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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/5439.txt b/5439.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b30cb8f --- /dev/null +++ b/5439.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2392 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook Uarda by Georg Ebers, Volume 1. +#1 in our series by Georg Ebers + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers***** + + +Title: Uarda, Volume 1. + +Author: Georg Ebers + +Release Date: April, 2004 [EBook #5439] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on April 29, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK UARDA BY GEORG EBERS, V1 *** + + + +This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + +[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the +file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an +entire meal of them. D.W.] + + + + + +UARDA + +Volume 1. + +By Georg Ebers + + + +THE HISTORICAL ROMANCES OF GEORG EBERS + +UARDA + +A ROMANCE OF ANCIENT EGYPT + +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 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. + +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." + + + + +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" +--[It is still standing and known as the temple of Qurnah.]--and was one +of the largest in the City of the Dead. Only that magnificent 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 gate-way +Amenophis III. had adorned with immense colossal statues--[That which +stands to the north is the famous musical statue, or Pillar of Memmon]-- +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 he succeeded in seizing the Egyptian throne; 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 foundations 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 was a very celebrated +school of learning. + + [Every detail of this description of an Egyptian school is derived + from sources dating from the reign of Rameses II. and his + successor, Merneptah.] + +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 frequented +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 sons, not +excepting Rameses, his successor, educated here. + +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 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, sculpture, or painting; in these also the learner might +choose his master. + +Every teacher in these institutions 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 divinities which belonged to the City of the Dead of Thebes. + +The temple of Seti proper was a massive structure of limestone. 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, enclosed on +the two sides by colonnades, and beyond which stood a second gate-way. +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. + +The innermost and last was dimly lighted by a few lamps. + +Behind the temple of Seti stood large square structures 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 philosophers. 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 apartments for the scholars, and instruction was +usually given in the paved courtyard strewn with mats. + +The most imposing was the house of the chief prophets; 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 restlessly 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 +guesses. A messenger from the king had arrived--the princess Bent-Anat +had been attacked by the Kolchytes--and 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 unobserved 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-brotherhood, 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, 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 resistance to the measures of the Pharaoh, + + [Pharaoh is the Hebrew form of the Egyptian Peraa--or Phrah. "The + great house," "sublime house," or "high gate" is the literal + meaning.] + +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 influence. + +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 himself 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 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 eyebrows, 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 Amemi. + +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 the head, made of ivory, + + [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] + +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.-- +[Castor oil, which was used in the lamps.] + +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 confined 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, + + [Egyptians belonging to the higher classes wore wigs on their shaven + heads. Several are preserved in museums.] + +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. + +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 Pharaoh sick?" asked the prelate. + +"No, father. She is well--even to wantonness, since--wishing to prove +the swiftness of her horses--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 had hitherto on the ground. + +"But," said the young priest, and now his eyes fell, "which can surely be +no crime. When Ra--[The Egyptian Sun-god.]--in his golden bark sails +across the heavens, his light falls as freely and as bountifully on the +hut of the despised poor as on the Palace of the Pharaohs; and shall the +tender human heart withhold 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 perishable learning, which the past +has won for you as much as for me--nothing but certain perceptions and +experiences 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 learning 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 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 symmetrical 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 commanding himself; on the other, an amiable desire +to overlook the faults and defects of the world, and to contemplate life +as it painted itself in the transfiguring magic-mirror of his poet's +soul. Frankness and enjoyment 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 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 firmly held the young man, +"nay, to my sorrow I must chastise you; and yet," he said, stepping back +and taking 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 institution 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 to, 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 easy for +them to say that he who errs in one point may as well fail in all? In +questions of faith, my son, nothing is insignificant. If we open one +tower 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 transgressed 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, 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 lie 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 profit and our own." + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +Pentauer 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. + + [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 + London which, like the first mentioned, has come down to us from the + 18th dynasty, takes the third. Also see Herodotus II. 84. Diodorus + I. 82.] + +The 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 returned 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 was suffering, and it was left to the principal medical staff of the +sanctuary to select that 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, according to every +indication, very considerable; but it was natural that physicians, who +stood by the bed of 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 comrade 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 + + [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 surgeons.] + +for his special province at Heliopolis, and would certainly have attained +the dignity of teacher there if an impediment 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 +defect springs the saving of our life. + +Thus, while the companions of Nebsecht were employed 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 +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 profession 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 unavoidable 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 required to expound to his friend the peculiarities of +organic beings whose development he had been the first to detect. + +The poet was dear in the sight of Nebsecht, and he loved Pentaur, who +possessed all the gifts he lacked; 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 +understanding its most difficult points; so it happened that Nebsecht +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 object under the table, threw a cover over +it, and hid a sharp flint scalpel + + [The Egyptians seem to have preferred to use flint instruments for + surgical purposes, at any rate for the opening of bodies and for + circumcision. Many flint instruments have been found and preserved + in museums.] + +fixed into a wooden handle, which 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 idleness. + +The solitary lamp, which was fixed on a high stand near his chair, shed a +scanty light, which, however, sufficed to show him his trusted friend +Pentaur, who had disturbed Nebsecht in his prohibited occupations. +Nebsecht 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 continued 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 law sentenced forgers to lose a hand.] + +"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?" + + [Small statuettes, placed in graves to help the dead in the work + performed in the under-world. They have axes and ploughs in their + hands, and seed-bags on their backs. The sixth chapter of the Book + of the Dead is inscribed on nearly all.] + +"Nonsense." + +"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 netherworld,' 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; leaned over the animal and +said: + +"How curious! the little beast still lives and breathes; a man would have +long been dead under such treatment. 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 not deny that you are master in +that art." + + [Toth is the god of the learned and of physicians. The Ibis was + sacred to him, and he was usually represented as Ibis-headed. Ra + created him "a beautiful light to show the name of his evil enemy." + Originally the Dfoon-god, he became the lord of time and measure. + He is the weigher, the philosopher among the gods, the lord of + writing, of art and of learning. The Greeks called him Hermes + Trismegistus, i.e. threefold or "very great" which was, in fact, in + imitation of the Egyptians, whose name Toth or Techud signified + twofold, in the same way "very great"] + +"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 paraschites." + +"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." + +"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." + + [Besa, the god of the toilet of the Egyptians. He was represented + as a deformed pigmy. He led the women to conquest in love, and the + men in war. He was probably of Arab origin.] + +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 +clothing, will you go and ask the high-priest if I have leave to quit the +temple." + +"He commissioned me to send a leech to the 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 offerings for +the temple from the dying. Go, while I undress, 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." + + [In Egypt, as in Palestine, beasts trod out the corn, as we learn + from many pictures m the catacombs, even in the remotest ages; + often with the addition of a weighted sledge, to the runners of + which rollers are attached. It is now called noreg.] + +"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. + +"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? + + [Calendars have been preserved, the completest is the papyrus + Sallier IV., which has been admirably treated by F. Chabas. Many + days are noted as lucky, unlucky, etc. In the temples many + Calendars of feasts have been found, the most perfect at Medinet + Abu, deciphered by Dumich.] + +The child of a paraschites 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 + + [The Pastophori were an order of priests to which the physicians + belonged.] + +Teta, with his friend as singer of the litany. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +Pentaur knew where to seek Gagabu, for he himself had been invited to the +banquet which the prophet had prepared in honor of two sages who had +lately come to the House of Seti from the university of Chennu. + + [Chennu was situated on a bend of the Nile, not far from the Nubian + frontier; it is now called Gebel Silsilch; it was in very ancient + times the seat of a celebrated seminary.] + +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 +armchairs. 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, + + [Gazelles were tamed for domestic animals: we find them in the + representations 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.] + +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. + + [Cellars maintain the mean temperature of the climate, and in Egypt + are hot Wine was best preserved in shady and airy lofts.] + +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, snowwhite 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--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 reference 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,--[Some of them are still in existence]--"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 can 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 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, pointing 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,--[One of the orders of priests in +the Egyptian hierarchy]--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 prescribed 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-- + + He is one only, Alone, without equal; + Dwelling alone in the holiest of holies." + + [Hymn to Amon preserved in a papyrus roll at Bulaq, and deciphered + by Grehaut and L. Stern.] + +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 Gagabu, "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." + + [A particularly solemn festival in honor of Amon-Chem, held in the + temple of Medinet-Abu.] + +"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 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 +overthrew 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 sun shines +brighter than an oil-lamp? Let Pentuar alone, I say; or you will do as +the man did, who, for fear of the toothache, 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 +ourselves!" + +"The enemy is not unknown to us also," said the elder priest from 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."--["Typhonisch," belonging to Typhon or Seth.--Translator.] + +"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; + + [At no period Egyptian writers use more Semitic words than during + the reigns of Rameses II. and his son Mernephtah.] + +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 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 attempt," replied Ameni. +"We have endured much already, 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 Anion here without delay to +hold a council. Each must first in his holy of holies seek good counsel +of the Celestials. When we have come to a 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 highpriest, "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 observer of the starry heavens, and a +most skilled interpreter 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 benevolently, "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," 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-fellows called him the +wild ass on account of his unruliness, 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 Cheraw, "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. Constant contests with them increased +that roughness which now makes him the terror of his subordinates and +alienates 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 +disposition, 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.] + +"I have often heard the deeds of the Mohar spoken of," said the old +priest from Chennu, "yet I do not exactly 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, + + [Corresponding to our minister of war. A person of the highest + importance even in the earliest times.] + +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 attained the highest consideration and vast wealth, escorted +home the niece of the King Hor-em-lieb, 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 grandfather of our sovereign, and in the +king's veins, from his mother's side, flows the blood of the legitimate +descendants 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 acuteness?" + +"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, +and has always been earnestly devout from his boyhood. 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 +unfortunately, 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." + +"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, interrupting 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 certainly 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 impulses 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. Covetousness 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 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 although lie 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 superhuman 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." + + [In the demotic papyrus preserved at Bulaq (novel by Setnau) first + treated by H. Brugsch, the following words occur: "Is it not the + law, which unites one to another?" Betrothed brides are mentioned, + for instance on the sarcophagus of Unnefer at Bulaq.] + +"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 interment, and then before the time of mourning was over, +hastened back to Syria, where, while the king returned 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 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 +fiends for a reward. But the omniscient 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 + + [Red was the color of Seth and Typhon. The evil one is named the + Red, as for instance in the papyrus of fibers. Red-haired men were + typhonic.] + +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. Pestilence and boils has he called down on Mena, and +barrenness and heartache 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 remonstrances 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 wandering husband, +and remains childless. It is hard to me to understand how you, Gagabu, +who so often absolve 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 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 it +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 goodness 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, 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 excellent, 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." + + + + +ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: + +A dirty road serves when it makes for the goal +Colored cakes in the shape of beasts +Deficient are as guilty in their eyes as the idle +For fear of the toothache, had his sound teeth drawn +Hatred between man and man +Hatred for all that hinders the growth of light +How tender is thy severity +Judge only by appearances, and never enquire into the causes +Often happens that apparent superiority does us damage +Seditious words are like sparks, which are borne by the wind +The scholar's ears are at his back: when he is flogged +Title must not be a bill of fare +Youth should be modest, and he was assertive + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK UARDA BY GEORG EBERS, V1 *** + +******This file should be named 5439.txt or 5439.zip ******** + +This eBook was produced by David Widger + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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