“No, thank you,” said the priest, swiftly backing. “Can you do that again?” “Yes.” “Then come with me to the great double house of Pharaoh. He loves good magic, and he will raise you to honour and glory. There’s no need of secrets between initiates,” he went on confidentially. “The fact is, I am out of favour at present owing to a little matter of failure of prophecy. I told him a beautiful princess would be sent to him from Syria, and, lo! a woman thirty years old arrived. But she _was_ a beautiful woman not so long ago. Time is only a mode of thought, you know.” The children thrilled to the familiar words. “So you know that too, do you?” said Cyril. “It is part of the mystery of all magic, is it not?” said the priest. “Now if I bring you to Pharaoh the little unpleasantness I spoke of will be forgotten. And I will ask Pharaoh, the Great House, Son of the Sun, and Lord of the South and North, to decree that you shall lodge in the Temple. Then you can have a good look round, and teach me your magic. And I will teach you mine.” This idea seemed good—at least it was better than any other which at that moment occurred to anybody, so they followed the priest through the city. The streets were very narrow and dirty. The best houses, the priest explained, were built within walls twenty to twenty-five feet high, and such windows as showed in the walls were very high up. The tops of palm-trees showed above the walls. The poor people’s houses were little square huts with a door and two windows, and smoke coming out of a hole in the back. “The poor Egyptians haven’t improved so very much in their building since the first time we came to Egypt,” whispered Cyril to Anthea. The huts were roofed with palm branches, and everywhere there were chickens, and goats, and little naked children kicking about in the yellow dust. On one roof was a goat, who had climbed up and was eating the dry palm-leaves with snorts and head-tossings of delight. Over every house door was some sort of figure or shape. “Amulets,” the priest explained, “to keep off the evil eye.” “I don’t think much of your ‘nice Egypt’,” Robert whispered to Jane; “it’s simply not a patch on Babylon.” “Ah, you wait till you see the palace,” Jane whispered back. The palace was indeed much more magnificent than anything they had yet seen that day, though it would have made but a poor show beside that of the Babylonian King. They came to it through a great square pillared doorway of sandstone that stood in a high brick wall. The shut doors were of massive cedar, with bronze hinges, and were studded with bronze nails. At the side was a little door and a wicket gate, and through this the priest led the children. He seemed to know a word that made the sentries make way for him.