Hence arose the fable that his body was deposited in the cataract, whence he arose each year to enrich the earth.
Isis was the sister and wife of Osiris. On the monuments she is variously styled the “Mistress of Heaven,” the “Regent of the Gods,” the “Eye of the Sun.” A veil always hung before her shrine, which, said the well known inscription, “None among mortals have ever lifted up.” Sometimes she represented the land of Egypt, just as Osiris did its fertilizing river, the Nile.
Such were the deities to whose mysterious worship, Philæ, the Sacred Island, was solemnly dedicated.
The temple was beautifully situated, as it covered a considerable part of the Island, and must have appeared in the days of its glory very much as though it rose out of the water. It is comparatively modern, as the dates upon it do not go back beyond the XXXth Dynasty—about four hundred years B. C. The building was very irregular, and the indications are that it was the work of several architects at different periods. The propylon towers are massive, and rise to a height of nearly sixty feet above their base, affording a fine view of the island and its surroundings. The colors on the walls and towers are wonderfully preserved,—better than in most of the Egyptian temples,—and they present a beautiful effect.
The sky was clear and the air soft and balmy; a slight breeze shook the leaves of the trees and roughened the water of the river. To the north were the black rocks that marked the locality of the cataract, while to the south the Nile made a short bend among the Nubian hills and was speedily lost to view.
There is a sentimental poem on the “Long Ago” by an American author, which contains the following stanza:
“There’s a musical isle up the river Time,
Where the softest of airs are playing;
There’s a cloudless sky and a tropical clime,
And a song as sweet as the vesper chime,