heathen King and the god whom he worshipped.

"What's this?" he was asking in his wheezy voice, pointing up with a
yellow Assouan cane.

"That is a hippopotamus," said the dragoman; and the tourists all
tittered, for there was just a suspicion of Mr. Stuart himself in the
carving.

"But it isn't bigger than a little pig," he protested. "You see that
the King is putting his spear through it with ease."

"They make it small to show that it was a very small thing to the King,"
said the dragoman. "So you see that all the King's prisoners do not
exceed his knee--which is not because he was so much taller, but so much
more powerful. You see that he is bigger than his horse, because he is
a king and the other is only a horse. The same way, these small women
whom you see here and there are just his trivial little wives."

"Well, now!" cried Miss Adams indignantly. "If they had sculpted that
King's soul it would have needed a lens to see it. Fancy his allowing
his wives to be put in like that."

"If he did it now, Miss Adams," said the Frenchman, "he would have more
fighting than ever in Mesopotamia. But time brings revenge. Perhaps
the day will soon come when we have the picture of the big strong wife
and the trivial little husband--_hein?_"

Cecil Brown and Headingly had dropped behind, for the glib comments of
the dragoman, and the empty, light-hearted chatter of the tourists