My Winter on the Nile. Warner Charles Dudley

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the head, and adds a certain dignity. In spite of the broken condition of the face, with the nose gone, it has not lost its character. There are the heavy eyebrows, the prominent cheek-bones, the full lips, the poetic chin, the blurred but on-looking eyes. I think the first feeling of the visitor is that the face is marred beyond recognition, but the sweep of the majestic lines soon becomes apparent; it is not difficult to believe that there is a smile on the sweet mouth, and the stony stare of the eyes, once caught, will never be forgotten.

      The Sphinx, grossly symbolizing the union of physical and intellectual force, and hinting at one of those recondite mysteries which we still like to believe existed in the twilight of mankind, was called Hor-em-Khoo (“the Sun in his resting-place”), and had divine honors paid to it as a deity.

      This figure, whatever its purpose, is older than the Pyramid of Cheops. It has sat facing the east, on the edge of this terrace of tombs, expecting the break of day, since a period that is lost in the dimness of tradition. All the achievements of the race, of which we know anything, have been enacted since that figure was carved. It has seen, if its stony eyes could see, all the procession of history file before it. Viewed now at a little distance or with evening shadows on it, its features live again, and it has the calmness, the simple majesty that belong to high art. Old writers say that the face was once sweet and beautiful. How long had that unknown civilization lasted before it produced this art?

      Why should the Sphinx face the rising sun? Why does it stand in a necropolis like a sleepy warden of the dead who sleep? Was it indeed the guardian of those many dead, the mighty who slept in pyramids, in rock-hewn tombs, in pits, their bodies ready for any pilgrimage; and does it look to the east expecting the resurrection?

      Not far from the Sphinx is a marvelous temple of syenite, which the sand almost buries; in a well in one of its chambers was found the splendid red-granite statue of Chephren, the builder of the second pyramid, a piece of art which succeeding ages did not excel. All about the rock plateau are tombs, and in some of them are beautiful sculptures, upon which the coloring is fresh. The scenes depicted are of common life, the occupations and diversions of the people, and are without any religious signification. The admirable sculptures represent no gods and no funeral mysteries; when they were cut the Egyptian theology was evidently not constructed.

      The residence of our guide is a tomb, two dry chambers in the rock, the entrance closed by a wooden door. The rooms are large enough for tables and chairs; upon the benches where the mummies have lain, are piled antique fragments of all sorts, set off by a grinning skull or a thigh-bone; the floor is covered with fine yellow sand. I don’t know how it may have seemed to its first occupant, but we found it an excellent luncheon place, and we could sleep there calmly and securely, when the door was shut against the jackals—though I believe it has never been objected to a tomb that one couldn’t sleep in it. While we sip our coffee Ali brings forth his antique images and scarabæi. These are all genuine, for Ali has certificates from most of the well-known Egyptologists as to his honesty and knowledge of antiquities. We are looking for genuine ones; those offered us at the pyramids were suspicious. We say to Ali:—

      “We should like to get a few good scarabæi; we are entirely ignorant of them; but we were sent to you as an honest man. You select half a dozen that you consider the best, and we will pay you a fair price; if they do not pass muster in Cairo you shall take them back.”

      “As you are a friend of Mr. Blank,” said Ali, evidently pleased with the confidence reposed in him, “you shall have the best I have, for about what they cost me.”

      The Scarabæus is the black beetle that the traveler will constantly see tumbling about in the sand, and rolling up balls of dirt as he does in lands where he has not so sounding a name. He was sacred to the old Egyptians as an emblem of immortality, because he was supposed to have the power of self-production. No mummy went away into the shades of the nether world without one on his breast, with spread-wings attached to it. Usually many scarabæi were buried with the mummy—several hundreds have been found in one mummy-case. They were cut from all sorts of stones, both precious and common, and made of limestone, or paste, hardened, glazed and baked. Some of them are exquisitely cut, the intaglio on the under side being as clean, true, and polished as Greek work. The devices on them are various; the name of a reigning or a famous king, in the royal oval, is not uncommon, and an authentic scarabæus with a royal name is considered of most value. I saw an insignificant one in soft stone and of a grey color, held at a hundred pounds; it is the second one that has ever been found with the name of Cheops on it. The scarabæi were worn in rings, carried as charms, used as seals; there are large coarse ones of blue pottery which seem to have been invitations to a funeral, by the inscriptions on them.

      The Scarabæus is at once the most significant and portable souvenir of ancient Egypt that the traveler can carry away, and although the supply was large, it could not fill the demand. Consequently antique scarabæi are now manufactured in large quantities at Thebes, and in other places, and distributed very widely over the length of Egypt; the dealers have them with a sprinkling of the genuine; almost every peasant can produce one from his deep pocket; the women wear them in their bosoms.

      The traveler up the Nile is pretty sure to be attacked with the fever of buying Scarabæi; he expects to happen upon one of great value, which he will get for a few piastres. It is his intention to do so. The Scarabæus becomes to him the most beautiful and desirable object in the world. He sees something fascinating in its shape, in its hieroglyphics, however ugly it may be to untaught eyes.

      Ali selected our scarabæi. They did not seem to us exactly the antique gems that we had expected to see, and they did not give a high idea of the old Egyptian art. But they had a mysterious history and meaning; they had shared the repose of a mummy perhaps before Abraham departed from Ur. We paid for them. We paid in gold. We paid Ali for his services as guide. We gave him backsheesh on account of his kindness and intelligence, besides. We said good-bye to his honest face with regret, and hoped to see him again.

      It was not long before we earnestly desired to meet him. He was a most accomplished fellow, and honesty was his best policy. There isn’t a more agreeable Bedawee at the Pyramids; and yet Ali is a modern Egyptian, just like his scarabæi, all the same. The traveler who thinks the Egyptians are not nimble-witted and clever is likely to pay for his knowledge to the contrary. An accumulated experience of five thousand years, in one spot, is not for nothing.

      We depart from the pyramids amid a clamor of importunity; prices have fallen to zero; antiquities old as Pharaoh will be given away; “backsheesh, backsheesh, O Howadji;” “I havn’t any bread to mangere, I have six children; what is a piastre for eight persons?” They run after us, they hang upon the carriage, they follow us a mile, begging, shrieking, howling, dropping off one by one, swept behind by the weight of a copper thrown to them.

      The shadows fall to the east; there is a lovely light on the plain; we meet long lines of camels, of donkeys, of fellaheen returning from city and field. All the west is rosy; the pyramids stand in a purple light; the Sphinx casts its shade on the yellow sand; its expectant eyes look beyond the Nile into the mysterious East.

      CHAPTER IX.—PREPARATIONS FOR A VOYAGE

      WE are giving our minds to a name for our dahabeëh. The owners have desired us to christen it, and the task is getting heavy. Whatever we are doing; guiding a donkey through the mazes of a bazaar; eating oranges at the noon breakfast; watching the stream of color and fantastic apparel, swaying camels and dashing harem-equipage with running saïses and outriding eunuchs, flowing by the hotel; following a wedding procession in its straggling parade, or strolling vacantly along, knocked, jostled, evaded by a dozen races in a dozen minutes and lost in the whirl, color, excitement of this perpetual masquerade, we are suddenly struck with, “what shall we call that boat?”

      We want a name that is characteristic of the country and expressive of our own feelings, poetic and not sentimental, sensible and not common-place. It seems

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