orientalcairocit00sladuoft

324 Oriental Cairo
in the morning, as the gold turned into withered leaves in
Irving's Alhambra. The gods who punish for greed should
decree this, for if you understand what Arabs are talking
about, you will always find that it is money.
It is by moonlight that you best realise how enormous, how
mighty is the head of the Sphinx—the most subtle piece of
sculpture the world ever saw ; even the muscles of its throat
tell their prodigious tale by night ; it is only by night that
you see the anatomy of its bones. To feel the littleness of
one's life in the presence of this millionaire of time, one has
only to climb up and stand upon its lion-like flanks in the
cold white light.
The moment we broke off our reverie with thoughts of the
last tram, the Arabs began fortune-telling and scarab-selling
again. As we were walking down and beating them off like
flies, we caught sight of the Great Pyramid on the edge
of the inundation, like Etna hanging over the Ionian Sea.
But with this difference, that its double was reflected on the
smooth water. Had the ancient Egyptians, I wonder, any
expression which signified both the Ka, the personal double
of the deceased man, and his reflection or shadow while
he was alive ?
The Ka, as it seemed to me, of the chief Pyramid on the
water, fixed in me the resolve to come back with blankets,
and pass the whole night in the magic company of the
Pyramids and the Sphinx.