The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

Then I cried aloud and tore my clothes and said, “Cursed be all my knowledge, cursed be my hands, cursed be my eyes, but most cursed be my silly heart, which never gives me peace and makes false accusations against me. Bring me the scales of Osiris that my lying heart may be weighed, and let his forty rightful baboons judge me for I trust them more than my wretched heart.”

Muti came hurrying out from the kitchen, and wetting a cloth in the pool, she wrapped it around my head and cooled my head by rolling a cool jar around it. With severe reproaches, she put me to bed and had me drink many unpalatable drugs until I grew quiet. For a long time, I lay sick and talked to Muti of the scales of Osiris, asking for the flour scale from her, and I talked to her of Merit and of little Thoth. She tended me faithfully, and I fancy she was overjoyed to be able to keep me in bed and feed me. She strictly forbade me to sit in the garden in the heat of the day, because my hair had all come out, and my bald head could not bear the poisonous rays of the sun. Yet I had not been sitting in the sun but in the cool shade of the sycamore, watching the fish, which were my brothers, since they couldn’t speak.

I recovered over time, and after I recovered, I was quieter than before and more peaceful, and I reconciled also with my heart so that it no longer tormented me that much. And I spoke no more of Merit and of little Thoth to Muti but kept them in my heart, knowing that they had to die so that my cup were to be full and I to be alone — for had they been with me, I should have been fulfilled and happy, and my heart would have gone silent. But I must always be alone, according to the measure given to me, and so I had drifted alone down the river in a pitched reed boat on the very night of my birth.

Having recovered, I dressed myself secretly in the coarse garment of the poor and kicked the sandals from my feet and left the copper founder’s house not to return. I went to the quays of the harbour and bore heavy burdens among the porters until my back hurt and my shoulders were crooked. I went to the vegetable market and gathered rotten vegetables as my meal, and I went to the charcoal market and worked the heavy bellows with my feet for the coal burners and the blacksmiths. I did the work of slaves and the work of porters, eating their bread and drinking their beer, and I said to them, “There is no

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difference between one man and another, for all are born naked into the world, and only their hearts separate them. A man cannot be measured by the colour of his skin or by his speech or by his clothes and jewels; and a man cannot be measured by his wealth or his poverty, but only by his heart. A good man is better than a bad man, and justice is better than injustice, but nothing else I know, and this is all I know.”

Thus I spoke to them before their mud huts in the twilight of the sunset, as their wives lit fires in the street and the air was filled with the smell of fried fish, spreading across the poor quarter. They laughed at me, saying, “You are a foolish man, Sinuhe, to do the work of slaves when you can read and write. No doubt you are involved in some crime and would hide yourself among us, and your talk reeks of Aten, whose name we may not utter any more. We shall not betray you to the guards but shall keep you among us to divert us with your funny prattle. But surely you don’t compare us with dirty Syrians and miserable blacks, for though we are but slaves and porters, we are at least Egyptians, proud of our colour and our speech, our past and our future.”

I said to them, “That is evil talk since as long as a man is proud of himself and believes himself to be better than other men, as long will he have chains, flogging, spears and ravens at his heels. A man should be judged by his heart alone, and all hearts of men are equal; and a heart of a man is no better than a heart of another man, since all tears are the same water and are as salty — the tears of the black and the brown, of the Syrians and the black men, of the poor and the rich.”

But they laughed at me aloud and smote their knees, saying, “Truly you are a foolish man and have not seen much of life but have grown up in a sack. A man cannot live unless he believes himself better than others, and there is no one so wretched who didn’t feel himself better than other men in one way or another. One is proud of the speed of his hands, another of the strength of his back, a thief of his cunning, a judge of his wisdom, a greedy man of his greed, a spender of his spending, a wife of her chastity, and a harlot of her generous nature. And nothing brings more pleasure to a man than knowing he is better than others in something. Thus it also brings pleasure to us to see how we are wiser than you and craftier than you, although we are but poor men and slaves while you can read and write.”

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