 | LETTER III. The pillar of fire, or, Israel in bondage |  |
3. LETTER III.
The climate of this land of the Sun is so delightful
to the senses that one feels a constant buoyancy of the
heart, and experiences in the consciousness of mere
existence, an undefinable and delicious joy; and herein
I discover the key to the cheerful gayety of the Egyptians.
The skies are blue with eternal sunshine. The
atmosphere, free from moisture, is so transparent and
crystalline, that distant objects lose one half their distance
to the eye. The sun rises ever with cloudless
splendor, and sets in a sea of golden glory, without a
shadow of a cloud falling upon his fiery disk. The moon
sails by night across the starry ocean of the heavens,
with a brilliancy unknown in other lands; while the
stars burn with an increased intensity, and seem enlarged
by means of the purity of the upper air through
which we behold them. It is no marvel that the
dwellers in this happy land are wise, and love art, and
delight in forms of beauty, and build palaces for gods!
But I promised in my last letter, dear mother, to
describe what particularly passed in the long and interesting
interview which the Prince Remeses had with
me on his first visit to my palace. I have already
always interested in costume, I will relate to you how
he was attired.
The Egyptians, you are aware, always shave the head
and beard closely, save when in mourning. They have
nevertheless a plaited lock of hair on the height of the
forehead, which falls down over the ear. Such is the
fashion with which the youthful god Horus is represented
in paintings and statues, though the beautiful
locks of this deity are not so closely removed but that a
crest of golden tresses covers the top of his head like
the plume of a helmet. Something in this manner
Prince Remeses wore the lock of jet-black hair which
remained. But upon his head he had a rich cap or
kaftan of green silk, the front of which was shaped like
the beak of an eagle, while behind, it fell to the shoulders
in a sort of cape, fashioned like drooping wings—
the whole most becoming and striking. In the eyes of
the eagle, blazed diamonds, and his plumage was studded
with precious stones, beryls, sardine gems, and the onyxstone.
This head-costume, in varied forms, is worn by
all the nobles and men of high rank. With some the
ibis or the vulture, with others the lion or the hawk,
form the insignia. I have seen him since in his chariot,
in a close-fitting helmet-cap of burnished gold, resembling
that of the Egyptian god of war, which, with his
martial form and commanding glance, lent to him the
aspect of the god himself!
His vesture was of fine linen, worn in numerous
folds about his form; and a surcoat embroidered with
gold in royal devices, left open in front, displayed
a girdle of links of steel and gold, exquisitely and cunningly
About his neck was fastened, by a pearl of price, a
collar of the red-hued gold of Ophir, massive and large;
and upon his manly chest glittered a breastplate, sparkling
with the enamelled cartouch of the god Athothis,
the deity who presided at his birth, and who is the same
as our Taut, the inventor of letters.
And here let me remark, that writing by letters is
scarcely yet known in Egypt, the hieroglyphic form
being still in current use; but Remeses has cultivated
the Phœnician art, and writes with a character of his
own construction, with the facility and beauty of one of
our own men of letters. Ere long, through his influence,
this form of writing will supersede wholly the
hieroglyph, which is cumbersome and difficult to be
understood, save by a native-born Egyptian; yet I have
commenced the study of it, and can read already the
cartouch of Mitres, on his obelisk over against the portico
of my residence. Of this obelisk, which is ninety-nine
feet high, it is said that when it was about to be
elevated to its position, he employed 20,000 workmen,
and apprehensive that the engineer would not raise it
with sufficient care, he bound the prince his son to the
apex while it lay on the ground, and thus effectually
guaranteed the safety of his monument. This was many
centuries ago; but, as I gazed to-day upon the towering
apex, I could not but think, with a tremor of the nerves,
of the hapless young prince as he mounted into the sky,
on that slow and perilous journey!
Have I not been digressing, dear mother? But you
must not, in familiar letters, look for artistic continuity
of narrative. I shall digress, or go from subject
passing them; but, nevertheless, I shall not leave your
curiosity unsatisfied upon any matter which I have
commenced, but in due time, from every digression,
shall return to it. I will, therefore, this apology once
for all, return to the princely Remeses.
He wore upon his right hand a signet-ring of silver,
once belonging to his ancestor, Amosis, the leader of
the XVIIIth dynasty; and also a large ring of pure
gold, set with a chrysoprasus, and bearing the shield of
Osirtasen I., or Sesostris—for he has both names in
history—for whom I am named.
In all respects he was attired with magnificence, and
yet with simplicity, as became a man of taste and a
prince. The profuse ornaments of jewelry, with which
I perceive the nobles about the court load themselves,
his good sense disdains. He retains only the insignia
belonging to his high rank.
I have said that his hair is raven-black, and may add
that his eyes are large, expressive, heavily-lidded, and
with a peculiar expression of mingled softness and brilliancy.
Unlike the Egyptians, his features are truly
Syriac, with the high arched nose and full red lips of the
inhabitants of the city of Damascus. Do you remember
when we last year visited Damascus, seeing, in the
painted chamber of the adytum of the mausoleum of Eliezer,
a representation of the Hebrew prince Abram, of
Syria? To that venerable prince, whose virtues and
wisdom tradition would have preserved, even if he had
not crected this tomb to his own and his master's
memory, Eliezer was chamberlain or steward for many
years. Returning to Damascus with great wealth, which
from Egypt, where he had once been, a cunning artist in
colors, who decorated the tomb he erected for himself,
in that wonderful manner which has excited the admiration
of all beholders. But, dear mother, beautiful as
that is, and well preserved as it has been for four hundred
years, it is not to be compared with art in Egypt at the
present day. You remember you were struck with the
majesty and almost celestial sublimity of the old shepherd
prince's face, which the affection of his steward has
preserved. You spoke of the eagle-like nose, the dark,
yet tearful-looking eyes, with the drooping lid just
casting into shadow the depth of its inner light. You
remember the nobly shaped head and commanding
brow. Such a head and profile is that of Remeses, the
Prince of Egypt. My first look at his face recalled the
portrait in the tomb, which its founder has so beautifully
and modestly inscribed:
“ELIEZER OF DAMASCUS,
THE STEWARD OF ABRAM,
PRINCE
BELOVED OF THE GODS.”
After I had received Remeses into my house, I conducted
him through a two-valved door, opened before
us by my chief butler, into the superb apartment allotted
for recreation and repose. My mansion consisted of a
court encircled by columns, and from it extended corridors
to various chambers. The court is crossed by
avenues of trees, while fountains and flowering plants
refresh the eye in every direction.
The apartment into which Remeses came with me,
was divided into tall panels, upon which were executed,
in the most brilliant colors, the fairest pictures. These
panels were intercolumnar, each column adorned with
carvings of leaves and flowers, and terminating in a
capital in imitation of an open lotus. This room was
open to the air, but shielded from the sun by a purple
awning that extended to its four sides, and was a little
raised above the walls upon the columns, so that the
breezes, which were wafted over the gardens of flowers,
might freely enter.
This was my reception-room, or mándara, as it is
termed. A beautiful cornice surrounds the whole room.
The furniture is of the most tasteful and luxurious description,
and of forms and uses unknown to our severer
Syrians. There are tables of Arabian wood, inlaid with
ivory; sofas of ebony and other rare materials, covered
with silken cushions; a chair ornamented with the skin
of a leopard; another, of still more graceful outline, embroidered
with silk and threads of gold; another, the
frame of which recedes gradually, terminating at its
summit in a graceful curve, and supported by resting
upon the back of a swan with feathers of ivory. A
chair for repose is covered with gilded leather, and
arched by a rich canopy of painted flowers, birds, and
fancy devices. The legs of all these chairs were in
imitation of some wild beast, while the arms represented
in ivory or ebony the beaks of birds,—that of the ibis,
sacred as it is, being the favorite. There are couches,
too, which are nothing more nor less than crouching
lions gilded, upon the backs of which the sleeper reposes
on gorgeous housings stuffed with the softest down.
are, in some of my rooms, chairs shaped like harps,
others like leaves of the fig-tree, others like birds.
Tables of ebony are supported on the heads of naked
Nubian slaves two feet high, carved in ebony, while the
bronze lamps are uplifted upon the palm of a dancing
girl cast in bronze, who seems to hold the light for you
while you read or write. Carpets and foot-stools, covered
with embroidery, are not wanting; and I have
three round tables—one of metal, one of ivory, one of
ebony—polished like mirrors of steel. These are covered
with ornaments of the most exquisite finish and
beauty; and before my window where I write is a sort
of bureau ornamented with hieroglyphics, carved in
intaglio, inlaid with sycamore, tamarisk, and palm
woods, and enriched with bosses of solid gold.
In this apartment I received Remeses. Placing a seat
by the window, I sat near him. For a moment he surveyed
me with a close but courteous scrutiny, such as strangers
irresistibly cast upon each other after a first meeting.
“I hope you are at home here, noble Sesostris,” he said.
“This is one of my palaces, but I have more than I can
make use of, such is the bounty and affection of my
mother.”
“I have every comfort and luxury—more than I
desire,” I answered. “I was not prepared to find in
Egypt such splendor and magnificence. The half, my
noble prince, has not been told the world.”
“And yet you have seen but a small portion of this
kingdom,” he said, with a smile of pardonable pride.
“Although On is the city of palaces and temples, for
there is a temple to each of the three hundred and sixty
of our empire. We rule Egypt from Memphis: we
worship the gods from On.”
“But is not the great god Apis the peculiar deity of
Memphis?” I asked; “and is not his worship the most
magnificent and imposing on earth?”
“Yet here in the City of the Sun is the temple of
Mnevis, the sacred ox of On, honored with a worship as
profound and universal as that of Apis.”
“But do the more polished Egyptians indeed worship
the ox, either here or in Memphis?” I asked with some
hesitation, for, as prince, Remeses is first priest of the
realm, next to the high-priest of Osiris.
“Do not fear to ask freely any questions, my dear
Sesostris,” he said. “We do not worship these animals.
They are but the embodiment of attributes. Under
both of these gods, at On and at Memphis, Osiris the
great Judge of men is veiled. They are but the living
images of Osiris. The origin of their introduction is
unknown save to the priests, whose office it is to keep
the records of all things appertaining to religion.”
“What is revealed concerning the history of Osiris?”
I asked; “for I am at a loss to understand the exact
relation a deity known over the world by name, but of
whose worship little is understood, holds to Egypt and to
the other gods. At home, in Syria, I have marvelled
how the Egyptian mythology could stand, when made
up of such contradictory elements,—a part directing the
worship of an invisible divinity, and a part directing
the adoration of the hosts of heaven and beasts of the
earth. In Phœnicia we worship the Invisible through
the sun, as his representative. We worship nothing
and images of stone and brass are adored, but not with
us.”
“The Egyptians, through all their forms, and by all
their gods, adore the Supreme Infinite, my Sesostris,”
said the prince. “The history of our faith is briefly
this, according to common tradition: Osiris was in the
beginning the one lord of worlds; the sun of truth and
the glory of his universe. He came upon earth for the
benefit of mankind. Before his coming, the ox and all
other animals were wild, and of no service to man.
The Nile was a terror to Egypt. Vegetation had perished.
He came as a `manifester of good and truth,' as
saith the great golden book in the Hall of Books. He
entered into all things, and infused his life, and good,
and uses into all. He bound the Nile to its banks, by
breasting its flood and subduing it. His spirit passed
into the bull, and all cattle. He tempered the heat of
the sun, and drew the poison from the moon. The
earth became his bride, under the name of Isis; and
brought forth Horus, and the order of equal times, and
thus man was benefited and the earth made habitable.
Upon this, his brother Sethis, who represented `evil,' as
Osiris did `good,' sought his destruction, and caused him
to be hated and put to death. He was buried, and rose
again, and became the judge of the dead. And this
legend or fable is the foundation, noble Sesostris, of our
mythology. The sun, moon, Nile, animals, and vegetables
even, are regarded as sacred, therefore, because the
spirit or soul of Osiris had been infused into them, to
change them from evil to good. Thus one god is worshipped
through visible objects, which he has consecrated,—objects
sacred record, he had to enter into every thing which he
restored to the use of man.”
“The mythology of Egypt,” I said, “is at once relieved,
O prince, from the charge of grossness and superstition
which has been attached to it. I can now
understand more clearly your system of religion.”
“The mysteries of our religion are still unfathomable,”
answered Remeses. “It is doubtful if they are
fully comprehended by the priests. In the multiplicity
and diversity of objects of worship I am often confounded,
and it is a relief to me to pass by all material forms
of Osiris, and send my mind upward only to himself!”
“That is a noble conception, great prince,” I said,
admiring the lofty and almost divine expression with
which this pure sentiment lighted up his fine countenance.
“But the people of Egypt are not able to comprehend
Deity except through visible forms; and, in order to
convey an impression of the abstract notions men form
of the attributes of Deity, it will always be necessary,
perhaps, to distinguish them by some fixed representation;
hence the figures of Osiris under the various forms
in which he is worshipped, of Pthah, of Amun, Neith,
and other gods and goddesses, were invented by the ancient
priests as the signs of the various attributes of the
Deity. And as the subtlety of speculation expanded
the simple principles of our mythology, the divine nature
was divided and subdivided, until any thing which
seemed to bear any analogy to it was deified, received
a figure or form as a god, and was admitted into the
the people.”
“And this nicety of philosophical speculation,” I said,
“must have given rise to the several grades of deities in
Egypt.”
“Yes; the gods of the first, second, and third orders:
each with its system of priesthood and rituals.”
“In all this, I see you give no divine honors to departed
heroes,” I remarked.
“No. Our gods are none of them deified men. They
are not like Bacchus, and Hercules, and other of the
ancient and Syriac deities, who were human heroes. Our
mythology is a pure spiritualism: its object, Divinity,
worshipped by emblems, symbols, signs, figures, and representative
attributes.”
“It is a pantheism, then, rather than a polytheism,” I
remarked.
“You speak justly, Sesostris,” he said. “The figures
of our gods, which you see hewn in marble, painted on
temples, standing colossal monoliths in the entrance of
the city, are but vicarious forms, not intended to be
looked upon as real divine personages. Not a child in
Egypt believes that a being exists, with the head of a
bird joined to the human form—as the statue of Thoth,
with the ibis head, in front of the temple; or under the
form of a Cynocephalus, having the horns of the moon
upon his head; or as the goddess Justice, without a
head; or a bird with the head of a woman; or a god
with a ram-headed vulture's head, or that of a hawk,
like the deity Horus; or Anubis, with the head of a
dog. Why these unnatural forms were chosen as emblems
of these gods, the priests fancifully explain, and
of divine attributes.”
“Abuses,” I remarked, when he had thus eloquently
spoken, “must naturally flow from such representations,
and these emblems, among the people, soon assume the
importance of the divine personages to which they appertain.
The mass of the population must be idolaters.”
“You speak truly. They are. The distinction between
the image and the idea which it represents is too
subtle for the ignorant; they lose sight of the attribute,
by filling the whole horizon of their minds with
its image. Thus the Egyptian mind is clearly more and
more being drawn away from its ancient spiritual worship,
to a superstitious veneration for images, which
originally were intended only to control and fix attention,
or to represent some religious tradition or idea of
divinity.”
“Are not Apis, the sacred bull, at Memphis, and
Mnevis at On, regarded as gods?” I asked.
“Only as the soul of Osiris. The bull is the most
powerful animal in all Egypt, and hence a type of the
Deity. But this subject, my dear Sesostris,” added the
prince, with a fine look of friendship, “you will know
more of by and by, as you dwell among us. I will
command that you shall have every facility from the
priests, and also from the philosophers and wise men,
in your further studies of our people. I am happy to
have given you your first lesson in Egyptian lore.”
“You have done me infinite honor, noble Remeses,”
I replied, returning with gratitude his looks of kindness.
“I hope ere long so to profit by your information as to
understand your ancient system of religion. From what
on earth, rightly interpreted; and before its spiritual
essence, our worship in Phœnicia—which is chiefly a
union of idolatry and Sabæanism—is pure materialism.”
At this moment we rose, as by one impulse, and
walked out upon the terrace to enjoy the breeze which
was waving refreshingly, to our eyes, the branches of
a palm that stood before the door. The day was intensely
hot. In the shade of the columns on the square,
many of the citizens had gathered for shelter from the
sun's beams. But still in its burning heat the bondmen
of whom I have spoken, toiled on, with their burdens
of brick. Not far off were a score under one task-master,
who stood by with a long staff with which
he severely beat an old man, who had sunk to the earth
under the combined heat of the sun and the weight he
was compelled to bear. My heart was touched at once
with pity and indignation.
“What unhappy people are these, O prince,” I said,
“who endure such heavy labor?”
“Hebrews!” he answered, haughtily and indifferently.
“Hast thou not heard of these bond-slaves of our land?
They have been in Egypt several generations. They
build our cities, our walls, our canals. They number two
millions, and are the hereditary slaves of the Pharaohs.”
“To what circumstances do they owe their captivity?”
I asked.
“If it will interest you, my Sesostris,” he said, “I will
at another time relate their history.”
“It will gratify me to listen to it,” I answered. “I
am struck with the Syriac cast of their features”
“Indeed! They originally came from Syria. Do
they preserve still the lineaments of their country?”
“Strikingly so,” I answered.
We now walked the noble terrace together, while he
pointed out to me the prospect from it. In view was
one half the city, and the dark “Lake of the Dead,” of
which I will speak hereafter; the avenues of sphinxes;
the gigantic gateways or pylones and obelisks on the
river; and the mighty Nile itself, flowing like an ever-lengthening
sea amid the fairest scenery of earth. Reposing
upon its bosom, like a gigantic floating garden,
was visible the noble isle of Rhoda, decked with gorgeous
palaces,—one of which, said Remeses, is the
favorite home of his royal mother. Still beyond this
lovely island rose from the water the gardens, villas,
palaces, temples, and propyla which lay between Memphis
and the river; while the city of Apis, “the diadem
of Egypt,” in all the glory of architectural majesty and
beauty, reposed on the plain beyond; the mighty pyramids,
with their winged temples and colossal dromos of
sphinxes, filling the background of this matchless scene.
| LETTER III. The pillar of fire, or, Israel in bondage | |