The Cat of Bubastes: A Tale of Ancient Egypt

by G. A. Henty

Wild-looking figures moved among the crowd, their garments, thrown loosely round them, affording a striking contrast to the cleanness of those of the Egyptians, while their unkempt hair was in equally strong contrast to the precise wigs of the middle-class Egyptians and the bare heads of the lower class. Their skins, too, were much darker in color, though there was considerable variation in this respect. Among them were a sprinkling of men of entirely different type, almost black in hue, with thicker lips and flatter features. These were Ethiopians, whose land lay beyond that of Meroe and who had also felt the weight and power of the arms of Egypt.

“These people of Meroe,” Amuba said, “are very similar in features to the Egyptians, Chebron. And their tongue is also not unlike yours; I can understand their speech.”

“Our oldest books,” Amuba said, “say that we are kindred people, and are Asiatic rather than African in our origin. The people of Meroe say that their far-back ancestors came from Arabia, and first spreading along the western shore of the Red Sea, ascended to the high lands and drove out the black people who inhabited them.

“As to our own origin, it is vague; but my father has told me that the opinion among those most skilled in the ancient learning is that we too came from Arabia. We were not all one people, that is certain; and it is comparatively of recent years, though a vast time as far as human lives go, that the people of the Thebaid—that is, of Upper Egypt—extended their dominion over Lower Egypt and made the whole country one nation. Even now, you know, the king wears two crowns—the one of Upper Egypt, the other of the lower country. Along the shores of the Great Sea to the west are Libyans and other peoples similar in race to ourselves. My father considered that the tribes which first came from Asia pressed on to the west, driving back or exterminating the black people. Each fresh wave that came from the east pushed the others further and further, until at last the ancestors of the people of Lower Egypt arrived and settled there.

“In Meroe the temples and religion are similar to our own. Whether they brought that religion from Arabia, or whether we planted it there during our various conquests of the country, I cannot tell you; but certain it is that there is at present but little more difference between Upper Egypt and Meroe than there is between Upper Egypt and the Delta.”

“And beyond Meroe the people are all black like those we see here?”

“So I believe, Amuba. Our merchants penetrate vast distances to the south exchanging our products for gold and ivory, and everywhere they find the country inhabited by black people living in wretched villages, without, as it seems, any government, or law, or order, waging war with each other and making slaves, whom they also sell to our merchants. They differ so wholly from us that it is certain that we cannot come from the same stock. But they are strong and active and make excellent slaves. Lying between Meroe and the sea, the country called Abyssinia is also inhabited by a race of Arab blood, but differing more from us than those of Meroe.

“They have great towns, but I do not think that their religion is the same as ours; our traders say that their language can be understood by them, although more rough and unpolished. I have heard my father say that he considered that all the country lying east of the Nile, and of its eastern branch that rises in Abyssinia and is called the Tacazze, belongs to Asia rather than to Africa.”

The party found that the death by violence of two successive high priests of Osiris was one of the principal topics of conversation in Syene, but none appeared to think that there was the remotest probability of any concerned in those occurrences making for the south. However, Jethro thought it prudent that the whole party should not land together, and therefore Amuba and Chebron usually went one way and he with the girls another. They paid visits to the sacred island of Ebo opposite the town, and to the quarries of Phile, four miles away. Here they saw the gangs of slaves cutting colossal statues, obelisks, and shrines from the solid rock.

First the outline was traced on the rock, then the surrounding stone was removed with chisels and wedges, and at last the statue or obelisk was itself severed from the rock. Then it was hewn and sculptured by the masons, placed on rollers and dragged by hundreds of men down to the landing-place below the rapids, and these placed on rafts to be floated down the river to its destination. They saw many of these masses of stone in all stages of manufacture. The number of slaves employed was enormous, and these inhabited great buildings erected near the quarries, where also were barracks for the troops who kept guard over them.