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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Christmas Light, by Ethel Calvert Phillips
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Christmas Light
+
+Author: Ethel Calvert Phillips
+
+Release Date: December 25, 2008 [EBook #27615]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTMAS LIGHT ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Chris Curnow, Greg Bergquist and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Christmas Light
+
+[Illustration]
+
+  Christmas Light
+
+  BY
+  ETHEL CALVERT PHILLIPS
+
+  _With Illustrations_
+
+  [Illustration]
+
+  BOSTON AND NEW YORK
+  HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
+  The Riverside Press Cambridge
+  1922
+
+  COPYRIGHT, 1922, BY ETHEL CALVERT PHILLIPS
+
+  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
+
+
+  The Riverside Press
+  CAMBRIDGE MASSACHUSETTS
+  PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
+
+  TO
+
+  MY MOTHER
+
+  Light of the world, the world is dark about Thee;
+    Far out on Judah's hills the night is deep.
+  Not yet the day is come when men shall doubt Thee,
+    Not yet the hour when Thou must wake and weep;
+    O little one, O Lord of Glory, sleep!
+
+  Love of all heaven, love's arms are folded round Thee,
+    Love's heart shall be the pillow for Thy cheek.
+  Not yet the hour has come when hate shall wound Thee,
+    Not yet for shelter vainly must Thou seek.
+    Rest, little one, so mighty and so weak.
+
+  Lie still and rest, Thou Rest of earth and heaven;
+    Rest, little hands--our Hope of bliss ye keep;
+  Rest, little heart--one day shalt Thou be riven;
+    O newborn Life, O Life eternal, sleep!
+    Far out on Judah's hills the night is deep.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+     I. Naomi's Garden                     1
+
+    II. One Sabbath                       20
+
+   III. The Trip to Jerusalem             37
+
+    IV. In the Dark                       60
+
+     V. All the World Comes Visiting      73
+
+    VI. The Shepherds                     88
+
+   VII. In a Manger                      101
+
+  VIII. The Light of the World           116
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+Christmas Light
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+NAOMI'S GARDEN
+
+
+It was in a little garden in the village of Bethlehem, many and many a
+year ago, that four scarlet poppies stood side by side and swayed gently
+back and forth upon their slim green stalks in the soft afternoon wind.
+
+A little girl came running over the grass and halted before the
+poppies.
+
+"How beautiful you are!" said the little girl, whose name was Naomi, and
+who was eight years old.
+
+She clasped her hands before her in delight, and stood smiling down upon
+the flowers that seemed to nod courteously in reply.
+
+This little Jewish girl had dark curling hair and gentle brown eyes. Her
+cheeks were as rosy as the poppies, and she wore a gay little robe of
+scarlet and yellow striped stuff, while upon her bare brown feet were
+tied soft leather sandals.
+
+"How beautiful you are!" said Naomi again to the poppies. "You are mine,
+for I made you grow, and you are the most beautiful flowers in all our
+lovely garden."
+
+And she looked as proudly round the tiny garden plot as if it were as
+spacious and as wonderful as the famous gardens of the wicked King
+Herod, or even those of the Temple High Priest himself.
+
+In the center of the grass plot stood an orange-tree, and under it, in
+the shade of its glossy leaves, had been placed a light wooden bench. A
+tall hedge of prickly thorns prevented passers-by on the narrow village
+street from peeping in. At one end a heavy grapevine clambered over a
+trellis, while at the other there were several rich clumps of myrtle
+that showed dark against the surrounding grass. Below the thorn hedge
+stood a row of bold flaunting tulips, and there were two flower-beds,
+one of white, the other of tall red lilies.
+
+The garden was indeed a pleasant place, and Naomi's happiest hours were
+spent here, whether playing peacefully alone, or amusing baby Jonas, or
+when the family gathered together under the orange-tree, Father and
+Mother, brother Ezra, baby Jonas, and herself.
+
+To be sure there were vines and flowers growing on the roof of Naomi's
+house, which was often used as a place to sit in the cool of the day and
+even to sleep when the house grew unbearably warm. For Naomi's dwelling
+looked like nothing so much as a square box turned upside down with only
+a door cut in the front and not a window to break the smooth white
+sides.
+
+Within, there was a single room, round which ran a bench where were kept
+the gay quilts, tightly rolled, which made the only beds Naomi knew.
+Here, too, lay the cushions upon which the family sat when at meals
+round the table, which was then pulled out from the wall. There was a
+great carved chest in which were kept the Sabbath clothes, the crescent
+of coins which belonged to Naomi's mother and which she wore upon her
+head as an ornament on festive occasions, and the long parchment rolls
+of Scripture in which Naomi's father took the keenest pride. At the
+door stood a tall water-jar with herbs floating on the top to keep the
+water cool.
+
+In a niche in the doorpost hung a small roll of parchment in a case.
+Naomi was used to seeing her father and his friends touch it reverently
+when passing in or out, and then kiss the fingers that had touched the
+Name of the Most High. She could even recite as well as Ezra the verses
+she knew were written there, beginning, "Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our God
+is one Jehovah," and ending "and thou shalt write them upon the
+doorposts of thy house and upon thy gates."
+
+In a small building near by stood the oven where Naomi's mother did her
+baking and which she used in common with several other families. It was
+often a meeting-place for the children, who hung about the door on
+baking-days hoping for hot crumbs--stout Solomon from across the road;
+Rachel and Rebekah, Naomi's particular friends; little Enoch, who walked
+with a limp and who would never grow any taller, though he might live to
+be ever so old.
+
+"I would that my Aunt Miriam used our oven," Naomi often thought, "for
+she bakes every day, and, oh, such good things as she makes."
+
+Naomi's aunt kept the village inn or khan that stood just outside the
+city gates on one of the little hills upon which Bethlehem was built.
+Many travelers stopped the night at the khan and even longer, for the
+village lay only one mile to the right of the great road which led from
+Jerusalem, six miles away, to the old town of Hebron, and then down into
+the far-away, mysterious land of Egypt itself. Where the road from
+Bethlehem joined the Jerusalem highway stood the tomb of Rachel, and
+many a time had Naomi, loitering in the courtyard of the inn, heard
+pious pilgrims, fresh from the spot, tell the stories of Rachel and
+Jacob, and their sons Joseph and Benjamin.
+
+Naomi's little head was packed full of the stories of the great people
+of her race. Ezra, eleven years old, went to school in the synagogue
+every day with the other boys of the village, and diligently studied the
+Law and the Prophets. At home, Naomi was taught by her mother, not only
+the care of the house, but the history of the Hebrew people, their
+songs, their prayers, and their hopes.
+
+"I know ten hymns without a mistake," Naomi would boast, and by hymns
+she meant what we call psalms. "I can recite the Song of Deborah and the
+Song of Hannah. I can tell all the story about them, too, and, oh, ever
+so many more."
+
+Her favorite story was that of the Naomi for whom she had been named.
+But this summer afternoon she was thinking of nothing save of the pretty
+blossoms that now swung before her after so many days of patient toil
+and care.
+
+She caught sight of her mother in the doorway and eagerly called her to
+come and see the sight.
+
+"Come, Mother, come," she called. "My poppies are all out, every one.
+Four of them in a row! See--even the smallest one that I feared would
+not bloom at all. There is one for each of thee: Father, Mother, Ezra,
+Jonas. The smallest one is for Jonas, and verily it is the prettiest one
+of all."
+
+Naomi's mother came smiling down the path. She carried a water-pitcher
+or urn, and astride her left shoulder sat baby Jonas, steadying himself
+by clutching his mother's thick dark hair.
+
+"The flowers are beautiful, Naomi," said she pleasantly. "They well
+repay thee for all thy patience and care. I go now to the fountain for
+water. It lacks but half an hour to sundown. Watch thy little brother
+Jonas well and keep him happy until I return."
+
+And slipping Jonas from her shoulder to the grass, and pulling her white
+linen veil into place, she stepped quickly out into the village street,
+her urn securely balanced upon her head.
+
+Jonas had already crept over to the bench, and, dragging himself up upon
+his unsteady legs, he looked into his sister's face with a smile.
+
+"The smallest poppy is thine, Jonas," Naomi told him, "but thou must
+touch it not. Come now with me and see the pigeons."
+
+Behind the house, a step out of the garden, stood a dove-cote made of
+mud. Inside were two wide-mouthed earthen jars that served as
+nesting-boxes. The pigeons were stepping majestically about on the
+ground, the sun touching their soft gray feathers with blue and green
+and rose. Jonas made several lunges at them in the hope of capturing a
+new plaything, but he succeeded only in stubbing his toe and sitting
+down hard upon the ground.
+
+"No, neither must thou touch them," said Naomi, helping him tenderly to
+his feet and brushing off the dirt. "It seems to me that there are a
+great many things that thou must not touch. But I know something that
+thou canst do. It is my secret, but I do not mind telling thee because
+thou canst not talk. Thou mayst help me dig a well!"
+
+Naomi's voice sank mysteriously as she guided the tottering Jonas back
+into the garden and over to a bare spot of ground behind the largest of
+the myrtle bushes.
+
+"Sit ye down, Jonas," said Naomi, sinking cross-legged to the ground.
+"I mean to dig the well here, it will be so handy for Mother. Then never
+will she have to walk down to the fountain unless she likes. You take
+that stick and I will use this one."
+
+For a few moments the little girl worked industriously, loosening the
+dry sun-baked soil, while Jonas scratched vigorously with his
+sharp-pointed stick.
+
+"It is hard work, Jonas," sighed Naomi, pausing to shake back her curls.
+"But it will be worth it when once the well is made. It will be called
+'Naomi's well' for me, and years and years from now my
+great-great-grandchildren will be proud of me because I made it. And
+when I am an old woman, all thin and brown and dried-up like lame
+Enoch's grandmother, I will say to my grandchildren, all standing round
+and listening to every word I say--I will say, 'Grandchildren, I well
+remember the day thy dear uncle--that is thou, Jonas--and I dug
+this'--Oh! Oh!" And Naomi screamed aloud and jumped to her feet.
+
+Something cold and wet had been placed against the back of her neck, and
+little shivers were running over her as she turned and saw her brother
+Ezra behind her, smiling at her fright. In his arms he held a small
+white lamb, and it was this little animal's nose that had been pressed
+to Naomi's neck, and that had brought her day-dreaming to such an abrupt
+close.
+
+"Wilt thou not tell the grandchildren anything about their dear Uncle
+Ezra?" inquired Ezra with a comical look. "Who sharpened those sticks
+for thee, I would fain know, and thou didst not even tell me what use
+they were for. How dost thou think the grandchildren would like to hear
+that?"
+
+"How unkind thou art to listen and then laugh at me," said Naomi,
+putting out her under lip. "I would have told thee, Ezra, about the well
+only it was a secret. Do not tell Mother, wilt thou? I would fain
+surprise her. Promise thou wilt not tell, Ezra! Promise!" And Naomi laid
+an imploring hand upon her brother's arm.
+
+Ezra's only answer was to laugh and shake his head. Though he had no
+intention of telling, he wanted to tease Naomi a little before making
+any promises. He was fond of his little sister, and was far more gentle
+and kindly than many another brother would have been in those days in
+old Palestine.
+
+For in the Jewish family, girls were not valued so highly as boys, and
+were made to feel their unimportance in many ways that would be highly
+displeasing to little sisters of to-day. Girls were taught to wait upon
+their brothers and to treat them with respect. It was impressed upon
+them that the duty of a girl was to be useful and modest and quiet, and
+that her chief pleasure should lie in making home happy and comfortable
+for her father and brothers.
+
+But in the household of Samuel the weaver, Naomi's lot had not been
+quite that of the ordinary Jewish girl. Her father was proud of his
+bright, lovable little daughter and had made her his special pet. Her
+mother, who had been well taught by her own mother, a "wise woman" of
+her day, was careful that Naomi seldom missed the daily lesson that kept
+the little girl, to her great delight, only a short way behind Ezra on
+the hard road of knowledge.
+
+So Ezra, though he felt his superiority as a boy and the first-born of
+his family, could not long resist Naomi's pleading glance nor the
+pressure of her little brown hand.
+
+"What wilt thou give me if I do not tell?" asked Ezra, not wishing to
+seem to relent too quickly.
+
+"The first bright shekel I find in the highway," answered Naomi saucily.
+
+She was smiling now, and her hand was gently stroking the little lamb's
+nose.
+
+"What lamb is this, Ezra?" she asked. "And why hast thou brought it
+home? It seems sleepy, poor little creature. Look, its eyes are half
+shut."
+
+"It is one of the Temple flock," answered Ezra, looking down at the
+quiet little animal in his arms. "But it has a blemish. It runs on three
+legs, and it does not see very well. They will not keep it in the
+flock--it is not fit for Temple use--and shepherd Eli gave it to me this
+afternoon for my own. I helped him find an old ewe that had caught her
+foot between two stones, and when I was leaving he gave me the lamb."
+
+By the "Temple flock" Ezra meant the sheep that were destined to be used
+as sacrifices in the great Temple at Jerusalem, and which were encamped
+all the year round on the hills outside the city. The shepherds of the
+flock were friendly to the boy, who declared he meant when a man to be a
+Temple shepherd himself. Ezra spent most of his spare time with them,
+helping them in their work and listening with delight to their thrilling
+stories of encounters with wolves and jackals. Many of the shepherds
+were friends of his father, for both were connected with the Temple,
+since Samuel the weaver spent his days, in common with a number of
+others in Bethlehem, in making the gorgeous curtains and veils that were
+used in the sacred building.
+
+"Stand up, Three Legs," said Ezra, putting his lamb on the ground and
+showing Naomi its pitifully shrunken limb. In naming it "Three Legs"
+Ezra was following the custom of the shepherds who called their charges
+by any peculiarity they might possess, such as "Black Ear" or "Long
+Tail." "I mean to make a little wagon and teach Three Legs to draw it.
+And if he is not able to do that, I shall sell him for whatever I can
+get."
+
+"Oh, no, Ezra," said Naomi whose tender heart was touched by the forlorn
+little animal. "He is sick, he is not able to draw a wagon. Give him to
+me and let me take care of him."
+
+Ezra shook his head.
+
+"I will sell him first," said he with determination. "I will not give
+him away."
+
+"Sell him to me!" cried Naomi; "sell him to me!"
+
+The lamb had toppled over in a little heap and was looking patiently and
+with half-closed eyes into Naomi's face bent above him. It seemed to
+the little girl that she would gladly give her dearest possession if she
+might have the lamb for her own to nurse and care for.
+
+"Sell him to me, Ezra. I will give thee anything thou mayst ask."
+
+"What hast thou to give?" asked Ezra shrewdly. He felt sure the lamb
+could never draw a wagon, and the prospect of selling a sick animal was
+small.
+
+"Anything thou mayst ask," was Naomi's reckless answer. The lamb had put
+out a limp pink tongue and was licking her fingers.
+
+"Thy poppies?"
+
+Ezra had heard his aunt say that very day, "I need poppies sorely for my
+brew for the palsy, and not a single one has bloomed in the khan garden
+this year."
+
+Surely four poppies would be worth a rich cake or two, or perhaps even
+a piece of money.
+
+"My poppies?" Naomi looked aghast. "My poppies? All four? Why, there is
+just one apiece! Father and Mother, thou and Jonas! My poppies?"
+
+The lamb stirred and with a little sigh of content snuggled his nose
+into the palm of Naomi's hand.
+
+"Take them!" Naomi stood up and gathered the lamb in her arms. "Take
+them, only let me not see thee."
+
+She turned her back upon Ezra and shut her eyes.
+
+Quickly he gathered the flowers and ran out of the garden.
+
+Naomi opened her eyes. She gave one look at her despoiled flower-bed and
+bent again over the lamb.
+
+"I am glad, Three Legs," said she warmly. "Thou art much better than
+many poppies, thou poor little creature, and I am glad I did it. I am
+glad!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+ONE SABBATH
+
+
+It was Sabbath morning, and Naomi and her mother and Ezra were on their
+way to the synagogue.
+
+They chose back streets as they went, and they met only women and
+children on their way, for the front roads on the Sabbath day were given
+up to the men.
+
+Naomi was happy as she walked quietly along holding fast to her mother's
+hand, for she wore her new hyacinth-blue robe that her mother had spun
+and her father had woven for her.
+
+Ezra had other thoughts, and presently he whispered in Naomi's ear:
+
+"In two years' time I shall be a Son of the Law, and then I shall sit on
+the men's side in the synagogue, and walk on the front streets on
+Sabbath. Thou and Mother will have to come alone."
+
+Naomi shook her head.
+
+"Jonas will walk with us then," she whispered back. "Boaster!"
+
+She did not really blame Ezra for his lordly words and air, for she knew
+how every Jewish boy looked forward to what was called his Day of
+Freedom, when by a priest in the synagogue he was made a Son of the Law.
+Then he would be no longer a child, but a young man. His school days
+would be over. He would choose a trade and begin to earn his own living.
+
+But it was a comfort to Naomi to think that, with Ezra gone, little
+Jonas would trot along by her side, and she was thinking of baby Jonas,
+left every Sabbath morning in the care of lame Enoch's old grandmother,
+now grown too feeble to climb the hill to the synagogue, when Aunt
+Miriam overtook them.
+
+Aunt Miriam's husband, Simon, was a wealthy man in the village of
+Bethlehem. He was the owner of the guest-house or khan that stood a
+little below the town on the way leading down into Egypt, and which was
+believed to have been the dwelling of Boaz and Ruth, and the birth-place
+of King David himself.
+
+To-day Aunt Miriam wore a robe of fine linen, covered with a wide cloak
+of black and white stripes, and her earrings and bracelets tinkled at
+every step. On week-days the children knew her to be bustling and chatty
+and fond of a jest. But the Sabbath saw her a different woman. Stately
+and dignified she walked beside them now, her brown eyes gazing far away
+and full of holy thought.
+
+The children felt awed and shy with her as they might with a stranger.
+Ezra stopped his whispering. Naomi glanced timidly up, her head held
+sideways like a little bird.
+
+"How good Aunt Miriam is!" she mused.
+
+But her aunt's thoughts wandered for a moment from their pious
+meditations. Suddenly she loosened the veil that was pulled across her
+face and spoke briefly to Naomi's mother.
+
+"I shall come to see thee to-night after sundown. I go to Jerusalem
+to-morrow, and there may be room in the cart for a certain good little
+maid."
+
+Naomi's heart leaped. Did Aunt Miriam mean her? What other little girl
+might she take with her? But she had said "a good little maid," and
+Naomi remembered with a pang of regret how she and Ezra had quarreled
+yesterday, and had not ceased their bickering until at sunset the three
+blasts of the silver trumpet, blown by the priest on the synagogue roof,
+had reminded them that Sabbath eve had come.
+
+She longed to ask outright: "Dost thou mean to take me to Jerusalem
+with thee, Aunt Miriam?"
+
+But they had reached the flat-roofed little synagogue, and once inside
+the gate the children silently followed their mother and aunt into the
+women's court and seated themselves on the mats that covered the stone
+floor.
+
+Naomi's mind was so occupied by the thought of a possible trip to
+Jerusalem that she forgot to peep, according to her wont, through the
+lattice that separated the men's court from that of the women, in the
+hope of seeing her father. She usually watched with interest while the
+sacred Rolls were taken from their curtained shrine, before which burned
+the holy lamp, and their outer cover of gold-embroidered silk and inner
+cover of linen removed.
+
+But this morning she scarcely heard the voice of the visiting rabbi who
+read the lesson for the day, and her mother was obliged to twitch her
+vigorously when, during the prayers, the congregation rose to their feet
+and turned toward the Holy City.
+
+The Sabbath day seemed endless to the eager little girl. All work and
+play were forbidden. No fire might be lighted, no bed made. Naomi had
+been well taught in the Law. She knew that it would be sinful for her
+even to carry a handkerchief tucked in her belt. And so surely not until
+Sabbath was over would the trip to Jerusalem be discussed.
+
+She sat alone in the shade of the fig-tree that grew beside their door,
+and wished that she might see her friends Rachel and Rebekah to tell
+them the good news. She watched the great sun flame through the bright
+Syrian sky until her eyes burned and ached, but still it was not
+sundown. At last she curled herself up on the floor of the house with
+heavy-eyed Three Legs at her side and fell asleep.
+
+When she woke it was the First Watch of the Evening, six o'clock, and
+the crimson sun was sinking out of sight behind the Judean hills. Naomi
+sprang up and ran into the garden. There on the bench under the
+orange-tree sat her father and mother and Aunt Miriam.
+
+Aunt Miriam was talking.
+
+"And so, since Simon is still sick with a heavy summer cold, nothing
+will do but I must ride to Jerusalem to-morrow with the load of grapes,"
+she was saying. Simon had large vineyards and owned many olive-trees,
+beside being host at the inn. "To be sure, Jacob is a good serving-lad
+and manages well without his master. But there is no one, after himself,
+who makes a better bargain than I, Simon says, and so I must ride with
+the fruit to see that justice is done my lord Simon in the trade."
+
+Here Aunt Miriam laughed so heartily that Samuel and his wife were
+forced to smile in sympathy. But Samuel was not altogether pleased with
+Aunt Miriam's little joke about her husband, who was in truth her lord
+and master and worthy of her deepest respect. He changed the subject by
+asking:
+
+"And what does the physician say of Simon?"
+
+"He recommended that he kiss the nose of a mule," Aunt Miriam answered
+gravely.
+
+To her and to her audience there was nothing amusing about this
+prescription. Stranger remedies than that had been ordered by the wise
+doctors of the day: a broth of beetle's legs, crab's eyes, the heads of
+mice, bruised flies to cure the sting of a hornet!
+
+"But in spite of this," she continued, "he is still flat on his back,
+groaning with aches and pains. So, to-morrow, Jacob and I start at
+sunrise with the bullock cart, and no doubt there will be room among the
+baskets of grapes for Naomi, if thou wilt permit her to go."
+
+Naomi, at her father's elbow, glanced imploringly into his face, but she
+did not speak a word. Her mother, from the end of the bench, smiled
+hopefully at the little girl, but she, too, waited in deferent silence
+until, to Naomi's great relief, her father gave a nod of consent.
+
+"It is kind of thee, sister Miriam," said he, putting his arm about
+Naomi and drawing her to his side, "to think of giving our little
+daughter this pleasure."
+
+"Naomi must be good and obedient and not make herself troublesome in any
+way," said her mother warningly, leaning forward to pull Naomi's little
+robe straight. "Thy aunt will be occupied with her business, Naomi, and
+thou must be as quiet as a mouse so that she will not regret that thou
+art with her."
+
+"Never fear that," said Aunt Miriam heartily, "Naomi is as dear to me as
+my own. I shall not be so busy that she will have to play mouse all day.
+She shall see something of the city, and eat a good dinner at the house
+of Simon's sister Anna, and make friends, perhaps, with Anna's little
+Martha who is just her age."
+
+"I will be quiet," promised Naomi, her face bright with smiles. "I will
+be good. I will not speak a word nor stir all day long."
+
+"Great are thy promises, Naomi," answered Aunt Miriam, rising to go and
+laying a kindly hand upon the curly head of her niece. "I will give thee
+a hot breakfast at the khan to stay thee on thy journey, so be not late.
+We start at sunrise!"
+
+"Oh, Father," cried Naomi, throwing her arms about her father's neck,
+"how good I mean to be always after this! Dost think I shall see the
+Temple? And, Mother, which am I to wear--my new blue robe or my yellow
+and red striped one? I am really to go to Jerusalem! Oh, what will Ezra
+say when he hears the good news I have to tell!"
+
+The next morning at daybreak, when the purple shadows lay heavily in the
+east and the sky was still gray overhead, Naomi, wearing a gay little
+cloak of scarlet over her best blue robe, ran hastily down the stony
+road that led to the Bethlehem khan.
+
+The drowsy gate-keeper had already unlocked the heavy town gates, for
+day begins early in hot countries, and at sight of Naomi, whom he knew
+well, he uttered a sleepy "Peace be with thee!" as a morning greeting.
+
+"With thee be peace!" piped Naomi in return. "Oh, Nathan, I go to-day
+to Jerusalem with my Aunt Miriam. This very day I go!"
+
+Old Nathan nodded his head solemnly and muttered in his beard.
+
+"Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth is Mount Zion,"
+responded the pious old Jew. But Naomi was half-way down the hill and
+did not hear one word.
+
+There before her at the crossroads stood the old khan, with its great
+wall of stone and its stout gate behind which all night long sat a
+watchman on the alert. Below the inn lay the very fields among which
+Ruth, long, long ago, had gleaned the golden corn, and where later King
+David as a shepherd lad had tended his flock.
+
+Naomi slipped through the open gate into the courtyard of the khan and
+stood for a moment watching the bustle and confusion of the scene
+before her. In the center of the court was the fountain, and round it
+now crowded the pilgrims and travelers, drawing water for the morning
+meal or in which to wash before eating. The archways which lined the
+wall formed the rooms of the ancient inn, for the building at the end of
+the court in which Simon the host and Aunt Miriam lived was not open to
+strangers. Shelter and food were not provided within. Each man in his
+little archway must spread his own carpet, light his own brazier, cook
+his own food, and eat from his own dish. A Syrian khan of that period
+was not at all like the inns of our day. It was expected to supply
+nothing but water and straw for a bed. It was a refuge from thieves and
+wild animals, a shelter from heat and dust, a spot where a trader might
+sell his wares.
+
+Naomi looked with interest at the patient camels already kneeling to
+receive their load, perhaps of precious ointment or sweet spices. Here
+were the merchants spreading their wares: gold work from Cairo; shawls
+of Tyrian dye, royal purple or scarlet; rich perfumes in their vases of
+alabaster, large and small. In one corner a group of dogs, snapping and
+snarling, quarreled over a bone.
+
+A caravan was starting for Egypt, and as the Bethlehem khan was the
+first night's rest after leaving Zion, many friends of the travelers had
+come with them from Jerusalem and were now sorrowfully saying their last
+farewells. Naomi stood watching an old father tenderly kiss his
+departing son upon either cheek and then lay his hand upon the boy's
+head in blessing. A little lad, carrying his pet monkey, was lifted to
+the back of a camel, and Naomi was staring so intently that she did not
+see the serving-lad Jacob until he was close upon her.
+
+"Thy aunt calls for thee," said he to Naomi. "The cart stands ready
+loaded and we start as soon as thou hast eaten."
+
+"I would that we were going down into Egypt, Jacob," said Naomi,
+skipping toward the house as she spoke. "To ride to Jerusalem is
+nothing. We shall be back to-morrow in this very spot."
+
+"Aye, if the robbers do not catch us," answered Jacob, wagging his head
+wisely. It was the first time he had been trusted to ride to Jerusalem
+with a load, and the responsibility weighed heavily upon him.
+
+"Robbers? Aunt Miriam, will there be robbers on the way to-day, think
+you?"
+
+Aunt Miriam paused in her brisk stepping about the room.
+
+"Here is a bowl of hot pottage and a warm cake for thee, Naomi. Eat all
+of it," she commanded. "And talk not to me of robbers. In truth, there
+are as many robbers in the khan at Bethlehem as upon the length of
+Jerusalem highway. The caravan to Egypt will pay for straw for six
+camels and ten mules, will they, when I myself counted no less than
+twenty animals in their train? Jacob, bring hither the leader of the
+caravan that I may talk with him. Robbers, indeed! Robbers!"
+
+Aunt Miriam's red cheeks and flashing eyes boded ill for the leader of
+the caravan for Egypt.
+
+Naomi ate her lentil pottage and munched her cake leisurely in a quiet
+corner, but she had long finished her meal when Aunt Miriam was at last
+satisfied and ready to start.
+
+The bullock cart stood loaded with baskets piled high with great bunches
+of purple grapes. Over them were spread the dewy green leaves of the
+vine to protect the fruit from the sun and to keep it fresh and moist.
+
+Aunt Miriam, with a sigh of relief, settled herself in place in the
+front of the cart. Naomi was tucked into a comfortable corner between
+two great brown baskets of woven rushes. Jacob, standing at the cattle's
+head, cracked his long whip, the animals strained forward, the cart
+wheels creaked and turned, and they were off for Jerusalem.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE TRIP TO JERUSALEM
+
+
+The road to Jerusalem stretched white and hot in the blazing sunshine.
+The deep blue sky was without a cloud, and the insects, hidden in the
+roadside grass, hummed in the heat.
+
+A cloud of dust in the distance told that the three Roman soldiers who,
+only a moment ago, it seemed, had galloped past the slowly moving ox
+cart, were nearing their destination, the Holy City. Naomi had watched
+the glitter of their helmets and the flashing of their bright lances
+with the same interest she had given to a string of melancholy gray
+camels led along the road by a country lad in his cool white tunic and
+broad red leather belt.
+
+Everything was interesting this morning to Naomi. She stared at the
+dusty gray olive-trees, the shabby scrub oaks, the low-branched
+sycamores as if she had not been familiar with them all her life. To-day
+the birds seemed to dart about more swiftly and to utter sweeter songs
+as they flew. The few sheep she spied nibbling the sparse grass on the
+rocky hillsides were surely whiter than those at home. The field
+flowers, with faces upturned to the bright sun, glowed with splendid
+color. The whole world was glad to-day.
+
+"They are all happy because I am happy," mused Naomi, smiling at her own
+thought.
+
+She glanced at Jacob plodding contentedly along beside his beasts, at
+Aunt Miriam who sat silent, her usually busy hands folded in her lap,
+enjoying this little rest from her many household cares.
+
+Tap, tap, tap!
+
+Naomi peered about, and Aunt Miriam sat up straight at this sound upon
+the road.
+
+Tap, tap, tap!
+
+Now the shuffling of cautious feet was to be heard, too.
+
+Down the Jerusalem highway came six men walking in single file, each
+with a staff in hand and the other hand resting upon the shoulder of the
+man before him. They were all blind! Even their guide, who tapped the
+ground as he walked, was sightless, "the blind leading the blind."
+
+Naomi stared curiously. She had often seen as many as a dozen blind men
+walking in such a row, and they were always to be found by the wayside
+or near the village gates at home, in company with the lame and the
+helpless, holding out a little bowl for money or food.
+
+"Jacob!" called Aunt Miriam.
+
+She took a piece of money from her purse, securely fastened in her belt,
+and Jacob, without being told, dropped it in the bowl of the blind
+leader. He was accustomed to the charity of his good master and
+mistress. Had not Moses the Lawgiver bade those who fear their God have
+sympathy for the blind?
+
+The blind men at sound of the cart had drawn up by the side of the road,
+and now they leaned upon their staffs and turned their sightless faces
+toward their unseen benefactress. They were glad of an excuse to rest
+and also to talk, for time meant little to them, and they liked nothing
+better than to recount, each one, the detailed history of his
+misfortune.
+
+But Aunt Miriam did not mean to spend several hours this morning in idle
+talk upon the highway. She motioned Jacob to move on, and in response to
+the thanks and blessings showered upon her for her gift, she called:
+
+"Peace be unto thee, friends! We hasten on to Jerusalem before the sun
+mounts high. May all good things await thee in Bethlehem!"
+
+Up the steep hill climbed the bullock cart, and once round the curve in
+the road Aunt Miriam pointed.
+
+"Naomi--the City!" she said. "See the Temple! How it gleams!"
+
+High above the flat roofs and massive walls of Jerusalem shone the great
+gold and white Temple of the Hebrews. The little party halted at the
+sight. Aunt Miriam's lips moved in prayer. Naomi was silent as she
+gazed. She recalled the lines in one of the hymns her mother had taught
+her:
+
+"We have thought on thy lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of thy
+temple."
+
+To the pious little Jewish girl there could be no more beautiful nor
+inspiring sight than that of the sacred Temple set in the midst of the
+Holy City. She kept a reverent silence until they reached the Bethlehem
+gate where entered all the trade and travel from Egypt and the sea.
+
+But once Naomi was lifted down from the cart, and placed in the shade of
+the huge gateway to wait with Aunt Miriam while Jacob justified their
+presence in the city to the haughty Roman guard, her tongue wagged on as
+merrily as before.
+
+"We have no watch-tower like this one on our gateway at home, Aunt
+Miriam," she observed, glancing up and down and roundabout. "I suppose
+that ten soldiers could stand in this one at once if they liked."
+
+Her aunt nodded absently. Her thoughts were with Jacob, still talking
+with the Roman guard. She hoped there would be no trouble on this day of
+all days when Simon was not with them.
+
+"Wilt thou buy me a drink, Aunt Miriam?" Naomi asked next. "Not of
+water, but of honey of wine."
+
+The water-carriers were rough-looking bearded men who ran about in short
+frocks, shouting and rattling their brass cups, with dingy goatskin
+bottles lashed upon their backs. Naomi was afraid of them. She liked far
+better the row of peasant women with grape juice to sell, who sat
+against the wall and called out:
+
+"Honey of wine! Who will buy? Honey of wine! Ho, every one that is
+athirst, come! Buy and drink! Honey of wine!"
+
+A moment later she had forgotten that she was thirsty and was watching
+two poor women who sat in a corner on the ground grinding at a stone
+mill. Near by stood a man selling the cakes new made from the meal the
+women had ground. It was hard work turning the handles that pressed the
+meal between the upper and nether millstones, and the women worked
+wearily.
+
+"How slow they are!" said Naomi scornfully. "I could work much faster
+than they, could I not, Aunt Miriam? Could I not grind fast if I tried?"
+
+Naomi's aunt did not answer. With a gentle hand she pushed the little
+girl back against the wall.
+
+"Stand there, thou chattering sparrow," said she with a smile, "and hold
+thy peace. Here comes one Solomon the goldbeater, thy Uncle Simon's
+friend. The load of grapes was brought here at his order, and it is my
+task to-day to see that he offers a fair price for them. Peace!"
+
+It seemed a long time to Naomi that Solomon the goldbeater and Jacob the
+serving-lad, standing at a little distance from the wall, haggled over
+the load of grapes. But at last Jacob came to report to his mistress the
+sum offered, and since she was satisfied the bargain was soon made.
+
+Then up they went through the narrow dingy streets with their
+overhanging houses that made a pleasant shade, past the quarters of the
+tinsmiths and the jewelers, the tailors and the sandal-makers. Naomi
+looked eagerly in at the gay bazaars piled high with fine linens and
+embroideries, rich scarves and veils, spices and coffee, dried fruits
+and nuts. On they went, past the street of the potters where anything
+might be bought, from water-jars as tall as Naomi herself to the tiny
+cup-shaped Virgin's lamps which, filled with sweet oil, were carried by
+the Jewish girls.
+
+"Look well about thee, child," instructed Aunt Miriam from behind her
+veil. "We shall not come this way again."
+
+"I can tell it all now to Ezra," answered Naomi confidently. "I have
+not forgotten a single sight. So far I liked it best of all when the
+great Pharisee gave alms to the poor in the market-place just now, when
+we were waiting there for Jacob. I liked it when his servant blew upon
+the trumpet, and the poor came hurrying, and every one turned to look.
+And next best I liked the cages of sparrows for sale. We have them in
+the market-place at home, but not so many nor so fat. And next--"
+
+"And next," interrupted her aunt with a smile, "thou wouldst like thy
+dinner, perhaps. Here is the home of Simon's sister Anna, and verily I
+believe her little Martha is watching for us through the wicket in the
+gate."
+
+Little Martha, with the help of the porter, threw open the gate before
+Aunt Miriam could say another word, and Naomi stepped through a
+passageway under the house into a courtyard with a tiny fountain
+playing in the center and a palm growing on either side of it.
+
+Little Martha was as fair as Naomi was dark. She had light reddish hair
+and blue eyes, and well pleased was her mother that it should be so, for
+this was called "King David's coloring" and was supposed to have been
+that of the great King himself. She wore a soft little robe of white and
+a fine gold chain about her neck. She joyfully led the visitors to her
+mother who was waiting for them at the end of the court.
+
+"Come in, thou blessed of the Lord," was the gracious greeting Anna gave
+them, and she ushered them up the stairs and into a room that actually
+had two windows cut in the side. They were the first windows Naomi had
+ever looked from, and she held tight to the sill for fear of falling
+into the street below.
+
+"I would that I had windows in my house," thought Naomi ruefully. "I
+would be so proud if I were Martha. But then she has no brother Ezra nor
+baby Jonas to play with her."
+
+In spite of the windows little Martha did not seem at all proud. She
+helped her mother bring bowls of water for the guests to wash in, and
+when the meal was ready she patted the plump cushions into shape on the
+divans placed before the gayly painted table.
+
+"Sit by me," she whispered to Naomi, breaking off a neat three-cornered
+piece of barley cake which was to serve Naomi as knife and fork and
+spoon.
+
+For dinner there was a dish of young kid stewed with olives, hot barley
+cakes, fresh and dried fruit--apricots, figs, pomegranates--and a bowl
+of amber honey.
+
+Not an easy thing is it to serve one's self with neatness and dispatch
+without knife or fork, and only one's fingers and a bit of bread to
+rely upon. But Naomi and Martha were able to dip their food from the
+common dish with a bit of barley cake quite as nicely as the grown
+people did, and they sat quiet and respectful while Aunt Miriam told of
+Simon's illness and the reason for this trip to Jerusalem.
+
+When the meal was over, Martha ran for fresh bowls of water, for the
+Jews were careful to wash both before and after eating, and as Naomi
+dabbled her fingers daintily Martha whispered to her:
+
+"Mother says we are all to go about the twelfth hour, in the cool of the
+day, to show thee the Temple and to see King Herod's garden. Oh! Oh!"
+
+And she squeezed her new friend's arm with such fervor that the pretty
+bowl was barely saved from falling to the floor.
+
+Later in the day when the first evening breezes were drifting down the
+dark ravines that swept round the city, the little party of sight-seers
+slowly climbed the steep lanes that led toward Mount Moriah on which the
+Temple stood. Built of white marble and glittering with gold, it dazzled
+the eyes of little village-bred Naomi and made her heart thrill as she
+gazed up the flights of steps at the very House of God.
+
+It was a flat-roofed, oblong building, this Temple of the Hebrews,
+divided within by a curtain of the finest work into two great rooms, the
+Holy of Holies and the Holy Place.
+
+The Holy of Holies was the dwelling-place of the Most High, never to be
+trodden, never to be seen, except upon the rarest occasions, by mortal
+man. It was now bare and empty, since the loss years before, in the war
+with Babylon, of the Ark with its Mercy Seat and two golden cherubim.
+
+In the outer chamber, the Holy Place, lying to the east, stood the
+golden candlestick bearing seven lamps, the golden table of shew bread
+with its twelve loaves arranged in two rows, and the golden Altar of
+Incense, having thirteen spices burning night and day to signify that
+all the produce of the earth belongs to God. In the huge doorway of this
+room, where only the priests might enter, and facing the sunrise, hung a
+second curtain or veil of fine linen richly embroidered in blue and
+scarlet, purple and flax. These colors were meant to be an image of the
+world. The scarlet represented fire, the flax earth, the blue sky, and
+the purple sea. Along the wall ran golden vines and clusters of the
+grape, the typical plant of Israel.
+
+All this Naomi could picture perfectly so often had she heard it
+described, but she saw it with the eye of her mind only, for the women
+of Israel had a court set apart for them many flights below the Temple
+building itself and at the east of the men's Court of the Israelites, as
+it was called.
+
+Martha stood at the little girl's elbow, gazing about, too, but not with
+the same eager interest that Naomi showed, since a visit to the Temple
+was no great rarity to her.
+
+"Thou shouldst see the Temple at Passover, Naomi," she murmured; "the
+crowds of people, and the priests at sunrise upon the walls blowing a
+thousand silver trumpets, and the long procession in the streets
+carrying the lambs for the offering."
+
+"Father hath promised to bring us all next Passover," Naomi answered
+happily. "But now I long mightily to see the great Altar of Burnt
+Offering in the Court of the Priests. It is made of unhewn stone, Ezra
+says, and there, too, stands the bronze basin where the priests wash
+hands and feet before entering the Holy Place. Ezra has learned all
+about it at school. I long to see it."
+
+Little Martha shook her head.
+
+"Nay," she murmured reprovingly, "that is not a sight for me and thee. I
+have seen the smoke rising--that is all."
+
+Naomi stared up at the great group of buildings--courts, halls,
+cloisters, terraces, and walls, topped by the splendid golden front of
+the Holy Place, in silent awe.
+
+"If once I should lose sight of Aunt Miriam," she thought, "I might
+wander about here for days and days and never find her again."
+
+And she took such a firm hold upon her aunt's cloak that she, feeling
+the tug, thought the little girl was impatient to move on.
+
+"Yes, child, yes," said she. "We go down now into the Court of the
+Gentiles. Do thou and little Martha walk on ahead. Pick thy way
+carefully, for this flight of steps is steep."
+
+The Court of the Gentiles was open to the men of all nations, since it
+was not strictly a part of the Temple. It was a sort of sacred
+market-place, and Naomi and little Martha, as they walked about, held
+tight to one another when they passed the pens of sheep and oxen
+destined to be burnt offerings, and which were restlessly shouldering
+one another and lowing and bleating as if in some way they sensed their
+approaching doom. Here the seller of doves and pigeons kept his cotes,
+for many a worshiper could not afford to buy a kid or a lamb. Here, too,
+were the booths and stalls of the moneychangers who did a brisk trade,
+since no coin might be offered in the Temple save the sacred shekel.
+
+"Art thou ready at last to leave the Temple, child?" asked Aunt Miriam,
+coming up behind Naomi as she stood gazing in at a penful of young
+lambs. "Wilt thou be able to tell all this to Ezra, think you?"
+
+Naomi nodded slowly. She was not listening to what her aunt said. She
+was wondering why at times the sheep looked so strangely blurred, and
+why little black specks seemed to dance before her eyes.
+
+"Over there is a little lamb that looks like my Three Legs, Aunt
+Miriam," said she. "I am glad he is not here, shut up in one of these
+great pens, and to die, perhaps, before another day."
+
+She moved listlessly along, and when her aunt took her hand she clung to
+her so heavily that good Aunt Miriam stopped short on the side of the
+hill.
+
+"What ails thee, child?" said she, bending over Naomi. "Thou art not
+like thyself. Thine eyes look strangely heavy, even like those of
+little Three Legs. Art thou ill?"
+
+"Nay," said Naomi crossly. Surely to have sudden pains shoot through
+one's eyes was not to be ill. "I would see the gardens of King Herod.
+That is what I want."
+
+"The child is weary," said little Martha's mother kindly. "She has had a
+long journey to-day besides this visit to the Temple. The gardens of
+King Herod will wait for thee, Naomi, until another time when thou art
+rested. They will not run away."
+
+But Naomi would not smile at this little joke. She pulled pettishly away
+when good friend Anna placed her hand upon her forehead to see if she
+were feverish.
+
+"I would see the gardens of King Herod," she repeated plaintively,
+rubbing her eyes as she spoke. "Ezra saw them, with rivers and flowers
+and fountains. He saw doves and pigeons flying through the air. He saw a
+great beast that spouted water from its mouth, and I would fain see it,
+too."
+
+The magnificent gardens of the King of Judea were open all day long to
+any one who wished to enter and enjoy their beauty, their coolness, and
+their shade. Canals flowed between green banks, flowers bloomed and
+trees rustled, fountains played in the sunlight, and tiny fish darted
+hither and thither in the artificial pools. But there, too, bright
+against the green, was to be seen the white marble of statues--nymphs,
+and dryads, figures symbolizing grace and beauty--and for this reason,
+since to him all statues were idols, no Jew would set foot within King
+Herod's garden.
+
+All that Naomi could hope to do, beside gazing at the three famous
+castles of white marble, with their battlements and turrets, built by
+Herod the Great, and at his own splendid palace with its massive walls
+and towers, was to peep at the garden through the open gateways or
+perhaps from the top of the wall, as Ezra had done.
+
+But Aunt Miriam, with sturdy common sense, had no intention of taking
+the weary and ailing little girl on the long trip across Cheesemonger's
+Valley from the Mount of the Temple to Mount Zion where the palaces
+stood. She beckoned to Jacob who had walked near them all the way, and
+when he came forward she said:
+
+"Carry the little maid home, Jacob. She is exceedingly weary and needs a
+night's rest."
+
+Naomi, without a protest, turned to Jacob and gladly hid her heavy,
+aching eyes upon his broad shoulder.
+
+"I am like Three Legs," thought Naomi, as the procession moved
+homeward. "But then Three Legs has been sick a long, long time, and I
+shall be well in the morning."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+IN THE DARK
+
+
+"Mother, is it sunrise yet?"
+
+"No, Naomi, it but nears the end of the Third Watch."
+
+"Mother, does the lamp still burn?"
+
+"Yes, child, as always, on the table. Lie still, Naomi, and try to
+sleep. Thou hast a journey before thee to-day."
+
+"Aye," said the little girl, turning restlessly on her quilt. "I know,
+to the Pool of Bethesda. Perhaps I shall come home with opened eyes,
+Mother. Perhaps I shall see when I come home to-day. Dost thou believe
+that the Angel of the Pool will open mine eyes?"
+
+"Yea, child, I do believe," answered her mother earnestly. "Thou shalt
+see again. I hope it with all my heart."
+
+"And then I shall help thee once more about the house," said Naomi
+hopefully, "and learn my lesson every day, and care for baby Jonas when
+thou art busy. Then I shall run and wait upon my father as of old, and
+he will place his hand upon my head and say, 'Naomi, thou art as quick
+and light upon thy feet as a young hart or doe.' That he cannot say now
+and speak the truth. But this very day it may be I shall have my sight
+again."
+
+And with this hope to comfort her, Naomi lay quietly down upon her bed
+and let her thoughts go back to her last trip to Jerusalem and its sad
+homecoming.
+
+She remembered the long ride in the jolting bullock cart, which Jacob
+guided as carefully as he knew how in order to spare Naomi's aching head
+and throbbing eyeballs.
+
+For the night's rest had not cured Naomi. She had awakened with swollen
+eyelids that were so heavy she could not hold them up, and sharp little
+stabs of pain had caused her to moan and twist in the arms of kind Aunt
+Miriam who held her tenderly on the long homeward ride.
+
+Then came days and nights of pain, and a visit from one of the great
+doctors of Palestine who ordered poultices of earth mixed with the
+saliva of one who had been long fasting. And when Naomi could no longer
+bear the heavy weight of this remedy upon her tortured eyes, he kindly
+changed the poultice to one of owl's brains, as being not only more
+comfortable but a trifle quicker in its action.
+
+At last the day arrived when Naomi was free from pain, but when also,
+alas! as she raised her head weakly and looked about, she did not see
+the familiar room with its carved chest and gay cushions and little
+table pushed against the wall, she did not see the loving anxious faces
+of her father and mother and Ezra, but only a black curtain dotted with
+blacker stars that danced and winked and danced again.
+
+"I cannot see thee! Where art thou, Mother? Is it night? How black it
+is! Oh, am I blind?"
+
+And Naomi clung fast to her father and mother as if they must save her
+from this dreadful fate.
+
+"Blind!" thought her mother, remembering with a shudder the numberless
+figures that stretched pitiful hands by the Bethlehem roadside. "My
+little Naomi, blind?"
+
+"An amulet will cure her," said worried Samuel stoutly. "Be not
+downhearted, my little maid. Thy father will buy for thee an amulet that
+will open those brown eyes of thine wider than ever before."
+
+So Naomi wore about her neck for weeks a small three-cornered bag, in
+which was sewn a scrap of parchment taken from a religious book, written
+after certain rules and with a diagram so mysterious that not even
+Samuel could understand it.
+
+And how were the contents of this little three-cornered bag to restore
+Naomi's eyesight? Why, by charming away the wicked spirit who had cast
+an evil eye upon her. Or perhaps Naomi had chanced to rub her eyes upon
+waking before she had washed her hands. Being unclean, the devil present
+had slipped from her fingers into her eyes, and now must be charmed out
+again by the holy words about her neck.
+
+Not a thought that Naomi, daily handling sick little Three Legs, might
+have caught the malady that first darkened the vision of the poor little
+animal, and then caused the frail life to flicker out altogether.
+
+Naomi missed her pet sorely, but its death was only one more grief added
+to the burden that overshadowed all her days.
+
+She could no longer play in the garden. Her well, begun so happily, was
+neglected, though not forgotten, and little Jonas was the leader now,
+guiding her faltering steps with such good-will that Naomi forgave him
+when he led her straight into the orange-tree or neglected to warn her
+that the myrtle bush was in her path.
+
+Her friends Rachel and Rebekah had deserted her, for at the first
+mention of the evil eye they had looked askance, and now they never came
+to play nor to entertain her with their talk.
+
+Little lame Enoch proved a faithful friend, and Naomi felt comfortable
+with him as a playmate, for he, too, suffered from a handicap and yet
+was cheerful and gay notwithstanding. He knew a host of stories told him
+by his old grandmother, and the long hours slipped away quickly while
+their little tongues chattered, though their hands and feet were
+pathetically still.
+
+But of all the comfort Naomi knew, apart from the love of her father and
+mother, the companionship of Ezra was the greatest. He amused her, he
+waited upon her, he revived her drooping spirits with his own high hopes
+and plans for her.
+
+"Thou shalt see again, Naomi," he would declare confidently. "All the
+cures have not been tried yet. Thou art _not_ like the beggars by the
+roadside. Say not that again, or I will dip thee some day in the well
+behind the myrtle bush that thou wilt be digging ere long. Most of the
+wayside beggars are old men with not an eyeball left, whilst thou,
+Naomi, art young, and thine eyes from without look as clear and strong
+as mine. Wait until my father has taken thee to the Pool of Bethesda!
+Have patience, Naomi! Thou shalt see again!"
+
+The Bethesda Pool lay in Jerusalem on the Temple mount, a stone's throw
+from the Sheep Gate of the Court of the Gentiles, where Naomi had
+lingered before the sheep-pens on the afternoon that now seemed so far
+away.
+
+Perhaps in these days we should say that the great pool contained a
+mineral spring, but in Naomi's time it was not doubted that an angel had
+wrought the cures that were told far and wide of this "well of healing."
+About it were always clustered the sick, the lame, the halt, and the
+blind, in the belief that when the angel troubled the waters the first
+to dip himself therein would be healed.
+
+So Samuel the weaver purposed to take Naomi thither, and, even while
+the little girl lay thinking long, long thoughts and wishing for
+daybreak, the moments slipped by, the Fourth Watch or Morning came, and
+Naomi's mother rose to prepare the meal so the travelers might have an
+early start.
+
+A stout little donkey, borrowed from the khan stable, carried Naomi and
+her father briskly over the familiar Jerusalem highway. The little girl
+remembered how happy she had been on her journey with Aunt Miriam and
+how all the world had seemed gay that morning. Then she recalled the
+"tap, tap, tap" of the blind men on the road, and she hid her face in
+her father's cloak and trembled.
+
+"O that the Angel of the Pool may open my eyes!" prayed Naomi. "O that
+the Angel of the Pool may open my eyes!"
+
+The Pool of Bethesda was a pretty spot. About it had been built five
+porches, and in their shelter lay the sick and the withered, the lame
+and the blind, waiting for a chance to push their way in the moment the
+waters began to move.
+
+When Naomi and her father arrived, the pool lay still in the sunlight,
+so Samuel established himself close to the edge with his arm about
+Naomi, and fell into conversation with a professional letter-writer who
+sat, bearded and grave, with ink-horn fastened at his side.
+
+"Thy little maid has felt the hand of the Lord?" queried the
+letter-writer, looking compassionately at Naomi who stood picking with
+nervous fingers at her father's sleeve.
+
+Samuel nodded sadly. In a few words he told the story of Naomi's
+trouble.
+
+"She is indeed grievously afflicted," observed the letter-writer,
+shaking his gray head and uttering a sigh. "And my friend here, whom I
+come to lift into the pool, has lain helpless upon his bed for eight and
+twenty years. O that the Messiah would come! 'Then the eyes of the blind
+shall be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall
+the lame man leap as a hart and the tongue of the dumb shall sing.'"
+
+"Think you the Messiah will come shortly?" inquired Samuel.
+
+This was a burning question of the day. The desire for the coming of the
+Kingdom of God was a flame that was consuming the Jewish nation.
+
+The letter-writer tapped his forehead thoughtfully with a brown
+forefinger.
+
+"Thou knowest the saying of the Pharisees, that if all Israel could keep
+the Law perfectly for a single day, Messiah would come. As for me, I
+long with a mighty longing to see Israel restored, to be delivered from
+our enemies, and to have our sins forgiven."
+
+Naomi stirred restlessly. What did all this talk of a Messiah mean to
+her? Well enough for the grown folk to look forward to the coming of a
+Saviour. As for her, all she asked of all the world was that the Angel
+of the Bethesda Pool might come with healing in his wings and lay his
+cool fingers upon her closed eyes and open them again.
+
+"Perhaps I shall see Mother's face to-night," she thought. "And Ezra
+will be at the village gate waiting for me. He promised. And I am to
+wave my girdle at the first turn in the road if my eyes are opened. O
+Angel of the Pool, remember me, Naomi! Remember me here in the dark!"
+
+Naomi's father, who had never taken his eyes from the pool, leaned
+forward.
+
+"It moves, Naomi," he whispered. "The Angel comes, although we see him
+not. Be ready, for I must act quickly."
+
+The surface of the pool began to heave and swell, and at the precise
+moment that the water boiled up, Samuel bent over with Naomi in his arms
+and dipped her head under the water once, twice, three times!
+
+Dripping, sputtering, and crying, Naomi was placed upon her feet, while
+her father endeavored to wipe away the water that ran down into her neck
+and stained her little robe.
+
+"Dost thou see, Naomi?" asked Samuel with a tremble in his voice. "Open
+thine eyes and look! Dost thou see, my little pomegranate?"
+
+If the Angel of the Pool failed them, where should he turn for help?
+
+Naomi obediently opened her brown eyes and stared, sightless as ever,
+into her father's face.
+
+The Angel of the Pool had failed them!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+ALL THE WORLD COMES VISITING
+
+
+It was the winter season in Palestine.
+
+In the darkness and despair that followed her trip to the Pool of
+Bethesda, Naomi had not cared what the weather might be. She had
+listened with indifference to the whistling, roaring wind-storm that had
+come suddenly one night in October telling the weather-wise that summer
+was over and the rainy season at hand.
+
+Huddled over the brazier of charcoal that smouldered under a rug in a
+shallow hole in the middle of the floor, Naomi had not heeded the wild
+dash of rain against the house nor its melancholy dripping in the
+deserted garden. Even the excitement of Ezra and Jonas over a slight
+fall of snow, the first either one had ever seen, had failed to rouse
+her.
+
+Samuel and his wife were troubled beyond words at this calamity that
+had come upon their child. Aunt Miriam and Simon were sympathetic, but
+could offer no advice. Ezra was at his wits' ends, for all his schemes
+and devices to amuse failed, and the hollow words of encouragement died
+upon his honest lips.
+
+Samuel, too, had a fresh worry of which Naomi knew nothing, and which,
+slight though it was in comparison with the little girl's misfortune,
+did not tend to make the daily life of the family more pleasant.
+
+"Aye, Samuel the weaver's child is blind," said the neighbors, wagging
+their heads in knowing fashion. "What sin hath he committed, think you,
+that this calamity befalls him? Truly the way of the transgressor is
+hard."
+
+"It may be that his wife is the sinner," was whispered about. "Or
+perhaps both."
+
+And little by little the village people turned aside when they saw
+Samuel coming, and fewer and fewer were the friendly words said to
+Naomi's mother when she went patiently down to the fountain for her
+supply of water.
+
+Ezra felt himself more fortunate than the grown people, for at the first
+unkind word from his former friend, fat Solomon across the road, he had
+flown at him in a fury, and had shortly enjoyed the satisfaction of
+seeing his blubbering enemy lick the dust.
+
+"Mole, indeed!" shouted Ezra, doubling up his fists. "Thou wilt call my
+sister a blind mole, wilt thou? Thou serpent, feeding upon the dust!
+Thou snake! Rise not up or I will rub thy nose in the dirt again."
+
+So cautious Solomon, having learned his lesson well, was forced to
+content himself with calling names from behind the wall, which Ezra was
+prompt to answer with sticks and stones.
+
+No one was happy in the little household, and faces were sober and
+voices hushed as they went about their tasks, until one day Aunt Miriam
+called Ezra and whispered in his ear. His eyes opened wide and his face
+brightened, and for more than a week he neglected his friends, the
+shepherds, and spent all his spare time at the khan.
+
+Then, one afternoon, when the rain had ceased and the little olive
+leaves glistened in the cold bright light, Naomi's mother approached the
+forlorn little figure crouched in a corner and raised her to her feet.
+
+"Here is thy warm cloak, beloved," said she, coaxingly, laying her hand
+on the soft brown curls that seemed to hang limply now that Naomi never
+tossed them back with a proud little shake of the head. "Before the door
+stand thy aunt, thy father, and thy brother. They wait for thee. And,
+little Naomi, there waits a surprise for thee also. Come and listen by
+the doorway."
+
+From behind the door Naomi heard an unfamiliar stamping, a running
+about, and Ezra's excited voice.
+
+"Be careful, Jonas," called Ezra sharply. "Wilt thou be stepped on?
+Stand from under. Naomi, where art thou? Mother! Oh, she comes! Aunt
+Miriam, Father, she comes!"
+
+Naomi's mother led out the white-faced little girl and Samuel took her
+gently by the hand.
+
+"A gift for thee, little Naomi," said he, smiling more happily than in
+many a long day, "from thy good Aunt Miriam. Put out thy hand and
+guess."
+
+Naomi stretched out a timid hand and touched a soft furry nose.
+
+"A donkey!" said Naomi. "To take me for a ride!"
+
+"Aye," burst out Ezra, his face shining with unselfish joy; "to take
+thee for a ride every day and everywhere. Up and down the hills and
+roundabout. We shall go everywhere together, thou and I."
+
+"Speak more plainly, Ezra," said Aunt Miriam, seeing the puzzled look
+upon his sister's face. "The donkey is thine, Naomi. Thy Uncle Simon and
+I have given it to thee. Ezra means that he will take thee riding upon
+it whenever and wherever thou wilt. No longer shalt thou lurk in the
+house with white cheeks from sunrise to sunrise. We shall have thee as
+rosy as a poppy again ere long."
+
+And her tender-hearted aunt first wiped her brimming eyes upon the
+corner of her veil, and then caught back Jonas by his leather pinafore
+from under the donkey's heels, where he seemed determined to meet with a
+speedy death.
+
+"Now the trick!" cried Ezra, who had been hopping from foot to foot
+during his aunt's long speech. "Have I not been teaching him for more
+than a week? Say thy lesson well, little donkey! Stand here before him,
+Naomi!"
+
+Samuel placed Naomi in position.
+
+"Thy donkey's name, Naomi," went on Ezra, "is Michmash, because he comes
+from the town of that name. Now place thy hands upon the tips of his
+ears. Do not pinch or he will kick. I know."
+
+Samuel guided the little girl's hands until they rested upon the tips of
+the long gray ears.
+
+"Now say his name slowly," instructed Ezra, his face aglow.
+
+"Mich," said Naomi, and down came a furry ear, "mash," and down came the
+other.
+
+Then the little donkey winked both ears violently, and turned a patient
+eye upon his young teacher as if asking praise.
+
+"He did it! He did it!" cried the teacher. "He did not forget his
+lesson and he will do it every time. Michmash!" And as the long ears
+fell again, Ezra threw his arms about Naomi and hugged her close.
+
+"Wilt thou come for a ride with me now?" he whispered. "The sun shines
+and the wind blows and it will be pleasant out upon the hills."
+
+So seated upon the back of Michmash, Naomi rode off, with such a bright
+look upon her wan face that her father and mother could not help
+thinking that better days were in store for them all.
+
+Every pleasant day Ezra, leading Michmash, took Naomi, wrapped in her
+little scarlet cloak, out riding, and as they moved along in the crisp,
+bracing air they talked--long, long talks of what they were passing, of
+Ezra's day at school, or of the thoughts and fancies that filled Naomi's
+active little mind.
+
+"Ezra," said she one day, as Michmash felt his way securely up the side
+of one of the stony little Judean hills, "Ezra, dost thou remember what
+was told thee that the letter-writer said that day by the Pool of
+Bethesda?"
+
+Her lip trembled as she spoke, but Ezra answered her instantly.
+
+"Yea," said he, "I do, indeed. He spoke of the Messiah."
+
+"And what think you of the Messiah?" asked Naomi timidly. "What think
+you he will do when he cometh, Ezra? Dost think that he will open the
+eyes of the blind?"
+
+Ezra, in order to speak more earnestly, halted Michmash, who gladly fell
+to cropping the coarse grass.
+
+"The Messiah, Naomi," said Ezra slowly, "will do what the prophet Isaiah
+promised of him. Never fear. He will open the eyes of the blind and
+unstop the ears of the deaf. He will make the lame man leap and the
+dumb man sing for joy. When he cometh, we shall all see the salvation of
+the Lord and our sins shall be forgiven us. All Israel shall rejoice.
+Aye, even stout Solomon also," added Ezra grimly. "The Kingdom of God
+will come, and the Messiah will rule in righteousness, and he shall put
+our enemies to flight. No longer then will we pay tribute to the Emperor
+Caesar Augustus at Rome. No longer will we tolerate the wicked King Herod
+in our city of Jerusalem. And the Roman eagle that hangs above our
+Temple gates will be torn down and trampled under foot."
+
+Ezra spoke warmly. He had been well taught in school and synagogue, and
+had listened carefully to his father and his friends as they talked in
+the market-place and elsewhere.
+
+"Oh, I would that the Messiah would come quickly," said Naomi
+wistfully. "And if he can make me see, he can make lame Enoch straight.
+I would that Enoch's old grandmother had not died and that he had not
+gone so far away to live as Jericho. I miss him."
+
+"Think now of this new numbering of all the world," went on Ezra, whose
+heart burned within him at the wrongs of his nation. "Every man must
+travel to the town whence his family sprang, whether he live near or far
+and whether or no he be rich enough to stand a journey. And why? Because
+the Emperor at Rome has ordered so. I stood in the market-place when the
+Roman heralds with their trumpets summoned all Bethlehem thither, and
+told of this new enrollment and of the taxing to follow. I saw the black
+looks and heard the muttering, but did any man speak out? Nay--afeard of
+the short sword the Roman soldier carries. Oh, aye, I am afeard of it
+myself," admitted Ezra indulgently; "but when the Messiah cometh things
+will not be so."
+
+"Mother says that many have already traveled to Bethlehem to be
+enrolled," said Naomi, "and that we shall have a houseful when the
+caravan from Nazareth comes in. I would fain be a help to her just now
+and not a trouble, but I can do nothing at all, nothing, only keep out
+of the way." And the tears rolled down poor Naomi's cheeks.
+
+"Do not cry," said Ezra pitifully, and with a patience wonderful in a
+boy of his years. "We all love thee, Naomi, better than if thou hadst
+the sharp sight of an eagle. Come, greedy one," he went on, pulling at
+Michmash's bridle. "Wilt thou eat all night? Come!"
+
+They stood upon a hill that looked toward the north, and as Ezra waited
+for lazy little Michmash to finish his mouthful, his eye caught a line
+of tiny black figures perhaps a mile away from Bethlehem village.
+
+"The caravan from Nazareth, I verily believe!" he exclaimed. "Hold fast,
+Naomi, and I will take thee down to the gate. There I will tell thee all
+the sights as they come in."
+
+Rattling over the stones and down the steep paths in reckless fashion,
+the little brother and sister were soon established in a spot where Ezra
+could see all that was needful, and whisper what he saw in Naomi's ear.
+
+"It is the caravan from Nazareth," he announced, "and they ride on
+horses, camels, mules, but some walk. There are great numbers of them
+and more are still to come. Some have fallen behind, they say, and are
+far back upon the road. They are very weary and they smile but little.
+Who would want to take the long journey in winter only to part with
+money in the end?"
+
+When Ezra and Naomi reached home, they found that, as their mother had
+said, their house was full to overflowing with company from the Nazareth
+caravan.
+
+Abner and Joel, merchants of Nazareth, were there with Joel's son Amos
+and his wife Elisabeth. Samuel's cousin, Daniel, who owned a large farm
+in fruitful Galilee, had come, bringing with him as a matter of course
+his friends, David and Phineas, neighboring farmers. All these people
+had originally sprung from this city of David, and now back they came to
+it, some in good, some in ill humor, but to a man obeying the command of
+the Emperor at Rome.
+
+Every inch of floor space in Samuel's little house was occupied that
+night when the soft quilts were spread out, and the family and their
+guests lay down to rest. Naomi and Jonas were cuddled in a corner next
+their mother. But when Ezra came in late from feeding Michmash, the dim
+light of the little oil lamp, that burned each night in all but the
+poorest of Jewish homes, showed him a floor so crowded with soundly
+sleeping guests that he knew not how to reach his own bed spread at his
+father's right hand.
+
+"Father!" whispered Ezra.
+
+"My son," answered Samuel in a cautious voice.
+
+"Father, it is so crowded here I would fain spend the night with old Eli
+in the fields with the sheep. They are encamped below the khan in the
+Fields of David. May I go? Old Eli said but yesterday that I had
+neglected him of late."
+
+"Go, my son. Give greetings to old Eli, and God's peace attend thee."
+
+So Ezra slipped out under the dark starry sky to join the shepherds
+abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE SHEPHERDS
+
+
+Ezra picked his way carefully down the dark Bethlehem lanes until he
+reached the town gate, swung shut and locked hours before at sunset.
+
+"Nathan! Nathan!" he called, until the old gate-keeper peered out from
+his little booth and muttered a friendly greeting to the lad.
+
+"Nathan, I would go down into the fields with shepherd Eli to-night,"
+explained Ezra politely. "Wilt thou not let me pass through the strait
+gate? Just this once! I will never ask thee again. Old Eli is thy friend
+and mine. Do the favor for him, I beg of thee, and I will bless thee all
+my days."
+
+Nathan could not help laughing at the old-fashioned speech of the boy.
+
+"Whether I do it for thee or for shepherd Eli, the deed is done," he
+cackled, and threw open the small gate standing beside the large one and
+known as the "strait" gate. "Ask me not again, I warn thee; ask me not
+again."
+
+Past the Bethlehem khan Ezra hurried, and down through the piece of
+fertile land that lay to the east, where the reapers of Boaz had swung
+their rude sickles and where Ruth had gleaned the golden sheaves. A walk
+of two miles brought him to the pasture land where the shepherd lad
+David had watched his father's sheep, battling with lion and bear when
+the need arose, and where, too, many of his sweetest songs had been
+written.
+
+The boy scurried along at a good pace, for on these dark and lonely
+roads to meet with wolf or jackal or, still more terrifying, with
+robbers, singly or in bands, was not unknown.
+
+At the end of the road Ezra peered about in the starlight until he
+could distinguish a number of dark forms huddled before one of the caves
+in the hillside. Within the shallow cave lay the flock asleep, and
+before it, on his rough bed of brushwood and rushes, sat shepherd Eli,
+with only a dog or two to keep him company. Beside him lay his
+shepherd's crook, his club tipped with iron the better to protect his
+charges, and his sling with which he was wont to throw stones just
+beyond his sheep to bring them back when they were going astray.
+
+Ezra chose to leap over the rude stone wall that enclosed this sheepfold
+instead of passing through the narrow gateway. The two great sheep dogs,
+gaunt and rough, who had spied him on the edge of the pasture land long
+before he had seen them, leaped fawning upon him with sharp yelps of
+affection.
+
+"Down! Down!" cried Ezra, half laughing, half impatient. "Eli, my
+father sends thee greeting. As for me, I would fain spend the night with
+thee here in the fields. I am crowded out of my father's house by
+visitors from Nazareth who come to be listed for the census. I will make
+myself useful, Eli. Perhaps thou canst steal a nap while I keep watch of
+the sheep. But why art thou alone to-night? Where are the other
+shepherds? And the dogs?"
+
+"Aye, aye," responded shepherd Eli, slowly wagging his head and drawing
+his sheepskin cloak about him. "Thou art always welcome, lad. As for
+sleep, never at cockcrow was I more wakeful than at this moment
+to-night. For there is something strange in the air, lad. The very dogs
+feel it. They lie quiet and still; they neither twist nor turn. Whether
+it be that friend or foe approaches, I know not. Something beyond our
+ken is a-wing to-night."
+
+"But, Eli," said Ezra, "if it were wolves or jackals, the dogs would be
+barking. And where are the other shepherds? Wilt thou battle alone if
+the wild beasts come?"
+
+"Nay, child, nay," said Eli patiently. "I look not for wild beasts
+to-night, nor do the dogs expect their ancient enemy. Thou sayest truly,
+like a wise little shepherd, that they behave not thus when wolf or
+jackal is abroad. The other shepherds read not the signs as do I.
+Thieves lurk near at hand, say they, and with the dogs they go to rout
+them out."
+
+"What dost thou expect, Eli?" asked Ezra timidly. He was thrilled and
+frightened and thrilled in turn at this talk.
+
+The old man sat with his face turned to the brilliant Oriental sky
+powdered thick with stars.
+
+"'He numbereth the stars, He calleth them all by name,'" said Eli
+softly. "Expect? Child, I know not what I expect except that He who hath
+promised us salvation from our enemies and remission of our sins shall
+keep His holy word. And there are signs that the time draws near. Surely
+thou hast heard of the priest Zacharias, who was smitten dumb as he
+served in the Temple, and of the birth of his son John who, it is
+promised, is to go before the face of the Lord to make ready His ways.
+Who made the promise? Who but the Angel of the Lord, Gabriel, who stands
+in the presence of God. Think you his word shall fail? Nay, I tell thee
+the times are ripe."
+
+"But Eli--" Ezra began in his shrill little voice, when the old shepherd
+cut him short with a sudden gesture.
+
+"The men return," muttered Eli. "Once already to-night they have heard
+what they term 'an old man's babbling.' Let us listen to their story
+now."
+
+"How many thieves caught ye, friends?" he called out. "Did ye surprise
+the enemy in his lair?"
+
+The shepherds filed in through the narrow opening and threw themselves
+heavily on the ground beside Eli and the lad. The dogs crouched low,
+with nose between paws, and closed their eyes.
+
+"Thieves? Nay," said one of the shepherds brusquely. "We saw naught
+amiss, and had but the walk for our pains."
+
+The shepherds wrapped their heavy woolen mantles about them and talked
+together in low voices. No one seemed disposed to sleep, though the
+day's work had been hard and all needed a night's rest. Ezra sat silent,
+thinking of old Eli's words and scarce hearing the conversation that
+went on about him.
+
+Suddenly the old shepherd grasped Ezra's arm. One of the younger men
+was speaking.
+
+"The night has grown so still," said he. "Note ye that the wind dies
+down and that a hush falls o'er all?"
+
+His voice ended on a trembling note. He covered his face with his mantle
+and fell forward among his prostrate companions. Only old Eli, with his
+arm about shaking little Ezra, held his white head erect--joyous,
+confident, trustful.
+
+For an angel of the Lord stood by them, and the glory of the Lord shone
+round about them: and they were sore afraid.
+
+And the angel said unto them:
+
+"Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which
+shall be to all the people: for there is born to you this day in the
+city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord. And this is the sign
+unto you: Ye shall find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, and lying
+in a manger."
+
+And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host
+praising God, and saying:
+
+  "Glory to God in the highest,
+  On earth peace, good will toward men."
+
+Ezra, strengthened by Eli's arm which did not waver, ventured to open
+his eyes.
+
+He saw a brilliant whiteness, clear as crystal, that seemed to light the
+world from end to end. High above, the sky was filled with clouds of
+rose and amber and amethyst. All the glories of sunrise and of sunset
+were mingled there.
+
+Did he catch a flutter of white pinions? Did he glimpse a Leader,
+majestic, terrible, yet radiant with gracious love?
+
+Even as he stared, unable to move, the song grew fainter, the colors
+faded and vanished.
+
+The echo of the angels' song rang in his ears. To his dying day it
+would haunt his memory.
+
+The muffled figures on the ground stirred and stood erect.
+
+Overhead burned the stars in the frosty sky.
+
+The silence was broken by old Eli.
+
+"Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing that is come to
+pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us."
+
+Over the rough, uneven ground hastened the shepherds. Their flocks for
+once were left uncared for, save by the dogs. They pressed on across the
+familiar pasture land, up and over the cornfields, and then took the
+sharp rise that would lead them past the Bethlehem inn.
+
+Clinging to the hillside and facing the cornfields was the stable of the
+inn, a rough cave in the limestone rock. On a rope stretched across the
+wide entrance swung a lantern, whose dim light twinkled and flickered
+before the eyes of the shepherds as they came up the hill.
+
+Old Eli quickened his pace, Ezra at his heels.
+
+"And this is the sign unto you: Ye shall find a babe wrapped in
+swaddling clothes, and lying in a manger."
+
+The boy knew that the inn was crowded to overflowing, as was his own and
+every house in Bethlehem that night. Was it possible that this familiar
+manger was the resting-place to-night of a Heavenly Guest? Were
+strangers lodged in the stable? Was this the only shelter that could be
+offered the latest arrivals of the Nazareth caravan because there was no
+room at the inn?
+
+At the stable entrance Ezra hung back. He saw a man come forward out of
+the shadows and talk with Eli. With a single gesture the old shepherd
+motioned his companions to join him. Lost for a moment in the gloom,
+Ezra saw them again speaking, bending forward, then falling upon their
+knees.
+
+The stars had faded and an early morning wind was blowing chill when at
+last the shepherds made their way out of the stable. The lamp, still
+swinging, burned pale in the dawn, but its faint light fell across the
+white face of a little boy who lurked in the doorway and whose cold hand
+clutched old Eli as he came exulting forth.
+
+"Praise God! Praise God for His mercy, justice, and truth! Praise--"
+
+Old Eli started at the cold touch, and looked down with eyes that glowed
+with an inward light.
+
+"Child, what doest thou here? Hinder me not. I go now to spread the
+good tidings--to praise and to glorify God."
+
+Ezra opened his dry lips.
+
+"Hast found Him?" he asked. "Is it the Messiah? Is it the Christ?"
+
+"Aye, child, 'tis as the angel said," answered Eli happily; "a babe
+wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. Come to bring peace on
+earth, our Saviour who is Christ the Lord, our long-looked-for Messiah!
+Glory to God in the highest! Glory!"
+
+Ezra heard no more. He had turned, and with the speed of an arrow from
+its bow was running up the steep road toward home.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+IN A MANGER
+
+
+The rising sun pushed through a bank of purple cloud and touched with
+long rosy beams the roof of Samuel the weaver's house. On the narrow
+parapet that bordered the roof walked a number of snowy pigeons,
+stepping delicately with heads raised and thrown back as if to enjoy the
+splendor and freshness of the early morning.
+
+In one corner of the roof lay a dark heap, heedless of sunlight, morning
+breeze, or bird, conscious only of the blackest misery, the deepest
+hopelessness that an eight-year-old heart can know.
+
+It was Naomi, who lay with hands clenched and face pressed against the
+cold stone, too heartsick for tears, wishing only in her wretchedness
+to creep away where she might be alone.
+
+Presently she stirred and lifted her head.
+
+Quite a different Naomi was this from the happy, generous child who had
+sacrificed her flower garden for the sake of an ailing lamb; not at all
+like the little girl who had set forth so joyfully for a day's pleasure
+in Jerusalem. Her little robe was wrinkled, her curls were tangled and
+rough, her face was pinched and pitiful. With her soft little fist she
+beat upon the roof in time with the rhythm of her words.
+
+"Did they think I could not hear?" she asked, speaking aloud in her
+fullness of heart. "Did Elisabeth, the wife of Amos, think that I was
+deaf as well as blind that she should say aloud, 'The child Naomi will
+never see again. There is no hope.'"
+
+"No hope! No hope! And perhaps I shall live to be as old as lame
+Enoch's grandmother lived to be. Who will care for me then? Who will
+give me shelter and food? Amos of Nazareth thought of that, too. I heard
+him, though he whispered low. 'She will be always a burden. It were
+better that she should die.' I heard him. He said those words. 'She will
+be always a burden. It were better that she should die.'"
+
+"Die? Die? I cannot die. I am well and strong. I shall live and live and
+live. My mother and father will die and leave me, and Ezra and Jonas
+will weary of me. I shall be a beggar by the roadside. No hope! No
+hope!"
+
+Naomi sank down again in a little heap and rocked to and fro. Her
+misfortune seemed too dreadful to be borne. It was incredible that such
+a fate should overtake her. It might happen to Rachel, or Rebekah, or
+to stout Solomon across the road, but not to Naomi, the daughter of
+Samuel the weaver.
+
+As she swayed back and forth, torn by her misery, there came to her,
+like balm upon a wound, the familiar, comforting words that her mother
+and father had used over and over of late, to soothe the little girl's
+pain and to encourage hope in the sad hearts of them all.
+
+  "I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of Jehovah
+  In the land of the living.
+  Wait for Jehovah:
+  Be strong, and let thy heart take courage;
+  Yea, wait thou for Jehovah."
+
+Naomi rose to her feet. The startled pigeons withdrew a short way and
+stood watching her curiously with their hard, bright eyes. About her was
+the soft sunlight, over her head the deep blue sky.
+
+She turned her sightless face toward Jerusalem and spoke as if to a
+friend present.
+
+"Yea, Lord," said the little Jewish girl in simple faith, "I will wait
+for Thee, and for Thy Messiah who will open the eyes of the blind.
+Surely when Messiah cometh I shall see. And until then, I will wait and
+pray for His coming. I will wait."
+
+On the outer stairway that led from the ground to the roof stood Ezra,
+breathless, his hand pressed against his side. He had run all the way,
+without stopping, up the steep lanes from the Bethlehem stable, and now,
+pausing to rest an instant before speaking to Naomi, he could not help
+overhearing the last words she said.
+
+"So thou wilt wait?" he whispered, his breath coming in gasps. "Thou
+wilt wait for His coming? Nay, my little sister, thy time of waiting is
+over. The Messiah is here! The Christ is born! O that I might shout it
+from the housetop, that my father and mother and all the world may know
+that the Lord hath kept His promise and the Messiah hath come!"
+
+Ezra's whole heart and soul were full of a great new hope, and the sight
+of Naomi's tear-stained face and groping, outstretched hands made him
+long to tell her the good tidings at once.
+
+But the boy's love for his unhappy little sister made him wise beyond
+his years.
+
+"If I tell her, and it does not come to pass as she wishes, it will
+break her heart," he argued. "The Messiah is but a tiny Baby now, weak
+and helpless. It may be He must grow to manhood before He can heal the
+blind, the deaf, and the sick. Who knows? Not I. I will not tell her
+yet."
+
+So Ezra clattered noisily up the remaining steps of the stairway,
+calling out:
+
+"Naomi! Naomi! Where art thou? Oh, here thou art! Are thy sandals well
+tied? For I have come to take thee down to the inn stable to show thee
+something there. And what it is, thou couldst never guess if thou didst
+guess a hundred years."
+
+Naomi shook her head.
+
+"Show me? What could I see? Nay, I will go nowhere, Ezra," she answered
+sadly. "If I went, I could not see thy wondrous sight. I would far
+rather stay at home."
+
+"But this is something to feel," said Ezra coaxingly, putting his arm
+about Naomi and leading her gently toward the stairway. "Tell me, dost
+thou remember when young Deborah, the vine-dresser's wife, laid
+something soft and warm in thine arms?"
+
+"A baby, Ezra?" asked Naomi, stopping short. "A baby at the inn stable?"
+
+"Aye," said Ezra firmly, "a Baby! A Baby born in a stable and lying in
+a manger because there was no room last night at the inn."
+
+"But I cannot see it, Ezra," said Naomi mournfully. "Why should I go? I
+cannot see."
+
+"Dost thou remember, too, how Deborah's baby clung to thy finger?" said
+the crafty Ezra, guiding her tenderly down the steps as he talked. "And
+did ye not find it pleasant to hold? You rocked it to and fro all day
+long, Naomi. You said that you wished that Jonas might be put back in
+swaddling clothes again."
+
+"Aye, it was pleasant," admitted Naomi. "But Deborah brought the baby to
+me. I will not go to the khan, Ezra. I do not wish to meet any one. My
+heart is heavy. There will be people to stare at me and to talk in the
+lanes and at the stable. I will not go."
+
+"Naomi," said Ezra desperately, "dost thou love me?"
+
+"Aye, thou knowest that I love thee," answered Naomi in surprise.
+
+"Then, to please me, come to the inn stable," was Ezra's quick response.
+"Ask me no questions and delay not, but come. It is early, Naomi. We
+will meet no one, I hope and trust. Give me thy hand and come."
+
+Naomi instantly slipped a thin little hand into her brother's
+outstretched palm.
+
+"For love of thee, Ezra," said she sweetly. "For love of thee."
+
+Down the quiet road, deserted in the winter season at this early hour,
+Ezra led Naomi, carefully guiding her over the stones and ruts in the
+rough highway. Unobserved, they slipped quietly through the town gate,
+and when a turn in the road brought the khan into view Ezra threw his
+arm about his sister and quickened their steps.
+
+He spoke but once.
+
+"One of thy pigeons flies before us, Naomi," said he, "as if to lead us
+on. It glistens in the sun like silver."
+
+Naomi only nodded and clung the tighter to Ezra's arm.
+
+Past the inn and round to the stable door he led her, and there they
+halted.
+
+"Naomi," said Ezra, his voice trembling with hope and fear, "thou
+knowest the stable well. Enter, and walk forward until thy feet touch
+the straw before the manger. There lies the Babe!"
+
+With a gentle push Ezra started Naomi toward the Mother and Child, whose
+figures he could dimly see on a heap of straw at the back of the cave.
+Then in the shadow of the doorway Ezra fell upon his knees.
+
+"O Lord," he prayed, "I know that this is Thy Messiah. I believe that
+Thou hast sent Him. Thou hast promised of old that when Messiah cometh
+He shall open the eyes of the blind. I would that He might open my
+sister Naomi's eyes. If Thou wilt answer this prayer, Lord, I will
+promise Thee anything. I will be Thy faithful servant, I will be an
+obedient son, I will learn my lessons well at school and never shirk. I
+will no more throw stones at stout Solomon nor even call him names. I
+will promise anything Thou mayst ask of me, if Thy Messiah will only
+open my sister Naomi's eyes. Hear my prayer, O Lord, hear my prayer."
+
+Within the stable Naomi crept cautiously forward. Her footsteps lagged,
+for she had no heart in this undertaking.
+
+What pleasure could there be for her in visiting a stranger's baby which
+she could not even see? A short time ago, to hold the soft little body
+close and to feel the tiny clinging hands might have given her a
+moment's happiness; but to-day her heart was so full of misery that
+there was no room in it for joy to enter. She longed to sink down on the
+stable floor. Only her love for Ezra kept her moving.
+
+She felt the straw before the manger beneath her feet, and she dropped
+to her knees and stretched out a timid hand.
+
+Yes, the Mother and Child were before her.
+
+She fingered the hem of the cloak wrapped about the young Mother, but
+she could not bring herself to touch the little Child.
+
+"I care not! I care not!" thought Naomi hopelessly. "What to me is this
+Baby? Why should Ezra wish me to visit this Child?"
+
+As if in answer to her unspoken question, with a sudden lovely gesture,
+the Child leaned forward. His tiny fingers touched Naomi's forehead and
+His hands rested for an instant upon her darkened eyes.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Naomi opened and closed her eyes rapidly. She rose to her feet and
+stared about her. Was it a dream, the same kind of a dream with which
+she had so often lightened the weary hours of darkness, the long watches
+of the night, when she had called to mind some old familiar scene--her
+mother at the well, the country road, Ezra hastening home from school?
+Now the inn stable rose before her. Did she really see the nose of an ox
+thrusting itself over the stall? Or did she only dream the mound of hay,
+and on it the young Mother wrapped in a wide blue cloak and in her arms
+a Child, at the velvet touch of Whose tiny hands the black curtain had
+dropped from before her eyes?
+
+Naomi rubbed her hands together and looked down at them. Yes, they were
+her own hands. There was the familiar little brown spot on the inside of
+her third finger. Her dress? Yes, that was an old friend, the yellow and
+red striped robe. She had worn it the day in the garden that she had
+given her four scarlet poppies in exchange for little Three Legs.
+
+Then it was true! She did see. But how had it happened? Why at the touch
+of this Baby hand had her sight been restored?
+
+"Ezra!" she called, not daring to stir. "Ezra!"
+
+Ezra's face, white under the tan, showed itself round the stable door.
+
+"Ezra," cried Naomi, "I can see! I can see! I know not how it is, but I
+was blind and now I see! O Ezra, the Baby touched me and I can see!"
+
+Ezra came swiftly forward. His eyes were full of tears, but his face was
+radiant. He knelt before the Mother, who was watching the scene with
+wondering eyes, and the Child, Who slept now in His Mother's arms. He
+pulled Naomi down beside him.
+
+"Naomi, it is the Christ Child," he whispered. "The Messiah has come!
+Our Saviour lies before us! O Naomi, the Messiah hath opened the eyes of
+the blind! The Lord hath heard my prayer!"
+
+And bending low before Him, they worshiped at the Christ Child's feet.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD
+
+
+The household of Samuel the weaver lay sleeping soundly. The dim light
+of the small oil lamp revealed the figures of Samuel and his wife
+wrapped in heavy slumber, with Jonas, rolled into a plump little ball,
+at his mother's feet. Naomi lay close by with arms outstretched. Her
+dreams were pleasant, for her lips were parted in a smile. Ezra was
+missing. He was again spending the night in the fields with shepherd
+Eli. The friendship between the old man and the lad had grown more deep
+and strong since the night of the Angels' Visit, and they never wearied
+of discussing the wonderful event and all the marvels that had followed
+in its train.
+
+These happenings had roused all the village of Bethlehem, and had now
+touched even the city of Jerusalem since the appearance of the Wise Men
+from the East, who, following His star, had come to worship the King of
+the Jews.
+
+That very evening Ezra and Naomi, caught on a lonely hillside by the
+sudden fall of night, had with one accord pointed to the dusky road
+below, along which rocked noiselessly three tall camels bearing the Magi
+rapidly in the direction of Arabia.
+
+"They brought gold and frankincense and myrrh," murmured Ezra, "the
+offerings to a king."
+
+"Aye, to my King, to my Messiah," answered Naomi happily. "Oh, Ezra, I
+would that I had all the gold and frankincense and myrrh in all the
+world that I might lay it at His feet. How can the neighbors doubt when
+they see what He has done for me? Who but the true Messiah could open my
+eyes and give me sight again?"
+
+Ezra shook his head.
+
+"Many do believe, Naomi," he answered. "And all thy life now thou canst
+be a living witness to God's mercy and love. How happy He has made us
+all! Father and Mother, thou and I!"
+
+"And Jonas, too," said Naomi quickly. "He laughs and plays with me now
+as never before. He knew that something was wrong, though he could not
+put it into words. We are to begin again to dig our well to-morrow, he
+and I. I promised him."
+
+It may be that Naomi's dreams that night were of this pleasant task that
+awaited her; it may be that in her sleep, as in her waking hours, her
+thoughts were filled with visions of the Christ Child even as her heart
+was full of love for Him. Her smile deepened, and she did not stir as
+the night wore on.
+
+The stars were growing pale, though morning was still far off, when the
+deep silence of the village was broken by the sound of feet running
+lightly, cautiously, up the lane.
+
+Nearer and nearer came the footsteps until they halted before the door
+of Samuel's house, and a little figure, panting and breathless, stepped
+quickly within.
+
+Naomi sat upright and peered sleepily through the gloom.
+
+"Ezra, is it thou?" she asked in surprise. "Is it morning yet? What
+brings thee here?"
+
+"I have news, Naomi, bad news, I fear," the boy answered. "I must waken
+my father and mother. Whatever is done must be done quickly. There is no
+time to lose."
+
+"I hear thee, son," said Samuel's voice unexpectedly. "What is thy
+tale?"
+
+"And my mother?" questioned Ezra. "It concerns Jonas."
+
+"I sleep not," said Jonas's mother, broad awake in an instant, and
+drawing the drowsy little ball into her arms in swift alarm. "Tell thy
+story quickly."
+
+"As ye know," began the boy hurriedly, "I went down to the Fields of
+David at sunset to spend the night with shepherd Eli. And as I passed
+through the gate old Nathan hailed me. He told me that one of the
+shepherds had borrowed his warm cloak and had not yet returned it, and
+that he was now full of aches and pains and sorrows because of the lack
+of it. He charged me straitly to tell the shepherd to return it at once
+or he would have him haled before the magistrate at daybreak, and that
+he would not cease his watch for it nor sleep that night until the cloak
+was round his shoulders once again.
+
+"When I reached the Fields, I gave his message, but the shepherd who
+had taken his cloak was not there; he had gone in search of a lost
+lamb. And when, less than an hour ago, he returned, he asked me to keep
+him company to the gateway, and help him make his peace with angry
+Nathan. They know that Nathan is friendly to me," added the boy in
+explanation.
+
+"And I know that some night, wandering about as thou dost, thou wilt be
+caught by beast or robber," growled Samuel. "Resume thy story."
+
+"The shepherd and I," continued Ezra hastily, "were passing the inn when
+I saw a figure by the roadside beckoning me to come to him. It was
+Joseph of Nazareth, and behind him in the shadow was his wife, Mary,
+bearing the Christ Child in her arms. He spoke low so that the shepherd
+should not hear. He told me that an angel of the Lord had appeared to
+him in a dream, saying, 'Arise and take the young child and his mother
+and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I tell thee: for Herod will
+seek the young child to destroy him.'
+
+"He spoke no more," Ezra went on, "but I said unto him, 'My little
+brother, think you there is danger for him?' He nodded in reply, and
+then I asked, 'Start you at once?' He nodded again and stepped back into
+the shadow.
+
+"At the gateway old Nathan, glad to see his cloak again, let me through,
+and I hastened home to tell the tale to thee."
+
+Ezra's mother had already arisen and, opening the great carved chest,
+had taken from it warm wrappings in which she was bundling the still
+sleeping Jonas.
+
+"Deborah, the vine-dresser's wife, leaves at sunrise in the caravan for
+Joppa." As she spoke, she worked busily gathering Jonas's little
+garments into a bundle. "For friendship's sake she will take Jonas with
+her. We have, in her, at least one true friend in Bethlehem. Her mother
+lies at Joppa sore stricken with a fever, and it may be that our boy
+will take the sickness and perchance will die. But rather would I see
+him in his baby grave than in the clutch of cruel King Herod."
+
+"I will go with thee, wife, to carry the child," said Samuel gravely,
+seeing that her simple preparations were now finished. "Give thy brother
+a kiss in farewell, children. It may be thou wilt never see him more."
+
+As Naomi stood on tiptoe and pressed a tender kiss upon Jonas's plump
+cheek, he suddenly opened his dark eyes and, at sight of his sister,
+broke into a broad smile.
+
+"Farewell, Jonas, farewell," whispered Naomi, her eyes full of tears.
+"When thou returnest we will dig the well behind the myrtle bush, thou
+and I. Farewell!"
+
+Then she laid her hand upon her father's arm.
+
+"Father," said she in a low voice, "the little Messiah also traveleth
+far to-night. I owe to Him my sight and the happiness of us all. I would
+fain give unto Him a gift. I would that I might give unto Him my little
+Michmash, that He may be borne swiftly and surely on the long road that
+He must go."
+
+Samuel looked for an instant into the brown eyes upturned to his own. He
+remembered the darkness, the suffering, the vain hope, the despair,
+then--blessed be Jehovah! the Light that had appeared and that had so
+wondrously shone into the life of his little maid.
+
+"Yea, child," said he warmly. "No gift that thou couldst give would be
+too great."
+
+"Ezra," cried Naomi, "canst thou overtake them, think you?"
+
+But Ezra had already left the room, and could be heard in the shed
+behind the house fitting the bridle over the astonished Michmash's head.
+
+Naomi caught up her little scarlet cloak from out the carven chest, and
+as Ezra came past the door, leading the little gray donkey, she flung it
+across her brother's arm.
+
+"The journey down into Egypt is far, and the night winds are cold. It
+may be my scarlet cloak will keep the little Messiah warm."
+
+She threw her arms about her donkey's neck and laid her cheek against
+his soft furry nose.
+
+"Fare thee well, little Michmash," she whispered. "Stumble not nor
+falter on the way. Thou carriest the Light of all the world, the Hope of
+every heart upon thy back. Farewell, farewell!"
+
+Sunrise--and again Naomi stood alone upon the housetop. Her night of
+darkness behind her, she turned her happy gaze upon the morning sky,
+blue and rose and violet, whose clouds touched to misty purple the
+hilltops and the peaks that surrounded Bethlehem village. Below her lay
+the white stone houses, a few steep fields of dark ruddy loam, the
+sloping gardens with their vines, their fig and olive trees.
+
+From where Naomi stood the road that led to the Holy City was hidden
+from view by the mountain peak Mar Elias, and as she looked toward it
+her face lighted and she clasped her hands before her. For on the
+mountain-top rested two great clouds like angels' wings, and with a
+heart full of awe and reverence and love little Naomi felt that she
+stood in the very presence of Jehovah God.
+
+What though the promised Messiah was fleeing secretly and in dread from
+His own country? The Lord was mindful of His own, and was even now
+keeping watch over His people. "Behold, He that keepeth Israel will
+neither slumber nor sleep."
+
+She had no words. She could only stand and let the tide of love she felt
+sweep over her again and again, until softly and almost imperceptibly
+the Heavenly Pinions faded away into the blue.
+
+When Ezra came he found Naomi looking toward the road that wound
+ribbon-like past the Bethlehem inn down into the land of the Pharaohs,
+the country of the Sphinx and the Pyramids.
+
+He nodded at the question in her eyes and silently pointed out to her a
+little group that moved steadily forward upon the dusty road below.
+
+"Dost see them?" asked Ezra softly. "Joseph, staff in hand, leads little
+Michmash who bears the Mother and the Child upon his back. He steps
+forth bravely, the little beast. Ah! now they take the turn that hides
+them from our sight. Our little Messiah! Gone from us after so short a
+time!"
+
+"Aye, but to come again," said Naomi confidently. "I know it, Ezra. I
+was blind and now I see. As a tiny Babe He brought the light to me
+alone. But when He comes again, He will be the Light of all the world,
+Ezra, the Light of all the world."
+
+  THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Christmas Light, by Ethel Calvert Phillips
+
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