CHAPTER II
Straightway his worthiness Herhor directed his adjutant who carriedthe mace to take charge of the vanguard in place of Eunana. Then hecommanded that the military engines for hurling great stones leave theroad, and that the Greek soldiers facilitate passage for those enginesin difficult places. All vehicles and litters of staff-officers wereto move in the rear.
When Herhor issued commands, the adjutant bearing the fan approachedPentuer and asked,--
"Will it be possible to go by this highway again?"
"Why not?" answered the young priest. "But since two sacred beetleshave barred the way now, we must not go farther; some misfortune mighthappen."
"As it is, a misfortune has happened. Or hast thou not noticed thatPrince Rameses is angry at the minister? and our lord is notforgetful."
"It is not the prince who is offended with our lord, but our lord withthe prince, and he has reproached him. He has done well; for it seemsto the young prince, at present, that he is to be a second Menes."
"Or a Rameses the Great," put in the adjutant.
"Rameses the Great obeyed the gods; for this cause there areinscriptions praising him in all the temples. But Menes, the firstpharaoh of Egypt, was a destroyer of order, and thanks only to thefatherly kindness of the priests that his name is stillremembered,--though I would not give one brass uten on this, that themummy of Menes exists."
"My Pentuer," added the adjutant, "thou art a sage, hence knowest thatit is all one to us whether we have ten lords or eleven."
"But it is not all one to the people whether they have to find everyyear a mountain of gold for the priests, or two mountains of gold forthe priests and the pharaoh," answered Pentuer, while his eyesflashed.
"Thou art thinking of dangerous things," said the adjutant, in awhisper.
"But how often hast thou thyself grieved over the luxuries of thepharaoh's court and of the nomarchs?" inquired the priest inastonishment.
"Quiet, quiet! We will talk of this, but not now."
In spite of the sand the military engines, drawn each by two bullocks,moved in the desert more speedily than along the highway. With thefirst of them marched Eunana, anxiously. "Why has the ministerdeprived me of leadership over the vanguard? Does he wish to give me ahigher position?" asked he in his own mind.
Thinking out then a new career, and perhaps to dull the fears whichmade his heart quiver, he seized a pole and, where the sands weredeeper, propped the balista, or urged on the Greeks with an outcry.
They, however, paid slight attention to this officer.
The retinue had pushed on a good half hour through a winding ravinewith steep naked walls, when the vanguard halted a second time. Atthis point another ravine crossed the first; in the middle of itextended a rather broad canal.
The courier sent to the minister of war with notice of the obstaclebrought back a command to fill the canal immediately.
About a hundred soldiers with pickaxes and shovels rushed to the work.Some knocked out stones from the cliff; others threw them into theditch and covered them with sand.
Meanwhile from the depth of the ravine came a man with a pickaxeshaped like a stork's neck with the bill on it. He was an Egyptianslave, old and entirely naked. He looked for a while with the utmostamazement at the work of the soldiers; then, springing between them ona sudden, he shouted,--
"What are ye doing, vile people? This is a canal."
"But how darest thou use evil words against the warriors of hisholiness?" asked Eunana, who stood there.
"Thou must be an Egyptian and a great person, I see that," said theslave; "so I answer thee that this canal belongs to a mighty lord; heis the manager and secretary of one who bears the fan for hisworthiness the nomarch of Memphis. Be on thy guard or misfortune willstrike thee!"
"Do your work," said Eunana, with a patronizing tone, to the Greeksoldiers who began to look at the slave.
They did not understand his speech, but the tone of it arrested them.
"They are filling in all the time!" said the slave, with rising fear."Woe to thee!" cried he, rushing at one of the Greeks with hispickaxe.
The Greek pulled it from the man, struck him on the mouth, and broughtblood to his lips; then he threw sand into the canal again.
The slave, stunned by the blow, lost courage and fell to imploring.
"Lord," said he, "I dug this canal alone for ten years, in the nighttime and during festivals! My master promised that if I should bringwater to this little valley he would make me a servant in it, give meone fifth of the harvests, and grant me freedom--do you hear? Freedomto me and my three children!--O gods!"
He raised his hands and turned again to Eunana,--
"They do not understand me, these vagrants from beyond the sea,descendants of dogs, brothers to Jews and Phoenicians! But listen,lord, to me! For ten years, while other men went to fairs and dancesor sacred processions, I stole out into this dreary ravine. I did notgo to the grave of my mother, I only dug; I forgot the dead so as togive freedom with laud to my children, and to myself even one free daybefore death. Ye, O gods, be my witnesses how many times has nightfound me here! how many times have I heard the wailing cries of hyenasin this place, and seen the green eyes of wolves! But I did not flee,for whither was I, the unfortunate, to flee, when at every path terrorwas lurking, and in this canal freedom held me back by the feet? Once,beyond that turn there, a lion came out against me, the pharaoh ofbeasts. The pickaxe dropped from my hands, I knelt down before him,and I, as ye see me, said these words: 'O lord! is it thy pleasure toeat me? I am only a slave.' But the lion took pity, the wolf alsopassed by; even the treacherous bats spared my poor head; but thou, OEgyptian--"
The man stopped; he saw the retinue of Herhor approaching. By the fanhe knew him to be a great personage, and by the panther skin, apriest. He ran to the litter, therefore, knelt down, and struck thesand with his forehead.
"What dost thou wish, man?" asked the dignitary.
"O light of the sun, listen to me!" cried the slave. "May there be nogroans in thy chamber, may no misfortune follow thee! May thy workscontinue, and may the current not be interrupted when thou shalt sailby the Nile to the other shore--"
"I ask what thy wish is," repeated Herhor.
"Kind lord," said the man, "leader without caprice, who conquerest thefalse and createst the true, who art the father of the poor, thehusband of the widow, clothing for the motherless, permit me to spreadthy name as the equal of justice, most noble of the nobles."[1]
[1] Authentic speech of a slave.
"He wishes that this canal be not filled in," said Eunana.
Herhor shrugged his shoulders and pushed toward the place where theywere filling the canal. Then the despairing man seized his feet.
"Away with this creature!" cried his worthiness, pushing back asbefore the bite of a reptile.
The secretary, Pentuer, turned his head; his lean face had a grayishcolor. Eunana seized the man by the shoulders and pulled, but, unableto drag him away from the minister's feet, he summoned warriors. Aftera while Herhor, now liberated, passed to the other bank of the canal,and the warriors tore away the earth-worker, almost carrying him tothe end of the detachment. There they gave the man some tens of blowsof fists, and subalterns who always carried canes gave him some tensof blows of sticks, and at last threw him down at the entrance to theravine.
Beaten, bloody, and above all terrified, the wretched slave sat on thesand for a while, rubbed his eyes, then sprang up suddenly and rangroaning toward the highway,--
"Swallow me, O earth! Cursed be the day in which I saw the light, andthe night in which it was said, 'A man is born!' In the mantle ofjustice there is not the smallest shred for a slave. The godsthemselves regard not a creature whose hands are for labor, whosemouth was made only for weeping, and whose back is for clubs. O death,rub my body into ashes, so that there, beyond on the fields of Osiris,I be not born into slavery a second time."