mpassion and show thy
face to the unfortunate people."

"AT LAST I HEAR THE PRAYERS OF MY PRIESTS, FOR I AM
COMPASSIONATE," answered the supernatural voice from the temple.

At that moment the darkness began to disappear, and the sun to regain
its brightness.

A new shout, new weeping, and new prayers were heard in the throng. The
people, drunk with delight, greeted the sun which had risen from the
dead. Men unknown to one another embraced, some persons died, and all
crawled on their knees to kiss the sacred walls of the temple.

Above the gate stood the most worthy Herhor, his eyes fixed on the sky,
and two priests supporting his holy hands with which he had dissipated
darkness, and saved his people from destruction.

Scenes of the same kind with certain changes took place throughout all
Lower Egypt. In each city on the 20th of Paofi people had collected
from early morning. In each city about midday some band was storming a
sacred gate. About one the high priest of the temple, with a retinue,
cursed the faithless attackers and produced darkness. But when the
throng fled in panic, or fell on the ground, the high priest prayed to
Osiris to show his face, and then the light of day returned to the
earth again.

In this way, thanks to the eclipse of the sun, the party of the
priests, full of wisdom, had shaken the importance of Ramses XIII in
Lower Egypt.

In the course of a few minutes the government of the pharaoh had come,
even without knowing it, to the brink of a precipice. Only great wisdom
could save it, and an accurate knowledge of the situation. But that was
lacking in the pharaoh's palace, where the all-powerful reign of chance
had set in at that critical moment.

On the 20th of Paofi his holiness rose exactly at sunrise, and, to be
nearer the scene of action, he transferred himself from the main palace
to a villa which was hardly an hour's distance from Memphis. On one
side of this villa were the barracks of the Asiatic troops, on the
other the villa of Tutmosis and his wife, the beautiful Hebron. With
their lord came the dignitaries faithful to Ramses, and the first
regiment of the guard in which the pharaoh felt unbounded reliance.

Ramses was in perfect humor. He bathed, ate with appetite, and began to
hear the reports of couriers who flew in from Memphis every fifteen
minutes.

Their reports were monotonous to weariness: The high priests and some
of the nomarchs, under the leadership of Herhor an