she stole away first to her uncle, and told him of her plot;
but he was angry because she wished to betray the children to King
Khufu, and he beat her with a scourge of flax. And as she went away by
the side of the river a great crocodile came out of the water, and
carried her off.... But here, alas! our story breaks off; the rest of
the book is lost, and we cannot tell whether King Khufu tried to kill
the three royal babies or not. Only we do know that the first three
Kings of the race which succeeded the race of Khufu bore the same names
as Rud-didet's three babies, and were called, like all the Kings of
Egypt after them, "Sons of the Sun."

These, then, are absolutely the oldest fairy-stories in the world, and
if they do not seem very wonderful to you, you must remember that
everything has to have a beginning, and that the people who made these
tales hadn't had very much practice in the art of story-telling.

CHAPTER VIII

SOME FAIRY-TALES OF LONG AGO (_Continued_)

Our next story belongs to a time several hundred years later, and I dare
say it seemed as wonderful to the little Egyptians as the story of
Sindbad the Sailor does to you. It is called "The Story of the
Shipwrecked Sailor," and the sailor himself tells it to a noble
Egyptian.

"I was going," he says, "to the mines of Pharaoh, and we set sail in a
ship of 150 cubits long and 40 cubits wide (225 feet by 60 feet--quite a
big ship for the time). We had a crew of 150 of the best sailors of
Egypt, men whose hearts were as bold as lions. They all foretold a happy
voyage, but as we came near the shore a great storm blew, the sea rose
in terrible waves, and our ship was fairly overwhelmed. Clinging to a
piece of wood, I was washed about for three days, and at last tossed up
on an island; but not one was left of all my shipmates--all perished in
the waves.

"I lay down in the shade of some bushes, and when I had recovered a
little, I looked about me for food. There was plenty on every hand--figs
and grapes, berries and corn, with all manner of birds. When my hunger
was satisfied, I lit a fire, and made an offering to the gods who had
saved me. Suddenly I heard a noise like thunder; the trees shook, and
the earth quaked. Looking round, I saw a great serpent approaching me.
He was nearly 50 feet long, and had a beard 3 feet in length. His body
shone in the sun like gold, and when he reared himself up from his coils
before me I fell upon my face.

"T