famine, when a bad harvest here had disappointed the hopes of the
husbandman.

And was there anywhere a more industrious nation of laborers, had there
ever been, before them, a thriftier or a more skilful race? When he
looked back on the fate and deeds of nations, on the remotest horizon
where the thread of history was scarcely perceptible, that same gigantic
Sphinx was there--the first and earliest monument of human joy in
creative art--those Pyramids which still proudly stood in undiminished
and inaccessible majesty beyond the Nile, beyond the ruined capital of
his forefathers, at the foot of the Libyan range. He was the son of the
men who had raised these imperishable works, and in his veins perchance
there still might flow a drop of the blood of those Pharaohs who had
sought eternal rest in these vast tombs, and whose greater progeny, had
overrun half the world with their armies, and had exacted tribute and
submission. He, who had often felt flattered at being praised for the
purity of his Greek--pure not merely for his time: an age of bastard
tongues--and for the engaging Hellenism of his person, here and now had
an impulse of pride of his Egyptian origin. He drew a deep breath, as he
gazed at the sinking sun; it seemed to lend intentional significance to
the rich beauty of his home as its magical glory transmuted the fields,
the stream, and the palm-groves, the roofs of the city, and even the
barren desert-range and the Pyramids to burning gold. It was fast going
to rest behind the Libyan chain. The bare, colorless limestone sparkled
like translucent crystal; the glowing sphere looked as though it were
melting into the very heart of the mountains behind which it was
vanishing, while its rays, shooting upwards like millions of gold
threads, bound his native valley to heaven--the dwelling of the
Divine Power who had blessed it above all other lands.