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Updated: May 9, 2025
Their shadows on the water were like passing spirits; and at night when the Nubian boatmen danced, their feet thudding on the lower deck to the cry of the darabukah, the Nile whispered of the past, with a tinkling whisper, like the music of Hathor's sacred sistrum.
Tachot looked at him earnestly before taking the golden sistrum from his hands, and then said, in a low voice, which only he could understand: "Are you Bartja? Tell me, in your mother's name are you Bartja?" "Yes, I am," was his answer, in a voice as low as her own, "your friend, Bartja." He could not say more, for the priests pushed him back among the crowd.
He felt that he had been recognized and for one moment thought of hiding himself in the crowd; but only for one moment his chivalrous feeling gained the day, he darted forward, picked up the sistrum, and forgetting the danger in which he was placing himself, held it out to the princess.
The queen, standing behind him like Isis behind Osiris, uplifts her hand to protect him, shakes the sistrum, beats the tambourine to dispel evil spirits, or holds the libation vase or bouquet. The eldest son carries the net or lassoes the bull, and recites the prayer while his father successively presents to the god each object prescribed by the ritual.
Tachot seemed to notice this, for she raised her eyes from the sistrum and looked kindly and gratefully at the crowd. Suddenly the color left her face, she turned deadly pale, and the golden sistrum fell on to the stone pavement with a clang, close to Bartja's feet.
She was dressed in priestly robes and wore a costly head-dress with the winged disc and the Uraeus. In her left hand she held a sacred golden sistrum, the tones of which were to scare away Typhon, and in her right some lotus-flowers. The wife, daughter and sister of the high-priest followed her, in similar but less splendid ornaments.
The priestesses some of whom, with garlands on their flowing hair, were already shaking the sistrum of Isis mingled with the line of priests, their high voices blending with the deep notes of the men. Neokori, or temple servants, and a large number of worshippers of Isis, closed the procession, all wearing wreaths and carrying flowers.
Plutarch describes it correctly, thus: "The Sistrum is rounded above, and the loop holds the four bars which are shaken." from one of the attendant pastophori, and held it on high; the priests behind him raised a solemn hymn, and the crowd sank on their knees; nor did they move till the chant ceased and the high-priest again cried out: "The Immortals bless you by me their servant.
After she had made this dreadful certainty clear to her own mind, and discovered that it was in vain to beg her attendants to carry her to her dying father, she left off listening to the courtiers below, and began looking at the sistrum which Bartja himself had put into her hand, and which she had brought on to the balcony with her, as if seeking comfort there.
Tachot seemed to notice this, for she raised her eyes from the sistrum and looked kindly and gratefully at the crowd. Suddenly the color left her face, she turned deadly pale, and the golden sistrum fell on to the stone pavement with a clang, close to Bartja's feet.
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