are filled with rows of silver swans, and where, on steps of lapis lazuli, the peacocks dance in agitation at the murmur of the thunder in the hills.  Where the lightning flashes without harming, to light the way to women stealing in the darkness to meetings with their lovers, and the rainbow hangs for ever like an opal on the dark blue curtain of the cloud.  Where, on the moonlit roofs of crystal palaces, pairs of lovers laugh at the reflection of each other’s love-sick faces in goblets of red wine, breathing, as they drink, air heavy with the fragrance of the sandal, wafted on the breezes from the mountain of the south.  Where they play and pelt each other with emeralds and rubies, fetched at the churning of the ocean from the bottom of the sea.  Where rivers, whose sands are always golden, flow slowly past long lines of silent cranes that hunt for silver fishes in the rushes on the banks.  Where men are true, and maidens love for ever, and the lotus never fades.” 
                           F.W.  BAIN:  A Heifer of the Dawn.

CHAPTER IV.

THE TEMPERAMENT OF THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS.

A certain school geography book, now out of date, condenses its remarks upon the character of our Gallic cousins into the following pregnant sentence:  “The French are a gay and frivolous nation, fond of dancing and red wine.”  The description would so nearly apply to the ancient inhabitants of Egypt, that its adoption here as a text to this chapter cannot be said to be extravagant.  The unbiassed inquirer into the affairs of ancient Egypt must discover ultimately, and perhaps to his regret, that the dwellers on the Nile were a “gay and frivolous people,” festive, light-hearted, and mirthful, “fond of dancing and red wine,” and pledged to all that is brilliant in life.  There are very many people, naturally, who hold to those views which their forefathers held before them, and picture the Egyptians as a sombre, gloomy people; replete with thoughts of Death and of the more melancholy aspect of religion; burdened with the menacing presence of a multitude of horrible gods and demons, whose priests demanded the erection of vast temples for their appeasement; having little joy of this life, and much uneasy conjecture about the next; making entertainment in solemn gatherings and ponderous feasts; and holding merriment in holy contempt.  Of the five startling classes into which the dictionary divides the human temperament, namely, the bilious or choleric, the phlegmatic, the sanguine, the melancholic, and the nervous, it is probable that the first, the second, and the fourth would be those assigned to the ancient Egyptians by these people.  This view is so entirely false that one will be forgiven if, in the attempt to dissolve it, the gaiety of the race is thrust before the reader with too little extenuation.  The sanguine, and perhaps the nervous, are the classes of temperament under which the Egyptians must be docketed.