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They did so, and when the multitude saw the youth, as it were, transformed into a well-known venerable shekh, they were stricken with awe, and said, "Heavens! the young man turns out to be our reverend chief of the herb-sellers;" for the old man had long been accustomed to dispose of greens and sugarcane at the college gate near the great mosque, and was the oldest in his trade.
Here were the tombs of the Theban chiefs in the period of the Old Kingdom, two of which have been found by Mr. Newberry. In later times, it would seem, these tombs were largely occupied and remodelled by the great nobles of the XVIIIth Dynasty, so that now nearly all the tombs extant on Shêkh Abd el-Kûrna belong to that dynasty.
This he said out of compliment; but the shekh replied, "My lord, the marriage cannot be valid without a dower." He then presented a vast sum of money, with many jewels, for the purpose to his pupil; after which he retired with the sultan into a chamber, and arrayed him in a splendid habit; rich dresses were also given to each of his attendants according to their rank.
Notwithstanding this diversity of design, the tomb of Shekh Selim, of which I have attempted to give you an idea, is an ideal of perfect harmony, and every stroke of the chisel was as precise as if the artist had been engraving a cameo.
They were surprised and delighted at the splendour of the first court, but much more so at the superior magnificence of a second; into which they were ushered, and introduced into a spacious hall, where they found the venerable shekh sitting to receive them. The sultan made a low obeisance; upon which the sage just moved his head, but did not rise.
At 7.40 the next morning they set out again, flew northeast along the Jebel esh Shekh Range to Palmyra, then east to the Euphrates, down that river to Ramadi, and thence across to Bagdad, a flight of 510 miles made in six hours and fifty minutes without a single stop, part of it over country untrod even by the most primitive travelers.
The holy man on the hill at Fattehpur was believed to have tremendous influence with those deities who control the coming of babies into this great world; hence the emperor and his sultana visited Shekh Selim in his rock retreat to solicit his interposition for the birth of a son.
Every winter traveller to Egypt knows, well the ride from the sandy shore opposite the Luxor temple, along the narrow pathway between the gardens and the canal, across the bridges and over the cultivated land to the Ramesseum, behind which rises Shêkh Abd el-Kûrna, with its countless tombs, ranged in serried rows along the scarred and scarped face of the hill.
I seized the crops by the wells, I looted the flocks and herds, I carried away the people and their slaves who ate their bread, I slew the men there. Through my sword and bow, and through my well-organised campaigns, I was highly esteemed in the mind of the Shēkh, and he loved me, for he knew my bravery, and he set me before his children when he saw the bravery of my arms.
When he had reached the palace he found the sultan expecting him; upon which he made his obeisance, and said, "Will my lord honour me by his company?" The sultan arose, mounted his horse, and attended by his whole court, followed the youth to the place chosen by the venerable shekh.
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