pig's ears, lizard's blood, bad meat, and decaying
fat, to say nothing of still nastier things. Often the doctor would look
very grave, and say, "The child is not ill; he is bewitched"; and then
he would sit down and write out a prescription something like this:
"Remedy to drive away bewitchment. Take a great beetle; cut off his head
and his wings, boil him, put him in oil, and lay him out. Then cook
his head and his wings; put them in snake-fat, boil, and let the patient
drink the mixture." I think you would almost rather take the risk of
being bewitched than drink a dose like that!

[Illustration: Plate 6
GRANITE STATUE OF RAMSES II. _Page_ 75
Note the hieroglyphics on base of statue. _Pages_ 68, 69]

Sometimes the doctor gave no medicines at all, but wrote a few magic
words on a scrap of old paper, and tied it round the part where the pain
was. I daresay it did as much good as his pills. Very often the mother
believed that it was not really sickness that was troubling her child,
but that a ghost was coming and hurting him; so when his cries showed
that the ghost was in the room, the mother would rise up, shaking all
over, I daresay, and would repeat the verse that she had been taught
would drive ghosts away:

"Comest thou to kiss this child? I suffer thee not to kiss him;
Comest thou to quiet him? I suffer thee not to quiet him;
Comest thou to harm him? I suffer thee not to harm him;
Comest thou to take him away? I suffer thee not to take him away."

When little Tahuti has got over his baby aches, and escaped the ghosts,
he begins to run about and play. He and his sister are not bothered to
any great extent with dressing in the mornings. They are very particular
about washing, but as Egypt is so hot, clothes are not needed very much,
and so the little boy and girl play about with nothing at all on their
little brown bodies except, perhaps, a narrow girdle, or even a single
thread tied round the waist. They have their toys just like you. Tahuti
has got a wonderful man, who, when you pull a string, works a roller up
and down upon a board, just like a baker rolling out dough, and besides
he has a crocodile that moves its jaws. His sister has dolls: a fine
Egyptian lady and a frizzy-haired, black-faced Nubian girl. Sometimes
they play together at ninepins, rolling the ball through a little gate.

For about four years this would go on, as long as Tahuti was what the
Egyptians called "a wise little