FilmIndia (Jan-Nov 1942)

Record Details:

Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

F I L M I X D I A September 1942 said. '"But we meet in a troubled hour. The work on my canal is not going forward as it should: the sand is an enemy that has to be fought continually: my workmen die like flies: one hindrance after another occurs. Certainly it is high time 1 invoked the blessing of the gods." "They would refuse it." said Patris sternly. "There can be no blessing upon a work that has taken such toll of human life. I warn you. O King, bid it cease, for fear the gods anger:*' They were such words as no man had ever dared speak to Pharaoh befcre: and courtiers and counsellors drew their breath, and looked fearfully at Pharaoh's proud stern face in the shade of the chariot's golden canopy. 'You take much upon yourself. Patris." Pharaoh said: his voice was scft and ominous. "Too much. My canal shall be completed whether you invoke a blessing on it or not.'" "And I say. O King." said Patris. "that it will never be completed. The sand will see to that. How many other kings have not attempted the same thing?— but always the sand intervenes — it creeps in, it silts up the channel, it rises in storms and buries the stonework: it has Time cn its side, the greatest of all allies. It is the instrument of the gods, and will inevitably conquer in the end.'' Pharaoh considered him for a long, still moment. "I say otherwise," he said at length. "My canal shall defy both Time and the sand. .. .There is a madness that these sands breed, tn those who walk upon them in the heat of the sun: it has killed many of my slaves. I think you are also suffering from it, which is a pity in a man once so wise. Well — since you claim to know the sand so well, you shall have everv chance to commune On the roof of Pharoah's palace a solitary figure stalked. "It is Pharoah. said Psamthek. "He has been stricken vrizh madness." with it My decree is that you be driven forth straightaway into the desert, to wander until you die." He made a sign to his guards. Instantly they surrounded Patris, and marched him forth at point of sword, until the canal and its workers were out of sight and wellnigh cut of hearing beyond the gleaming dur.es. There they left him, a proud chief priest no longer, but an outcast with neither food, water, nor hope . "He'll not last long." they told each other, and wondered at the serenity of his face. There was neither fear nor sorrow in Patris' heart: only deep gladness. "The gods have deigned to accept my life as the price of many," he told himself joyfully. ■•There will be no more slaughter of cur young men now.'" How long he wandered in that world of burning heat and glaring brightness he did not know; but as exhaustion came upon him. and his tongue began to swell with thirst and his threat to parch unbearably, he lifted his eyes and saw ahead of him a grove of green trees*. "Mirage", he thought, but it was no mirage. It was an oasis of grass and trees, and at its centre bubbled a spring of clear water. He stumbled forward and drank deeply, and sank exhausted in the cool delicious shade. s * * ' The oasis was large and very pleasant. Date-palms grew there, and fig-trees, and wild vines. ■ suited Patris well: and as the loflfl tranquil days went by, filled wiUk. prayer and meditation and deep contentment, he knew a happineai that he had never attained before. Then the hot wind altered itt; direction, and bore to his ears ■ faint but unmistakable sound — tht far-off boom of huge blocks of stontf falling into place at the hands afl Pharaoh's toiling workmen.... "Then the gods have not acceptefl my sacrifice," said Patris. "My dea liverance is, after all, no more than a temptation set by the Evil Ontlj