The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-03-17
CINDERELLA IN EGYPT.


who would look for fairy tales in sand
heap? Nevertheless, in the lost tomb OF
the last King of the Twenty sixth Dy-
nasty lies buried the original story of
Cinderella and her slipper. There Is, in
deed, only one variation of any conse-
quence between the two versions, and the
ancient one is certainly the more roman
tic. Cinderelia's princely admirer finds
in her lost shoe clue to his vanished
enchsntress, but King Psammetichus
falls over head and ears in love with he
knows not whom, from only seeing her
sandal. The ancient Cinderella was q
beautiful Greek; Sappho calls her Dori-
cha, and that was most likely her proper
name, but the Gre elk people, with whom
fairness of skin was one Of the highest
qualities of female beauty, named her,
from the loneliness Of her complexion,
"Rhodopis," Rosy Cheeks, and as Rosy
Cheeks she is known in history. She is
mentioned by several writer's, but the
slipper story rests on the authority of
ELAN. He relates it as having occurred
to Psammetichus. There were three
kings of the name, and he probably
meant the third (Psametik III. of the
Scriptures), the last of the dynasty of the
Saite kings, who was conquered and de-
posed by Cambyses the Persian. Rho
dopis was originally slave and fellow
bondswoman OF Esop, the writer of IA
bles, in the house of Iadmon OF Samos;
and, like the heroine OF the modern tale,
mental and drudge, SO the parallel
holds good from the beginning.
Like Cinderella, too, she had fairy
god.mother, but a more powerful and
lavish ono, and her name was Aphrodite.
This patroness procured her libeItyeand
heaped upon her riches; and Rbodopis,
to make her name immortal by an offer
ing such as had never been made before,
dedicated with tenth part of her prop
erty a quantity of iron spits in the Tenn
pie of Apollo at Delphi, and this extra
ordinary gift was still to be seen there
in Herodotus's time. Some also say that
she built one OF the Pyramids of Egypt;
but, as Herodotus remarks, those who
say SO, evidently know nothing about it;
and, however this may be, if Rhodopis
was not so'simple as our own Cinderella,
she was, at all events, more lucky; and
il her coachman, and horses, and char.
lots were really rats and mice and pump
kins, they inever resumed their proper
shape; and no Disseminating clock sent
her hurryingk back to her scullery, one
shoe of and one shoe on. Midnight
never struck for her, and she lost her
shoe in quite another way. At the time
speak of she was said to be the most
beautiful woman in Egypt, and she
lived at Naucratis, port on the Canopic
branch OF the mile, founded in the pre-
ceding reign byrcolonists from Miletus;
and, though born Greek, living in
Greek city, it pleased her now and then to
play the Egyptian, and to adopt the man.
ners and fashions of her new country.
And so it came about that one morning,
before the sun was yet high, she went
down, just as did Pharaoh's daughter,
with her maidens TO battle in the Nile.
At short distance from the bank she
left her litter, and sought a secluded
creek, where, screened in by the feather
ing papyrus, she would be undisturbed
and unseen from the busy river, and
there her girls unmade her toilet.
Now, the banks of the Father of Rivers
are hard in places-a mixture of sand and
clay baked by the scorching sun, and rough
to delicate feet. So Rhodopis did not
quit her sandals until the moment when
she stepped down into the still, cool wat
or, herself as white and rosy as the lotu-
ses around her. There, half wading and
half-swimming, she played and frolicked,
happy in the pure Joy Of living, like the
gay butterflies that futtered about the
rushes. She gathered handfuls of To-
fuses, and threw them away again; and
then, in a lazy fit, she hosted on her
back, and gave herself up to thought on
things in general, and on herself in part.
eular But to return TO her sandals, which
she had kicked of on the rivers brink.
They lay as she had left them, pair of
dainty shoes ft for such dainty feet.
They were embroidered in gold and