were muttered, and how every person and thing, which had approached or
been brought into contact with the dead body, was subjected to numerous
purifications with water and pungent fluids.

The same evening Cambyses was seized by one of his old epileptic attacks.
Two days later he gave Nebenchari permission to embalm Nitetis' body in
the Egyptian manner, according to her last wish. The king gave way to
the most immoderate grief; he tore the flesh of his arms, rent his
clothes and strewed ashes on his head, and on his couch. All the
magnates of his court were obliged to follow his example. The troops
mounted guard with rent banners and muffled drums. The cymbals and
kettle-drums of the "Immortals" were bound round with crape. The horses
which Nitetis had used, as well as all which were then in use by the
court, were colored blue and deprived of their tails; the entire court
appeared in mourning robes of dark brown, rent to the girdle, and the
Magi were compelled to pray three days and nights unceasingly for the
soul of the dead, which was supposed to be awaiting its sentence for
eternity at the bridge Chinvat on the third night.

Neither the king, Kassandane, nor Atossa shrank from submitting to the
necessary purifications; they repeated, as if for one of their nearest
relations, thirty prayers for the dead, while, in a house outside the
city gates Nebenchari began to embalm her body in the most costly manner,
and according to the strictest rules of his art.


[Embalming was practised in three different ways. The first cost a
talent of silver (L225.); the second 20 Minae (L60.) and the third
was very inexpensive. Herod. II. 86-88. Diod. I. 9. The brain
was first drawn out through the nose and the skull filled with