ir supple
naked feet hardly stirred the stones on the road.

Behind them followed an elegant, two-wheeled chariot, with two prancing
brown horses bearing tufts of red and blue feathers on their noble
heads, and seeming by the bearing of their arched necks and flowing
tails to express their pride in the gorgeous housings, richly
embroidered in silver, purple, and blue and golden ornaments, which they
wore--and even more in their beautiful, royal charioteer, Bent-Anat, the
daughter of Rameses, at whose lightest word they pricked their ears, and
whose little hand guided them with a scarcely perceptible touch.

Two young men dressed like the other runners followed the chariot, and
kept the rays of the sun off the face of their mistress with large fans
of snow-white ostrich feathers fastened to long wands.

By the side of Bent-Anat, so long as the road was wide enough to allow
of it, was carried Nefert, the wife of Mena, in her gilt litter, borne
by eight tawny bearers, who, running with a swift and equally measured
step, did not remain far behind the trotting horses of the princess and
her fan-bearers.

Both the women, whom we now see for the first time in daylight, were of
remarkable but altogether different beauty.

The wife of Mena had preserved the appearance of a maiden; her large
almond-shaped eyes had a dreamy surprised look out from under her long
eyelashes, and her figure of hardly the middle-height had acquired a
little stoutness without losing its youthful grace. No drop of foreign
blood flowed in her veins, as could be seen in the color of her skin,
which was of that fresh and equal line which holds a medium between
golden yellow and bronze brown--and which to this day is so charming in
the maidens of Abyssinia--in her straight nose, her well-formed brow,
in her smooth but thick black hair, and in the fineness of her hands and
feet, which were ornamented with circles of gold.

The maiden princess next to her had hardly reached her nineteenth year,
and yet something of a womanly self-consciousness betrayed itself in
her demeanor. Her stature was by almost a head taller than that of
her friend, her skin was fairer, her blue eyes kind and frank, without
tricks of glance, but clear and honest, her profile was noble but
sharply cut, and resembled that of her father, as a landscape in the
mild and softening light of the moon resembles the same landscape in the
broad clear light of day. The scarcely perceptible a