CLEOPATRA




INTRODUCTION

In the recesses of the desolate Libyan mountains that lie behind the
temple and city of Abydus, the supposed burying place of the holy
Osiris, a tomb was recently discovered, among the contents of which were
the papyrus rolls whereupon this history is written. The tomb itself is
spacious, but otherwise remarkable only for the depth of the shaft which
descends vertically from the rock-hewn cave, that once served as the
mortuary chapel for the friends and relatives of the departed, to the
coffin-chamber beneath. This shaft is no less than eighty-nine feet in
depth. The chamber at its foot was found to contain three coffins only,
though it is large enough for many more. Two of these, which in all
probability inclosed the bodies of the High Priest, Amenemhat, and of
his wife, father and mother of Harmachis, the hero of this history, the
shameless Arabs who discovered them there and then broke up.

The Arabs broke the bodies up. With unhallowed hands they tore the holy
Amenemhat and the frame of her who had, as it is written, been filled
with the spirit of the Hathors--tore them limb from limb, searching for
treasure amidst their bones--perhaps, as is their custom, selling the