Adjutants ran to the tree, and saw that the hanging man was that old slave whose canal they had closed in the morning.
"He did right to hang himself!" cried Eunana among the officers. "Could ye believe it, that wretch dared to seize the feet of his holiness the minister!"
On hearing this, Ramses reined in his horse, dismounted, and walked up to the ominous tree.
The slave was hanging with his head stretched forward; his mouth was opened widely, his hands turned toward the spectators, and terror was in his eyes. He looked like a man who had wished to say something, but whose voice had failed him.
"The unfortunate!" sighed Ramses, with compassion.
On returning to the retinue he gave command to relate to him the history of the man, and then he rode a long time in silence.
Before his eyes was the picture of the suicide, and in his heart was the feeling that a great wrong had been done, such a wrong that even he, the son and the heir of the pharaoh, might halt in face of it.
The heat was unendurable, the dust dried up the water and pierced the eyes of man and beast. The division was detained for a short rest, and meanwhile Nitager finished his conversation with the minister.
"My officers," said the old commander, "never look under their feet, but always straight forward."
"That is the reason, perhaps, why no enemy has ever surprised me."