his guests.

Psamtik went at once to the commander of the native troops, ordered
him to banish the Egyptian captain who had failed in executing his
revengeful plans, to the quarries of Thebais, and to send the Ethiopians
back to their native country. He then hurried to the high-priest of
Neith, to inform him how much he had been able to extort from the king.

Neithotep shook his head doubtfully on hearing of Amasis' threats, and
dismissed the prince with a few words of exhortation, a practice he
never omitted.

Psamtik returned home, his heart oppressed and his mind clouded with
a sense of unsatisfied revenge, of a new and unhappy rupture with his
father, a fear of foreign derision, a feeling of his subjection to the
will of the priests, and of a gloomy fate which had hung over his head
since his birth.

His once beautiful wife was dead; and, of five blooming children, only
one daughter remained to him, and a little son, whom he loved tenderly,
and to whom in this sad moment he felt drawn. For the blue eyes and
laughing mouth of his child were the only objects that ever thawed this
man's icy heart, and from these he now hoped for consolation and courage
on his weary road through life.

"Where is my son?" he asked of the first attendant who crossed his path.

"The king has just sent for the Prince Necho and his nurse," answered
the man.

At this moment the high-steward of the prince's household approached,
and with a low obeisance delivered to Psamtik a sealed papyrus letter,
with the words: "From your father, the king."

In angry haste he broke the yellow wax of the seal bearing the king's
name, and read: "I have sent for thy son, that he may not become, like
his father, a blind instrument in the hands of the priesthood, forgetful
of what is due to himself and his country. His education shall be my
care, for the impressions of childhood affect the whole of a man's later
life. Thou canst see him if thou wilt, but I must be acquainted with thy
intention beforehand."

[Signet rings were worn by the Egyptians at a very early period.
Thus, in Genesis 41. 42., Pharaoh puts his ring on Joseph's hand.
In the Berlin Museum and all other collections of Egyptian
antiquities, numbers of these rings are to be found, many of which
are more than 4000 years old.]

Psamtik concealed his indignation from the surrounding attendants with
difficulty. The mere wish of a royal father had, according to Egyptian
cus