The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5

lbow and saw that the bed was empty; yet the first beams of the sun, striking the frieze of the portico, were only now beginning to cast on the wall the shadow of

dressed, and perfumed water had been poured over her lovel

search of her mistress. She looked for her first under the portico of the two courts, thinking that, unable

e took a fancy to see the night dew sparkle on the leaves of

the arbour, but she did not find Tahoser; she hastened to the pond, in which her mistress might have taken a fancy to bathe, as she sometimes did with her companions, upon the granite steps which led from the edge of the basin to t

ce of Tahoser, proceeded to make most minute search. They ascended the terraces, rummaged every room, every corner, every place where she might possibly be. Nofré, in her agitation,

y a narrow, dainty sole belonging to a much smaller foot than the maid's. He followed this track, which led him, passing under the arbour, from the pylon in the court to the water gate. The bolts, as he pointed out to Nofré, had been drawn, and the two leaves of the door were held merely by their weight; therefore Petamounoph's daughter had gone out that way. Farther on the track was lost; the brick quay had preserved no trace; the boatman who had carried Tahoser

desolate attitudes, letting one of their hands hang down, its palm turned up, and placing the other

egion to which travel the dead. She was a kind mistress; she gave us food in abundance, did not exact excessive labour, and caused us to be bea

the men and women as they

l lacerate your fair body, will draw your heart out through a cut like that made by the dissectors, will throw your remains to the ferocious crocodiles, and on the day of reunion your mutilated soul will find shapeless remains

ser will soon return. She has no doubt yielded to some fancy which we cannot guess, and pr

square block of basalt, and pressing his temples between his dry hands, seemed to reflect deeply. His face of a reddish brown, his sunken eyes, his prominent jaws, the deeply wri

awaited by Nofré, was thus expressed: "

hought that she was the only one w

en is the number symbolical of voluptuousness; and for some time past she has been calling at unaccustomed hours

But how have you learned to know women,-you who merely dig the

bited two rows of teeth fit to crush date-stones. The

oked so splendid on his war chariot in the triumphal procession. As she was in love with him herself, though she was not fully aware of it, she assumed that her mistr

touche of the Pharaoh; the brazen poniard, with the jade handle open-worked to allow the fingers to pass through; the flat-edged battle-axe, the falchion with curved blade; the helmet with i

ht him a message from Tahoser, although the priest's daughter had never taken notice of his glances; but the man to whom the gods have imparted the gift of beauty easily fancies th

aid, full of her search, did not break silence. "Your mistress is we

ied Nofré; "for she has fled from her home without informing any one of her

king about?" cried Ahmosis, with a sur

"and sometimes the best-behaved maidens

not one of his beams, which end in hands, has fallen on her

her faithful Nofré, who would have asked nothing better than to serve your loves. You are han

rvants might be suspected of having killed Tahoser in order to seize on her riches, and tha

in thought, paying no attention to the gambols of his women, who, nude and crowned with flowers, were disporting themselves in the transparent waters of the piscina, splashing each other and utter

urt, surrounded by columns painted in brilliant colours, in the clear light of an azure sky, across which flew from time to ti

air, the long locks of which made their white skins seem whiter still. A few last drops of water ran down their shining shoulders and their arms polished like

on the back of his armchair the tame monkey was eating dates and cracking its jaws; against the master's legs the tame cat rubbed itself, arching its back; the deformed dwarf pulled the monkey's tail and the cat's moustaches, making the one scratch and the

Moui, necklaces of seven rows of cornelian, lapis-lazuli, red jasper, pearls, agates, sardonyx, and onyx; exquisitely chased anklets, belts, with plates engraved with hieroglyphs, rings with scarab?i set in them; quantities of fishes, crocodiles, and hearts stamped out of gold, serpents in enamel twisted on themselves; bronze vases, flagons of wavy alabaster, and of blue glass on which wound white spirals; coffers of

eto, and clapping his hands, he called Timopht, the servant who had followed Tahoser, and said to him,

n, which crossed the Nile on a royal barge, and soo

Pharaoh," said Timoph

ar, half with amazement. She dreaded lest the King should put her

our sacred geese, Amset, Sis, Soumauts, and Kebhsniv, which fly

them back. Keep them until Tahoser is found. You shall answer for them on your head. Have

s brow in the dust, said that Tahoser had vanished, the King became very wroth, and h