CHAPTER XIX.IN JERUSALEM.

[pg 235]CHAPTER XIX.IN JERUSALEM.Among those who watched the approach of Judas and his host to Jerusalem were two men, one in extreme old age, the other numbering, it would seem, about fifty years. They wore the priestly garments, old indeed and threadbare, but still clean and showing many signs of careful repair. Theirs was a strange history. For two years they had been in hiding in the city. When Apollonius had filled the streets of Jerusalem with blood, the murderers had sought with especial care for all priests and Levites. To them at least no mercy was to be shown. These two men—Shemaiah was the name of the elder of the two, and Joel that of the younger—had narrowly escaped death from the soldiers of Apollonius. They had taken refuge—so close was the pursuit—in a garden, the gate of which happened to be open, and had hidden themselves in the bushes till nightfall. Where they were, who or of what[pg 236]race was the owner of the house, whether they were likely to meet with more mercy from his hands than they could expect from the soldiers, they knew not. But that hiding-place was their only chance, and in their desperate strait they snatched at it. While they were debating in whispers whether they should throw themselves on the compassion of this unknown person, they saw—for it was a moonlight night—the figure of a woman walking down a path which passed close by their hiding-place. They could see from her features, which the brilliant moonlight of the East lighted up, that she was a countrywoman of their own, and they resolved to appeal to her for protection. Shemaiah, whose age and venerable appearance would, they judged, be less likely to alarm, threw himself on the ground at her feet. She started back in astonishment.“Lady,”he said,“I see that you are a daughter of Abraham. Can you help two servants of the Lord that have so far escaped from the sword of the Greeks?”She was reassured by a nearer view of the speaker.“Who are you?”she said.“Speak without fear, for there is no one to harm you.”Shemaiah told his story.“And your companion,”said Eglah—for that was the woman’s name—“where is he?”The old man called to Joel, who came forth at his bidding from his hiding-place.[pg 237]Eglah stood for a few minutes buried in thought. Then she spoke.“As I hope that the Lord will have mercy on me and pardon my sin, so will I help you even to the giving up of my life. But I am not worthy that you should come under my roof. Now listen to my story. When Antiochus—the Lord reward him for the evil that he has done to His people!—came to this city, I was seized and sold for a slave. And a certain Greek soldier, Glaucus by name, the captain of a company, bought me in the market. He had compassion on me, and dealt honourably with me, and made me his wife after the fashion of his people. And I consented to live with him, though I knew that it was a sin for a daughter of Abraham to be wife unto a man that was a heathen. But alas! sirs, what was I to do? for I was a weak woman, and there was no one to help me. Should I have slain him in his sleep, as Judith slew Holofernes? Once I thought to do so, and I took a dagger in my hand, but when I saw him I repented. Whether it was fear or love that turned me I know not. That I was afraid I know, for the very sight of the steel made me tremble. And I must confess that I loved him also, for he had been very kind and gentle with me; and there is not a goodlier man to look at in all Jerusalem.”“Be comforted, my daughter,”said Shemaiah, whose years had taught him a tolerance to which[pg 238]his younger companion had, perhaps, scarcely attained.“’Tis at least no sin for a wife to love her husband.”“Then you do not think me so wicked as to be beyond all hope?”cried poor Eglah, eagerly.“Nay, my daughter,”said the old man;“you were in a sore strait, and all women are not as Judith was.”“Then you will not refuse to come into my house? I have a large cellar where you can lie hid. ’Tis under the ground, indeed, but airy and dry, and you can make shift to live there. And I will feed you as best I may. My husband has an open hand, and never makes any question as to the money that I spend upon the house, and he will not know what I have done. I judge it best to keep the thing from him, not because I fear that he would betray you—for he is an honourable man and kindly, but it would go hard with him, being an officer in the army of the King, if it should be discovered that he knew it.”And so for two years Shemaiah and Joel had inhabited the cellar in Eglah’s house. Glaucus, the husband, was just the kindly, generous man whom his wife had described. Once or twice he had terrified her by some joking remark about the rapidity with which the provision purchased for the house disappeared.“When we dine together, my darling,”he said, on one occasion,“you eat what would be scarce enough for a well-favoured fly;[pg 239]but I am glad to think that you are hungry at other times.”“O husband,”she said,“there are many poor of my own people, and I cannot deny them.”She hoped as she said it that the falsehood would not be counted as another sin against her.“Nay, nay, darling,”said the good-natured man.“Give as much as thou wilt. Thank the gods and his Highness the King I have enough and to spare.”Glaucus, though allowed to live in his own house, had, of course, to spend much time upon his military duties, and was, consequently, often away. During his absence Eglah could bring out the two prisoners from their underground lodging, and allow them to enjoy the fresh air of the garden, which, happily, was not overlooked. She gave them the best food that her means would procure, and at the same time took pains, as has been said, to keep their garments scrupulously clean and neat. On the whole they passed the time of their captivity in tolerable comfort, and without much injury to their health. Latterly they had been cheered by the tidings, always given to them at the very earliest opportunity by their hostess, of the successes of Judas. Within the last few days Glaucus had told his wife that a decisive battle was expected, that it would probably be fought at Beth-zur, and that if her countrymen won it, there was nothing that could hinder them from taking possession of Jerusalem.[pg 240]Glaucus, who held a command in the garrison of the fort, had not been with Lysias at Beth-zur, but he had heard late on the evening of the day of the result of the battle and had, of course, told it to his wife, and she in turn had communicated it to her inmates. They had been scarcely able to sleep for joy, and had eagerly waited for news of the conqueror’s approach. Evening was come, and Eglah had not paid them the accustomed visit. The house was curiously silent; all day not a sound of voices or steps had reached their ears. And now the suspense had become unbearable.“Go forth,”said Shemaiah to his younger companion,“go forth, and bring me word again.”Joel crept out of his retreat. The streets were deserted; but the fortress was crowded. The garrison stood thickly clustered on the walls, and with them were many inhabitants of the city. It was easy to guess that what Glaucus had foretold had happened. Judas was on his way to take possession of Jerusalem, and all who had compromised themselves by resisting him, had either fled from the place altogether or had taken refuge in the fort. He returned to Shemaiah with a description of what he had seen, and the two at once hastened down to the walls to greet the deliverers.The sun was near its setting when they entered the city. Without turning to the right or left, though many must have been consumed with[pg 241]anxiety to hear the fate of kinsmen and friends, they marched to Mount Sion. It was an hour of triumph, the fruition of hopes passionately cherished through many a dark day of sorrow. To stand once more in the place which God had chosen to set His name there, how glorious. But it had its bitterness, as such hours will have, for it was a miserable sight that greeted them. Nothing, indeed, had been done of which they had not heard. There was nothing that they might not have expected or foreseen. Yet the actual view of the holy place in its dismal forlornness overpowered them. It was as if the sight had come upon them by surprise.“When they saw the Sanctuary desolate and the altar profaned, and the gates burnt with fire, and shrubs growing in the courts as in a forest or one of the mountains, and the chambers of the priests pulled down, they rent their clothes, and made great lamentations, and cast ashes upon their heads, and fell down flat to the ground upon their faces.”To repair this ruin, to put an end to this desolation, to purify the place which had been so shamefully polluted, was the first duty of the deliverers. But that the work might be done in peace it was necessary that the fortress of Acra, to use military language, should be masked. A strong force was told off to perform this duty; the rest would lend their aid to the great work of purification.[pg 242]CHAPTER XX.THE CLEANSING OF THE TEMPLE.Azariah and Micah had been put under John, the eldest of the five brothers, in command of the force employed to blockade the garrison of Acra. The night had passed quietly; the garrison had not attempted a sortie, and had not even harassed the besiegers with a discharge of missiles. And when the morning came they seemed inclined to continue the same inaction. From the high ground the two Jews looked down upon the Temple courts and saw the priests directing a crowd of eager helpers in the work of cleansing the Sanctuary, and labouring diligently with their own hands. The first task was to pull down the idol altar which had been erected on the altar of burnt-offering. This was done in a fury of haste. The hands of the workmen could not, it seemed, move fast enough in destroying the abominable thing. The stones were carried out of the temple with gestures of loathing and disgust,[pg 243]and afterwards taken to the Valley of Hinnom—unholy things to be cast away in an unholy place.But the stones of the holy altar itself had been polluted by the superstructure that had been erected upon them. What was to be done with them? At least it was manifest that they could not stand where they were. Sacrifice could not be offered upon them. They were reverently detached from the cement which bound them together, and then borne one by one to a chamber of the Temple, where they were to be laid up till a prophet should arise who should show what was to be done with them. The first duty of dealing with the altar completed, came the work of cleansing and repairing the courts and chambers. The long, trailing creepers were pulled down; the weeds and shrubs were rooted out. The place was still a ruin, but the manifest signs of its desolation and abandonment were removed. So numerous and so eager were the labourers that for this part of the work a few hours sufficed. The task of reparation would, of necessity, be longer and more tedious.Azariah and Micah had been watching the work with perhaps a more absorbing interest than was quite consistent with their duty of watching the garrison, when suddenly one of the sentries blew an alarm. Scarcely had it sounded when a flight of arrows from the garrison of the fortress fell among the besiegers. The Greeks had watched[pg 244]their opportunity, and when almost all eyes were turned on the work that was going on below, had sent a volley among the ranks of the enemy.This sudden attack did no little damage. One or two of the patriots were killed on the spot, several were seriously wounded; the others either covered themselves with their shields, a precaution which they ought not to have neglected, or sought refuge among the ruins.Azariah, though he had been caught a little off his guard, was not unprepared to deal with a manifestation of this kind. He had organized a company of slingers, and he now ordered them to advance and clear the wall of its defenders. They knelt with one knee upon the ground, and covered themselves with their shields. Under this shelter they loaded their slings. Then, rising rapidly at a preconcerted signal from their commander, they sent a simultaneous and well-directed shower of leaden bullets on the defenders of the wall. These missiles, sent with a skill and a strength in which the Jewish slingers were unsurpassed, had a marvellous effect. In a moment the wall was cleared, except that here and there along its length the dead and wounded might be seen. The survivors did not venture forth from shelter to carry them away. A fierce conflict followed. From the loopholes of the towers and from behind the battlements the Greek archers kept up the discharge of their arrows, and the Jewish[pg 245]slingers replied. No great damage was done on either side; but every now and then a skilful aim at some exposed body or limb was followed by a cry of pain from the wounded man, and the cry was taken up by a shout of triumph from the hostile force. In the course of the afternoon a storm came on, with thunder and lightning and a deluge of rain. Before it had cleared away the light had failed, and hostilities had perforce to be suspended.About the beginning of the second watch16Micah, who was making a round of the sentries, heard the sound of something that seemed to fall heavily upon the soft and plashy ground. The rain had ceased, and the sky had partially cleared; for a few minutes all was still; then Micah could hear a sighing which was not the sighing of the wind. He followed the guidance of the sound, and found a woman lying almost insensible upon the ground. He called one of the sentinels to help him, and together they carried her under shelter, and brought torches, by the light of which they might examine her injuries. That she was stunned by the fall was evident, for she did not speak, and when they attempted to move her she groaned with the pain. When left alone she did not seem to suffer much, and they judged it best to wait for the morning, administering meanwhile a little wine and water from time to time.[pg 246]The next morning four of the soldiers were told off to remove her on a litter that had been constructed for the use of the wounded to a deserted house in the Lower City—and of deserted houses there was only too great a choice. As the bearers put down their burden on the way to take a brief rest a strange figure came up to the party. It was a woman, young and still showing the remains of beauty, but with a miserably haggard look. It was easy to see from her uncertain gait and wandering eye that she was a lunatic.Huldah had been for some time a well-known figure in Jerusalem, and her story was of the saddest. She had been a servant in the house of Seraiah, and had been Ruth’s own waiting-maid. Returning home from some errand on which she had been sent one day at the beginning of Apollonius’s reign of terror, she had been seized by the attendants of the newly-dedicated Temple of Jupiter, and made a slave. Before many weeks had passed the cruel outrages to which she was subjected overthrew her reason. Thus become a trouble to her captors she was permitted to escape. Since then she had been accustomed to wander about the city. The horrors of the past still haunted her, and the recollection of the abominable idolatries in which she had been forced to serve. At every pool of water and fountain she would stay and wash. From every passer-by she would beg for something that might[pg 247]serve for her cleansing: it was the one craving of her soul to be rid of its defilement. For food or money she never asked; but a few kindly souls in the city gave her enough to support life, and sometimes would renew the garments, threadbare, but always scrupulously neat and clean, which she wore. Of these friends the kindest was Eglah, who had a fellow-feeling for the sufferer, and who was always on the watch to atone by her charitable deeds for what she believed to be the great offence of her life.Huldah cast a glance at the litter in passing, and at once recognized in the suffering woman her own benefactress. For indeed it was Eglah whom Micah had found under the fortress wall. The recognition made a marvellous change in the poor maniac. It turned her thoughts in another direction. She ceased to dwell upon her own sufferings, and, for the time at least, reason regained its sway.She knelt down by the side of the litter, and kissed one of the hands that hung listlessly down. Then, rising to her feet, she arranged the cushion on which Eglah lay so as to make it more comfortable. That done, she bade the bearers take up their burden, made a gesture of dissent when they were turning aside to the house to which they had been directed, and led the way to Eglah’s own dwelling.The unhappy creature was positively transformed by the charge which had thus been laid upon her. The most intelligent and thoughtful nurse could not[pg 248]have done better for her patient than did the poor distracted Huldah. A physician who was called in examined Eglah, and found that though she had been sadly bruised and shaken, no bones were broken. Whether any internal injury existed was more than he could positively say; that time alone would show. Meanwhile careful attention was all that could be done for her, and attention more careful than Huldah’s it would be impossible to imagine.The two priests who had found shelter in Eglah’s house were naturally among those whom Judas had summoned to take part in the cleansing of the Temple when he made proclamation for all such as, being of the House of Aaron, were“of blameless conversation and had pleasure in the Law.”Posts of special dignity were, indeed, conferred upon them, for both were men of high reputation for sanctity and learning, which was not a little increased by the romantic story of their long seclusion and marvellous escape. Judas assigned them quarters near to his own, and was accustomed to have frequent recourse to their advice. They thus found themselves almost constantly employed, and were unable for several days to find an opportunity of inquiring what had happened to their protectress.When at last they found their way to the house Eglah had sufficiently recovered her strength to be able to rise from her bed. She was sitting, busy with her needle. Huldah was watching her with[pg 249]an intense look of affection that was infinitely pathetic.The poor woman told her story with a voice that again and again was broken with sobs.“When I was preparing your morning meal in the kitchen my husband, whom I had never before known to set foot in the place, suddenly appeared. I was greatly terrified lest he should ask for whom I was getting the food ready, but he was too much occupied with other things to notice it at all.‘Eglah,’he said,‘you must come with me into the fort. Judas the Hammer has broken our army to pieces. Lysias has fled before him, no one knows whither, and within a few hours he will be in the city. I would have you here, for the fort is scarcely a place for a woman, but I fear your people. Haply they may slay you as having been yoked to a heathen. My darling,’he went on—and here poor Eglah’s voice was choked with tears—‘I have done ill for you, I fear; but I meant it for the best. And now, I fear, you must cast in your lot with me. May the God whom you serve turn it for good.’So I gathered a few things together, and went with him. I thought many times that we should scarcely have reached the fort alive, for the people cursed us as we went, the women especially casting many bitter words at me as one that had left her people to join herself to the heathen. But my husband had some six or seven soldiers with him; and they were brave men and[pg 250]well armed. We had not been many hours in the fort before there began a battle between the garrison and the soldiers of Judas. One of my husband’s men, who had gone in a spirit of folly and vanity to show his courage, was struck down with a stone, and my husband ran forth to drag him in. And just as he was returning, another stone from the slingers struck him on the back of his head. It was about the ninth hour of the day when he was wounded, and he lived till the beginning of the second watch, but he never spoke again.”Here the poor creature’s story became confused and broken, and her listeners could only guess what had followed. The tale of what followed must be told for her.“‘Ah!’said one of the soldiers,‘Glaucus has it. He will never move again, I reckon. A good fellow, but overstrict.’‘But how about the Jewish girl whom he calls his wife?’said the other;‘I shall take her.’‘Nay, nay; let there be fair play between us, comrade, as there has always been. Why you more than I?’‘Because I was the first to speak.’‘Not so; ’twas I that first spoke of her.’‘Well, we won’t quarrel, comrade. No woman is good enough to separate old friends. Let us cast the dice for her, and the man that wins shall stand treat for a flagon of wine.’And then Eglah heard them cast the dice, and count the numbers—they would have twenty throws a-piece, they said—and curse and swear when they[pg 251]threw low. And when they had finished their dice-throwing they came in to see how Glaucus fared; and just as they entered the chamber, he drew a long breath and died. One of them put his hand upon his heart and said,‘’Tis all over with him; he will never toss a flagon or kiss a pretty girl again.’And then he laid his hand upon Eglah’s shoulder, and said,‘Cheer up; we will find another husband for thee as good as he.’But the first said,‘Nay, Timon, leave her alone. The women are not like us. You must give them a few hours to cry.’‘Well, well,’said his comrade,‘you were always soft-hearted. Let us come and have our flagon; there is no reason why we should wait for that.’”The comrades went on their errand and left the widow alone with her dead husband. She kissed him, and cut off a little curl of his hair, and then went forth on the wall—for the chamber in which he lay was in one of the wall-towers—and threw herself down to the ground. It was better, she thought, to die than to sin again.“Daughter,”said Joel,“you should thank the Lord that, without your own doing, the tie that bound you to this heathen man is broken.”“O sir,”broke out the poor woman,“do not say so. I cannot find it in my heart to thank Him, though I do try to say in my heart,‘Thy will be done.’”“Brother,”said the old Shemaiah,“you are too hard upon her. ’Tis right that a wife should mourn[pg 252]for her husband, be he Jew or Greek. Before the Lord, I had thought ill of her had she been of the temper that you would have her.”Eglah turned to the old man a grateful look.“O sir,”she said,“you do not know how kind and good my Glaucus was. I never had an angry word from him. Nor did he ever hinder me from my prayers. Rather he would say when I went three times to my chamber to pray,‘Speak a word for me, wife, if you will.’And he would oftentimes speak to me about my God, and say that he liked Him better than the gods in whomhehad been taught to believe. And I used to tell him stories out of the Book, and how the Lord had delivered his people out of the land of Egypt, and had brought them into the land which He sware to Abraham to give him. And he never mocked or laughed, but listened with all his heart. And, sir, I do sometimes think that if he had been spared to live longer, he would have become one of us. But he is dead, and I shall never, never see him any more.”And the poor desolate widow burst out into a passion of tears, and threw herself prostrate on the couch, Huldah trying to comfort her, not with words—which, indeed, she could not command, and which, in any case, would have been of small avail—but with great demonstrations of love.After a while Eglah looked up, and turning to Shemaiah, in whose sympathy and charity she[pg 253]trusted, said,“O, sir, do you think that there is any hope for him? Must he go into that dreadful Gehenna? For indeed he was kind and good, and never thought of any woman but his wife, and never injured one of our people, but would help them and defend them when his fellows were rough with them. He was better than many Jews that I know. Is it not possible that God may have mercy upon him?”Joel was about to speak, but Shemaiah beckoned to him to hold his peace.“My daughter,”he said,“these things are too deep for us; but I would say, be of good hope for him that is gone, seeing that he was such as you say. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? To some He giveth much light, and to some but little; and He judgeth each according to that which He has given. Therefore I bid you be of good cheer.”“And may I pray for him?”asked Eglah.“Surely you may, for no prayer, so that it come out of an honest heart and pure lips, but finds some fulfilment.”17He rose and, giving her his blessing, departed, followed by Joel, whose narrow intelligence was not a little startled by what his old companion had said.[pg 254]CHAPTER XXI.THE DEDICATION OF THE TEMPLE.Jerusalem now began to assume an aspect very different from that which it had borne for some years past. Thousands, who had been driven away by the terrors of the evil days, now hastened to return. Many of the lower class, constrained by the necessity of poverty, had always remained, enduring persecution as best they could, and often, of course, escaping it by their obscurity. Now the wealthier inhabitants began to flock back from their hiding-places in the country and from foreign lands; the streets again began to be busy; the shopkeepers displayed the wares which there had been no one to purchase, or which they had been afraid to show; the long-shut markets were reopened and thronged with purchasers.The priests alone, gathered as they were from their abodes scattered throughout Palestine, made a considerable addition to the population of the[pg 255]city. They were a numerous class, far beyond any requirements of their sacrificial duties, and commonly remained at home, awaiting the rarely recurring occasion of services that called them to Jerusalem. But now a work was before them in which all could take part, for the Temple, having been cleansed and having received such repair as could be done at once, was to be dedicated afresh.The first necessary work was the construction of a new altar of sacrifice. This work was to be of the primitive kind, in strict conformity to the Law, and as unlike as possible to the elaborate erections of the alien worship, and it was to be done, from first to last, by the consecrated hands of the priests. They dug out of the earth of the valley rough stones. No tool of iron was to be used in raising them from their place; none was to be employed in hewing them into shape. It was the priests again who solemnly conveyed them into the Great Court of the Temple, who joined them together with mortar, and covered them with whitewash. Meanwhile other preparations for a wholly renovated service were being busily carried on. Most of the furniture of the Temple had been carried off by a succession of plunderers; if any of the less valuable and less easily removed articles had been left these had suffered an irremediable defilement. Everything therefore had to be replaced; and workmen were now busily employed[pg 256]in this work. The altar of incense, the candlestick with its seven branches, the table on which the loaves of the shew-bread were to be placed, the mercy-seat with the overshadowing cherubim that was the chief feature of the Holy of Holies, and the various curtains that were needed for the separation of the various parts of the building, were manufactured with all possible haste, some of the articles, from lack of time and materials, being intended to serve their purpose only till they could be more worthily replaced. Generally, however, it was time rather than means that was wanting, for in the late campaigns treasure almost enough to replace the spoliations of years had been taken from the Greeks, and this, after being duly purified and blessed, could be devoted to holy uses.And so came on the day that had been appointed for the Feast of Dedication. It was to be the 25th of the month Chisleu.18It was a memorable day, both for good and evil, in the annals of Jewish worship. On this day, ages before, Jerusalem, the newly-won capital of the nation, had been finally chosen as the place where God should set His name; for on this day David, as he made atonement in the day of pestilence, bought the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite to be the future dwelling-place of the Presence of the Lord God of Israel. And on this day, again, five years ago, the first[pg 257]idol sacrifice had been offered within the consecrated precincts.In the early morning, before the sun had risen upon the earth, a spark was obtained by striking stone against stone, the fire was rekindled on the altar, the golden candlestick was lighted and the table of the shew-bread duly furnished with its twelve loaves.Meanwhile the rest of the people also had been busy in making preparations for the great celebration. Every family, even the poorest, was to keep festival on the day that was to be a new beginning of the national life. The women and children were early afoot, gathering branches of palms and other“goodly trees”; none of them having busier hands than Ruth and her nieces. Even the little Daniel would take his part in the work, tottering along by his mother’s side with his arms full of boughs. When they had gathered as great a burden as they could carry, Ruth gathered her little company about her, and told them, just as the rising sun began to flood the valley with its slanting rays, the story of the day—of the glory and the shame which it had brought to Israel.And now, as the time of the morning sacrifice drew near, the whole people moved in one great stream towards the Temple, and the Great Court was crowded. On the walls of the fortress the heathen soldiers of the garrison stood in throngs watching the solemnities of the day. Some of them,[pg 258]of course, were ready with their mockery; but most looked on in respectful silence. Many of them had witnessed the prowess of these strange fanatics in the field. They might be given over to a“senseless and tasteless superstition,”but they could deal shrewd blows with their swords, and therefore they were not to be despised. No truce had been arranged, but one was tacitly observed. The forbearance of the Greeks was partly due to a wholesome awe of the Jewish archers and slingers, partly to a curiosity that, as has been said, was not wholly unmixed with respect.Then came the solemn ritual of sacrifice. This ended, the whole congregation of the people united in solemn supplication to the Lord God of Israel. Usually it was the custom to stand during the office of prayer; sometimes the attitude of kneeling was used; now, as if to express the intensity of their feeling, they threw themselves flat upon their faces, and poured out their entreaty that evils such as they had endured in the past might never again come upon them in the future.“O Lord,”—this was the burden of their prayer,—“if we sin against Thee any more, do Thou chasten us Thyself with Thine own hand, after the multitude of Thy mercies. Make us suffer that which shall seem good to Thee here in our own land, but scatter us no more among the heathen, and deliver us not again unto the nations that blaspheme Thy holy name.”[pg 259]The prayer ended, came the great Psalm of Thanksgiving; and then the people dispersed to their houses to hold festival. Their mirth was prolonged far into the night, which, indeed, was almost turned into day throughout the streets of Jerusalem, so brilliant was the light that streamed from the lamps set in almost every window.For eight days the Feast of Dedication was continued. Each day the services began with the customary morning sacrifice. At earliest dawn the Master of the Temple summoned the priests who had been watching round the fire in the gate-house as they waited for his summons. Then they went out and fetched the lamb for the burnt-offering. The creature had already been examined on the previous day, and pronounced to be free from spot or blemish. This done, they went outside the court in which the great altar stood, and watched for the coming day. The Mount of Olives stood between them and the East, and far behind it were the mountains of Moab. Here the first streaks of the morning light were to show themselves. Then the priest whose turn it was to slay the victim of the day bathed in the great laver. Thus purified for the performance of his office, he stirred up the burning embers from under the ashes of the altar, and added fresh fuel. This done, he was joined by the other priests, and the morning sacrifice was offered. Then followed the special ceremonies of the festival,[pg 260]among them the prayer for deliverance from captivity, as already given, and the singing of the great Thanksgiving. And every day the public services were followed by private rejoicings. No one could have believed that the rejoicing city, gay with its brightly dressed throngs of merry-makers and resounding with the music of tabret and harp, was the desolate place so long trodden down by the heathen. There had been days in the past when the most hopeful could scarcely discern any light in the darkness. But now they could see the“silver lining of the cloud.”In this very Temple, now dedicated afresh with such joyous zeal, but a few years before, the priests“had left the sacrifices when the game of the Discus called them forth.”That deadly folly had been purged with blood. The brutal violence of Antiochus had saved the nation from an imminent relapse into heathenism.Among the many hearts that were gladdened by these rejoicings there was one, as sorely burdened as any, that had found a complete deliverance from the troubles of the past. The unhappy Huldah, in proportion as her charge gained strength, and her work became less absorbing, had seemed to be falling back into her old condition. For the time her thoughts had been concentrated on the suffering Eglah; now they were free to be turned upon herself, her own troubles, her own dismal memories. Eglah did all she could to keep her employed, and[pg 261]the girl’s gentle and affectionate nature still felt her influence. Yet it was evident that unless some remedy could be found the old madness would resume its sway.On the first day of the Dedication festival, the two were standing together in the Court of the Women. The priests, who were making a circuit of the whole building, sprinkling everywhere the blood of purification, came in due course to the spot. As they performed their office a drop fell upon the garment of Huldah, who had been joining in the prayers with an earnestness almost frenzied. The effect was marvellous. In a moment the excitement passed away. Her eyes lost their wandering look, and, in a tone calmer and more collected than any that she had ever before been known to use since the time of her trouble, she said, showing the crimson spot to Eglah—“He has heard my prayer; He has sprinkled me with the blood of cleansing.”She stood silent and collected until the whole ritual was finished, and when the time for the hymn of thanksgiving came round joined her voice with a quiet happiness to the voices of the congregation.When the people returned to their homes Huldah left the Temple in company with Eglah. But it was evident that her strength was exhausted. She could barely totter along with all the help that Eglah and a neighbour could give her, and when she came to the house of Seraiah and Ruth, which happened[pg 262]to lie in her way, she sank almost unconscious to the ground. Providentially at that moment Ruth came up with her husband and the little Daniel.“She seemed so much better in the Temple—was quite calm and peaceful again—and now I am afraid that she is going to be very ill,”said Eglah.Woman’s wit suggested to Ruth a happy thought for dealing with the sufferer.“Leave her to me,”she said.“She was happy here once, and here, if it please the Lord, she will be happy again.”Ruth and her husband carried her into the house, and laid her upon her bed in her old chamber. Once there she was able to swallow a little broth which had been hastily prepared, cast one grateful look of recognition at her old mistress, and then fell into a deep sleep. The next morning she awoke, entirely restored to reason, and, though still somewhat weak, able to go about the household tasks in which she had been once employed, and which she resumed at once without a question, and as if, indeed, they had never been interrupted for a day. The three years of misery were entirely blotted out of her memory; nor did any spectre from the past ever come back to trouble her.

[pg 235]CHAPTER XIX.IN JERUSALEM.Among those who watched the approach of Judas and his host to Jerusalem were two men, one in extreme old age, the other numbering, it would seem, about fifty years. They wore the priestly garments, old indeed and threadbare, but still clean and showing many signs of careful repair. Theirs was a strange history. For two years they had been in hiding in the city. When Apollonius had filled the streets of Jerusalem with blood, the murderers had sought with especial care for all priests and Levites. To them at least no mercy was to be shown. These two men—Shemaiah was the name of the elder of the two, and Joel that of the younger—had narrowly escaped death from the soldiers of Apollonius. They had taken refuge—so close was the pursuit—in a garden, the gate of which happened to be open, and had hidden themselves in the bushes till nightfall. Where they were, who or of what[pg 236]race was the owner of the house, whether they were likely to meet with more mercy from his hands than they could expect from the soldiers, they knew not. But that hiding-place was their only chance, and in their desperate strait they snatched at it. While they were debating in whispers whether they should throw themselves on the compassion of this unknown person, they saw—for it was a moonlight night—the figure of a woman walking down a path which passed close by their hiding-place. They could see from her features, which the brilliant moonlight of the East lighted up, that she was a countrywoman of their own, and they resolved to appeal to her for protection. Shemaiah, whose age and venerable appearance would, they judged, be less likely to alarm, threw himself on the ground at her feet. She started back in astonishment.“Lady,”he said,“I see that you are a daughter of Abraham. Can you help two servants of the Lord that have so far escaped from the sword of the Greeks?”She was reassured by a nearer view of the speaker.“Who are you?”she said.“Speak without fear, for there is no one to harm you.”Shemaiah told his story.“And your companion,”said Eglah—for that was the woman’s name—“where is he?”The old man called to Joel, who came forth at his bidding from his hiding-place.[pg 237]Eglah stood for a few minutes buried in thought. Then she spoke.“As I hope that the Lord will have mercy on me and pardon my sin, so will I help you even to the giving up of my life. But I am not worthy that you should come under my roof. Now listen to my story. When Antiochus—the Lord reward him for the evil that he has done to His people!—came to this city, I was seized and sold for a slave. And a certain Greek soldier, Glaucus by name, the captain of a company, bought me in the market. He had compassion on me, and dealt honourably with me, and made me his wife after the fashion of his people. And I consented to live with him, though I knew that it was a sin for a daughter of Abraham to be wife unto a man that was a heathen. But alas! sirs, what was I to do? for I was a weak woman, and there was no one to help me. Should I have slain him in his sleep, as Judith slew Holofernes? Once I thought to do so, and I took a dagger in my hand, but when I saw him I repented. Whether it was fear or love that turned me I know not. That I was afraid I know, for the very sight of the steel made me tremble. And I must confess that I loved him also, for he had been very kind and gentle with me; and there is not a goodlier man to look at in all Jerusalem.”“Be comforted, my daughter,”said Shemaiah, whose years had taught him a tolerance to which[pg 238]his younger companion had, perhaps, scarcely attained.“’Tis at least no sin for a wife to love her husband.”“Then you do not think me so wicked as to be beyond all hope?”cried poor Eglah, eagerly.“Nay, my daughter,”said the old man;“you were in a sore strait, and all women are not as Judith was.”“Then you will not refuse to come into my house? I have a large cellar where you can lie hid. ’Tis under the ground, indeed, but airy and dry, and you can make shift to live there. And I will feed you as best I may. My husband has an open hand, and never makes any question as to the money that I spend upon the house, and he will not know what I have done. I judge it best to keep the thing from him, not because I fear that he would betray you—for he is an honourable man and kindly, but it would go hard with him, being an officer in the army of the King, if it should be discovered that he knew it.”And so for two years Shemaiah and Joel had inhabited the cellar in Eglah’s house. Glaucus, the husband, was just the kindly, generous man whom his wife had described. Once or twice he had terrified her by some joking remark about the rapidity with which the provision purchased for the house disappeared.“When we dine together, my darling,”he said, on one occasion,“you eat what would be scarce enough for a well-favoured fly;[pg 239]but I am glad to think that you are hungry at other times.”“O husband,”she said,“there are many poor of my own people, and I cannot deny them.”She hoped as she said it that the falsehood would not be counted as another sin against her.“Nay, nay, darling,”said the good-natured man.“Give as much as thou wilt. Thank the gods and his Highness the King I have enough and to spare.”Glaucus, though allowed to live in his own house, had, of course, to spend much time upon his military duties, and was, consequently, often away. During his absence Eglah could bring out the two prisoners from their underground lodging, and allow them to enjoy the fresh air of the garden, which, happily, was not overlooked. She gave them the best food that her means would procure, and at the same time took pains, as has been said, to keep their garments scrupulously clean and neat. On the whole they passed the time of their captivity in tolerable comfort, and without much injury to their health. Latterly they had been cheered by the tidings, always given to them at the very earliest opportunity by their hostess, of the successes of Judas. Within the last few days Glaucus had told his wife that a decisive battle was expected, that it would probably be fought at Beth-zur, and that if her countrymen won it, there was nothing that could hinder them from taking possession of Jerusalem.[pg 240]Glaucus, who held a command in the garrison of the fort, had not been with Lysias at Beth-zur, but he had heard late on the evening of the day of the result of the battle and had, of course, told it to his wife, and she in turn had communicated it to her inmates. They had been scarcely able to sleep for joy, and had eagerly waited for news of the conqueror’s approach. Evening was come, and Eglah had not paid them the accustomed visit. The house was curiously silent; all day not a sound of voices or steps had reached their ears. And now the suspense had become unbearable.“Go forth,”said Shemaiah to his younger companion,“go forth, and bring me word again.”Joel crept out of his retreat. The streets were deserted; but the fortress was crowded. The garrison stood thickly clustered on the walls, and with them were many inhabitants of the city. It was easy to guess that what Glaucus had foretold had happened. Judas was on his way to take possession of Jerusalem, and all who had compromised themselves by resisting him, had either fled from the place altogether or had taken refuge in the fort. He returned to Shemaiah with a description of what he had seen, and the two at once hastened down to the walls to greet the deliverers.The sun was near its setting when they entered the city. Without turning to the right or left, though many must have been consumed with[pg 241]anxiety to hear the fate of kinsmen and friends, they marched to Mount Sion. It was an hour of triumph, the fruition of hopes passionately cherished through many a dark day of sorrow. To stand once more in the place which God had chosen to set His name there, how glorious. But it had its bitterness, as such hours will have, for it was a miserable sight that greeted them. Nothing, indeed, had been done of which they had not heard. There was nothing that they might not have expected or foreseen. Yet the actual view of the holy place in its dismal forlornness overpowered them. It was as if the sight had come upon them by surprise.“When they saw the Sanctuary desolate and the altar profaned, and the gates burnt with fire, and shrubs growing in the courts as in a forest or one of the mountains, and the chambers of the priests pulled down, they rent their clothes, and made great lamentations, and cast ashes upon their heads, and fell down flat to the ground upon their faces.”To repair this ruin, to put an end to this desolation, to purify the place which had been so shamefully polluted, was the first duty of the deliverers. But that the work might be done in peace it was necessary that the fortress of Acra, to use military language, should be masked. A strong force was told off to perform this duty; the rest would lend their aid to the great work of purification.[pg 242]CHAPTER XX.THE CLEANSING OF THE TEMPLE.Azariah and Micah had been put under John, the eldest of the five brothers, in command of the force employed to blockade the garrison of Acra. The night had passed quietly; the garrison had not attempted a sortie, and had not even harassed the besiegers with a discharge of missiles. And when the morning came they seemed inclined to continue the same inaction. From the high ground the two Jews looked down upon the Temple courts and saw the priests directing a crowd of eager helpers in the work of cleansing the Sanctuary, and labouring diligently with their own hands. The first task was to pull down the idol altar which had been erected on the altar of burnt-offering. This was done in a fury of haste. The hands of the workmen could not, it seemed, move fast enough in destroying the abominable thing. The stones were carried out of the temple with gestures of loathing and disgust,[pg 243]and afterwards taken to the Valley of Hinnom—unholy things to be cast away in an unholy place.But the stones of the holy altar itself had been polluted by the superstructure that had been erected upon them. What was to be done with them? At least it was manifest that they could not stand where they were. Sacrifice could not be offered upon them. They were reverently detached from the cement which bound them together, and then borne one by one to a chamber of the Temple, where they were to be laid up till a prophet should arise who should show what was to be done with them. The first duty of dealing with the altar completed, came the work of cleansing and repairing the courts and chambers. The long, trailing creepers were pulled down; the weeds and shrubs were rooted out. The place was still a ruin, but the manifest signs of its desolation and abandonment were removed. So numerous and so eager were the labourers that for this part of the work a few hours sufficed. The task of reparation would, of necessity, be longer and more tedious.Azariah and Micah had been watching the work with perhaps a more absorbing interest than was quite consistent with their duty of watching the garrison, when suddenly one of the sentries blew an alarm. Scarcely had it sounded when a flight of arrows from the garrison of the fortress fell among the besiegers. The Greeks had watched[pg 244]their opportunity, and when almost all eyes were turned on the work that was going on below, had sent a volley among the ranks of the enemy.This sudden attack did no little damage. One or two of the patriots were killed on the spot, several were seriously wounded; the others either covered themselves with their shields, a precaution which they ought not to have neglected, or sought refuge among the ruins.Azariah, though he had been caught a little off his guard, was not unprepared to deal with a manifestation of this kind. He had organized a company of slingers, and he now ordered them to advance and clear the wall of its defenders. They knelt with one knee upon the ground, and covered themselves with their shields. Under this shelter they loaded their slings. Then, rising rapidly at a preconcerted signal from their commander, they sent a simultaneous and well-directed shower of leaden bullets on the defenders of the wall. These missiles, sent with a skill and a strength in which the Jewish slingers were unsurpassed, had a marvellous effect. In a moment the wall was cleared, except that here and there along its length the dead and wounded might be seen. The survivors did not venture forth from shelter to carry them away. A fierce conflict followed. From the loopholes of the towers and from behind the battlements the Greek archers kept up the discharge of their arrows, and the Jewish[pg 245]slingers replied. No great damage was done on either side; but every now and then a skilful aim at some exposed body or limb was followed by a cry of pain from the wounded man, and the cry was taken up by a shout of triumph from the hostile force. In the course of the afternoon a storm came on, with thunder and lightning and a deluge of rain. Before it had cleared away the light had failed, and hostilities had perforce to be suspended.About the beginning of the second watch16Micah, who was making a round of the sentries, heard the sound of something that seemed to fall heavily upon the soft and plashy ground. The rain had ceased, and the sky had partially cleared; for a few minutes all was still; then Micah could hear a sighing which was not the sighing of the wind. He followed the guidance of the sound, and found a woman lying almost insensible upon the ground. He called one of the sentinels to help him, and together they carried her under shelter, and brought torches, by the light of which they might examine her injuries. That she was stunned by the fall was evident, for she did not speak, and when they attempted to move her she groaned with the pain. When left alone she did not seem to suffer much, and they judged it best to wait for the morning, administering meanwhile a little wine and water from time to time.[pg 246]The next morning four of the soldiers were told off to remove her on a litter that had been constructed for the use of the wounded to a deserted house in the Lower City—and of deserted houses there was only too great a choice. As the bearers put down their burden on the way to take a brief rest a strange figure came up to the party. It was a woman, young and still showing the remains of beauty, but with a miserably haggard look. It was easy to see from her uncertain gait and wandering eye that she was a lunatic.Huldah had been for some time a well-known figure in Jerusalem, and her story was of the saddest. She had been a servant in the house of Seraiah, and had been Ruth’s own waiting-maid. Returning home from some errand on which she had been sent one day at the beginning of Apollonius’s reign of terror, she had been seized by the attendants of the newly-dedicated Temple of Jupiter, and made a slave. Before many weeks had passed the cruel outrages to which she was subjected overthrew her reason. Thus become a trouble to her captors she was permitted to escape. Since then she had been accustomed to wander about the city. The horrors of the past still haunted her, and the recollection of the abominable idolatries in which she had been forced to serve. At every pool of water and fountain she would stay and wash. From every passer-by she would beg for something that might[pg 247]serve for her cleansing: it was the one craving of her soul to be rid of its defilement. For food or money she never asked; but a few kindly souls in the city gave her enough to support life, and sometimes would renew the garments, threadbare, but always scrupulously neat and clean, which she wore. Of these friends the kindest was Eglah, who had a fellow-feeling for the sufferer, and who was always on the watch to atone by her charitable deeds for what she believed to be the great offence of her life.Huldah cast a glance at the litter in passing, and at once recognized in the suffering woman her own benefactress. For indeed it was Eglah whom Micah had found under the fortress wall. The recognition made a marvellous change in the poor maniac. It turned her thoughts in another direction. She ceased to dwell upon her own sufferings, and, for the time at least, reason regained its sway.She knelt down by the side of the litter, and kissed one of the hands that hung listlessly down. Then, rising to her feet, she arranged the cushion on which Eglah lay so as to make it more comfortable. That done, she bade the bearers take up their burden, made a gesture of dissent when they were turning aside to the house to which they had been directed, and led the way to Eglah’s own dwelling.The unhappy creature was positively transformed by the charge which had thus been laid upon her. The most intelligent and thoughtful nurse could not[pg 248]have done better for her patient than did the poor distracted Huldah. A physician who was called in examined Eglah, and found that though she had been sadly bruised and shaken, no bones were broken. Whether any internal injury existed was more than he could positively say; that time alone would show. Meanwhile careful attention was all that could be done for her, and attention more careful than Huldah’s it would be impossible to imagine.The two priests who had found shelter in Eglah’s house were naturally among those whom Judas had summoned to take part in the cleansing of the Temple when he made proclamation for all such as, being of the House of Aaron, were“of blameless conversation and had pleasure in the Law.”Posts of special dignity were, indeed, conferred upon them, for both were men of high reputation for sanctity and learning, which was not a little increased by the romantic story of their long seclusion and marvellous escape. Judas assigned them quarters near to his own, and was accustomed to have frequent recourse to their advice. They thus found themselves almost constantly employed, and were unable for several days to find an opportunity of inquiring what had happened to their protectress.When at last they found their way to the house Eglah had sufficiently recovered her strength to be able to rise from her bed. She was sitting, busy with her needle. Huldah was watching her with[pg 249]an intense look of affection that was infinitely pathetic.The poor woman told her story with a voice that again and again was broken with sobs.“When I was preparing your morning meal in the kitchen my husband, whom I had never before known to set foot in the place, suddenly appeared. I was greatly terrified lest he should ask for whom I was getting the food ready, but he was too much occupied with other things to notice it at all.‘Eglah,’he said,‘you must come with me into the fort. Judas the Hammer has broken our army to pieces. Lysias has fled before him, no one knows whither, and within a few hours he will be in the city. I would have you here, for the fort is scarcely a place for a woman, but I fear your people. Haply they may slay you as having been yoked to a heathen. My darling,’he went on—and here poor Eglah’s voice was choked with tears—‘I have done ill for you, I fear; but I meant it for the best. And now, I fear, you must cast in your lot with me. May the God whom you serve turn it for good.’So I gathered a few things together, and went with him. I thought many times that we should scarcely have reached the fort alive, for the people cursed us as we went, the women especially casting many bitter words at me as one that had left her people to join herself to the heathen. But my husband had some six or seven soldiers with him; and they were brave men and[pg 250]well armed. We had not been many hours in the fort before there began a battle between the garrison and the soldiers of Judas. One of my husband’s men, who had gone in a spirit of folly and vanity to show his courage, was struck down with a stone, and my husband ran forth to drag him in. And just as he was returning, another stone from the slingers struck him on the back of his head. It was about the ninth hour of the day when he was wounded, and he lived till the beginning of the second watch, but he never spoke again.”Here the poor creature’s story became confused and broken, and her listeners could only guess what had followed. The tale of what followed must be told for her.“‘Ah!’said one of the soldiers,‘Glaucus has it. He will never move again, I reckon. A good fellow, but overstrict.’‘But how about the Jewish girl whom he calls his wife?’said the other;‘I shall take her.’‘Nay, nay; let there be fair play between us, comrade, as there has always been. Why you more than I?’‘Because I was the first to speak.’‘Not so; ’twas I that first spoke of her.’‘Well, we won’t quarrel, comrade. No woman is good enough to separate old friends. Let us cast the dice for her, and the man that wins shall stand treat for a flagon of wine.’And then Eglah heard them cast the dice, and count the numbers—they would have twenty throws a-piece, they said—and curse and swear when they[pg 251]threw low. And when they had finished their dice-throwing they came in to see how Glaucus fared; and just as they entered the chamber, he drew a long breath and died. One of them put his hand upon his heart and said,‘’Tis all over with him; he will never toss a flagon or kiss a pretty girl again.’And then he laid his hand upon Eglah’s shoulder, and said,‘Cheer up; we will find another husband for thee as good as he.’But the first said,‘Nay, Timon, leave her alone. The women are not like us. You must give them a few hours to cry.’‘Well, well,’said his comrade,‘you were always soft-hearted. Let us come and have our flagon; there is no reason why we should wait for that.’”The comrades went on their errand and left the widow alone with her dead husband. She kissed him, and cut off a little curl of his hair, and then went forth on the wall—for the chamber in which he lay was in one of the wall-towers—and threw herself down to the ground. It was better, she thought, to die than to sin again.“Daughter,”said Joel,“you should thank the Lord that, without your own doing, the tie that bound you to this heathen man is broken.”“O sir,”broke out the poor woman,“do not say so. I cannot find it in my heart to thank Him, though I do try to say in my heart,‘Thy will be done.’”“Brother,”said the old Shemaiah,“you are too hard upon her. ’Tis right that a wife should mourn[pg 252]for her husband, be he Jew or Greek. Before the Lord, I had thought ill of her had she been of the temper that you would have her.”Eglah turned to the old man a grateful look.“O sir,”she said,“you do not know how kind and good my Glaucus was. I never had an angry word from him. Nor did he ever hinder me from my prayers. Rather he would say when I went three times to my chamber to pray,‘Speak a word for me, wife, if you will.’And he would oftentimes speak to me about my God, and say that he liked Him better than the gods in whomhehad been taught to believe. And I used to tell him stories out of the Book, and how the Lord had delivered his people out of the land of Egypt, and had brought them into the land which He sware to Abraham to give him. And he never mocked or laughed, but listened with all his heart. And, sir, I do sometimes think that if he had been spared to live longer, he would have become one of us. But he is dead, and I shall never, never see him any more.”And the poor desolate widow burst out into a passion of tears, and threw herself prostrate on the couch, Huldah trying to comfort her, not with words—which, indeed, she could not command, and which, in any case, would have been of small avail—but with great demonstrations of love.After a while Eglah looked up, and turning to Shemaiah, in whose sympathy and charity she[pg 253]trusted, said,“O, sir, do you think that there is any hope for him? Must he go into that dreadful Gehenna? For indeed he was kind and good, and never thought of any woman but his wife, and never injured one of our people, but would help them and defend them when his fellows were rough with them. He was better than many Jews that I know. Is it not possible that God may have mercy upon him?”Joel was about to speak, but Shemaiah beckoned to him to hold his peace.“My daughter,”he said,“these things are too deep for us; but I would say, be of good hope for him that is gone, seeing that he was such as you say. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? To some He giveth much light, and to some but little; and He judgeth each according to that which He has given. Therefore I bid you be of good cheer.”“And may I pray for him?”asked Eglah.“Surely you may, for no prayer, so that it come out of an honest heart and pure lips, but finds some fulfilment.”17He rose and, giving her his blessing, departed, followed by Joel, whose narrow intelligence was not a little startled by what his old companion had said.[pg 254]CHAPTER XXI.THE DEDICATION OF THE TEMPLE.Jerusalem now began to assume an aspect very different from that which it had borne for some years past. Thousands, who had been driven away by the terrors of the evil days, now hastened to return. Many of the lower class, constrained by the necessity of poverty, had always remained, enduring persecution as best they could, and often, of course, escaping it by their obscurity. Now the wealthier inhabitants began to flock back from their hiding-places in the country and from foreign lands; the streets again began to be busy; the shopkeepers displayed the wares which there had been no one to purchase, or which they had been afraid to show; the long-shut markets were reopened and thronged with purchasers.The priests alone, gathered as they were from their abodes scattered throughout Palestine, made a considerable addition to the population of the[pg 255]city. They were a numerous class, far beyond any requirements of their sacrificial duties, and commonly remained at home, awaiting the rarely recurring occasion of services that called them to Jerusalem. But now a work was before them in which all could take part, for the Temple, having been cleansed and having received such repair as could be done at once, was to be dedicated afresh.The first necessary work was the construction of a new altar of sacrifice. This work was to be of the primitive kind, in strict conformity to the Law, and as unlike as possible to the elaborate erections of the alien worship, and it was to be done, from first to last, by the consecrated hands of the priests. They dug out of the earth of the valley rough stones. No tool of iron was to be used in raising them from their place; none was to be employed in hewing them into shape. It was the priests again who solemnly conveyed them into the Great Court of the Temple, who joined them together with mortar, and covered them with whitewash. Meanwhile other preparations for a wholly renovated service were being busily carried on. Most of the furniture of the Temple had been carried off by a succession of plunderers; if any of the less valuable and less easily removed articles had been left these had suffered an irremediable defilement. Everything therefore had to be replaced; and workmen were now busily employed[pg 256]in this work. The altar of incense, the candlestick with its seven branches, the table on which the loaves of the shew-bread were to be placed, the mercy-seat with the overshadowing cherubim that was the chief feature of the Holy of Holies, and the various curtains that were needed for the separation of the various parts of the building, were manufactured with all possible haste, some of the articles, from lack of time and materials, being intended to serve their purpose only till they could be more worthily replaced. Generally, however, it was time rather than means that was wanting, for in the late campaigns treasure almost enough to replace the spoliations of years had been taken from the Greeks, and this, after being duly purified and blessed, could be devoted to holy uses.And so came on the day that had been appointed for the Feast of Dedication. It was to be the 25th of the month Chisleu.18It was a memorable day, both for good and evil, in the annals of Jewish worship. On this day, ages before, Jerusalem, the newly-won capital of the nation, had been finally chosen as the place where God should set His name; for on this day David, as he made atonement in the day of pestilence, bought the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite to be the future dwelling-place of the Presence of the Lord God of Israel. And on this day, again, five years ago, the first[pg 257]idol sacrifice had been offered within the consecrated precincts.In the early morning, before the sun had risen upon the earth, a spark was obtained by striking stone against stone, the fire was rekindled on the altar, the golden candlestick was lighted and the table of the shew-bread duly furnished with its twelve loaves.Meanwhile the rest of the people also had been busy in making preparations for the great celebration. Every family, even the poorest, was to keep festival on the day that was to be a new beginning of the national life. The women and children were early afoot, gathering branches of palms and other“goodly trees”; none of them having busier hands than Ruth and her nieces. Even the little Daniel would take his part in the work, tottering along by his mother’s side with his arms full of boughs. When they had gathered as great a burden as they could carry, Ruth gathered her little company about her, and told them, just as the rising sun began to flood the valley with its slanting rays, the story of the day—of the glory and the shame which it had brought to Israel.And now, as the time of the morning sacrifice drew near, the whole people moved in one great stream towards the Temple, and the Great Court was crowded. On the walls of the fortress the heathen soldiers of the garrison stood in throngs watching the solemnities of the day. Some of them,[pg 258]of course, were ready with their mockery; but most looked on in respectful silence. Many of them had witnessed the prowess of these strange fanatics in the field. They might be given over to a“senseless and tasteless superstition,”but they could deal shrewd blows with their swords, and therefore they were not to be despised. No truce had been arranged, but one was tacitly observed. The forbearance of the Greeks was partly due to a wholesome awe of the Jewish archers and slingers, partly to a curiosity that, as has been said, was not wholly unmixed with respect.Then came the solemn ritual of sacrifice. This ended, the whole congregation of the people united in solemn supplication to the Lord God of Israel. Usually it was the custom to stand during the office of prayer; sometimes the attitude of kneeling was used; now, as if to express the intensity of their feeling, they threw themselves flat upon their faces, and poured out their entreaty that evils such as they had endured in the past might never again come upon them in the future.“O Lord,”—this was the burden of their prayer,—“if we sin against Thee any more, do Thou chasten us Thyself with Thine own hand, after the multitude of Thy mercies. Make us suffer that which shall seem good to Thee here in our own land, but scatter us no more among the heathen, and deliver us not again unto the nations that blaspheme Thy holy name.”[pg 259]The prayer ended, came the great Psalm of Thanksgiving; and then the people dispersed to their houses to hold festival. Their mirth was prolonged far into the night, which, indeed, was almost turned into day throughout the streets of Jerusalem, so brilliant was the light that streamed from the lamps set in almost every window.For eight days the Feast of Dedication was continued. Each day the services began with the customary morning sacrifice. At earliest dawn the Master of the Temple summoned the priests who had been watching round the fire in the gate-house as they waited for his summons. Then they went out and fetched the lamb for the burnt-offering. The creature had already been examined on the previous day, and pronounced to be free from spot or blemish. This done, they went outside the court in which the great altar stood, and watched for the coming day. The Mount of Olives stood between them and the East, and far behind it were the mountains of Moab. Here the first streaks of the morning light were to show themselves. Then the priest whose turn it was to slay the victim of the day bathed in the great laver. Thus purified for the performance of his office, he stirred up the burning embers from under the ashes of the altar, and added fresh fuel. This done, he was joined by the other priests, and the morning sacrifice was offered. Then followed the special ceremonies of the festival,[pg 260]among them the prayer for deliverance from captivity, as already given, and the singing of the great Thanksgiving. And every day the public services were followed by private rejoicings. No one could have believed that the rejoicing city, gay with its brightly dressed throngs of merry-makers and resounding with the music of tabret and harp, was the desolate place so long trodden down by the heathen. There had been days in the past when the most hopeful could scarcely discern any light in the darkness. But now they could see the“silver lining of the cloud.”In this very Temple, now dedicated afresh with such joyous zeal, but a few years before, the priests“had left the sacrifices when the game of the Discus called them forth.”That deadly folly had been purged with blood. The brutal violence of Antiochus had saved the nation from an imminent relapse into heathenism.Among the many hearts that were gladdened by these rejoicings there was one, as sorely burdened as any, that had found a complete deliverance from the troubles of the past. The unhappy Huldah, in proportion as her charge gained strength, and her work became less absorbing, had seemed to be falling back into her old condition. For the time her thoughts had been concentrated on the suffering Eglah; now they were free to be turned upon herself, her own troubles, her own dismal memories. Eglah did all she could to keep her employed, and[pg 261]the girl’s gentle and affectionate nature still felt her influence. Yet it was evident that unless some remedy could be found the old madness would resume its sway.On the first day of the Dedication festival, the two were standing together in the Court of the Women. The priests, who were making a circuit of the whole building, sprinkling everywhere the blood of purification, came in due course to the spot. As they performed their office a drop fell upon the garment of Huldah, who had been joining in the prayers with an earnestness almost frenzied. The effect was marvellous. In a moment the excitement passed away. Her eyes lost their wandering look, and, in a tone calmer and more collected than any that she had ever before been known to use since the time of her trouble, she said, showing the crimson spot to Eglah—“He has heard my prayer; He has sprinkled me with the blood of cleansing.”She stood silent and collected until the whole ritual was finished, and when the time for the hymn of thanksgiving came round joined her voice with a quiet happiness to the voices of the congregation.When the people returned to their homes Huldah left the Temple in company with Eglah. But it was evident that her strength was exhausted. She could barely totter along with all the help that Eglah and a neighbour could give her, and when she came to the house of Seraiah and Ruth, which happened[pg 262]to lie in her way, she sank almost unconscious to the ground. Providentially at that moment Ruth came up with her husband and the little Daniel.“She seemed so much better in the Temple—was quite calm and peaceful again—and now I am afraid that she is going to be very ill,”said Eglah.Woman’s wit suggested to Ruth a happy thought for dealing with the sufferer.“Leave her to me,”she said.“She was happy here once, and here, if it please the Lord, she will be happy again.”Ruth and her husband carried her into the house, and laid her upon her bed in her old chamber. Once there she was able to swallow a little broth which had been hastily prepared, cast one grateful look of recognition at her old mistress, and then fell into a deep sleep. The next morning she awoke, entirely restored to reason, and, though still somewhat weak, able to go about the household tasks in which she had been once employed, and which she resumed at once without a question, and as if, indeed, they had never been interrupted for a day. The three years of misery were entirely blotted out of her memory; nor did any spectre from the past ever come back to trouble her.

[pg 235]CHAPTER XIX.IN JERUSALEM.Among those who watched the approach of Judas and his host to Jerusalem were two men, one in extreme old age, the other numbering, it would seem, about fifty years. They wore the priestly garments, old indeed and threadbare, but still clean and showing many signs of careful repair. Theirs was a strange history. For two years they had been in hiding in the city. When Apollonius had filled the streets of Jerusalem with blood, the murderers had sought with especial care for all priests and Levites. To them at least no mercy was to be shown. These two men—Shemaiah was the name of the elder of the two, and Joel that of the younger—had narrowly escaped death from the soldiers of Apollonius. They had taken refuge—so close was the pursuit—in a garden, the gate of which happened to be open, and had hidden themselves in the bushes till nightfall. Where they were, who or of what[pg 236]race was the owner of the house, whether they were likely to meet with more mercy from his hands than they could expect from the soldiers, they knew not. But that hiding-place was their only chance, and in their desperate strait they snatched at it. While they were debating in whispers whether they should throw themselves on the compassion of this unknown person, they saw—for it was a moonlight night—the figure of a woman walking down a path which passed close by their hiding-place. They could see from her features, which the brilliant moonlight of the East lighted up, that she was a countrywoman of their own, and they resolved to appeal to her for protection. Shemaiah, whose age and venerable appearance would, they judged, be less likely to alarm, threw himself on the ground at her feet. She started back in astonishment.“Lady,”he said,“I see that you are a daughter of Abraham. Can you help two servants of the Lord that have so far escaped from the sword of the Greeks?”She was reassured by a nearer view of the speaker.“Who are you?”she said.“Speak without fear, for there is no one to harm you.”Shemaiah told his story.“And your companion,”said Eglah—for that was the woman’s name—“where is he?”The old man called to Joel, who came forth at his bidding from his hiding-place.[pg 237]Eglah stood for a few minutes buried in thought. Then she spoke.“As I hope that the Lord will have mercy on me and pardon my sin, so will I help you even to the giving up of my life. But I am not worthy that you should come under my roof. Now listen to my story. When Antiochus—the Lord reward him for the evil that he has done to His people!—came to this city, I was seized and sold for a slave. And a certain Greek soldier, Glaucus by name, the captain of a company, bought me in the market. He had compassion on me, and dealt honourably with me, and made me his wife after the fashion of his people. And I consented to live with him, though I knew that it was a sin for a daughter of Abraham to be wife unto a man that was a heathen. But alas! sirs, what was I to do? for I was a weak woman, and there was no one to help me. Should I have slain him in his sleep, as Judith slew Holofernes? Once I thought to do so, and I took a dagger in my hand, but when I saw him I repented. Whether it was fear or love that turned me I know not. That I was afraid I know, for the very sight of the steel made me tremble. And I must confess that I loved him also, for he had been very kind and gentle with me; and there is not a goodlier man to look at in all Jerusalem.”“Be comforted, my daughter,”said Shemaiah, whose years had taught him a tolerance to which[pg 238]his younger companion had, perhaps, scarcely attained.“’Tis at least no sin for a wife to love her husband.”“Then you do not think me so wicked as to be beyond all hope?”cried poor Eglah, eagerly.“Nay, my daughter,”said the old man;“you were in a sore strait, and all women are not as Judith was.”“Then you will not refuse to come into my house? I have a large cellar where you can lie hid. ’Tis under the ground, indeed, but airy and dry, and you can make shift to live there. And I will feed you as best I may. My husband has an open hand, and never makes any question as to the money that I spend upon the house, and he will not know what I have done. I judge it best to keep the thing from him, not because I fear that he would betray you—for he is an honourable man and kindly, but it would go hard with him, being an officer in the army of the King, if it should be discovered that he knew it.”And so for two years Shemaiah and Joel had inhabited the cellar in Eglah’s house. Glaucus, the husband, was just the kindly, generous man whom his wife had described. Once or twice he had terrified her by some joking remark about the rapidity with which the provision purchased for the house disappeared.“When we dine together, my darling,”he said, on one occasion,“you eat what would be scarce enough for a well-favoured fly;[pg 239]but I am glad to think that you are hungry at other times.”“O husband,”she said,“there are many poor of my own people, and I cannot deny them.”She hoped as she said it that the falsehood would not be counted as another sin against her.“Nay, nay, darling,”said the good-natured man.“Give as much as thou wilt. Thank the gods and his Highness the King I have enough and to spare.”Glaucus, though allowed to live in his own house, had, of course, to spend much time upon his military duties, and was, consequently, often away. During his absence Eglah could bring out the two prisoners from their underground lodging, and allow them to enjoy the fresh air of the garden, which, happily, was not overlooked. She gave them the best food that her means would procure, and at the same time took pains, as has been said, to keep their garments scrupulously clean and neat. On the whole they passed the time of their captivity in tolerable comfort, and without much injury to their health. Latterly they had been cheered by the tidings, always given to them at the very earliest opportunity by their hostess, of the successes of Judas. Within the last few days Glaucus had told his wife that a decisive battle was expected, that it would probably be fought at Beth-zur, and that if her countrymen won it, there was nothing that could hinder them from taking possession of Jerusalem.[pg 240]Glaucus, who held a command in the garrison of the fort, had not been with Lysias at Beth-zur, but he had heard late on the evening of the day of the result of the battle and had, of course, told it to his wife, and she in turn had communicated it to her inmates. They had been scarcely able to sleep for joy, and had eagerly waited for news of the conqueror’s approach. Evening was come, and Eglah had not paid them the accustomed visit. The house was curiously silent; all day not a sound of voices or steps had reached their ears. And now the suspense had become unbearable.“Go forth,”said Shemaiah to his younger companion,“go forth, and bring me word again.”Joel crept out of his retreat. The streets were deserted; but the fortress was crowded. The garrison stood thickly clustered on the walls, and with them were many inhabitants of the city. It was easy to guess that what Glaucus had foretold had happened. Judas was on his way to take possession of Jerusalem, and all who had compromised themselves by resisting him, had either fled from the place altogether or had taken refuge in the fort. He returned to Shemaiah with a description of what he had seen, and the two at once hastened down to the walls to greet the deliverers.The sun was near its setting when they entered the city. Without turning to the right or left, though many must have been consumed with[pg 241]anxiety to hear the fate of kinsmen and friends, they marched to Mount Sion. It was an hour of triumph, the fruition of hopes passionately cherished through many a dark day of sorrow. To stand once more in the place which God had chosen to set His name there, how glorious. But it had its bitterness, as such hours will have, for it was a miserable sight that greeted them. Nothing, indeed, had been done of which they had not heard. There was nothing that they might not have expected or foreseen. Yet the actual view of the holy place in its dismal forlornness overpowered them. It was as if the sight had come upon them by surprise.“When they saw the Sanctuary desolate and the altar profaned, and the gates burnt with fire, and shrubs growing in the courts as in a forest or one of the mountains, and the chambers of the priests pulled down, they rent their clothes, and made great lamentations, and cast ashes upon their heads, and fell down flat to the ground upon their faces.”To repair this ruin, to put an end to this desolation, to purify the place which had been so shamefully polluted, was the first duty of the deliverers. But that the work might be done in peace it was necessary that the fortress of Acra, to use military language, should be masked. A strong force was told off to perform this duty; the rest would lend their aid to the great work of purification.

Among those who watched the approach of Judas and his host to Jerusalem were two men, one in extreme old age, the other numbering, it would seem, about fifty years. They wore the priestly garments, old indeed and threadbare, but still clean and showing many signs of careful repair. Theirs was a strange history. For two years they had been in hiding in the city. When Apollonius had filled the streets of Jerusalem with blood, the murderers had sought with especial care for all priests and Levites. To them at least no mercy was to be shown. These two men—Shemaiah was the name of the elder of the two, and Joel that of the younger—had narrowly escaped death from the soldiers of Apollonius. They had taken refuge—so close was the pursuit—in a garden, the gate of which happened to be open, and had hidden themselves in the bushes till nightfall. Where they were, who or of what[pg 236]race was the owner of the house, whether they were likely to meet with more mercy from his hands than they could expect from the soldiers, they knew not. But that hiding-place was their only chance, and in their desperate strait they snatched at it. While they were debating in whispers whether they should throw themselves on the compassion of this unknown person, they saw—for it was a moonlight night—the figure of a woman walking down a path which passed close by their hiding-place. They could see from her features, which the brilliant moonlight of the East lighted up, that she was a countrywoman of their own, and they resolved to appeal to her for protection. Shemaiah, whose age and venerable appearance would, they judged, be less likely to alarm, threw himself on the ground at her feet. She started back in astonishment.

“Lady,”he said,“I see that you are a daughter of Abraham. Can you help two servants of the Lord that have so far escaped from the sword of the Greeks?”

She was reassured by a nearer view of the speaker.“Who are you?”she said.“Speak without fear, for there is no one to harm you.”

Shemaiah told his story.

“And your companion,”said Eglah—for that was the woman’s name—“where is he?”

The old man called to Joel, who came forth at his bidding from his hiding-place.

Eglah stood for a few minutes buried in thought. Then she spoke.

“As I hope that the Lord will have mercy on me and pardon my sin, so will I help you even to the giving up of my life. But I am not worthy that you should come under my roof. Now listen to my story. When Antiochus—the Lord reward him for the evil that he has done to His people!—came to this city, I was seized and sold for a slave. And a certain Greek soldier, Glaucus by name, the captain of a company, bought me in the market. He had compassion on me, and dealt honourably with me, and made me his wife after the fashion of his people. And I consented to live with him, though I knew that it was a sin for a daughter of Abraham to be wife unto a man that was a heathen. But alas! sirs, what was I to do? for I was a weak woman, and there was no one to help me. Should I have slain him in his sleep, as Judith slew Holofernes? Once I thought to do so, and I took a dagger in my hand, but when I saw him I repented. Whether it was fear or love that turned me I know not. That I was afraid I know, for the very sight of the steel made me tremble. And I must confess that I loved him also, for he had been very kind and gentle with me; and there is not a goodlier man to look at in all Jerusalem.”

“Be comforted, my daughter,”said Shemaiah, whose years had taught him a tolerance to which[pg 238]his younger companion had, perhaps, scarcely attained.“’Tis at least no sin for a wife to love her husband.”

“Then you do not think me so wicked as to be beyond all hope?”cried poor Eglah, eagerly.

“Nay, my daughter,”said the old man;“you were in a sore strait, and all women are not as Judith was.”

“Then you will not refuse to come into my house? I have a large cellar where you can lie hid. ’Tis under the ground, indeed, but airy and dry, and you can make shift to live there. And I will feed you as best I may. My husband has an open hand, and never makes any question as to the money that I spend upon the house, and he will not know what I have done. I judge it best to keep the thing from him, not because I fear that he would betray you—for he is an honourable man and kindly, but it would go hard with him, being an officer in the army of the King, if it should be discovered that he knew it.”

And so for two years Shemaiah and Joel had inhabited the cellar in Eglah’s house. Glaucus, the husband, was just the kindly, generous man whom his wife had described. Once or twice he had terrified her by some joking remark about the rapidity with which the provision purchased for the house disappeared.“When we dine together, my darling,”he said, on one occasion,“you eat what would be scarce enough for a well-favoured fly;[pg 239]but I am glad to think that you are hungry at other times.”“O husband,”she said,“there are many poor of my own people, and I cannot deny them.”She hoped as she said it that the falsehood would not be counted as another sin against her.“Nay, nay, darling,”said the good-natured man.“Give as much as thou wilt. Thank the gods and his Highness the King I have enough and to spare.”

Glaucus, though allowed to live in his own house, had, of course, to spend much time upon his military duties, and was, consequently, often away. During his absence Eglah could bring out the two prisoners from their underground lodging, and allow them to enjoy the fresh air of the garden, which, happily, was not overlooked. She gave them the best food that her means would procure, and at the same time took pains, as has been said, to keep their garments scrupulously clean and neat. On the whole they passed the time of their captivity in tolerable comfort, and without much injury to their health. Latterly they had been cheered by the tidings, always given to them at the very earliest opportunity by their hostess, of the successes of Judas. Within the last few days Glaucus had told his wife that a decisive battle was expected, that it would probably be fought at Beth-zur, and that if her countrymen won it, there was nothing that could hinder them from taking possession of Jerusalem.

Glaucus, who held a command in the garrison of the fort, had not been with Lysias at Beth-zur, but he had heard late on the evening of the day of the result of the battle and had, of course, told it to his wife, and she in turn had communicated it to her inmates. They had been scarcely able to sleep for joy, and had eagerly waited for news of the conqueror’s approach. Evening was come, and Eglah had not paid them the accustomed visit. The house was curiously silent; all day not a sound of voices or steps had reached their ears. And now the suspense had become unbearable.“Go forth,”said Shemaiah to his younger companion,“go forth, and bring me word again.”Joel crept out of his retreat. The streets were deserted; but the fortress was crowded. The garrison stood thickly clustered on the walls, and with them were many inhabitants of the city. It was easy to guess that what Glaucus had foretold had happened. Judas was on his way to take possession of Jerusalem, and all who had compromised themselves by resisting him, had either fled from the place altogether or had taken refuge in the fort. He returned to Shemaiah with a description of what he had seen, and the two at once hastened down to the walls to greet the deliverers.

The sun was near its setting when they entered the city. Without turning to the right or left, though many must have been consumed with[pg 241]anxiety to hear the fate of kinsmen and friends, they marched to Mount Sion. It was an hour of triumph, the fruition of hopes passionately cherished through many a dark day of sorrow. To stand once more in the place which God had chosen to set His name there, how glorious. But it had its bitterness, as such hours will have, for it was a miserable sight that greeted them. Nothing, indeed, had been done of which they had not heard. There was nothing that they might not have expected or foreseen. Yet the actual view of the holy place in its dismal forlornness overpowered them. It was as if the sight had come upon them by surprise.“When they saw the Sanctuary desolate and the altar profaned, and the gates burnt with fire, and shrubs growing in the courts as in a forest or one of the mountains, and the chambers of the priests pulled down, they rent their clothes, and made great lamentations, and cast ashes upon their heads, and fell down flat to the ground upon their faces.”

To repair this ruin, to put an end to this desolation, to purify the place which had been so shamefully polluted, was the first duty of the deliverers. But that the work might be done in peace it was necessary that the fortress of Acra, to use military language, should be masked. A strong force was told off to perform this duty; the rest would lend their aid to the great work of purification.

[pg 242]CHAPTER XX.THE CLEANSING OF THE TEMPLE.Azariah and Micah had been put under John, the eldest of the five brothers, in command of the force employed to blockade the garrison of Acra. The night had passed quietly; the garrison had not attempted a sortie, and had not even harassed the besiegers with a discharge of missiles. And when the morning came they seemed inclined to continue the same inaction. From the high ground the two Jews looked down upon the Temple courts and saw the priests directing a crowd of eager helpers in the work of cleansing the Sanctuary, and labouring diligently with their own hands. The first task was to pull down the idol altar which had been erected on the altar of burnt-offering. This was done in a fury of haste. The hands of the workmen could not, it seemed, move fast enough in destroying the abominable thing. The stones were carried out of the temple with gestures of loathing and disgust,[pg 243]and afterwards taken to the Valley of Hinnom—unholy things to be cast away in an unholy place.But the stones of the holy altar itself had been polluted by the superstructure that had been erected upon them. What was to be done with them? At least it was manifest that they could not stand where they were. Sacrifice could not be offered upon them. They were reverently detached from the cement which bound them together, and then borne one by one to a chamber of the Temple, where they were to be laid up till a prophet should arise who should show what was to be done with them. The first duty of dealing with the altar completed, came the work of cleansing and repairing the courts and chambers. The long, trailing creepers were pulled down; the weeds and shrubs were rooted out. The place was still a ruin, but the manifest signs of its desolation and abandonment were removed. So numerous and so eager were the labourers that for this part of the work a few hours sufficed. The task of reparation would, of necessity, be longer and more tedious.Azariah and Micah had been watching the work with perhaps a more absorbing interest than was quite consistent with their duty of watching the garrison, when suddenly one of the sentries blew an alarm. Scarcely had it sounded when a flight of arrows from the garrison of the fortress fell among the besiegers. The Greeks had watched[pg 244]their opportunity, and when almost all eyes were turned on the work that was going on below, had sent a volley among the ranks of the enemy.This sudden attack did no little damage. One or two of the patriots were killed on the spot, several were seriously wounded; the others either covered themselves with their shields, a precaution which they ought not to have neglected, or sought refuge among the ruins.Azariah, though he had been caught a little off his guard, was not unprepared to deal with a manifestation of this kind. He had organized a company of slingers, and he now ordered them to advance and clear the wall of its defenders. They knelt with one knee upon the ground, and covered themselves with their shields. Under this shelter they loaded their slings. Then, rising rapidly at a preconcerted signal from their commander, they sent a simultaneous and well-directed shower of leaden bullets on the defenders of the wall. These missiles, sent with a skill and a strength in which the Jewish slingers were unsurpassed, had a marvellous effect. In a moment the wall was cleared, except that here and there along its length the dead and wounded might be seen. The survivors did not venture forth from shelter to carry them away. A fierce conflict followed. From the loopholes of the towers and from behind the battlements the Greek archers kept up the discharge of their arrows, and the Jewish[pg 245]slingers replied. No great damage was done on either side; but every now and then a skilful aim at some exposed body or limb was followed by a cry of pain from the wounded man, and the cry was taken up by a shout of triumph from the hostile force. In the course of the afternoon a storm came on, with thunder and lightning and a deluge of rain. Before it had cleared away the light had failed, and hostilities had perforce to be suspended.About the beginning of the second watch16Micah, who was making a round of the sentries, heard the sound of something that seemed to fall heavily upon the soft and plashy ground. The rain had ceased, and the sky had partially cleared; for a few minutes all was still; then Micah could hear a sighing which was not the sighing of the wind. He followed the guidance of the sound, and found a woman lying almost insensible upon the ground. He called one of the sentinels to help him, and together they carried her under shelter, and brought torches, by the light of which they might examine her injuries. That she was stunned by the fall was evident, for she did not speak, and when they attempted to move her she groaned with the pain. When left alone she did not seem to suffer much, and they judged it best to wait for the morning, administering meanwhile a little wine and water from time to time.[pg 246]The next morning four of the soldiers were told off to remove her on a litter that had been constructed for the use of the wounded to a deserted house in the Lower City—and of deserted houses there was only too great a choice. As the bearers put down their burden on the way to take a brief rest a strange figure came up to the party. It was a woman, young and still showing the remains of beauty, but with a miserably haggard look. It was easy to see from her uncertain gait and wandering eye that she was a lunatic.Huldah had been for some time a well-known figure in Jerusalem, and her story was of the saddest. She had been a servant in the house of Seraiah, and had been Ruth’s own waiting-maid. Returning home from some errand on which she had been sent one day at the beginning of Apollonius’s reign of terror, she had been seized by the attendants of the newly-dedicated Temple of Jupiter, and made a slave. Before many weeks had passed the cruel outrages to which she was subjected overthrew her reason. Thus become a trouble to her captors she was permitted to escape. Since then she had been accustomed to wander about the city. The horrors of the past still haunted her, and the recollection of the abominable idolatries in which she had been forced to serve. At every pool of water and fountain she would stay and wash. From every passer-by she would beg for something that might[pg 247]serve for her cleansing: it was the one craving of her soul to be rid of its defilement. For food or money she never asked; but a few kindly souls in the city gave her enough to support life, and sometimes would renew the garments, threadbare, but always scrupulously neat and clean, which she wore. Of these friends the kindest was Eglah, who had a fellow-feeling for the sufferer, and who was always on the watch to atone by her charitable deeds for what she believed to be the great offence of her life.Huldah cast a glance at the litter in passing, and at once recognized in the suffering woman her own benefactress. For indeed it was Eglah whom Micah had found under the fortress wall. The recognition made a marvellous change in the poor maniac. It turned her thoughts in another direction. She ceased to dwell upon her own sufferings, and, for the time at least, reason regained its sway.She knelt down by the side of the litter, and kissed one of the hands that hung listlessly down. Then, rising to her feet, she arranged the cushion on which Eglah lay so as to make it more comfortable. That done, she bade the bearers take up their burden, made a gesture of dissent when they were turning aside to the house to which they had been directed, and led the way to Eglah’s own dwelling.The unhappy creature was positively transformed by the charge which had thus been laid upon her. The most intelligent and thoughtful nurse could not[pg 248]have done better for her patient than did the poor distracted Huldah. A physician who was called in examined Eglah, and found that though she had been sadly bruised and shaken, no bones were broken. Whether any internal injury existed was more than he could positively say; that time alone would show. Meanwhile careful attention was all that could be done for her, and attention more careful than Huldah’s it would be impossible to imagine.The two priests who had found shelter in Eglah’s house were naturally among those whom Judas had summoned to take part in the cleansing of the Temple when he made proclamation for all such as, being of the House of Aaron, were“of blameless conversation and had pleasure in the Law.”Posts of special dignity were, indeed, conferred upon them, for both were men of high reputation for sanctity and learning, which was not a little increased by the romantic story of their long seclusion and marvellous escape. Judas assigned them quarters near to his own, and was accustomed to have frequent recourse to their advice. They thus found themselves almost constantly employed, and were unable for several days to find an opportunity of inquiring what had happened to their protectress.When at last they found their way to the house Eglah had sufficiently recovered her strength to be able to rise from her bed. She was sitting, busy with her needle. Huldah was watching her with[pg 249]an intense look of affection that was infinitely pathetic.The poor woman told her story with a voice that again and again was broken with sobs.“When I was preparing your morning meal in the kitchen my husband, whom I had never before known to set foot in the place, suddenly appeared. I was greatly terrified lest he should ask for whom I was getting the food ready, but he was too much occupied with other things to notice it at all.‘Eglah,’he said,‘you must come with me into the fort. Judas the Hammer has broken our army to pieces. Lysias has fled before him, no one knows whither, and within a few hours he will be in the city. I would have you here, for the fort is scarcely a place for a woman, but I fear your people. Haply they may slay you as having been yoked to a heathen. My darling,’he went on—and here poor Eglah’s voice was choked with tears—‘I have done ill for you, I fear; but I meant it for the best. And now, I fear, you must cast in your lot with me. May the God whom you serve turn it for good.’So I gathered a few things together, and went with him. I thought many times that we should scarcely have reached the fort alive, for the people cursed us as we went, the women especially casting many bitter words at me as one that had left her people to join herself to the heathen. But my husband had some six or seven soldiers with him; and they were brave men and[pg 250]well armed. We had not been many hours in the fort before there began a battle between the garrison and the soldiers of Judas. One of my husband’s men, who had gone in a spirit of folly and vanity to show his courage, was struck down with a stone, and my husband ran forth to drag him in. And just as he was returning, another stone from the slingers struck him on the back of his head. It was about the ninth hour of the day when he was wounded, and he lived till the beginning of the second watch, but he never spoke again.”Here the poor creature’s story became confused and broken, and her listeners could only guess what had followed. The tale of what followed must be told for her.“‘Ah!’said one of the soldiers,‘Glaucus has it. He will never move again, I reckon. A good fellow, but overstrict.’‘But how about the Jewish girl whom he calls his wife?’said the other;‘I shall take her.’‘Nay, nay; let there be fair play between us, comrade, as there has always been. Why you more than I?’‘Because I was the first to speak.’‘Not so; ’twas I that first spoke of her.’‘Well, we won’t quarrel, comrade. No woman is good enough to separate old friends. Let us cast the dice for her, and the man that wins shall stand treat for a flagon of wine.’And then Eglah heard them cast the dice, and count the numbers—they would have twenty throws a-piece, they said—and curse and swear when they[pg 251]threw low. And when they had finished their dice-throwing they came in to see how Glaucus fared; and just as they entered the chamber, he drew a long breath and died. One of them put his hand upon his heart and said,‘’Tis all over with him; he will never toss a flagon or kiss a pretty girl again.’And then he laid his hand upon Eglah’s shoulder, and said,‘Cheer up; we will find another husband for thee as good as he.’But the first said,‘Nay, Timon, leave her alone. The women are not like us. You must give them a few hours to cry.’‘Well, well,’said his comrade,‘you were always soft-hearted. Let us come and have our flagon; there is no reason why we should wait for that.’”The comrades went on their errand and left the widow alone with her dead husband. She kissed him, and cut off a little curl of his hair, and then went forth on the wall—for the chamber in which he lay was in one of the wall-towers—and threw herself down to the ground. It was better, she thought, to die than to sin again.“Daughter,”said Joel,“you should thank the Lord that, without your own doing, the tie that bound you to this heathen man is broken.”“O sir,”broke out the poor woman,“do not say so. I cannot find it in my heart to thank Him, though I do try to say in my heart,‘Thy will be done.’”“Brother,”said the old Shemaiah,“you are too hard upon her. ’Tis right that a wife should mourn[pg 252]for her husband, be he Jew or Greek. Before the Lord, I had thought ill of her had she been of the temper that you would have her.”Eglah turned to the old man a grateful look.“O sir,”she said,“you do not know how kind and good my Glaucus was. I never had an angry word from him. Nor did he ever hinder me from my prayers. Rather he would say when I went three times to my chamber to pray,‘Speak a word for me, wife, if you will.’And he would oftentimes speak to me about my God, and say that he liked Him better than the gods in whomhehad been taught to believe. And I used to tell him stories out of the Book, and how the Lord had delivered his people out of the land of Egypt, and had brought them into the land which He sware to Abraham to give him. And he never mocked or laughed, but listened with all his heart. And, sir, I do sometimes think that if he had been spared to live longer, he would have become one of us. But he is dead, and I shall never, never see him any more.”And the poor desolate widow burst out into a passion of tears, and threw herself prostrate on the couch, Huldah trying to comfort her, not with words—which, indeed, she could not command, and which, in any case, would have been of small avail—but with great demonstrations of love.After a while Eglah looked up, and turning to Shemaiah, in whose sympathy and charity she[pg 253]trusted, said,“O, sir, do you think that there is any hope for him? Must he go into that dreadful Gehenna? For indeed he was kind and good, and never thought of any woman but his wife, and never injured one of our people, but would help them and defend them when his fellows were rough with them. He was better than many Jews that I know. Is it not possible that God may have mercy upon him?”Joel was about to speak, but Shemaiah beckoned to him to hold his peace.“My daughter,”he said,“these things are too deep for us; but I would say, be of good hope for him that is gone, seeing that he was such as you say. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? To some He giveth much light, and to some but little; and He judgeth each according to that which He has given. Therefore I bid you be of good cheer.”“And may I pray for him?”asked Eglah.“Surely you may, for no prayer, so that it come out of an honest heart and pure lips, but finds some fulfilment.”17He rose and, giving her his blessing, departed, followed by Joel, whose narrow intelligence was not a little startled by what his old companion had said.

Azariah and Micah had been put under John, the eldest of the five brothers, in command of the force employed to blockade the garrison of Acra. The night had passed quietly; the garrison had not attempted a sortie, and had not even harassed the besiegers with a discharge of missiles. And when the morning came they seemed inclined to continue the same inaction. From the high ground the two Jews looked down upon the Temple courts and saw the priests directing a crowd of eager helpers in the work of cleansing the Sanctuary, and labouring diligently with their own hands. The first task was to pull down the idol altar which had been erected on the altar of burnt-offering. This was done in a fury of haste. The hands of the workmen could not, it seemed, move fast enough in destroying the abominable thing. The stones were carried out of the temple with gestures of loathing and disgust,[pg 243]and afterwards taken to the Valley of Hinnom—unholy things to be cast away in an unholy place.

But the stones of the holy altar itself had been polluted by the superstructure that had been erected upon them. What was to be done with them? At least it was manifest that they could not stand where they were. Sacrifice could not be offered upon them. They were reverently detached from the cement which bound them together, and then borne one by one to a chamber of the Temple, where they were to be laid up till a prophet should arise who should show what was to be done with them. The first duty of dealing with the altar completed, came the work of cleansing and repairing the courts and chambers. The long, trailing creepers were pulled down; the weeds and shrubs were rooted out. The place was still a ruin, but the manifest signs of its desolation and abandonment were removed. So numerous and so eager were the labourers that for this part of the work a few hours sufficed. The task of reparation would, of necessity, be longer and more tedious.

Azariah and Micah had been watching the work with perhaps a more absorbing interest than was quite consistent with their duty of watching the garrison, when suddenly one of the sentries blew an alarm. Scarcely had it sounded when a flight of arrows from the garrison of the fortress fell among the besiegers. The Greeks had watched[pg 244]their opportunity, and when almost all eyes were turned on the work that was going on below, had sent a volley among the ranks of the enemy.

This sudden attack did no little damage. One or two of the patriots were killed on the spot, several were seriously wounded; the others either covered themselves with their shields, a precaution which they ought not to have neglected, or sought refuge among the ruins.

Azariah, though he had been caught a little off his guard, was not unprepared to deal with a manifestation of this kind. He had organized a company of slingers, and he now ordered them to advance and clear the wall of its defenders. They knelt with one knee upon the ground, and covered themselves with their shields. Under this shelter they loaded their slings. Then, rising rapidly at a preconcerted signal from their commander, they sent a simultaneous and well-directed shower of leaden bullets on the defenders of the wall. These missiles, sent with a skill and a strength in which the Jewish slingers were unsurpassed, had a marvellous effect. In a moment the wall was cleared, except that here and there along its length the dead and wounded might be seen. The survivors did not venture forth from shelter to carry them away. A fierce conflict followed. From the loopholes of the towers and from behind the battlements the Greek archers kept up the discharge of their arrows, and the Jewish[pg 245]slingers replied. No great damage was done on either side; but every now and then a skilful aim at some exposed body or limb was followed by a cry of pain from the wounded man, and the cry was taken up by a shout of triumph from the hostile force. In the course of the afternoon a storm came on, with thunder and lightning and a deluge of rain. Before it had cleared away the light had failed, and hostilities had perforce to be suspended.

About the beginning of the second watch16Micah, who was making a round of the sentries, heard the sound of something that seemed to fall heavily upon the soft and plashy ground. The rain had ceased, and the sky had partially cleared; for a few minutes all was still; then Micah could hear a sighing which was not the sighing of the wind. He followed the guidance of the sound, and found a woman lying almost insensible upon the ground. He called one of the sentinels to help him, and together they carried her under shelter, and brought torches, by the light of which they might examine her injuries. That she was stunned by the fall was evident, for she did not speak, and when they attempted to move her she groaned with the pain. When left alone she did not seem to suffer much, and they judged it best to wait for the morning, administering meanwhile a little wine and water from time to time.

The next morning four of the soldiers were told off to remove her on a litter that had been constructed for the use of the wounded to a deserted house in the Lower City—and of deserted houses there was only too great a choice. As the bearers put down their burden on the way to take a brief rest a strange figure came up to the party. It was a woman, young and still showing the remains of beauty, but with a miserably haggard look. It was easy to see from her uncertain gait and wandering eye that she was a lunatic.

Huldah had been for some time a well-known figure in Jerusalem, and her story was of the saddest. She had been a servant in the house of Seraiah, and had been Ruth’s own waiting-maid. Returning home from some errand on which she had been sent one day at the beginning of Apollonius’s reign of terror, she had been seized by the attendants of the newly-dedicated Temple of Jupiter, and made a slave. Before many weeks had passed the cruel outrages to which she was subjected overthrew her reason. Thus become a trouble to her captors she was permitted to escape. Since then she had been accustomed to wander about the city. The horrors of the past still haunted her, and the recollection of the abominable idolatries in which she had been forced to serve. At every pool of water and fountain she would stay and wash. From every passer-by she would beg for something that might[pg 247]serve for her cleansing: it was the one craving of her soul to be rid of its defilement. For food or money she never asked; but a few kindly souls in the city gave her enough to support life, and sometimes would renew the garments, threadbare, but always scrupulously neat and clean, which she wore. Of these friends the kindest was Eglah, who had a fellow-feeling for the sufferer, and who was always on the watch to atone by her charitable deeds for what she believed to be the great offence of her life.

Huldah cast a glance at the litter in passing, and at once recognized in the suffering woman her own benefactress. For indeed it was Eglah whom Micah had found under the fortress wall. The recognition made a marvellous change in the poor maniac. It turned her thoughts in another direction. She ceased to dwell upon her own sufferings, and, for the time at least, reason regained its sway.

She knelt down by the side of the litter, and kissed one of the hands that hung listlessly down. Then, rising to her feet, she arranged the cushion on which Eglah lay so as to make it more comfortable. That done, she bade the bearers take up their burden, made a gesture of dissent when they were turning aside to the house to which they had been directed, and led the way to Eglah’s own dwelling.

The unhappy creature was positively transformed by the charge which had thus been laid upon her. The most intelligent and thoughtful nurse could not[pg 248]have done better for her patient than did the poor distracted Huldah. A physician who was called in examined Eglah, and found that though she had been sadly bruised and shaken, no bones were broken. Whether any internal injury existed was more than he could positively say; that time alone would show. Meanwhile careful attention was all that could be done for her, and attention more careful than Huldah’s it would be impossible to imagine.

The two priests who had found shelter in Eglah’s house were naturally among those whom Judas had summoned to take part in the cleansing of the Temple when he made proclamation for all such as, being of the House of Aaron, were“of blameless conversation and had pleasure in the Law.”Posts of special dignity were, indeed, conferred upon them, for both were men of high reputation for sanctity and learning, which was not a little increased by the romantic story of their long seclusion and marvellous escape. Judas assigned them quarters near to his own, and was accustomed to have frequent recourse to their advice. They thus found themselves almost constantly employed, and were unable for several days to find an opportunity of inquiring what had happened to their protectress.

When at last they found their way to the house Eglah had sufficiently recovered her strength to be able to rise from her bed. She was sitting, busy with her needle. Huldah was watching her with[pg 249]an intense look of affection that was infinitely pathetic.

The poor woman told her story with a voice that again and again was broken with sobs.

“When I was preparing your morning meal in the kitchen my husband, whom I had never before known to set foot in the place, suddenly appeared. I was greatly terrified lest he should ask for whom I was getting the food ready, but he was too much occupied with other things to notice it at all.‘Eglah,’he said,‘you must come with me into the fort. Judas the Hammer has broken our army to pieces. Lysias has fled before him, no one knows whither, and within a few hours he will be in the city. I would have you here, for the fort is scarcely a place for a woman, but I fear your people. Haply they may slay you as having been yoked to a heathen. My darling,’he went on—and here poor Eglah’s voice was choked with tears—‘I have done ill for you, I fear; but I meant it for the best. And now, I fear, you must cast in your lot with me. May the God whom you serve turn it for good.’So I gathered a few things together, and went with him. I thought many times that we should scarcely have reached the fort alive, for the people cursed us as we went, the women especially casting many bitter words at me as one that had left her people to join herself to the heathen. But my husband had some six or seven soldiers with him; and they were brave men and[pg 250]well armed. We had not been many hours in the fort before there began a battle between the garrison and the soldiers of Judas. One of my husband’s men, who had gone in a spirit of folly and vanity to show his courage, was struck down with a stone, and my husband ran forth to drag him in. And just as he was returning, another stone from the slingers struck him on the back of his head. It was about the ninth hour of the day when he was wounded, and he lived till the beginning of the second watch, but he never spoke again.”

Here the poor creature’s story became confused and broken, and her listeners could only guess what had followed. The tale of what followed must be told for her.“‘Ah!’said one of the soldiers,‘Glaucus has it. He will never move again, I reckon. A good fellow, but overstrict.’‘But how about the Jewish girl whom he calls his wife?’said the other;‘I shall take her.’‘Nay, nay; let there be fair play between us, comrade, as there has always been. Why you more than I?’‘Because I was the first to speak.’‘Not so; ’twas I that first spoke of her.’‘Well, we won’t quarrel, comrade. No woman is good enough to separate old friends. Let us cast the dice for her, and the man that wins shall stand treat for a flagon of wine.’And then Eglah heard them cast the dice, and count the numbers—they would have twenty throws a-piece, they said—and curse and swear when they[pg 251]threw low. And when they had finished their dice-throwing they came in to see how Glaucus fared; and just as they entered the chamber, he drew a long breath and died. One of them put his hand upon his heart and said,‘’Tis all over with him; he will never toss a flagon or kiss a pretty girl again.’And then he laid his hand upon Eglah’s shoulder, and said,‘Cheer up; we will find another husband for thee as good as he.’But the first said,‘Nay, Timon, leave her alone. The women are not like us. You must give them a few hours to cry.’‘Well, well,’said his comrade,‘you were always soft-hearted. Let us come and have our flagon; there is no reason why we should wait for that.’”The comrades went on their errand and left the widow alone with her dead husband. She kissed him, and cut off a little curl of his hair, and then went forth on the wall—for the chamber in which he lay was in one of the wall-towers—and threw herself down to the ground. It was better, she thought, to die than to sin again.

“Daughter,”said Joel,“you should thank the Lord that, without your own doing, the tie that bound you to this heathen man is broken.”

“O sir,”broke out the poor woman,“do not say so. I cannot find it in my heart to thank Him, though I do try to say in my heart,‘Thy will be done.’”

“Brother,”said the old Shemaiah,“you are too hard upon her. ’Tis right that a wife should mourn[pg 252]for her husband, be he Jew or Greek. Before the Lord, I had thought ill of her had she been of the temper that you would have her.”

Eglah turned to the old man a grateful look.“O sir,”she said,“you do not know how kind and good my Glaucus was. I never had an angry word from him. Nor did he ever hinder me from my prayers. Rather he would say when I went three times to my chamber to pray,‘Speak a word for me, wife, if you will.’And he would oftentimes speak to me about my God, and say that he liked Him better than the gods in whomhehad been taught to believe. And I used to tell him stories out of the Book, and how the Lord had delivered his people out of the land of Egypt, and had brought them into the land which He sware to Abraham to give him. And he never mocked or laughed, but listened with all his heart. And, sir, I do sometimes think that if he had been spared to live longer, he would have become one of us. But he is dead, and I shall never, never see him any more.”

And the poor desolate widow burst out into a passion of tears, and threw herself prostrate on the couch, Huldah trying to comfort her, not with words—which, indeed, she could not command, and which, in any case, would have been of small avail—but with great demonstrations of love.

After a while Eglah looked up, and turning to Shemaiah, in whose sympathy and charity she[pg 253]trusted, said,“O, sir, do you think that there is any hope for him? Must he go into that dreadful Gehenna? For indeed he was kind and good, and never thought of any woman but his wife, and never injured one of our people, but would help them and defend them when his fellows were rough with them. He was better than many Jews that I know. Is it not possible that God may have mercy upon him?”

Joel was about to speak, but Shemaiah beckoned to him to hold his peace.“My daughter,”he said,“these things are too deep for us; but I would say, be of good hope for him that is gone, seeing that he was such as you say. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? To some He giveth much light, and to some but little; and He judgeth each according to that which He has given. Therefore I bid you be of good cheer.”

“And may I pray for him?”asked Eglah.

“Surely you may, for no prayer, so that it come out of an honest heart and pure lips, but finds some fulfilment.”17

He rose and, giving her his blessing, departed, followed by Joel, whose narrow intelligence was not a little startled by what his old companion had said.

[pg 254]CHAPTER XXI.THE DEDICATION OF THE TEMPLE.Jerusalem now began to assume an aspect very different from that which it had borne for some years past. Thousands, who had been driven away by the terrors of the evil days, now hastened to return. Many of the lower class, constrained by the necessity of poverty, had always remained, enduring persecution as best they could, and often, of course, escaping it by their obscurity. Now the wealthier inhabitants began to flock back from their hiding-places in the country and from foreign lands; the streets again began to be busy; the shopkeepers displayed the wares which there had been no one to purchase, or which they had been afraid to show; the long-shut markets were reopened and thronged with purchasers.The priests alone, gathered as they were from their abodes scattered throughout Palestine, made a considerable addition to the population of the[pg 255]city. They were a numerous class, far beyond any requirements of their sacrificial duties, and commonly remained at home, awaiting the rarely recurring occasion of services that called them to Jerusalem. But now a work was before them in which all could take part, for the Temple, having been cleansed and having received such repair as could be done at once, was to be dedicated afresh.The first necessary work was the construction of a new altar of sacrifice. This work was to be of the primitive kind, in strict conformity to the Law, and as unlike as possible to the elaborate erections of the alien worship, and it was to be done, from first to last, by the consecrated hands of the priests. They dug out of the earth of the valley rough stones. No tool of iron was to be used in raising them from their place; none was to be employed in hewing them into shape. It was the priests again who solemnly conveyed them into the Great Court of the Temple, who joined them together with mortar, and covered them with whitewash. Meanwhile other preparations for a wholly renovated service were being busily carried on. Most of the furniture of the Temple had been carried off by a succession of plunderers; if any of the less valuable and less easily removed articles had been left these had suffered an irremediable defilement. Everything therefore had to be replaced; and workmen were now busily employed[pg 256]in this work. The altar of incense, the candlestick with its seven branches, the table on which the loaves of the shew-bread were to be placed, the mercy-seat with the overshadowing cherubim that was the chief feature of the Holy of Holies, and the various curtains that were needed for the separation of the various parts of the building, were manufactured with all possible haste, some of the articles, from lack of time and materials, being intended to serve their purpose only till they could be more worthily replaced. Generally, however, it was time rather than means that was wanting, for in the late campaigns treasure almost enough to replace the spoliations of years had been taken from the Greeks, and this, after being duly purified and blessed, could be devoted to holy uses.And so came on the day that had been appointed for the Feast of Dedication. It was to be the 25th of the month Chisleu.18It was a memorable day, both for good and evil, in the annals of Jewish worship. On this day, ages before, Jerusalem, the newly-won capital of the nation, had been finally chosen as the place where God should set His name; for on this day David, as he made atonement in the day of pestilence, bought the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite to be the future dwelling-place of the Presence of the Lord God of Israel. And on this day, again, five years ago, the first[pg 257]idol sacrifice had been offered within the consecrated precincts.In the early morning, before the sun had risen upon the earth, a spark was obtained by striking stone against stone, the fire was rekindled on the altar, the golden candlestick was lighted and the table of the shew-bread duly furnished with its twelve loaves.Meanwhile the rest of the people also had been busy in making preparations for the great celebration. Every family, even the poorest, was to keep festival on the day that was to be a new beginning of the national life. The women and children were early afoot, gathering branches of palms and other“goodly trees”; none of them having busier hands than Ruth and her nieces. Even the little Daniel would take his part in the work, tottering along by his mother’s side with his arms full of boughs. When they had gathered as great a burden as they could carry, Ruth gathered her little company about her, and told them, just as the rising sun began to flood the valley with its slanting rays, the story of the day—of the glory and the shame which it had brought to Israel.And now, as the time of the morning sacrifice drew near, the whole people moved in one great stream towards the Temple, and the Great Court was crowded. On the walls of the fortress the heathen soldiers of the garrison stood in throngs watching the solemnities of the day. Some of them,[pg 258]of course, were ready with their mockery; but most looked on in respectful silence. Many of them had witnessed the prowess of these strange fanatics in the field. They might be given over to a“senseless and tasteless superstition,”but they could deal shrewd blows with their swords, and therefore they were not to be despised. No truce had been arranged, but one was tacitly observed. The forbearance of the Greeks was partly due to a wholesome awe of the Jewish archers and slingers, partly to a curiosity that, as has been said, was not wholly unmixed with respect.Then came the solemn ritual of sacrifice. This ended, the whole congregation of the people united in solemn supplication to the Lord God of Israel. Usually it was the custom to stand during the office of prayer; sometimes the attitude of kneeling was used; now, as if to express the intensity of their feeling, they threw themselves flat upon their faces, and poured out their entreaty that evils such as they had endured in the past might never again come upon them in the future.“O Lord,”—this was the burden of their prayer,—“if we sin against Thee any more, do Thou chasten us Thyself with Thine own hand, after the multitude of Thy mercies. Make us suffer that which shall seem good to Thee here in our own land, but scatter us no more among the heathen, and deliver us not again unto the nations that blaspheme Thy holy name.”[pg 259]The prayer ended, came the great Psalm of Thanksgiving; and then the people dispersed to their houses to hold festival. Their mirth was prolonged far into the night, which, indeed, was almost turned into day throughout the streets of Jerusalem, so brilliant was the light that streamed from the lamps set in almost every window.For eight days the Feast of Dedication was continued. Each day the services began with the customary morning sacrifice. At earliest dawn the Master of the Temple summoned the priests who had been watching round the fire in the gate-house as they waited for his summons. Then they went out and fetched the lamb for the burnt-offering. The creature had already been examined on the previous day, and pronounced to be free from spot or blemish. This done, they went outside the court in which the great altar stood, and watched for the coming day. The Mount of Olives stood between them and the East, and far behind it were the mountains of Moab. Here the first streaks of the morning light were to show themselves. Then the priest whose turn it was to slay the victim of the day bathed in the great laver. Thus purified for the performance of his office, he stirred up the burning embers from under the ashes of the altar, and added fresh fuel. This done, he was joined by the other priests, and the morning sacrifice was offered. Then followed the special ceremonies of the festival,[pg 260]among them the prayer for deliverance from captivity, as already given, and the singing of the great Thanksgiving. And every day the public services were followed by private rejoicings. No one could have believed that the rejoicing city, gay with its brightly dressed throngs of merry-makers and resounding with the music of tabret and harp, was the desolate place so long trodden down by the heathen. There had been days in the past when the most hopeful could scarcely discern any light in the darkness. But now they could see the“silver lining of the cloud.”In this very Temple, now dedicated afresh with such joyous zeal, but a few years before, the priests“had left the sacrifices when the game of the Discus called them forth.”That deadly folly had been purged with blood. The brutal violence of Antiochus had saved the nation from an imminent relapse into heathenism.Among the many hearts that were gladdened by these rejoicings there was one, as sorely burdened as any, that had found a complete deliverance from the troubles of the past. The unhappy Huldah, in proportion as her charge gained strength, and her work became less absorbing, had seemed to be falling back into her old condition. For the time her thoughts had been concentrated on the suffering Eglah; now they were free to be turned upon herself, her own troubles, her own dismal memories. Eglah did all she could to keep her employed, and[pg 261]the girl’s gentle and affectionate nature still felt her influence. Yet it was evident that unless some remedy could be found the old madness would resume its sway.On the first day of the Dedication festival, the two were standing together in the Court of the Women. The priests, who were making a circuit of the whole building, sprinkling everywhere the blood of purification, came in due course to the spot. As they performed their office a drop fell upon the garment of Huldah, who had been joining in the prayers with an earnestness almost frenzied. The effect was marvellous. In a moment the excitement passed away. Her eyes lost their wandering look, and, in a tone calmer and more collected than any that she had ever before been known to use since the time of her trouble, she said, showing the crimson spot to Eglah—“He has heard my prayer; He has sprinkled me with the blood of cleansing.”She stood silent and collected until the whole ritual was finished, and when the time for the hymn of thanksgiving came round joined her voice with a quiet happiness to the voices of the congregation.When the people returned to their homes Huldah left the Temple in company with Eglah. But it was evident that her strength was exhausted. She could barely totter along with all the help that Eglah and a neighbour could give her, and when she came to the house of Seraiah and Ruth, which happened[pg 262]to lie in her way, she sank almost unconscious to the ground. Providentially at that moment Ruth came up with her husband and the little Daniel.“She seemed so much better in the Temple—was quite calm and peaceful again—and now I am afraid that she is going to be very ill,”said Eglah.Woman’s wit suggested to Ruth a happy thought for dealing with the sufferer.“Leave her to me,”she said.“She was happy here once, and here, if it please the Lord, she will be happy again.”Ruth and her husband carried her into the house, and laid her upon her bed in her old chamber. Once there she was able to swallow a little broth which had been hastily prepared, cast one grateful look of recognition at her old mistress, and then fell into a deep sleep. The next morning she awoke, entirely restored to reason, and, though still somewhat weak, able to go about the household tasks in which she had been once employed, and which she resumed at once without a question, and as if, indeed, they had never been interrupted for a day. The three years of misery were entirely blotted out of her memory; nor did any spectre from the past ever come back to trouble her.

Jerusalem now began to assume an aspect very different from that which it had borne for some years past. Thousands, who had been driven away by the terrors of the evil days, now hastened to return. Many of the lower class, constrained by the necessity of poverty, had always remained, enduring persecution as best they could, and often, of course, escaping it by their obscurity. Now the wealthier inhabitants began to flock back from their hiding-places in the country and from foreign lands; the streets again began to be busy; the shopkeepers displayed the wares which there had been no one to purchase, or which they had been afraid to show; the long-shut markets were reopened and thronged with purchasers.

The priests alone, gathered as they were from their abodes scattered throughout Palestine, made a considerable addition to the population of the[pg 255]city. They were a numerous class, far beyond any requirements of their sacrificial duties, and commonly remained at home, awaiting the rarely recurring occasion of services that called them to Jerusalem. But now a work was before them in which all could take part, for the Temple, having been cleansed and having received such repair as could be done at once, was to be dedicated afresh.

The first necessary work was the construction of a new altar of sacrifice. This work was to be of the primitive kind, in strict conformity to the Law, and as unlike as possible to the elaborate erections of the alien worship, and it was to be done, from first to last, by the consecrated hands of the priests. They dug out of the earth of the valley rough stones. No tool of iron was to be used in raising them from their place; none was to be employed in hewing them into shape. It was the priests again who solemnly conveyed them into the Great Court of the Temple, who joined them together with mortar, and covered them with whitewash. Meanwhile other preparations for a wholly renovated service were being busily carried on. Most of the furniture of the Temple had been carried off by a succession of plunderers; if any of the less valuable and less easily removed articles had been left these had suffered an irremediable defilement. Everything therefore had to be replaced; and workmen were now busily employed[pg 256]in this work. The altar of incense, the candlestick with its seven branches, the table on which the loaves of the shew-bread were to be placed, the mercy-seat with the overshadowing cherubim that was the chief feature of the Holy of Holies, and the various curtains that were needed for the separation of the various parts of the building, were manufactured with all possible haste, some of the articles, from lack of time and materials, being intended to serve their purpose only till they could be more worthily replaced. Generally, however, it was time rather than means that was wanting, for in the late campaigns treasure almost enough to replace the spoliations of years had been taken from the Greeks, and this, after being duly purified and blessed, could be devoted to holy uses.

And so came on the day that had been appointed for the Feast of Dedication. It was to be the 25th of the month Chisleu.18It was a memorable day, both for good and evil, in the annals of Jewish worship. On this day, ages before, Jerusalem, the newly-won capital of the nation, had been finally chosen as the place where God should set His name; for on this day David, as he made atonement in the day of pestilence, bought the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite to be the future dwelling-place of the Presence of the Lord God of Israel. And on this day, again, five years ago, the first[pg 257]idol sacrifice had been offered within the consecrated precincts.

In the early morning, before the sun had risen upon the earth, a spark was obtained by striking stone against stone, the fire was rekindled on the altar, the golden candlestick was lighted and the table of the shew-bread duly furnished with its twelve loaves.

Meanwhile the rest of the people also had been busy in making preparations for the great celebration. Every family, even the poorest, was to keep festival on the day that was to be a new beginning of the national life. The women and children were early afoot, gathering branches of palms and other“goodly trees”; none of them having busier hands than Ruth and her nieces. Even the little Daniel would take his part in the work, tottering along by his mother’s side with his arms full of boughs. When they had gathered as great a burden as they could carry, Ruth gathered her little company about her, and told them, just as the rising sun began to flood the valley with its slanting rays, the story of the day—of the glory and the shame which it had brought to Israel.

And now, as the time of the morning sacrifice drew near, the whole people moved in one great stream towards the Temple, and the Great Court was crowded. On the walls of the fortress the heathen soldiers of the garrison stood in throngs watching the solemnities of the day. Some of them,[pg 258]of course, were ready with their mockery; but most looked on in respectful silence. Many of them had witnessed the prowess of these strange fanatics in the field. They might be given over to a“senseless and tasteless superstition,”but they could deal shrewd blows with their swords, and therefore they were not to be despised. No truce had been arranged, but one was tacitly observed. The forbearance of the Greeks was partly due to a wholesome awe of the Jewish archers and slingers, partly to a curiosity that, as has been said, was not wholly unmixed with respect.

Then came the solemn ritual of sacrifice. This ended, the whole congregation of the people united in solemn supplication to the Lord God of Israel. Usually it was the custom to stand during the office of prayer; sometimes the attitude of kneeling was used; now, as if to express the intensity of their feeling, they threw themselves flat upon their faces, and poured out their entreaty that evils such as they had endured in the past might never again come upon them in the future.“O Lord,”—this was the burden of their prayer,—“if we sin against Thee any more, do Thou chasten us Thyself with Thine own hand, after the multitude of Thy mercies. Make us suffer that which shall seem good to Thee here in our own land, but scatter us no more among the heathen, and deliver us not again unto the nations that blaspheme Thy holy name.”

The prayer ended, came the great Psalm of Thanksgiving; and then the people dispersed to their houses to hold festival. Their mirth was prolonged far into the night, which, indeed, was almost turned into day throughout the streets of Jerusalem, so brilliant was the light that streamed from the lamps set in almost every window.

For eight days the Feast of Dedication was continued. Each day the services began with the customary morning sacrifice. At earliest dawn the Master of the Temple summoned the priests who had been watching round the fire in the gate-house as they waited for his summons. Then they went out and fetched the lamb for the burnt-offering. The creature had already been examined on the previous day, and pronounced to be free from spot or blemish. This done, they went outside the court in which the great altar stood, and watched for the coming day. The Mount of Olives stood between them and the East, and far behind it were the mountains of Moab. Here the first streaks of the morning light were to show themselves. Then the priest whose turn it was to slay the victim of the day bathed in the great laver. Thus purified for the performance of his office, he stirred up the burning embers from under the ashes of the altar, and added fresh fuel. This done, he was joined by the other priests, and the morning sacrifice was offered. Then followed the special ceremonies of the festival,[pg 260]among them the prayer for deliverance from captivity, as already given, and the singing of the great Thanksgiving. And every day the public services were followed by private rejoicings. No one could have believed that the rejoicing city, gay with its brightly dressed throngs of merry-makers and resounding with the music of tabret and harp, was the desolate place so long trodden down by the heathen. There had been days in the past when the most hopeful could scarcely discern any light in the darkness. But now they could see the“silver lining of the cloud.”In this very Temple, now dedicated afresh with such joyous zeal, but a few years before, the priests“had left the sacrifices when the game of the Discus called them forth.”That deadly folly had been purged with blood. The brutal violence of Antiochus had saved the nation from an imminent relapse into heathenism.

Among the many hearts that were gladdened by these rejoicings there was one, as sorely burdened as any, that had found a complete deliverance from the troubles of the past. The unhappy Huldah, in proportion as her charge gained strength, and her work became less absorbing, had seemed to be falling back into her old condition. For the time her thoughts had been concentrated on the suffering Eglah; now they were free to be turned upon herself, her own troubles, her own dismal memories. Eglah did all she could to keep her employed, and[pg 261]the girl’s gentle and affectionate nature still felt her influence. Yet it was evident that unless some remedy could be found the old madness would resume its sway.

On the first day of the Dedication festival, the two were standing together in the Court of the Women. The priests, who were making a circuit of the whole building, sprinkling everywhere the blood of purification, came in due course to the spot. As they performed their office a drop fell upon the garment of Huldah, who had been joining in the prayers with an earnestness almost frenzied. The effect was marvellous. In a moment the excitement passed away. Her eyes lost their wandering look, and, in a tone calmer and more collected than any that she had ever before been known to use since the time of her trouble, she said, showing the crimson spot to Eglah—“He has heard my prayer; He has sprinkled me with the blood of cleansing.”She stood silent and collected until the whole ritual was finished, and when the time for the hymn of thanksgiving came round joined her voice with a quiet happiness to the voices of the congregation.

When the people returned to their homes Huldah left the Temple in company with Eglah. But it was evident that her strength was exhausted. She could barely totter along with all the help that Eglah and a neighbour could give her, and when she came to the house of Seraiah and Ruth, which happened[pg 262]to lie in her way, she sank almost unconscious to the ground. Providentially at that moment Ruth came up with her husband and the little Daniel.

“She seemed so much better in the Temple—was quite calm and peaceful again—and now I am afraid that she is going to be very ill,”said Eglah.

Woman’s wit suggested to Ruth a happy thought for dealing with the sufferer.

“Leave her to me,”she said.“She was happy here once, and here, if it please the Lord, she will be happy again.”

Ruth and her husband carried her into the house, and laid her upon her bed in her old chamber. Once there she was able to swallow a little broth which had been hastily prepared, cast one grateful look of recognition at her old mistress, and then fell into a deep sleep. The next morning she awoke, entirely restored to reason, and, though still somewhat weak, able to go about the household tasks in which she had been once employed, and which she resumed at once without a question, and as if, indeed, they had never been interrupted for a day. The three years of misery were entirely blotted out of her memory; nor did any spectre from the past ever come back to trouble her.

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