Produced by David Widger
A ROMANCE OF ANCIENT EGYPT
FROM THE HISTORICAL ROMANCES OF GEORG EBERS
By Georg Ebers
Translated from the German by Clara Bell
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 myself 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 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 try step through
the details of religious, public, and private life, even of particular
individuals. The same remark cannot be made in regard to their mental
life, and here many an anachronism will slip in, many things will appear
modern, and show the coloring of the Christian mode of thought.
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
foregoing one. Every glance at the foot-notes must necessarily 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 inculcated, 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 papyri; 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
accustomed 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 physiognomy, 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 represent 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
corrupters 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 peculiar 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” 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 Tadelna in
London and Gustav Richter in 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 Egyptians 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 “An
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.
Rheinbollerhutte, September 22, 1876.
GEORG EBERS.
PREFACE TO THE FIFTH GERMAN EDITION.
The earlier editions of “Uarda” were published in such rapid succession,
that no extensive changes in the stereotyped text could be made; but
from the first issue, I have not ceased to correct it, and can now
present to the public this new fifth edition as a “revised” one.
Having felt a constantly increasing affection for “Uarda” during the
time I was writing, the friendly and comprehensive attention bestowed
upon it by our greatest critics and the favorable reception it met with
in the various classes of society, afforded me the utmost pleasure.
I owe the most sincere gratitude to the honored gentlemen, who called
my attention to certain errors, and among them will name particularly
Professor Paul Ascherson of Berlin, and Dr. C. Rohrbach of Gotha. Both
will find their remarks regarding mistakes in the geographical location
of plants, heeded in this new edition.
The notes, after mature deliberation, have been placed at the foot of
the pages instead of at the end of the book.
So many criticisms concerning the title “Uarda” have recently reached
my ears, that, rather by way of explanation than apology, I will here
repeat what I said in the preface to the third edition.
This title has its own history, and the more difficult it would be for
me to defend it, the more ready I am to allow an advocate to speak for
me, an advocate who bears a name no less distinguished than that of G.
E. Lessing, who says:
“Nanine? (by Voltaire, 1749). What sort of title is that? What thoughts
does it awake? Neither more nor less than a title should arouse. A title
must not be a bill of fare. The less it betrays of the contents, the
better it is. Author and spectator are both satisfied, and the ancients
rarely gave their comedies anything but insignificant names.”
This may be the case with “Uarda,” whose character is less prominent
than some others, it is true, but whose sorrows direct the destinies of
my other heroes and heroines.
Why should I conceal the fact? The character of “Uarda” and the present
story have grown out of the memory of a Fellah girl, half child, half
maiden, whom I saw suffer and die in a hut at Abu el Qurnah in the
Necropolis of Thebes.
I still persist in the conviction I have so frequently expressed, the
conviction that the fundamental traits of the life of the soul have
undergone very trivial modifications among civilized nations in all
times and ages, but will endeavor to explain the contrary opinion, held
by my opponents, by calling attention to the circumstance, that
the expression of these emotions show considerable variations among
different peoples, and at different epochs. I believe that Juvenal, one
of the ancient writers who best understood human nature, was right in
saying:
“Nil erit ulterius, quod nostris moribus addat
Posteritas: eadem cupient facientque minores.”
Leipsic, October 15th, 1877.
U A R D A.
CHAPTER 1.
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.
The lotos floats on the mirror of the waters, and among the papyrus
reeds by the shore water-fowl innumerable 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-cuttings to 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.
The western shore of the Nile showed a quite different 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.
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 current 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 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 Tum the descending god.
[The course of the Sun was compared to that of the life of Man.
He rose as the child Horns, grew by midday to the hero Ra, who
conquered the Uraeus snake for his diadem, and by evening was an old
Man, Tum. Light had been born of darkness, hence Tum was regarded
as older than Horns and the other gods of light.]
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 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 farther shore.
The voices of the singers and of the wailing women were hushed, even the
song of the sailors on the numberless 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
evening near the Nile to catch flies, to drink, and so prepare 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 of sepulchres; and indeed they did little
mischief, for they found abundant food in the tombs.
[The jackal-headed god Anubis was the son of Osiris and Nephthys,
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
Psychopompos (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.”]
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 accepted 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 perceived 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.]
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 imperious, 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 porter muttered an unintelligible answer and came down the
steps within to open the door, the lady in the chariot turned to her
impatient companion 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,--[A Semitic race of robbers in the
cast of Egypt.]--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 speaking, 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 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 she carried her to her father’s house--he is a paraschites--[One
who opened the bodies of the dead to prepare them for being
embalmed.]--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 judgment,” replied the master
of the ceremonies.
“And that always hits on the right course,” cried the wife of Mena.
“Would to God it were so!” said the princess in a subdued voice. Then
she continued, addressing the 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?”
[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.]
“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,--[A great queen of the 18th
dynasty and guardian of two Pharaohs]--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 we already know, thus called upon, bowed to the
earth, his arms hanging by his sides, and asked:
“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--
[The title here rendered pioneer was 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.
--Translator.]
besides, you share my guilt, for,” she added, turning to the priest, “I
confess that the misfortune happened because I would try with my horses
to overtake Paaker’s Syrian racers, 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. “Packer’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 physician to the house of the
paraschites,” said the princess. “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 Satiland?”--[Asia].
“He would not have welcomed us kindly!” said the master of the
ceremonies, laughing.
“But the leech, the leech!” cried Bent-Anat. “Packer, 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.
Paaker remained alone with his two slaves; the commission with which
the princess had charged him greatly displeased him. So long as the
moonlight enabled 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 forwards, 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--
“Ah! you good-for-nothing brood of Seth.”
[The Typhon of the Greeks. The enemy of Osiris, of truth, good
and purity. Discord and strife in nature. Horns who fights against
him for his father Osiris, can throw him and stun him, but never
annihilate him.]
“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 before:
“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.”