Still he stretched out his arms to the limitless, featureless, velvety
dusk that was Egypt by day, and wept.
He entered Tanis in the middle of the third watch, and there he learned
that the Pharaoh had departed, but whither, the solemn, haggard
citizens he met could not tell. He repaired to the inn, a house of
mourning, also, and awaited the dawn. Then he looked on the funereal
capital of Meneptah. The city no longer cried out; it sighed or
sobbed, exhausted with its grief; it went the heavy round of labor
demanded by the necessities of life, bowed, disheveled and blinded with
woe. Kenkenes, humbled, sorrowful, and helpless, averted his eyes and
hurried to the palace.
There he found that the queen and Seti, with all the queen's retinue,
had departed on a pilgrimage to the temple of the sacred ram at Mendes
for the welfare of the soul of Rameses. Masanath was in Pelusium
mourning for her sister who died with the first-born. The
others,--Har-hat, Hotep, Nechutes, Menes, Seneferu, Kephren the
mohar,--all except the palace attendants had accompanied the king. The
great house of the Pharaoh was empty, solitary and haunted.
The destination of the king was a state secret that had not been
imparted to the chamberlains.
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