This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of thefile for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making anentire meal of them. D.W.]
THE EMPEROR, Part 1.
By Georg Ebers
Pontius had gone to the steward's room, with a frowning brow, but it waswith a smile on his strongly-marked lips, and a brisk step that hereturned to his work-people. The foreman came to meet him with looks ofenquiry as he said. "The steward was a little offended and with reason;but now we are capital friends and he will do what he can in the matterof lighting."
In the hall of the Muses he paused outside the screen, behind which
Pollux was working, and called out:
"Friend sculptor, listen to me, it is high time to have supper."
"It is, indeed," replied Pollux, "else it will be breakfast."
"Then lay aside your tools for a quarter of an hour and help me and thepalace-steward to demolish the food that has been sent me."
"You will need no second assistant if Keraunus is there. Food meltsbefore him like ice before the sun."
"Then come and save him from an overloaded stomach."
"Impossible, for I am just now dealing most unmercifully with a bowl fullof cabbage and sausages. My mother had cooked that food of the gods andmy father has brought it in to his first-born son."
"Cabbage and sausages!" repeated the architect, and its tone betrayedthat his hungry stomach would fain have made closer acquaintance with thesavory mess.
"Come in here," continued Pollux, "and be my guest. The cabbage hasexperienced the process which is impending over this palace—it has beenwarmed up."
"Warmed-up cabbage is better than freshly-cooked, but the fire over whichwe must try to make this palace enjoyable again, burns too hotly and mustbe too vigorously stirred. The best things have been all taken out, andcannot be replaced."
"Like the sausages, I have fished out of my cabbages," laughed thesculptor. "After all I cannot invite you to be my guest, for it would bea compliment to this dish if I were now to call it cabbage with sausages.I have worked it like a mine, and now that the vein of sausages is nearlyexhausted, little remains but the native soil in which two or threemiserable fragments remain as memorials of past wealth. But my mothershall cook you a mess of it before long, and she prepares it withincomparable skill."
"A good idea, but you are my guest."
"I am replete."
"Then come and spice our meal with your good company."
"Excuse me, sir; leave me rather here behind my screen. In the firstplace, I am in a happy vein, and on the right track; I feel thatsomething good will come of this night's work."
"And tomorrow—"
"Hear me out."
"Well."
"You would be doing your other guest an ill-service by inviting me."
"Do you know the steward then?"
"From my earliest youth, I am the son of the gatekeeper of the palace."
"Oh, ho! then you came from that pretty little lodge with the ivy andthe birds, and the jolly old lady."
"She is my mother—and the first time the butcher kills she will concoctfor you and me a dish of sausages and cabbage without a