By the time the chariot had turned the next corner, and the crowd had followed it, she had almost fallen to the ground.  She could not take another step, and looked round for a litter, but, while generally there was no lack of them, in this spot, to-day there was not one to be seen.  The factory was only a few hundred steps farther, but in her fancy they seemed like so many stadia.  Presently some of the workmen and women from the factory came by, laughing and showing each other their wages, so the payment must be now going on.  A glance at the sun showed her how long she had already been on her way, and remind her of the purpose of her walk.

With the exertion of all her strength, she dragged herself a few steps farther; then, just as her courage was again beginning to fail, a little girl came running towards her who was accustomed to wait upon the workers at the table where Selene and Arsinoe were employed, and who held in her hand a pitcher.  She called the dusky little Egyptian, and said: 

“Hathor, pray come back to the factory with me.  I cannot walk any farther, my foot is so dreadfully painful; but if I lean a little on your shoulder, I shall get on better.”

“I cannot,” said the child.  “If I make haste home I shall have some dates,” and she ran on.

Selene looked after her, and an inward voice, against which she had had to rebel before to-day, asked her why she of all people must be a sufferer for others, when they thought only of themselves, and with a heavy sigh, she made a fresh attempt to proceed on her way.

When she had gone a few steps, neither seeing not hearing anything that passed her, a girl came up to her, and asked her timidly, but kindly, what was the matter.  It was a leaf-joiner who sat opposite to her at the works, a poor, deformed creature, who, nevertheless, plied her nimble fingers contentedly and silently, and who at first had taught Selene and Arsinoe many useful tricks of working.  The girl offered her crooked shoulder unasked as a support to Selene, and measured her step; to those of the sufferer with as much nicety as if she felt everything that Selene herself did; thus, without speaking, they reached the door of the factory; there, in the first court-yard the little hunchback made Selene sit down on one of the bundles of papyrus-stems which lay all about the place, by the side of the tanks in which the plants were dipped to freshen them, and arranged in order, built up into high heaps, according to the localities whence they were brought.  After a short rest, they went on through the hall in which the triangular green stems were sorted, according to the quality of the white pith they contained.  The next rooms, in which men stripped the green sheath from the pith, and the long galleries where the more skilled hands split the pith with sharp knives into long moist strips about a finger wide, and of different degrees of fineness, seemed to Selene to grow longer the farther she went, and to be absolutely interminable.