In the middle of the valley walked Nefert and the pioneer, with the
princess Bent-Anat and Pentaur who accompanied her.
When these two had come out of the hut of the paraschites, they stood
opposite each other in silence. The royal maiden pressed her hand to
her heart, and, like one who is thirsty, drank in the pure air of the
mountain valley with deeply drawn breath; she felt as if released from
some overwhelming burden, as if delivered from some frightful danger.
At last she turned to her companion, who gazed earnestly at the ground.
"What an hour!" she said.
Pentaur's tall figure did not move, but he bowed his head in assent, as
if he were in a dream. Bent-Anat now saw him for the first time in fall
daylight; her large eyes rested on him with admiration, and she asked:
"Art thou the priest, who yesterday, after my first visit to this house,
so readily restored me to cleanness?"
"I am he," replied Pentaur.
"I recognized thy voice, and I am grateful to thee, for it was thou that
didst strengthen my courage to follow the impulse of my heart, in spite
of my spiritual guides, and to come here again. Thou wilt defend me if
others blame me."
"I came here to pronounce thee unclean."
"Then thou hast changed thy mind?" asked Bent-Anat, and a smile of
contempt curled her lips.
"I follow a high injunction, that commands us to keep the old
institutions sacred. If touching a paraschites, it is said, does not
defile a princess, whom then can it defile? for whose garment is more
spotless than hers?"
"But this is a good man with all his meanness," interrupted Bent-Anat,
"and in spite of the disgrace, which is the bread of life to him as
honor is to us. May the nine great Gods forgive me! but he who is in
there is loving, pious and brave, and pleases me--and thou, thou,
who didst think yesterday to purge away the taint of his touch with a
word--what prompts thee today to cast him with the lepers?"
"The admonition of an enlightened man, never to give up any link of
the old institutions; because thereby the already weakened chain may be
broken, and fall rattling to the ground."
"Then thou condemnest me to uncleanness for the sake of all old
superstition, and of the populace, but not for my actions? Thou art
silent? Answer me now, if thou art such a one as I took the for, freely
and sincerely; for it concerns the peace of my soul." Pentaur breathed
hard; and then from the depths of his soul, tormented by doubts, these
deeply-felt words forced themselves as if wrung from him; at first
softly, but louder as he went on.
"Thou dost compel me to say what I had better not even think; but rather
will I sin against obedience than against truth, the pure daughter
of the Sun, whose aspect, Bent-Anat, thou dost wear. Whether the
paraschites is unclean by birth or not, who am I that I should decide?
But to me this man appeared--as to thee--as one moved by the same pure
and holy emotions as stir and bless me and mine, and thee and every
soul born of woman; and I believe that the impressions of this hour have
touched thy soul as well as mine, not to taint, but to purify. If I am
wrong, may the many-named Gods forgive me, Whose breath lives and works
in the paraschites as well as in thee and me, in Whom I believe, and to
Whom I will ever address my humble songs, louder and more joyfully, as I
learn that all that lives and breathes, that weeps and rejoices, is the
image of their sublime nature, and born to equal joy and equal sorrow."
Pentaur had raised his eyes to heaven; now they met the proud and joyful
radiance of the princess' glance, while she frankly offered him her
hand. He humbly kissed her robe, but she said:
"Nay--not so. Lay thy hand in blessing on mine. Thou art a man and a
true priest. Now I can be satisfied to be regarded as unclean, for my
father also desires that, by us especially, the institutions of the past
that have so long continued should be respected, for the sake of the
people. Let us pray in common to the Gods, that these poor people may
be released from the old ban. How beautiful the world might be, if men
would but let man remain what the Celestials have made him. But Paaker
and poor Nefert are waiting in the scorching sun-come, follow me."
She went forward, but after a few steps she turned round to him, and
asked:
"What is thy name?"
"Pentaur."
"Thou then art the poet of the House of Seti?"
"They call me so."
Bent-Anat stood still a moment, gazing full at him as at a kinsman whom
we meet for the first time face to face, and said:
"The Gods have given thee great gifts, for thy glance reaches farther
and pierces deeper than that of other men; and thou canst say in words
what we can only feel--I follow thee willingly!"
Pentaur blushed like a boy, and said, while Paaker and Nefert came
nearer to them:
"Till to-day life lay before me as if in twilight; but this moment shows
it me in another light. I have seen its deepest shadows; and," he added
in a low tone "how glorious its light can be."
CHAPTER VII.
An hour later, Bent-Anat and her train of followers stood before the
gate of the House of Seti.
Swift as a ball thrown from a man's hand, a runner had sprung forward
and hurried on to announce the approach of the princess to the
chief priest. She stood alone in her chariot, in advance of all her
companions, for Pentaur had found a place with Paaker. At the gate of
the temple they were met by the head of the haruspices.
The great doors of the pylon were wide open, and afforded a view into
the forecourt of the sanctuary, paved with polished squares of
stone, and surrounded on three sides with colonnades. The walls and
architraves, the pillars and the fluted cornice, which slightly curved
in over the court, were gorgeous with many colored figures and painted
decorations. In the middle stood a great sacrificial altar, on which
burned logs of cedar wood, whilst fragrant balls of Kyphi
[Kyphi was a celebrated Egyptian incense. Recipes for its
preparation have been preserved in the papyrus of Ebers, in the
laboratories of the temples, and elsewhere. Parthey had three
different varieties prepared by the chemist, L. Voigt, in Berlin.
Kyphi after the formula of Dioskorides was the best. It consisted
of rosin, wine, rad, galangae, juniper berries, the root of the
aromatic rush, asphalte, mastic, myrrh, Burgundy grapes, and honey.]
were consumed by the flames, filling the wide space with their heavy
perfume. Around, in semi-circular array, stood more than a hundred
white-robed priests, who all turned to face the approaching princess,
and sang heart-rending songs of lamentation.
Many of the inhabitants of the Necropolis had collected on either side
of the lines of sphinxes, between which the princess drove up to the
Sanctuary. But none asked what these songs of lamentation might signify,
for about this sacred place lamentation and mystery for ever lingered.
"Hail to the child of Rameses!"--"All hail to the daughter of the Sun!"
rang from a thousand throats; and the assembled multitude bowed almost
to the earth at the approach of the royal maiden.
At the pylon, the princess descended from her chariot, and preceded by
the chief of the haruspices, who had gravely and silently greeted her,
passed on to the door of the temple. But as she prepared to cross the
forecourt, suddenly, without warning, the priests' chant swelled to a
terrible, almost thundering loudness, the clear, shrill voice of the
Temple scholars rising in passionate lament, supported by the deep and
threatening roll of the basses.
Bent-Anat started and checked her steps. Then she walked on again.
But on the threshold of the door, Ameni, in full pontifical robes, stood
before her in the way, his crozier extended as though to forbid her
entrance.
"The advent of the daughter of Rameses in her purity," he cried in loud
and passionate tones, "augurs blessing to this sanctuary; but this
abode of the Gods closes its portals on the unclean, be they slaves or
princes. In the name of the Immortals, from whom thou art descended, I
ask thee, Bent-Anat, art thou clean, or hast thou, through the touch of
the unclean, defiled thyself and contaminated thy royal hand?"
Deep scarlet flushed the maiden's cheeks, there was a rushing sound in
her ears as of a stormy sea surging close beside her, and her bosom rose
and fell in passionate emotion. The kingly blood in her veins boiled
wildly; she felt that an unworthy part had been assigned to her in
a carefully-premeditated scene; she forgot her resolution to accuse
herself of uncleanness, and already her lips were parted in vehement
protest against the priestly assumption that so deeply stirred her
to rebellion, when Ameni, who placed himself directly in front of the
Princess, raised his eyes, and turned them full upon her with all the
depths of their indwelling earnestness.
The words died away, and Bent-Anat stood silent, but she endured the
gaze, and returned it proudly and defiantly.
The blue veins started in Ameni's forehead; yet he repressed the
resentment which was gathering like thunder clouds in his soul, and
said, with a voice that gradually deviated more and more from its usual
moderation:
"For the second time the Gods demand through me, their representative:
Hast thou entered this holy place in order that the Celestials may purge
thee of the defilement that stains thy body and soul?"
"My father will communicate the answer to thee," replied Bent-Anat
shortly and proudly.
"Not to me," returned Ameni, "but to the Gods, in whose name I now
command thee to quit this sanctuary, which is defiled by thy presence."
Bent-Anat's whole form quivered. "I will go," she said with sullen
dignity.
She turned to recross the gateway of the Pylon. At the first step her
glance met the eye of the poet. As one to whom it is vouchsafed to stand
and gaze at some great prodigy, so Pentaur had stood opposite the royal
maiden, uneasy and yet fascinated, agitated, yet with secretly uplifted
soul. Her deed seemed to him of boundless audacity, and yet one suited
to her true and noble nature. By her side, Ameni, his revered and
admired master, sank into insignificance; and when she turned to leave
the temple, his hand was raised indeed to hold her back, but as his
glance met hers, his hand refused its office, and sought instead to
still the throbbing of his overflowing heart.
The experienced priest, meanwhile, read the features of these two
guileless beings like an open book. A quickly-formed tie, he felt,
linked their souls, and the look which he saw them exchange startled
him. The rebellious princess had glanced at the poet as though claiming
approbation for her triumph, and Pentaur's eyes had responded to the
appeal.
One instant Ameni paused. Then he cried: "Bent-Anat!"
The princess turned to the priest, and looked at him gravely and
enquiringly.
Ameni took a step forward, and stood between her and the poet.
"Thou wouldst challenge the Gods to combat," he said sternly. "That is
bold; but such daring it seems to me has grown up in thee because thou
canst count on an ally, who stands scarcely farther from the Immortals
than I myself. Hear this:--to thee, the misguided child, much may be
forgiven. But a servant of the Divinity," and with these words he turned
a threatening glance on Pentaur--"a priest, who in the war of free-will
against law becomes a deserter, who forgets his duty and his oath--he
will not long stand beside thee to support thee, for he--even though
every God had blessed him with the richest gifts--he is damned. We drive
him from among us, we curse him, we--"
At these words Bent-Anat looked now at Ameni, trembling with excitement,
now at Pentaur standing opposite to her. Her face was red and white
by turns, as light and shade chase each other on the ground when at
noon-day a palm-grove is stirred by a storm.
The poet took a step towards her.
She felt that if he spoke it would be to defend all that she had done,
and to ruin himself. A deep sympathy, a nameless anguish seized her
soul, and before Pentaur could open his lips, she had sunk slowly down
before Ameni, saying in low tones:
"I have sinned and defiled myself; thou hast said it--as Pentaur said it
by the hut of the paraschites. Restore me to cleanness, Ameni, for I am
unclean."
Like a flame that is crushed out by a hand, so the fire in the
high-priest's eye was extinguished. Graciously, almost lovingly, he
looked down on the princess, blessed her and conducted her before the
holy of holies, there had clouds of incense wafted round her, anointed
her with the nine holy oils, and commanded her to return to the royal
castle.
Yet, said he, her guilt was not expiated; she should shortly learn by
what prayers and exercises she might attain once more to perfect purity
before the Gods, of whom he purposed to enquire in the holy place.
During all these ceremonies the priests stationed in the forecourt
continued their lamentations.
The people standing before the temple listened to the priest's chant,
and interrupted it from time to time with ringing cries of wailing, for
already a dark rumor of what was going on within had spread among the
multitude.
The sun was going down. The visitors to the Necropolis must soon be
leaving it, and Bent-Anat, for whose appearance the people impatiently
waited, would not show herself. One and another said the princess had
been cursed, because she had taken remedies to the fair and injured
Uarda, who was known to many of them.
Among the curious who had flocked together were many embalmers,
laborers, and humble folk, who lived in the Necropolis. The mutinous and
refractory temper of the Egyptians, which brought such heavy suffering
on them under their later foreign rulers, was aroused, and rising
with every minute. They reviled the pride of the priests, and their
senseless, worthless, institutions. A drunken soldier, who soon reeled
back into the tavern which he had but just left, distinguished himself
as ringleader, and was the first to pick up a heavy stone to fling at
the huge brass-plated temple gates. A few boys followed his example
with shouts, and law-abiding men even, urged by the clamor of fanatical
women, let themselves be led away to stone-flinging and words of abuse.
Within the House of Seti the priests' chant went on uninterruptedly;
but at last, when the noise of the crowd grew louder, the great gate was
thrown open, and with a solemn step Ameni, in full robes, and followed
by twenty pastophori--[An order of priests]--who bore images of the Gods
and holy symbols on their shoulders--Ameni walked into the midst of the
crowd.
All were silent.
"Wherefore do you disturb our worship?" he asked loudly and calmly.
A roar of confused cries answered him, in which the frequently repeated
name of Bent-Anat could alone be distinguished.
Ameni preserved his immoveable composure, and, raising his crozier, he
cried--
"Make way for the daughter of Rameses, who sought and has found
purification from the Gods, who behold the guilt of the highest as
of the lowest among you. They reward the pious, but they punish the
offender. Kneel down and let us pray that they may forgive you, and
bless both you and your children."
Ameni took the holy Sistrum
[A rattling metal instrument used by the Egyptians in the service of
the Gods. Many specimens are extant in Museums. Plutarch describes
it correctly, thus: "The Sistrum is rounded above, and the loop
holds the four bars which are shaken." On the bend of the Sistrum
they often set the head of a cat with a human face.]
from one of the attendant pastophori, and held it on high; the priests
behind him raised a solemn hymn, and the crowd sank on their knees; nor
did they move till the chant ceased and the high-priest again cried out:
"The Immortals bless you by me their servant. Leave this spot and make
way for the daughter of Rameses."
With these words he withdrew into the temple, and the patrol, without
meeting with any opposition, cleared the road guarded by Sphinxes which
led to the Nile.
As Bent-Anat mounted her chariot Ameni said "Thou art the child of
kings. The house of thy father rests on the shoulders of the people.
Loosen the old laws which hold them subject, and the people will conduct
themselves like these fools."
Ameni retired. Bent-Anat slowly arranged the reins in her hand, her eyes
resting the while on the poet, who, leaning against a door-post, gazed
at her in beatitude. She let her whip fall to the ground, that he might
pick it up and restore it to her, but he did not observe it. A runner
sprang forward and handed it to the princess, whose horses started off,
tossing themselves and neighing.
Pentaur remained as if spell-bound, standing by the pillar, till the
rattle of the departing wheels on the flag-way of the Avenue of Sphinxes
had altogether died away, and the reflection of the glowing sunset
painted the eastern hills with soft and rosy hues.
The far-sounding clang of a brass gong roused the poet from his ecstasy.
It was the tomtom calling him to duty, to the lecture on rhetoric which
at this hour he had to deliver to the young priests. He laid his left
hand to his heart, and pressed his right hand to his forehead, as if
to collect in its grasp his wandering thoughts; then silently and
mechanically he went towards the open court in which his disciples
awaited him. But instead of, as usual, considering on the way the
subject he was to treat, his spirit and heart were occupied with the
occurrences of the last few hours. One image reigned supreme in his
imagination, filling it with delight--it was that of the fairest woman,
who, radiant in her royal dignity and trembling with pride, had thrown
herself in the dust for his sake. He felt as if her action had invested
her whole being with a new and princely worth, as if her glance had
brought light to his inmost soul, he seemed to breathe a freer air, to
be borne onward on winged feet.
In such a mood he appeared before his hearers. When he found himself
confronting all the the well-known faces, he remembered what it was
he was called upon to do. He supported himself against the wall of the
court, and opened the papyrus-roll handed to him by his favorite pupil,
the young Anana. It was the book which twenty-four hours ago he had
promised to begin upon. He looked now upon the characters that covered
it, and felt that he was unable to read a word.
With a powerful effort he collected himself, and looking upwards tried
to find the thread he had cut at the end of yesterday's lecture, and
intended to resume to-day; but between yesterday and to-day, as it
seemed to him, lay a vast sea whose roaring surges stunned his memory
and powers of thought.
His scholars, squatting cross-legged on reed mats before him, gazed in
astonishment on their silent master who was usually so ready of speech,
and looked enquiringly at each other. A young priest whispered to his
neighbor, "He is praying--" and Anana noticed with silent anxiety the
strong hand of his teacher clutching the manuscript so tightly that the
slight material of which it consisted threatened to split.
At last Pentaur looked down; he had found a subject. While he was
looking upwards his gaze fell on the opposite wall, and the painted
name of the king with the accompanying title "the good God" met his eye.
Starting from these words he put this question to his hearers, "How do
we apprehend the Goodness of the Divinity?"
He challenged one priest after another to treat this subject as if he
were standing before his future congregation.
Several disciples rose, and spoke with more or less truth and feeling.
At last it came to Anana's turn, who, in well-chosen words, praised
the purpose-full beauty of animate and inanimate creation, in which the
goodness of Amon
[Amon, that is to say, "the hidden one." He was the God of Thebes,
which was under his aegis, and after the Hykssos were expelled from
the Nile-valley, he was united with Ra of Heliopolis and endowed
with the attributes of all the remaining Gods. His nature was more
and more spiritualized, till in the esoteric philosophy of the time
of the Rameses he is compared to the All filling and All guiding
intelligence. He is "the husband of his mother, his own father, and
his own son," As the living Osiris, he is the soul and spirit of all
creation.]
of Ra,
[Ra, originally the Sun-God; later his name was introduced into the
pantheistic mystic philosophy for that of the God who is the
Universe.]
and Ptah,
[Ptah is the Greek Henhaistas, the oldest of the Gods, the great
maker of the material for the creation, the "first beginner," by
whose side the seven Chnemu stand, as architects, to help him, and
who was named "the lord of truth," because the laws and conditions
of being proceeded from him. He created also the germ of light, he
stood therefore at the head of the solar Gods, and was called the
creator of ice, from which, when he had cleft it, the sun and the
moan came forth. Hence his name "the opener."]
as well as of the other Gods, finds expression.
Pentaur listened to the youth with folded arms, now looking at him
enquiringly, now adding approbation. Then taking up the thread of the
discourse when it was ended, he began himself to speak.
Like obedient falcons at the call of the falconer, thoughts rushed down
into his mind, and the divine passion awakened in his breast glowed and
shone through his inspired language that soared every moment on freer
and stronger wings. Melting into pathos, exulting in rapture, he praised
the splendor of nature; and the words flowed from his lips like a limpid
crystal-clear stream as he glorified the eternal order of things, and
the incomprehensible wisdom and care of the Creator--the One, who is one
alone, and great and without equal.
"So incomparable," he said in conclusion, "is the home which God has
given us. All that He--the One--has created is penetrated with His own
essence, and bears witness to His Goodness. He who knows how to find Him
sees Him everywhere, and lives at every instant in the enjoyment of His
glory. Seek Him, and when ye have found Him fall down and sing praises
before Him. But praise the Highest, not only in gratitude for the
splendor of that which he has created, but for having given us the
capacity for delight in his work. Ascend the mountain peaks and look on
the distant country, worship when the sunset glows with rubies, and the
dawn with roses, go out in the nighttime, and look at the stars as they
travel in eternal, unerring, immeasurable, and endless circles on silver
barks through the blue vault of heaven, stand by the cradle of the
child, by the buds of the flowers, and see how the mother bends over
the one, and the bright dew-drops fall on the other. But would you know
where the stream of divine goodness is most freely poured out, where the
grace of the Creator bestows the richest gifts, and where His holiest
altars are prepared? In your own heart; so long as it is pure and full
of love. In such a heart, nature is reflected as in a magic mirror, on
whose surface the Beautiful shines in three-fold beauty. There the eye
can reach far away over stream, and meadow, and hill, and take in the
whole circle of the earth; there the morning and evening-red shine,
not like roses and rubies, but like the very cheeks of the Goddess of
Beauty; there the stars circle on, not in silence, but with the mighty
voices of the pure eternal harmonies of heaven; there the child smiles
like an infant-god, and the bud unfolds to magic flowers; finally,
there thankfulness grows broader and devotion grows deeper, and we throw
ourselves into the arms of a God, who--as I imagine his glory--is a
God to whom the sublime nine great Gods pray as miserable and helpless
suppliants."
The tomtom which announced the end of the hour interrupted him.
Pentaur ceased speaking with a deep sigh, and for a minute not a scholar
moved.
At last the poet laid the papyrus roll out of his hand, wiped the sweat
from his hot brow, and walked slowly towards the gate of the court,
which led into the sacred grove of the temple. He had hardly crossed the
threshold when he felt a hand laid upon his shoulder.
He looked round. Behind him stood Ameni. "You fascinated your hearers,
my friend," said the high-priest, coldly; "it is a pity that only the
Harp was wanting."
Ameni's words fell on the agitated spirit of the poet like ice on the
breast of a man in fever. He knew this tone in his master's voice, for
thus he was accustomed to reprove bad scholars and erring priests; but
to him he had never yet so spoken.
"It certainly would seem," continued the high-priest, bitterly, "as if
in your intoxication you had forgotten what it becomes the teacher to
utter in the lecture-hall. Only a few weeks since you swore on my hands
to guard the mysteries, and this day you have offered the great secret
of the Unnameable one, the most sacred possession of the initiated, like
some cheap ware in the open market."
"Thou cuttest with knives," said Pentaur.
"May they prove sharp, and extirpate the undeveloped canker, the rank
weed from your soul," cried the high-priest. "You are young, too young;
not like the tender fruit-tree that lets itself be trained aright, and
brought to perfection, but like the green fruit on the ground, which
will turn to poison for the children who pick it up--yea even though it
fall from a sacred tree. Gagabu and I received you among us, against
the opinion of the majority of the initiated. We gainsaid all those
who doubted your ripeness because of your youth; and you swore to me,
gratefully and enthusiastically, to guard the mysteries and the law.
To-day for the first time I set you on the battle-field of life beyond
the peaceful shelter of the schools. And how have you defended the
standard that it was incumbent on you to uphold and maintain?"
"I did that which seemed to me to be right and true," answered Pentaur
deeply moved.
"Right is the same for you as for us--what the law prescribes; and what
is truth?"
"None has lifted her veil," said Pentaur, "but my soul is the offspring
of the soul-filled body of the All; a portion of the infallible spirit
of the Divinity stirs in my breast, and if it shows itself potent in
me--"
"How easily we may mistake the flattering voice of self-love for that of
the Divinity!"
"Cannot the Divinity which works and speaks in me--as in thee--as in
each of us--recognize himself and his own voice?"
"If the crowd were to hear you," Ameni interrupted him, "each would set
himself on his little throne, would proclaim the voice of the god within
him as his guide, tear the law to shreds, and let the fragments fly to
the desert on the east wind."
"I am one of the elect whom thou thyself hast taught to seek and to
find the One. The light which I gaze on and am blest, would strike the
crowd--I do not deny it--with blindness--"
"And nevertheless you blind our disciples with the dangerous glare-"
"I am educating them for future sages."
"And that with the hot overflow of a heart intoxicated with love!"
"Ameni!"
"I stand before you, uninvited, as your teacher, who reproves you out of
the law, which always and everywhere is wiser than the individual, whose
defender the king--among his highest titles--boasts of being, and to
which the sage bows as much as the common man whom we bring up to blind
belief--I stand before you as your father, who has loved you from a
child, and expected from none of his disciples more than from you; and
who will therefore neither lose you nor abandon the hope he has set upon
you--
"Make ready to leave our quiet house early tomorrow morning. You have
forfeited your office of teacher. You shall now go into the school of
life, and make yourself fit for the honored rank of the initiated which,
by my error, was bestowed on you too soon. You must leave your scholars
without any leave-taking, however hard it may appear to you. After the
star of Sothis
[The holy star of Isis, Sirius or the dog star, whose course in the
time of the Pharaohs coincided with the exact Solar year, and served
at a very early date as a foundation for the reckoning of time among
the Egyptians.]
has risen come for your instructions. You must in these next months try
to lead the priesthood in the temple of Hatasu, and in that post to win
back my confidence which you have thrown away. No remonstrance; to-night
you will receive my blessing, and our authority--you must greet the
rising sun from the terrace of the new scene of your labors. May the
Unnameable stamp the law upon your soul!"
Ameni returned to his room.
He walked restlessly to and fro.
On a little table lay a mirror; he looked into the clear metal pane,
and laid it back in its place again, as if he had seen some strange and
displeasing countenance.
The events of the last few hours had moved him deeply, and shaken his
confidence in his unerring judgment of men and things.
The priests on the other bank of the Nile were Bent-Anat's counsellors,
and he had heard the princess spoken of as a devout and gifted maiden.
Her incautious breach of the sacred institutions had seemed to him
to offer a welcome opportunity for humiliating--a member of the royal
family.
Now he told himself that he had undervalued this young creature that he
had behaved clumsily, perhaps foolishly, to her; for he did not for a
moment conceal from himself that her sudden change of demeanor resulted
much more from the warm flow of her sympathy, or perhaps of her,
affection, than from any recognition of her guilt, and he could not
utilize her transgression with safety to himself, unless she felt
herself guilty.
Nor was he of so great a nature as to be wholly free from vanity, and
his vanity had been deeply wounded by the haughty resistance of the
princess.
When he commanded Pentaur to meet the princess with words of reproof, he
had hoped to awaken his ambition through the proud sense of power over
the mighty ones of the earth.
And now?
How had his gifted admirer, the most hopeful of all his disciples, stood
the test.
The one ideal of his life, the unlimited dominion of the priestly idea
over the minds of men, and of the priesthood over the king himself, had
hitherto remained unintelligible to this singular young man.
He must learn to understand it.
"Here, as the least among a hundred who are his superiors, all the
powers of resistance of his soaring soul have been roused," said Ameni
to himself. "In the temple of Hatasu he will have to rule over the
inferior orders of slaughterers of victims and incense-burners; and,
by requiring obedience, will learn to estimate the necessity of it. The
rebel, to whom a throne devolves, becomes a tyrant!"
"Pentuar's poet soul," so he continued to reflect "has quickly yielded
itself a prisoner to the charm of Bent-Anat; and what woman could resist
this highly favored being, who is radiant in beauty as Ra-Harmachis, and
from whose lips flows speech as sweet as Techuti's. They ought never to
meet again, for no tie must bind him to the house of Rameses."
Again he paced to and fro, and murmured:
"How is this? Two of my disciples have towered above their fellows, in
genius and gifts, like palm trees above their undergrowth. I brought
them up to succeed me, to inherit my labors and my hopes.
"Mesu fell away;
[Mesu is the Egyptian name of Moses, whom we may consider as a
contemporary of Rameses, under whose successor the exodus of the
Jews from Egypt took place.]
and Pentaur may follow him. Must my aim be an unworthy one because it
does not attract the noblest? Not so. Each feels himself made of better
stuff than his companions in destiny, constitutes his own law, and fears
to see the great expended in trifles; but I think otherwise; like a
brook of ferruginous water from Lebanon, I mix with the great stream,
and tinge it with my color."
Thinking thus Ameni stood still.
Then he called to one of the so-called "holy fathers," his private
secretary, and said:
"Draw up at once a document, to be sent to all the priests'-colleges in
the land. Inform them that the daughter of Rameses has lapsed seriously
from the law, and defiled herself, and direct that public--you hear me
public--prayers shall be put up for her purification in every temple.
Lay the letter before me to be signed within in hour. But no! Give me
your reed and palette; I will myself draw up the instructions."
The "holy father" gave him writing materials, and retired into the
background. Ameni muttered: "The King will do us some unheard-of
violence! Well, this writing may be the first arrow in opposition to his
lance."
CHAPTER VIII.
The moon was risen over the city of the living that lay opposite the
Necropolis of Thebes.
The evening song had died away in the temples, that stood about a mile
from the Nile, connected with each other by avenues of sphinxes and
pylons; but in the streets of the city life seemed only just really
awake.
The coolness, which had succeeded the heat of the summer day, tempted
the citizens out into the air, in front of their doors or on the
roofs and turrets of their houses; or at the tavern-tables, where they
listened to the tales of the story-tellers while they refreshed them
selves with beer, wine, and the sweet juice of fruits. Many simple folks
squatted in circular groups on the ground, and joined in the burden of
songs which were led by an appointed singer, to the sound of a tabor and
flute.
To the south of the temple of Amon stood the king's palace, and near it,
in more or less extensive gardens, rose the houses of the magnates
of the kingdom, among which, one was distinguished by it splendor and
extent.
Paaker, the king's pioneer, had caused it to be erected after the
death of his father, in the place of the more homely dwelling of his
ancestors, when he hoped to bring home his cousin, and install her as
its mistress. A few yards further to the east was another stately though
older and less splendid house, which Mena, the king's charioteer, had
inherited from his father, and which was inhabited by his wife Nefert
and her mother Isatuti, while he himself, in the distant Syrian land,
shared the tent of the king, as being his body-guard. Before the door
of each house stood servants bearing torches, and awaiting the long
deferred return home of their masters.
The gate, which gave admission to Paaker's plot of ground through the
wall which surrounded it, was disproportionately, almost ostentatiously,
high and decorated with various paintings. On the right hand and on the
left, two cedar-trunks were erected as masts to carry standards; he had
had them felled for the purpose on Lebanon, and forwarded by ship to
Pelusium on the north-east coast of Egypt. Thence they were conveyed by
the Nile to Thebes.
On passing through the gate one entered a wide, paved court-yard, at
the sides of which walks extended, closed in at the back, and with roofs
supported on slender painted wooden columns. Here stood the pioneer's
horses and chariots, here dwelt his slaves, and here the necessary store
of produce for the month's requirements was kept.
In the farther wall of this store-court was a very high doorway, that
led into a large garden with rows of well-tended trees and trellised
vines, clumps of shrubs, flowers, and beds of vegetables. Palms,
sycamores, and acacia-trees, figs, pomegranates, and jasmine throve
here particularly well--for Paaker's mother, Setchem, superintended the
labors of the gardeners; and in the large tank in the midst there was
never any lack of water for watering the beds and the roots of the
trees, as it was always supplied by two canals, into which wheels turned
by oxen poured water day and night from the Nile-stream.
On the right side of this plot of ground rose the one-storied dwelling
house, its length stretching into distant perspective, as it consisted
of a single row of living and bedrooms. Almost every room had its own
door, that opened into a veranda supported by colored wooden columns,
and which extended the whole length of the garden side of the house.
This building was joined at a right angle by a row of store-rooms, in
which the garden-produce in fruits and vegetables, the wine-jars, and
the possessions of the house in woven stuffs, skins, leather, and other
property were kept.
In a chamber of strong masonry lay safely locked up the vast riches
accumulated by Paaker's father and by himself, in gold and silver rings,
vessels and figures of beasts. Nor was there lack of bars of copper and
of precious stones, particularly of lapis-lazuli and malachite.
In the middle of the garden stood a handsomely decorated kiosk, and a
chapel with images of the Gods; in the background stood the statues of
Paaker's ancestors in the form of Osiris wrapped in mummy-cloths.
[The justified dead became Osiris; that is to say, attained to the
fullest union (Henosis) with the divinity.]
The faces, which were likenesses, alone distinguished these statues from
each other.
The left side of the store-yard was veiled in gloom, yet the moonlight
revealed numerous dark figures clothed only with aprons, the slaves of
the king's pioneer, who squatted on the ground in groups of five or six,
or lay near each other on thin mats of palm-bast, their hard beds.
Not far from the gate, on the right side of the court, a few lamps
lighted up a group of dusky men, the officers of Paaker's household, who
wore short, shirt-shaped, white garments, and who sat on a carpet round
a table hardly two feet high. They were eating their evening-meal,
consisting of a roasted antelope, and large flat cakes of bread. Slaves
waited on them, and filled their earthen beakers with yellow beer. The
steward cut up the great roast on the table, offered the intendant of
the gardens a piece of antelope-leg, and said:
[The Greeks and Romans report that the Egyptians were so addicted to
satire and pungent witticisms that they would hazard property and
life to gratify their love of mockery. The scandalous pictures in
the so-called kiosk of Medinet Habu, the caricatures in an
indescribable papyrus at Turin, confirm these statements. There is
a noteworthy passage in Flavius Vopiscus, that compares the
Egyptians to the French.]
"My arms ache; the mob of slaves get more and more dirty and
refractory."
"I notice it in the palm-trees," said the gardener, "you want so many
cudgels that their crowns will soon be as bare as a moulting bird."
"We should do as the master does," said the head-groom, "and get sticks
of ebony--they last a hundred years."
"At any rate longer than men's bones," laughed the chief neat-herd, who
had come in to town from the pioneer's country estate, bringing with him
animals for sacrifices, butter and cheese. "If we were all to follow the
master's example, we should soon have none but cripples in the servant's
house."
"Out there lies the lad whose collar-bone he broke yesterday," said the
steward, "it is a pity, for he was a clever mat-platter. The old lord hit softer." |
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