nd
above all we must keep straight those that are young.

_Cries are heard outside._

STEWARD. What cries are those?

SATNI. Women in distress.

_Yaouma enters, leading Mieris. Both are agitated._

YAOUMA. Come, mistress--come--We are at the house of the potter, the
father of Satni--Satni help--quick! quick! Run! your father, Satni!

SATNI. Mieris, Yaouma, how come you here?

YAOUMA. They will tell you--go!

MIERIS. Fly to the rescue, he is wounded!--I have sent to the palace for
those who drive out the evil spirits.

YAOUMA. We were set upon by some men.

MIERIS. He defended us--But they will kill him--go!

_Satni and the Steward seize some arms left by Nourm and run
out._

MIERIS. Yaouma! He is wounded! Wounded in saving us--

YAOUMA. Alas!

MIERIS [_listening_] Who is there?

NOURM. I, mistress.

MIERIS. Nourm! Run to the palace, bid them send hither those who drive
forth the evil spirits--

YAOUMA. Alas! mistress, I do fear--already he has fallen--struck to
earth.

MIERIS. They will save him, they will bear him hither--

YAOUMA. Will they bear him hither alive?

MIERIS [_to Nourm_] Run!--You hear!--Run to the palace, bid those who
assist at the last hour be ready to come. If he have died defending us,
the same honors shall be paid him as though ourselves were dead! Go!
[_Nourm goes out. A pause_] Now, Yaouma, lead me out upon the road to
the Nile.

YAOUMA. Mistress, you seek to die? Many then must be your sorrows!

MIERIS. Alas! Alas! Why did you discover my flight? Why did you seek me,
find me, and bring me back--

YAOUMA. Had I not guessed your purpose?

MIERIS. What have I left to live for?

YAOUMA. You have lived all these years in spite of your affliction, what
is there that is changed?

MIERIS. What is there that is changed! You ask me what is changed! Until
now I lived in the hope of a miracle.

YAOUMA. Perhaps it would never have come.

MIERIS. Even at my last hour I should have still looked for it.

YAOUMA. Then you would have died believing in a lie--if what they say be
true.

MIERIS. What matter, I had smiled as I died, thinking death but the
journey to a land where my lost child was waiting for me. The death of a
child! No mother ever can believe, at heart, in that. It is too
unjust--too cruel to be possible. One says to oneself: it is but a
separation! Oh! Satni, thy doctrines may be the truth. But they declare
this separation eternal; they m