"I am obeying. I examine the nomarchs, I look at the country and the people. I listen to reports of scribes, but I understand nothing; this poisons my life and astounds me.

"When I have to do with the army, I know everything,--how many soldiers there are, how many horses, chariots, which officers drink or neglect their service, and which do their duty. I know, too, what to do with an army. When on a plain there is a hostile corps, I must take two corps to beat it. If the enemy is in a defensive position, I should not move without three corps. When the enemy is undisciplined and fights in unordered crowds against a thousand, I send five hundred of our soldiers and beat him. When the opposing side has a thousand men with axes, and I a thousand, I rush at them and finish those troops, if I have a hundred men with slings in addition.

"In the army, holy father," continued Rameses, "everything is as visible as the fingers on my hand, and to every question an answer is ready which my mind comprehends. Meanwhile in the management of a province I not only see nothing, but there is such confusion in my head that more than once I forget the object of my journey.

"Answer me, therefore, sincerely, as a priest and an officer: What does this mean? Are the nomarchs deceiving me, or am I incompetent?"

The holy prophet fell to thinking.

"Whether they attempt to deceive thee, worthiness," answered he, "I know not, for I have not examined their acts. It seems to me, however, that they explain nothing, because they themselves comprehend nothing.

The nomarchs and their scribes," continued the priest, "are like decurions in an army; each one knows his ten men and reports on them.

Each commands those under him. But the decurion knows not the general plan made by leaders of the army. The nomarchs and the scribes write down everything that happens in their province, and lay those reports at the feet of the pharaoh. But only the supreme council extracts from them the honey of wisdom."

"But that honey is just what I need," said the prince. "Why do I not get it?"

Mentezufis shook his head.

"Wisdom of the state," said he, "belongs to the priesthood; therefore only the man who is devoted to the G.o.ds can obtain it. Meanwhile, worthiness, though reared by priests, thou pushest thyself away from the temples decisively."

"How is that? Then, if I do not become a priest, will ye not explain to me?"

"There are things, worthiness, which thou mayest know even now, as erpatr, there are others which thou wilt know when thou art the pharaoh. There are still others which only a high priest may know."

"Every pharaoh is a high priest," interrupted the prince.

"Not every pharaoh. Besides, even among high priests there are grades of difference."

"Then," cried the enraged heir, "ye hide the order of the state from me, and I shall not be able to carry out the commands of my father?"

"What the prince needs may be known," answered Mentezufis, quietly, "for thou hast the inferior priestly consecration. Those things, however, are hidden behind the veil in temples, which no one will dare to draw aside without due preparation."

"I will draw it."

"May the G.o.ds defend Egypt from such a misfortune!" replied the priest, as he raised both his hands. "Dost thou not know, worthiness, that a thunderbolt would kill any man who without the needed ceremonies should touch the veil? Were the prince to take to the temple any slave or condemned criminal and let him stretch out his hand, the man would die that same instant."

"For ye would kill him."

"Each one of us would die just like an ordinary criminal were he to approach the altar sacrilegiously. In presence of the G.o.ds, my prince, a pharaoh or a priest means as little as a slave."

"What am I to do, then?" asked Rameses.

"Seek an answer to thy trouble in the temple, after thou hast purified thyself by prayers and fasting," answered the priest. "While Egypt is Egypt, no ruler has gained wisdom of state in another way."

"I will meditate over this," said the prince. "Though I see from thy words that the most venerable Mefres, and thou, holy prophet, wish to involve me in ceremonies as ye have involved my father."

"Not at all. Worthiness, if thou as pharaoh would limit thyself to commanding the army, thou mightst take part in ceremonies a few times a year merely, for on other occasions the high priest would be thy subst.i.tute. But if thou wish to learn the secrets of temples, thou must honor the G.o.ds, for they are the fountain of wisdom."

CHAPTER XXIV

Rameses saw now that either he would not carry out the commands of the pharaoh or that he must yield to the will of the priesthood; this filled him with dislike and anger. Hence he did not hurry toward the secrets hidden in temples. He had time yet for fasting and devotional exercises; so he took part all the more zealously in feasts which were given in his honor.

Tutmosis, a master in every amus.e.m.e.nt, had just returned, and brought the prince pleasant news from Sarah. She was in good health and looked well, which concerned Rameses less at that time. But the priests gave such a horoscope to the coming child that the prince was delighted.

They a.s.sured him that the child would be a son, greatly gifted by the G.o.ds, and if his father loved him he would during life obtain high honor.

The prince laughed at the second part of this prediction. "Their wisdom is wonderful," said he to Tutmosis. "They know that it will be a son, while I, its father, do not know; and they doubt whether I shall love it, though it is easy to divine that I shall love the child even should it be a daughter. And as to honor for it, let them be at rest; I will occupy myself with that question."

In the month Pachons (January, February) the heir pa.s.sed through the province of Ka, where he was received by the nomarch Sofra. The city of Anu lay about seven hours of a foot journey from Atribis, but the prince was three days on this journey. At thought of the fasts and prayers which were awaiting him during initiation into temple secrets, Rameses felt a growing wish for amus.e.m.e.nts. His retinue divined this; hence pleasure followed pleasure.

Again, on the road over which he travelled to Atribis, appeared throngs of people with shouts, flowers, and music. The enthusiasm reached its height at the city. It even happened that a certain gigantic laborer threw himself under the chariot of the viceroy. But when Rameses held in the horses, a number of young women stepped forth from the crowd and wreathed the whole chariot with flowers.

"Still they love me!" thought the prince.

In the province of Ka he did not ask the nomarch about the income of the pharaoh, he did not visit factories, he did not command to read reports to him; he knew that he would understand nothing, so he deferred those occupations till the time of his initiation. But once, when he saw that the temple of the G.o.d Sebak stood on a lofty eminence, he desired to ascend the pylon and examine the surrounding country.

The worthy Sofra accomplished at once the will of the heir, who, when he found himself on the summit of the pylon, pa.s.sed a couple of hours with great delight there.

The province of Ka was a fertile plain. A number of ca.n.a.ls and branches of the Nile pa.s.sed through it in every direction, like a network of silver and lapis lazuli. Melons and wheat sown in November were ripening. On the fields were crowds of naked people who were gathering cuc.u.mbers or planting cotton. The land was covered with small buildings which at points were close together and formed villages.

Most of the dwellings, especially those in the fields, were mud huts covered with straw and palm leaves. In the towns the houses were walled, had flat roofs, and looked like white cubes with holes in places where there were doors and windows. Very often on such a cube was another somewhat smaller, and on that a third still smaller, and each story was painted a different color. Under the fiery sun of Egypt those houses looked like great pearls, sapphires, and rubies, scattered about on the green of the fields, and surrounded by palms and acacias.

From that place Rameses saw a phenomenon which arrested his attention.

Near the temples the houses were more beautiful, and more people were moving in the fields about them.

"The lands of the priests are the most valuable," thought he; and once again he ran over with his eyes the temples great and small, of which he saw between ten and twenty from the pylon.

But since he had agreed with Herhor, and needed the services of the priesthood, he did not care to occupy himself longer with that problem.

In the course of the following days the worthy Sofra arranged a series of hunts for Rameses, setting out toward the east from Atribis. Around the ca.n.a.ls they shot birds with arrows; some they snared in an immense net trap which took in a number of tens of them, or they let out falcons against those which were flying at freedom. When the prince's retinue entered the eastern desert, great hunts began with dogs and panthers against wild beasts. Of these they killed and seized, in the course of some days, a couple of hundred.

When the worthy Sofra noticed that the prince had had enough of amus.e.m.e.nt in the open air and of company intents, he ceased hunting and brought his guest by the shortest road to Atribis.

They arrived about four hours after midday, and the nomarch invited all to a feast in his palace.

He conducted the prince to a bath, he a.s.sisted at the bathing, and brought out from his own chest perfumes wherewith to anoint Rameses.

Then he oversaw the barber who arranged the viceroy's hair; next he kneeled down on the pavement and implored the prince to accept new robes from him.

These were a newly woven tunic covered with embroidery, a skirt worked with pearls, and a mantle interwoven with gold very thickly, but so delicate that it could be held between a man's ten fingers.

The heir accepted this graciously, declaring that he had never received a gift of such beauty.

The sun set, and the nomarch conducted the prince to the hall of entertainment.

It was a large court surrounded by columns and paved with mosaic. All the walls were covered with paintings representing scenes in the lives of the ancestors of Sofra; hence expeditions by sea, hunts, and battles. Over the s.p.a.ce, instead of a roof, was a giant b.u.t.terfly with many-colored wings which were moved by hidden slaves to freshen the atmosphere. In bronze holders fastened to the columns blazed bright tapers which gave out smoke with fragrance.