Nettie ceased to clap her little hands; "Jovial James" looked as grave as his usually rollicking, fun-twinkling eyes permitted; the stately Mary could only look fixedly towards the approaching Arabs, the serenity of our patriarchal friend was more than ever disturbed; sweet Isidore grew marble pale, and leaned heavily back upon the sculptured pillar against which we had secured her camp-seat, and your uncle Hal—well! he is a "proverbial philosopher," you know!
There we were, amid the solemn magnificence of the ruined palaces and temples of once-mighty Thebes.
Our little party was gathered in front of the great Propylon of the famous Temple of Luxor, whose mysterious grandeur we had come many thousands of miles to behold. Massive pillars, covered with minutely-finished picture-writing and mystic hieroglyphics, sufficient for the life-long study of the curious student; enormous architraves, half-buried colossi, far-reaching colonnades, "grand, gloomy and peculiar;" the world-famed Memnon; the grim, tomb-hallowed mountains—all the wonders of the Nile, of El Uksorein, of Karnac, surrounded us!
But humiliating reflections upon the mutability of human greatness and human power, the eager speculations of the disciples of Champollion, sarcophagi and sculptured ceilings, and scarabæi and Sesostris, alike sunk into matters of insignificance and indifference when compared with the expectation of Letters from Home!
That most amiable and hospitable of Mussulmans, Mustapha Aga, the traveller's friend, had engaged the Sheik (heaven spare the mark!) of one of the squalid Arab villages, whose mud walls cluster upon the roofs of the grand halls and porticoes of ancient Thebes—reminding one of animalculœ by comparison—to accompany my servant and one or two of our dusky satellites to a point in the vicinity, to which the American and English consuls at Cairo had engaged to forward our letters, etc.
Our motley band of couriers was now seen advancing along the low bank of the river, and all was eager anticipation and impatience.
The ceremony of distribution was speedily accomplished, and an observer of the scene, like our calm, silent host, the kindly Mustapha, might almost read the contents of the different letters of the several members of our little group reflected in the faces of each.
"Jovial James" sunk down at once at the feet of the fair Nettie, who had sacrilegiously seated herself upon the edge of an open sarcophagus, with a lap full of treasures, before which her hoarded antiques—and she was the most indefatigable collector of our corps—relapsed again into the nothingness from which her admiration had, for a time, redeemed them. Something very much like a tear glistened in the bright eyes of the frolicksome youth as he murmured, half-unconsciously "Mother," and sunshine and shadow played in quick succession over the mirroring features of the fair girl.
The usually placid Mary Marston fairly turning her back upon us, beat a retreat towards a prostrate column and
half-concealed herself among its crumbling fragments; and our sweet, fast-fading flower, for whose comfort each vied with the other, the beautiful Isidore, clasped her triple prizes between her slight palms, and folding them to her meek bosom, lifted her soft eyes toward the heaven that looked alike on Egypt and on her native land, and whispered "Home! Oh, father take me Home!"