Slowly the sun descends; and behind us the granites of the town-mummy
seem to burn more and more. It is true that a slight shadow of a warmer
tint, an amaranth violet, begins to encroach upon the lower parts,
spreading along the avenues and over the open spaces. But everything
that rises into the sky--the friezes of the temples, the capitals of
the columns, the sharp points of the obelisks--are still red as glowing
embers. These all become imbued with light and continue to glow and shed
a rosy illumination until the end of the twilight.

It is a glorious hour, even for the old dust of Egypt, which fills the
air eternally, without detracting at all from its wonderful clearness.
It savours of spices, of the Bedouin, of the bitumen of the sarcophagus.
And here now it is playing the role of those powders of different shades
of gold which the Japanese use for the backgrounds of their lacquered
landscapes. It reveals itself everywhere, close to and on the horizon,
modifying at its pleasure the colour of things, and giving them a kind
of metallic lustre. The phantasy of its changes is unimaginable. Even
in the distances of the countryside, it is busy indicating by little
trailing clouds of gold the smallest pathways traversed by the herds.

And now the disc of the God of Thebes has disappeared behind the Libyan
mountains, after changing its light from red to yellow and from yellow
to green.

And thereupon the tourists, judging that the display is over for
the night, commence to descend and make ready for departure. Some in
carriages, others on donkeys, they go to recruit themselves with the
electricity and elegance of Luxor, the neighbouring town (wines and
spirits are paid for as extras, and we dress for dinner). And the dust
condescends to mark their exodus also by a last cloud of gold beneath
the palm-trees of the road.

An immediate solemnity succeeds to their departure. Above the mud houses
of the fellah villages rise slender columns of smoke, which are of a
periwinkle-blue in the midst of the still yellow atmosphere. They tell
of the humble life of these little homesteads, subsisting here, where in
the backward of the ages were so many palaces and splendours.

And the first bayings of the watchdogs announce already the vague
uneasiness of the evenings around the ruins. There is no one now within
the mummy-town, which seems all at once to have grown larger in the
silence. Very quickly the violet shadow covers it,