Art, which gives to us a second and a more withdrawn
life, opening to us a door through which we pass to our dreams, may
well imitate life in this.
IV
ABYDOS
Through a long and golden noontide, and on into an afternoon whose
opulence of warmth and light it seemed could never wane, I sat alone,
or wandered gently quite alone, in the Temple of Seti I. at Abydos.
Here again I was in a place of the dead. In Egypt one ever seeks the
dead in the sunshine, black vaults in the land of the gold. But here
in Abydos I was accompanied by whiteness. The general effect of Seti's
mighty temple is that it is a white temple when seen in full sunshine
and beneath a sky of blinding blue. In an arid place it stands, just
beyond an Egyptian village that is a maze of dust, of children, of
animals, and flies. The last blind houses of the village, brown as
brown paper, confront it on a mound, and as I came toward it a girl-
child swathed in purple with ear-rings, and a twist of orange
handkerchief above her eyes, full of cloud and fire, leaned from a
roof, sinuously as a young snake, to watch me. On each side,
descending, were white, ruined walls, stretched out like defaced white
arms of the temple to receive me. I stood still for a moment and
looked at the narrow, severely simple doorway, at the twelve broken
columns advanced on either side, white and greyish white with their
right angles, their once painted figures now almost wholly colorless.
Here lay the Osirians, those blessed dead of the land of Egypt, who
worshipped the Judge of the Dead, the Lord of the Underworld, and who
hoped for immortality through him - Osiris, husband of Isis, Osiris,
receiver of prayers. Osiris the sun who will not be conquered by
night, but eternally rises again, and so is the symbol of the
resurrection of the soul. It is said that Set, the power of Evil, tore
the body of Osiris into fourteen fragments and scattered them over the
land. But multitudes of worshippers of Osiris believed him buried near
Abydos and, like those who loved the sweet songs of Hafiz, they
desired to be buried near him whom they adored; and so this place
became a place of the dead, a place of many prayers, a white place of
many longings.
I was glad to be alone there. The guardian left me in perfect peace. I
happily forgot him. I sat down in the shadow of a column upon its
mighty projecting base. The sky was blinding blue. Great bees hummed,
like bourdons, through the silence, deepening the almost heavy calm.
These columns, architraves, doorways, how mighty, how grandly strong
they were! And yet soon I began to be aware that even here, where
surely one should read only the Book of the Dead, or bend down to the
hot ground to listen if perchance one might hear the dead themselves
murmuring over the chapters of Beatification far down in their hidden
tombs, there was a likeness, a gentle gaiety of life, as in the tomb
of Thi. The effect of solidity was immense. These columns bulged,
almost like great fruits swollen out by their heady strength of blood.
They towered up in crowds. The heavy roof, broken in places most
mercifully to show squares and oblongs of that perfect, calling blue,
was like a frowning brow. And yet I was with grace, with gentleness,
with lightness, because in the place of the dead I was again with the
happy, living walls. Above me, on the roof, there was a gleam of
palest blue, like the blue I have sometimes seen at morning on the
Ionian sea just where it meets the shore. The double rows of gigantic
columns stretched away, tall almost as forest trees, to right of me
and to left, and were shut in by massive walls, strong as the walls of
a fortress. And on these columns, and on these walls, dead painters
and gravers had breathed the sweet breath of life. Here in the sun,
for me alone, as it seemed, a population followed their occupations.
Men walked, and kneeled, and stood, some white and clothed, some nude,
some red as the red man's child that leaped beyond the sea. And here
was the lotus-flower held in reverent hands, not the rose-lotus, but
the blossom that typified the rising again of the sun, and that, worn
as an amulet, signified the gift of eternal youth. And here was hawk-
faced Horus, and here a priest offering sacrifice to a god, belief in
whom has long since passed away. A king revealed himself to me,
adoring Ptah, "Father of the beginnings," who established upon earth,
my figures thought, the everlasting justice, and again at the knees of
Amen burning incense in his honor. Isis and Osiris stood together, and
sacrifice was made before their sacred bark. And Seti worshipped them,
and Seshta, goddess of learning, wrote in the book of eternity the
name of the king.
The great bees hummed, moving slowly in the golden air among the
mighty columns, passing slowly among these records of lives long over,
but which seemed still to be. And I looked at the lotus-flowers which
the little grotesque hands were holding, had been holding for how many
years - the flowers that typified the rising again of the sun and the
divine gift of eternal youth. And I thought of the bird and the
Sphinx, the thing that was whimsical wooing the thing that was mighty.
And I gazed at the immense columns and at the light and little figures
all about me. Bird and Sphinx, delicate whimsicality, calm and
terrific power! In Egypt the dead men have combined them, and the
combination has an irresistible fascination, weaves a spell that
entrances you in the sunshine and beneath the blinding blue.
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