course! It is necessary to end this," confirmed the overseers.

"Who knows if Mefres did not act in concert with the most worthy
Herhor?" whispered some one.

"Enough!" exclaimed the high priest. "If we find Herhor in the
labyrinth we will act as the law directs. But to make guesses, or
suspect any one is not permitted. Let the secretaries prepare sentences
for Mefres and Lykon, Let those chosen hurry after them, and let the
militia strengthen the watch. We must also examine the interior of the
edifice and discover how Samentu got into it, though I am sure that he
will have no followers in the near future."

A couple of hours later six men had set out for Memphis.

CHAPTER LXIV

ON the eighteenth day of Paofi chaos had begun. Communication was
interrupted between Lower and Upper Egypt; commerce had ceased; on the
Nile moved only boats on guard, the roads were occupied by troops
marching toward those cities which contained the most famous temples.

Only the laborers of the priests were at work in the fields. On the
estates of nobles and nomarchs, but especially of the pharaoh, flax was
unpulled, clover uncut; there was no one to gather in grapes. The
common people did nothing but prowl about in bands; they sang, ate,
drank, and threatened either priests or Phoenicians. In the cities all
shops were closed, and the artisans who had lost their occupation
counseled whole days over the reconstruction of Egypt. This offensive
spectacle was no novelty, but it appeared in such threatening
proportions that the tax-gatherers, and even the judges began to hide,
especially as the police treated all offences of common men very
mildly.

One thing more deserved attention: the abundance of food and wine. In
dramshops and cook houses, especially of the Phoenicians, as well in
Memphis as in the provinces, whoso wished might eat and drink what he
pleased at a very low price, or for nothing. It was said that his
holiness was giving his people a feast which would continue a whole
month in every case.

Because of difficult and even interrupted communication the cities were
not aware of what was happening in neighboring places. Only the
pharaoh, or still better the priests, knew the general condition of the
country.

The position was distinguished, first of all, by a break between Upper,
or Theban, and Lower, or Memphian Egypt. In Thebes partisans of the
priesthood were stronger, in Memphis adherents of the pharaoh. In
Thebes p