even were death to be the punishment of my audacity."

"What is his name?" said the King.

"Mosche," replied Timopht.

XV

The King passed into another hall to receive Mosche, and sat down on a
throne, the arms of which were formed of lions, hung a broad pectoral
ornament on his breast, and assumed a pose of supreme indifference.

Mosche appeared, accompanied by another Hebrew, called Aharon. August
though the Pharaoh was, as he sat on his golden throne, surrounded by
his officers and his fan-bearers, within that high hall with its huge
columns, against that background of paintings which depicted the deeds
of his ancestors or his own, Mosche was no less imposing. In him the
majesty of age equalled the majesty of sovereignty. Although he was
seventy years old, he seemed endowed with manly vigour, and nothing in
him showed decadence into senility. The wrinkles on his brow and his
cheeks, like the marks of the chisel on the granite, made him venerable
without telling his age. His brown and wrinkled neck was joined to his
powerful shoulders by gaunt but still powerful muscles, and a network of
sinewy veins showed upon his hands, which did not tremble as old men's
hands generally do. A soul more energetic than a human soul vivified his
body, and on his face shone in the shadow a strange light. It seemed
like the reflection of an invisible sun.

Without prostrating himself, as was the custom when men approached the
King, Mosche drew near the throne of the Pharaoh and said to him: "Thus
saith the Lord God of Israel: 'Let my people go, that they may hold a
feast unto me in the wilderness.'"

The Pharaoh replied, "Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to
let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go."

Without being intimidated by the King's words, the tall old man replied
unhesitatingly, for the stuttering which had formerly affected him had
disappeared,--

"The God of the Hebrews hath met with us. Let us go, we pray thee, three
days' journey into the desert, and sacrifice unto the Lord our God; lest
he fall upon us with pestilence, or with the sword."

Aharon confirmed by a nod the demand of Mosche.

"Wherefore do ye, Mosche and Aharon, let the people from their works?"
replied the Pharaoh. "Happily for you I am to-day in a clement humour,
for I might have had you beaten with rods, had your tongues and ears
cut off, or thrown you living to the crocodiles. Know, for I tell you
so,