CHAPTER XVII.

EXPERIMENTS OF MORE KINDS THAN ONE.

"Papa," said Hester, "did I not hear you say those pretty farms in

Yorkshire are about to change tenants?"

"You did, my dear."

"Have you any tenants in view for them?"

"No! Has any one applied to you for one, or all of them?"

"I want to be the tenant myself."

"You?"

"Yes, indeed; there are good coals beneath the surface; the district

is well watered; I want to try these new steam engines on a large

scale. I will set up factories and form industrial associations,

governing them myself. I will establish them on the principle of

mutual assistance in forming and promoting a wide-spread intelligence:

my factories shall contain schools, reading-rooms, museums,

observatories, everything that can assist the onward progression of

the race."

{493}

"You will at least spend money, Hester?"

"Not more than if I kept race horses for Ascot, or frequented

Crockford's, which you could well afford to let me do if I were a man.

Not more then I might cost you if I insisted on taking a house house

in town, and on becoming the belle of the season; this would the

neither extravagant nor wonderful; and if I wanted diamonds and

emeralds and sapphires and glittering toys, you would get them all for

me, I know you would, for when did you refuse your Hester anything,

dear father?" said Hester, throwing her white arms around her father's

neck. "But now I want none of of these babyish fancies, I want to do

good in my generation, and my father must help me. We do not spend

half our income in our present mode of living, and money is like

manure you know, it wants spreading. Think of the glory of aiding

'progress.' Think of reigning over a population emancipated from

ignorance by your efforts. Think of forming a nucleus whence freedom

and happiness shall spring, handing down your name as a benefactor

throughout all time; it is a project well fitted to my father s noble

mind."

Mr. Godfrey gazed on his darling, and felt that he could refuse her

nothing; still he paused. "Supposing the necessary expenses incurred,

my Hester, your buildings erected, your villages formed, you have

forgotten one thing; your schemes might be suddenly interrupted, when

you least expected it: those farms are all entailed."

"I forgot that," mused Hester. After awhile she said: "Could not some

arrangement be made with my brother on this subject?"

"I do not know. Is he a likely one, think you, to consent to the

catting off the entail?"

"He might be," said Hester; "he must be badly off now, though I

suppose my mother helps him. Offer him a handsome allowance for life,

from this time out, on condition that the entail be cut off: he might

be induced to accept it."

"He would be a fool if he did," said Mr. Godfrey.

"Nay, father, that is not so certain, if you take into consideration

his present position. He is likely to suffer poverty for many years. I

think I would accept the alternative were I in his place."

Mr. Godfrey could deny nothing to Hester, so he replied:

"Well, I will think of it."

. . . . .

But what had Eugene been doing all this time? Eugene, after his

interview with his sister, went straight to M. Bertolot to inquire

after his aunt and Euphrasie. He was not mistaken in supposing that he

knew where they were, but he would tell nothing more than that they

were in good health and spirits. "I have no authority," he said, "to

divulge their place of abode; in fact, I promised secrecy."

"But how do they live? They have no means!" said Eugene.

"How, but by their labor!"

"Labor! my aunt labor?"

"No, I was wrong in saying their labor; it is Euphrasie who does the

work. Euphrasie gives lessons in French, music, and drawing, and waits

on her mother. De Villeneuve has hopes of recovering their estates for

them. He is now in France negotiating with the emperor to that effect.

He took care of them when they left your sister's and procured

Euphrasie the situation she required, as both she and Madame refused

to live at his expense."

"And did he offer to support them?"

"Well, yes; it appears that he and Euphrasie's father were sworn

brothers in friendship, and de Villeneuve made a solemn promise to the

Comte de Meglior to watch over Euphrasie's well-being. This promise

keeps him in Europe to this day, for he had always a misgiving that

she would not be permanently happy among those not of her faith. We

are expecting de Villeneuve very shortly."

{494}

"And if he succeeds, my aunt will go back to France?"

"Probably; but I am not so sanguine about their success as de

Villeneuve is. Madame is an English-woman, and that will not help her

cause with the emperor just now."

"And meantime Euphrasie works for her daily bread?"

"She does, and is happy in doing so. Euphrasie, my friend, is a

practical Catholic; one whose delight it is to _realize_, to make her

own, the life led by the holy family at Nazareth. I venture to say she

is far happier in sweeping her mother's room and in cooking her

mother's dinner than she would be in a glittering ball-room lit up

with its brilliant chandeliers."

"And does she really descend to these menial offices?" asked Eugene,

in a sort of stupefied amazement.

"Descend! Is it to descend when we aspire to imitate Jesus and Mary?

You are a Catholic, my young friend. You must not look at these things

with the eyes of the world: its false maxims are not the ones which

may guide your ideas. Labor, actual manual labor, was imposed on man

in penalty for sin; its acceptance is part of man's atonement for that

undervaluing of grace which led to the commission of that sin: which

still leads to the commission of daily sins. The avoidance of labor is

a child of pride, one which has occasioned multitudinous disorders

among mankind. But Jesus accepted labor--real, genuine labor: he

worked many years at his father's trade, and Mary kept no servant in

her house at Nazareth; she labored, for she felt that in lowly labor

there is a sanctifying influence, and it is this thought that makes

Euphrasie happy now."

"But she is so unused to actual toil!" said Eugene.

"Not so much as you may suppose," replied his friend. "The good nuns

taught her much that was useful, and even when she was at Estcourt

Hall and Durimond Castle she did much work that was unsuspected. The

produce of her needle clothed the poor, fed the hungry, and many times

defrayed the expense of a mission, when accident brought her in

contact with poor Catholics to whom such ministrations were acceptable

and profitable. All this was done so quietly that I suppose your

family knew nothing about it."

"At least I never heard of it," said Eugene.

Our hero was much depressed by this interview, not merely because he

could gain no clue to abode of his friends, but also because he was as

yet too new to the practice of Catholic principles to acquiesce

cheerfully in the idea of the refined, elegant, accomplished daughter

of a French nobleman toiling for her daily bread, and performing all

the menial services required in the household.

It was with right good-will that he greeted the Comte de Villeneuve on

his return, in the hope through him of seeing something accomplished

that would alter these circumstances. But the comte's embassy had been

unsuccessful; all he had been able to effect was to leave the case

with such other friends as should introduce it at a more favorable

period. But he was not so reserved respecting his friends as M.

Bertolot had been. He deemed that Eugene's position in his own family

should plead exemption for him from the ban of exclusion, and

willingly mediated to obtain an interview view for him with Madame.

Euphrasie was not at home when he called; and Madame greeted him

cordially, though she could not refrain from blaming him for running

counter to his friends about religion.

"What a fuss about a matter of opinion," she said. "But perhaps in

France, before the Revolution, a Protestant might have then as little

acceptable to the aristocracy. They say, too, that this new man, this

emperor, patronizes the Catholic religion also, so I shall not ask

Euphrasie to become a proselyte to English notions; her faith is that

of her country and of her kindred, and my brother ought to {495} have

understood this; but why you, Eugene, should wish to adopt the French

religion, I cannot divine."

"Perhaps religion is neither exclusively French nor English, aunt.

There may be a faith necessary to every nation alike, if it be true

that every man has a soul to save."

"Perhaps so; I do not meddle with these matters," replied the lady. "I

think everyone had better let everybody alone; it must be bad to

quarrel about religion; and as to saving the soul, we know so little

about it that it is quite presumptuous for one person to dictate to

another on that subject. I hope we shall all meet in heaven at last,

though we go there by different roads; for my part, I keep nobody

out."

The entrance Euphrasie prevent its the necessity of a reply.

Euphrasie's greeting was that of one who appreciates high principal.

There were respect and kindness in her manner, but no familiarity, no

approach to intimacy. Eugene felt disappointed, though certainly there

was nothing of which he felt he had a right to complain.

Eugene's visits to his aunt were now frequent, but never could he see

Euphrasie alone; whether from design or accident she avoided receiving

him, save in her mother's presence. Yet daily did his reverence for

her increase. To see the young French girl now, the supporter of the

household, the caterer for its wants, the tender minister to her

mother's manifold demands, none would have dreamed that heretofore

contemplation had absorbed her faculties, and that she was making to

duty the greatest sacrifice she could make in thus exchanging the

cherished practices of devotion for the active employments of life.

She was so cheerful, so almost gay, so unusually animated when the

state of her mother's spirits required it; a stranger might have

concluded that all her life she had been accustomed to this manner of

living.

Suddenly Eugene received a missive which had traced him to many

places, requesting him to meet his father in London.

TO BE CONTINUED.

--------

ORIGINAL.

ON ST. PETER'S DENIAL.

"And the Lord, turning, looked on Peter."

Lord! wilt thou that I also should deny

That I am thine?

Behold, my longing soul cries upward to the sky

For sight divine!

All through the silent night in livelong day--

O grievous lot!--

I seek to know thee more, and yet am forced to say

"I know thee not".

With Peter let these bitter tears confess

My treachery:

Yet, Lord, to know thee as thou art I need no less

A look from thee!

--------

{496}

Translated from the German of Hans Wachenhusen.

CHRIST IS BORN.

"Really I take it unkindly of our pastor that he is continually

speaking ill of us thorns, in the church yonder," said the thorn-bush,

standing by a crumbling stable wall among the castle-ruins near the

village church. "It is very unfair in him. How can he know, for

instance, how the subject may affect me? On the bloody field of

Golgotha, nearly two thousand years ago, there stood my ancestor, a

buckthorn, of whose branches they wove our Saviour's crown. But the

pastor yonder little thinks that I come of that same buckthorn;

[Footnote 149] or that all its lineal descendants bear red blossoms

and weep tears of blood on Christmas night; or that we thorns are ever

renewed like Christ's teachings, being woven in with them?"

[Footnote 149: Kreuzdorn--Cross-thorn, literally.]

So spake the thorn-bush; and the wind blew through its branches, and

shook them until the snow dropped off.

"Positively, this connection ought to be known!" sighed the

thorn-bush.

But it was just then Christmas eve, and midnight was drawing near.

Therefore did the thorn-bush make these pious reflections, which

should have been cherished on other days too, if the lineage were

really so wonderful as it fancied. Meantime the church-bells were

ringing for the midnight mass, and the good priest passed by, going to

the service of God.

"See, now, how indifferently he goes past me," said the thorn-bush.

"And no wonder, since he knows nothing of my connections! And all the

rest brush by me into the church; and if the Lord God could not see

the things that are hidden, yet would he know his faithful by the

footprints that lead from the houses to the church. But he knows them

all, for he guides their steps. I know, though, two in the village who

have not been to church to-day nor yet this whole year, for they are

right godless men: the gloomy lord of our castle, and Wild Stephen,

whom he turned out of his cottage yesterday because the rent was not

paid. Here lie the poor wife and her half-naked children now in this

ruined stable before which I stand guard. Really I must take a peep

and see how the poor woman and her sick child are getting on," said

the thorn-bush, and stretched up its bought to look in at the broken

window.

But it was dark within, and the night-wind moaned through the damp

walls and the open window. "O God! the creature is so good and so

wretched. Here in this stable are tears and chattering teeth on this

day of Christmas gifts. Now, that is too grievous," sighed the

thorn-bush.

And over the way the church-organ poured out its solemn tones. "Christ

is born," sang the people from the choir and benches. "Christ is

born," cried the watchman from the tower. And our thorn-bush was

right. In that old, deserted stable a poor woman knelt and prayed. Hot

tears ran down her cheeks, her hands were convulsively clasped, and

her eyes rested fixedly on the straw in the old stone manger; for in

that manger lay her youngest born, a half-year old child, sick, and

trembling with ague and cold. The moon shone through the

window-opening upon this group. Her rays fell sympathizingly on the

sick child, but they could not warm him; nor could the mother's breast

do it either, she was herself so icy cold. {497} And through the

chinks of the rotting roof, gaps were covered with snow, fell by

hundred thousands the little glittering snow-stars and played in the

moon-beams, but they gave no light or warmth either.

"Saviour of the world, thou who wert born this night, who didst live

and die for us all, who didst lie to-day in a manger, like this poor

helpless creature, save, oh! save my sick child!" So prayed this poor

woman, and the baby stretched out his little cold hands to his mother

and wept. But her strengths was all gone. She let her weary head sink

on the icy edge of the stone manger; her eyes closed, and a heavy sigh

burst forth from her breast. Days and nights had she watched; days and

nights of bitter misery had she endured; but now she broke down, and

sleep took pity on her wretchedness.

"Poor wife, where is thy husband? Poor baby, where is thy father?"

whispered the thorn-bush pityingly, looking in at the window.

Yes, where was the husband, where was the father? Wild Stephen, for so

the villagers called him, had been turned out of his cottage with his

wife and children the evening before, as we have already said. He

sought a refuge among the neighbors, but they would have nothing to do

with him, for they were afraid of godless Stephen, who never had done

a good thing, so they said. And so he and his had come to this

deserted stable. Then he had rushed away breathless, in spite of the

entreaties of his wife, who dreaded some misfortune. Where, then, was

Wild Stephen? The bells ring out, the organ sounded, the people sang

pious songs in the church, and the good priest stood before the altar

and chanted: "Glory be to God on high, and on earth peace to men of

good-will."

Up in the old castle, in a comfortless room, a man of dark, forbidding

aspect set near the long-extinguished fire. He was the lord of the

castle, a hard-hearted man, feared by every one within the limits of

his estate. The light before him on the table burnt low; his face

looked stiff and motionless, his eyes were closed. It seemed like

sleep, only he looked so very pale. Now, while in the out-buildings of

the court-yard servants hurried to and fro, a man was stealing up the

stairs and through the gloomy corridor. He softly opened the door of

the great room, crept lightly in, and up to the arm-chair where the

landlord slept. The stranger's eyes gleamed with passion, a sneering

smile disfigured his weather-beaten face. He cast one look stealthily

around the room. A knife glistened in one hand, the other grasped that

of the sleeping landlord. The blade quivered--

"Christ is born," saying the people in the church below.

Wild Stephen shrank back, for the hand was icy cold. He had touched a

corpse.

"Christ is born," cried the warder from the tower; for mass was over,

and the people were hastening home.

Stephen's knife fell from his hand. He looked again at the dead man,

and it seemed as if the cold eyes were opening to blast him. Covering

his face with both hands, he fled from the room. No one had seen him

glide into the house; no one saw him now pause before the old stable

and looked in the window--no one but the thorn-bush. Ashy pale,

Stephen gazed into the stable. There he saw his wife kneeling,

motionless as the dead man in the castle yonder, but more lovely; and

gentle and pure as innocence, the child in the manger. Then Stephen,

rushed forward, not knowing whither, rushed through the open

church-door, and sank senseless on the steps of the altar.

Now the pastor was just going home. He came to the thorn-bush and saw

two little boys sitting beneath it in the snow. They were shivering,

and hiding their little red hands in their rags.

"Take them with thee," said the thorn-bush to the pastor. "They are

Wild Stephen's children; they dare not {498} go in-doors for fear

their father may beat them because they have come home empty-handed.

Take them with thee. I cannot warm them; I am so poor and naked."

We know not whether it was the pastor's heart or the thorn-bush that

spoke; but he took the children home with him.

"So, now have I one care the less!" said the thorn-bush to itself.

"Now they are beginning to light up the Christmas tree there--and

there--and again over yonder. What a pity that I'm not stationed under

the windows, for here in this dreary stable there will be nothing to

see."

But the thorn-bush was wrong, for just then the interior of the stable

grew bright with a piercing light. Still knelt the poor woman with

closed eyes, but the sick child waked up and stretched out its little

arms laughing; for the roof opened, and down fluttered, surrounded by

a light cloud, two lovely angels, one of them bearing a little

Christmas tree gleaming with countless lights, the other bringing

costly gifts. And it grew warm in the stable, and the light threw such

a gleam into the street that the thorn-bush wondered within itself.

"There is no hut so poor but Christ is there to-night," it said.

The angels fluttered down, and while one offered the Christmas tree,

the other went to the sick child and laid his hand healingly upon its

breast. Then they flew upward again and vanished; but the light

remained in the stable. In the mean time Wild Stephen lay upon the

cold altar-steps. At last his consciousness returned, and he raised

his head from the stone. A wonderful vision had appeared to him in a

dream, for he had seen two beautiful spirits who, blessing him, walked

by his side: and now, on awaking, he saw them standing by him, and

felt each angel lay a little warm hand in his and lead him from the

church.

It seemed to Stephen as if he still dreamed; as if it were in sleep

that the two little angels led him from the church to the stable where

he knew his poor wife and sorrowing children were. Willingly he let

himself be guided; but when they reached the wretched dwelling, and

everything within looked so warm and bright and pleasant; when he saw

the Christmas presents, he rubbed his eyes, and look down at the

angels who had brought him there and were still standing by his side.

Then Stephen recognized his two other boys, grandly and beautifully

dressed as he had never seen them before.

Still it seemed like a vision. He raised both children in his arms; he

held them close and kissed them--no, it could not be a dream.

"Christ is born," cried the watchmen from the tower. "Ay, born is he,

and within my own soul too!" exclaimed Stephen, and, still holding the

two children, sprang to his wife. He drew her toward him and held her

to his breast. "Jenny," he said, "wake up, Christ is indeed born!"

And she lifted her eyes and looked around in amazement, saying: "What

has happened? Is it really thou, Stephen?--and all this light here! Is

my dream true? I saw two angels bringing a Christmas tree and

beautiful presents, and one of them went to the manger and laid his

hand healingly upon my baby's breast. Yes, yes, it is true, for he is

alive," she explained, taking the smiling child from the manger and

clasping it to her bosom. "Get is true, Stephen," she said, and laid

the baby in his arms. "Our Saviour is born, and he will not let my

child die."

And while they were all looking at the Christmas presents the pastor

stepped from behind the tree, for he it was who had sent the gifts

through two good children of his parish; he it was who had seen Wild

Stephen sink down upon the altar-steps; he it was who had dressed the

little boys so beautifully, and led them to their father in the

church.

{499}

"Christ is born," said the pastor, "and it is his will that even the

poorest dwelling should not be without him to-day; but where he lodges

for the first time, Stephen, is in your heart; cherish him tenderly,

for you know that there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that

repenteth than over ninety-nine just persons."

And all this time the thorn-bush was looking in at the window, its

branches rustled with joy, and, like the cross-thorn on Christmas

night, its boughs put forth violet-red eyes, and wept tears of blood

upon the snow.

The next morning Stephen went to church with his wife and children. In

the meantime something must have passed between them and the pastor,

producing a change in material as well as spiritual matters; for they

were seen clad in modest and suitable attire, going to the Lord's

table with deepest devotion. The villagers passed by the thorn-bush in

their holiday dress, and when they saw the snow underneath it bedewed

as if with ruddy pearls, they cried: "See, now, the buckthorn has

borne red blossoms during the night!"

"Yes," answered the cross-thorn, "for Christ is born indeed. These

thorns know it, for we crowned him in death; and you men should know

it also, for he was crucified for you."

------

From Chambers' Journal.

THE DYING YEAR.

Scant leaves upon the aspen

Shake golden in the sun;

Old Year, thy sins are many,

Thy sand is almost run.

The beech-tree, brazen-orange,

Burns like a sunset down;

Old Year, thy grave is ready;

Doff sceptre, robe, and crown.

The elm, a yellow mountain,

Is shedding leaf by leaf;

The rains, in gusts of passion.

Pour forth their quenchless grief;

The winds, like banshees mourning.

Wail in the struggling wood;

Old Year, put off thy splendor.

And don thy funeral hood.

Lay down thy golden glories;

The bare boughs bar the sky--

Skeletons wild and warning.

Quaking to see thee die.

Thou hast lived thy life, remember;

Now lay thee down and rest;

The grass shall grow above thy head,

And the flower above thy breast.

------

{500}

From The Dublin University Magazine.

THE HOLY LAND.

There can be no doubt that the Mount Moriah where Abraham would have

sacrificed his son is the same spot as the Moriah upon which Solomon

built the temple. "Then Solomon began to build the house of the Lord

at Jerusalem in Mount Moriah" (2 Chron. iii. 1). [Footnote 150] It is

also probable that it is the same place as the Salem mentioned in

Genesis xiv. 18, of which Melchisedek was king; for in Psalm lxxvi. 2

we read, "In Salem also is his tabernacle, and his dwelling-place in

Sion." Josephus calls Melchisedek King of Solyma, a name afterward

altered to Hierosolyma. But the first mention of the name Jerusalem

occurs in Joshua x. 1, where Adoni-zedec is spoken of as "King of

Jerusalem." There are to be gathered from sacred and secular annals

the records of twenty-one invasions of this ancient city by hostile

armies. The first attack was made upon her by the children of Judah,

shortly after the death of Joshua. They fought against Jerusalem, took

it, put it to the fire and sword (Judges i. 1-8); but they were unable

to expel the Jebusites, nor were the children of Benjamin any more

successful, but they both dwelt with the Jebusites in the city; the

Jebusites being probably driven from the lower part to Mount Sion,

where they remained until the time of David, who marched against

Jerusalem, drove them from Mount Sion, and called it the City of

David.

[Footnote 150: Also confirmed by Josephus, Antiq i, 13-2.]

The Ark of the Covenant was conveyed there, an altar built, and

Jerusalem became the imperial residence, the centre of the political

and religious history of the Israelites. Its glory was enhanced by the

labors of Solomon, but under his son Rehoboam ten tribes revolted, so

that Jerusalem became only the capital of Judah, with whom the tribe

of Benjamin alone remained faithful. During the reign of this king,

Shishak, the Egyptian monarch, invaded the holy city and ransacked the

temple. Then about a hundred years rolled by, when Amaziah was king of

Judah, and Joash of Israel; the latter marched against Jerusalem,

threw down the wall, and the temple was once more rifled of its

treasures. In the next century Manasseh the king was taken captive by

the Assyrians to Babylon but ultimately restored. In consequence of

the strange intermeddling of Josiah, a few years later, when

Pharao-necho, king of Egypt, was on his march, he was killed in

battle, and the latter directed his army toward Jerusalem, and placed

Eliakim on the throne by the name of Jehoiakim. The advance of this

Egyptian king is confirmed by Herodotus. [Footnote 151]

[Footnote 151: Herodotus, Euterpe, 159. He also mentions a victory

gained by him at Magdola, then says that he took the city of Cadytis

[Greek text]. This city Cadytis is generally accepted as Jerusalem,

which was called "holy," "_Hakkodesh_." The shekel was marked

"Jerusalem _Kedusha_," a Syriac corruption of the Hebrew "Kodesh."

Then the word Jerusalem was omitted, and "Kedusha" only used, which,

being translated into Greek, became [Greek text] as quoted by

Herodotus.]

Against Jehoiakim, however, came Nebuchadnezzar, who ravaged the city

more than once, and after a siege of two years, in the reign of

Zedekiah, burned it down, took all the sacred vessels to Babylon with

the two remaining tribes (the other ten were already in captivity);

and now that the temple was destroyed, the city in ruins, and {501}

the people all in bondage, it appeared as if the prediction of her

prophets had already been accomplished. But a time of rejoicing was

yet to come, and though the chosen people did writhe under Babylonish

tyranny, and did hitting their harps on the willows, there was still a

prophet of hope among them in the person of Daniel. This was the time

alluded to in that beautiful psalm composed after their return, in

allusion to an occasion when their persecutors had asked them

tauntingly to sing one of their national songs for their amusement,

the Hebrew words of which, if we may be allowed the expression,

glitter with tears:

"By the rivers of Babylon there we sat down,

Yea, we wept when we remembered Zion.

We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

For there, they that carried us away captive required of us a song;

And they that wasted us required of us mirth,

Saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

How shall we sing the Lord's song

In a strange land?

If I forget thee, O Jerusalem,

Let my right hand forget her cunning;

If I do not remember thee,

Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,

If I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief Joy."

In the time of Cyrus their deliverance came; they were released from

captivity, and there was a mighty "going up" to Jerusalem when the

temple was rebuilt and the sacred vessels which Nebuchadnezzar had

taken away were restored; money, too, was given them, and the works,

after being interrupted for a time by difficulties, were resumed under

Darius Hystaspes and completed. Some time afterward another large body

of Jews came up to the holy city with Ezra, and the capital was once

more active with busy life and once more became glorious.

Alexander the Great marched against the Jews, but was prevented from

entering the city by the intercession of the high priest--a scene

which found its parallel in after-times, when the aged Leo went to the

camp of Attila, and by his entreaties diverted that semi-Christian

barbarian from Rome. After the death of Alexander, Ptolemy, king of

Egypt, surprised the Jews on their Sabbath day, when he knew they

would not fight; he made an easy conquest, and carried off thousands

of Jews into Egypt.

For a hundred years of comparative peace this fated city remained

under the Ptolemies, when it fell into the hands of the Syrians.

Antiochus Epiphanes, their king, after his Egyptian campaigns, finding

his treasure-chest nearly empty, bethought him of sacking the temple

of Jerusalem, marched his army upon the city, pillaged it, slew about

forty thousand people, and sold as many more into slavery. He then

endeavored to exterminate the ceremonial; a pagan altar was set up and

sacrifice made to Jupiter. The Maccabaean revolution broke out, and

the city was ultimately recovered by the hero, Judas Maccabaeus, when

a new phase of priesthood was established, which we shall notice

elsewhere. Things went on thus until about the year 60 B.C., when

Pompey seized the city and massacred twelve thousand Jews in the

temple courts. Thus it fell into the hands of the Romans, against whom

it rebelled, and by whom ultimately, after the most terrible siege

recorded in history, it was taken and subjected to violations over

which the mind even now shudders; its temple was ransacked, violated,

and burned, its priests butchered, pagan rites were celebrated in its

holy place, its maidens were ravished, its palaces burned down, an

unrestrained carnage was carried on, Jews were crucified on crosses as

long as trees could be found to make them, and when the woods were

exhausted they were slain in cold blood. Nearly a million of Jews are

said to have fallen in this terrible conflict. For fifty years after

there is no mention of Jerusalem in history. They kept themselves

quiet, watching eagerly and stealthily for an opportunity of throwing

off the hated Roman yoke. About the year 131 A-D., Adrian, to prevent

any outbreak, ordered the city to be fortified. The Jews rebelled at

once, but were so completely crushed by the {502} year 135 that this

date has always been accepted as that of their final dispersion. The

holy city was then made a Roman colony, the Jews were forbidden to

enter into its walls under pain of immediate death, the very name was

altered to the pagan one of AElia Capitolina, a temple was erected on

Mount Moriah to Jupiter Capitolinus, and Jerusalem was henceforth

spoken of by this pagan name until the days of Constantine, when

pilgrimages were rife, and the Christians began to turn their steps

toward the city whose streets had been hallowed by the footsteps of

Christ. Helena, the emperor's mother, wandered there in penitence,

built a church on the site of the nativity, and agitated Christendom

to its foundations by the announcement of the discovery of the true

cross. Constantine then built a church on the site of the Holy

Sepulcher, and at last the Jews were admitted once a year into the

city of their glory to sing penitential psalms over their degradation.

The sorrows of the place were not yet ended, for in the year 614 the

Persians fell upon Jerusalem, and this time the Christians suffered,

ninety thousand of whom were killed. Then it was retaken by the

Romans, when the Emperor Heraclius marched in triumph through its

streets with the real cross on his shoulders. In 637, however, it fell

into the hands of Arabic Saracens, from whom the Turks took it in

1079. Then came that marvellous agitation of Europe, when she poured

out her millions of devotees to drive the Saracen from the holy land;

and in 1099 Godfrey de Bouillon was proclaimed King of Jerusalem by

the victorious Crusaders. The Christians held it for eighty-eight

years, when Saladin, the sultan of Egypt, wrested it from them in

1187, and they held it until the year 1517, when the Ottoman Turks

seizing upon Jerusalem, made the twenty-first and last invasion which

this devoted city has undergone, and in their hands it still remains.

In the very earliest ages of Christianity people begin to bend their

steps toward Jerusalem and to write their travels. Some of these

variations are extant, and the earliest is called "Itinerarium a

Burdigala Hierusalem usque:" it was written by a Christian of

Bordeaux, who went to the Holy Land in the year 333, about two years

before the church of the Holy Sepulchre was consecrated by Constantine

and his mother Helena. It is to be gleaned also from the works of the

Greek fathers that pilgrimages to Jerusalem were becoming so frequent

as to lead to many abuses. St. Porphyry, after living as a recluse in

Egypt, went to the Holy Land, visited Jerusalem, and finally settled

in the country as Bishop of Gaza. Toward the end of the fourth century

(385), St. Eusebius of Cremona and St. Jerome went there and founded a

monastery at Bethlehem. St. Paula also visited it about the same time.

In the seventh century we have St. Antonius going there and telling us

he admired the beauty of the Jewish women who lived at Nazareth. In

the year 637, the taking of Jerusalem by the Saracens interrupted the

the flow of visitors, but Areulf, a French bishop, went there toward

the end of the century. In the early part of the eighth century the

Anglo Saxons began to go there. Willibald, a relative of Boniface,

paid a visit to Jerusalem in 724. Then the war with the Greeks

interposed, and we do not hear much about the Holy Land until the end

of the eighth century, when, through the friendship of Charlemagne

with Haroun al Raschid, the Christians were once more allowed to go to

the Holy Sepulcher. A monk, called Bernard Sapiens, went in 870, and

wrote anon account of it. Then the celebrated Gerbert, who was

afterward pope, under the title of Sylvester II., went to Jerusalem in

986, came back and wrote a work, in which he made the holy city mourn

her misfortunes and woes, her wasted temples and violated sacred

places; then he appealed to the whole Christian world to go and help

her. France {503} and Italy began to move. The Saracens heard of this

agitation, and interdicted the Christians in their dominions from

worshipping, turned their temples into stables, and threw down the

church of the Holy Sepulcher and others in the year 1008. At the

tidings of this devastation Europe was aroused, and in fact we may

fairly say that Gerbert's book of travel was the first spark that

fired the conflagration of the Crusades. The first narrative we have

of any pilgrim who followed the Crusades is by Saewulf, a Saxon, and a

very interesting narration he has left; he went in the year 1102, was

a monk of Malmesbury Monastery, and is mentioned by the renowned

William of that abbey in his Gesta Pontificum. There are accounts also

in the twelfth century by Benjamin of Tudela; in the fourteenth by Sir

John Mandeville; in the fifteenth by Bertrandon de la Brocquière; and

in the sixteenth by Henry Maundrell. [Footnote 152]

[Footnote 152: See Early Travels in Palestine, An interesting

collection of itineraries and ancient visits to the Holy Land, by

Mr. Thomas Wright.]

Modern times have multiplied books on the Holy Land, but those

mentioned above are nearly all that are extent of early periods. In

our own day there is a tendency to revive the subject; we have had

many books lately, good, bad, and indifferent, upon Holy

Land--Wanderings in Bible Lands and Scenes, Horeb and Jerusalem, Sinai

and Palestine, Giant Cities of Bashan, Jerusalem as It Is, and many

others, of which we cannot stop to say more than that they are

generally interesting and readable. It would take a wretched writer,

indeed, to make a dull book upon the Holy Land; the subject itself and

the scenes enlist the attention at once. But the last pilgrim who has

returned from that sacred city and emptied his wallet for our

inspection has produced a book not only valuable as an interesting

account of travel, but useful as an excellent commentary upon the

incidents of the Bible and the life and work of our Lord. There have

been many reviews of this book as a book of travel, but it is in this

higher light more particularly that we wish to examine Mr. Hepworth

Dixon's two volumes on the Holy Land. From the very earliest times

down to the present, Jaffa or Joppa seems to be the portal of

Palestine to western travellers, who are, it appears, compelled to

make their _début_ in Palestine in no very dignified manner. The

water-gate of Jaffa, Mr. Dixon tells us, faces the sea, and is "no

more than a slit or window in the wall about six feet square." Through

this narrow opening all importations from the west must be hoisted

from the canoes; "such articles as pashas, bitter beer, cotton cloth,

negroes, antiquaries, dervishes, spurious coins and stones, monks,

Muscovite bells, French clocks, English damsels and their hoops,

Circassian slaves, converted Jews, and Bashi Bazouks." Once safe

through this slit in the wall, the stranger is ushered into a town

whose scenes recall to his imagination the Arabian Nights of his

childhood, so little has the Holy Land changed; the dress of the

people and their customs being so little altered that Haroun, if he

were allowed to take another midnight trip with his vizier, would be

quite at home. Marvellous it is, too, that civilization has left

another peculiarity untouched in Palestine. Mr. Dixon tells us that

after "three months of Syrian travel you will learn to treat a

skeleton in the road with as much indifference as a gentleman in a

turban and a lady in a veil." Whatever dies in the plain lies

there--asses, camels, or men. The travelling baggage of an Arab

includes a winding-sheet, in which he may be rolled by his companion,

if he has one, and covered with sand; bodies are found, too, who, in

the last gasp, had striven to cover their faces with the loose sand.

There is no exaggeration in this statement--the Saxon Saewulf, who

went there in the year 1102, nearly eight centuries ago, draws the

same picture. He says:

{504}

"Went from Joppa to Jerusalem, two days' journey by a mountainous

road, very rough and dangerous on account of the Saracens, who lie in

wait for the Christians to rob and spoil them. Numbers of human

bodies lie by the wayside, torn to pieces by wild beasts, many of

whom have been cut off by Saracens; some, too, have perished from

heat, and thirst for want of water, and others from too much

drinking."

Travelling in the Holy Land is not mere sport; there are a myriad of

dangers to be avoided and watched for, armed Bedaween are prowling

about, bands of horsemen scour across the plain like clouds over the

sky.

"Horsemen!" cries Yakoub, reining in. "Hushing the still night, and

with hands on our revolvers, bending forward toward the dim fields

on our left hand, we can hear the footfall of horses crushing their

way through stubble and stones. In a moment while they sounded afar

off, they are among us; fine dark figures, on brisk little mares,

and poising above them their bamboo spears. A word or two of parley,

in which Ishmael has his share, and we are asking each other for the

news. . . . . Perhaps they consider us too strong to be robbed, for

a Bedaween rarely thinks it right to attack under an advantage of

five to one."

At dawn of day they arrive at the spot where once stood Modin, the

birth place of the Maccabees, now a den of robbers, called Latrun.

This spot is a most interesting one, and Mr. Dixon rapidly sketches

the results of the events which were transacted here, showing how from

the Maccabaean revolt sprang the Great Separation, a new kind of

priesthood, and also, for which the influence of the captivity had

already prepared them, the ignoring of the written law of Moses, and

the introduction and veneration of the oral law or tradition of the

elders. The peculiar aspects of the Jews at the time of the Roman

domination and the advent of Christ, their hopes and opinions, may be

traced back to the drama which was played out on this spot. We

propose, then, to pause for a moment to sketch the history of that

period, as it is the keystone to the whole fabric of Jewish

degeneracy.

About half a century before the birth of Christ the Jews had fallen

into the hands of the Romans, and in the writings of Tacitus we have a

description of them, an attempt at investigation into their history,

and a version of Roman opinion upon them, which is the more

interesting as it affords an admirable corroboration of what is

recorded in the Scriptures. Tacitus endeavors very ingeniously to make

them come originally from Crete, on account of their name, Idaeos or

Judaeos, from Mount Ida, in Crete. We must bear in mind that it is

scarcely probable that Tacitus could have read Genesis. Then he

mentions other theories which were in vogue as to the origin of this

strange people, who were beginning to be very troublesome to the

Romans. In the first theory we get a slight trace of the sacred

tradition; certain people, he say, declare that a great multitude in

the reign of Isis overflowed Egypt and discharged themselves into the

lands of Judea and the surrounding neighborhood, some call them a race

of AEthiops, others Assyrians; and we are told there were some even

who claimed for them a far more renowned descent from the [Greek text]

mentioned by Homer, whence they called their great city Hiero-Solyma.

These theories are very ingenious, but they only serve to prove that

the eye of the philosophical historian of the Romans had never rested

on the Jewish records. Still the character he gives of them is the one

they have universally borne in the world; he speaks also of "Moyses,"

who gave them a distinct legislation; he mentions "circumcision" and

their abstinence from certain kinds of meet; he records their national

exclusiveness, their immovable obstinacy, their notion of one God, so

strange to the a pagan mind, and the temple, _without images_, equally

absurd.

Though the Romans treated the Jews, as indeed they did all the people

they conquered, with great forbearance, still they had a sort of

secret dislike for them, and in the {505} and they served them as they

served no other race of people subject to their power. And this

feeling was reciprocated by the Jews, who now more than ever longed

for the advent of the great Deliverer, whom they also more than ever

felt must come in the shape of a warrior, with power and majesty to

sweep these Romans out of the country, and restore Jerusalem to her

former position of splendor and renown. There can be no question that

the political circumstances in which the Jews were placed at the time

of the coming of Christ helped to unfit them for his reception, by

fostering that idea of a great temporal sovereign which had been

implanted in their bosom. But this idea was of much older origin than

their troubles with the Romans. It is an interesting fact that the

Maccabaean revolution, which restored the priesthood, may be looked

upon as the event which first taught the Jews that fatal error. Before

that time they had a more spiritual conception of the Messiah, but the

events which followed in the wake of the heroism of Judas Maccabaeus

changed the whole character of their hopes. Let us review those

circumstances, for it is only by doing so we can properly understand

how the Jews came to be so persistent in their expectations of a great

omnipotent temporal sovereign. Antiochus Epiphanes, upon the death of

his brother, Seleucus Philopator, king of Syria, seized upon the

vacant throne, although Demetrius, the son of Seleucus, was alive at

Rome, where he had been sent as a hostage. In Daniel xi. 21, we glean

that he obtained the kingdom by flattery, which receives some support

from what Livy says about his extravagant rewards (Livy xli. c.20). He

had undertaken several campaigns against Egypt, and was on his return

from one of these, with wasted army and exhausted treasury, when it

occurred to him that if he could only plunder the temple of the Jews,

it would go far to recruit his finances. He turned his army at once

toward Jerusalem, marched upon it, and sacked it. An altar was raised

and sacrifice made to Jupiter in the holy place. Then he endeavored to

abolish the ceremonial, and to introduce pagan worship, when the Jews,

exasperated beyond endurance, were ripe all over the country for

revolt, but dared not rise. At this time, however, there dwelt in a

little village called Modin, not far from Emmaus, a family who were

called the Maccabees, for what reason it is now impossible to

ascertain; but this family, who had lived there in the peaceable

obscurity of village life, were destined to become heroic. It

consisted of an aged father, Mattathias, and five sons. Antiochus

Epiphanes had sent his officers to this village to erect an altar in

the Jewish place of worship for sacrifice to the gods, when Mattathias

boldly declared that he would resist it. The altar was set up, and one

miserable renegade Jew was advancing toward it to make the pagan

offering, when he was slain on the spot by Mattathias. The family then

fled to the wilderness, and concealed themselves; they were soon

joined by others; a band was formed, which gradually increased, until

it became numerous enough to attack towns. Then Mattathias died, and

his son, even more memorable in the history of patriotism, came

forward, and took the command of the gathering confederation, now a

disciplined army. Apollonius was sent against him, whom Judas met

boldly on the field of battle, and slew. The same success attended him

in his encounter with the Syrian general, Seron. Antiochus now saw the

necessity of vigorous measures to prevent the Jews from recovering

their independence; he went to Persia to recruit his treasures, while

Lysias, the regent, sent an army to Judea of 40,000 foot and 7,000

cavalry, which was reinforced by auxiliaries from the provinces, and

even by Jews who were already becoming jealous of the fame of Judas.

The Jewish hero pointed out to his {506} followers the desperate odds

against which they would have to contend, and resolved upon employing

a stratagem. By a forced march he reached a portion of the enemy

encamped at Emmaus and surprised them, with complete success: several

portions of the army were put to flight, and a great booty secured.

Another and more numerous army was sent against him, but with no

success. At the head of 10,000 followers, fired by fanaticism, Judas

put to flight the army of Lysias, 60,000 strong, and marched on

Jerusalem to purify the temple and restore it to its glory. The

festival of Purification was then inaugurated. Day by day the

successes of Judas increased, when Antiochus Eupator, who had

succeeded Antiochus Epiphanes, invaded Judea, and only made peace with

Judas in consequence of dissensions at home. He was murdered by his

uncle, Demetrius, who seized the kingdom and confirmed the peace with

Judas, but took possession of the citadel of Jerusalem, placing his

general, Nicanor, there with troops. Suspicions were then entertained

that treachery was being plotted between Judas and this general; the

matter was pressed, when Nicanor cleared himself, and Judas was

obliged to flee. A battle took place, which he won, and another

victory followed at Beth-horon, in which Nicanor fell. Re-enforcements

strengthened the enemy, and Judas was compelled to retire to Laish

with 3,000 followers, where he was attacked at a disadvantage. Only

800 of his men remained faithful to him, but with these he boldly

encountered the avenging hosts of Demetrius, and found a hero's death

on the field. Though Judas was dead, yet the Maccabaean spirit was not

extinct. Simon and Jonathan, his brothers, rallied their companions,

and took the lead, fortifying themselves in a strong position in the

neighborhood of Tekoa. Jonathan bid fair to equal Judas; he avoided an

open engagement with the Syrians, but kept his position, and harassed

the enemy for the space of two years, when events brought about what

perhaps the slender forces of his army would have never accomplished.

A pretender to the throne of Syria sprang up in the person of

Alexander Balas, the reputed natural son of Antiochus Epiphanes, and a

party was soon found to promote his claim against Demetrius. By this

time Jonathan's little body of troops had been augmented by continued

re-enforcements, and his position was such that to the contending

parties in Syria it became clear that if either could win over this

obstinate Jew to his cause it would decide the matter. Demetrius took

the first step, by making him at once general of the forces in Judea

and governor of Jerusalem; but Jonathan was in no hurry, he suspected

the wily Demetrius, and having received overtures from Alexander

Balas, that if he would espouse his cause he would make him high

priest when he was on the throne of Syria, he yielded. These overtures

were accompanied by the present of a purple robe, and Jonathan, who,

doubtless, saw in the dissensions of his enemies the opportunity for

Jerusalem, accepted the proposition, joined Alexander, who slew

Demetrius in battle, and ascended the throne of Syria. True to his

engagement, he made Jonathan high priest, with the rank of prince, and

did all he could to ensure his fidelity. Jonathan afterward attended

the marriage of Alexander with a daughter of the King of Egypt, at

Ptolemais, where he received many marks of consideration from the

Syrian and Egyptian monarchs. He ultimately fell, however, a victim to

treachery, and was succeeded by his brother Simon, who confirmed the

Jews in their independence in return, for which, in 131 B.C., they

passed a decree, by which the dignity of high priest and prince of the

Jews was made hereditary in the family of Simon. Thus was founded the

long line of Asmonean priests, which remained unbroken down to about

thirty-four years before Christ. The Mosaic principle was set aside,

and {507} from this time the changes came over the Jews and their

institutions which are admirably sketched by Mr. Dixon in the two

chapters on the Great Separation and the Oral Law, which we recommend

to the careful perusal of any one who wishes to form a clear idea of

the origin of the state of Judaism at the time of our Lord. He thus

sums up in a sentence the results of the Maccabaean insurrection:

"The main issues, then, as regards the faith and policy in Israel of

that glorious revolt of Modin, w the elevation of a fighting sect to

power; the general adoption of separative principles; the

substitution of an explanatory law for the Covenant; a change in the

divine succession of high priests, and a lawless union of the

spiritual and secular forces."

The Idyls of Bethlehem form a most interesting chapter: the death of

Rachel, the idyl of Ruth, the episode of Saul, the house of Chimham,

the idyl of Jeremiah, and the birth of our Saviour, are all sketched

in a manner which tends to impress these well-known scenes upon the

mind indelibly. A chapter on Syrian Khans, which throws much light

upon the incident of the birth of Christ, we would like to extract did

not the exigencies of space forbid. The reader will find in the

chapters, The Inn of Bethlehem, The Province of Galilee, Herod the

Great, John the Baptist, and Jewish Parties, an admirable introduction

to those scenes of the life and wanderings of our blessed Lord which

are contained in the second part of the book, and to which we wish to

devote the remainder of this paper.

When speaking of the early life of Jesus, Mr. Dixon takes up the

question of the obscurity of his origin, that favorite point with the

sceptics of all ages, from the "Is not this the carpenter's son?" of

the Jews, down to puerile objections of the German Strauss. He has

shown that it was the custom to teach the youth of all classes some

useful art; and the best born and greatest men in Jewish history had

been instructed in such trades as weaving, tent-making etc. Beside,

certain trades were held in honor. We cannot understand this if we

think of carpentering by the contemptuous estimate of modern life.

That contempt for hand-labor was unknown in the early ages of

Scripture history. Adam dressed the garden, Abel was a keeper of

sheep, Cain a tiller of the ground. Tubal Cain a smith; and so, among

the Jews, it was a reproach to any man if he had not been taught one

of the useful mechanical arts. It was dignified by the Almighty

himself, who, we are told--

"Called by name Bezaleel, . . . and he hath filled him with the

spirit of God in wisdom, in understanding, and in knowledge, and in

all manner of workmanship, and to devise curious works, to work in

gold and in silver and in brass, and in the cutting of stones to set

them, and in carving of wood to make any manner of cunning work. And

he hath put it in his heart that he may teach." Exod. xxxv. 30-34.

This reverence was cherished by the Jews; carpentering was always

looked upon as a noble occupation; the fact that the carpenter might

have to go into the temple to labor would have rescued that occupation

from contempt. This is a striking peculiarity of eastern life; and

elsewhere the objection of the sceptic to the humble origin of Jesus

has been well answered:

"The princes of Turkey in Egypt are still instructed in the

mechanical arts, one being made a brazier, another a carpenter, a

third a good weaver, and so on. Said Pasha was a good mechanic,

Ishmael Pasha is not inferior to his brother. Much of the domestic

life of Israel has been lost to us, but still we know something of

the crafts in which many of the most famous rabbis and doctors had

been taught to excel. We know that Hillel practised a trade. St.

Paul was a tent-maker, Rabbi Ishmael was a needle-maker, Rabbi

Jonathan a cobbler. Rabbi Jose was a tanner. Rabbi Simon was a

weaver. Among the Talmudists there was a celebrated Rabbi Joseph who

was a carpenter. What then becomes of Strauss's inference that

Joseph must have been a man of low birth--not of the stock of

David--because he followed a mechanical trade?" [Footnote 153]

[Footnote 153: Athenaeum, 27th Jan., 1866.]

{508}

We may conclude this point by adding that among the Jews the only

trades which could prevent a man from attaining to the dignity of high

priest were weavers, barbers, fullers, perfumers, cuppers, and

tanners.

But to return to the life and work of Jesus. His fame was gradually

spreading, and he went about the small towns and hamlets:

"Capernaum, Chorazin Magdala, Bethsaida, Dalmanutha Gerasa,

preaching in the synagogues, visiting the fishing-boats and

threshing-floors, healing the sick, and comforting the poor; gentle

in his aspect and in his life; wise as a sage and simple as a child;

winning people to his views by the charm of his manner and the

beauty of his sayings."

His first aim was to win the Jews from the Oral Law, to convince them

of its emptiness; it is the key to the following scenes graphically

depicted by Mr. Dixon. Christ had gone to Jerusalem for the feast of

Purim, and was walking by the Pool of Bethesda in the sheet market, a

spot he had to pass daily. On the thanks of this pool were crowds of

sick, the halt, aged, and blind, a spectacle sure to attract the eye

of Jesus:

"It was the Sabbath day.

"In the temple hard by, these wretches could hear the groaning of

bulls under the mace, the bleating of lambs under the sacrificial

knife, the shouting of dealers as they sold doves and shekels.

Bakers were hurrying through with bread. The captain of the temple

was on duty with his guards. Priests were marching in procession,

and crowds of worshippers standing about the holy place. Tongues of

flame leaped faintly from the altars on which the priests were

sprinkling blood . . . but the wretches who lay around (the pool) on

their quilts and rugs, the blind, the leprous, and the aged poor,

drew no compassion from the busy priests. One man, the weakest of

the weak, had been helpless no less than thirty-eight years. Over

this man Jesus paused and said:

"'Wilt thou be made whole?'

"'Rabbi, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into

the pool; but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me."

The Compassionate answered him:

"'Rise, take up thy bed and walk.'

"At once the life leaped quickly into the poor man's limbs. Rising

from the ground he folded up his quilt, taking it on his arm to go

away; but some of the Pharisees seeing him get up and roll his bed

into a coil, run toward him crying: 'It is the Sabbath day; it is

not lawful for thee two carry thy bed.' It was certainly an offense

against the Oral Law."

The Jews had turned the blessing of the Sabbath into a curse.

"From the moment of hearing the ram's horn, a sacred trumpet, called

the shofa, blown from the temple wall, announcing that the seventh

had commenced, he was not allowed to tight a fire or make a bed, to

boil him a pot; he could not pool his ass from a ditch, nor raise

and arms in defense of his life . . . A Jew could not quit his camp,

his village, or his city on the day of rest. He might not begin a

journey; if going along a road, he must rest from sundown till the

same event of the coming day. He might not carry a pencil, a

kerchief a shekel in his belt; if he required a handkerchief for

use, he had to tie it round his leg. If he offended against one of

these rules, he was held to deserve the doom awarded to the vilest

of sinners. Some rabbins held that a man ought not to change his

position, but that, whether he was standing or sitting when the

shofa sounded, _he should stand or sit immovable as a stone until

the Sabbath had passed away_."

Jesus broke the Oral Law that he might bring his followers to a sense

of its degrading spirit, and announced the new truth that "_The

Sabbath is made for man; not and for the Sabbath_." After two very

interesting chapters upon Antipas Herod and Herodias, we have once

upon the Synagogue. Some writers have striven to claim the remotest

antiquity for this institution, but in all probability it might be

dated from the captivity. There would be a natural desire to meet

together away from the pagans, by whom they were surrounded, to pray

to their God, to sing their psalms, and to read the law. This gave

rise to the synagogue, which means no more then a "meeting together;"

but after the Maccabaean insurrection it became a popular institution,

and every little village had its synagogue. Now, as much of the work

of Christ was done in the synagogue, as he loved to go into them and

to take part {509} in their services, it is desirable that we should

have a clear notion of what a synagogue was:

"A house of unhewn stones taken up from the hillside; squat and

square of the ancient Hebrew style, having a level roof, but neither

spire nor tower, neither dome nor minaret to enchant the eye; such

was the simple synagogue of the Jews in which Jesus taught. . .

Inside a Syrian synagogue is like one of our parish schools with

seats for the men, rough sofas of wood half covered with rushes and

straw; a higher seat stands in the centre like that of a mosque, for

the elders of the town, a desk for the reader of the day; at the

south end a closet, concealed by a hanging veil, in which the torah,

a written copy of the Pentateuch, is kept in the sacred ark. A

silver lamp is always kept burning, a candlestick with eight arms, a

pulpit, a reading-desk, are the chief articles of furniture in the

room. . . . . In olden times women were allowed to enter with the

men, though they were even then parted from father and son by a

wooden screen. . . . Before entering a synagogue a man is expected

to dip his hands into water. . . . Ten persons are necessary to form

a meeting; every town or city having a synagogue appointed ten men

called batlanim (men of leisure), who were bound to appear at the

hour of prayer. . . Higher in office was the chazzan, who took

charge of the house and scroll. . . The meturgeman was an

interpreter of the law, whose duty it was to stand near the reader

for the day, and translate the sacred verses, one by one, from the

Hebrew into the vulgar tongue. Above him were the elders. . . . When

the people came in they first bowed to the ark; the elders took

their places on the raised platform; the rich went up to high seats

near the ark; the poor sat on wooden sofas, matted with straw. . . .

A prayer was said, one of the Psalms of David sung. The chazzan

walked up to the veil, which he drew aside with reverence, lifted

the ark from its niche, took out the torah, carried the roll round

the benches, every one striving either to kiss or touch it with his

palm; the sheliach read the lesson for the day; at its close the

elder expounded the text in a sort of sermon, when the torah was

carried back, the prayers began. . . . Every hearer had in those

times a right to express his opinion of the sacred text, and of what

it meant."

Our Lord availed himself of this right, which every Jew possessed, of

speaking in the synagogue upon the text which had been read; and Mr.

Dixon has worked up two scenes well known in the career of our Lord,

with all the surrounding incidents and scenery, so graphically and so

accurately that no one could read these descriptions without rising

from them with a clearer and more complete understanding of the simple

statement of the gospel. The gospels were not written as historical

sketches, but as vehicles for the vital truth they contain;

consequently anything that resuscitates the scene and reproduces the

incidents as they took place, with all their peculiar surroundings,

must be of great value in assisting us to comprehend more readily, and

to retain in our minds more vividly the events of our Lord's career.

We think this is more preeminently the characteristic aim and

achievement of this work than of the many others we have read upon the

subject, and we shall instance one, the scene in the synagogue of

Capernaum. The first alluded to was the declaration of Jesus in the

synagogue at Nazareth; but as many of the incidents are included in

this of Capernaum, we content ourselves with giving it somewhat in

detail, as an illustration of the peculiarity we have already

mentioned. Let the reader first peruse the simple statement in the

gospel of St. John, vi. ch., 25 v., to the end, and then the

following; or better still the whole of chapter xvii. in the second

volume of Mr. Dixon's work, called The Bread of Life, and he will rise

from it with a much more vivid conception of one of the most trying

scenes in our Lord's history. On the steps of the synagogue a motley

crowd had collected, eager, excited, and curious, for it was just

after the miraculous feeding of the 5,000, and they were full of it;

they had heard of it in all its stupendous power; it was the miracle

of all miracles most likely to overpower the Jewish mind; it recalled

to them the words of Jehovah:

"At even ye shall eat flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled

with bread, and ye shall know that I am the Lord your God."

{510}

And this man, this son of Joseph the carpenter, had fed 5,000 people

on fire barley loaves and two small fishes. They saw the little boat

on the beach in which Jesus had come; they had heard of his walking on

the water that very night; and now the crowd was increasing, for the

country was aroused, and people came flocking from all parts to see

this man who did such marvellous things.

"Jesus sat in the synagogue in his usual place. The Jews poured in,

each man and woman making lonely reverence toward the ark. . . , The

service began with the prayer of sweet incense, after which the

congregation, the batlanim leading, sang Psalms of David; when these

were sung, the chazzan, going up to the ark, drew aside the veil and

took out the sacred roll, which he carried round the aisles to the

reader of the day, who raised it in his hands, so that all who were

present could see the sacred text. Then the whole congregation rose.

. . . Opening the scroll, the reader read out the section or chapter

for the day. . . . When the lesson was finished the chazzan took the

scroll from the reader and carried it back to its place behind the

veil. Then when the roll was restored to the ark, they sang other

psalms, after which the elder delivered the midrash, an exposition

of the text which had been read. The time now being come to question

and be question, all eyes turned on the Teacher who had fed the

5,000 men. . . . Their questions were Sharp and loud:

"'Rabbi, when camest thou hither?'

"'Verily, verily, I say unto you, ye ask me not because ye saw the

miracles, but because ye ate of the loaves and were filled. Labor

not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth

unto everlasting life, which the Son of Man shall give unto you, for

him hath God the Father sealed."

"Then they asked him:

"'What must we do that we may work the works of God?'

"To which he answered, with a second public declaration, that he was

Christ the Son of God:

"'This is the word of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath

sent.'

"'What sign showest thou that we may see and believe thee! What dost

thou work?'

"Full of the great act which many witnesses declared that they had

seen in the desert beyond the lake, they wished to have it repeated

before their eyes; so they said to him:

"'Our fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, as it is written, he

gave them bread from heaven to eat.'

"Jesus took up their thought.

"'Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not the bread from

heaven, but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the

bread of God is that which cometh down from heaven and giveth life

unto the world.'

"'Rabbi, evermore give us this bread.'

"Jesus answered them:

"' I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall not hunger,

and he that believeth in me shall never thirst. . . . . . For I am

come down from heaven not to do mine own will, but the will of him

that sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose

nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. '. . .

"The elders, the batlanim, the chazzan gazed into each other's

faces, and began to murmur against him, just as the men of Nazareth

had murmured against him.

"'Is not this Jesus the son of Joseph whose father and mother we

know? How is it, then, that he saith, I am come down from heaven?"

"Jesus spoke to them again:

"Murmur not among yourselves. No man can come to me except the

Father which sent me draw him; and I will raise him up the last. . . .

I am the bread of life. . . . . I am the living bread which came

down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread he shall live

forever; yea, and the bread that I will give you is my flesh, which

I will give for the life of the world.'

"Strange doctrines for Jews to weigh. Then leapt hot words among

them, and some of those who had meant to believe in him drew back.

If he were the Christ, the Son of David, the King of Israel, why was

he not marching on Jerusalem, why not driving out the Romans, why

not assuming a kingly crown? 'How can this Man give us his flesh to

eat?'

"The Lord spoke again, still more to their discontent and chagrin,

seeing that they wanted an earthly Christ:

"'Except ye eat of the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood,

ye have no life in you.'

"This was too much for many, even for some who had been brought to

the door of belief. . . . . The service of the synagogue ended, the

elders came down from the platform, the chazzan put away the sacred

vessels, the congregation came out into the sun, angry in word and

mocking spirit. They wanted facts; he had given them truth. They

hungered for miraculous bread, for a new shower of manna; he had

offered them symbolically his flesh and blood. They had set their

hearts on finding a captain who would march against the Romans, who

would would cause Judas of Gamala to be forgotten, who would put the

glories of Herod the Great to shame. They had asked him for earth,

and he had answered them with heaven."

{511}

But the scene was drawing to a close; Jesus went on with his work

after this tumult in the synagogue, opposing himself to the senseless

rites of the Pharisees, defying the oral law, healing the sick, and

preaching to the people. Passing through the country from Galilee a

Syro-Phenecian woman who had heard of him, and perhaps seen him, ran

after him in the road, and besought him to heal her daughter who was a

lunatic. The disciples urged him to send her away, for his life would

not have been safe if he had another conflict with the Jews in that

quarter, and to heal this Gentile woman's child would be sure to bring

them on his track. Turning to the woman, Jesus told her he was sent

only to the lost sheep of Israel; but she persisted, crying, "Lord,

help me!" an evidence of faith which was quite sufficient, and Jesus

turned to her and said, "Great is thy faith, O woman, be it unto thee

as thou wilt." This was a fatal blow to the Jewish exclusiveness, a

Gentile had been called into the church, and the pride of the Jew

humbled forever. On the last Sabbath day which Jesus spent on earth,

he struck another blow at the ceremonial law, by taking his disciples

to dine at the house of one Simon a leper. He had reached Bethany, and

taken up his abode in the house of Martha and Mary, among the outcast

and the poor, for that last seven days now called in the church the

holy week. The scene was an impressive one. The city, as far as the

eye could reach, was one vast encampment, caravans were arriving from

every direction, bringing thousands of Jews to the feast, who,

selecting their ground, drove four stakes into the earth, drew long

reeds round them, and covered them with leaves, making a sort of

bower; others brought small tents with them; the whole city, Mount

Gibeon, the plain of Rephaim, the valley of Gihon, the hill of Olivet,

were all studded with tense, and crowded with busy people hastening to

finish their preparations before the shofa should sound at sunset, and

the Sabbath begin, when no man could work. In the temple, the priests,

the doctors, the money-changers, the bakers of shew-bread, were all at

work, and the last panorama in the life of Christ commenced.

On the first day in Holy Week, now known as Palm _Sunday_, Jesus

entered Jerusalem on an ass's colt, a prominent figure in the

festivities, for the crowds rushed up see him, with their palms, and

marched with him singing psalms; they had come out from Jerusalem to

meet him, and they escorted him into the city. At night he returned to

Bethany.

On the _Monday_ and _Tuesday_ he went early to the temple, mixing

among the people, restoring sight to the blind, and preaching to the

poor. As his life began with a series of temptations, so it was the

will of his Father that he should be persecuted with them at its

close--a lesson we may all do well to dwell upon. Up to the last days

of his life Jesus was subjected to temptations. On the Tuesday some

emissaries of the Sanhedrim came to the court where he was preaching

to question him, and gather evidence against him. They found him

amongst a crowd of Baptists, and demanded his authority for teaching.

Christ retorted by putting them to the dilemma of stating whether

John's baptism was of heaven or not; they were too much afraid of the

people to say it was of men, and if they said of heaven, Jesus would

have reproached them for their want of faith; they confessed their

ignorance. Then each party tried to entrap him.

The _Pharisees_ brought him a woman taken in adultery. By the Mosaic

law this offence would have been punished with death. But the Roman

government would have executed any Jew who would venture to carry out

such a law, and therefore the question seemed to compel Jesus to speak

either against Moses or the Romans. He quietly turned to the

witnesses, and told the man who was {512} innocent among them to cast

the first stone at her.

The _Herodians_ tempted him on a point of tribute. They had two taxes,

one to God and one to Caesar, both were disputed, and they consulted

him in order to involve him with God or Caesar; but he foiled them by

confirming both:

"Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the

things that are God's."

They began to be astonished.

The _Sadducees_ tempted him with their dogma of the non-resurrection.

They told him sneeringly of a woman who had married seven husbands,

and they wanted to know whose she would be in the life to come. Jesus

replied calmly:

"In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage,

but are as the angels in heaven."

And the Sadducees with their philosophy, their learning, and their

unbelief, retired in confusion.

On the _Wednesday_ he remained in Bethany in seclusion, while Judas

was arranging for his safe betrayal to Annas and the nobles.

_Thursday_ Jesus sent Peter and John into Jerusalem to prepare the

Passover, and at sunset that day he and the twelve sat down to the

last supper; Judas left to see Annas, and after singing a hymn, the

other disciples rose from the table, passed through the sheep-gate

into the Cedron valley, and came to Gethsemane. Here Jesus withdrew,

and while his disciples were sleeping, he watched and prayed until the

betrayers came, and the kiss of Judas revealed him to them. The

Sanhedrim was summoned in the dead of the night, and when the members

arrived they found Annas examining witnesses, but with no avail, they

could not substantiate any charge against him that the Roman

government would allow them to punish with death. Annas told him to

speak for himself, but he would not. The high priest then said, "Art

thou the Christ?" he said, "I am." Then Annas asked him who were his

disciples, and Jesus replied: "I spake openly to the world, I taught

in the synagogue and in the temple, whither the Jews resort, in secret

I have said nothing; ask them which heard me, they know what I have

said." The officer of the temple smote him, and Annas ordered him to

be bound with cords, and when it was day they went in a body to the

palace of Caiaphas. Here Jesus was questioned again, and answered that

he was the Christ, the high priest rent his clothes, in sign that it

was blasphemy and worthy of death. The Sanhedrim pronounced him

guilty, and the officers carried him to the Praetorian gates and

delivered him a prisoner into the hands of Pilate's guards. The

vacillation of Pilate and the last scene in our Lord's career are

known to all. Mr. Dixon leaves them with the observation, "They form a

divine episode in the history of man, and must be left to the writers

who could not err."

A good book is its own best eulogy, and we may safely leave this of

Mr. Dixon's to itself; but we cannot refrain from testifying our

appreciation of such a valuable addition to the records of eastern

travel. It is superfluous to say that it is excellently written, as it

emanates from the 10, not of a tyro, but of a master-craftsman, whose

style is too well known to need eulogy, a style graphic, pointed, and

impressive, the result of clear vision and accurate delineation,

strengthened by a sort of Frith-like power of grouping as witness the

description of the street life of Jaffa, which, as an exquisite piece

of word-painting, is perfect.

The reader is led through the sacred scenes of the Holy Land by an

artist as well as a scholar, who as he journeys on revives the life of

the past; we see the patriarchal life, the tents, the flocks grazing

on the hills, the ready-writer with his and lingering and the city

gate. We here David's minstrelsy and the tramp of Maccabaean

soldierly; we peer into the depths of {513} one of those ancient wells

build by the patriarchs, and listen to the conversation of the

Samaritan woman with that wonderful stranger; we linger at the wayside

Khan, and see how natural is the tale of the gospel. As we near

Jerusalem the grander figures of the panorama pass over the scene, the

Herods in their luxury and pride, in their humiliation and their sins,

the grim towers of Macherus and the dark deed behind its walls when

the head of the messenger of God fell to please a wanton woman, and

terror was struck into the heart of the tyrant; the splendid

ceremonial service of the temple, with its altars, its sacrifices, and

its robed priests; the Sadducees luxuriating in their palaces, with

servants, carriages, gardens, living their voluptuous, godless lives;

the Pharisees with their demure aspect, broad and multiplied

phylacteries; the elements of Roman soldiery, the imperial eagles

hovering over the scene as the Jews past by scowling at the pagan

rulers of the holy city; and then that marvellous god-like figure

wandering about the streets followed by crowds of people, now entering

the temple courts to preach to them, and now stopping on his way to

heal some lame man or leper; his wanderings' along the wearying roads

of Galilee; his mingling with the people in the synagogues, the

popular gathering-place; his taking part in the service and reading

the Scriptures; his final coming up to the holy city, the betrayal,

this scenes of his trial, the frantic eagerness of the Jews, the

vacillation of Pilate, the terrible suspense and the ultimate triumph

of his foes, all these and many more incidents of biblical and gospel

history are revived and enacted, as it were, amid the very scenes and

in the very places where they once took place. We repeat again, that

this work is an excellent commentary and illustration of the gospel

narrative; and though pen of its author has been nobly wielded in the

controversial defence of that gospel, yet perhaps even greater good

may be done by this exhibition and illustration of the life and work

of Christ. To hold him up to the eyes of men is the best antidote to

scepticism; and whatever tends to do that, to plant the image of

Christ in the hearts of men, is a good work; the illustration of his

individuality, standing out as he did in his times, and as he does in

every time, distinct from all men and things. We take up the great

work of any age, its characteristic achievement, and we find the

impress of the age stamped indelibly upon it; it smacks of the time

and the scenes. Homer is pervaded with the valor of a mythic heroism,

bloodshed and victory. Dante is the very best reflection of

mediaevalism--its deep, superstitious piety, its weird dreams, and its

peculiar theology. Shakespeare, though he has written with spotless

purity, yet bears traces of the tolerated licentiousness of the

Elizabethan age. But Christ and his gospel stand out distinct, totally

distinct from the times and the life when they appeared. That gospel

could not have been produced by the age, for it was an antagonism to

it; the age was a degenerate one, a mixture of formal ceremony, and

licentious unbelief; paganism was waning; Rome becoming debased; the

ancient traditions of the Jews were lost in human inventions and

Rabbinical fantasies, when, rising up in the midst of all this

debasement, this corruption, these anomalies, came Christ and his

gospel, pure among rottenness, gentle in the midst of violence, holy

among flagrant infidelity and wanton vice, the Preacher and the

preaching both sent from somewhere, but manifestly not from the world,

not from oriental barbarism, not from western paganism, not from

Jewish corruption; it could then have come from no other place than

heaven, and had no other author than God. And when we reflect upon

what was compressed in that three years' labor, and compare it with

systems which have occupied men's lives to sketch out merely, and

taken {514} ages to perfect; when we see that this greatest system,

which has spread over the whole civilized world by the force of its

own truth, was in three short years laid down and consolidated, every

principle defined, every rule established, every law delineated, and

an impetus given to it by its great Master, which has always kept it

advancing in the world against every opposing force, and in spite of

every disadvantageous circumstance, all doubt about its individuality,

its superhuman character, and its divine origin, must vanish from the

mind. Therefore we think, in conclusion. that the best thing for

Christians still to do in this world is, to lift up Christ before the

eyes of men, no matter how, so that he be listed up boldly and

faithfully, be it by the voice, the pencil, or the pen (as in this

instance before us), or, better still by the more impressive

exhibition of Christ in a Christian life. If we wish to save men, let

us display him always and everywhere in the confidence that he will

fulfil his own divine promise--"I, if I be lifted up from the earth,

will draw all men unto me."

--------

ORIGINAL.

ON THE APPARITION OF OUR LORD TO THE DISCIPLES AT EMMAUS.

"Whilst he was at table with them,

he took bread, and blessed, and brake, and gave to them.

And their eyes were opened, and they knew him."

DISCIPLE.

"Lord! grant to thy servant this singular grace,

To gaze but for once on thy beautiful face."

JESUS.

"Most easily may'st thou this blessing secure:

Who gives unto mine, unto me gives instead.

Of thy loaf give a part to my suffering poor,

And thy Lord thou shalt see at the breaking of bread."

--------

{515}

ORIGINAL.

LITTLE SUNBEAM'S CHRISTMAS STORY.

God bless you, kind gentlemen, for your merry Christmas, and thank you

kindly for these nice things; but you must not be angry if I say I'm

almost sorry it is Christmas day, for you see it makes me think about

last Christmas and the Christmas before.

I am Mr. Willsup's little girl--Mr. Willsup that is dead, you know. I

suppose you think I ought to wear black; and so I would, but mother

says we are too poor, and we must only mourn in our hearts. I do mourn

in my heart, oh! so much, I can't tell you. I don't like to

acknowledge it, and it gives me an ugly pain and a dreadful sinking

about my heart when I think of it, but it was on a Christmas night

that we lost poor father, and I'm afraid he wasn't right, you

understand, at the time.

There was a time when father was such a nice, good man, and when we

weren't poor, as we are now. We didn't always live up in this cold,

bare garret. We used to live in a fine, large house, all to ourselves;

and we had a nice garden in front, full of pretty flowers, and a long

back porch with a buying running over it; and we had a beautiful

parlor where we talked to the visitors only--not to sleep in and cook

in as we do here, when we have any fire; and I had the cosiest little

bedroom you ever saw, with a little altar in the corner, and on it a

statue of the Blessed Virgin, white as snow; and Chip, that's a

canary-bird, hung in his cage in the window when it was fine weather,

and cat sugar like a good fellow; and then we had silver forks and

spoons; and Zephyr, that's the horse, and Dash, our dog, and Pussy,

and oh! so many nice things, I never could tell you all in a long

time. But we haven't got any of them now, for we are poor, and

father's dead, and we must only mourn in our hearts.

I hardly know how to tell you all about it, for though I am little

I've seen a good deal; so much bad and trouble that my mind goes quite

round and round sometimes thinking over it. If you ever saw poor

father after we got to be poor, that wouldn't tell you how he looked

as I recollect him. Oh! he was so much changed! I used to be so proud

of him, and delighted to go out to walk with him in the street or

across the fields; and I used to love him so much--not that I didn't

always love him just as much as ever, only I didn't get so much chance

to love him, you understand, when he got to stay away from home and

be--oh! my heart, how it aches!

Father was a handsome-looking man once, and so smart. Everybody bowed

to him in the street. But he got rough and careless, I know, and it

made me feel sorry to see him go out without brushing his hat, or

asking me to do it for him, as he used to do. And then his face turned

to such a different look from old times. It got puffed up and red, and

his eyes that I remember were so bright and so deep, for I used to

climb up on his knee often, and look 'way down into them, and then he

would laugh and ask me if I could see his thoughts, and I almost

fancied I could sometimes, and give me a sweet kiss, and call me his

darling Susy; but when he changed, you know, his eyes seemed to be,

how shall I say it? so flat and soft, and he never seemed to be

looking anywhere in particular half the time.

{516}

You see it was business and appointments that changed him. When I

wished him to stay home and we would all enjoy ourselves--for we had

the pleasantest times together, father, mother, and me, and baby,

that's dead; and perhaps Dash and Pussy too sometimes, you know--then

he would be obliged to excuse himself on account of business and

appointments, which I fear were not always with the best of people,

for when he said he was going out mother would sigh _so_ deep and _so_

long; and then when he came home late at night I often woke up and

heard mother coaxing him and soothing him, and I am sure frequently

crying and sobbing, and that would make me cry too, all alone by

myself; and so the time went on, till father began to take less and

less notice of either mother or of me. As for dear little baby, even

when she sickened and died, I don't think he seemed to understand it,

and he stood by the grave and looked at the little coffin being let

down as if he were dreaming.

It was not long before father left off doing almost any business in

the daytime, and only went out at night. I noticed then that we began

to sell some of our nice furniture, and our silver forks and spoons. I

suppose, as we scarcely ever had any visitors now, we did not need

them; but the house began to look bare and desolate and strange, as if

it wasn't our house; and the servant quarrelled with mother and left

us, and we didn't get another, but mother did the work herself, and it

made her sick, for she wasn't used to it. Sam, our man, went away,

because after the horse and carriage was sold he had nothing to do. I

recollect hearing him say to mother:

"I'd stand by you and Susy, miss, as I've always stood by you, and

it's not wages, but times is changed, and I know you ain't able to

have me." And then he pulled his hat down over his eyes so far that he

had to lift it up again before he could see his way out of the front

door; and then ran across the garden and down the street, as if he

were running away from somebody. I cried a good deal when mother told

me he was not going to come back, for I loved Sam very much, and I'm

not I ashamed of if either, though Pinkey Silver said I ought to be,

for he was just like a brother to me, and a better brother than Pinkey

Silver's brother ever was.

Once, on a Christmas eve, I was going to hang up my stocking, as I had

always done, for good Santa Claus to put something in it, when mother

burst out into such a violent fit of crying that I was afraid she

would die. When she could speak to me she wanted me to let Santa Claus

go to some other children this year; but I determined to give him a

chance to leave me, say, a doll, if he happened to have one left over,

and so I slipped down-stairs in my night-gown, after mother had gone

to her room, and hung my stocking up in the old place. Just as I had

done it, father came staggering in. He was very bad, and fell over

several things. The noise brought mother down-stairs, and father

looking at me said so savagely that it sent all the blood to my heart:

"What devilish nonsense is the girl about?"

"Oh! don't blame the child," said mother, turning pale and getting

between him and me. "You know it is Christmas eve, John."

Then he swore many awful oaths, and said he didn't care for Christmas,

and that he was not going to be taunted with his poverty by his own

children, and went stamping around the room in a furious passion.

Mother went up to him to coax him, and put her arms around his neck;

but he threw her off and knocked her down and, though you mayn't

believe it, he actually lifted up his foot and stamped upon her face.

That is why mother looks so bad now, with those great scars, but she

was very beautiful before that, as everybody knows. When mother fell,

Dash sprang up from the hearth where he lay curled up, and barked at

father.

{517}

"They've all turned against me," said he, "even the dog. But I'll

brain _you_", says he to Dash.

When I saw mother trying to get up, with the blood all streaming down

her dress from her face and mouth, I got faint, and don't recollect

any more until I woke up, it must have been noon next day, with a

dreadful headache. I crept out of bed and went into the hall, and

there I heard people talking down in the parlor. It was mother, Mrs.

Thrifty, our next-door neighbor, and the doctor. The doctor and Mrs.

Thrifty were trying to persuade mother to do something, but she kept

saying, "Never! I couldn't--poor John!" and words like that.

Such terrible things had taken place and put my mind so astray that I

quite forgot I shouldn't listen; but I soon remembered it, and went

away. I wondered where father was, and thought I would look in his

room to see if he was there. In the old times, before father changed,

I used to be let come in, bright and early, to his room, and climb up

on a chair and kiss him before he got up; and he used to call me his

"Little Sunbeam" that came creeping in to say it was day. There he was

now, lying on the bed without taking off his clothes or muddy boots,

in a deep, heavy sleep. I did so want to love him, but I was afraid to

wake him up to tell him so, he looked so frightful, gnashing his teeth

in his dreams. But I thought I might be "Little Sunbeam" once more,

even if he didn't know it, and I got a chair and climbed up and

reached my arm over round his neck and gave him a kiss. It did not

seem like father's face, but I suppose I had forgotten, it was so long

since I kissed him before. Poor father! I began to mourn in my heart

for him then, as mother says we must do now. I was afraid to stay

there, but before I went away I knelt down beside the bed and prayed

the Blessed Virgin to ask God to make him a good man again, and make

him give up drinking, and make mother well, and let me be his "Little

Sunbeam" as before. Then I slipped back to my room and dressed myself,

and mother came up-stairs with her face all bandaged up, and she told

me not to say anything to anybody about the last night.

That Christmas day wasn't like any Christmas day I can ever recollect.

I didn't find any toys from Santa Claus in my stocking. We didn't go

to mass, nor to see the little Jesus in the Crib, nor to hear the

children sing around it. Nor we didn't have any plum pudding; and when

I went out on the back porch--oh! dear, how my heart does ache--there

lay poor old Dash, with his head split open, and quite dead.

You see I had so many things happen that I don't recollect how things

turned out, except that mother and I left our house one day, because

we got poor, mother said, and then we came here, and she says we are

never to go back because our house is sold to strangers, to whom

father was in debt. Pinkey Silver told me that the man who keeps the

grog-shop where poor father was stabbed owns it now. And I must tell

you about that.

It was the next Christmas day after the last one I told you about. We

had nothing to eat all day. Toward evening mother told me to go to

Mrs. Thrifty's and ask her to please lend us a loaf of bread. Mrs.

Thrifty was gone to a party, and so I had to wait until near nine

o'clock, when George Thrifty, that's Mrs. Thrifty's son, came in

laughing and singing:

"Hie for merry Christmas!

Ho for merry Christmas!

Hurrah! for Christmas day!"

As soon as I told him what I wanted he ran and got a loaf of bread and

a pie and some cakes, and gave it all to me; and then he put his hand

in his pocket and turned it inside out, but there wasn't anything in

it, and says he:

"Oh! little one, I'm as sorry as if I'd lost my grandmother; but I

wish I hadn't spent all my Christmas, for I'd like to give you some

money."

{518}

I thanked him very much and came away. As I was coming home I passed

the grog-shop I spoke to you about. I heard loud, angry quarrelling

and scuffling going on, and father's voice was among the rest. I was

afraid to go away, for I did not like to leave father there to get

hurt, and thought I had better go in and persuade him to come home

with me. I had no sooner put my head in the door than the then who

keeps the store told me to "be off, that he didn't want any beggars

around his place."

"I don't want to beg," said I, "I want father," and just as I said

that I saw a knife flash in the gaslight, and then--O my poor,

mourning heart!--poor father staggered and reeled toward me, and as

he saw me he cried out:

"Why, is it you, Little Sunbeam! O my God!" and then he fell down

across the sill of the door, at my feet, dead.