fighting.
"My mother sometimes spoke of the God of our fathers as a mighty
protector, to whom the people in former days owed much gratitude, and
told me many beautiful tales of Him; but she herself often offered
sacrifices in the temple of Seth, or carried clover blossoms to the
sacred bull of the sun-god. She, too, was kindly disposed toward the
Egyptians, among whom her pride and joy, our Moses, had attained such
high honors.

"So in happy intercourse with the others I reached my fifteenth year. In
the evening, when the shepherds returned home, I sat with the young
people around the fire, and was pleased when the sons of the shepherd
princes preferred me to my companions and sought my love; but I refused
them all, even the Egyptian captain who commanded the garrison of the
storehouse; for I remembered you, the companion of my youth. My best
possession would not have seemed too dear a price to pay for some magic
spell that would have brought you to us when, at the festal games, I
danced and sang to the tambourine while the loudest shouts of applause
greeted me. Whenever many were listening I thought of you--then I poured
forth like the lark the feelings that filled my heart, then my song was
inspired by you and not by the fame of the Most High, to whom it was
consecrated."

Here passion, with renewed power, seized the man, to whom the woman he
loved was confessing so many blissful memories. Suddenly starting up, he
extended his arms toward her; but she sternly repulsed him, that she
might control the yearning which threatened to overpower her also.

Yet her deep voice had gained a new, strange tone as, at first rapidly
and softly, then in louder and firmer accents, she continued:

"So I attained my eighteenth year and was no longer satisfied to dwell in
Succoth. An indescribable longing, and not for you only, had taken
possession of my soul. What had formerly afforded me pleasure now seemed
shallow, and the monotony of life here in the remote frontier city amid
shepherds and flocks, appeared dull and pitiful.

"Eleasar, Aaron's son, had taught me to read and brought me books, full
of tales which could never have happened, yet which stirred the heart.
Many also contained hymns and fervent songs such as one lover sings to
another. These made a deep impression on my soul and, whenever I was
alone in the evening, or at noon-day when the shepherds and flocks were
far away in the fields, I repeated these songs or composed new ones, most
of which were hymns in praise of the deity. Sometimes they extolled Amon
with the ram's head, sometimes cow-headed Isis, and often, too, the great
and omnipotent God who revealed Himself to Abraham, and of whom my mother
spoke more and more frequently as she advanced in years. To compose such
hymns in quiet hours, wait for visions revealing God's grandeur and
splendor, or beautiful angels and horrible demons, became my favorite
occupation. The merry child had grown a dreamy maiden, who let household
affairs go as they would. And there was no one who could have warned me,
for my mother had followed my father to the grave; and I now lived alone
with my old aunt Rachel, unhappy myself, and a source of joy to no one.
Aaron, the oldest of our family, had removed to the dwelling of his
father-in-law Amminadab: the house of Amram, his heritage, had become too
small and plain for him and he left it to me. My companions avoided me;
for my mirthfulness had departed and I patronized them with wretched
arrogance because I could compose songs and beheld more in my visions
than all the other maidens.

"Nineteen years passed and, on the evening of my birthday, which no one
remembered save Milcah, Eleasar's daughter, the Most High for the first
time sent me a messenger. He came in the guise of an angel, and bade me
set the house in order; for a guest, the person dearest to me on earth,
was on the way.

"It was early and under this very tree; but I went home and, with old
Rachel's help, set the house in order, and provided food, wine, and all
else we offer to an honored guest. Noon came, the afternoon passed away,
evening deepened into night, and morning returned, yet I still waited for
the guest. But when the sum of that day was nearing the western horizon,
the dogs began to bark loudly, and when I went to the door a powerful
man, with tangled grey hair and beard, clad in the tattered white robes
of a priest, hurried toward me. The dogs shrank back whining; but I
recognized my brother.

"Our meeting after so long a separation at first brought me more fear
than pleasure; for Moses was flying from the officers of the law because
he had slain the overseer. You know the story.

"Wrath still glowed in his flashing eyes. He seemed to me like the god
Seth in his fury, and each one of his slow words was graven upon my soul
as by a hammer and chisel. Thrice seven days and nights he remained under
my roof, and as I was alone with him and deaf Rachel, and he was
compelled to remain concealed, no one came between us, and he taught me
to know Him who is the God of our fathers.

"Trembling and despairing, I listened to his powerful words, which seemed
to fall like rocks upon my breast, when he admonished me of God's
requirements, or described the grandeur and wrath of Him whom no mind can
comprehend, and no name can describe. Ah, when he spoke of Him and of the
Egyptian gods, it seemed as if the God of my people stood before me like
a giant, whose head touched the sky, and the other gods were creeping in
the dust at his feet like whining curs.

"He taught me also that we alone were the people whom the Lord had
chosen, we and no other. Then for the first time I was filled with pride
at being a descendant of Abraham, and every Hebrew seemed a brother,
every daughter of Israel a sister. Now, too, I perceived how cruelly my
people had been enslaved and tortured. I had been blind to their
suffering, but Moses opened my eyes and sowed in my heart hate, intense
hate of their oppressors, and from this hate sprang love for the victims.
I vowed to follow my brother and await the summons of my God. And lo, he
did not tarry and Jehovah's voice spoke to me as with tongues.

"Old Rachel died. At Moses' bidding I gave up my solitary life and
accepted the invitation of Aaron and Amminadab.

"So I became a guest in their household, yet led a separate life among
them all. They did not interfere with me, and the sycamore here on their
land became my special property. Beneath its shadow God commanded me to
summon you and bestow on you the name "Help of Jehovah"--and you, no
longer Hosea, but Joshua, will obey the mandate of God and His
prophetess."

Here the warrior interrupted the maiden's words, to which he had listened
earnestly, yet with increasing disappointment:

"Ay, I have obeyed you and the Most High. But what it cost me you disdain
to ask. Your story has reached the present time, yet you have made no
mention of the days following my mother's death, during which you were
our guest in Tanis. Have you forgotten what first your eyes and then your
lips confessed? Have the day of your departure and the evening on the
sea, when you bade me hope for and remember you, quite vanished from your
memory? Did the hatred Moses implanted in your heart kill love as well as
every other feeling?"

"Love?" asked Miriam, raising her large eyes mournfully to his. "Oh no.
How could I forget that time, the happiest of my life! Yet from the day
Moses returned from the wilderness by God's command to release the people
from bondage--three months after my separation from you--I have taken no
note of years and months, days and nights."

"Then you have forgotten those also?" Hosea asked harshly.

"Not so," Miriam answered, gazing beseechingly into his face. "The love
that grew up in the child and did not wither in the maiden's heart,
cannot be killed; but whoever consecrates one's life to the Lord. . . . "

Here she suddenly paused, raised her hands and eyes rapturously, as if
borne out of herself, and cried imploringly: "Thou art near me,
Omnipotent One, and seest my heart! Thou knowest why Miriam took no note
of days and years, and asked nothing save to be Thy instrument until her
people, who are, also, this man's people, received what Thou didst
promise."

During this appeal, which rose from the inmost depths of the maiden's
heart, the light wind which precedes the coming of dawn had risen, and
the foliage in the thick crown of the sycamore above Miriam's head
rustled; but Hosea fairly devoured with his eyes the tall majestic
figure, half illumined, half veiled by the faint glimmering light. What
he heard and saw seemed like a miracle. The lofty future she anticipated
for her people, and which must be realized ere she would permit herself
to yield to the desire of her own heart, he believed that he was hearing
to them as a messenger of the Lord. As if rapt by the noble enthusiasm of
her soul, he rushed toward her, seized her hand, and cried in glad
emotion: "Then the hour has come which will again permit you to
distinguish months from days and listen to the wishes of your own soul.
For to I, Joshua, no longer Hosea, but Joshua, come as the envoy of the
Lord, and my message promises to the people whom I will learn to love as
you do, new prosperity, and thus fulfils the promise of a new and better
home, bestowed by the Most High."

Miriam's eyes sparkled brightly and, overwhelmed with grateful joy, she
exclaimed:

"Thou hast come to lead us into the land which Jehovah promised to His
people? Oh Lord, how measureless is thy goodness! He, he comes as Thy
messenger."

"He comes, he is here!" Joshua enthusiastically replied, and she did not
resist when he clasped her to his breast and, thrilling with joy, she
returned his kiss.




CHAPTER XVI.

Fear of her own weakness soon made Miriam release herself from her
lover's embrace, but she listened with eager happiness, seeking some new
sign from the Most High in Joshua's brief account of everything he had
felt and experienced since her summons.

He first described the terrible conflict he endured, then how he regained
entire faith and, obedient to the God of his people and his father's
summons, went to the palace expecting imprisonment or death, to obtain
release from his oath.

He told her how graciously the sorrowing royal pair had received him, and
how he had at last taken upon himself the office of urging the leaders of
his nation to guide them into the wilderness for a short time only, and
then take them home to Egypt, where a new and beautiful region on the
western bank of the river should be allotted to them. There no foreign
overseer should henceforward oppress the workmen, but the affairs of the
Hebrews should be directed by their own elders, and a man chosen by
themselves appointed their head.

Lastly he said that he, Joshua, would be placed in command of the Hebrew
forces and, as regent, mediate and settle disputes between them and the
Egyptians whenever it seemed necessary.

United to her, a happy husband, he would care in the new land for even
the lowliest of his race. On the ride hither he had felt as men do after
a bloody battle, when the blast of trumpets proclaim victory. He had
indeed a right to regard himself as the envoy of the Most High.

Here, however, he interrupted himself; for Miriam, who at first had
listened with open ears and sparkling eyes, now showed a more and more
anxious and troubled mien. When he at last spoke of making the people
happy as her husband, she withdrew her hand, gazed timidly at his manly
features, glowing with joyful excitement, and then as if striving to
maintain her calmness, fixed her eyes upon the ground.

Without suspecting what was passing in her mind, Hosea drew nearer. He
supposed that her tongue was paralyzed by maidenly shame at the first
token of favor she had bestowed upon a man. But when at his last words,
designating himself as the true messenger of God, she shook her head
disapprovingly, he burst forth again, almost incapable of self-control in
his sore disappointment:

"So you believe that the Lord has protected me by a miracle from the
wrath of the mightiest sovereign, and permitted me to obtain from his
powerful hand favors for my people, such as the stronger never grant to
the weaker, simply to trifle with the joyous confidence of a man whom he
Himself summoned to serve Him."

Miriam, struggling to force back her tears, answered in a hollow tone:
"The stronger to the weaker! If that is your opinion, you compel me to
ask, in the words of your own father: 'Who is the more powerful, the Lord
our God or the weakling on the throne, whose first-born son withered like
grass at a sign from the Most High. Oh, Hosea! Hosea!'"

"Joshua!" he interrupted fiercely. "Do you grudge me even the name your
God bestowed? I relied upon His help when I entered the palace of the
mighty king. I sought under God's guidance rescue and salvation for the
people, and I found them. But you, you . . . ."

"Your father and Moses, nay, all the believing heads of the tribes, see
no salvation for us among the Egyptians," she answered, panting for
breath. "What they promise the Hebrews will be their ruin. The grass
sowed by us withers where their feet touch it! And you, whose honest
heart they deceive, are the whistler whom the bird-catcher uses to decoy
his feathered victims into the snare. They put the hammer into your hand
to rivet more firmly than before the chains which, with God's aid, we
have sundered. Before my mind's eye I perceive . . . ."

"Too much!" replied the warrior, grinding his teeth with rage. "Hate dims
your clear intellect. If the bird-catcher really--what was your
comparison--if the bird-catcher really made me his whistler, deceived and
misled me, he might learn from you, ay, from you! Encouraged by you, I
relied upon your love and faith. From you I hoped all things--and where
is this love? As you spared me nothing that could cause me pain, I will,
pitiless to myself, confess the whole truth to you. It was not alone
because the God of my fathers called me, but because His summons reached
me through you and my father that I came. You yearn for a land in the far
uncertain distance, which the Lord has promised you; but I opened to the
people the door of a new and sure home. Not for their sakes--what
hitherto have they been to me?--but first of all to live there in
happiness with you whom I loved, and my old father. Yet you, whose cold
heart knows naught of love, with my kiss still on your lips, disdain what
I offer, from hatred of the hand to which I owe it. Your life, your
conflicts have made you masculine. What other women would trample the
highest blessings under foot?"

Miriam could bear no more and, sobbing aloud, covered her convulsed face
with her hands.

At the grey light of dawn the sleepers in the camp began to stir, and men
and maid servants came out of the dwellings of Amminadab and Naashon. All
whom the morning had roused were moving toward the wells and watering
places, but she did not see them.

How her heart had expanded and rejoiced when her lover exclaimed that he
had come to lead them to the land which the Lord had promised to his
people. Gladly had she rested on his breast to enjoy one brief moment of
the greatest bliss; but how quickly had bitter disappointment expelled
joy! While the morning breeze had stirred the crown of the sycamore and
Joshua had told her what Pharaoh would grant to the Hebrews, the rustling
among the branches had seemed to her like the voice of God's wrath and
she fancied she again heard the angry words of hoary-headed Nun. The
latter's reproaches had dismayed Uri like the flash of lightning, the
roll of thunder, yet how did Joshua's proposition differ from Uri's?

The people--she had heard it also from the lips of Moses--were lost if,
faithless to their God, they yielded to the temptations of Pharaoh. To
wed a man who came to destroy all for which she, her brothers, and his
own father lived and labored, was base treachery. Yet she loved Joshua
and, instead of harshly repulsing him, she would have again nestled ah,
how gladly, to the heart which she knew loved her so ardently.

But the leaves in the top of the tree continued to rustle and it seemed
as if they reminded her of Aaron's warning, so she forced herself to
remain firm.

The whispering above came from God, who had chosen her for His
prophetess, and when Joshua, in passionate excitement, owned that the
longing for her was his principal motive for toiling for the people, who
were as unknown to him as they were dear to her, her heart suddenly
seemed to stop beating and, in her mortal agony, she could not help
sobbing aloud.

Unheeding Joshua, or the stir in the camp, she again flung herself down
with uplifted arms under the sycamore, gazing upward with dilated,
tearful eyes, as if expecting a new revelation. But the morning breeze
continued to rustle in the summit of the tree, and suddenly everything
seemed as bright as sunshine, not only within but around her, as always
happened when she, the prophetess, was to behold a vision. And in this
light she saw a figure whose face startled her, not Joshua, but another
to whom her heart did not incline. Yet there he stood before the eyes of
her soul in all his stately height, surrounded by radiance, and with a
solemn gesture he laid his hand on the stones he had piled up.

With quickened breath, she gazed upward to the face, yet she would gladly
have closed her eyes and lost her hearing, that she might neither see it
nor catch the voices from the tree. But suddenly the figure vanished, the
voices died away, and she appeared to behold in a bright, fiery glow, the
first man her virgin lips had kissed, as with uplifted sword, leading the
shepherds of her people, he dashed toward an invisible foe.

Swiftly as the going and coming of a flash of lightning, the vision
appeared and vanished, yet ere it had wholly disappeared she knew its
meaning.

The man whom she called "Joshua" and who seemed fitted in every respect
to be the shield and leader of his people, must not be turned aside by
love from the lofty duty to which the Most High had summoned him. None of
the people must learn the message he brought, lest it should tempt them
to turn aside from the dangerous path they had entered.

Her course was as plain as the vision which had just vanished. And, as if
the Most High desired to show her that she had rightly understood its
meaning, Hur's voice was heard near the sycamore--ere she had risen to
prepare her lover for the sorrow to which she must condemn herself and
him--commanding the multitude flocking from all directions to prepare for
the departure.

The way to save him from himself lay before her; but Joshua had not yet
ventured to disturb her devotions.

He had been wounded and angered to the inmost depths of his soul by her
denial. But as he gazed down at her and saw her tall figure shaken by a
sudden chill, and her eyes and hands raised heavenward as though,
spell-bound, he had felt that something grand and sacred dwelt within her
breast which it would be sacrilege to disturb; nay, he had been unable to
resist the feeling that it would be presumptuous to seek to wed a woman
united to the Lord by so close a tie. It must be bliss indeed to call
this exalted creature his own, yet it would be hard to see her place
another, even though it were the Almighty Himself, so far above her lover
and husband.

Men and cattle had already passed close by the sycamore and just as he
was in the act of calling Miriam and pointing to the approaching throng,
she rose, turned toward him, and forced from her troubled breast the
words:

"I have communed with the Lord, Joshua, and now know His will. Do you
remember the words by which God called you?"

He bent his head in assent; but she went on:

"Well then, you must also know what the Most High confided to your
father, to Moses, and to me. He desires to lead us out of the land of
Egypt, to a distant country where neither Pharaoh nor his viceroy shall
rule over us, and He alone shall be our king. That is His will, and if He
requires you to serve Him, you must follow us and, in case of war,
command the men of our people."

Joshua struck his broad breast, exclaiming in violent agitation: "An oath
binds me to return to Tanis to inform Pharaoh how the leaders of the
people received the message with which I was sent forth. Though my heart
should break, I cannot perjure myself."

"And mine shall break," gasped Miriam, "ere I will be disloyal to the
Lord our God. We have both chosen, so let what once united us be sundered
before these stones."

He rushed frantically toward her to seize her hand; but with an imperious
gesture she waved him back, turned away, and went toward the multitude
which, with sheep and cattle, were pressing around the wells.

Old and young respectfully made way for her as, with haughty bearing, she
approached Hur, who was giving orders to the shepherds; but he came
forward to meet her and, after hearing the promise she whispered, he laid
his hand upon her head and said with solemn earnestness:

"Then may the Lord bless our alliance."

Hand in hand with the grey-haired man to whom she had given herself,
Miriam approached Joshua. Nothing betrayed the deep emotion of her soul,
save the rapid rise and fall of her bosom, for though her cheeks were
pale, her eyes were tearless and her bearing was as erect as ever.

She left to Hur to explain to the lover whom she had forever resigned
what she had granted him, and when Joshua heard it, he started back as
though a gulf yawned at his feet.

His lips were bloodless as he stared at the unequally matched pair. A
jeering laugh seemed the only fitting answer to such a surprise, but
Miriam's grave face helped him to repress it and conceal the tumult of
his soul by trivial words.

But he felt that he could not long succeed in maintaining a successful
display of indifference, so he took leave of Miriam. He must greet his
father, he said hastily, and induce him to summon the elders.

Ere he finished several shepherds hurried up, disputing wrathfully and
appealed to Hur to decide what place in the procession belonged to each
tribe. He followed them, and as soon as Miriam found herself alone with
Joshua, she said softly, yet earnestly, with beseeching eyes:

"A hasty deed was needful to sever the tie that bound us, but a loftier
hope unites us. As I sacrificed what was dearest to my heart to remain
faithful to my God and people, do you, too, renounce everything to which
your soul clings. Obey the Most High, who called you Joshua! This hour
transformed the sweetest joy to bitter grief; may it be the salvation of
our people! Remain a son of the race which gave you your father and
mother! Be what the Lord called you to become, a leader of your race! If
you insist on fulfilling your oath to Pharaoh, and tell the elders the
promises with which you came, you will win them over, I know. Few will
resist you, but of those few the first will surely be your own father. I
can hear him raise his voice loudly and angrily against his own dear son;
but if you close your ears even to his warning, the people will follow
your summons instead of God's, and you will rule the Hebrews as a mighty
man. But when the time comes that the Egyptian casts his promises to the
winds, when you see your people in still worse bondage than before and
behold them turn from the God of their fathers to again worship
animal-headed idols, your father's curse will overtake you, the wrath of
the Most High will strike the blinded man, and despair will be the lot of
him who led to ruin the weak masses for whose shield the Most High chose
him. So I, a feeble woman, yet the servant of the Most High and the
maiden who was dearer to you than life, cry in tones of warning: Fear
your father's curse and the punishment of the Lord! Beware of tempting
the people."

Here she was interrupted by a female slave, who summoned her to her
house--and she added in low, hurried accents: "Only this one thing more.
If you do not desire to be weaker than the woman whose opposition roused
your wrath, sacrifice your own wishes for the welfare of yonder
thousands, who are of the same blood! With your hand on these stones you
must swear . . . ."

But here her voice failed. Her hands groped vainly for some support, and
with a loud cry she sank on her knees beside Hur's token.

Joshua's strong arms saved her from falling prostrate, and several women
who hurried up at his shout soon recalled the fainting maiden to life.

Her eyes wandered restlessly from one to another, and not until her
glance rested on Joshua's anxious face did she become conscious where she
was and what she had done. Then she hurriedly drank the water a
shepherd's wife handed to her, wiped the tears from her eyes, sighed
painfully, and with a faint smile whispered to Joshua: "I am but a weak
woman after all."

Then she walked toward the house, but after the first few steps turned,
beckoned to the warrior, and said softly:

"You see how they are forming into ranks. They will soon begin to move.
Is your resolution still unshaken? There is still time to call the
elders."

He shook his head, and as he met her tearful, grateful glance, answered
gently:

"I shall remember these stones and this hour, wife of Hur. Greet my
father for me and tell him that I love him. Repeat to him also the name
by which his son, according to the command of the Most High, will
henceforth be called, that its promise of Jehovah's aid may give him
confidence when he hears whither I am going to keep the oath I have
sworn."

With these words he waved his hand to Miriam and turned toward the camp,
where his horse had been fed and watered; but she called after him: "Only
one last word: Moses left a message for you in the hollow trunk of the
tree."

Joshua turned back to the sycamore and read what the man of God had
written for him. "Be strong and steadfast" were the brief contents, and
raising his head he joyfully exclaimed: "Those words are balm to my soul.
We meet here for the last time, wife of Hur, and, if I go to my death, be
sure that I shall know how to die strong and steadfast; but show my old
father what kindness you can."

He swung himself upon his horse and while trotting toward Tanis, faithful
to his oath, his soul was free from fear, though he did not conceal from
himself that he was going to meet great perils. His fairest hopes were
destroyed, yet deep grief struggled with glad exaltation. A new and lofty
emotion, which pervaded his whole being, had waked within him and was but
slightly dimmed, though he had experienced a sorrow bitter enough to
darken the light of any other man's existence. Naught could surpass the
noble objects to which he intended to devote his blood and life--his God
and his people. He perceived with amazement this new feeling which had
power to thrust far into the background every other emotion of his
breast--even love.

True, his head often drooped sorrowfully when he thought of his old
father; but he had done right in repressing the eager yearning to clasp
him to his heart. The old man would scarcely have understood his motives,
and it was better for both to part without seeing each other rather than
in open strife.

Often it seemed as though his experiences had been but a dream, and while
he felt bewildered by the excitements of the last few hours, his strong
frame was little wearied by the fatigues he had undergone.

At a well-known hostelry on the road, where he met many soldiers and
among them several military commanders with whom he was well acquainted,
he at last allowed his horse and himself a little rest and food; and as
he rode on refreshed active life asserted its claims; for as far as the
gate of the city of Rameses he passed bands of soldiers, and learned that
they were ordered to join the cohorts he had himself brought from Libya.

At last he rode into the capital and as he passed the temple of Amon he
heard loud lamentations, though he had learned on the way that the plague
had ceased. What many a sign told him was confirmed at last by some
passing guards--the first prophet and high-priest of Amon, the
grey-haired Rui, had died in the ninety-eighth year of his life. Bai, the
second prophet, who had so warmly protested his friendship and gratitude
to Hosea, had now become Rui's successor and was high-priest and judge,
keeper of the seals and treasurer, in short, the most powerful man in the
realm.




CHAPTER XVII.

"Help of Jehovah!" murmured a state-prisoner, laden with heavy chains,
five days later, smiling bitterly as, with forty companions in
misfortune, he was led through the gate of victory in Tanis toward the
east.

The mines in the Sinai peninsula, where more convict labor was needed,
were the goal of these unfortunate men.

The prisoner's smile lingered a short time, then drawing up his muscular
frame, his bearded lips murmured: "Strong and steadfast!" and as if he
desired to transmit the support he had himself found he whispered to the
youth marching at his side: "Courage, Ephraim, courage! Don't gaze down
at the dust, but upward, whatever may come."

"Silence in the ranks!" shouted one of the armed Libyan guards, who
accompanied the convicts, to the older prisoner, raising his whip with a
significant gesture. The man thus threatened was Joshua, and his
companion in suffering Ephraim, who had been sentenced to share his fate.

What this was every child in Egypt knew, for "May I be sent to the
mines!" was one of the most terrible oaths of the common people, and no
prisoner's lot was half so hard as that of the convicted state-criminals.

A series of the most terrible humiliations and tortures awaited them. The
vigor of the robust was broken by unmitigated toil; the exhausted were
forced to execute tasks so far beyond their strength that they soon found
the eternal rest for which their tortured souls longed. To be sent to the
mines meant to be doomed to a slow, torturing death; yet life is so dear
to men that it was considered a milder punishment to be dragged to forced
labor in the mines than to be delivered up to the executioner.

Joshua's encouraging words had little effect upon Ephraim; but when, a
few minutes later, a chariot shaded by an umbrella, passed the prisoners,
a chariot in which a slender woman of aristocratic bearing stood beside a
matron behind the driver, he turned with a hasty movement and gazed after
the equipage with sparkling eyes till it vanished in the dust of the
road.

The younger woman had been closely veiled, but Ephraim thought he
recognized her for whose sake he had gone to his ruin, and whose lightest
sign he would still have obeyed.

And he was right; the lady in the chariot was Kasana, the daughter of
Hornecht, captain of the archers, and the matron was her nurse.

At a little temple by the road-side, where, in the midst of a grove of
Nile acacias, a well was maintained for travellers, she bade the matron
wait for her and, springing lightly from the chariot which had left the
prisoners some distance behind, she began to pace up and down with
drooping head in the shadow of the trees, until the whirling clouds of
dust announced the approach of the convicts.

Taking from her robe the gold rings she had ready for this purpose, she
went to the man who was riding at its head on an ass and who led the
mournful procession. While she was talking with him and pointing to
Joshua, the guard cast a sly glance at the rings which had been slipped
into his hand, and seeing a welcome yellow glitter when his modesty had
expected only silver, his features instantly assumed an expression of
obliging good-will.

True, his face darkened at Kasana's request, but another promise from the
young widow brightened it again, and he now turned eagerly to his
subordinates, exclaiming: "To the well with the moles, men! Let them
drink. They must be fresh and healthy under the ground!"

Then riding up to the prisoners, he shouted to Joshua:

"You once commanded many soldiers, and look more stiff-necked now than
beseems you and me. Watch the others, guards, I have a word or two to say
to this man alone."

He clapped his hands as if he were driving hens out of a garden, and
while the prisoners took pails and with the guards, enjoyed the
refreshing drink, their leader drew Joshua and Ephraim away from the
road--they could not be separated on account of the chain which bound
their ancles together.

The little temple soon hid them from the eyes of the others, and the
warder sat down on a step some distance off, first showing the two
Hebrews, with a gesture whose meaning was easily understood, the heavy
spear he carried in his hand and the hounds which lay at his feet.

He kept his eyes open, too, during the conversation that followed. They
could say whatever they chose; he knew the duties of his office and
though, for the sake of good money he could wink at a farewell, for
twenty years, though there had been many attempts to escape, not one of
his moles--a name he was fond of giving to the future miners--had
succeeded in eluding his watchfulness.

Yonder fair lady doubtless loved the stately man who, he had been told,
was formerly a chief in the army. But he had already numbered among his
"moles," personages even more distinguished, and if the veiled woman
managed to slip files or gold into the prisoner's hands, he would not
object, for that very evening the persons of both would be thoroughly
searched, even the youth's black locks, which would not have remained
unshorn, had not everything been in confusion prior to the departure of
the convicts, which took place just before the march of Pharaoh's army.

The watcher could not hear the whispered words exchanged between the
degraded chief and the lady, but her humble manner and bearing led him to
suppose that it was she who had brought the proud warrior to his ruin.
Ah, these women! And the fettered youth! The looks he fixed upon the
slender figure were ardent enough to scorch her veil. But patience!
Mighty Father Amon! His moles were going to a school where people learned
modesty!

Now the lady had removed her veil. She was a beautiful woman! It must be
hard to part from such a sweetheart. And now she was weeping.

The rude warder's heart grew as soft as his office permitted; but he
would fain have raised his scourge against the older prisoner; for was it
not a shame to have such a sweetheart and stand there like a stone?

At first the wretch did not even hold out his hand to the woman who
evidently loved him, while he, the watcher, would gladly have witnessed
both a kiss and an embrace.

Or was this beauty the prisoner's wife who had betrayed him? No, no! How
kindly he was now gazing at her. That was the manner of a father speaking
to his child; but his mole was probably too young to have such a
daughter. A mystery! But he felt no anxiety concerning its solution;
during the march he had the power to make the most reserved convict an
open book.

Yet not only the rude gaoler, but anyone would have marvelled what had
brought this beautiful, aristocratic woman, in the grey light of dawn,
out on the highway to meet the hapless man loaded with chains.

In sooth, nothing would have induced Kasana to take this step save the
torturing dread of being scorned and execrated as a base traitress by the
man whom she loved. A terrible destiny awaited him, and her vivid
imagination had shown her Joshua in the mines, languishing, disheartened,
drooping, dying, always with a curse upon her on his lips.

On the evening of, the day Ephraim bad been brought to the house,
shivering with the chill caused by burning fever, and half stifled with
the dust of the road, her father lead told her that in the youthful
Hebrew they possessed a hostage to compel Hosea to return to Tanis and
submit to the wishes of the prophet Bai, with whom she knew her father
was leagued in a secret conspiracy. He also confided to her that not only
great distinction and high offices, but a marriage with herself had been
arrranged to bind Hosea to the Egyptians and to a cause from which the
chief of the archers expected the greatest blessings for himself, his
house, and his whole country.

These tidings had filled her heart with joyous hope of a long desired
happiness, and she confessed it to the prisoner with drooping head amid
floods of tears, by the little wayside temple; for he was now forever
lost to her, and though he did not return the love she had lavished on
him from his childhood, he must not hate and condemn her without having
heard her story.

Joshua listened willingly and assured her that nothing would lighten his
heart more than to have her clear herself from the charge of having
consigned him and the youth at his side to their most terrible fate.

Kasana sobbed aloud and was forced to struggle hard for composure ere she