The god Osiris, as we have seen in the chapter on the Egyptian Religion in the accompanying volume, lived and reigned at one time upon earth in the form of a man.  His twin-brother Set was jealous of his popularity, and hated him to such a degree that he contrived a plan whereby he succeeded in putting Osiris to death.  Set then tried to usurp his brother’s kingdom and to make himself sole lord of Egypt, and, although no text states it distinctly, it is clear that he seized his brother’s wife, Isis, and shut her up in his house.  Isis was, however, under the protection of the god Thoth, and she escaped with her unborn child, and the following Legend describes the incidents that befell her, and the death and revivification of Horus.  It is cut in hieroglyphs upon a large stone stele which was made for Ankh-Psemthek, a prophet of Nebun in the reign of Nectanebus I, who reigned from 373 B.C. to 360 B.C.  The stele was dug up in 1828 at Alexandria, and was given to Prince Metternich by Muhammad Ali Pasha; it is now commonly known as the “Metternich Stele.”  The Legend is narrated by the goddess herself, who says: 

I am Isis.  I escaped from the dwelling wherein my brother Set placed me.  Thoth, the great god, the Prince of Truth in heaven and on earth, said unto me:  “Come, O goddess Isis [hearken thou], it is a good thing to hearken, for he who is guided by another liveth.  Hide thyself with thy child, and these things shall happen unto him.  His body shall grow and flourish, and strength of every kind shall be in him.  He shall sit upon his father’s throne, he shall avenge him, and he shall hold the exalted position of ‘Governor of the Two Lands.’” I left the house of Set in the evening, and there accompanied me Seven Scorpions, that were to travel with me, and sting with their stings on my behalf.  Two of them, Tefen and Befen, followed behind me, two of them, Mestet and Mestetef, went one on each side of me, and three, Petet, Thetet, and Maatet, prepared the way for me.  I charged them very carefully and adjured them to make no acquaintance with any one, to speak to none of the Red Fiends, to pay no heed to a servant (?), and to keep their gaze towards the ground so that they might show me the way.  And their leader brought me to Pa-Sui, the town of the Sacred Sandals,[1] at the head of the district of the Papyrus Swamps.  When I arrived at Teb I came to a quarter of the town where women dwelt.  And a certain woman of quality spied me as I was journeying along the road, and she shut her door in my face, for she was afraid because of the Seven Scorpions that were with me.  Then they took counsel concerning her, and they shot out their poison on the tail of Tefen.  As for me, a peasant woman called Taha opened her door, and I went into the house of this humble woman.  Then the scorpion Tefen crawled in under the door of the woman Usert [who had shut it in my face], and stung her son, and a fire broke out in it; there was no water to put it out, but the