Having laid off our rifles, swords, and outer coats, I lifted my cap and made a low bow to the youth and to the old men, but the doctor tried the salute of the right hand upon the cheek, as he had seen the soldier do. In answer the youth simply looked toward the twelve, waving his hand towards us in a way which seemed to say to them, "Gentlemen, behold the enigma!" Then, beginning with the eldest, the twelve jabbered at us in turn, apparently in different tongues, some sibilant, some guttural, and others with the musical cadence of frequent vowel sounds. Needless to say, each was equally incomprehensible to us, and we did not think it worth while to try German or English upon them. When they had finished, they looked much vexed, and slowly wagged their beards. Then the youth spoke something to them with a confident gesture toward himself. He arose, and began addressing us. I suddenly stopped short in the middle of a sentence I was whispering to the doctor. It seemed as if the youth had ceased making mere sounds, and had begun to speak a coherent language, a tongue which has lived ages while others have languished into forgetfulness; a language whose words I understood, but yet the words carried little clear meaning to me. "Listen, Doctor! The boy is speaking Hebrew! Ancient and archaic in form, but yet Hebrew which I understand!" And this is what he had said: "Oh ye, who speak among yourselves, but understand only those who speak not at all, I, Zaphnath, revealer of God's hidden things, will address ye in my native tongue, which none but me in all the land of Kem hath any knowledge of." "There be two of us in Kem, O Zaphnath, who understand that tongue. Speak on!" I cried. But the boy stripped off his wig and beard, and, leaving the throne, hastened toward me and laid his soft right cheek against my own with gentle pressure. "Comest thou, then, from the land of my father, a stranger wandering into Kem, even as I came?" he asked. "Nay, gentle youth, we came a vastly farther way, from another world, so distant that thou seest it from here only as a twinkling star in the night. But if, indeed, thou camest a wandering stranger into Kem, art thou then the king?" He had resumed his wig and beard, and his proud seat upon the throne, and after he had translated my words for the twelve old men, he answered me,-- "I am Zaphnath, ruler over all the land of Kem, without whom the Pharaoh doeth not, nor sayeth anything. These are his twelve wise men, who do not believe what thou hast said, for there is no other world large enough for the abode of two men, except the Day-Giver, whence they think ye have come. The Pharaoh may believe them, but I will believe what ye tell me. He hath given me full power to treat with you, and hath taken refuge with all his women in his tomb, and will not come forth until ye be appeased. Tell me in truth, then, are ye men, or gods? Ye look not half so warlike as all the soldiers have described you."