er of Thotmes I., wife of her brother Thotmes II., and
predecessor of her second brother Thotmes III. An energetic woman
who executed great works, and caused herself to be represented with
the helmet and beard-case of a man.]

a great queen of the dethroned dynasty.

The priests who served it were endowed with peculiar chartered
privileges, which hitherto had been strictly respected. Their dignity was
hereditary, going down from father to son, and they had the right of
choosing their director from among themselves.

Now their chief priest Rui was ill and dying, and Ameni, under whose
jurisdiction they came, had, without consulting them, sent the young poet
Pentaur to fill his place.

They had received the intruder most unwillingly, and combined strongly
against him when it became evident that he was disposed to establish a
severe rule and to abolish many abuses which had become established
customs.

They had devolved the greeting of the rising sun on the temple-servants;
Pentaur required that the younger ones at least should take part in
chanting the morning hymn, and himself led the choir. They had trafficked
with the offerings laid on the altar of the Goddess; the new master
repressed this abuse, as well as the extortions of which they were guilty
towards women in sorrow, who visited the temple of Hathor in greater
number than any other sanctuary.

The poet-brought up in the temple of Seti to self-control, order,
exactitude, and decent customs, deeply penetrated with a sense of the
dignity of his position, and accustomed to struggle with special zeal
against indolence of body and spirit--was disgusted with the slothful
life and fraudulent dealings of his subordinates; and the deeper insight
which yesterday's experience had given him into the poverty and sorrow of
human existence, made him resolve with increased warmth that he would
awake them to a new life.

The conviction that the lazy herd whom he commanded was called upon to
pour consolation into a thousand sorrowing hearts, to dry innumerable
tears, and to clothe the dry sticks of despair with the fresh verdure of
hope, urged him to strong measures.

Yesterday he had seen how, with calm indifference, they had listened to
the deserted wife, the betrayed maiden, to the woman, who implored the
withheld blessing of children, to the anxious mother, the forlorn
widow,--and sought only to take advantage of sorrow, to extort gifts for
the Goddess, or be