I have no fault to find with her--no fault at all. But she is
obstinate--oh, very obstinate, as her mother was. Do you know,
dear lady, that in a papyrus scroll which I lately acquired I
found the recipe for a genuine Egyptian dish, which Amenemha--
the last Pharaoh of the eleventh dynasty, you know--might have
eaten, and probably did eat. I desired Lucy to serve it
to-night, but she refused, much to my annoyance. The
ingredients, which had to do with roasted gazelle, were oil and
coriander seed and--if my memory serves me--asafoetida."
"Ugh!" Mrs. Jasher's handkerchief went again to her mouth. "Say
no more, Professor; your dish sounds horrid. I don't wish to eat
it, and be turned into a mummy before my time."
"You would make a really beautiful mummy," said Braddock, paying
what he conceived was a compliment; "and, should you die, I shall
certainly attend to your embalming, if you prefer that to
cremation."
"You dreadful man!" cried the widow, turning pale and shrinking.
"Why, I really believe that you would like to see me packed away
in one of those disgusting coffins."
"Disgusting!" cried the outraged Professor, striking one of the
brilliantly tinted cases. "Can you call so beautiful a specimen
of sepulchral art disgusting? Look at the colors, at the
regularity of the hieroglyphics--why, the history of the dead is
set out in this magnificent series of pictures.
Pages:
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51