[Illustration: 180.jpg SHU UPLIFTING THE SKY. 2] 2 Drawing by Faucher-Gudin of a green enamelled statuette in my possession. It was from Shu that the Greeks derived their representations, and perhaps their myth of Atlas. The latent germs of things had always existed, but they had slept for ages and ages in the bosom of the Nu, of the dark waters. In fulness of time the god of each nome drew them forth, classified them, marshalled them according to the bent of his particular nature, and made his universe out of them by methods peculiarly his own. Nit of Sais, who was a weaver, had made the world of warp and woof, as the mother of a family weaves her children's linen. Khnumu, the Nile-God of the cataracts, had gathered up the mud of his waters and therewith moulded his creatures upon a potter's table. In the eastern cities of the Delta these procedures were not so simple. There it was admitted that in the beginning earth and sky were two lovers lost in the Nu, fast locked in each other's embrace, the god lying beneath the goddess. On the day of creation a new god, Shu, came forth from the primaeval waters, slipped between the two, and seizing Nuit with both hands, lifted her above his head with outstretched arms.[*] * This was what the Egyptians called _the upliftings of Shu_. The event first took place at Hermopolis, and certain legends added that in order to get high enough the god had been obliged to make use of a staircase or mound situate in this city, and which was famous throughout Egypt.