Mika Waltari - The Egyptian

For the throat of age is filled with ashes

And the body embalmed smiles not

In the darkness of the grave.

I did my best, first writing it down in ordinary script and then in pictures. Lastly I wrote the words “age,” “ashes,” “body,” and “grave” in all the ways in which they can be written, both in syllables and letters. I showed him my tablet. He found not one mistake, and I knew that my father was proud of me.

“And the other boy?” said Ptahor, holding out his hand. Thothmes had been sitting apart, drawing pictures on his tablet, and he hesitated before handing it over, though there was mirth in his eyes. When we bent forward to look, we saw that he had drawn Ptahor fastening his collar about father’s neck, then Ptahor pouring beer over himself, while in the third picture he and my father were singing with their arms round each other’s shoulders-such a funny picture that you could see what manner of song it was that they were singing. I wanted to laugh but dared not for fear that Ptahor might be angry. For Thothmes had not flattered him; he had made him just as short and bald and bandy and swagbellied as he really was.

For a long time Ptahor said nothing but looked keenly from the pictures to Thothmes and back again. Thothmes grew a little scared and balanced nervously on tiptoe. At last Ptahor asked, “What do you want for your picture, boy? I will buy it.”

Thothmes, crimson in the face, replied, “My tablet is not for sale. I would give it-to a friend.”

Ptahor laughed.

Good. Let us then be friends, and the tablet is mine.”

He looked at it attentively once more, laughed, and smashed it to pieces against a stone. We all started, and Thothmes begged forgiveness if he had offended.

Am I wroth with water when it reflects my image?” returned Ptahor mildly. “And the eye and the hand of the draftsman are more than water-for I know now how I looked yesterday, and I do not desire that others shall see it. I smashed the tablet but acknowledge you as an artist.”

Thothmes jumped for glee.

Ptahor turned to my father and, pointing to me, solemnly pronounced the ancient oath of the physician: “I will undertake his treatment.”

Pointing then to Thothmes he said, “I will do what I can.” And, having thus come into doctors’ talk again, they both laughed contentedly. My father, laying his hand upon my head, asked, “Sinuhe, my son, will you be a physician like me?”

Tears came into my eyes, and my throat tightened till I could not speak, but I nodded in answer. I looked about me, and the garden was dear to me; the sycamore, the stone-set pool-all were dear to me.

“Sinuhe, my son,” he went on. “Will you be a physician more skilled than I, better than I-lord of life and death and one to whom all, be they high or low, may entrust their lives?”

“Neither like him nor like me!” broke in Ptahor. He straightened himself, and a shrewd glint came into his eye. “A true physician, for that is the mightiest of all. Before him Pharaoh himself stands naked, and the richest is to him one with the beggar.”

“I would like to be a real physician,” I said shyly, for I was still a boy and knew nothing of life nor that age ever seeks to lay its own dreams, its own disappointments, on the shoulders of youth.

But to Thothmes Ptahor showed a gold ring that was about his wrist and said, “Read!”

Thothmes spelled out the characters there inscribed and then read aloud uncertainly, “ ‘A full cup rejoiceth my heart.’“ He could not repress a smile.

“There is nothing to laugh at, you rascal!” said Ptahor gravely. “This has nothing to do with wine. If you are to be an artist you must demand that your cup be full. In the true artist Ptah reveals himself-the creator, the builder. The artist is more than a reflecting pool. Art indeed may often be nothing but flattering water or a lying mirror, yet the artist is more. So let your cup never be less than full, son, and do not rest content with what men tell you. Trust rather to your own clear eyes.”

He promised that I should soon be summoned as a pupil to the House of Life and that he would try to help Thothmes enter the art school in Ptah’s temple, if such a thing were possible.

“But, boys,” he added, “listen carefully to what I say and then forget it at once-or forget at least that it was the royal skull surgeon who said it. You will now fall into the hands of priests; you, Sinuhe, will become one yourself in course of time. Your father and I were both initiated into the lowest grade, and no one may follow the physician’s calling without being so initiated. When you come among them, be wary as jackals and cunning as serpents, that you be not blinded and misled. But outwardly be as harmless as doves, for not until the goal js attained may a man appear as he is. Remember!”

We conversed further until Ptahor’s servant appeared with a hired chair and fresh clothes for his master. The slaves had pawned Ptahor’s own chair at a neighboring brothel and were still sleeping there. Ptahor gave his servant authority to redeem both chair and slaves, took leave of us, assuring my father of his friendship, and returned to the fashionable quarter of the city.

But next day he sent a present to Kipa-a sacred scarab carved from a precious stone, to be placed next her heart beneath the shroud at her burial. He could have given my mother no greater joy, and she forgave him everything and ceased lecturing my father Senmut upon the curse of wine.

In Thebes in those days all higher education was in the hands of the priests of Ammon, and it was not possible to study for an important post without a certificate from them. As everyone knows, the Houses of Life and of Death had stood for untold ages within the temple walls, and also the theological schools for priests in the higher grades. That the faculties of mathematics and astronomy should be subordinate to the priesthood can be understood, but when both juridical and mercantile training were taken over, misgivings arose in the minds of the more alert among the educated classes that the priests were meddling with matters that concerned Pharaoh and the taxation department alone. Initiation was not, indeed, indispensable to membership in the merchants’ and lawyers’ guilds, but as Ammon controlled at least a fifth of the land of Egypt, and therefore also of its commerce, those who wished to become merchants on a large scale or enter the administration found it wise to qualify for the lowest grade of priesthood and submit themselves as the faithful servants of Ammon.

Before I might set foot in the House of Life I had to pass the examination for admission to the lowest grade of priesthood in the theological faculty. This took me more than two years, for at the same time I had to accompany my father on his visits to the sick and from his experience gain knowledge that would profit me in my future career. I lived at home as before but had to attend one lecture or another every day.

Candidates for the lowest grade were divided into groups according to the profession they were to follow afterward. We, that is to say those who were to be disciples in the House of Life, formed a group °n our own, but I found no close friend among my companions. I had taken Ptahor’s wise warning to heart and kept myself aloof, meekly obeying every order and feigning stupidity when the others jested 0r blasphemed as boys will. Among us were the sons of medical specialists whose advice and treatment were requited in gold. And there Were with us also the sons of country doctors, often older than the rest of us, full-grown, gawky, sunburned fellows who strove to hide their shyness and addressed themselves laboriously to their tasks. There were lads from the lower classes who wanted to rise above their fathers’ trade and social level and had a natural thirst for knowledge, but they received the severest treatment of any, for the priests were by nature mistrustful of all who were not content with the old ways.