CHAPTER XXI
Of the Capture of Belur, the Hittite
The city of Kadesh lay gleaming in the evening sunlight at the upper end of that vast plain which stretched northward to the Lake Country. As viewed from Shabtuna, where the Egyptian army was now encamped, it seemed a veritable city of towers.
Along the eastern front of this Asiatic city the waters of the Orontes glittered like a straight Hittite sword. The high, machicolated gate-towers, on the eastern side, were approached by a causeway and a broad flight of stone steps. Protected by a white wall on either side, these steps rose from the very waters of the turgid Orontes itself.
The city towers were black with people, frenzied women for the most part. Their piercing shrieks, now of exultation, now of despair, floated out upon the flashing waters of the broad river. The sounds reached the ears of Ramses, the Egyptian general, where he stood.
Along the city walls youths and old men peered anxiously southward, across the level plain. Men, women and children stood with faces glued to the openings which capped the city walls.
The eyes of the people of Kadesh were riveted upon the ebb and flow of a gigantic conflict, which had raged throughout the day back and forth across the broad reaches of the plain below.
The mighty hosts of the Hittites, led by Rimur of Charchemish in person, had struggled since daybreak with the forces of Egypt.
The battle had opened auspiciously for the Hittites, though the ninth of Khoiak was a favorable day alike to Egyptian and Hittite. To the Egyptians it meant that the very gods would lend their aid in the conflict, for was not this the day in which the god Thoth gained his memorable victory over Set!
Yet, so far, matters had gone badly for the Egyptians. The Division of Sutekh, led by old Noferhotep, had been surprised at the ford near Shabtuna, and cut to pieces. Noferhotep himself had been drowned in the blood-red waters and his body had not been recovered.