then, with tears, lay it softly, sweetly sleeping the while, within
the basket of bulrushes,--pillowing its head first upon her hand,
until the daughter had placed beneath it a pillow of wild-flowers and
lotus-leaves, gathered on the spot in the dawning light. The father
then covered it carefully over, and kissing it, with grief shaking his
strong frame, was about to commit the frail boat to the water, when
the poor mother arrested his arm, implored one more look, one more
embrace of her child! She was a young and beautiful woman; and, the
last kiss given, kneeled by the shore praying to her God, as the
father launched the ark into the stream. At this moment, I beheld,
straying upon the bank, as if seeking its parents, the other child
that I had seen in the house. I now saw the current take to its
embrace the little ark, and upon its bosom bear it downward. In a few
moments it lodged amid some rushes, which the mother seeing, she ran
hastily, entered the water, passionately kissed her child, and would
have offered it the breast again, but the more resolute father sent it
once more upon its way. In the vision, I now saw that day had dawned,
and that the stir of life on land and water was everywhere visible.
The father watched the bark, until it could be no longer seen for the
curve of the shore, and then drew near to his wife, and gently led her
away to the hut,--her lingering looks ceaselessly stretched towards
the Nile. The little maid, who was not more than twelve or thirteen
years of age, having been previously instructed by her mother,
followed along the shore to see what would become of the ark. But I
weary you, Sesostris, with details, which to me had a sort of
fascination, as they were enacted before me in the scenes I beheld."
"And they are deeply interesting to me, my dear Remeses," I said with
emotion.
"I followed the bark also," continued Remeses, "until, after several
escapes from imminent peril, it lodged against a group of flags, at
the moment that a beautiful lady, accompanied by her maids, came to
bathe, at the foot of the garden of Pharaoh's palace. At a glance,
Sesostris, I recognized, as she was in her youth, my mother--I mean to
say, the Queen Amense. I saw her attention drawn to the little ark, in
the fate of which I had become intensely interested, little dreaming
how much and intimately it concerned _me_! I heard her bid the maids
take the basket out of the river, and her cry of surprise, on opening
it and seeing the babe, which answered her with a sorrowful wail, as
it were, of appeal. I saw her offer it to the bosoms of three Egyptian
nurses in vain, when the little maid, its half-sister, drew near with
mingled curiosity and fear and said--
"'O princess, shall I call one of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse
the child for thee?'
"The princess said, 'Go!'
"Immediately the maiden ran with the swiftness of a gazelle, until she
came at length to her mother's house. The poor Hebrew woman was at her
task, combing flax and weeping as she toiled, feeling that she had
parted with her child forever. At the height of her grief, the young
maid flew in at the door, crying with a voice choked with joy--
"'Mother, run quickly! make no stay! Pharaoh's daughter has found my
little brother, taken it from the ark, and sent me for a Hebrew nurse!
Come quickly, before any other is found!'
"With a cry of joy, and with hands clasped to heaven in gratitude, I
saw the mother about to rush out, wild with happiness, when her
daughter said, 'Be calm, mother, or the princess will suspect. Put on
your coif! Arrange your dress! Seem quiet, as if you were not its
mother!'
"'I will try to do so--oh, I will try to do so!' she said touchingly.
I saw that, in her emotion, she did not think of her other boy, who,
though hardly four years old, had followed the stream, as if he
understood what the ark contained. Him I saw kindly taken pity upon by
an Egyptian priest, who carried him away to his house."
Here I uttered an exclamation which attracted the notice of Remeses;
for I recollected the story of the young Hebrew ecclesiastic and gold
image-caster, dear mother, and saw now that he was this brother of
Remeses, and the mystery of the resemblance was solved. I did not make
any remark to Remeses, however, in reply to his inquiring look, and he
resumed his wonderful narrative.
But I will continue the subject, dear mother, in a subsequent letter.
SESOSTRIS.
LETTER XXV.
PALACE OF REMESES, CITY OF ON.
MY DEAREST MOTHER:
Your courier reached me yesterday with your important letter, advising
me of the refusal of the King of Cyprus to receive your ambassador, or
release your subjects; and that you only await my return to declare
war. I shall not fail to respond to your call, and will next week
leave Egypt for Syria. I have not yet visited the Thebaïd, and the
superb temples of Upper Egypt, nor seen the wonderful Labyrinth, nor
the Cataracts; but I hope at some future day to revisit this
interesting land. I feel, indeed, rejoiced to go away now, as the
painful and extraordinary events connected with Remeses have cast a
gloom over all things here, and changed all my plans.
But I will resume the narrative, interrupted by the abrupt ending of
my last letter. That, with the preceding, as well as this, I shall now
send to you, as the seal of secrecy is removed from them, by the
publicity which has been given to all the events by Remeses.
To return, dear mother, to the account of the scenes which the
magicians presented to his vision, in the black marble chamber of the
pyramid.
"I now," continued Remeses, "beheld the excited mother reach the
presence of the princess, trying to calm the wild tumult of hope and
fear in her maternal bosom; and to her, I saw the princess, after many
inquiries, commit the charge of the infant.
"'I shall adopt this child, O nurse,' she said; 'bring it, therefore,
to the palace daily that I may see it. Take as faithful care of it as
if it were your own, and you shall be rewarded with my favor, as well
as with a nurse's wages.'
"The joyful Hebrew woman tried to repress her happiness, and trembled
so, that the princess said--
"'Thou art awkward. Carry it tenderly; and see that thou keep this
secret closely, or I shall take the boy away from thee, woman, and
also punish thee. What is thy name?'
"'Jochebeda,' she answered.
"'And thy husband's?'
"'Amram, your majesty,' she replied.
"I saw her, O Sesostris, when she had well got out of the princess's
sight, clasp, by stealth, her recovered child to her bosom, while
words of tenderness were in her mouth, and her eyes streaming with
tears of gratitude and wonder.
"That child, O Sesostris, was myself!" suddenly exclaimed Remeses. "Of
this you have already been convinced. I saw the scene before me,
rapidly change from day to night, and months and years fly by like a
cloud, or like a fleet of ships leaving no trace of their track on the
closing waters. Through all I saw myself, from the infant of three
years old, taken into the palace from my Hebrew mother, to the boy of
twelve--to the youth of twenty! Like the cycle of fate, that scene
rolled by before my eyes, until I saw myself, that is, the Hebrew boy,
in every scene of my life up to the very moment then present. Then,
with a sound of mournful music, the Nile and its scenes slowly faded
from before my vision, and I was alone! The whole fearful history had
terminated in me, and left me standing there in solitude, to reflect
upon what I had seen.
"Housing myself from my stupor of amazement, I staggered back, and
sunk in horror upon the stone bench. I know not how long I lay there,
but I was at length aroused by a hand upon my shoulder; I looked up
and beheld the magician with the emblem of life, and the
emerald-tipped wand. He said--
"'My son, thou hast read the past of thy life! Wilt thou still be King
of Egypt?'
"'By what power hast thou opened the gates of the past? How hast thou
known all this?' I cried, with a heart of despair.
"'Dost thou believe?'
"'As if the open Book of Thoth lay before me! I doubt not,' I
answered.
"'Wilt thou be King of Egypt?' again asked another voice. A third, in
another direction, took it up, and every subterranean echo of the
vaulted pyramid seemed to take up the cry. I rushed from the hall, not
knowing whither I went. Doors seemed to open before me, as if by
magic, and I at length found myself emerging, guided by the magician,
into the open night. The granite valves of the gate closed behind me,
and I was alone, in the quadrangle of the great temple of Thoth. The
stars shone down upon me like mocking eyes, watching me. I fled
onward, as if I would fly from myself--I feared to reflect. I passed
the sphinx, the pylones, the obelisks; and ran along the avenue of the
Lake of the Dead, until I reached the Nile. I crossed it in a boat
that I found upon the shore, and without having formed any clear idea
of what I ought to do, sought the palace, and gained my mother's
ante-room. Did I say 'my mother,' Sesostris? I meant the good queen. I
sent in a page to say I wished to see her. In surprise at my return,
before the forty days were fulfilled, she came to the door hurriedly,
in her night-robe, and opened it. I entered as calmly as I could, and
did not refuse her kiss, though I knew I was but a Hebrew! One night's
scenes, dreadful as they were, O Sesostris, could not wholly break the
ties of a lifetime of filial love and reverence. I closed the door,
secured it in silence, and then sat down, weary with what I had
undergone; and, as she came near and knelt by me, and laid her hand
against my forehead, and asked me 'if I were ill, and hence had left
the temple,' I was overcome with her kindness; and when the reflection
forced itself upon me that I could no more call her mother, or be
entitled to these acts of maternal solicitude, I gave way to the
strong current of emotion, and fell upon her shoulder, weeping as
heartily as she had seen me weep when lying in the little ark a
helpless infant.
"During this brief moment, a suspicion flashed across my mind, that
the magicians might have produced this as a part of my trial as a
prince;--that it was not real, but that by their wonderful arts of
magic they had made it appear so to my vision. I seized upon this
idea, as a man drowning in the Nile grasps at a floating flower.
"'Mother,' I said, 'I am ill. I am also very sorrowful!'
"'The tasks and toils of thy initiation, my son, have been too great
for thee. Thy face is haggard and thy looks unnatural. What is thy
sorrow?'
"'I have had a vision, or what was like a dream, my mother. I saw an
infant, in this vision, before me, placed in an ark, and set adrift
upon the Nile. Lo, after being borne by the current some ways, it was
espied by a princess who was bathing, whose maids, at her command,
brought it to her. It contained a circumcised Hebrew child. The
princess, being childless, adopted it, and educated it, and declared
it to be her son. She placed him next to her in the kingdom, and was
about to resign to him the crown, when--'
"Here my mother, whose face I had earnestly regarded, became pale and
trembled all over. She seized my hands and gasped--
"'Tell me, Remeses, tell me, was this a dream, or hast thou heard it?'
"'I saw it, my mother, in a vision, in the subterranean chamber of the
pyramids. It was one of those scenes of magic which the arts of the
magi know how to produce.'
"'Dost thou believe it?' she cried.
"'Is it not thy _secret_, O my mother, which Prince Mœris shares
with thee? Am I not right? Does not that Hebrew child,' I cried,
rising, 'now stand before thee?'
"She shrieked, and fell insensible!
"At length I restored her to consciousness. I related all I have told
you. Reluctantly, she confessed that all was true as I had seen it. I
then, in a scene such as I hope never to pass through again, assured
her I should refuse the throne and exile myself from Egypt. She
implored me with strong appeals to keep the secret, and mount the
throne. I firmly refused to do so, inasmuch as it would be an act of
injustice, not only to Mœris, but to the Egyptians, to deceive them
with a Hebrew ruler. She reminded me how, for sixty-one years, Prince
Joseph had governed Egypt. 'Yes,' I said, 'but it was openly and
without deceit; while my reign, would be a gross deception and
usurpation.' But, O Sesostris, I cannot revive the scene. It has
passed!--I have yielded! She showed me the letters of Prince Mœris.
She implored me for her sake to keep the secret, and aid her in
resisting the conspiracy of the viceroy. When I reflected that he had
made my mother so long miserable, and now menaced her throne, I
yielded to her entreaties to remain a few days at the head of the
affairs that have been intrusted to my control, and to lead the army
against Mœris, should he fulfil his menace to invade Lower Egypt.
After that, I said, I shall refuse to be called the son of Pharaoh's
daughter, and will retire from the Court."
"Not among the Hebrews?" I exclaimed.
"No, perhaps not. I have nothing in common with them. I can do them no
good: I cannot yet consent to share their bondage. I shall seek my own
family, for the queen has told me who they are. My mother, my _own_
mother, Sesostris, shall again fold her child to her heart! I
recollect her beautiful, tearful face, as seen in the vision of the
pyramids. I have a brother, too, and a sister!"
"I know them both!" I cried, almost joyfully; though, dear mother, it
was a sad joy I felt, to know that Remeses was a brother to Miriam and
the ecclesiastic gold-caster. He became at once interested, and I told
him all I knew about them, as I have you. He listened with deep
attention, and seemed pleased. I also told him how often I had
conversed, in the garden of flowers, with the venerable Amram, the
father of Miriam.
"And _my_ father also, you should add," he said, with a melancholy
smile. "I knew it not, Sesostris; I believed him to be the husband of
my nurse. Thinkest thou all this time he knew I was his son?"
"I doubt it not," I answered. "The eyes of your father and mother must
naturally have been upon you from your childhood up. They must have
witnessed all your career, and rejoiced in it, and kept the secret
locked in their own humble hearts, lest you and the world should know
it, and the glory they secretly saw you sharing, be taken away or
resigned by you."
"I shall see them. They shall yet hear me say, mother, father,
brother, sister, to each one of them. But, Sesostris, I must then bid
them farewell forever, and Egypt also,--if the queen will permit me to
go," he suddenly added, with bitter irony unusual with him; "for
slaves must have no will but their master's."
I laid my arm kindly and sympathizingly upon his shoulder, and
silently embraced him.
"I feel for you, O Remeses, with all my heart," I said.
"I know you do, O prince: I am sure that you do. But let us terminate
this subject. My mother's--I mean, alas! the queen's desire shall be
gratified. I will, for a few days, continue as I am, but no more
return to the temples. My initiation is over. Without doubt the
priests of the hierarchy will seek to put me to death, when they learn
that a Hebrew has been initiated into all their learning and
mysteries. It will be necessary for me to leave Egypt."
"Then let Tyre, O prince, be thy asylum--thy future home!" I cried.
"There the Hebrew is not in bondage, and is a Syrian among Syrians.
There you shall have a palace and retinue, and be served as becomes
your wisdom and greatness. My mother Epiphia will welcome you with
pleasure, for she has already learned to honor you, from my letters.
Our city is about to go to war with the King of Cyprus, and my mother
has written, urging me to return. Twelve galleys will await me at
Pelusium, in a fortnight hence, to escort my own to Tyre. Consent, O
Remeses, to go with me."
"Noble prince," he exclaimed, deeply moved, "how can I thank you! It
is the greatest consolation, in this my sorrow and humiliation, to
know that you do not withdraw from me your friendship; that you can
still esteem me as a man! Sesostris, I thank you. I will accept your
offer, if my--that is, the queen, will change her mind, and permit me
to address a letter, by a swift courier, to Prince Mœris. In it I
will briefly say that I am informed of my true lineage, and that if he
will quietly wait the succession, and be submissive to the queen, and
withhold his army from Memphis, I will, within three days after
obtaining his affirmative reply, leave Egypt for a foreign land. Such
a course will prove the best in the end for him and Egypt, and I have
no doubt he will consent to adopt it. How extraordinary that this wily
man should so long have kept the secret with which he so terribly
menaced my--the queen!"
I approved of the course suggested. Remeses soon afterwards sought the
queen; and at the end of four hours he returned to me, looking very
weary and pale, yet smiling, saying--
"It is achieved! It was a fearful struggle! The queen has consented!
Indeed, she seems heart-broken, spirit-crushed! This discovery,
against which her soul has so long battled, has left her prostrate,
almost wrecked! For her sake I bore up and hid my own unfathomable
sorrow. She has, at my solicitation, consented that I shall not only
write to Prince Mœris, inserting a clause enjoining silence as to
my birth, but her own courier shall be its bearer, signifying her wish
for conciliation. The letter was written in her presence, the clause
for silence introduced, and the courier is already gone with it."
While Remeses was speaking, a page entered and informed him that the
queen wished to see him. He found her ill with a feverish pulse. She
called him to her, and said--
"My son, I am about to die! This blow is too heavy for me to bear! I
shall never recover! It was my wish to leave you firmly seated upon my
throne; but the gods have decreed otherwise. Call a council of the
hierarchy. I must not be faithless to my ancestors, and leave a vacant
throne. You have advised me to adopt Prince Mœris. I can do no
otherwise. For this act, assemble my councils, both of state and of
the priesthood."
"I obeyed," said Remeses, when he subsequently related what passed.
"The next day the councils met in one session, and the queen,
supported upon her couch, presided. Briefly she announced her
intention of adopting Mœris-Mento,--giving his full name,--as her
son, and the next in succession to the throne, their consent being
obtained. Then came up the question, 'why Prince Remeses declined?'
Being present, I answered that it was my intention to retire from the
court, visit foreign lands, and leave the government of Egypt in the
hands of Mœris. At the earnest request of the queen I made no
allusion to the secret. The united councils yielded their assent, and
the royal secretary drew up the papers in due form, which the queen,
supported by me, signed. A courier was then dispatched with a copy of
the instrument to the prince. The cabinet was soon afterwards
dismissed, and I was left alone with the queen, who soon became very
ill."
Thus far, my dearest mother, had I written in this letter five days
ago, when the chief chamberlain came hastening to my room, in great
terror, saying that the queen was dying! I lost not a moment in
following him to her apartments. Ever since the meeting of the council
she had been growing worse, and all the skill of her physicians could
not abate the disease, which was pronounced inflammation of the brain.
She had been for two days wildly delirious, calling upon Remeses not
to leave her, and accusing the gods of seeking to put upon her a
stranger for her own son! At length her ravings and her fever ceased,
and she rapidly failed. When I entered, I found Remeses kneeling by
her side, his manly head bowed upon her couch, and tears falling upon
her cold hand, held in his. Her mind was clear now, but I could see
that the azure circle of death girdled her eyes, and that the light of
the soul within was expiring. Her whole attention was fixed upon
Remeses, to whom she kept saying, in a faint whisper, and with a
smile, "My son, my son, my own son! call me mother!"
"Mother, O my mother!" he exclaimed, in his strong anguish, "I cannot
part with thee! Thou hast been a mother to me indeed!"
As I entered, her gaze turned towards me.
"It is the Prince of Tyre! I thought it was the others!"
"What others, my mother?" asked Remeses.
"They will soon come. I commanded him to bring them all. I must see
them ere I die. But the Prince of Tyre is welcome!" And she smiled
upon me, and gave me her other hand to kiss. It was cold as ivory! I
also knelt by her, and sorrowfully watched her sharpening features,
which the chisel of Death seemed shaping into the marble majesty of a
god.
At this moment the door opened, and I saw, ushered in by a Hebrew
page, the venerable head gardener, Amram; the young Hebrew
ecclesiastic; Miriam the papyrus writer; and, leaning upon her arm, a
dignified and still beautiful dame of fifty-five. I could not be
mistaken--this last was the mother of Remeses.
"Cause all persons to go forth the chamber," cried the queen at the
sight, her voice recovering in part its strength. She glanced at me to
remain.
"Come hither, Amram," she said, "and lead to my bedside thy wife.
Remeses, behold thy mother and father! Mother, embrace thy son! Since
he can be no longer mine, I will return him to thee forever!" Her
voice was veiled with tears. Remeses rose, and turning to his mother,
who looked worthy of him, said:
"My mother, I acknowledge thee to be my mother! Give me thy blessing,
as thou hast often done in my infancy."
He tenderly and respectfully embraced her, and then pressing his
father's hand to his lips, he knelt before them. They were deeply
moved, and instead of blessing him, wept upon him with silent joy.
"Are there not two more--a brother, a sister?" said Remeses, his fine
face radiant with that ineffable beauty which shines from benevolence
and the performance of a holy duty. I then led forward Miriam, whom he
regarded with admiring surprise (for she looked like a queen in her
own right), and then tenderly embraced, saying to me, "Though I have
lost a kingdom, O Sesostris, I have gained a sister, which no crown
could bestow upon me." Then, when he saw the noble and princely
looking priest, he cried, as he folded him to his breast--
"This is, indeed, my brother!"
The whole scene was touching and interesting beyond the power of my
pen to describe, my dear mother. The dying queen smiled with serene
pleasure, and waving her hand, Remeses led first his mother, and then
his father, and in succession his sister and brother, to her couch.
Upon the heads of each she laid her hand, but longest upon the
mother's, saying:
"Love him--be kind to him--he has no mother now but thee! Love him for
my sake--you cannot but love him for his own! If I took thy babe, O
mother, I return thee a man and a prince worthy to rule a nation, and
in whom my eyes, closing upon the present, and seeing far into the
future, behold a leader of thy people--a prince to thy nation. Born to
a throne, he shall yet reign king of armies and leader of hosts, who I
see follow him obedient to his will and submissive to the rod of his
power. Remeses, I die! Kiss me!"
The noble Hebrew reverently bent over her lips, as if in an act of
worship; and when he lifted his face, there remained a statue of clay.
The Queen of Egypt was no more!
SESOSTRIS.
I closed, dear mother, my account of the death of the great and good
Queen Amense (which I wrote the day following that sad event), in
order to accompany Remeses to the chief embalmers. As I passed through
the streets, I saw that the whole population was in mourning. Women
went with dishevelled hair, men ceased to shave their heads and
beards, and all the signs of woe for death, which I have before
described, were visible. By the laws of Egypt, not even a king can be
embalmed in his own palace. Remeses, on reaching the suburb of the
embalmers, was received into the house of the chief, and here he gave
directions as to the fashion of the case and sarcophagus, and the
pattern of the funeral car, and of the baris in which it was to cross
the Nile to the pyramid which, I have already said, she has
been, since the first year of her reign, erecting for her
burial-place--placing a casing of vast stones, brought down from the
quarries near Elephantis, each year.