alone. All those who have come bidden to the feast retire to their homes, to ponder of what they have seen, or to join the populace in their revelry in honour of the joyous night. But the royal bridegroom waits in solitude and prayer; waits until his bride is ready to receive him, at the first streak of dawn, when Isis herself sinks fainting into the arms of Osiris her beloved, and suffuses the vault of heaven with the roseate hue of her bridal blush. Then the royal bridegroom goes forth to meet his bride, and his footsteps lead him through the garden of Isis to that secluded nook, beside the sacred cataract, where stands the hallowed shrine of the goddess, and where foot of man ne'er treads, save he be of royal blood, and hath not yet received the first kiss of his bride. Dost remember the spot, oh, Maat-kha?" he added. "There didst thou go twenty years ago, one summer night, beneath the light of sinking Isis; there didst thou hear the sound of the path crunch beneath the foot of Hor-tep-ra; there didst thou give the first bridal kiss to him whose son thou hast murdered, within the very temple of the goddess."
"I remember," she murmured dreamily, "and oh! how oft have I not thought of that solemn meeting within the sacred precincts, with him whom I love beyond all things earthly—with him who to me, to all Kamt, is sacred, nay! divine."
"It will not be thou, oh, Maat-kha! who wilt meet the bridegroom beneath the shrine of Isis."
"Who then, oh, mighty priest of Ra?" she asked with sudden terror.
"The dead body of thy murdered son."
"I do not understand."
"Nay! thy mind must be strangely overclouded. The Pharaoh did oft in his life evade his attendants and wander about aimlessly in his palaces and his
