s drawn by eight snow-white horses, and
held in one hand a golden goblet and in the other a caduceus. After her
came the river-god Nile, the bridegroom of the marriage, studied from
the famous statue carried away from Alexandria by the Romans: a
splendid and mighty bearded man, resting against an urn. Sixteen naked
children--the sixteen ells that the river must rise for its overflow to
bless the land--played round his herculean form, and a bridal wreath of
lotos-flowers crowned his flowing locks. This car, which was decorated
with crocodiles, sheaves, dates, grapes, and shells, was hailed with
shouts of enthusiasm; it was escorted by old men in the costume of the
heathen priesthood.

Behind this came more music and singers, with a troop of young men
and maidens led by lute-players singing. These too were dressed as the
genie, and nymphs of the river and were the groomsmen and bridesmaids in
attendance on the betrothed.

The longer the procession lasted and the nearer the looked-for victim
approached, the more eagerly attent were the gazing multitude.

When this group of youths and maidens had gone by, there was hardly a
sound to be heard in the tribune and among the crowd. No one felt the
fierce heat of the sun, no one heeded the thirst that parched every
tongue; all eyes were bent in one direction; only the black Vekeel,
whose colossal form towered up where he stood, occasionally sent a
sinister and anxious glance towards the town. He expected to see smoke
rising from the quarter near the prison, and suddenly his lips parted
and he displayed his dazzlingly white teeth in a scornful laugh. That
which he looked for had come to pass; the little grey cloud which he
discerned grew blacker, and then, in the heart of it, rose a crimson
glow which did not take its color from the sun. But of all those
thousands he was the only one who looked behind him and observed it.

The bride's attendants had by this time taken their station on the
pontoon; here came another band of youths with panther skins on their
shoulders; and now--at last, at last--a car came swaying along, drawn
by eight coal-black oxen dressed with green ostrich-feathers and
water-plants.

The car was shaded by a tall canopy, supported by four poles, against
which leaned four men in the robes of the heathen priesthood; this
awning was lavishly decorated with wreaths of lotos and reeds, and
fenced about with papyrus, bulrushes, tall grasses and blossoming
river