 
 was now realized, many decades after his death.
 
 292 UARDA. 
 
 had thought of planning a carpet, on which the palace 
 should seem to stand. Tiny streams, in bends and 
 curves, formed the oytline of the design, and the shapes 
 they enclosed were filled with plants of every size, 
 form, and color; beautiful plats of fresh green turf 
 everywhere represented the ground-work of the pattern, 
 and flower-beds and clumps of shrubs stood out from 
 them in harmonious mixtures of colors, while the tall 
 and rare trees, of which Hatasu's ships had brought 
 several from Arabia, gave dignity and impressiveness 
 to the whole. 
 
 Clear drops sparkled on leaf and flower and blade, 
 for, only a short time before, the garden by Bent- 
 Anat's house had been freshly watered. The Nile be- 
 yond surrounded an island, where flourished the well- 
 kept sacred grove of Amon. 
 
 The Necropolis on the farther side of the river was 
 also well seen from Bent-Anat's balcony. There stood 
 in long perspective the rows of sphinxes, which led 
 from the landing-place of the festal barges to the gi- 
 gantic buildings of Amenophis III. with its colossi the 
 hugest in Thebes to the House of Seti, and to the 
 temple of Hatasu. There lay the long work-shops of 
 the embalmers and closely-packed homes of the in- 
 habitants of the City of the Dead. In the farthest 
 west rose the Libyan mountains with their innumerable 
 graves, and the valley of the king's tombs took a wide 
 curve behind, concealed by a spur of the hills. 
 
 The two women looked in silence towards the west. 
 The sun was near the horizon now it touched it, now 
 it sank behind the hills; and as the heavens flushed 
 with hues like living gold, blazing rubies, and liquid 
 garnet and amethyst, the evening chant rang out from
 
 UARDA. 
 
 2 93 
 
 all the temples, and the friends sank on their knees, 
 hid their faces in the bower-rose garlands that clung 
 to the trellis, and prayed with full hearts. 
 
 When they rose night was spreading over the land- 
 scape, for the twilight is short in Thebes. Here and 
 there a rosy cloud fluttered across the darkening sky, 
 and faded gradually as the evening star appeared. 
 
 "I am content," said Bent-Anat. "And you? have 
 you recovered your peace of mind ?" 
 
 Nefert shook her head. The princess drew her on to 
 a seat, and sank down beside her. Then she began again : 
 
 " Your heart is sore, poor child ; they4ave spoilt the 
 past for you, and you dread the future. Let me be 
 frank with you, even if it gives you pain. You are sick, 
 and I must cure you. Will you listen to me ?" 
 
 " Speak on," said Nefert. 
 
 "Speech does not suit me so well as action," re- 
 plied the princess ; " but I believe I know what you 
 need, and can help you. You love your husband ; duty 
 calls him from you, and you feel lonely and neglected ; 
 that is quite natural. But those whom I love, my 
 father and my brothers, are also gone to the war; my 
 mother is long since dead ; the noble woman, whom the 
 king left to be my companion, was laid low a few 
 weeks since by sickness. Look what a half-abandoned 
 spot my house is ! Which is the lonelier do you think, 
 you or I ?" 
 
 " I," said Nefert. " For no one is so lonely as a 
 wife parted from the husband her heart longs after." 
 
 " But you trust Mena's love for you ?" asked Bent- 
 Anat. 
 
 Nefert pressed her hand to her heart and nodded 
 assent :
 
 294 UARDA. 
 
 "And he will return, and with him your happiness." 
 
 " I hope so," said Nefert softly. 
 
 " And he who hopes," said Bent-Anat, " possesses 
 already the joys of the future. Tell me, would you 
 have changed places with the Gods so long as Mena 
 was with you ? No ! Then you are most fortunate, 
 for blissful memories the joys of the past are yours 
 at any rate. What is the present ? I speak of it, and 
 it is no more. Now, I ask you, what joys can I look 
 forward to, and what certain happiness am I justified 
 in hoping for ? 
 
 " Thou dost not love any one," replied Nefert. 
 "Thou dost follow thy own course, calm and un- 
 deviating as the moon above us. The highest joys are 
 unknown to thee, but for the same reason thou dost 
 not know the bitterest pain." 
 
 " What pain ?" asked the princess. 
 
 " The torment of a heart consumed by the fires of 
 Sechet," replied Nefert. 
 
 The princess looked thoughtfully at the ground, 
 then she turned her eyes eagerly on her friend. 
 
 " You are mistaken," she said ; " I know what love 
 and longing are. But you need only wait till a feast- 
 day to wear the jewel that is your own, while my 
 treasure is no more mine than a pearl that I see 
 gleaming at the bottom of the sea." 
 
 "Thou canst love!" exclaimed Nefert with joyful 
 excitement. " Oh ! I thank Hathor that at last she has 
 touched thy heart. The daughter of Rameses need 
 not even send for the diver to fetch the jewel out of 
 the sea ; at a sign from her the pearl will rise of itself, 
 and lie on the sand at her slender feet." 
 
 Bent-Anat smiled and kissed Nefert's brow.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 2 95 
 
 " How it excites you," she said, " and stirs your 
 heart and tongue ! If two strings are tuned in har- 
 mony, and one is struck, the other sounds, my music- 
 master tells me. I believe you would listen to me till 
 morning if I only talked to you about my love. But 
 it was not for that that we came out on the balcony. 
 Now listen ! I am as lonely as you, I love less happilv 
 than you, the House of Seti threatens me with evil 
 times and yet I can preserve my full confidence in 
 life and my joy in existence. How can you explain 
 this ?" 
 
 " We are so very different," said Nefert. 
 " True," replied Bent-Anat, " but we are both young, 
 both women, and both wish to do right. My mother 
 died, and I have had no one to guide me, for I who 
 for the most part need some one to lead me can al- 
 ready command, and be obeyed. You had a mother 
 to bring you up, who, when you were still a child, was 
 proud of her pretty little daughter, and let her as it 
 became her so well dream and play, without warning 
 her against the dangerous propensity. Then Mena 
 courted you. You love him truly, and in four long 
 years he has been with you but a month or two ; your 
 mother remained with you, and you hardly observed 
 that she was managing your own house for you, ami 
 took all the trouble of the household. You had a 
 great pastime of your own your thoughts of Mena. 
 and scope for a thousand dreams in your distant 
 love. I know it, Nefert; all that you have seen and 
 heard and felt in these twenty months has centred in 
 him and him alone. Nor is it wrong in itself. The 
 rose tree here, which clings to my balcony, delights us 
 both ; but if the gardener did not frequently prune it
 
 296 UARDA. 
 
 and tie it with palm-bast, in this soil, which forces 
 everything to rapid growth, it would soon shoot up so 
 high that it would cover door and window, and I 
 should sit in darkness. Throw this handkerchief over 
 your shoulders, for the dew falls as it grows cooler, 
 and listen to me a little longer! The beautiful 
 passion of love and fidelity has grown unchecked in 
 your dreamy nature to such a height, that it darkens 
 your spirit and your judgment. Love, a true love, it 
 seems to me, should be a noble fruit-tree, and not a 
 rank weed. I do not blame you, for she who should 
 have been the gardener did not heed and would not 
 heed what was happening. Look, Nefert, so long as 
 I wore the lock of youth, I too did what I fancied. 
 I never found any pleasure in dreaming, but in wild 
 games with my brothers, in horses and in falconry ;* 
 they often said I had the spirit of a boy, and indeed 
 I would willingly have been a boy." 
 
 " Not I never !" said Nefert. 
 
 " You are just a rose my dearest," said Bent-Anat. 
 " Well ! when I was fifteen I was so discontented, so 
 insubordinate and full of all sorts of wild behavior, so 
 dissatisfied in spite of all the kindness and love that 
 surrounded me but I will tell you what happened. 
 It is four years ago, shortly before your wedding with 
 Mena; my father called me to play draughts.** You 
 know how certainly he could beat the most skilful 
 antagonist ; but that day his thoughts were wandering, 
 and I won the game twice following. Full of insolent 
 delight, I jumped up and kissed his great handsome 
 
 * In many papyri of the period of this narrative the training of falcons is 
 mentioned. 
 
 ** At Medinet Habu a picture represents Rameses the Third, not Kameses 
 the Second, playing at draughts with his daughter.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 forehead, and cried 'The sublime God, the hero, under 
 whose feet the strange nations writhe, to whom the 
 priests and the people pray is beaten by a girl!' 
 He smiled gently, and answered 'The Lords of Heaven 
 are often out-done by the Ladies, and Necheb,* the 
 lady of victory, is a woman.' Then he grew graver, 
 and said: 'You call me a God, my child, but in this 
 only do I feel truly God-like, that at every moment 
 I strive to the utmost to prove myself useful by my 
 labors; here restraining, there promoting, as is need- 
 ful.** God-like I can never be but by doing or 
 producing something great!' These words, Nefert, fell 
 like seeds in my soul. At last I knew what it was 
 that was wanting to me; and when, a few weeks later, 
 my father and your husband took the field with a 
 hundred thousand fighting men, I resolved to be 
 v/orthy of my God-like father, and in my little circle 
 to be of use too! You do not know all that is done 
 in the houses behind there, under my direction. Three 
 hundred girls spin pure flax, and weave it into bands 
 of linen for the wounds of the soldiers; numbers of 
 children, and old women, gather plants on the moun- 
 tains, and others sort them according to the instruc- 
 tions of a physician ; in the kitchens no banquets are 
 prepared, but fruits are preserved in sugar for the 
 loved ones, and the sick in the camp. Joints of meat 
 are salted, dried, and smoked for the army on its 
 
 * The Eileithyia of the Greeks. The Goddess of the South, in contradis- 
 tinction to Buto, the Goddess of the North. She often flics, in the fc 
 vulture, as the goddess of victory at the head of the troops led to war by H* 
 Pharaoh. 
 
 ** The crook-shaped staff, and the whip or scourge are blcms rarely 
 missing from the representations of the Pharaohs, and severa 
 they probably refer to the duty of a king, who must exercise 
 and coercion.
 
 298 UARDA. 
 
 march through the desert. The butler no longer thinks 
 of drinking-bouts, but brings me wine in great stone 
 jars ; we pour it into well-closed skins for the soldiers, 
 and the best sorts we put into strong flasks, carefully 
 sealed with pitch, that they may perform the journey 
 uninjured, and warm and rejoice the hearts of our 
 heroes. All that, and much more, I manage and ar- 
 range, and my days pass in hard work. The Gods send 
 me no bright visions in the night, for after utter fatigue 
 I sleep soundly. But I know that I am of use. I can 
 hold my head proudly, because in some degree I re- 
 semble my great father; and if the king thinks of me 
 at all I know he can rejoice in the doings of his child. 
 That is the end of it, Nefert and I only say, Come 
 and join me, work with me, prove yourself of use, and 
 compel Mena to think of his wife, not with affection 
 only, but with pride." Nefert let her head sink slowly 
 on Bent-Anat's bosom, threw her arms round her neck, 
 and wept like a child. At last she composed herselt 
 and said humbly : 
 
 " Take me to school, and teach me to be useful." 
 " I knew," said the princess smiling, " that you only 
 needed a guiding hand. Believe me, you will soon 
 learn to couple content and longing. But now hear 
 this ! At present go home to your mother, for it is late; 
 and meet her lovingly, for that is the will of the Gods. 
 To-morrow morning I will go to see you, and beg 
 Katuti to let you come to me as companion in the 
 place of my lost friend. The day after to-morrow 
 you will come to me in the palace. You can live in 
 the rooms of my departed friend and begin, as she 
 had done, to help me in my work. May these hours 
 be blest to you !"
 
 UARDA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 AT the time of this conversation the leech Neb- 
 secht still lingered in front of the hovel of the para- 
 schites, and waited with growing impatience for the 
 old man's return. 
 
 At first he trembled for him ; then he entirely forgot 
 the danger into which he had thrown him, and only 
 hoped for the fulfilment of his desires, and for wonder- 
 ful revelations through his investigations of the human 
 heart. 
 
 For some minutes he gave himself up to scientific 
 considerations ; but he became more and more agitated 
 by anxiety for the paraschites, and by the exciting 
 vicinity of Uarda. 
 
 For hours he had been alone with her, for her 
 father and grandmother could no longer stop awav 
 from their occupations. The former must go to escort 
 prisoners of war to Hermonthis, and the old woman, 
 since her granddaughter had been old enough to 
 undertake the small duties ot the household, had been 
 one of the wailing-women, who, with hair all dis 
 hevelled, accompanied the corpse on its way to the 
 grave, weeping, and lamenting, and casting Nile-mud 
 on their forehead and breast. Uarda still lay, when 
 the sun was sinking, in front of the hut. 
 
 She looked weary and pale. Her long hair had 
 come undone, and once more got entangled with tl 
 straw of her humble couch. If Nebsecht went i 
 her to feel her pulse or to speak to her she cai 
 turned her face from him.
 
 300 UARDA. 
 
 Nevertheless when the sun disappeared behind the 
 rocks he bent over her once more, and said : 
 
 " It is growing cool; shall I carry you indoors ?" 
 
 " Let me alone," she said crossly. " I am hot, keep 
 farther away. I am no longer ill, and could go in- 
 doors by myself if I wished ; but grandmother will be 
 here directly." 
 
 Nebsecht rose, and sat down on a hen-coop that 
 was some paces from Uarda, and asked stammering : 
 
 "Shall I go farther off?" 
 
 " Do as you please," she answered. 
 
 " You are not kind," he said sadly. 
 
 " You sit looking at me," said Uarda, " I cannot 
 bear it ; and I am uneasy for grandfather was quite 
 different this morning from his usual self, and talked 
 strangely about dying, and about the great price that 
 was asked of him for curing me. Then he begged me 
 never to forget him, and was so excited and so strange. 
 He is so long away ; I wish he were here, with me." 
 
 And with these words Uarda began to cry silently. 
 A nameless anxiety for the paraschites seized Nebsecht, 
 and it struck him to the heart that he had demanded 
 a human life in return for the mere fulfilment of a duty. 
 He knew the law well enough, and knew that the old 
 man would be compelled without respite or delay to 
 empty the cup of poison if he were found guilty of the 
 theft of a human heart. 
 
 It was dark : Uarda ceased weeping, and said to 
 the surgeon: 
 
 " Can it be possible that he has gone into the city 
 to borrow the great sum of money that thou or thy 
 temple demandest for thy medicine? But there is 
 the princess's golden bracelet, and half of father's
 
 UARDA. 301 
 
 prize, and in the chest two years' wages that grand- 
 mother had earned by wailing, lie untouched. Is all 
 that not enough?" 
 
 The girl's last question was full of resentment and 
 reproach, and Nebsecht, whose perfect sincerity was 
 part of his very being, was silent, as he would not 
 venture to say yes. He had asked more in return for 
 his help than gold or silver. Now he remembered Pen- 
 taur's warning, and when the jackals began to bark he 
 took up the fire-stick,* and lighted some fuel that wa-> 
 lying ready. Then he asked himself what Uarda'. 
 fate would be without her grandparents, and a strange 
 plan which had floated vaguely before him for some 
 hours, began now to take a distinct outline and in- 
 telligible form. He determined if the old man did 
 not return to ask the kolchytes or embalmers to admit 
 him into their guild** and for the sake of his adroit- 
 ness they were not likely to refuse him then he would 
 make Uarda his wife, and live apart from the world, 
 for her, for his studies, and for his new calling, in 
 which he hoped to learn a great deal. What did he 
 care for comfort and proprieties, for recognition from 
 his fellow-men, and a superior position ! 
 
 He could hope to advance more quickly along the 
 new stony path than on the old beaten track. The im- 
 pulse to communicate his acquired knowledge to 
 others he did not feel. Knowledge in itself amply 
 satisfied him, and he thought no more of his ties to 
 the House of Seti. For three whole days he had not 
 
 * The hieroglyphic sign Sam seems to me to represent the wooden kk 
 used to produce fire (as among some savage tnbes) by rapid 
 hollow piece of wood. 
 
 ** This guild still existed in Roman times, and we have a 
 about it in various Greek papyri.
 
 302 UARDA. 
 
 changed his garments, no razor had touched his chin 
 or his scalp, not a drop of water had wetted his hands 
 or his feet. He felt half bewildered and almost as if 
 he had already become an embalmer, nay even a 
 paraschites, one of the most despised of human beings. 
 This self-degradation had an infinite charm, for it 
 brought him down to the level of Uarda, and she, 
 lying near him, sick and anxious, with her dishevelled 
 hair, exactly suited the future which he painted to 
 himself. 
 
 "Do you hear nothing?" Uarda asked suddenly. 
 
 He listened. In the valley there was a barking of 
 dogs, and soon the paraschites and his wife appeared, 
 and, at the door of their hut, took leave of old Hekt, 
 who had met them on her return from Thebes. 
 
 "You have been gone a long time," cried Uarda, 
 when her grandmother once more stood before her. " I 
 have been so frightened." 
 
 "The doctor was with you," said the old woman 
 going into the house to prepare their simple meal, 
 while the paraschites knelt down by his granddaugh- 
 ter, and caressed her tenderly, but yet with respect, 
 as if he were her faithful servant rather than her blood- 
 relation. 
 
 Then he rose, and gave to Nebsecht, who was 
 trembling with excitement, the bag of coarse linen 
 which he was in the habit of carrying tied to him by 
 a narrow belt. 
 
 "The heart is in that," he whispered to the leech; 
 "take it out, and give me back the bag, for my knife 
 is in it, and I want it." 
 
 Nebsecht took the heart out of the covering with 
 trembling hands, and laid it carefully down. Then he
 
 UARDA. 
 
 33 
 
 felt in the breast of his dress, and going up to the 
 paraschites he whispered: 
 
 " Here, take the writing, hang it round your neck, 
 and when you die I will have the book of scripture 
 wrapped up in your mummy cloths like a great man. 
 But that is not enough. The property that I inherited 
 is in the hands of my brother, who is a good man of 
 business, and I have not touched the interest for ten 
 years. I will send it to you, and you and your wife 
 shall enjoy an old age free from care." 
 
 The paraschites had taken the little bag with the 
 strip of papyrus, and heard the leech to the end. 
 Then he turned from him saying: "Keep thy money; 
 we are quits. That is if the child gets well," he 
 added humbly. 
 
 "She is already half cured," stammered Nebsecht. 
 " But why will you why won't you accept " 
 
 " Because till to day I have never begged nor bor- 
 rowed," said the paraschites, "and I will not begin in 
 my old age. Life for life. But what I have done this 
 clay not Rameses with all his treasure could repay." 
 
 Nebsecht looked down, and knew not how to an- 
 swer the old man. 
 
 His wife now came out; she set a bowl of lentils 
 that she had hastily warmed before the two men, with 
 radishes and onions,* then she helped Uarda, who did 
 not need to be carried, into the house, and invited 
 Nebsecht to share their meal. He accepted her in- 
 vitation, for he had eaten nothing since the previous 
 evening. 
 
 * Radishes, onions, and garlic were the 
 dinner. 1,600 talents worth were consumed, according to 
 tlie building of the pyramid of Cheops ^360,000.
 
 304 UARDA. 
 
 When the old woman had once more disappeared 
 indoors, he asked the paraschites: 
 
 " Whose heart is it that you have brought me, and 
 how did it come into your hands?" 
 
 "Tell me first," said the other, "why thou hast 
 laid such a heavy sin upon my soul?" 
 
 " Because I want to investigate the structure of the 
 human heart," said Nebsecht, "so that, when I meet 
 with diseased hearts, I may be able to cure them." 
 
 The paraschites looked for a long time at the 
 ground in silence; then he said 
 
 "Art thou speaking the truth?" 
 
 "Yes," replied the leech with convincing emphasis. 
 
 "I am glad," said the old man, "for thou givest 
 help to the poor." 
 
 "As willingly as to the rich!" exclaimed Nebsecht. 
 " But tell me now where you got the heart." 
 
 " I went into the house of the embalmer," said the 
 old man, after he had selected a few large flints, to 
 which, with crafty blows, he gave the shape of knives, 
 "and there I found three bodies in which I had to 
 make the eight prescribed incisions with my flint-knife. 
 When the dead lie there undressed on the wooden 
 bench they all look alike, and the begger lies as still 
 as the favorite son of a king. But I knew very well 
 who lay before me. The strong old body in the 
 middle of the table was the corpse of the Superior of 
 the temple of Hatasu, and beyond, close by each 
 other, were laid a stone-mason of the Necropolis, and 
 a poor girl from the strangers' quarter, who had died 
 of consumption two miserable wasted figures. I had 
 known the Prophet well, for I had met him a hundred 
 times in his gilt litter, and we always called him Rui,
 
 UARDA. 
 
 3S 
 
 the rich. I did my duty by all three, I was driven 
 away with the usual stoning, and then I arranged the 
 inward parts of the bodies with my mates. Those of 
 
 , the Prophet are .to be preserved later in an alabaster 
 canopus,* those of the mason and the girl were put 
 back in their bodies. 
 
 " Then I went up to the three bodies, and I asked 
 myself, to which I should do such a wrong as to rob 
 him of his heart. I turned to the two poor ones, and 
 I hastily went up to the sinning girl. Then I heard 
 the voice of the demon that cried out in my heart: 
 ' The girl was poor and despised like you while she 
 walked on Seb,** perhaps she may find compensation 
 and peace in the other world if you do not mutilate 
 her;' and when I turned to the mason's lean corpse, 
 and looked at his hands, which were harder and 
 rougher than my own, the demon whispered the same. 
 Then I stood before the strong, stout corpse of the 
 prophet Rui, who died of apoplexy, and I remembered 
 the honor and the riches that he had enjoyed on 
 earth, and that he at least for a time had known hap- 
 piness and ease. And as soon as I was alone, I 
 
 ' slipped my hand into the bag, and changed the sheep's 
 heart for his. 
 
 " Perhaps I am doubly guilty for playing such an 
 accursed trick with the heart of a high-priest; but 
 Rui's body will be hung round with a hundred amu- 
 lets, Scarabsi*** will be placed over his heart, and holy 
 
 * This vase was called canopus at a later date. There were four oi 
 
 them for each mummy. , , _/ 
 
 ** Seb is the earth: Plutarch calls Seb Chronos. Heis often spok, 
 " the father of the gods " on the monuments. He is the god ol 
 Egyptians regarded matter as eternal, it is not by accident that th 
 represented the earth was also used for eternity. . , ^^ 
 
 5* Imitations of the sacred beetle Scarabxus made of vanou 
 
 Uarda. 1. *"
 
 306 UARDA. 
 
 oil and sacred sentences will preserve him from all 
 the fiends on his road to Amenti; while no one will 
 devote helping talismans to the poor. And then ! thou 
 hast sworn, in that world, in the hall of judgment, t<> 
 take my guilt on thyself." 
 
 Nebsecht gave the old man his hand. 
 
 " That I will," said he, " and I should have chosen 
 as you did. Now take this draught, divide it in four 
 parts, and give it to Uarda for four evenings following. 
 Begin this evening, and by the day after to-morrow I 
 think she will be quite well. I will come again and 
 look after her. Now go to rest, and let me stay a 
 while out here ; before the star of Isis is extinguished 
 I will be gone, for they have long been expecting me 
 at the temple." 
 
 When the paraschites came out of his hut the next 
 morning, Nebsecht had vanished ; but a blood-stained 
 cloth that lay by the remains of the fire showed the 
 old man that the impatient investigator had examined 
 the heart of the high-priest during the night, and per- 
 haps cut it up. 
 
 Terror fell upon him, and in agony of mind he 
 threw himself on his knees as the golden bark of the 
 Sun-God appeared on the horizon, and prayed fervently, 
 first for Uarda, and then for the salvation of his im- 
 perilled soul. 
 
 He rose encouraged, convinced himself that his 
 granddaughter was progressing towards recovery, bid 
 farewell to his wife, took his flint knife and his bronze 
 
 frequently put into the mummies in the place of the heart. I-irge 
 
 have often the 36th, 3oth, and 6th chapter* of the Book of the Dead engraved 
 
 on them, as they treat of the heart
 
 UARDA. 
 
 3<>7 
 
 hook, and went to the house of the embalmer to follow 
 his dismal calling. 
 
 The group of buildings in which the greater num- 
 ber of the corpses from Thebes went through the pro- 
 cesses of mummifying, lay on the bare -desert-land at 
 some distance from his hovel, southwards from the 
 House of Seti at the foot of the mountain. They oc- 
 cupied by themselves a fairly large space, enclosed by 
 a rough wall of dried mud-bricks. 
 
 The bodies were brought in through the great gate 
 towards the Nile, and delivered to the kolchytes ; while 
 the priests, paraschites, and taricheutes, bearers and 
 assistants who here did their daily work, as well as 
 innumerable water-carriers who came up from the Nile, 
 loaded with skins, found their way into the establish- 
 ment by a side gate. 
 
 At the farthest northern end stood a handsome 
 building of wood, with a separate gate, in which the 
 orders of the bereaved were taken, and often indeed 
 those of men still in active life, who thought to pro- 
 vide betimes for their suitable interment.* 
 
 The crowd in this house was considerable. About 
 fifty men and women were moving in it at the present 
 moment, all of different ranks; and not only from Thebes 
 but from many smaller towns of upper Egypt, to make 
 
 * The well-known passages in Herodotus and in Piodons, are ampjhr 
 -supported by the manuscripts of the ancient Egyptians. In MJ 
 work on a papyrus published by Mariettc, and on one in the I 
 a mass of hitherto unknown details on the ntual for embali 
 physiological investigation of two mummies led to very- inter 
 demonstrated the wonderful preservat.on of even the mos 
 His researches were printed in " Sitzungsbencnten < :r * ^i.^ 
 Wissenschaften," Vienna, .852. The bilingual papyrus of Rhmd o 
 valuable information.
 
 308 UARDA. 
 
 purchases or to give commissions to the functionaries 
 who were busy here. 
 
 This bazaar of the dead was well supplied, for cof- 
 fins of every form stood up against the walls, from the 
 simplest chest to the richly gilt and painted coffer, in 
 form resembling a mummy. On wooden shelves lay 
 endless rolls of coarse and fine linen, in which the 
 limbs of the mummies were enveloped, and which were 
 manufactured by the people of the embalming establish- 
 ment under the protection of the tutelar goddesses of 
 weavers, Neith, Isis and Nephthys, though some were 
 ordered from a distance, particularly from Sais. 
 
 There was free choice for the visitors of this pattern- 
 room in the matter of mummy-cases and cloths, as well 
 as of necklets, scarabaei, statuettes, Uza-eyes, girdles, 
 head-rests, triangles, split-rings, staves, and other sym- 
 bolic objects, which were attached to the dead as 
 sacred amulets, or bound up in the wrappings. 
 
 There were innumerable stamps of baked clay, 
 which were buried in the earth to show any one who 
 might dispute the limits, how far each grave extended, 
 images of the gods, which were laid in the sand to 
 purify and sanctify* it for by nature it belonged to 
 Seth-Typhon as well as the figures called Schebti, 
 which \VITC either enclosed several together in little- 
 boxes, or laid separately in the grave; it was supposed 
 that they would help the dead to till the fields of the 
 blessed with the pick-axe, plough, and seed-bag which 
 they carried on their shoulders. 
 
 The widow and the steward of the wealthy Su- 
 
 * The purpose of the amulets i* in most case* known, as almost every on'- 
 has a chapter of the book of the dead devoted to it. The little clay cones and 
 images arc found in vast numbers, and may be met with in every Museum.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 39 
 
 perior of the temple of Hatasu, and with them a 
 priest of high rank, were in eager discussion with the 
 officials of the embalming-house, and were selecting the 
 most costly of the patterns of mummy-cases which 
 were offered to their inspection, the finest linen, and 
 amulets of malachite, and lapis-lazuli, of blood-stone, 
 carnelian and green felspar,* as well as the most elegant 
 alabaster canopi for the deceased; his body was to 
 be enclosed first in a sort of case of papier-mach, 
 and then in a wooden and a stone coffin. They wrote 
 his name on a wax tablet which was ready for the 
 purpose, with those of his parents, his wife and chil- 
 dren, and all his titles; they ordered what verses should 
 be written on his coffin, what on the papyrus rolls to 
 be enclosed in it, and what should be set out above 
 his name. With regard to the inscription on the walls 
 of the tomb, the pedestal of the statue to be placed 
 there, and the face of the stele to be erected in it, 
 yet further particulars would be given ; a priest of the 
 temple of Seti was charged to write them, and to draw 
 up a catalogue of the rich offerings of the survivors. 
 The last could be done later, when, after the division 
 of the property, the amount of the fortune he had left 
 could be ascertained. The mere mummifying of the 
 body with the finest oils and essences, cloths, amulets, 
 and cases, would cost a talent of silver, without the 
 stone sarcophagus. 
 
 The widow wore a long mourning robe, her forehead 
 was lightly daubed with Nile-mud, and in the midst of 
 her chaffering with the functionaries of the embalmmg- 
 
 * The use of this material proves the extent of < me 
 times, for green felspar is now known to be found only in co 
 Egypt
 
 310 UARDA. 
 
 house, whose prices she complained of as enormous 
 and rapacious, from time to time she broke out into a 
 loud wail of grief as the occasion demanded. 
 
 More modest citizens finished their commissions 
 sooner, though it was not unusual for the income of a 
 whole year to be sacrificed for the embalming of the 
 head of a household the father or the mother of a 
 family. The mummifying of the poor was cheap, and 
 that of the poorest had to be provided by the kolchytes 
 as a tribute to the king, to whom also they were obliged 
 to pay a tax in linen from their looms. 
 
 This place of business was carefully separated from 
 the rest of the establishment, which none but those 
 who were engaged in the processes carried on there 
 were on any account permitted to enter. The kolchytes 
 formed a closely-limited guild at the head of which 
 stood a certain number of priests, and from among 
 them the masters of the many thousand members were 
 chosen. This guild was highly respected, even the 
 taricheutes, who were entrusted with the actual work 
 of embalming, could venture to mix with the other 
 citizens, although in Thebes itself people always avoided 
 them with a certain horror; only the paraschites, whose 
 duty it was to open the body, bore the whole curse of 
 uncleanness. Certainly the place where these people 
 fulfilled their office was dismal enough. 
 
 The stone chamber in which the bodies were 
 opened, and the halls in which they were prepared 
 with salt, had adjoining them a variety of laboratories 
 and depositaries for drugs and preparations of every 
 description. 
 
 In a court-yard, protected from the rays of the sun 
 only by an awning, was a large walled bason, contain-
 
 UARDA. 3! i 
 
 ing a solution of natron, in which the bodies were 
 salted, and they were then dried in a stone vault, 
 artificially supplied with hot air. 
 
 The little wooden houses of the weavers, as well 
 as the work-shops of the case-joiners and decorators, 
 stood in numbers round the pattern-room; but the 
 farthest off, and much the largest of the buildings of 
 the establishment, was a very long low structure, solidly 
 built of stone and well roofed in, where the prepared 
 bodies were enveloped in their cerements, tricked out 
 in amulets, and made ready for their journey to the 
 next world. What took place in this building into 
 which the laity were admitted, but never for more than 
 a few minutes was to the last degree mysterious, for 
 here the gods' themselves appeared to be engaged with 
 the mortal bodies. 
 
 Out of the windows which opened on the street, 
 recitations, hymns, and lamentations sounded night and 
 day. The priests who fulfilled their office here wore 
 masks like the divinities of the under-world.* Many 
 were the representatives of Anubis, with the jackal- 
 head, assisted by boys with masks of the so-called 
 child-Horus. At the head of each mummy stood or 
 squatted a wailing-woman with the emblems of Neph- 
 thys, and one at its feet with those of Isis. 
 
 Every separate limb of the deceased was dedi- 
 cated to a particular divinity by the aid of holy oils, 
 charms, and sentences; a specially prepared cloth was 
 wrapped round each muscle, every drug and every 
 
 * There are many indications of this in the tomb paintings, and a papyrw 
 (III. of the museum at Bulaq) confirms the idea. The art of mouk 
 in a paste resembling papier-mach was early known to the Egyptians, 
 such a mask of the deod is not unfrequently found at the head ol 
 
 cases.
 
 312 L'ARDA. 
 
 bandage owed its origin to some divinity, and the con- 
 fusion of sounds, of disguised figures, and of various 
 perfumes, had a stupefying effect on those who visited 
 this chamber. It need not be said that the whole 
 embalming establishment and its neighborhood was 
 enveloped in a cloud of powerful resinous fumes, of 
 sweet attar, of lasting musk, and of pungent spices. 
 
 When the wind blew from the west it was wafted 
 across the Nile to Thebes, and this was regarded as 
 an evil omen, for from the south-west comes the wind 
 that enfeebles the energy of men the fatal simoom. 
 
 In the court of the pattern-house stood several 
 groups of citizens from Thebes, gathered round dif- 
 ferent individuals, to whom they were expressing their 
 sympathy. A new-comer, the superintendent of the 
 victims of the temple of Amon, who seemed to be 
 known to many and was greeted with respect, an- 
 nounced, even before he went to condole with Rui's 
 widow, in a tone full of horror at what had happened, 
 that an omen, significant of the greatest misfortune, 
 had occurred in Thebes, in a spot no less sacred than 
 the very temple of Amon himself. 
 
 Many inquisitive listeners stood round him while 
 he related that the Regent Ani, in his joy at the victory 
 of his troops in Ethiopia, had distributed wine with a 
 lavish hand to the garrison of Thebes, and also to the 
 watchmen of the temple of Amon, and that, while the 
 people were carousing, wolves* had broken into the 
 
 * Wolves have now disappeared from Egypt : they were sacred animals, 
 and were worshipped and buried at Lykopolis, the present Sitit, where mummies 
 of wolves have been found. Herodotus says that if a wolf was found dead he 
 was buried, and Elian states that the herb Lykoktonon, which was poisonous 
 to wolves, might on no account be brought into the city, where they were hell/ 
 acred.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 3'3 
 
 stable of the sacred rams.* Some were killed, but 
 the noblest ram, which Rameses himself had sent as a 
 gift from Mendes when he set out for the war the 
 magnificent beast which Amon had chosen as the 
 tenement of his spirit,** was found, torn in pieces, 
 by the soldiers, who immediately terrified the whole 
 city with the news. At the same hour news had come 
 from Memphis that the sacred bull Apis was dead. 
 
 All the people who had collected round the priest, 
 broke out into a far-sounding cry of woe, in which he 
 himself and Rui's widow vehemently joined. 
 
 The buyers and functionaries rushed out of the 
 pattern-room, and from the mummy-house the tari- 
 cheutes, paraschites and assistants; the weavers left 
 their looms, and all, as soon as they had learned what 
 had happened, took part in the lamentations, howling 
 and wailing, tearing their hair and covering their faces 
 with dust. 
 
 The noise was loud and distracting, and when its 
 violence diminished, and the workpeople went back to 
 their business, the east wind brought the echo of the 
 cries of the dwellers in the Necropolis, perhaps too, 
 those of the citizens of Thebes itself. 
 
 " Bad news," said the inspector of the victims, 
 " cannot fail to reach us soon from the king and the 
 army ; he will regret the death of the ram which we 
 
 * There was also a bull which was sacred to Amon. 
 ** The ram was especially worshipped at Mendes. The n 
 have been found at a short distance from Mansura m the Del..-., "j^ngd 
 has interpreted some inscriptions which were found therc^ and !**' 
 new light on the worship of the ram, and on the accounts of*** 
 been hlnded down to us. The ram is called " Ba, " which is i Iso t 
 the Soul, and the sacred rams were supposed to be the l.rmg ci 
 the soul of Ra.
 
 314 UARDA. 
 
 called by his name more than that of Apis. It is a 
 bad a very bad omen." 
 
 " My lost husband Rui, who rests in Osiris, foresaw 
 it all," said the widow. "If only I dared to speak I 
 could tell a good deal that many might find u % n- 
 pleasant." 
 
 The inspector of sacrifices smiled, for he knew 
 that the late superior of the temple of Hatasu had 
 been an adherent of the old royal family, and he 
 replied : 
 
 " The Sun of Rameses may be for a time covered 
 with clouds, but neither those who fear it nor those 
 who desire it will live to see its setting." 
 
 The priest coldly saluted the lady, and went into 
 the house of a weaver in which he had business, and 
 the widow got into her litter which was waiting at 
 the gate. 
 
 The old paraschites Pinem had joined with his 
 fellows in the lamentation for the sacred beasts, and 
 was now sitting on the hard pavement of the dissecting 
 room to eat his morsel of food for it was noon. 
 
 The stone room in which he was eating his meal 
 was badly lighted ; the daylight came through a small 
 opening in the roof, over which the sun stood per- 
 pendicularly, and a shaft of bright rays, in which 
 danced the whirling motes, shot down through the 
 twilight on to the stone pavement. Mummy-cases 
 leaned against all the walls, and on smooth polished 
 slabs lay bodies covered with coarse cloths. A rat 
 scudded now and then across the floor, and from the 
 wide cracks between the stones sluggish scorpions 
 crawled out.
 
 UAROA. ^Ij 
 
 The old paraschites was long since blunted to the 
 horror which pervaded this locality. He had spread a 
 coarse napkin, and carefully laid on it the provisions 
 which his wife had put into his satchel ; first half a 
 cake of bread, then a little salt, and finally a radish. 
 
 But the bag was not yet empty. 
 
 He put his hand in and found a piece of meat 
 wrapped up in two cabbage-leaves. Old Hekt had 
 brought a leg of a gazelle from Thebes for Uarda, and 
 he now saw that the women had put a piece of it into 
 his little sack for his refreshment. He looked at the 
 gift with emotion, but he did not venture to touch it. 
 for he felt as if in doing so he should be robbing the 
 sick girl. While eating the bread and the radish he 
 contemplated the piece of meat as if it were some 
 costly jewel, and when a fly dared to settle on it he 
 drove it off indignantly. 
 
 At last he tasted the meat, and thought of many 
 former noon-day meals, and how he had often found 
 a flower in the satchel, that Uarda had placed there to 
 please him, with the bread. His kind old eyes filled 
 with tears, and his whole heart swelled with gratitude 
 and love. He looked up, and his glance fell on the 
 table, and he asked himself how he would have felt if 
 instead of the old priest, robbed of his heart, the sun- 
 shine of his old age, his granddaughter, were lying 
 there motionless. A cold shiver ran over him, and hi- 
 felt that his own heart would not have been too great 
 a price to pay for her recovery. And yet! In the 
 course of his long life he had experienced so much 
 suffering and wrong, that he could not imagine 
 any hope of a better lot in the other world. Then 
 he drew out the bond Nebsecht had given him, held
 
 316 UARDA. 
 
 it up with both hands, as if to show it to the Im- 
 mortals, and particularly to the judges in the hall of 
 truth and judgment, that they might not reckon with 
 him for the crime he had committed not for him- 
 self but for another and that they might not refuse 
 to justify Rui, whom he had robbed of his heart. 
 
 While he thus lifted his soul in devotion, matters 
 were getting warm outside the dissecting room. He 
 thought he heard his name spoken, and scarcely had 
 he raised his head to listen when a taricheut came 
 in and desired him to follow him. 
 
 In front of the rooms, filled with resinous odors 
 and incense, in which the actual process of embalming 
 was carried on, a number of taricheutes were standing 
 and looking at an object in an alabaster bowl. The 
 knees of the old man knocked together as he recognized 
 the heart of the beast which he had substituted for 
 that of the Prophet. 
 
 The chief of the taricheutes asked him whether he 
 had opened the body of the dead priest. 
 
 Pinem stammered out " Yes." 
 
 Whether this was his heart ? 
 
 The old man nodded affirmatively. 
 
 The taricheutes looked at each other, whispered 
 together ; then one of them went away, and returned 
 soon with the inspector of victims from the temple of 
 Amon, whom he had found in the house of the weaver, 
 and the chief of the kolchytes. 
 
 " Show me the heart," said the superintendent of 
 the sacrifices as he approached the vase. " I can decide 
 in the dark if you have seen rightly. I examine a 
 hundred animals every day. Give it here ! By all the 
 Gods of Heaven and Hell that is the heart of a ram !"
 
 UARDA. 
 
 3'7 
 
 " It was found in the breast of Rui," said one of 
 the taricheutes decisively. " It was opened yesterday 
 in the presence of us all by this old paraschites." 
 
 " It is extraordinary," said the priest of Amon. 
 " And incredible. But perhaps an exchange was 
 effected. Did you slaughter any victims here yester- 
 day or ?" 
 
 "We are purifying ourselves," the chief of the 
 kolchytes interrupted, "for the great festival of the 
 valley, and for ten days no beast can have been killed 
 here for food ; besides, the stables and slaughter- 
 houses are a long way from this, on the other side of 
 the linen-factories." 
 
 " It is strange !" replied the priest. " Preserve this 
 heart carefully, kolchytes : or, better still, let it be 
 enclosed in a case. We will take it over to the chief 
 prophet of Amon. It would seem that some miracle 
 has happened." 
 
 " The heart belongs to the Necropolis," answered 
 the chief kolchytes, " and it would therefore be more 
 fitting if we took it to the chief priest of the temple 
 of Seti, Ameni." 
 
 " You command here !" said the other. "Let us go." 
 
 In a few minutes the priest of Amon and the 
 chief of the kolchytes were being carried towards the 
 valley in their litters. A taricheut followed them, who 
 sat on a seat between two asses, and carefully earned 
 a casket of ivory, in which reposed the ram's heart. 
 
 The old paraschites watched the priests disappear 
 behind the tamarisk bushes. He longed to run a) 
 them, and tell them everything. 
 
 His conscience quaked with self reproach, a 
 his sluggish intelligence did not enable him to take in
 
 318 UARDA. 
 
 at a glance all the results that his deed might entail, 
 he stiil could guess that he had sown a seed whence 
 deceit of every kind must grow. He felt as if he had 
 fallen altogether into sin and falsehood, and that the 
 goddess of truth, whom he had all his life honestly 
 served, had reproachfully turned her back on him. 
 After what had happened never could he hope to be 
 pronounced a " truth-speaker " by the judges of the 
 dead. Lost, thrown away, was the aim and end of a 
 long life, rich in self-denial and prayer! His soul 
 shed tears of blood, a wild sighing sounded in his 
 ears, which saddened his spirit, and when he went 
 back to his work again, and wanted to remove the 
 soles of the feet* from a body, his hand trembled so 
 that he could not hold the knife. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE news of the end of the sacred ram of Amon, 
 and of the death of the bull Apis of Memphis, had 
 reached the House of Seti, and Was received there with 
 loud lamentation, in which all its inhabitants joined, from 
 the chief haruspex down to the smallest boy in the 
 school-courts. 
 
 The superior of the institution, Ameni, had been 
 for three days in Thebes, and was expected to return 
 to-day. His arrival was looked for with anxiety and 
 excitement by many. The chief of the haruspices was 
 eager for it that he might hand over the imprisoned 
 
 One of the mummies of Prague which were dissected by Czermak, had 
 the soles of the feet removi-d and laid on the breast. We learn from 
 Chapter 125 of the Book of the Dead that this was done that the sacred floor 
 of the hall of judgment might not ! denied when the dead were summoned 
 before (Xiris
 
 UARDA. 
 
 3'9 
 
 scholars to condign punishment, and complain to him 
 of Pentaur and Bent-Anat ; the initiated knew that 
 important transactions must have been concluded on 
 the farther side of the Nile ; and the rebellious disciples 
 knew that now stern justice would be dealt to them. 
 
 The insurrectionary troop were locked into an 
 open court upon bread and water, and as the usual 
 room of detention of the establishment was too small 
 for them all, for two nights they had had to sleep in a 
 loft on thin straw mats. The young spirits were excited 
 to the highest pitch, but each expressed his feelings 
 in quite a different manner. 
 
 Bent-Anat's brother, Rameses' son, Rameri, had ex- 
 perienced the same treatment as his fellows, whom 
 yesterday he had led into every sort of mischief, with 
 even more audacity than usual, but to-day he hung 
 his head. 
 
 In a corner of the court sat Anana, Pentaur's 
 favorite scholar, hiding his face in his hands which 
 rested on his knees. Rameri went up to him, touched 
 his shoulders and said : 
 
 "We have played the game, and now must bear 
 the consequences for good and for evil. Are you not 
 ashamed of yourself, old boy ? Your eyes are wet, and 
 the drops here on your hands have not fallen from 
 the clouds. You who are seventeen, and in a few 
 months will be a scribe and a grown man !" 
 
 Anana looked at the prince, dried his eyes quickly, 
 and said : 
 
 " I was the ring-leader. Ameni will turn me < 
 of the place, and I must return disgraced to my poor 
 mother, who has no one in the world but me."
 
 320 UARDA. 
 
 " Poor fellow !" said Rameri kindly. " It was striking 
 at random! If only our attempt had done Pentaur 
 any good !" 
 
 " We have done him harm, on the contrary," said 
 Anana vehemently, " and have behaved like fools !" 
 
 Rameri nodded in full assent, looked thoughtful 
 for a moment, and then said : 
 
 " Do you know, Anana, that you were not the ring- 
 leader ? The trick was planned in this crazy brain ; 
 I take the whole blame on my own shoulders. I am 
 the son of Rameses, and Ameni will be less hard on 
 me than on you." 
 
 " He will examine us all," replied Anana, " and I 
 will be punished sooner than tell a lie." 
 
 Rameri colored. 
 
 " Have you ever known my tongue sin against the 
 lovely daughter of Ra ?" he exclaimed. " But look 
 here ! did I stir up Antef, Hapi, Sent and all the others 
 or no ? Who but I advised you to find out Pentaur ? 
 Did I threaten to beg my father to take me from the 
 school of Seti or not ? I was the instigator of the 
 mischief, I pulled the wires, and if we are questioned 
 let me speak first. Not one of you is to mention 
 Anana's name ; do you hear ? not one of you, and if 
 they flog us or deprive us of our food we all stick to 
 this, that I was guilty of all the mischief." 
 
 " You are a brave fellow !" said the son of the 
 chief priest of Amon, shaking his right hand, while 
 Anana held his left. 
 
 The prince freed himself laughing from their 
 grasp. 
 
 " Now the old man may come home," he exclaimed, 
 " we are ready for him. But all the same I will ask
 
 UARDA. 
 
 321 
 
 my father to send me to Chennu, as sure as my name 
 is Rameri, if they do not recall Pentaur." 
 
 " He treated us like school-boys !" said the eldest 
 of the young malefactors. 
 
 " And with reason," replied Rameri, " I respect him 
 all the more for it. You all think I am a careless dog 
 but I have my own ideas, and I will speak the words 
 of wisdom." 
 
 With these words he looked round on his com- 
 panions with comical gravity, and continued imitating 
 Ameni's manner: 
 
 " Great men are distinguished from little men by 
 this they scorn and contemn all which flatters their 
 vanity, or seems to them for the moment desirable, or 
 even useful, if it is not compatible with the laws which 
 they recognize, or conducive to some great end which 
 they have set before them ; even though that end may 
 not be reached till after their death. 
 
 " I have learned this, partly from my father, but 
 partly I have thought it out for myself; and now I ask 
 you, could Pentaur as ' a great man ' have dealt with 
 us better ?" 
 
 " You have put into words exactly what I myself 
 have thought ever since yesterday," cried Anana. 
 " We have behaved like babies, and instead of carrying 
 our point we have brought ourselves and Pentaur into 
 disgrace." 
 
 The rattle of an approaching chariot was now 
 audible, and Rameri exclaimed, interrupting Anana: 
 
 " It is he. Courage, boys ! I am the guilty one. 
 He will not dare to have me thrashed but he will 
 stab me with looks !" 
 
 Uariia. I. "
 
 332 UARDA. 
 
 Ameni descended quickly from his chariot. The 
 gate-keeper informed him that the chief of the 
 Icolchytes, and the inspector of victims from the temple 
 of Amon, desired to speak with him. 
 
 " They must wait," said the Prophet shortly. " Show 
 them meanwhile into the garden pavilion. Where is 
 the chief haruspex ?" 
 
 He had hardly spoken wjien the vigorous old man 
 for whom he was enquiring hurried to meet him, to 
 make him acquainted with all that had occurred in 
 his absence. But the high-priest had already heard 
 in Thebes all that his colleague was anxious to tell 
 him. 
 
 When Ameni was absent from the House of Seti, 
 he caused accurate information to be brought to him 
 every morning of what had taken place there. 
 
 Now when the old man began his story he inter- 
 rupted him. 
 
 " I know everything," he said. " The disciples cling 
 to Pentaur, and have committed a folly for his sake, 
 and you met the princess Bent-Anat with him in the 
 temple of Hatasu, to which he had admitted a woman 
 of low rank before she had been purified. These are 
 grave matters, and must be seriously considered, but 
 not to-day. Make yourself easy; Pentaur will not 
 escape punishment ; but for to-day we must recall him 
 to this temple, for we have need of him to-morrow for 
 the solemnity of the feast of the valley. No one 
 shall meet him as an enemy till he is condemned; 
 I desire this of you, and charge you to repeat it to 
 the others," 
 
 The haruspex endeavored to represent to his 
 superior what a scandal would arise from this un-
 
 UARDA. 
 
 323 
 
 timely clemency ; but Ameni did not allow him to talk, 
 he demanded his ring back, called a young priest, 
 delivered the precious signet into his charge, and 
 desired him to get into his chariot that was waiting 
 at the door, and carry to Pentaur the command, in 
 his name, to return to the temple of Seti. 
 
 The haruspex submitted, though deeply vexed, and 
 asked whether the guilty boys were also to go un- 
 punished. 
 
 " No more than Pentaur," answered Ameni. "But 
 can you call this school-boy's trick guilt ? Leave the 
 children to their fun, and their imprudence. The 
 educator is the destroyer, if he always and only keeps 
 his eyes open, and cannot close them at the right 
 moment. Before life demands of us the exercise of 
 serious duties we have a mighty over-abundance of 
 vigor at our disposal; the child exhausts it in play, 
 and the boy in building wonder-castles with the 
 hammer and chisel of his fancy, in inventing follies. 
 You shake your head, Septah! but I tell you, the 
 audacious tricks of the boy are the fore-runners of 
 the deeds of the man. I shall let one only of the 
 boys suffer for what is past, and I should let him even 
 go unpunished if I had not other pressing reasons 
 for keeping him away from our festival." 
 
 The haruspex did not contradict his chief; for he 
 knew that when Ameni's eyes flashed so suddenly, and 
 his demeanor, usually so measured, was as restless as 
 at present, something serious was brewing. 
 
 The high-priest understood what was passing 11 
 Septah's mind. 
 
 " You do not understand me now," said he. 
 this evening, at the meeting of the initiated, you shall
 
 324 UARUA. 
 
 know all. Great events are stirring. The brethren in 
 the temple of Amon, on the other shore, have fallen 
 off from what must always be the Holiest to us white- 
 robed priests, and will stand in our way when the 
 time for action is arrived. At the feast of the valley 
 we shall stand in competition with the brethren from 
 Thebes. All Thebes will be present at the solemn 
 service, and it must be proved which knows how to 
 serve the Divinity most worthily, they or we. We must 
 avail ourselves of all our resources, and Pentaur we 
 certainly cannot do without. He must fill the func- 
 tion of Cherheb* for to-morrow only ; the day after 
 he must be brought to judgment. Among the re- 
 bellious boys are our best singers, and particularly 
 young Anana, who leads the voices of the choir-boys ; 
 I will examine the silly fellows at once. Rameri 
 Rameses' son was among the young miscreants ?" 
 
 " He seems to have been the ring-leader," answered 
 Septah. ' 
 
 Ameni looked at the old man with a significant 
 smile, and said : 
 
 "The royal family are covering themselves with 
 honor! His eldest daughter must be kept far from 
 the temple and the gathering of the pious, as being 
 unclean and refractory, and we shall be obliged to 
 expel his son too from our college. You look horrified, 
 but I say to you that the time for action is come. 
 More of this, this evening. Now, one question : Has 
 the news of the death of the ram of Amon reached 
 you ? Yes ? Rameses himself presented him to the 
 God, and they gave it his name. A bad omen." 
 
 " Cherheb was the title of the speaker or reciter at a festival. We cannot 
 agree with those who confuse this personage with the chief of the Kolchytcs.
 
 UARDA. 
 
 325 
 
 " And Apis too is dead I" The haruspex threw up 
 his arms in lamentation. 
 
 " His Divine spirit has returned to God," replied 
 Ameni. " No\v we have much to do. Before all 
 things we must prove ourselves equal to those in 
 Thebes over there, and win the people over to our 
 side. The panegyric prepared by us for to-morrow must 
 offer some great novelty. The Regent Ani grants us 
 a rich contribution, and " 
 
 "And," interrupted Septah, "our thaumaturgists 
 understand things very differently from those of the 
 house of Amon, who feast while we practise." 
 
 Ameni nodded assent, and said with a smile: "Also 
 Ave are more indispensable than they to the people. 
 They show them the path of life, but we smooth the 
 way of death. It is easier to find the way without a 
 guide in the day-light than in the dark. We are more 
 than a match for the priests of Amon." 
 
 " So long as you are our leader, certainly," cried the 
 haruspex. 
 
 " And so long as the temple has no lack of men of 
 your temper! " added Ameni, half to Septah, and half to 
 the second prophet of the temple, sturdy old Gagabu, 
 who had come into the room. 
 
 Both accompanied him into the garden, where the 
 two priests were awaiting him with the miraculous 
 heart. 
 
 Ameni greeted the priest from the temple of Amon 
 with dignified friendliness, the head kolchytes with 
 distant reserve, listened to their story, looked at the 
 heart which lay in the box, with Septah and Gagabu, 
 touched it delicately with the tips of his fingers, care-
 
 326 UARDA. 
 
 fully examining the object, which diffused a strong per- 
 fume of spices; then he said earnestly: 
 
 " If this, in your opinion, kolchytes, is not a human 
 heart, and if in yours, my brother of the temple of 
 Amon, it is a ram's heart, and if it was found in the 
 body of Rui, who is gone to Osiris, we here have a 
 mystery which only the Gods can solve. Follow me 
 into the great court. Let the gong be sounded, Gagabu, 
 four times, for I wish to call all the brethren to- 
 gether." 
 
 The gong rang in loud waves of sound to the 
 farthest limits of the group of buildings. The initiated, 
 the fathers, the temple-servants, and the scholars streamed 
 in, and in a few minutes were all collected. Not a man 
 was wanting, for at the four strokes of the rarely-sounded 
 alarum every dweller in the House of Seti was expected 
 to appear in the court of the temple. Even the leech 
 Nebsecht came; for he feared that the unusual sum- 
 mons announced the outbreak of a fire. 
 
 Ameni ordered the assembly to arrange itself in a 
 procession, informed his astonished hearers that in the 
 breast of the deceased prophet Rui, a ram's heart, in- 
 stead of a man's, had been found, and desired them all 
 to follow his instructions. Each one, he said, was to 
 fall on his knees and pray, while he would carry the 
 heart into the holiest of holies, and enquire of the 
 Gods what this wonder might portend to the faithful. 
 
 Ameni, with the heart in his hand, placed himself at 
 the head of the procession, and disappeared behind the 
 veil of the sanctuary; the initiated prayed in the vesti- 
 bule, in front of it; the priests and scholars in the vast 
 court, which was closed on the west by the stately 
 colonnade and the main gateway to the temple.
 
 UAKUA. 
 
 327 
 
 For fully an hour Ameni remained in the silent 
 holy of holies, from which thick clouds of incense rolled 
 out, and then he reappeared with a golden vase set with 
 precious stones. His tall figure was now resplendent 
 with rich ornaments, and a priest, who walked before 
 him, held the vessel high above his head. 
 
 Ameni's eyes seemed spell-bound to the vase, and 
 he followed it, supporting himself by his crozier, with 
 humble inflections. 
 
 The initiated bowed their heads till they touched 
 the pavement, and the priests and scholars bent their 
 faces down to the earth, when they beheld their haughty 
 master so filled with humility and devotion. The wor- 
 shippers did not raise themselves till Ameni had reached 
 the middle of the court and ascended the steps of the 
 altar, on which the vase with the heart was now placed, 
 and they listened to the slow and solemn accents of 
 the high-priest which sounded clearly through the whole 
 court. 
 
 "Fall down again and worship! wonder, pray, and 
 adore! The noble inspector of sacrifices of the temple 
 of Amon has not been deceived in his judgment; a 
 ram's heart was in fact found in the pious breast of 
 Rui. I heard distinctly the voice of the Divinity in the 
 sanctuary, and strange indeed was the speech that met 
 my ear. Wolves tore the sacred ram of Amon in his 
 sanctuary on the other bank of the river, but the heart 
 of the divine beast found its way into the bosom of the 
 saintly Rui. A great miracle has been worked, and 
 the Gods have shown a wonderful sign. The spirit of 
 the Highest liked not to dwell in the body of this not 
 perfectly holy ram, and seeking a purer abiding-place 
 found it in the breast of our Rui; and now in this con-
 
 328 UARDA. 
 
 secrated vase. In this the heart shall be preserved till 
 a new ram offered by a worthy hand enters the herd of 
 Amon. This heart shall be preserved with the most 
 sacred relics, it has the property of healing many 
 diseases, and the significant words seem favorable 
 which stood written in the midst of the vapor of in- 
 cense, and which I will repeat to you word for word, 
 'That which is high shall rise higher, and that which 
 exalts itself, shall soon fall down." Rise, pastophori! 
 hasten to fetch the holy images, bring them out, place 
 the sacred heart at the head of the procession, and let 
 us march round the walls of the temple with hymns of 
 praise. Ye temple-servants, seize your staves, and spread 
 in every part of the city the news of the miracle which 
 the Divinity has vouchsafed to us." 
 
 After the procession had marched round the temple 
 and dispersed, the priest of Amon took leave of Amcni ; 
 he bowed deeply and formally before him, and with a 
 coolness that was almost malicious said: 
 
 " We, in the temple of Amon, shall know how to 
 appreciate what you heard in the holy of holies. The 
 miracle has occurred, and the king shall learn 
 how it came to pass, and in what words it was an- 
 nounced." 
 
 "In the words of the Most High," said the high- 
 priest with dignity; he bowed to the other, and turned 
 to a group of priests, who were discussing the great 
 event of the day. 
 
 Ameni enquired of them as to the preparations for 
 the festival of the morrow, and then desired the chief 
 haruspex to call the refractory pupils together in the 
 school-court. The old man informed him that Pentaur 
 had returned, and he followed his superior to the
 
 UARDA. 
 
 3*9 
 
 released prisoners, who, prepared for the worst, and 
 expecting severe punishment, nevertheless shook with 
 laughter when Rameri suggested that, if by chance 
 they were condemned to kneel upon peas, they should 
 get them cooked first. 
 
 "It will be long asparagus not peas," said an- 
 other looking over his shoulder, and pretending to be 
 flogging. 
 
 They all shouted again with laughter, but it was 
 hushed as soon as they heard Ameni's well-known foot- 
 step. 
 
 Each feared the worst, and when the high-priest 
 stood before them even Rameri's mirth was quite 
 quelled, for though Ameni looked neither angry nor 
 threatening, his appearance commanded respect, and 
 each one recognized in him a judge against whose 
 verdict no remonstrance was to be thought of. 
 
 To their infinite astonishment Ameni spoke kindly 
 to the thoughtless boys, praised the motive of their 
 action their attachment to a highly-endowed teacher 
 but then clearly and deliberately laid before them 
 the folly of the means they had employed to attain 
 their end, and at what a cost "Only think, he con- 
 tinued, turning to the prince, "if your father sent a 
 general, who he thought would be better in a different 
 place, from Syria to Kusch, and his troops therefore 
 all went over to the enemy! How would you like 
 that?" 
 
 So for some minutes he continued to blar 
 warn them, and he ended his speech by promising, n 
 consideration of the great miracle that gave that 
 special sanctity, to exercise unwonted clemency. 
 the sake of example, he said, he could not let them
 
 33 UARDA. 
 
 pass altogether unpunished, and he now asked them 
 which of them had been the instigator of the deed; he 
 and he only should suffer punishment. 
 
 He had hardly done speaking, when prince Rameri 
 stepped forward, and said modestly: 
 
 " We acknowledge, holy father, that we have played 
 a foolish trick; and I lament it doubly because I de- 
 vised it, and made the others follow me. I love Pen- 
 taur, and next to thee there is no one like him in the 
 sanctuary." 
 
 Ameni's countenance grew dark, and he answered 
 with displeasure: 
 
 "No judgment is allowed to pupils as to their 
 teachers nor to you, If you were not the son of the 
 king, who rules Egypt as Ra, I would punish your 
 temerity with stripes. My hands are tied with regard 
 to you, and yet they must be everywhere and always at 
 work if the hundreds committed to my care are to be 
 kept from harm." 
 
 "Nay, punish me!" cried Rameri. "If I commit a 
 folly I am ready to bear the consequences." 
 
 Ameni looked pleased at the vehement boy, and 
 would willingly have shaken him by the hand and 
 stroked his curly head, but the penance he proposed 
 for Rameri was to serve a great end, and Ameni would 
 not allow any overflow of emotion to hinder him in the 
 execution of a well considered design. So he answered 
 the prince with grave determination : 
 
 "I must and will punish you and I do so by 
 requesting you to leave the House of Seti this very 
 day." 
 
 The prince turned pale. But Ameni went on more 
 kindly :
 
 UARDA. 
 
 33' 
 
 " I do not expel you with ignominy from among us 
 I only bid you a friendly farewell. In a few weeks 
 you would in any case have left the college, and by 
 the king's command have transferred your blooming 
 life, health, and strength to the exercising ground of the 
 chariot-brigade. No punishment for you but this lies 
 in my power. Now give me your hand; you will make 
 a fine man, and perhaps a great warrior." 
 
 The prince stood in astonishment before Ameni, 
 and did not take his offered hand. Then the priest 
 went up to him, and said: 
 
 " You said you were ready to take the consequences 
 of your folly, and a prince's word must be kept. Be- 
 fore sunset we will conduct you to the gate of the 
 temple." 
 
 Ameni turned his back on the boys, and left the 
 school-court. 
 
 Rameri looked after him. Utter whiteness had 
 overspread his blooming face, and the blood had left 
 even his lips. None of his companions approached 
 him, for each felt that what was passing in his soul 
 at this moment would brook no careless intrusion. No 
 one spoke a word; they all looked at him. 
 
 He soon observed this, and tried to collect himself, 
 and then he said in a low tone while he held out his 
 hands to Anana and another friend: 
 
 "Am I then so bad that I must be driven out from 
 among you all like this that such a blow must be in- 
 flicted on my father?" 
 
 "You refused Ameni your hand !" answered Ana 
 "Go to him, offer him your hand, beg him to be less 
 severe, and perhaps he will let you remain." 
 
 Rameri answered only " No." But that " No " was a
 
 332 UARDA. 
 
 decided that all who knew him understood that it was 
 Anal. 
 
 Before the sun set he had left the school. Ameni 
 gave him his blessing; he told him that if he himself 
 ever had to command he would understand his severity, 
 and allowed the other scholars to accompany him as far 
 as the Nile. Pentaur parted from him tenderly at the 
 gate. 
 
 When Rameri was alone in the cabin of his gilt 
 bark with his tutor, he felt his eyes swimming in tears. 
 
 "Your highness is surely not weeping?" asked the 
 official. 
 
 " Why ?" asked the prince sharply. 
 
 "I thought I saw tears on your highness' cheeks." 
 
 "Tears of joy that I am out of the trap," cried 
 Rameri; he sprang on shore, and in a few minutes he 
 was with his sister in the palace. 
 
 END OF VOL. I.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below 
 
 FEB 14 1953 
 
 5 RECO 
 
 NOV 19 1963
 
 
 UC SOUTHERN REOONM. ItMttt MCUTV 
 
 A 001 174089 1 
 
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 1851 
 
 E16U1E 
 
 1880 
 
 v.l
 
 KM 
 
 ^HKc9 
 
 BH 
 
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