THE STREETS OF CAIRO
43
of their triumphs alone remaining. Where are the hoof-prints of Cambyses, and of Alexander, of Cæsar and of Omar? Can it be, O Thomas, that thy donkey, even thine, makes tracks as fleeting as the chargers of those mighty warriors, and that thy sojourn here is destined, like theirs and their descendants', to be remembered but as a mere brief episode in the history of this strange monumental people, who still look forth upon the traveller with the self-same eyes and faces that confront him from their sculptured tombs?