elihood, were agents of the chief Egyptian council.

These dignitaries, as if dissatisfied with things in Egypt, or offended
at the pharaoh and the priesthood, had come to Libya from the seashore;
they took no part in conversations, they avoided meetings with
disbanded warriors, and explained to Musawasa, as the greatest secret,
and with proofs in hand, that that was just his time to fall on Egypt.

"Thou wilt find there endless wealth," said they, "and granaries for
thyself, thy people, and the grandsons of thy grandsons."

Musawasa, though a skilful diplomat and leader, let himself be caught
in that way. Like a man of energy, he declared a sacred war at once,
and, as he had valiant warriors in thousands, he hurried off the first
corps eastward. His son, Tehenna, who was twenty years of age at that
time, led it.

The old barbarian knew what war was, and understood that he who plans
to conquer must act with speed and give the first blows in the
struggle.

Libyan preparations were very brief. The former warriors of his
holiness had no weapons, it is true, but they knew their trade, and it
was not difficult in those days to find weapons for an army. A few
straps, or pieces of rope for a sling, a dart or a sharpened stick, an
axe, or a heavy club, a bag of stones, and another of dates, that was
the whole problem.

So Musawasa gave two thousand men, ex-warriors of the pharaoh, and four
thousand of the Libyan rabble to Tehenna, commanding him to fall on
Egypt at the earliest, seize whatever he could find, and collect
provisions for the real army. Assembling for himself the most important
forces, he sent swift runners through the oases and summoned to his
standard all who had no property.

There had not been such a movement in the desert for a long time. From
each oasis came crowd after crowd, such a proletariat, that, though
almost naked, they deserved to be called a tattered rabble. Relying on
the opinion of his counselors, who a month earlier had been officers of
his holiness, Musawasa supposed, with perfect judgment, that his son
would plunder hundreds of villages and small places from Teremethis to
Senti-Nofer, before he would meet important Egyptian forces. Finally
they reported to him, that at the first news of a movement among the
Libyans, not only had all laborers fled from the glass works, but that
even the troops had withdrawn from fortresses in Sochet-Heman on the
Soda Lakes.

This was of very good impor