Though the rise of the river has reached barely one third of its height, the whole region near the banks is under water. Every hour some little height takes on the semblance of an island, divided from others by a narrow channel, which widens gradually and cuts off the house more and more from its neighbors. Very often he who walked out to work comes home in a boat from his labor.
Boats and rafts appear more and more frequently on the river. From some of them men are catching fish in nets; on others they bring the harvest to granaries, or bellowing cattle to their stables. With other boats visits are made to acquaintances to inform them amid shouts and laughter that the river is rising. Sometimes boats gather in one place, like a flock of daws, and then shoot apart on all sides before a broad raft bearing down from Upper Egypt immense blocks of stone hewn out in quarries near the river.
In the air, as far as the ear can hear, extend the roar of the rising water, the cries of frightened birds, and the gladsome songs of people. The Nile is rising, there will be bread in abundance.
During a whole month investigation continued in the affair of the attack on the house of Ramses. Each morning a boat with officials and warriors came to some small estate. People were snatched from their labor, overwhelmed with treacherous questions, beaten with sticks. Toward evening two boats returned to Memphis: one brought officials, the other brought prisoners.
In this way some hundreds of men were caught, of whom one half knew nothing, the other half were threatened by imprisonment or toil for a number of years in the quarries. But nothing was learned of those who led the attack, or of that priest who had persuaded the people to leave the place. Prince Ramses had qualities which were uncommonly contradictory. He was as impetuous as a lion and as stubborn as a bullock, but he had a keen understanding and a deep sense of justice.
Seeing that this investigation by officials gave no result whatever, he sailed on a certain day to Memphis and commanded to open the prison.
The prison was built on an eminence surrounded by a lofty wall, and was composed of a great number of stone, brick, and wooden buildings. These buildings for the main part were merely the dwellings of overseers. Prisoners were placed in subterranean dens hewn out in a cliff of limestone.
When Prince Ramses passed the gate, he saw a crowd of women washing and feeding some prisoner. This naked man, who resembled a skeleton, was sitting on the ground, having his hands and feet in four openings of a square plank which took the place of fetters.
"Has this man suffered long in this way?" asked Ramses.
"Two months," said the overseer.