The Greatest Historical Novels of Georg Ebers. Georg Ebers
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the name
given to midwives, to meschennu.]
“If that be the case, those letters are my property, and I have not the slightest intention of giving them up; besides which you might search Persia from one end to the other without finding any one who could decipher my father’s writing.”
“Pardon me, if I point out one or two errors into which you have fallen. First, this box is at present in my hands, and though I am generally accustomed to respect the rights of property, I must assure you that, in the present instance, I shall not return the box until its contents have served my purpose. Secondly, the gods have so ordained, that just at this moment there is a man in Babylon who can read every kind of writing known to the Egyptian priests. Do you perhaps happen to know the name of Onuphis?”
For the third time the Egyptian turned pale. “Are you certain,” he said, “that this man is still among the living?”
“I spoke to him myself yesterday. He was formerly, you know, high-priest at Heliopolis, and was initiated into all your mysteries there. My wise countryman, Pythagoras of Samos, came to Egypt, and after submitting to some of your ceremonies, was allowed to attend the lessons given in the schools for priests. His remarkable talents won the love of the great Onuphis and he taught him all the Egyptian mysteries, which Pythagoras afterwards turned to account for the benefit of mankind. My delightful friend Rhodopis and I are proud of having been his pupils. When the rest of your caste heard that Onuphis had betrayed the sacred mysteries, the ecclesiastical judges determined on his death. This was to be caused by a poison extracted from peach-kernels. The condemned man, however, heard of their machinations, and fled to Naukratis, where he found a safe asylum in the house of Rhodopis, whom he had heard highly praised by Pythagoras, and whose dwelling was rendered inviolable by the king’s letter. Here he met Antimenidas the brother of the poet Alcarus of Lesbos, who, having been banished by Pittakus, the wise ruler of Mitylene, had gone to Babylon, and there taken service in the army of Nebuchadnezzar, the King of Assyria. Antimenidas gave him letters to the Chaldians. Onuphis travelled to the Euphrates, settled there, and was obliged to seek for some means of earning his daily bread, as he had left Egypt a poor man. He is now supporting himself in his old age, by the assistance which his superior knowledge enables him to render the Chaldoeans in their astronomical observations from the tower of Bel. Onuphis is nearly eighty, but his mind is as clear as ever, and when I saw him yesterday and asked him to help me, his eyes brightened as he promised to do so. Your father was one of his judges, but he bears you no malice and sends you a greeting.”
Nebenchari’s eyes were fixed thoughtfully on the ground during this tale. When Phanes had finished, he gave him a penetrating look and said: “Where are my papers?”
“They are in Onuphis’ hands. He is looking among them for the document I want.”
“I expected to hear that. Be so good as to tell me what the box is like, which Hib thought proper to bring over to Persia?”
“It is a small ebony trunk, with an exquisitely-carved lid. In the centre is a winged beetle, and on the four corners...”
“That contains nothing but a few of my father’s notices and memorandums,” said Nebenchari, drawing a deep breath of relief.
“They will very likely be sufficient for my purpose. I do not know whether you have heard, that I stand as high as possible in Cambyses’ favor.”
“So much the better for you. I can assure you, however, that the paper. which would have been most useful to you have all been left behind in Egypt.”
“They were in a large chest made of sycamore-wood and painted in colors.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because—now listen well to what I am going to say, Nebenchari—because I can tell you (I do not swear, for our great master Pythagoras forbade oaths), that this very chest, with all it contained, was burnt in the grove of the temple of Neith, in Sais, by order of the king.”
Phanes spoke slowly, emphasizing every syllable, and the words seemed to strike the Egyptian like so many flashes of lightning. His quiet coolness and deliberation gave way to violent emotion; his cheeks glowed and his eyes flashed. But only for one single minute; then the strong emotion seemed to freeze, his burning cheeks grew pale. “You are trying to make me hate my friends, in order to gain me as your ally,” he said, coldly and calmly. “I know you Greeks very well. You are so intriguing and artful, that there is no lie, no fraud, too base, if it will only help to gain your purpose.”
“You judge me and my countrymen in true Egyptian fashion; that is, they are foreigners, and therefore must be bad men. But this time your suspicions happen to be misplaced. Send for old Hib; he will tell you whether I am right or not.”
Nebenchari’s face darkened, as Hib came into the room.
“Come nearer,” said he in a commanding tone to the old man.
Hib obeyed with a shrug of the shoulders.
“Tell me, have you taken a bribe from this man? Yes or no? I must know the truth; it can influence my future for good or evil. You are an old and faithful servant, to whom I owe a great deal, and so I will forgive you if you were taken in by his artifices, but I must know the truth. I conjure you to tell me by the souls of your fathers gone to Osiris!”
The old man’s sallow face turned ashy pale as he heard these words. He gulped and wheezed some time before he could find an answer, and at last, after choking down the tears which had forced their way to his eyes, said, in a half-angry, half-whining tone: “Didn’t I say so? they’ve bewitched him, they’ve ruined him in this wicked land. Whatever a man would do himself, he thinks others are capable of. Aye, you may look as angry as you like; it matters but little to me. What can it matter indeed to an old man, who has served the same family faithfully and honestly for sixty years, if they call him at last a rogue, a knave, a traitor, nay even a murderer, if it should take their fancy.”
And the scalding tears flowed down over the old man’s cheeks, sorely against his will.
The easily-moved Phanes clapped him on the shoulder and said, turning to Nebenchari: “Hib is a faithful fellow. I give you leave to call me a rascal, if he has taken one single obolus from me.”
The physician did not need Phanes’ assurance; he had known his old servant too well and too long not to be able to read his simple, open features, on which his innocence was written as clearly as in the pages of an open book. “I did not mean to reproach you, old Hib,” he said kindly, coming up to him. “How can any one be so angry at a simple question?”
“Perhaps you expect me to be pleased at such a shameful suspicion?”
“No, not that; but at all events now you can tell me what has happened at our house since I left.”
“A pretty story that is! Why only to think of it makes my mouth as bitter, as if I were chewing wormwood.”
“You said I had been robbed.”
“Yes indeed: no one was ever so robbed before. There would have been some comfort if the knaves had belonged to the thieves’ caste, for then we should have got the best part of our property back again, and should not after all have been worse off than many another; but when...”
[The cunning son of the architect, who robbed the treasure-house of
Rhampsinitus was, according to Herodotus, (II. 120), severely
punished; but in Diod. I. 80. we see that when thieves acknowledged
themselves to the authorities to be such, they were not punished,
though a strict watch was set over them. According to Diodorus,
there was a president of the thieves’ caste, from whom the stolen
goods could be reclaimed on relinquishment of a fourth part of the
same. This strange rule possibly owed its rise to the law, which
compelled every Egyptian to appear once in each year before