Under the feet of the deities they have made
the tomb of Radames—a chasm wrought in a
mountain of hewn granite. Above it the weird-faced gods with beards of basalt have sat for a
thousand years. Their eyes of stone have beheld the courses of the stars change in heaven;
generations have worshiped at their feet of
granite. Rivers have changed their courses;
dynasties have passed away since first they
took their seats upon their thrones of mountain
rock, and placed their giant hands upon their
knees. Changeless as the granite hill from
whose womb they were delivered by hieratic
art, they watch over the face of Egypt, far-gazing through the pillars of the temple into
the palm-shadowed valley beyond. Their will
is inexorable as the hard rock of which their
forms are wrought; their faces have neither
pity nor mercy, because they are the faces of
gods!
*
* *
The priests close up the tomb; they chant their holy and awful hymn. Radames finds his Aïda beside him. She had concealed herself in the darkness that she might die in his arms.
