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HATHOR: A MEMORY
By John Galsworthy
DECORATION BY SYDNEY JOSEPH
\THOR of the old Egyptians
! Divine cow, with
the mild, lustrous eyes, the
proud and gentle step; immortally
desirable, ever
fruitful; veiled and radiant
with that soft, devotional glow which
wraps all the greatest works of art, causing
all who behold to feel a thrill and sweetness,
a longing to put out hands and worship.
Far from earthly lust; goddess
nymph of the crescent horns—Hathor of
the old Egyptians ! . . .
In camp at Sennoures of the Fayoum
it has fallen dark, and dinner is over when
the dancer summoned by Mahmoud Ibrahim
arrives. Pretty she is as the dusk,
as a tiger-cat, a firefly, a flower of the
hibiscus, her skin but little darker than
our own; her eyes clear agate-green, her
teeth whiter than milk, a gold crescent
through her right nostril, and her fine chin
blue from tattooing. Quite a woman of
the world, too, in her greetings.
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In the tent made holy by embroidered
texts from the Koran, ourselves and Hallilah
(parent of all the gods); Mahmoud
Ibrahim in dragoman's best robes; Sadik in
white waiter's dress; and the ten Arabs in
black night-cloaks—camel-boy "Daisy"
with his queer child-voice and his quaint
ear-wrappings; Mabrouk, imp with a past
and a future; dusky, sweet-tempered
" Comedy"; the holy Ahmet, more excited
than he should be; green camel-boy and
white camel-boy, all teeth and expectation;
Karim, smiling; and the three dark,
solemn camel-men who play the pipes, for
once in animation: fifteen of us to sit,
kneel, crouch, and wait; only cook, and
the watchman—ah ! and Samara—absent.
And soon our dancer comes in again,
with her drummer, and her brother, whose
agate eyes are finer than her own, to pipe
for her. She has taken off her cloak now,
and is clothed in beads and netting, with
bare waist and dark, heavy skirt. Standing
by the tent-pole she looks slowly
round at us; then, lifting her upper lip