d, 'Let them build, sister, let them build.'

And Neith answered, 'What shall they build, if I build not with them?'

And Pthah drew with his measuring rod upon the sand. And I saw suddenly,
drawn on the sand, the outlines of great cities, and of vaults, and
domes, and aqueducts, and bastions, and towers, greater than obelisks,
covered with black clouds. And the wind blew ripples of sand amidst the
lines that Pthah drew, and the moving sand was like the marching of men.
But I saw that wherever Neith looked at the lines, they faded, and were
effaced.

'Oh, Brother!' she said at last, 'what is this vanity? If I, who am
Lady of wisdom, do not mock the children of men, why shouldst thou mock
them, who art Lord of truth?' But Pthah answered, 'They thought to bind
me; and they shall be bound. They shall labour in the fire for vanity.'

And Neith said, looking at the sand, 'Brother, there is no true labour
here--there is only weary life and wasteful death.'

And Pthah answered, 'Is it not truer labour, sister, than thy sculpture
of dreams?'

Then Neith smiled; and stopped suddenly.

She looked to the sun; its edge touched the horizon-edge of the desert.
Then she looked to the long heaps of pieces of clay, that lay, each with
its blue shadow, by the lake shore.

'Brother,' she said, 'how long will this pyramid of thine be in
building?'

'Thoth will have sealed the scroll of the years ten times, before the
summit is laid.'

'Brother, thou knowest not how to teach thy children to labour,'
answered Neith. 'Look! I must follow Phre beyond Atlas; shall I build
your pyramid for you before he goes down?' And Pthah answered, 'Yea,
sister, if thou canst put thy winged shoulders to such work.' And Neith
drew herself to her height; and I heard a clashing pass through the
plumes of her wings, and the asp stood up on her helmet, and fire
gathered in her eyes. And she took one of the flaming arrows out of the
sheaf in her left hand, and stretched it out over the heaps of clay. And
they rose up like flights of locusts, and spread themselves in the air,
so that it grew dark in a moment. Then Neith designed them places with
her arrow point; and they drew into ranks, like dark clouds laid level
at morning. Then Neith pointed with her arrow to the north, and to the
south, and to the east, and to the west, and the flying motes of earth
drew asunder into four great ranked crowds; and stood, one in the north,
and one in the south, and on