in them, that a pedagogue could record this saying: "The
scholar's ears are at his back: when he is flogged then he hears."
Those youths who wished to pass up from the lower to the high-school
had to undergo an examination. The student, when he had passed it,
could choose a master from among the learned of the higher grades,
who undertook to be his philosophical guide, and to whom he remained
attached all his life through, as a client to his patron. He could
obtain the degree of "Scribe" and qualify for public office by a second
examination.
Near to these schools of learning there stood also a school of art, in
which instruction was given to students who desired to devote themselves
to architecture, sculpture, or painting; in these also the learner might
choose his master.
Every teacher in these institutions belonged to the priesthood of the
House of Seti. It consisted of more than eight hundred members, divided
into five classes, and conducted by three so-called Prophets.
The first prophet was the high-priest of the House of Seti, and at the
same time the superior of all the thousands of upper and under servants
of the divinities which belonged to the City of the Dead of Thebes.
The temple of Seti proper was a massive structure of limestone. A row
of Sphinxes led from the Nile to the surrounding wall, and to the
first vast pro-pylon, which formed the entrance to a broad fore-court,
enclosed on the two sides by colonnades, and beyond which stood a second
gate-way. When he had passed through this door, which stood between two
towers, in shape like truncated pyramids, the stranger came to a second
court resembling the first, closed at the farther end by a noble row of
pillars, which formed part of the central temple itself.
The innermost and last was dimly lighted by a few lamps.
Behind the temple of Seti stood large square structures of brick of the
Nile mud, which however had a handsome and decorative effect, as the
humble material of which they were constructed was plastered with
lime, and that again was painted with colored pictures and hieroglyphic
inscriptions.
The internal arrangement of all these houses was the same. In the midst
was an open court, on to which opened the doors of the rooms of the
priests and philosophers. On each side of the court was a shady, covered
colonnade of wood, and in the midst a tank with ornamental plants. In
the upper story were the apartments for the scholars, and inst
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