"Candace," he said, "the story is quite true. Gilgamesh builded a ship and pitched it within and without, and he took with him Ia-bani, and some chosen comrades, and journeyed over the waters which engirdle the earth, and he crossed the river of death, which flows round these waters without mixing with them, and he landed in the country of the shades. Then he dug a trench, and cut the throat of a black bull so that the blood flowed into the trench, and the shades flocked to drink of the warm blood; but Gilgamesh drove them from it with his sword until Ut-Napishtim came to drink of it, and had drank his fill. And of all these who came to drink of it only Ut-Napishtim and his wife had life and substance; but all the others were unsubstantial shades. Then Ut-Napishtim told Gilgamesh all the things which had befallen him in this life, and how that the gods had given him and his wife, alone of all human kind, imperishable bodies and immortal youth; but he said it was sad to dwell among the shades, whom he could not touch with his hands, and to see loved faces, which, whenever the wind blew, lost their remembered contours, and became as wreaths of vapour drifting over the desolate marshes. And he bade Gilgamesh to make haste and get him into his ship again, for that if night found him there, he would become even as the shades himself, and his bones would rot by the bitter flood. Then Gilgamesh made haste into his ship with his companions, and they lifted the creaking sail, and bent to the oars, and departed over the sea. But Ut-Napishtim stood upon the beach where the waves broke at his feet, and his eyes strained after the vessel; for he was like an exile there, who sees a ship bound to his own country, and his heart goes with it. So the body of Ut-Napishtim stood upon the beach, but his heart was with the living offspring of his race; for a long time he stood thus, until the ship was a mere speck on the waters, while tears blinded his eyes; then he sighed and went back into the shadowy ways of that twilit land." His audience listened to Merodach with astonishment, his voice was full of emotion. He had hurried through the story, careless of whither it led him, like a man blind with grief, who stumbles against all the obstacles in his path. When he had finished there was silence. "And Gilgamesh," he added after a pause, "wrote all these things in a book, which is preserved in the Temple of Bel at Nippur." He glanced at Bagoas indignantly as he spoke. Bagoas was eating a dish of leverets stewed with rice and prunes; he looked up from his plate, and wiped his mouth with a fine napkin. "There is preserved in our Temple at Nippur a book which purports to be the work of Gilgamesh," he said. "It is the work of a poet, such a history as Mekerah might invent for you, which it would be ridiculous to consider as a true and serious narrative of actual events." Mekerah caught a malicious glance from the Queen Parysatis, and rose angrily.