The Mummys Foot | Page 6

dreams in which nothing seems
impossible, I asked him for the hand of the Princess Hermonthis. The
hand seemed to me a very proper antithetic recompense for the foot.
Pharaoh opened wide his great eyes of glass in astonishment at my
witty request.
'What country do you come from, and what is your age?'
'I am a Frenchman, and I am twenty-seven years old venerable
Pharaoh.'
'Twenty-seven years old, and he wishes to espouse the Princess
Hermonthis who is thirty centuries old!' cried out at once all the
Thrones and all the Circles of Nations.
Only Hermonthis herself did not seem to think my request
unreasonable.
'If you were even only two thousand years old,' replied the ancient king,
'I would willingly give you the princess, but the disproportion is too
great; and, besides, we must give our daughters husbands who will last
well. You do not know how to preserve yourselves any longer. Even
those who died only fifteen centuries ago are already no more than a
handful of dust. Behold, my flesh is solid as basalt, my bones are bars
of steel!
'I will be present on the last day of the world with the same body and
the same features which I had during my lifetime. My daughter

Hermonthis will last longer than a statue of bronze.
'Then the last particles of your dust will have been scattered abroad by
the winds, and even Isis herself, who was able to find the atoms of
Osiris, would scarce be able to recompose your being.
'See how vigorous I yet remain, and how mighty is my grasp,' he added,
shaking my hand in the English fashion with a strength that buried my
rings in the flesh of my fingers.
He squeezed me so hard that I awoke, and found my friend Alfred
shaking me by the arm to make me get up.
'Oh, you everlasting sleeper! Must I have you carried out into the
middle of the street, and fireworks exploded in your ears? It is
afternoon. Don't you recollect your promise to take me with you to see
M. Aguado's Spanish pictures?'
'God! I forgot all, all about it,' I answered, dressing myself hurriedly.
'We will go there at once. I have the permit lying there on my desk.'
I started to find it, but fancy my astonishment when I beheld, instead of
the mummy's foot I had purchased the evening before, the little green
paste idol left in its place by the Princess Hermonthis!

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