It was midnight. A fire was blazing in front of Hosea’s tent, and he sat
alone before it, gazing mournfully now into the flames and anon over
the distant country. Inside the canvas walls Ephraim was lying on his
uncle’s camp-bed.
The surgeon who attended the soldiers had bandaged the youth’s wounds,
given him an invigorating cordial, and commanded him to keep still; for
the violence with which the fever had attacked the lad alarmed him.
But in spite of the leech’s prescription Ephraim continued restless.
Sometimes Kasana’s image rose before his eyes, increasing the fever of
his over-heated blood, sometimes he recalled the counsel to become a
warrior like his uncle. The advice seemed wise--at least he tried to
persuade himself that it was--because it promised honor and fame, but in
reality he wished to follow it because it would bring her for whom his
soul yearned nearer to him.
Then his pride rose as he remembered the insults which she and her
father had heaped on those to whom by every tie of blood and affection,
he belonged. His hand clenched as he thought of the ruined home of his
grandfather, whom he had ever regarded one of the noblest of men. Nor
was his message forgotten. Miriam had repeated it again and again,
and his clear memory retained every syllable, for he had unweariedly
iterated it to himself during his solitary walk to Tanis. He was
striving to do the same thing now but, ere he could finish, his mind
always reverted to thoughts of Kasana. The leech had told Hosea to
forbid the sufferer to talk and, when the youth attempted to deliver
his message, the uncle ordered him to keep silence. Then the soldier
arranged his pillow with a mother’s tenderness, gave him his medicine,
and kissed him on the forehead. At last he took his seat by the fire
before the tent and only rose to give Ephraim a drink when he saw by the
stars that an hour had passed.
The flames illumined Hosea’s bronzed features, revealing the countenance
of a man who had confronted many a peril and vanquished all by steadfast
perseverance and wise consideration. His black eyes had an imperious
look, and his full, firmly-compressed lips suggested a quick temper and,
still more, the iron will of a resolute man. His broad-shouldered form
leaned against some lances thrust crosswise into the earth, and when
he passed his strong hand through his thick black locks or smoothed his
dark beard, and his eyes sparkled with ire, it was evident that his soul
was stirred by conflicting emotions and that he stood on the threshold
of a great resolve. The lion was resting, but when he starts up, let his
foes beware!
His soldiers had often compared their fearless, resolute leader, with
his luxuriant hair, to the king of beasts, and as he now shook his fist,
while the muscles of his bronzed arm swelled as though they would burst
the gold armlet that encircled them, and his eyes flashed fire, his
awe-inspiring mien did not invite approach.
Westward, the direction toward which his eyes were turned, lay the
necropolis and the ruined strangers’ quarter. But a few hours ago he had
led his troops through the ruins around which the ravens were circling
and past his father’s devastated home.
Silently, as duty required, he marched on. Not until he halted to seek
quarters for the soldiers did he hear from Hornecht, the captain of
the archers, what had happened during the night. He listened silently,
without the quiver of an eye-lash, or a word of questioning, until his
men had pitched their tents. He had but just gone to rest when a Hebrew
maiden, spite of the menaces of the guard, made her way in to implore
him, in the name of Eliab, one of the oldest slaves of his family, to
go with her to the old man, her grandfather. The latter, whose weakness
prevented journeying, had been left behind, and directly after the
departure of the Hebrews he and his wife had been carried on an ass
to the little but near the harbor, which generous Nun, his master, had
bestowed on the faithful slave.
The grand-daughter had been left to care for the feeble pair, and
now the old servant’s heart yearned for one more sight of his lord’s
first-born son whom, when a child, he had carried in his arms. He had
charged the girl to tell Hosea that Nun had promised his people that his
son would abandon the Egyptians and cleave to his own race. The tribe of
Ephraim, nay the whole Hebrew nation had hailed these tidings with the
utmost joy. Eliab would give him fuller details; she herself had been
well nigh dazed with weeping and anxiety. He would earn the richest
blessings if he would only follow her.
The soldier realized at once that he must fulfil this desire, but he was
obliged to defer his visit to the old slave until the nest morning. The
messenger, however, even in her haste, had told him many incidents she
had seen herself or heard from others.
At last she left him. He rekindled the fire and, so long as the flames
burned brightly, his gaze was bent with a gloomy, thoughtful expression
upon the west. Not till they had devoured the fuel and merely flickered
with a faint bluish light around the charred embers did he fix his eyes
on the whirling sparks. And the longer he did so, the deeper, the more
unconquerable became the conflict in his soul, whose every energy, but
yesterday, had been bent upon a single glorious goal.
The war against the Libyan rebels had detained him eighteen months from
his home, and he had seen ten crescent moons grow full since any news
had reached him of his kindred. A few weeks before he had been ordered
to return, and when to-day he approached nearer and nearer to the
obelisks towering above Tanis, the city of Rameses, his heart had pulsed
with as much joy and hopefulness as if the man of thirty were once more
a boy.
Within a few short hours he should again see his beloved, noble father,
who had needed great deliberation and much persuasion from Hosea’s
mother--long since dead--ere he would permit his son to follow the bent
of his inclinations and enter upon a military life in Pharaoh’s army. He
had anticipated that very day surprising him with the news that he had
been promoted above men many years his seniors and of Egyptian lineage.
Instead of the slights Nun had dreaded, Hosea’s gallant bearing, courage
and, as he modestly added, good-fortune had gained him promotion, yet
he had remained a Hebrew. When he felt the necessity of offering to some
god sacrifices and prayer, he had bowed before Seth, to whose temple
Nun had led him when a child, and whom in those days all the people in
Goshen in whose veins flowed Semitic blood had worshipped. But he also
owed allegiance to another god, not the God of his fathers, but the
deity revered by all the Egyptians who had been initiated. He remained
unknown to the masses, who could not have understood him; yet he was
adored not only by the adepts but by the majority of those who had
obtained high positions in civil or military life-whether they were
servants of the divinity or not--and Hosea, the initiated and the
stranger, knew him also. Everybody understood when allusion was made to
“the God,” the “Sum of All,” the “Creator of Himself,” and the “Great
One.” Hymns extolled him, inscriptions on the monuments, which all could
read, spoke of him, the one God, who manifested himself to the world,
pervaded the universe, and existed throughout creation not alone as
the vital spark animates the human organism, but as himself the sum
of creation, the world with its perpetual growth, decay, and renewal,
obeying the laws he had himself ordained. His spirit, existing in every
form of nature, dwelt also in man, and wherever a mortal gazed he could
discern the rule of the “One.” Nothing could be imagined without him,
therefore he was one like the God of Israel. Nothing could be created
nor happen on earth apart from him, therefore, like Jehovah, he was
omnipotent. Hosea had long regarded both as alike in spirit, varying
only in name. Whoever adored one was a servant of the other, so
the warrior could have entered his father’s presence with a clear
conscience, and told him that although in the service of the king he had
remained loyal to the God of his nation.
Another thought had made his heart pulse faster and more joyously as he
saw in the distance the pylons and obelisks of Tanis; for on countless
marches through the silent wilderness and in many a lonely camp he had
beheld in imagination a virgin of his own race, whom he had known as a
singular child, stirred by marvellous thoughts, and whom, just before
leading his troops to the Libyan war, he had again met, now a dignified
maiden of stern and unapproachable beauty. She had journeyed from
Succoth to Tanis to attend his mother’s funeral, and her image had been
deeply imprinted on his heart, as his--he ventured to hope--on hers. She
had since become a prophetess, who heard the voice of her God. While the
other maidens of his people were kept in strict seclusion, she was free
to come and go at will, even among men, and spite of her hate of the
Egyptians and of Hosea’s rank among them, she did not deny that it was
grief to part and that she would never cease thinking of him. His future
wife must be as strong, as earnest, as himself. Miriam was both, and
quite eclipsed a younger and brighter vision which he had once conjured
before his memory with joy.
He loved children, and a lovelier girl than Kasana he had never met,
either in Egypt or in alien lands. The interest with which the fair
daughter of his companion-in-arms watched his deeds and his destiny, the
modest yet ardent devotion afterwards displayed by the much sought-after
young widow, who coldly repelled all other suitors, had been a delight
to him in times of peace. Prior to her marriage he had thought of her as
the future mistress of his home, but her wedding another, and Hornecht’s
oft-repeated declaration that he would never give his child to a
foreigner, had hurt his pride and cooled his passion. Then he met Miriam
and was fired with an ardent desire to make her his wife. Still, on the
homeward march the thought of seeing Kasana again had been a pleasant
one. It was fortunate he no longer wished to wed Hornecht’s daughter; it
could have led to naught save trouble. Both Hebrews and Egyptians held
it to be an abomination to eat at the same board, or use the same seats
or knives. Though he himself was treated by his comrades as one of
themselves, and had often heard Kasana’s father speak kindly of his
kindred, yet “strangers” were hateful in the eyes of the captain of the
archers, and of all free Egyptians.
He had found in Miriam the noblest of women. He hoped that Kasana might
make another happy. To him she would ever be the charming child from
whom we expect nothing save the delight of her presence.
He had come to ask from her, as a tried friend ever ready for leal
service, a joyous glance. From Miriam he would ask herself, with all
her majesty and beauty, for he had borne the solitude of the camp long
enough, and now that on his return no mother’s arms opened to welcome
him, he felt for the first time the desolation of a single life. He
longed to enjoy the time of peace when, after dangers and privations of
every kind, he could lay aside his weapons. It was his duty to lead a
wife home to his father’s hearth and to provide against the extinction
of the noble race of which he was the sole representative. Ephraim was
the son of his sister.
Filled with the happiest thoughts, he had advanced toward Tannis and, on
reaching the goal of all his hopes and wishes, found it lying before him
like a ripening grain-field devastated by hail and swarms of locusts.
As if in derision, fate led him first to the Hebrew quarter. A heap
of dusty ruins marked the site of the house where he had spent his
childhood, and for which his heart had longed; and where his loved
ones had watched his departure, beggars were now greedily searching for
plunder among the debris.
The first man to greet him in Tanis was Kasana’s father. Instead of a
friendly glance from her eyes, he had received from him tidings that
pierced his inmost heart. He had expected to bring home a wife, and the
house where she was to reign as mistress was razed to the ground. The
father, for whose blessing he longed, and who was to have been gladdened
by his advancement, had journeyed far away and must henceforward be the
foe of the sovereign to whom he owed his prosperity.
He had been proud of rising, despite his origin, to place and power.
Now he would be able, as leader of a great host, to show the prowess
of which he was capable. His inventive brain had never lacked schemes
which, if executed by his superiors, would have had good results; now
he could fulfil them according to his own will, and instead of the tool
become the guiding power.
These reflections had awakened a keen sense of exultation in his breast
and winged his steps on his homeward march and, now that he had reached
the goal, so long desired, must he turn back to join the shepherds and
builders to whom--it now seemed a sore misfortune--he belonged by the
accident of birth and ancestry, though, denial was futile, he felt
as utterly alien to the Hebrews as he was to the Libyans whom he had
confronted on the battle-field. In almost every pursuit he valued,
he had nothing in common with his people. He had believed he might
truthfully answer yes to his father’s enquiry whether he had returned
a Hebrew, yet he now felt it would be only a reluctant and half-hearted
assent.
He clung with his whole soul to the standards beneath which he had gone
to battle and might now himself lead to victory. Was it possible to
wrench his heart from them, renounce what his own deeds had won? Yet
Eliab’s granddaughter had told him that the Hebrews expected him to
leave the army and join them. A message from his father must soon reach
him--and among the Hebrews a son never opposed a parent’s command.
There was still another to whom implicit obedience was due, Pharaoh, to
whom he had solemnly vowed loyal service, sworn to follow his summons
without hesitation or demur, through fire and water, by day and night.
How often he had branded the soldier who deserted to the foe or rebelled
against the orders of his commander as a base scoundrel and villain,
and by his orders many a renegade from his standard had died a shameful
death on the gallows under his own eyes. Was he now to commit the deed
for which he had despised and killed others? His prompt decision was
known throughout the army, how quickly in the most difficult situations
he could resolve upon the right course and carry it into action; but
during this dark and lonely hour of the night he seemed to himself a
mere swaying reed, and felt as helpless as a forsaken orphan.
Wrath against himself preyed upon him, and when he thrust a spear into
the flames, scattering the embers and sending a shower of bright sparks
upward, it was rage at his own wavering will that guided his hand.
Had recent events imposed upon him the virile duty of vengeance, doubt
and hesitation would have vanished and his father’s summons would have
spurred him on to action; but who had been the heaviest sufferers here?
Surely it was the Egyptians whom Moses’ curse had robbed of thousands
of beloved lives, while the Hebrews had escaped their revenge by flight.
His wrath had been kindled by the destruction of the Hebrews’ houses,
but he saw no sufficient cause for a bloody revenge, when he remembered
the unspeakable anguish inflicted upon Pharaoh and his subjects by the
men of his own race.
Nay; he had nothing to avenge; he seemed to himself like a man who
beholds his father and mother in mortal peril, owns that he cannot save
both, yet knows that while staking his life to rescue one he must leave
the other to perish. If he obeyed the summons of his people, he would
lose his honor, which he had kept as untarnished as his brazen helm, and
with it the highest goal of his life; if he remained loyal to Pharaoh
and his oath, he must betray his own race, have all his future days
darkened by his father’s curse, and resign the brightest dream he
cherished; for Miriam was a true child of her people and he would be
blest indeed if her lofty soul could be as ardent in love as it was
bitter in hate.
Stately and beautiful, but with gloomy eyes and hand upraised in
warning, her image rose before his mental vision as he sat gazing over
the smouldering fire out into the darkness. And now the pride of his
manhood rebelled, and it seemed base cowardice to cast aside, from dread
of a woman’s wrath and censure, all that a warrior held most dear.
“Nay, nay,” he murmured, and the scale containing duty, love, and filial
obedience suddenly kicked the beam. He was what he was--the leader of
ten thousand men in Pharaoh’s army. He had vowed fealty to him--and to
none other. Let his people fly from the Egyptian yoke, if they desired.
He, Hosea, scorned flight. Bondage had sorely oppressed them, but the
highest in the land had received him as an equal and held him worthy
of the loftiest honor. To repay them with treachery and desertion was
foreign to his nature and, drawing a long breath, he sprang to his feet
with the conviction that he had chosen aright. A fair woman and the
weak yearning of a loving heart should not make him a recreant to grave
duties and the loftiest purposes of his life.
“I will stay!” cried a loud voice in his breast. “Father is wise and
kind, and when he learns the reasons for my choice he will approve
them and bless, instead of cursing me. I will write to him, and the boy
Miriam sent me shall be the messenger.”
A call from the tent startled him and when, springing up, he glanced at
the stars, he found that he had forgotten his duty to the suffering lad
and hurried to his couch.
Ephraim was sitting up in his bed, watching for him, and exclaimed: “I
have been waiting a long, long time to see you. So many thoughts crowd
my brain and, above all, Miriam’s message. I can get no rest until I
have delivered it--so listen now.”
Hosea nodded assent and, after drinking the healing potion handed to
him, Ephraim began:
“Miriam the daughter of Amram and Jochebed greets the son of Nun the
Ephraimite. Thy name is Hosea, ‘the Help,’ and the Lord our God hath
chosen thee to be the helper of His people. But henceforward, by
His command, thou shalt be called Joshua,--[Jehoshua, he who helps
Jehova]--the help of Jehovah; for through Miriam’s lips the God of her
fathers, who is the God of thy fathers likewise, bids thee be the sword
and buckler of thy people. In Him dwells all power, and he promises to
steel thine arm that He may smite the foe.”
Ephraim had begun in a low voice, but gradually his tones grew more
resonant and the last words rang loudly and solemnly through the
stillness of the night.
Thus had Miriam uttered them, laying her hands on the lad’s head and
gazing earnestly into his face with eyes deep and dark as night, and
while repeating them he had felt as though some secret power were
constraining him to shout them aloud to Hosea, just as he had heard them
from the lips of the prophetess. Then, with a sigh of relief, he turned
his face toward the canvas wall of the tent, saying quietly:
“Now I will go to sleep.”
But Hosea laid his hand on his shoulder, exclaiming imperiously: “Say it
again.”
The youth obeyed, but this time he repeated the words in a low, careless
tone, then saying beseechingly:
“Let me rest now,” put his hand under his cheek and closed his eyes.
Hosea let him have his way, carefully applied a fresh bandage to
his burning head, extinguished the light, and flung more fuel on the
smouldering fire outside; but the alert, resolute man performed every
act as if in a dream. At last he sat down, and propping his elbows
on his knees and his head in his hands, stared alternately, now into
vacancy, and anon into the flames.
Who was this God who summoned him through Miriam’s lips to be, under His
guidance, the sword and shield of His people?
He was to be known by a new name, and in the minds of the Egyptians
the name was everything “Honor to the name of Pharaoh,” not “Honor to
Tharaoh” was spoken and written. And if henceforward he was to be called
Joshua, the behest involved casting aside his former self, and becoming
a new man.
The will of the God of his fathers announced to him by Miriam meant no
less a thing than the command to transform himself from the Egyptian his
life had made him, into the Hebrew he had been when a lad. He must learn
to act and feel like an Israelite! Miriam’s summons called him back to
his people. The God of his race, through her, commanded him to fulfil
his father’s expectations. Instead of the Egyptian troops whom he must
forsake, he was in future to lead the men of his own blood forth to
battle! This was the meaning of her bidding, and when the noble virgin
and prophetess who addressed him, asserted that God Himself spoke
through her lips, it was no idle boast, she was really obeying the will
of the Most High. And now the image of the woman whom he had ventured
to love, rose in unapproachable majesty before him. Many things which
he had heard in his childhood concerning the God of Abraham, and His
promises returned to his mind, and the scale which hitherto had been the
heavier, rose higher and higher. The resolve just matured, now seemed
uncertain, and he again confronted the terrible conflict he had believed
was overpast.
How loud, how potent was the call he heard! Ringing in his ears, it
disturbed the clearness and serenity of his mind, and instead of calmly
reflecting on the matter, memories of his boyhood, which he had imagined
were buried long ago, raised their voices, and incoherent flashes of
thought darted through his brain.
Sometimes he felt impelled to turn in prayer to the God who summoned
him, but whenever he attempted to calm himself and uplift his heart and
eyes to Him, he remembered the oath he must break, the soldiers he must
abandon to lead, instead of well-disciplined, brave, obedient bands
of brothers-in-arms, a wretched rabble of cowardly slaves, and rude,
obstinate shepherds, accustomed to the heavy yoke of bondage.
The third hour after midnight had come, the guards had been relieved,
and Hosea thought he might now permit himself a few hours repose. He
would think all these things over again by daylight with his usual clear
judgment, which he strove in vain to obtain now. But when he entered the
tent and heard Ephraim’s regular breathing, he fancied that the boy’s
solemn message was again echoing in his ears. Startled, he was in the
act of repeating it himself, when loud voices in violent altercation
among the sentinels disturbed the stillness of the night.
The interruption was welcome, and he hurried to the outposts.