The Egyptian princess's happiness was seriously disturbed by the arrival
of a letter from her mother, which brought her naught but sad news. Her
father, Amasis, had been struck with blindness on the very day she had
reached Babylon; and her frail twin-sister Tachot, after falling into a
violent fever, was wasting away for love of Bartja, whose beauty had
captured her heart at the time of his mission in Sais. His name had been
even on her lips in her delirium, and the only hope for her was to see
him again.

Nitetis' whole happiness was destroyed in one moment. She wept and
sighed, until she fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. When her maid
Mandane came to put a last touch to her dress for the banquet, she found
her sleeping, and as there was ample time she went out into the garden,
where she met the eunuch Boges. He was the bearer of good news. Mandane
had been brought up with the children of a Magian, one of whom was now
the high-priest Oropastes. Love had sprung up between her and his
handsome brother Gaumata; and Oropastes, who had ambitious schemes, had
sent his brother to Rhagæ and procured her a situation at court, so that
they might forget one another. And now Gaumata had come and begged her
to meet him next evening in the hanging gardens. Mandane consented after
a hard struggle.

Boges hurried away with malicious pleasure in the near success of his
scheme. He met one of the gardeners, whom he promised to bring some of
the nobles to inspect a special kind of blue lily, in which the gardener
took great pride. He then hurried to the harem, to make sure that the
king's wives should look their best, and insisted upon Phædime painting
her face white, and putting on a simple, dark dress without ornament,
except the chain given her by Cambyses on her marriage, to arouse the
pity of the Achæmenidæ, to which family she herself belonged.