Chebron was too well trained in the respect due to a parent to ask further questions, but he renewed the subject with Amuba as they strolled in the garden together afterward.
“I wonder how each nation found out who were the gods who specially cared for them, Amuba?”
“I have no idea,” Amuba, who had never given the subject a thought, replied. “You are always asking puzzling questions, Chebron.”
“Well, but it must have been somehow,” Chebron insisted. “Do you suppose that any one ever saw our gods? and if not, how do people know that one has the head of a dog and another of a cat, or what they are like? Are some gods stronger than others, because all people offer sacrifices to the gods and ask for their help before going to battle? Some are beaten and some are victorious; some win to-day and lose to-morrow. Is it that these gods are stronger one day than another, or that they do not care to help their people sometimes? Why do they not prevent their temples from being burned and their images from being thrown down? It is all very strange.”
“It is all very strange, Chebron. I was not long ago asking Jethro nearly the same question, but he could give me no answer. Why do you not ask your father. He is one of the wisest of the Egyptians.”
“I have asked my father, but he will not answer me,” Chebron said thoughtfully. “I think sometimes that it is because I have asked these questions that he does not wish me to become a high priest. I did not mean anything disrespectful to the gods. But somehow when I want to know things, and he will not answer me, I think he looks sadly, as if he was sorry at heart that he could not tell me what I want to know.”
“Have you ever asked your brother Neco?”
“Oh, Neco is different,” Chebron said with an accent almost of disdain. “Neco gets into passions and threatens me with all sorts of things; but I can see he knows no more about it than I do, for he has a bewildered look in his face when I ask him these things, and once or twice he has put his hands to his ears and fairly run away, as if I was saying something altogether profane and impious against the gods.”
On the following day the high priest and his party started for Goshen. The first portion of the journey was performed by water. The craft was a large one, with a pavilion of carved wood on deck, and two masts, with great sails of many colors cunningly worked together. Persons of consequence traveling in this way were generally accompanied by at least two or three musicians playing on harps, trumpets, or pipes; for the Egyptians were passionately fond of music, and no feast was thought complete without a band to discourse soft music while it was going on. The instruments were of the most varied kinds; stringed instruments predominated, and these varied in size from tiny instruments resembling zithers to harps much larger than those used in modern times. In addition to these they had trumpets of many forms, reed instruments, cymbals, and drums, the last-named long and narrow in shape.
Ameres, however, although not averse to music after the evening meal, was of too practical a character to care for it at other times. He considered that it was too often an excuse for doing nothing and thinking of nothing, and therefore dispensed with it except on state occasions. As they floated down the river he explained to his son the various objects which they passed; told him the manner in which the fishermen in their high boats made of wooden planks bound together by rushes, or in smaller crafts shaped like punts formed entirely of papyrus bound together with bands of the same plant, caught the fish; pointed out the entrances to the various canals, and explained the working of the gates which admitted the water; gave him the history of the various temples, towns, and villages; named the many waterfowl basking on the surface of the river, and told him of their habits and how they were captured by the fowlers; he pointed out the great tombs to him, and told him by whom they were built.