the driver.

The weary wretches rose slowly, the beasts were loaded, and on went the
pitiable procession, so as to reach the mines before sunset.

The destination of the travellers was a wide valley, closed in by two
high and rocky mountain-slopes; it was called Ta Mafka by the Egyptians,
Dophka by the Hebrews. The southern cliff-wall consisted of dark granite,
the northern of red sandstone; in a distant branch of the valley lay the
mines in which copper was found. In the midst of the valley rose a hill,
surrounded by a wall, and crowned with small stone houses, for the guard,
the officers, and the overseers. According to the old regulations, they
were without roofs, but as many deaths and much sickness had occurred
among the workmen in consequence of the cold nights, they had been
slightly sheltered with palm-branches brought from the oasis of the
Alnalckites, at no great distance.

On the uttermost peak of the hill, where it was most exposed to the wind,
were the smelting furnaces, and a manufactory where a peculiar green
glass was prepared, which was brought into the market under the name of
Mafkat, that is to say, emerald. The genuine precious stone was found
farther to the south, on the western shore of the Red Sea, and was highly
prized in Egypt.

Our friends had already for more than a month belonged to the
mining-community of the Mafkat valley, and Pentaur had never learned how
it was that he had been brought hither with his companion Nebsecht,
instead of going to the sandstone quarries of Chennu.

That Uarda's father had effected this change was beyond a doubt, and the
poet trusted the rough but honest soldier who still kept near him, and
gave him credit for the best intentions, although he had only spoken to
him once since their departure from Thebes.

That was the first night, when he had come up to Pentaur, and whispered:
"I am looking after you. You will find the physician Nebsecht here; but
treat each other as enemies rather than as friends, if you do not wish to
be parted."

Pentaur had communicated the soldier's advice to Nebsecht, and he had
followed it in his own way.

It afforded him a secret pleasure to see how Pentaur's life contradicted
the belief in a just and beneficent ordering of the destinies of men; and
the more he and the poet were oppressed, the more bitter was the irony,
often amounting to extravagance, with which the mocking sceptic attacked
him.

He loved Pentaur, for the poe