_The Prince of Naphtali Confronts Desolation_
[Sidenote: The Choice of a Leader]
War was now inevitable. Attempts had been made by our rulers to
propitiate the Roman emperor, but their answer was the march of a legion
to Jerusalem. The seizure of some of the people who had made themselves
conspicuous in the late capture of the citadel followed, and an order was
despatched to the governor of Galilee for the execution of Eleazar. His
tribe instantly assembled and all voices were for resistance. My noble
kinsman, still pacific, offered himself as the victim. But this generous
sacrifice we all denounced, and called for war. The appointment of a
leader was next debated in a hurried assemblage, to which every head of a
village came in arms. No man could contest the command with Eleazar. But
he declined it from a sense of his inexperience in war in a few simple
words.
Then, suddenly bursting into ardor, he exclaimed: “Our war is holy! It is
not to be hazarded on the claims of hereditary rank, personal freedom,
or even on national favoritism. The only claims which the nation must
acknowledge in its extremity are the rights of tried talent, experienced
intrepidity, and unquestionable service. Such a leader stands among us
at this moment.” Every eye was turned upon _me_. “Yes,” exclaimed my
noble kinsman, “you have already made your choice. Genius, valor, and
success have combined to mark one man for the leader of Israel. He is
worthy of the diadem.” Then turning to me and lifting his hand, as if he
was letting fall the diadem upon my head, “Go forth,” cried he in a tone
of almost prophetic grandeur, “Go forth, prince of Naphtali, leader of
Israel, to break the chains of Judah and conquer in the cause of man and
Heaven!” The words were received with acclamation.
I vainly protested against the general voice, that I was a priest of the
Temple of the house of Aaron, of the tribe of Levi, and bound to Naphtali
only by ties of kindred and gratitude. I was answered by a multitude of
voices that my summons was actually in the service of the Temple; that
war extinguished all office but that of defending the country; that I had
long retired from the duties of the priesthood; that Moses was at once
the priest and the leader; that Samuel was at once the prophet and the
sovereign of Israel; above all, that I had shown myself, by daring and
success, almost superior to man, the Heaven-elected leader of Israel.
[Sidenote: Salathiel Becomes a Leader]
I acknowledged that my heart was with the answerers, and I at length gave
way to what even I believed to be the will of more than man. A thousand
falchions, wielded by as sinewy hands as ever drew sword, were instantly
moved round my head. I was placed on a shield, and in this ancient
fashion of our countrymen I was inaugurated prince of Naphtali. This was
one of the blinding flashes that broke in from time to time on my gloomy
career. When the assemblage dispersed and I returned toward my mountain
home, I was still in the excitement of the scene. I even began to imagine
that my terrible sentence was about to be lightened, perhaps to pass
away; my station in life was now fixed; services of the highest rank in
the noblest cause were before me, and I felt myself exclaiming, even to
the solitude, “I am prince of Naphtali!”[19] My exultation was soon to
have a fall.
It was the evening of one of the freshest days of the loveliest season of
earth, the spring of Palestine. All nature was clothed with its robe of
genial beauty; the olives on the higher grounds had put forth their first
green, and with every slight gust that swept across them heaved like
sheets of emerald; the birds sang in a thousand notes from every bush;
the sheep and camels lay in the meadows visibly enjoying the sweet air;
the shepherds sat gathered together on the side of some gentle eminence,
talking, or listening to the songs of the maidens who came in long lines
to the fountains below. The heavens gave prospect of a glorious day in
the colors shown only to the Oriental eyes; hues so brilliant that many
a traveler stops on the verge of the valleys arrested, in his haste
homeward, by the pomp above. All was the loveliness and joy of pastoral
life, in the only country where I ever found it realized. The mind is
to be medicined by natural loveliness, and mine was doubly cheered. To
return to our home is at all times a delight; but the new conjuncture,
the high hopes of the future, and the consciousness that a career of the
most distinguished honors might be opening before my steps, made this
return more vivid than all the past; and when we reached the foot of
the long ascent from which my dwelling was visible I felt an impatience
beyond restraint, and spurred up the hill with my tidings. How fine the
ear becomes when quickened by the heart! As the mountain road, now more
difficult by the darkness of the wild pines and cedars that crowned
the summit, compelled me to slacken my pace, I thought that I could
distinguish the household voices, the barking of my hounds, and the laugh
of the retainers and peasantry that during the summer crowded my doors.
[Sidenote: Salathiel’s Daughters]
I pictured the dearer group that had so often welcomed me. The early and
cruel loss of my son had not been repaired. I was not destined to be the
father of a race; but two daughters were given to me, and in the absence
of all ambition, they were more than a recompense. Salome, the elder, was
now approaching womanhood; she had the dark eyes and animated beauty of
her mother; the foot of the antelope was not lighter; and her wreathed
smile, her laugh of innocence, and her buoyancy of soul forbade sorrow
in her sight. How changed I afterward saw that face of living joy! What
floods of sorrow bathed those cheeks, that once shamed the Persian rose!
The younger was scarcely more than a child; her mind and her form were
yet equally in the bud, but she had an eye of the deepest azure, a living
star; and even in her playfulness there was an elevation, a lofty and
fervent spirit, that made me often forget her years. She was mistress of
music almost by nature, and the cadences and rich modulations that poured
from her harp, under fingers slight and feeble, as if the stalks of
flowers had been flung across the strings, were like secrets of harmony
treasured for her touch alone. Our prophets, the true masters of the
sublime, were her rapturous study. Their truths might yet be veiled, but
their genius blazed broad upon her sensitive soul.
[Sidenote: A Sound in the Thicket]
I pictured my children hastening through the portal, hand in hand with
their noble mother, still in the prime of matronly beauty, to give me
welcome. The light thickened, and the intricacy of the forest impeded
me. At length, wearied by the delay, I sprang from my horse, left him to
make his way as best he could, and pushed forward through a thicket which
crept round the skirts of the forest. As I struggled onward, listening
with sharpened anxiety for every sound of home, I heard a noise like that
of a wild beast rustling close at my side. The thicket was now dark. My
eyes were useless. I drew my simitar, and plunged it straight before me.
The blow was instantly followed by a shriek. Friend or enemy, silence
was now impossible, and I demanded who was nigh. I was answered but by
groans; my next step was on a human body. Shocked and startled, I lifted
it in my arms and bore the dying man to an open space where the moonlight
glimmered. To my unspeakable horror, he was one of my most favored
attendants, whom I had left in the principal charge of my household; I
had slain him. I tore up my mantle to stanch his wound, but he fiercely
repelled my hand. In an undefined dread of some evil to my family, I
commanded him to speak, if but one word, and tell me that all was safe.
He buried his face in his mantle.
In the whirlwind of my thoughts I flung him from me, that I might go
forward and know the good or evil; but he clung round my feet, and
exerted his last breath to implore me not to leave him to die alone.
“You have killed me,” said he, in broken accents; “but it was only the
hand of the Avenger. I was corrupted by gold. You have terrible enemies
among the leaders of Jerusalem; a desperate deed has been done.”
My suspense amounted to agony; I made another effort to cast off the
trammels of the assassin, but he still implored.
“Evil things were whispered against you. I was told that you had been
convicted of a horrible crime.” The sound shot through my senses; he must
have felt the trembling of my frame, for he for the first time looked
upon my face.
“My sight is gone,” groaned he, and fell back. I dared not meet the
glance even of his clouding eyes. “They said that you were condemned to
an unspeakable punishment and that the man who swept the world of you and
yours did God service. In my hour of sin the tempter met me, and this day
from sunrise have I lurked on your road to strike my benefactor and my
lord. In the dark I lost my way in the thicket; but vengeance found me.”
“My wife, my children, are they safe?” I exclaimed.
He quivered, relaxed his hold, and uttering “Forgive!” two or three
times, with nervous agony, expired.
[Sidenote: Salathiel Finds Ruin]
A single bound from this spot of death placed me on a point of rock from
which I had often gazed on my little world in the valley. The moon was
now bright and the view unobstructed. I looked down. Were my eyes dim?
There was no habitation beneath me; the grove, the garden, were there,
sleeping in the moonlight; but all that had the semblance of life was
gone! I rushed down and found myself among ruins and ashes still hot. I
called aloud—in terror and distraction, I yelled to the night, but no
voice answered me. My foot struck upon something in the grass; it was a
sword dyed with recent blood. There had been burning, plunder, slaughter
here in this treasure-house of my heart; desolation had been busy in the
center of what was to me life—more than life. I raved; I flew through
the fields; I rushed back, to convince myself that I was not in some
frightful dream. What I endured that night I never endured again; that
conflict of fear, astonishment, love, and misery could be contained but
once even in my bosom; in all others it must have been death. In the
moment of reviving hope I had been smitten. While my spirit was ascending
on the wings of justified ambition and sacred love of country, I had been
dashed down to earth, a desolate and a desperate man.
What I did thenceforth, or how I passed through that night, I know
not; but I was found in the morning with my robe fantastically thrown
over me like a royal mantle, and a fragment of half-burned wood for a
scepter in my hand, performing the part of a monarch, giving orders for
the rebuilding of my palace, and marshaling the movements of an army of
shrubs and weeds. I was led away with the lofty reluctance of a captive
sovereign, to the household of Eleazar.
[Sidenote: A Fruitless Search]
The wrath and grief of my kinsmen were without bounds. Every defile
of the mountains was searched—every straggler seized; messengers were
despatched across the frontier with offers of ransom to the chiefs of
the desert, in case my family should have escaped the sword. Threats of
severe retaliation were used by the Roman governor of the province; all
was in vain. The only intelligence was from a shepherd, who, two nights
before, had seen a troop which he supposed to be Arabs, ride swiftly by
the gates of Kuriathim, our nearest city; but this intelligence only
added to the misfortune. The habits of those robbers were proverbially
savage; they lived by the torch and the sword; they slaughtered the men
without mercy; the females they generally sold into endless captivity. To
leave no trace of their route, they slaughtered the captives whom they
could not carry through their hurried marches. To leave no trace of what
they had done, they burned the place of massacre. But this ruin was from
other and more malignant hands!