[Representations of Rameses' camp are preserved on the pylons of the
temple of Luxor and the Ramesseum.]

where numerous fires burned, round which crowded the resting warriors.
Here a wine-skin was passed from hand to hand, there a joint was
roasting on a wooden spit; farther on a party were throwing dice for the
booty they had won, or playing at morra. All was in eager activity,
and many a scuffle occurred amoung the excited soldiers, and had to be
settled by the camp-watch.

Near the enclosed plots, where the horses were tethered, the smiths were
busily engaged in shoeing the beasts which needed it, and in sharpening
the points of the lances; the servants of the chariot-guard were also
fully occupied, as the chariots had for the most part been brought over
the mountains in detached pieces on the backs of pack-horses and asses,
and now had to be put together again, and to have their wheels greased.
On the eastern side of the camp stood a canopy, under which the
standards were kept, and there numbers of priests were occupied in their
office of blessing the warriors, offering sacrifices, and singing hymns
and litanies. But these pious sounds were frequently overpowered by the
loud voices of the gamblers and revellers, by the blows of the hammers,
the hoarse braying of the asses, and the neighing of the horses. From
time to time also the deep roar of the king's war-lions

[See Diodorus, 1. 47. Also the pictures of the king rushing to the
fight.]

might be heard; these beasts followed him into the fight, and were now
howling for food, as they had been kept fasting to excite their fury.

In the midst of the camp stood the king's tent, surrounded by foot
and chariot-guards. The auxiliary troops were encamped in divisions
according to their nationality, and between them the Egyptian legions of
heavy-armed soldiers and archers. Here might be seen the black Ethiopian
with wooly matted hair, in which a few feathers were stuck--the
handsome, well proportioned "Son of the desert" from the sandy Arabian
shore of the Red Sea, who performed his wild war-dance flourishing his
lance, with a peculiar wriggle of his--hips pale Sardinians, with metal
helmets and heavy swords--light colored Libyans, with tattooed arms and
ostrich-feathers on their heads-brown, bearded Arabs, worshippers of the
stars, inseparable from their horses, and armed, some with lances, and
some with bows and arrows. And not less various than their asp