How
much dead majesty lay in the hill upon which he stood? Were they all
really dead, he wondered, or were those fellaheen right? Did their
spirits still come forth at night and wander through the land where once
they ruled? Of course that was the Egyptian faith according to which
the _Ka_, or Double, eternally haunted the place where its earthly
counterpart had been laid to rest. When one came to think of it, beneath
a mass of unintelligible symbolism there was much in the Egyptian faith
which it was hard for a Christian to disbelieve. Salvation through a
Redeemer, for instance, and the resurrection of the body. Had he, Smith,
not already written a treatise upon these points of similarity which he
proposed to publish one day, not under his own name? Well, he would not
think of them now; the occasion seemed scarcely fitting--they came home
too pointedly to one who was engaged in violating a tomb.
His mind, or rather his imagination--of which he had plenty--went off at
a tangent. What sights had this place seen thousands of years ago! Once,
thousands of years ago, a procession had wound up along the roadway
which was doubtless buried beneath the sand whereon he stood towards
the dark door of this sepulchre.
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