the mouths of the Nile, I forwarded to her, by a private messenger in my gilded barge, the letters written by your loving hand and sealed with the regal signet of your kingdom, {28} commending me to her personal favor and royal consideration.
{28}
Although I have not yet been presented to the court, I have seen, and must describe to you, the royal son of Queen Amense—this proud daughter of the Pharaohs—Prince Remeses. Never did the gods set their seal upon a nobler and truer prince. Every movement of his stately and graceful person, his rich voice, his superb height, his lordly eyes, his majestic yet winning carriage, all bespeak a youth born to empire—created for dominion over men.
He is now in his thirty-fourth year, and is in the full glory of manhood. He is skilled in all the arts of war, and not less celebrated for his learning in all the wisdom of the Egyptians. Sages and philosophers listen to his words when he converses, not so much with the deference that is the homage due to rank, as with the attention which intelligence lends to superior wisdom.
He received me with kindness and embraced me with affection, inquiring after the welfare of my royal mother, and welcoming me to his country with gracious and courteous words. Notwithstanding there is a difference of six years in our ages, I feel that I shall be regarded by him on terms of equal friendship, and that to his companionship I shall owe the happiest hours I may pass in the land of Egypt.
But, dear mother, as I promised to write you an account of my voyage hither, with the adventures and scenes thereof worthy of your notice, I will devote the remainder of my letter to this subject.
When I took leave of you on the marble steps of the stately pier which extends along the front of our palace, {29} and had stepped upon the deck of my galley, I felt that a twofold cord had parted at my heart,—one which bound me to thee, O mother, from whom I had never before been separated, and one which tied me to my native land.
{29}
Although for the first time in command of a beautiful fleet, numbering a score and ten galleys, and about to visit the fairest of all realms under the sunny skies of Afric, yet the pang of this twofold separation deeply grieved my soul. It was with tears glittering upon my eyelids that I gazed upon you, as you waved your adieux and called on the god of our race to bless me! It was with a voice thick
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