The Ethics of the Dust Part 4

"Thoth will have sealed the scroll of the years ten times, before the summit is laid."

"Brother, thou knowest not how to teach thy children to labor,"

answered Neith. "Look! I must follow Phre beyond Atlas; shall I build your pyramid for you before he goes down?" And Pthah answered, "Yea, sister, if thou canst put thy winged shoulders to such work." And Neith drew herself to her height; and I heard a clashing pa.s.s through the plumes of her wings, and the asp stood up on her helmet, and fire gathered in her eyes. And she took one of the flaming arrows out of the sheaf in her left hand, and stretched it out over the heaps of clay. And they rose up like flights of locusts, and spread themselves in the air, so that it grew dark in a moment. Then Neith designed them places with her arrow point; and they drew into ranks, like dark clouds laid level at morning. Then Neith pointed with her arrow to the north, and to the south, and to the east, and to the west, and the flying motes of earth drew asunder into four great ranked crowds; and stood, one in the north, and one in the south, and one in the east, and one in the west--one against another. Then Neith spread her wings wide for an instant, and closed them with a sound like the sound of a rushing sea; and waved her hand towards the foundation of the pyramid, where it was laid on the brow of the desert. And the four flocks drew together and sank down, like sea-birds settling to a level rock, and when they met, there was a sudden flame, as broad as the pyramid, and as high as the clouds; and it dazzled me; and I closed my eyes for an instant; and when I looked again, the pyramid stood on its rock, perfect; and purple with the light from the edge of the sinking sun.

THE YOUNGER CHILDREN (variously pleased). I'm so glad! How nice!

But what did Pthah say?

L. Neith did not wait to hear what he would say. When I turned back to look at her, she was gone; and I only saw the level white cloud form itself again, close to the arch of the sun as it sank.

And as the last edge of the sun disappeared, the form of Pthah faded into a mighty shadow, and so pa.s.sed away.

EGYPT. And was Neith's pyramid left?

L. Yes; but you could not think, Egypt, what a strange feeling of utter loneliness came over me when the presence of the two G.o.ds pa.s.sed away. It seemed as if I had never known what it was to be alone before; and the unbroken line of the desert was terrible.

EGYPT. I used to feel that, when I was queen: sometimes I had to carve G.o.ds, for company, all over my palace. I would fain have seen real ones, if I could.

L. But listen a moment yet, for that was not quite all my dream.

The twilight drew swiftly to the dark, and I could hardly see the great pyramid; when there came a heavy murmuring sound in the air; and a horned beetle, with terrible claws, fell on the sand at my feet, with a blow like the beat of a hammer. Then it stood up on its hind claws, and waved its pincers at me: and its fore claws became strong arms, and hands; one grasping real iron pincers, and the other a huge hammer; and it had a helmet on its head, without any eyelet holes, that I could see. And its two hind claws became strong crooked legs, with feet bent inwards. And so there stood by me a dwarf, in glossy black armor, ribbed and embossed like a beetle's back, leaning on his hammer. And I could not speak for wonder; but he spoke with a murmur like the dying away of a beat upon a bell. He said, "I will make Neith's great pyramid small. I am the lower Pthah; and have power over fire. I can wither the strong things, and strengthen the weak; and everything that is great I can make small, and everything that is little I can make great." Then he turned to the angle of the pyramid and limped towards it. And the pyramid grew deep purple; and then red like blood, and then pale rose-color, like fire. And I saw that it glowed with fire from within. And the lower Pthah touched it with the hand that held the pincers; and it sank down like the sand in an hour-gla.s.s,--then drew itself together, and sank, still, and became nothing, it seemed to me; but the armed dwarf stooped down, and took it into his hand, and brought it to me, saying, "Everything that is great I can make like this pyramid; and give into men's hands to destroy." And I saw that he had a little pyramid in his hand, with as many courses in it as the large one; and built like that,--only so small. And because it glowed still, I was afraid to touch it; but Pthah said, "Touch it--for I have bound the fire within it, so that it cannot burn." So I touched it, and took it into my own hand; and it was cold; only red, like a ruby. And Pthah laughed, and became like a beetle again, and buried himself in the sand, fiercely; throwing it back over his shoulders. And it seemed to me as if he would draw me down with him into the sand; and I started back, and woke, holding the little pyramid so fast in my hand that it hurt me.

EGYPT. Holding WHAT in your hand?

L. The little pyramid.

EGYPT. Neith's pyramid?

L. Neith's, I believe; though not built for Asychis. I know only that it is a little rosy transparent pyramid, built of more courses of bricks than I can count, it being made so small. You don't believe me, of course, Egyptian infidel; but there it is.

(Giving crystal of rose Fluor.)

(Confused examination by crowded audience, over each other's shoulders and under each other's arms. Disappointment begins to manifest itself.)

SIBYL. (not quite knowing why she and others are disappointed).

But you showed us this the other day!

L. Yes; but you would not look at it the other day.

SIBYL. But was all that fine dream only about this?

L. What finer thing could a dream be about than this? It is small, if you will; but when you begin to think of things rightly, the ideas of smallness and largeness pa.s.s away. The making of this pyramid was in reality just as wonderful as the dream I have been telling you, and just as incomprehensible. It was not, I suppose, as swift, but quite as grand things are done as swiftly. When Neith makes crystals of snow, it needs a great deal more marshaling of the atoms, by her flaming arrows, than it does to make crystals like this one; and that is done in a moment.

EGYPT. But how you DO puzzle us! Why do you say Neith does it? You don't mean that she is a real spirit, do you?

L. What _I_ mean, is of little consequence. What the Egyptians meant, who called her "Neith,"--or Homer, who called her "Athena,"--or Solomon, who called her by a word which the Greeks render as "Sophia," you must judge for yourselves. But her testimony is always the same, and all nations have received it: "I was by Him as one brought up with Him, and I was daily His delight; rejoicing in the habitable parts of the earth, and my delights were with the sons of men."

MARY. But is not that only a personification?

L. If it be, what will you gain by unpersonifying it, or what right have you to do so? Cannot you accept the image given you, in its life; and listen, like children, to the words which chiefly belong to you as children: "I love them that love me, and those that seek me early shall find me"?

(They are all quiet for a minute or two; questions begin to appear in their eyes.)

I cannot talk to you any more to-day. Take that rose-crystal away with you, and think.

LECTURE 3.

THE CRYSTAL LIFE

A very dull Lecture, willfully brought upon themselves by the elder children. Some of the young ones have, however, managed to get in by mistake. SCENE, the Schoolroom.

L. So I am to stand up here merely to be asked questions, to-day, Miss Mary, am I?

MARY. Yes; and you must answer them plainly; without telling us any more stories. You are quite spoiling the children: the poor little things' heads are turning round like kaleidoscopes: and they don't know in the least what you mean. Nor do we old ones, either, for that matter: to-day you must really tell us nothing but facts.

L. I am sworn; but you won't like it, a bit.

MARY. Now, first of all, what do you mean by "bricks"?--Are the smallest particles of minerals all of some accurate shape, like bricks?

L. I do not know. Miss Mary; I do not even know if anybody knows.

The smallest atoms which are visibly and practically put together to make large crystals, may better be described as "limited in fixed directions" than as "of fixed forms." But I can tell you nothing clear about ultimate atoms: you will find the idea of little bricks, or, perhaps, of little spheres, available for all the uses you will have to put it to.

MARY. Well, it's very provoking; one seems always to be stopped just when one is coming to the very thing one wants to know.

L. No, Mary, for we should not wish to know anything but what is easily and a.s.suredly knowable. There's no end to it. If I could show you, or myself, a group of ultimate atoms, quite clearly, in this magnifying gla.s.s, we should both be presently vexed, because we could not break them in two pieces, and see their insides.

MARY. Well then, next, what do you mean by the flying of the bricks? What is it the atoms do, that is like flying?

L. When they are dissolved, or uncrystallized, they are really separated from each other, like a swarm of gnats in the air, or like a shoal of fish in the sea;--generally at about equal distances. In currents of solutions, or at different depths of them, one part may be more full of the dissolved atoms than another; but on the whole, you may think of them as equidistant, like the spots in the print of your gown. If they are separated by force of heat only, the substance is said to be melted; if they are separated by any other substance, as particles of sugar by water, they are said to be "dissolved." Note this distinction carefully, all of you.

DORA. I will be very particular. When next you tell me there isn't sugar enough in your tea, I will say, "It is not yet dissolved, sir."

L. I tell you what shall be dissolved, Miss Dora; and that's the present parliament, if the members get too saucy.

(DORA folds her hands and casts down her eyes.)

L. (proceeds in state). Now, Miss Mary, you know already, I believe, that nearly everything will melt, under a sufficient heat, like wax. Limestone melts (under pressure); sand melts; granite melts; the lava of a volcano is a mixed ma.s.s of many kinds of rocks, melted: and any melted substance nearly always, if not always, crystallizes as it cools; the more slowly the more perfectly. Water melts at what we call the freezing, but might just as wisely, though not as conveniently, call the melting, point; and radiates as it cools into the most beautiful of all known crystals. Gla.s.s melts at a greater heat, and will crystallize, if you let it cool slowly enough, in stars, much like snow. Gold needs more heat to melt it, but crystallizes also exquisitely, as I will presently show you. a.r.s.enic and sulphur crystallize from their vapors. Now in any of these cases, either of melted, dissolved, or vaporous bodies, the particles are usually separated from each other, either by heat, or by an intermediate substance; and in crystallizing they are both brought nearer to each other, and packed, so as to fit as closely as possible: the essential part of the business being not the bringing together, but the packing. Who packed your trunk for you, last holidays, Isabel?

ISABEL. Lily does, always.

L. And how much can you allow for Lily's good packing, in guessing what will go into the trunk?

ISABEL. Oh! I bring twice as much as the trunk holds. Lily always gets everything in.

LILY. Ah! but, Isey, if you only knew what a time it takes! and since you've had those great hard b.u.t.tons on your frocks, I can't do anything with them. b.u.t.tons won't go anywhere, you know.

L. Yes, Lily, it would be well if she only knew what a time it takes; and I wish any of us knew what a time crystallization takes, for that is consummately fine packing. The particles of the rock are thrown down, just as Isabel brings her things--in a heap; and innumerable Lilies, not of the valley, but of the rock, come to pack them. But it takes such a time!