Page:The Pharaohs and their people; scenes of old Egyptian life and history (IA pharaohstheirpeo00berkiala).pdf/136

 There is an inscription on the tomb of a valiant captain of Thothmes, named Amenemhib, in which he tells us of the campaigns he was engaged in by his master's side. 'I never left him,' he says; 'great was the valour of his arm.' Then he records his own deeds, and describes the rich rewards assigned him. Twice he saved the king's life when in imminent peril. 'I saw the lord of the two countries in the land of Ni; he was hunting 120 elephants for the sake of their tusks. The largest one of the herd rushed upon his majesty, but I cut his trunk, and escaped through the water between the rocks.' Another time the King of Kadesh had started a wild horse to run upon the king. 'I followed him as he dashed among the warriors, and I slew him with my sword, and cut off his tail, which I presented to the king as a trophy.' In the siege of Kadesh he led the party that stormed the walls. 'I broke them open; I led all the valiant. None other went before me.'

The return of the king and his army from these distant expeditions was a sort of triumphal procession. No presage or foreboding of future ill troubled the Egyptians as they looked out