citizens out into the air, in front of their doors or on the roofs and
turrets of their houses; or at the tavern-tables, where they listened to
the tales of the story-tellers while they refreshed them selves with
beer, wine, and the sweet juice of fruits. Many simple folks squatted in
circular groups on the ground, and joined in the burden of songs which
were led by an appointed singer, to the sound of a tabor and flute.

To the south of the temple of Amon stood the king's palace, and near it,
in more or less extensive gardens, rose the houses of the magnates of the
kingdom, among which, one was distinguished by it splendor and extent.

Paaker, the king's pioneer, had caused it to be erected after the death
of his father, in the place of the more homely dwelling of his ancestors,
when he hoped to bring home his cousin, and install her as its mistress.
A few yards further to the east was another stately though older and less
splendid house, which Mena, the king's charioteer, had inherited from his
father, and which was inhabited by his wife Nefert and her mother
Isatuti, while he himself, in the distant Syrian land, shared the tent of
the king, as being his body-guard. Before the door of each house stood
servants bearing torches, and awaiting the long deferred return home of
their masters.

The gate, which gave admission to Paaker's plot of ground through the
wall which surrounded it, was disproportionately, almost ostentatiously,
high and decorated with various paintings. On the right hand and on the
left, two cedar-trunks were erected as masts to carry standards; he had
had them felled for the purpose on Lebanon, and forwarded by ship to
Pelusium on the north-east coast of Egypt. Thence they were conveyed by
the Nile to Thebes.