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My Dear Lads:

In all history there is no drama of more terrible interest than that which terminated with the total destruction of Jerusalem. Had the whole Jewish nation joined in the desperate resistance made by a section of it to the overwhelming strength of Rome, the world would have had no record of truer patriotism than that displayed by this small people in their resistance to the forces of the mistress of the world. Unhappily the reverse of this was the case. Except in the defense of Jotapata and Gamala, it can scarcely be said that the Jewish people as a body offered any serious resistance to the arms of Rome. The defenders of Jerusalem were a mere fraction of its population, a fraction composed almost entirely of turbulent characters and robber bands, who fought with the fury of desperation, after having placed themselves beyond the pale of forgiveness or mercy by the deeds of unutterable cruelty with which they had desolated the city before its siege by the Romans. They fought, it is true, with unflinching courage, a courage never surpassed in history, but it was the courage of despair, and its result was to bring destruction upon the whole population as well as upon themselves. Fortunately the narrative of Josephus, an eye-witness of the events which he describes, has come down to us; and it is the storehouse from which all subsequent histories of the events have been drawn. It is no doubt tinged throughout by his desire to stand well with his patrons Vespasian and Titus, but there is no reason to doubt the accuracy of his descriptions. I have endeavored to present you with as vivid a picture as possible of the events of the war without encumbering the story with details, and except as regards the exploits of John of Gamala, of whom Josephus says nothing, have strictly followed in every particular narrative of the historian.

Yours sincerely,

G. A. Henty

“Dreaming, John, as usual? I never saw such a joy. You are always in extremes, either tiring yourself out or lying half-asleep.”

“I was not half-asleep, mother; I was looking at the lake.”

“I cannot see much to look at, John; It’s just as it has been ever since you were born or since I was born.”

“No, I suppose there’s no change, mother, but I am never tired of looking at the sun shining on the ripples, and the fishermen’s boats, and the birds standing in the shallows or flying off in a desperate hurry without any reason that I can make out. Besides, mother, when one is looking at the lake one is thinking of other things.”

“And very often thinking of nothing at all, my son.”

“Perhaps so, mother; but there’s plenty to think of in these times.”

“Plenty, John; there are baskets and baskets of figs to be stripped from the trees and hung up to dry for the winter, and next week we are going to begin the grape harvest. But the figs are the principal matter at present, and I think that it would be far more useful for you to go and help old Isaac and his son in getting them in than in lying there watching the lake.”

I suppose it would, mother,” the lad said, rising briskly, for his fits of indolence were by no means common, and as a rule he was ready to assist at any work which might be going on.

“I do not wonder at John loving the lake,” his mother said to herself when the lad had hurried away. “It is a fair scene, and it may be, as Simon thinks, that a change may come over it before long, and that ruin and desolation may fall upon us all.”

There were, indeed, few scenes which could surpass in tranquil beauty that which Martha, the wife of Simon, was looking upon, the sheet of sparkling water with its low shores dotted with towns and villages. Down the lake, on the opposite shore, rose the walls and citadel of Tiberias, with many stately buildings, for although Tiberias was not now the chief town of Galilee, for Sephoris had usurped its place, it had been the seat of the Roman authority, and the kings who ruled the country for Rome generally dwelt there. Half a mile from the spot where Martha was standing rose the newly erected wall so Hippos.

Where the towns and villages did not engross the shore, the rich orchards and vineyards extended down to the very edge of the water. The plain of Galilee was a veritable garden; here flourished in the greatest abundance the vine and the fig; while the low hills were covered with olive groves, and the corn waved thickly on the rich, fat land. No region on the earth’s face possessed a fairer climate. The heat was never extreme; the winds blowing from the Great Sea brought the needed moisture for the vegetation, and so soft and equable was the air that for ten months in the year grapes and figs could be gathered. The population, supported by the abundant fruits of the earth, was very large. Villages which could elsewhere be called towns, for those containing but a few thousand inhabitants were regarded as small indeed, were scattered thickly over the plain, and few areas of equal dimensions could show a population approaching that which inhabited the plains and slopes between the Sea of Galilee and the Mediterranean. None could have been dreamed of the dangers that were to come, or believe that this rich cultivation and teeming population would disappear, and that in time a few flocks of wandering sheep would be scarce to be able to find herbage growing on the wastes of land which would take the place of this fertile soil. Certainly no such thought as this occurred to Martha as she re-entered the house, though she did fear that trouble and ruin might be approaching.

John was soon at work among the fig-trees, aiding Isaac and his son Reuben, a lad of some fifteen years, to pick the soft, luscious fruit, and carry it to the little courtyard shaded from the rays of the sun by an overhead trellis-work covered with vines and almost bending beneath the purple bunches of grapes. Miriam, the old nurse, and four or five maid-servants, under the eye of Martha, tied them in rows on strings and fastened them to pegs driven into that side of the house upon which the sun beat down most hotly. It was only the best fruit that was so served, for that which had been damaged in the picking and all of smaller size were laid on trays in the sun. The girls chatted merrily as they worked, for Martha, although a good housewife, was a gentle mistress, and so long as fingers were busy heeded not if the tongue ran on.

“Let the damsels be happy while they may, “she would say if Miriam scolded a little when the laughter rose louder than usual. “Let them be happy while they can; who knows what lies in the future?”

But at present the future cast no shade upon the group, nor upon a girl of about fourteen years old who danced in and out of the courtyard in the highest spirits, now stopping a few minutes to string the figs, then scampering away with an empty basket, which, when she reached the gatherers, she placed on her head and supported demurely for a little while at the foot of the ladder upon which John was perched, so that he could lay the figs in it without bruising them; but long ere the basket was filled she would tire of the work, and setting it on the ground run back into the house.

“And so you think you are helping, Mary,” John said, laughing, when the girl returned for the fourth time with an empty basket.

“Helping, John! Of course I am, ever so much; helping you and helping them at the house, and carrying empty baskets. I consider myself the most active of the party.”

“Active, certainly, Mary! But if you do not help them in stringing and hanging the figs more than you help me, I think you might as well leave it alone.”

“Fie, John! That is most ungrateful, after my standing here like a statue with the basket on my head ready for you to lay the figs in.”

“That is all very fine!” John laughed; “but before the basket is half-full away you go, and I have to get down the ladder and bring up the basket and fix it firmly, and that without shaking the figs, whereas ha you left it alone altogether I could have brought up the empty basket and fixed it close by my hand without any trouble at all.”

“You are an ungrateful boy, and you know how bad it is to be ungrateful! And after my making myself so hot, too!” Miriam said. “My face is as red as fire, and that is all the thanks I get. Very well, then, I shall go into the house and leave you to your own bad reflections.”

“You need not do that, Mary; you can sit down in the shade there and watch us at work, and eat figs and get yourself cool, all at the same time. The sun will be down in another half hour and then I shall be free to amuse you.”

“Amuse me, indeed!” the girl said indignantly as she sat down on the bank to which John had pointed. “You mean that I shall amuse you; that is what it generally comes to. If it wasn’t for me I am sure very often there would not be a word said when we are out together.”

“Perhaps that is true,” John agree; “but you see there is so much to think about.”

“And so you choose the time when you are with me to think! Thank you, John! You had better think at present;” and rising from the seat she had just taken, she walked back to the house again, regardless of John’s explanations and shouts.

Old Isaac chuckled on his tree close by.

“They are ever so sharp for us in words, John. The damsel is younger than you by full two years, and yet she can always put you in the wrong with her tongue.”

“She puts meanings to my words which I never thought of,” John said, “and is angered, or pretends to be, for I never know which it is, at things which she has coined out of her own mind, for they had no place in mine.”

“Boys’ wits are always slower than girls’,” the old man said; “a girl has more fancy in her little finger than a boy in his whole body. Your cousin laughs at you because she sees that you take it seriously, and wonders in her mind how it is her thoughts run ahead of yours. But I love the damsel, and so do all in the house, for if she be a little wayward at times, she is bright and loving, and has cheered the house since she came here. Your father is not a man of many words, and Martha, as becomes her age, is staid and quiet, though she is no enemy of mirth and cheerfulness; but the loss of all her children save you has saddened her, and I think she must often have pined that she had not a girl, and she has brightened much since the damsel came here three years ago. But the sun is sinking and my basket is full; there will be enough for the maids to go on with in the morning until we can supply them with more.”

John’s basket was not full, but he was well content to stop, and descending their ladders the three returned to the house.

Simon of Cadez, for that was the name of his farm and the little fishing village close by on the shore was a prosperous and well-to-do man. His land, like that of all around him, had come down from father to son through long generations, for the law by which all mortgages were cleared off every seven years prevented those who might be disposed to idleness and extravagance from ruining themselves and their children. Every man dwelt upon the land which, as eldest son, he had inherited, while the younger sons, taking their smaller share, would settle in the towns or villages and become traders or fishermen according to their bent and means.

There were poor in Palestine, for there will be poor everywhere so long as human nature remains as it is, and some men are idle and self-indulgent while others are industrious and thrifty; but taking it as a whole there were, thanks to the wise provisions of their laws, no people on the face of the earth so generally comfortable and well-to-do. They grumbled, of course, over the exactions of the tax-collectors—exactions due not to the contributions which was paid by the province to imperial Rome, but to the luxury and extravagance of their kings and to the greed and corruption of the officials. But in spite of this the people of rich and prosperous Galilee could have lived in contentment and happiness had it not been for the factions in their mist.

On reaching the house, John found that his father had just returned from Hippos, whither he had gone on business. He nodded when the lad entered with his basket.

“I have hired eight men in the market to-day to come out to-morrow to aid in gathering in the figs,” he said, “and your mother has just sent down to get some of the fishermen’s maidens to come in to help her; it is time that we had done with them, and we will then set about the vintage. Let us reap while we can’ there is no saying what the morrow will bring forth. Wife, add something to the evening mean, for the Rabbi Solomon Ben Masassch will sup with us and sleep here to-night.”

John saw that his father looked graver than usual; but he knew his duty as a son too well to think of asking any questions, and he busied himself for the time in laying out the figs on trays, knowing that otherwise their own weight would crush the soft fruit before the morning, and bruise the tender skins.

A quarter of an hour later the quick footsteps of a donkey were heard approaching. John ran out, and having saluted the rabbi, held the animal while his father assisted him to alight, and welcoming him to his house, led him within. The meal was soon served. It consisted of fish from the lake, kid’s flesh seethed in milk, and fruit. Only the men sat down; the rabbi sitting upon Simon’s right hand, John on his left, and Isaac and his son at the other end of the table. Martha’s maids waited upon them, for it was not the custom for the women to sit down with the men; and although in the country this usage was not strictly observed, and Martha and little Mary generally took their meals with Simon and John, they did not do so if any guest was present.

In honor of the visitor a white cloth had been laid on the table. All ate with their fingers, two dishes of each kind being placed on the table—one at each end. But few words were said during the meal. After it was concluded Isaac and his son withdrew, and presently Martha and Mary, having taken their meals in the women’s apartments, came into the room. Mary made a little face at John to signify her disapproval of the visitor, whose coming would compel her to keep silent all the evening. But though John smiled, he made no sign of sympathy, for indeed he was anxious to hear the news from without, and doubted not that he should learn much from the rabbi.

Solomon Ben Manasseh was a man of considerable influence in Galilee. He was a tall, stern-looking old man, with bushy black eyebrows, deep-set eyes, and a long beard of black hair streaked with gray. He was said to have acquired much of the learning of the Gentiles, among whom at Antioch he had dwelt for some years; but it was to his powers as a speaker that he owed his influence. It was the tongue in those days that ruled men, and there were few who could lash a crowd to fury, or still their wrath when excited, better than Solomon Ben Manasseh. For some time they talked upon different subjects—on the corn-harvest and vintage, the probable amount of taxation, the marriage feast which was to take place in the following week at the house of one of the principal citizens of Hippos, and other matters. But at last Simon broached the subject which was uppermost in all their thoughts.

“And the news from Tiberias, you say, is bad, rabbi?”

“The news from Tiberias is always bad, friend Simon; in all the land there is not a city which will compare with it in the wrong-headedness of its people and the violence of its seditions, and little can be hoped, as far as I can see, so long as our good governor, Josephus, continues to treat the malefactors so leniently. A score of times they have conspired against his life, and as often has he eluded them, for the Lord has been ever with him. But each time, instead of punishing those who have brought about these disorders, he lets them go free, trusting always that they will repent them of their ways, although he sees that his kindness is thrown away and that they grow even bolder and more bitter against him after each failure.

“All Galilee is with him. Whenever he gives the word every man takes up his arms and follows him; and did he but give the order they would level those proud towns Tiberias and Sepphoris to the ground, and tear down stone by stone the stronghold of John of Gischala. But he will suffer them to do nothing—not a hair of these traitors’ heads is to be touched, nor their property to value of a penny be interfered with. I call such lenity culpable. The law ordains punishment for those who disturb people. We know what befell those who rebelled against Moses. Josephus has the valor and the wisdom of King David, but it were well if he had, like our great king, a Joab by his side, who would smite down traitors and spare not.”

“It is his only fault,” Simon said. “What a change has taken place since he was sent hither from Jerusalem to take up our government! All abuses have been repressed, extortion has been put down, taxes have been lightened. We eat our bread in peace and comfort and each man’s property is his own. Never was there such a change as he has wrought, and were it not for John of Gischala, Justus the son of Piscus, and Jesus the son of Sapphias all would go quietly and well; but these men are continually stirring up the people, who in their folly listen to them, and conspiring to murder Josephus and seize upon his government.

“Already he has had more than once to reduce to submission Tiberias and Sepphoris, happily without bloodshed. For when the people of these cities saw that all Galilee was with Josephus, they opened their gates and submitted themselves to his mercy. Truly in Leviticus it is said: ‘Thou shalt not avenge nor bear any grudge against the children of they people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’ But Josephus carries this beyond reason. Seeing that his adversaries by no means observe this law, he should remember that it is also said that ‘He that taketh the sword shall fall by the sword,” and that the law lays down punishments for the transgressors. Our judges and kinds slew those who troubled the land and destroyed them utterly, and Josephus does wrong to depart from their teaching.”

“I know not where he could have learned such notions of mercy to his enemies and to the enemies of the land,” Simon said. “He has been to Rome, but it is not among the Romans that he will have found that it is right to forgive those who rise up in rebellion.”

“Yes, he was in Rome when he was twenty-six years old,” Simon said. “He went thither to plead the case of certain priests who had been thrown into bonds by Felix and sent to Rome. It was a perilous voyage, for his ship was wrecked in the Adriatic, and of six hundred men who were aboard only eighty were picked up, after floating and swimming all night, by a ship of Cyrene. He was not long in Rome, for being introduced to Popæa, the wife of Cæsar, he used his interest with her and obtained the release of those for whose sake he went there. No, if he gained these ideas from any one, he learned them from one Banus, and Ascetic, of the sect of the Essenes, who lived in the desert with no other clothing than the park and leaves of trees, and no other food save that which grew wild.”

“Josephus lived with him in like fashion for three years, and doubtless learned all that was in his heart. Banus was a follower, they say, of that John whom Herod put to death, and, for aught I know, of that Jesus who was crucified two years afterward at Jerusalem, and in whom many people believed, and who has many followers to this day. I have conversed with some of them, and from what they tell me this Jesus taught doctrines similar to those which Josephus practices, and which he may have learned from Banus, without accepting the doctrines which the members of this sect hold as to their founder being the promised Messiah who was to restore Israel.”

“I too have talked with many of the sect,” Simon said, “and have argued with them on the folly of their belief, seeing that their founder by no means saved Israel, but was himself put to death. From what I could see there was much that was good in the doctrines they hold; but they have exaggerated ideas, and are opposed to all wars, even to fighting for their country. I hear that since there has been trouble with Rome most of them have departed altogether out of the land so as to avoid the necessity of fighting.”

“They are poor creatures,” Solomon Ben Manasseh said scornfully; “but we need not talk of them now, for they affect us in no way, save that it may be that Josephus has learned somewhat of their doctrines from Banus, and that he is thus unduly, and as I think, most unfortunately for the country, inclined too much to mercy instead of punishing the evil-doers as they deserve.”

“But, nevertheless, rabbi, it seems to me that there has been good policy as well in the mercy which Josephus has shown his foes. You know that John has many friends in Jerusalem, and that if he could accuse Josephus of slaughtering any, he would be able to make so strong a party there that he could obtain the recall of Josephus.”

“We would not let him go,” Solomon said hotly. “Since the Romans have gone we submit to the supremacy of the council at Jerusalem, but it is only on sufferance. For long ages we have had nothing to do with Judah, and we are not disposed to put our necks under their yoke now. We submit to unity because in the Romans we have a common foe, but we are not going to be tyrannized. Josephus has shown himself a wise ruler. We are happier under him than we have been for generations under the men who call themselves kings, but who are nothing but Roman satraps, and we are not going to suffer him to be taken from us. Only let the people of Jerusalem try that, and they will have to deal with all the men of Galilee.”

“I am past the age at which men are bound to take up the sword, and John has not yet attained it, but if there were need we would both go out and fight. What should they do? For the population of Galilee is greater than that of Judah. And while we would fight every man to the death, the Jews would few of them care to hazard their lives only to take from us the man we desire to rule over us. Still Josephus does wisely perhaps to give no occasion for accusation by his enemies. There is no talk, is there, rabbi, of any movement on the part of the Romans to come against us in force?”

“None so far as I have heard,” the rabbi replied. “King Agrippa remains in his country to the east, but he has no Roman force with him sufficient to attempt any great enterprise, and so long as they leave us alone we are content.”

“They will come sooner or later,” Simon said, shaking his head. “They are busy elsewhere. When they have settled with their other enemies they will come here to avenge the defeat of Cestius, to restore Florus, and to reconquer the land. Where Rome has once laid her paw she never lets slip her prey.”

“Well, we can fight,” Solomon Ben Manasseh said sternly. “Our forefathers won the land with the sword, and we can hold it by the sword.”

“Yes,” Martha said quietly, joining in the conversation for the first time, “if God fights for us as He fought for our forefathers.”

“Why should He not?” the rabbi asked sternly. “We are still His people. We are faithful to his law.”

“But God has many times in the past suffered us to fall into the hands of our enemies as a punishment for our sins,” Martha said quietly. “The tribes were carried away into captivity, and are scattered we know not where. The temple was destroyed, and the people of Judah dwelt long as captives in Babylon. He suffered us to fall under the yoke of the Romans. In his right time he will fight for us again, but can we say that that time has come, rabbi, and that he will smite the Romans as he smote the host of Sennacherib?”

“That no man can say,” the rabbi answered gloomily; “time only will show; but whether or no, the people will fight valiantly.”

“I doubt not that they will fight,” Simon said; “but many other nations, to whom we are but as a bandful, have fought bravely, but have succumbed to the might of Rome. It is said that Josephus and many of the wisest in Jerusalem were heartily opposed to the tumults against the Romans, and that they only went with the people because they were in fear of their lives; and even at Tiberias many men of worth and gravity, such as Julius Capellus, Herod the son of Miarus, Herod the son of Gamalus, Compsus, and others, are all strongly opposed to hostility against the Romans. And it is the same elsewhere. Those who know best what is the might and power of Rome would fain remain friendly with her. It is the ignorant and violent classes have led us into this strait, from which, as I fear, naught but ruin can arise.”

“I thought better things of you, Simon,” the rabbi said angrily.

“But you yourself have told me,” Simon urged, “that you thought it a mad undertaking to provoke the vengeance of Rome.”

“I thought so at first,” Solomon admitted, “but now our hand is placed on the plow we must not draw back; and I believe that the God of our fathers will show his might before the heathen.”

“I trust that it may be so,” Simon said gravely. “In his hand is all power. Whether he will see fit to put it forth now in our behalf remains to be seen. However, for the present we need not concern ourselves greatly with the Romans. It may be long before they bring an army against us, while these seditions here are at our very door and ever threaten to involve us in civil war.”

“We need fear no civil war,” the rabbi said. “The people of all Galilee, save the violent and ill-disposed in a few of the towns, are all for Josephus. If it comes to force, John and his party know that they will be swept away like a straw before the wind. The fear is that they may succeed in murdering Josephus, either by the knife of an assassin or in one of these tumults. They would rather the latter, because they would then say that the people had torn him to pieces in their fury at his misdoings. However, we watch over him as much as we can, and his friends have warned him that he must be careful, not only for his own sake but for that of all the people, and he has promised that as far as he can he will be on his guard against these traitors.”

“The governor should have a strong body-guard,” John exclaimed impetuously, “as the Roman governors had. In another year I shall be of age to have my name inscribed in the list of fighting men, and I would gladly be one of his guards.”

“You are neither old enough to fight nor to express an opinion unasked,” Simon said, “in the presence of your elders.”

“Do not check the boy,” the rabbi said; “he has fire and spirit, and the days are coming when we shall not ask how old or how young are those who would fight, so that they can but hold arms. Josephus is wise not to have a military guard, John, because the people love not such appearance of state. His enemies would use this as an argument that he is setting himself up above them. It is partly because he behaves himself discreetly and goes about among them like a private person of no more account than themselves that they love him. None can say he is a tyrant, because he has no means of tyrannizing. His enemies cannot urge it against him at Jerusalem, as they would doubtless do if they could, that he is seeking to lead Galilee away from the rule of Jerusalem, and to set himself up as its master; for to do this he would require to gather an army, and Josephus has not a single armed man at his service, save and except that when he appears to be in danger many out of love of him assemble and provide him escort. No, Josephus is wise in that he affects neither pomp nor state, that he keeps no armed men around him, but trusts to the love of the people. He would be wiser, however, did he seize one of the occasions when the people have taken up arms for him, to destroy all those who make sedition, and to free the country once and for all from the trouble.

“Sedition should be always nipped in the bud. Lenity in such a case is the most cruel course, for it encourages men to think that those in authority fear them, and that they can conspire without danger; and whereas at first the blood of ten men will put an end to sedition, it needs at last the blood of as many thousands to restore peace and order. It is good for a man to be merciful, but not for a ruler, for the good of the whole people is placed in his hands. The sword of justice is given to him, and he is most merciful who uses it the most promptly against those who work sedition. The wise ruler will listen to the prayers of his people, and will grant their petitions when they show that their case is hard; but he will grant nothing to him who asketh with his sword in his hand, for he knows full well that when he yields once he must yield always, until the time comes, as come it surely will, when he must resist with the sword. Then the land will be filled with blood, whereas in the beginning he could have avoided all trouble by refusing so much as to listen to those who spoke with threats. Josephus is a good man, and the Lord has given him great gifts. He has done great things for the land, but you will see that many woes will come and much blood will be shed from this lenity of his toward those who stir up tumults among the people.”

A few minutes later the family retired to bed, the hour being a late one for Simon’s household, which generally retired to rest a short time after the evening meal.

The next day the work of gathering in the figs was carried on earnestly and steadily, with the aid of the workers whom Simon had hired in the town, and in two days the trees were all stripped, and strings of figs hung to dry from the boughs of all the trees round the house. Then the gathering of the grapes began. All the inhabitants of the little fishing village lent their aid—men as well as women and children, for the vintage was looked upon as a holiday, and Simon was regarded as a good friend by his neighbors, being ever ready to aid them when there was need, judging any disputes which arouse between them, and lending them money without interest if misfortune came upon their boats or nets, or if illness befell them; while the women in times of sickness or trouble went naturally to Martha with their griefs, and were assured of sympathy, good advice, and any drugs or dainty food suited to the case. The women and girls picked the grapes and laid them in baskets; these were carried by men and emptied into the vat, where other men trod them down and pressed out the juice. Martha and her maids saw to the cooking and laying out on the great table in the courtyard of the meals, to which all sat down together. Simon superintended the crushing of the grapes, and John worked now at one task and now at another. It was a pretty scene, and rendered more gay by the songs of the women and girls as they worked, and the burst of merry laughter which at times arose.

It lasted four days, by which time the last bunch, save those on a few vines preserved for eating, was picked and crushed, and the vats in the cellar, sunk underground for coolness, were full to the brim. Simon was much pleased with the result, and declared that never in his memory had the vine and fig harvest turned out more abundant. The corn had long before been gathered, and there remained now only the olives, but it would be some little time yet before these were fit to be gathered and their oil extracted, for they were allowed to hang on the trees until ready to drip. The last basket of grapes was brought in with much ceremony, the gatherers forming a little procession and singing a thanksgiving hymn as they walked; the evening meal was more bounteous even than usual, and all who helped carried away with them substantial proofs of Simon’s thankfulness and satisfaction.

For the next few days Simon and his men and Martha’s maids lent their assistance in getting in the vintage of their neighbors, for each family had its patch of ground and grew sufficient grapes and fruits for its own needs. Those in the village brought their grapes to a vat which they had in common, the measures of the grapes being counted as they were put in, and the wine afterward divided in like proportion; for wine to be good must be made in considerable quantities.

And now there was a time little to do on the farm. Simon superintended the men who were plowing up the corn stubbles ready for the sowing in the spring, sometimes putting his hand to the plow and driving the oxen. Isaac and his son worked in the vineyard and garden near the house, aided to some extent by John, who, however, was not yet called upon to take a man’s share of the work of the farm, he having but lately finished his learning with the rabbi at the school in Hippos. Still he worked steadily every morning, and in the afternoon generally went out on the lake with the fishermen, with whom he was a great favorite. This was not to last long, for at seventeen he was to join his father regularly in the management of the farm, and indeed the Rabbi Solomon, who was a frequent guest, was of opinion that Simon gave the boy too much license, and that he ought already be doing man’s work; but Simon when urged by him said:

“I know that at his age I was working hard, rabbi, but the lad has studied diligently and I have a good report of him, and I think it well that at his age the bow should be unbent somewhat; besides, who know what is before us! I will let the lad have as much pleasure from his life as he can. The storm is approaching; let him play while the sun shines.”

Chapter II: A Storm on Galilee


One day after the midday meal John said: 'Mary, Raphael and his brother have taken the big boat and gone off with fish to Tiberias, and have told me that I can take the small boat if I will. Ask my mother to let you off your task and come out with me. It is a fortnight since we had a row on the lake together.'

'I was beginning to think that you were never going to ask me again, John; and only I should punish myself, I would say you nay. There have you been going out fishing every afternoon, and leaving me at home to spin; and it is all the worse because your mother has said that the time is fast coming when I must give up wandering about like a child, and must behave myself like a woman. Oh, dear, how tiresome it will be when there will be nothing to do but to sit and spin, and to look after the house, and to walk instead of running when I am out, and to behave like grown-up person altogether.'

'You are almost grown-up,' John said; 'you are taller now than any of the maids except Zillah; but I shall be sorry to see you growing staid and solemn. And it was selfish of me not to ask you to go out before, but I really did not think of it. The fishermen have been working hard to make up for the time lost during the harvest, and I have really been useful helping them with their nets, and this is the last year I shall have my liberty. But come, don't let's be wasting time in talking; run in and get my mother's permission, and then join me on the shore. I will take some grapes down for you to eat, for the sun is hot to-day and there is scarce a breath of wind on the water.'

A few minutes later the young pair stood together by the side of the boat.

'Your mother made all sorts of objections,' Mary said, laughing; 'and I do think she won't let me come again. I don't think she would have done it to-day if Miriam had not stood up for me and said that I was but a child though I was so tall, and that, as you are very soon going to work with your father, she thought that it was no use in making the change before that.'

'What nonsense it all is!' John said. 'Besides, you know it is arranged that in a few months we are to be betrothed according to the wish of your parents and mine. It would have been done long ago only my father and mother do not approve of young betrothals, and think it better to wait to see if the young ones like each other; and I think that it is quite right, too, in most cases' only, of course, living here as you have done for the last three years, since your father and mother died, there was no fear of our not liking each other.'

'Well, you see,' Mary said as she sat in the stern of the boat while John rowed it quietly along, 'it might have been just the other way: when people don't see anything of each other till they are betrothed by their parents, they can't dislike each other very much; whereas when they get to know each other, if they are disagreeable they might get to almost hate each other.'

'Yes, there is something in that,' John agreed. 'Of course, in our case it is all right, because we do like each other we couldn't have liked each other more, I think, if we had been brother and sister; but it seems to me that sometimes it must be horrid when a boy is told by his parents that he is to be betrothed to a girl he has never seen. You see, it isn't as if it were for a short time, but for all one's life. It must be awful!'

'Awful!' Mary agreed heartily, 'but of course it would have to be done.'

'Of course,' John said, the possibility of a lad refusing to obey his parents' commands not even occurring to him 'Still, it doesn't seem to me quite right that one should have no choice in so important a matter. Of course when one's got a father and mother like mine, who would be sure to think only of making me happy, and not of the amount of dowry or anything of that sort, it would be all right; but with some parents it would be dreadful.'

For some time not a word was spoken, both of them meditating over the unpleasantness of being forced to marry some one they disliked. Then, finding the subject too difficult for them, they began to talk about other things, stopping sometimes to see the fishermen haul up their nets, for there were a number of boats out on the lake. They rowed down as far as Tiberias, and there John ceased rowing, and they sat chatting over the wealth and beauty of that city, which John had often visited with his father, but which Mary had never entered. Then John turned the head of the boat up the lake and again began to row, but scarcely had he dipped his oar into the water when he exclaimed:

'Look that that black cloud rising at the other end of the lake! Why did you not tell me, Mary''

'How stupid of me,' she exclaimed, 'not to have kept my eyes open!'

He bent to his oars and made the boat move through the water at a very different rate to that at which she had before traveled.

'Most of the boats have gone,' Mary said presently, 'and the rest are all rowing to the shore, and the clouds are coming up very fast,' she added looking around.

'We are going to have a storm,' John said, 'it will be upon us long before we get back. I shall make for the shore, Mary. We must leave the boat there and take shelter for awhile, and then walk home. It will not be more than four miles to walk.'

But though he spoke cheerfully, John knew enough of the sudden storms that bursts upon the Sea of Galilee to be aware that long before he could cross the mile and a half of water which separated them from the eastern shore the storm would be upon them; and indeed they were not more than half-way when it burst.

The sky was already covered with black clouds; a great darkness gathered round them; then came a heavy downpour of rain; and then with a sudden burst the wind smote them. It was useless now to try to row, for the oars would have been twisted from his hands in a moment; and John took the helm, and told Mary to lie down in the bottom of the boat. He had already turned the boat's head up the lake, the direction in which the storm was traveling.

The boat sprang forward as if it had received a blow when the gale struck it. John had more than once been out on the lake with the fishermen when sudden storms had come up, and knew what was best to be done. When he had laid in his oars he had put them so that the blades stood partly up above the bow and caught the wind somewhat, and he himself crouched down in the bottom, with his head below the gunwale and his hand on the tiller; so that the tendency of the boat was to drive straight before the wind. With a strong crew he knew that he could have rowed obliquely toward the sore, but alone his strength could have done nothing to keep the heavy boat off her course.

The sea rose as if by magic, and the spray was soon dashing over them; each wave, as it followed the boat, rising higher and higher. The shores were no longer visible, and the crests of the waves seemed to gleam with a pallid light in the darkness which surrounded them. John sat quietly in the bottom of the boat, with one hand on the tiller and the other hand around Mary, who was crouched up against him. She had made no cry or exclamation from the moment the gale struck them.

'Are we getting near the shore?' she asked at last.

'No, Mary; we are running straight before the wind, which is blowing right up the lake. There is nothing to be done but to keep straight before it.'

Mary had seen many storms on the lake, and knew into what a fury its waters were lashed in a tempest such as was now upon them.

'We are in God's hands, John,' she said with the quiet resignation of her race. 'He can save us if he will; let us pray to him.'

John nodded, and for a few minutes no word was spoken.

'Can I do anything'' Mary asked presently as a wave struck the stern and threw a mass of water into the boat.

'Yes,' john replied; 'take that earthen pot and bail out the water.'

John had no great hope that they would live through the gale, but he thought it better for the girl to be kept busily employed. She bailed steadily; but fast as she worked the water came in faster, for each wave, as it swept past them, broke on board. So rapidly were they traveling that John had the greatest difficulty in keeping the boat from broaching to, in which case the flowing waves would have filled or overturned her.

'I don't think it's any use, John,' Mary said quietly as a great wave broke on board, pouring in as much water in a second as she could have bailed out in ten minutes.

'No use, dear. Sit quietly by me; but first pull those oars aft; now tie them together with that piece of rope. Now when the boat goes down keep tight hold of them. Cut off another piece of rope and give it me. When we are in the water I will fasten you to the oars. They will keep you afloat easily enough. I will keep close to you. You know I am a good swimmer; and whenever I feel tired I can rest my hands on the oars too. Keep up your courage and keep as quiet as you can. These sudden storms seldom last long, and my father will be sure to get the boats out as soon as he can to look for us.'

John spoke cheerfully, but he had no great hope of their being able to live in so rough a sea. Mary had still less, but she quietly carried out John's instruction. The boat was half-filled of water now and rose but heavily upon the waves. John raised himself and looked round, in hopes that he wind might unnoticed have shifted a little and blown them toward shore. As he glanced around him he gave a shout. Following almost in their tracks and some fifty yards away, was a large galley running before the wind, with a rag of sail set on its mast.

'We are saved, Mary!' he exclaimed. 'Here is a galley close to us.'

He shouted loudly, though he knew that his voice could not be heard many yards away on the teen of the gale; but almost directly he saw two or three men stand up in the bow of the galley. One was pointing toward them, and he saw that they were seen. In another minute the galley came sweeping along close to the boat. A dozen figures appeared over her side, and two or three ropes were thrown. John caught one, twisted it rapidly round Mary's body and his own, knotted it, and, taking her in his arms, jumped overboard. Another minute they were drawn alongside the galley and pulled on board. As soon as the ropes were unfastened John rose to his feet, but Mary lay insensible on the deck.

'Carry the damsel into the cabin,' a man who was evidently in authority said. 'She has fainted, but will soon come around. I will see to her myself.'

The suddenness of the rescue, the plunge in the water, and the sudden revulsion of his feelings, affected John so much that it was two or three minutes before he could speak.

'Come along with me, lad,' one of the sailors said, laying his hand on his shoulder. 'Some dry clothes and a draught of wine will set you all right again; but you have had a narrow escape of it. That boat of yours was pretty nearly water-logged, and in another five minutes we should have been too late.'

John hastily changed his clothes in the forecastle, took a draught of wine, and then hurried back again toward the aft cabin. Just as he reached it the man who had ordered Mary to be carried in came out.

'The damsel has opened her eyes,' he said, 'and you need not be uneasy about her. I have given her some woolen cloths, and bade her take off her wet garments and wrap herself in them. Why did you not make for the shore before the tempest broke' It was foolish of you indeed to be out on the lake when any one could see that this gale was coming.'

'I was rowing down and did not notice it until I turned,' John replied. 'I was making for the shore when the gale struck her.'

'It was well for you that I noticed you. I was myself thinking of making for the shore, although in so large and well-manned a craft as this there is little fear upon the lake. It is not like the Great Sea, where I myself have seen a large ship as helpless before the waves as that small boat we picked you from. I had just set out from Tiberias when I marked the storm coming up; but my business was urgent, and, moreover, I marked your little boat and saw that you were not likely to gain the shore, so I bade the helmsman keep his eye on you until the darkness fell upon us, and then to follow straight in your wake, for you could but run before the wind; and well he did it, for when we first caught sight of you you were right ahead of us.'

The speaker was a man of about thirty years of age, tall, and with a certain air of command.

'I thank you, indeed, sir,' John said, 'for saving my life and that of my cousin Mary, the daughter of my father's brother. Truly my father and mother will be grateful to you for having saved us, for I am their only son. Whom are they to thank for our rescue''

'I am Joseph, the son of Matthias, to whom the Jews have entrusted the governorship of this province.'

'Josephus!' John exclaimed in a tone of surprise and reverence.

'So men call me,' Josephus replied with a smile.

It was indeed the governor. Flavius Josephus, as the Romans afterward called him, came of a noble Jewish family, his father, Matthias, belonging to the highest of the twenty-four classes into which the sacerdotal families were divided. Matthias was eminent for his attainments and piety, and had been one of the leading men in Jerusalem. From his youth Josephus had carefully prepared himself for public life, mastering the doctrines of the three leading sects among the Jews: the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes -- and having spent three years in the desert with Banus the Ascetic. The fact that at only twenty-six years of age he had gone as the leader of a deputation to Rome on behalf of some priests sent there by Felix shows that he was early looked upon as a conspicuous person among the Jews, and he was but thirty when he was intrusted with the important position of governor of Galilee.

Contrary to the custom of the times, he had sought to make no gain from his position. He accepted neither presents nor bribes, but devoted himself entirely to ameliorating the condition of the people, and in repressing the turbulence of the lower classes of the great towns, and of the robber chieftains who, like John of Gischala, took advantage of the authority caused by the successful rising against the Romans to plunder and tyrannize over the people.

The expression of the face of Josephus was lofty and at the same time gentle. His temper was singularly equable, and whatever the circumstances he never gave way to anger, but kept his passions well under control. His address was soft and winning, and he had the art of attracting respect and friendship from all who came in contact with him. Poppæa, the wife of Nero, had received him with much favor; and bravely as he fought against them, Vespasian and Titus were afterward as much attached to him as were the Jews of Galilee. There can be no doubt that had he been otherwise placed than as one of a people on the verge of destruction, Josephus would have been one of the great figures of history.

John had been accustomed to hear his father and his friends speak in tones of such admiration for Josephus as the man who was regarded not only as the benefactor of the Jews of Galilee, but as the leader and mainstay of the nation, that he has long ardently desired to see him; and to find that he had now been rescued from death by him, and that he was now talking to him face to face, filled him with confusion.

'You are a brave lad,' Josephus said, 'for you kept your head well in a time when older men might have lost their presence of mind. You must have kept your boat dead before the wind, and you were quick and ready in seizing the rope and knotting it round yourself and the maid with you. I feared you might try and fasten it to the boat. If you had, full of water as she was, and fast as we were sailing before the wind, the rope would barely have stood the strain.'

'The clouds are breaking,' the captain of the boat said, coming up to Josephus, 'and I think that we are past the worst of the gale. And well it is so, for even in so stanch a craft there is much peril in such a sea as this.'

The vessel, although one of the largest on the lake, was indeed pitching and rolling very heavily, but she was light and buoyant, and each time that she plunged bows under, as the following waves lifted her stern high in the air, she rose lightly again, and scarce a drop fell into her deep waist, the lofty erections fore and aft throwing off the water.

'Where do you belong, my lad'' Josephus asked. 'I fear that it is impossible for us to put you ashore until we reach Capernaum; but once there, I will see that you are provided with means to take you home.'

'Our farm lies three miles above Hippos.'

'That is unfortunate,' Josephus said, 'since it lies on the opposite side of the lake to Capernaum. However, we shall see. If the storm goes down rapidly I may be able to get a fishing-boat to take you across this evening, for your parents will be in sore trouble. If not, you must wait till early morning.'

In another hour they reached Capernaum. The wind had by this time greatly abated, although the sea still ran high. The ship was soon alongside a landing-jetty which ran out a considerable distance, and formed a breakwater protecting the shipping from the heavy sea which broke there when the wind was, as at present, from the south. Mary came out from the cabin, as the vessel entered the harbor, wrapped up from head to food in the woolen cloths with which she had been furnished. John sprang to her side.

'Are you quite well, Mary''

'Quite well,' she said, 'only very ashamed of having fainted, and very uncomfortable in these wrappings. But, oh! John, how thankful we ought to be to God for having sent this ship to our aid when all seemed lost!'

'We ought indeed, Mary. I have been thanking him as I have been standing here watching the waves, and I am sure you have been doing the same in the cabin.'

'Yes, indeed, John. But what am I to do now' I do not like going on shore like this, and the officer told me I was on no account to put on my wet clothes.'

'Do you know, it is Josephus himself, Mary think of that  the great Josephus, who has saved us! He marked our boat before the storm broke and seeing that we could not reach the shore, had his vessel steered so as to overtake us.'

Mary was too surprised to utter more than an exclamation. The thought that the man who had been talking so kindly and pleasantly to her was the great leader of whom she had heard so much quite took away her breath.

At that moment Josephus himself came up.

'I am glad to see you have got your color again, maiden,' he said. 'I am just going to land. Do you with your cousin remain on board here. I will send a woman down with some attire for you. She will conduct you both to the house where I shall be staying. The sea is going down, and the captain tells me that he thinks in another three or four hours I shall be able to get a boat to send you across to your home. It will be late, but you will not mind that, for they are sure not to retire to rest at home, but to be up all night searching for you.'

A crowd assembled on the jetty, for Josephus was expected, and the violent storm had excited the fears of all for his safety, and the leading inhabitants had all flocked down to welcome him when his vessel was seen approaching.

'Isn't he kind and good?' Mary said enthusiastically as she watched the greeting which he received as he landed. 'He talked to me just as if he had been of my own family.'

'He is grand!' John agreed with equal enthusiasm. 'He is just what I pictured to myself that a great leader would be, such as Joshua, or Gideon, or the Prince of the Maccabees.'

'Yes, but more gentle, John.'

'Brave men should always be gentle,' John said positively.

'They ought to be, perhaps,' Mary agreed, 'but I don't think they are.'

They chatted then about the storm and the anxiety which they would be feeling at home until an officer, accompanied by a woman carrying attire for Mary, came on board.

Mary soon came out of the cabin dressed, and the officer conducted them to the house which had been placed at the disposal of Josephus. The woman led them up to a room where a meal has been prepared for them.

'Josephus is in council with the elders,' she said; 'he bade me see that you had all that you required. He has arranged that a bark shall start with you as soon as the sea goes down, but if by eight o'clock it is still too rough, I shall take the maiden home to my house to sleep, and they will arouse you as soon as it is safe to put out, whatever the hour may be, as your friends will be in great anxiety concerning you.'

The sun had already set, and just as they finished their meal the man belonging to the boat came to say that it would be midnight before he could put out.

Mary then went over with the woman, and John lay down on some mats to sleep until it was time to start. He slept soundly until he was aroused by the entry of some one with lights. He started to his feet, and found that it was Josephus himself with an attendant.

'I had not forgotten you,' he said; 'but I have been until now in council. It is close upon midnight, and the boat is in readiness I have sent to fetch the damsel, and have bidden them take plenty of warm wraps so that the night air may do her no harm.'

Mary soon arrived, and Josephus himself went down with them to the shore and saw them on board the boat, which was a large one with eight rowers. The wind had died away to a gentle breeze, and the sea had gone down greatly. The moon was up and the stars shining brightly. Josephus chatted kindly to John as they made their way to the shore.

'Tell your father,' he said, 'that I hope he will come over to see me ere long, and that I shall bear you in mind. The time is coming when every Jew who can bear arms will be needed in the service of his country, and if your father consents I will place you near my person for I have seen that you are brave and cool in danger, and you will have plenty of opportunities of winning advancement.'

With many thanks for his kindness John and Mary took their places in the stern of the boat. Mary enveloped herself in the wraps that had been prepared for her, for the nights were chilly. Then the sail was hoisted, and the boat sailed away from the land. The wind had shifted round somewhat to the west, and they were able to lay their course across toward Hippos, but their progress was slow, and the master bade the crew out their oars and aid the sail.

In three hours they neared the land, John pointing out the exact position of the village, which was plainly enough marked out by a great fire blazing on the shore. As they approached it they could see several figures, and presently there came a shout which John recognized as that of Isaac.

'Any news''

'Here we are, Isaac, safe and well.'

There was a confused sound of shouts and cries of pleasure. In a few minutes the boat grated on the shallow shore. The moment she did so John leaped out over the bow and waded ashore, and was at once clasped in his mother's arms, while one of the fishermen carried Mary to land. She received from Martha a full share of her caresses, for she loved the girl almost as dearly as she did her son. Then Miriam and the maids embraced and kissed her, while Isaac folded John in his arms.

'The God of Israel be thanked and praised, my children!' Mary exclaimed. 'He has brought you back to us as from the dead, for we never thought to see you again. Some of the fishermen returned and told us that they saw your boat far on the lake before the storm burst, and none held out hope that you could have weathered such a storm.'

'Where is father'' John asked.

'He is out on the lake, as are all the fishermen of their village, searching for you. That reminds me, Isaac' set fire to the other piles of wood that we have prepared. If one of the boats returned with any sure new of you we were to light them to call the others back: one fire if the news was bad, tow if it was good; but we hardly even dared to hope that the second would be required.

A brand from the fire was soon applied to the other piles, and the three fires shone out across the lake with the good news. In a quarter of an hour a boat was seen approaching, and soon came a shout:

'Is all well''

'All is well,' John shouted in reply, and soon he was clasped in his father's arms.

The other boats came in one by one, the last to arrive towing in the boat, which had been found bottom upward far up the lake, its discovery destroying the last hope of its late occupants being found alive. As soon as Simon landed the party returned to the house. Miriam and the maids hurried to prepare a meal, of which all were sorely in need, for no food had been eaten since the gale burst on the lake, while their three hours in the boat had again sharpened the appetite of John and Mary. A quantity of food was cooked and a skin of old wine brought up from the cellar, and Isaac remained down on the shore to bid all who had been engaged in the search come up and feast as soon as they landed.

John related to his parents the adventure which had befallen them, and they wondered greatly at the narrowness of their deliverance. When the feasting was over, Simon called all together, and solemnly returned thanks to God for the mercies which he had given them. It was broad daylight before all sought their beds for a few hours before beginning the work of the day.

A week later Josephus himself came to Hippos, bringing with him two nobles who had fled from King Agrippa and sought refuge with him; he had received them hospitably, and had allotted a home to them at Tarichea, where he principally dwelt. He had just before had another narrow escape, for six hundred armed men (robbers and others) had assembled round his house, charging him with keeping some spoils which had been taken by a party of men of that town from the wife of Ptolemy, King Agrippa's procurator, instead of dividing them among the people.

For a time he pacified them by telling them that this money was destined for strengthening the walls of their town and for walling other towns at present undefended, but the leaders of the evil-doers were determined to set his house on fire and slay him. He had but twenty armed men with him. Closing the doors he went to an upper room and told the robbers to send in one of their number to receive the money. Directly he entered the door was closed. One of his hands was cut off and hung round his neck, and he was then turned out again. Believing that Josephus would not have ventured to act so boldly had he not had a large body of armed men with him, the crowd were seized with panic and fled to their homes.

After this the enemies of Josephus persuaded the people that the nobles he had sheltered were wizards, and demanded that they should be given up to be slain, unless they would change religion to that of the Jews. Josephus tried to argue them out of their belief, saying that there were no such things as wizards, and if the Romans had wizards who could work them wrong they would not need to send an army to fight against them; but as the people still clamored he got the men privately on board a ship, and sailed across the lake with them to Hippos, where he dismissed them with many presents.

As soon as the news came that Josephus had come to Hippos, Simon set out with Martha, John, and Mary to see him. Josephus received them kindly, and would permit no thanks for what he had done.

'Your son is a brave youth,' he said to Simon, 'and I would gladly have him near me if you would like to have it so. This is the time when there are greater things than planting vineyards and gathering in harvests to be done, and there is a need for brave and faithful men. If, then, you and your wife will give the lad to me I will see to him and keep him near me. I have need of faithful men with me, for my enemies are ever trying to slay me. If all goes well with the land he will have a good opportunity to rise to honor. What say you' Do not give an answer hastily, but think it over among yourselves, and if you agree to my proposal send him across the lake to me.

'It need no thought, sir,' Simon said. 'I know well that there are more urgent things now than sowing and reaping, and that much trouble and peril threaten the land. Right glad am I that my son should serve one who is the hope of Israel, and his mother will not grudge him for such service. As to advancement, I wish nothing better than that he should till the land of his fathers; but none can say what the Lord hath in store for us, or whether strangers may not reap what I have sown. Thus, then, the wisdom which he will gain in being with you is likely to be a far better inheritance than any I can give him. What say you, Martha''

'I say as you do, Simon. It will grieve me to part with him, but I know that such an offer as that which my Lord Josephus makes is greatly for his good. Moreover, the manner in which he was saved from death seems to show that the Lord has something for his hand to do and that his path is specially marked out for him. To refuse to let him go would be to commit the sin of withstanding God' therefore, my lord, I willingly give up my son to follow you.'

'I think that you have decided wisely,' Josephus said. 'I tarry here for to-night, and to-morrow cross to Tiberias, therefore let him be here by noon.'

Mary was the most silent of the party on the way home. Simon and his wife felt convinced the decision they had made was a wise one, and although they were not ambitious, they yet felt that the offer of Josephus was a most advantageous one, and opened a career of honor to their son.

John himself was in a state of the highest delight. To be about the person of Josephus seemed to him the greatest honor and happiness. It opened the way to the performance of great actions which would bring honor to his father's name; and although he had been hitherto prepared to settle down to the life of a cultivator of the soil, he had had his yearnings for one of more excitement and adventure, and these were now likely to be gratified to the fullest. Mary, however, felt the approaching loss of her friend and playmate greatly, though even she was not insensible to the honor which the offer of Josephus conferred upon him.

'You don't seem glad of my good fortune, Mary,' John said as, after they returned home, they strolled together as usual down to the edge of the lake.

'It may be your good fortune, but it's not mine,' the girl said pettishly. 'It will be very dull here without you. I know what it will be. Your mother will always be full of anxiety, and will be fretting whenever we get news of any disturbances, and that is often enough, for there seem to be disturbances continually. Your father will go about silently, Miriam will be sharper than usual with the maids, and everything will go wrong. I can't see why you couldn't have said that in a year or two you would go with the governor, but that at present you thought you had better stop with your own people.'

'A nice milksop he would have thought me!' John laughed. 'No. If he thought I was man enough to do him service it would have been a nice thing for me to say that I thought I was too young. Besides, Mary, after all it is your good fortune as well as mine, for is it not settled that you are to share it' Josephus is all-powerful, and if I please him and do my duty he can, in time, raise me to a position of great honor. I may even come to be the governor of a town, or a captain over troops, or a councilor,'

'No, no!' Mary laughed; 'not a councilor, John -' a governor perhaps, and a captain perhaps, but never, I should say, a councilor.' John laughed good-temperedly.

'Well, Mary, then you shall look forward to be the wife of a governor or captain, but you see I might even fill the place of a councilor with credit, because I could always come to you for advice before I gave an opinion, then I should be sure to be right. But, seriously, Mary, I do think it great honor to have had such an offer made me by the governor.'

'Seriously, so do I, John, though I wish in my heart he had not made it. I had looked forward to living here all my life, just as your mother has done, and now there will be nothing fixed to look forward to. Besides, where there is honor there is danger. There seems to be always tumults, always conspiracies, and then, as your father says, above all, there are the Romans to be reckoned with; and, of course, if you are near Josephus you run a risk, going wherever he does.'

'I shall never be in greater risk, Mary, than we were together on the lake the other day. God helped us then and brought us through it, and I have faith that he will do so again. It may be that I am meant to do something useful before I die. At any rate, when the Romans come every one will have to fight, so I shall be in no greater danger than any one else.'

'I know, John; and I am not speaking quite in earnest. I am sorry you are going, that is only natural; but I am proud that you are to be near our great leader, and I believe that our God will be your shield and protector. And now we had better go in. Your father will doubtless have much to say to you this evening, and your mother will grudge every minute you are out of her sight.'

That evening the Rabbi Solomon Ben Manasseh came in, and was informed of the offer which Josephus had made.

“You are present, rabbi,” Simon said, “at the events which took place in Jerusalem, and at the defeat of Cestius. John has been asking me to tell him more about these matters; for now that he is to be with the governor it is well that he should be well acquainted with public affairs.”

“I will willingly tell him the history, for, as you say, it is right that the young man should be well acquainted with the public events and the state of parties, and though the story must be somewhat long, I will try and not make it tedious. The first tumult broke out in Cæsarea, and began by frays between our people and the Syrian Greeks. Felix, the governor, took the part of the Greeks, and many of our people were killed and more plundered. When Felix was recalled to Rome we sent a deputation there with charges against him; but the Greeks, by means of bribery, obtained a decree against us, depriving the Jews of Cæsarea of rights of equal citizenship. From this constant troubles arouse; but outside Cæsarea Festus kept all quiet, putting down robbers as well as impostors who led the people astray.

“Then there came trouble in Jerusalem. King Agrippa’s palace stood on Mount Zion, looking toward the temple, and he built a lofty story from whose platform he could command a view of the courts of the Temple, and watch the sacrifices. Our people resented this impious intrusion, and built a high wall to cut off the view. Agrippa demanded its destruction on the ground that it intercepted the view of the Roman guard. We appealed to Nero, and sent to him a deputation headed by Ismael, the high-priest, and Hilkiah, the treasurer. They obtained an order for the wall to be allowed to stand; but Ismael and Hilkiah were detained in Rome. Agrippa thereupon appointed another high-priest, Joseph, but soon afterward nominated Annas in his place.

“When Festus, the Roman governor, was away Annas put to death many of the sect called Christians to gratify the Sadducees. The people were indignant, for these men had done no harm, and Agrippa deprived him of the priesthood and appointed Jesus, son of Damnai. Then, unhappily, Festus, who was a just and good governor, died, and Albinus succeeded him. He was a man greedy of money, and ready to do anything for gain; he took bribes from robbers and encouraged rather than repressed evil-doers. There was open war in the streets between the followers of various chief robbers. Albinius opened the prisons and filled the city with malefactors, and at the completion of the works at the Temple eighteen thousand workmen were discharged, and thus the city was filled with men ready to sell their services to the highest bidder.

“Albinus was succeeded by Gessius Florus, who was even worse than Albinus. This man was a great friend of Cestius Gallus, who commanded the Roman troops in Syria, and who therefore scoffed at the complaints of the people against Florus. At this time strange prodigies appeared in Rome. A sword of fire hung above the city for a whole year. The inner gate of the Temple, which required twenty men to move it, opened by itself, chariots and armed squadrons were seen in the heavens, and, worse than all, the priests in the Temple heard a great movement and a sound of many voices, which said, “Let us depart hence!”

“So things went on in Jerusalem until the old feud at Cæsarea broke out afresh. The trouble this time began about one of our synagogues. The land around it belonged to the Greek, and for this our people offered a high price. The heathen who owned it refused, and to annoy us raised mean houses round the synagogue. The Jewish youths interrupted the workmen, and the wealthier of the community, headed by John, a publican, subscribed eight talents and sent them to Florus as a bribe, that he might order the building to be stopped.

“Forus took the money and made many promises; but the evil man desired that a revolt should place in order that he might gain great plunder. So he went away from Cæsarea and did nothing, and a great tumult arose between the heathen and our people. In this we were worsted and went away from the city, while John, with twelve of the highest rank, went to Samaria to lay the matter before Florus, who threw them into prison, doubtless the more to excite the people, and at the same time sent to Jerusalem and demanded seventeen talents from the treasure of the Temple.

“The people burst into loud outcries, and Florus advanced upon the city with all his force. But we knew that we could not oppose the Romans, and so received Florus on his arrival with acclamations. But this did not suit the tyrant. The next morning he ordered his troops to plunder the upper market and put to death all they met. The soldiers obeyed, and slew thirty-six hundred men, women, and children.

“You may imagine, John, the feelings of grief and rage which filled every heart. The next day the multitude assembled in the market-place, wailing for the dead and cursing Florus. But the principal men of the city, with the priests, tore their robes, and went among them praying them to disperse and not to provoke the anger of the governor. The people obeyed their voices and went quietly home.

“But Florus was not content that matters should end so. He sent for the priests and leaders and commanded them to go forth and receive with acclamations of welcome two cohorts of troops who were advancing from Cæsarea. The priests called the people together in the Temple, and with difficulty persuaded them to obey the order. The troops, having orders from Florus, fell upon the people and trampled them down, and driving the multitude before them entered the city, and at the same time Florus sallied out from his palace with his troops, and both parties pressed forward to gain the castle of Antonia, whose possession would lay the Temple open to them, and enable Florus to gain the sacred treasures deposited there. But as soon as the people perceived their object they ran together in such vast crowds that the Roman soldiers could not cut their way through the mass which blocked up the streets, while the more active men, going up on to roofs, hurled down stones and missiles upon the troops.

“What a scene was that, John! I was on the portico near Antonia and saw it all. It was terrible to hear the shouts of the soldiers as they strove to hew their way through the defenseless people, the war-cries of our own youths, the shrieks and wailings of the women. While the Romans were still striving our people broke down the galleries connecting Antonia with the Temple, and Florus, seeing that he could not carry out his objective, ordered his troops to retire to their quarters, and calling the chief priests and the rulers proposed to leave the city, leaving behind min one cohort to preserve the peace.

“As soon as he had done so he sent to Cestius Gallus lying accounts of the tumults, laying all the blame upon us, while we and Bernice, the sister of King Agrippa, who had tried in vain to obtain mercy for the people from Florus, sent complaints against him. Cestius was moving to Jerusalem, to inquire into the matter, as he said, but really to restore Florus, when fortunately King Agrippa arrived from Egypt.

“While he was yet seven miles from the city a procession of the people met him, headed by the women whose husbands had been slain; these, with cries and wailings called on Agrippa for protection, and related to a centurion, whom Cestius had sent forward and who met Agrippa on the way, the cruelty of Florus. When the king and the centurion arrived in the city they were taken to the market-place and shown the houses where the inhabitants had been massacred.

“Agrippa called the people together, and taking his seat on the lofty dais, with Bernice by his side, harangued them. He assured them that when the emperor heard what had been done he would send a better governor to them in the place of Florus. He told them that it was vain to hope for independence, for that the Romans had conquered all the nations in the world, and that the Jews could not contend against them, and that war would bring about the destruction of the city and the Temple.

“The people exclaimed they had taken up arms, not against the Romans, but against Florus. Agrippa urged us to pay our tribute and repair the galleries. This was willingly done. We sent out leading men to collect the arrears of tribute, and these soon brought in forty talents. All was going well until Agrippa tried to persuade us to receive Florus till the emperor should send another governor. At the thought of the return of Florus a mad rage seized the people. They poured abuse upon Agrippa, threw stones at him, and ordered him to leave the city. This he did, and retired to his own kingdom.

“The upper class, and all those who possessed wisdom enough to know how great was the power of Rome, still strove for peace. But the people were beyond control. They seized the fortress of Masada, a very strong place near the Dead Sea, and put the Roman garrison to the sword. But what was even worse, Eleazar, son of Ananias, the chief priest, persuaded the priests to reject the offerings regularly made in the name of the emperor to the God of the Hebrews, and to make a regulation that from that time no foreigner should be allowed to sacrifice in the Temple. The chief priests, with the heads of the Pharisees, addressed the people in the quadrangle of the Temple before the eastern gate. I myself was one of those who spoke. We told them that the Temple had long benefited by the splendid gifts of strangers, and that it was not only inhospitable, but impious to preclude them from offering victims and worshipping God there.

“We, who were learned in the law, showed them that it was an ancient and immemorial usage to receive the offerings of strangers, and that this refusal to accept the Roman gifts was nothing short of a declaration of war. But all we could do or say availed nothing. The influence of Eleazar was too great. A madness had seized the people, and they rejected all our words; but the party of peace made one more effort. They sent a deputation, headed by Simon, son of Ananias, to Florus, and another to Agrippa, praying them to march upon Jerusalem and reassert their authority before it was too late. Florus made no reply, for things were going just as he wished; but Agrippa, anxious to preserve the city, sent three thousand horsemen, commanded by Darius and Philip. When these troops arrived the party of peace took possession of the upper city, while Eleazar and the war party held the Temple.

“For a week fighting went on between the two parties. Then at the festival of the Wood Carrying great numbers of the poorer people were allowed by the party of the chief priest to pass through their lines and go as usual to the Temple. When there these joined the party of Eleazar, and a great attack was made on the upper city. The troops of Darius and Philip gave way. The house of Ananias, the high-priest, and the palaces of Agrippa and Bernice were burned, and also the public archives. Here all the bonds of the debtors were registered, and thus at one blow the power of the rich over the poor was destroyed. Ananias himself and a few others escaped into the upper towers of the palace, which they held.

“The next day Eleazar’s party attacked the fortress of Antonia, which was feebly garrisoned, and after two days’ fighting captured it and slew the garrison. Manahem, the son of Judas the Zealot, arrived two days later, while the people were besieging the palace. He was accepted as general by them, and took charge of the siege. Having mined under one of the towers they brought it to the ground, and the garrison asked for terms. Free passage was granted to the troops of Agrippa and the Jews, but none was granted to the Roman soldiers, who were few in number and retreated to the three great towers, Hippicus, Phasaelus, and Mariamne.

“The palace was entered and Ananias and Hezekiah his brother, were found in hiding and put to death. Manahem now assumed the state of a king; but Eleazar, unwilling that, after having led the enterprise, the fruits should be gathered by another, stirred up the people against him, and he was slain. The three towers were now besieged, and Metilius, the Roman commander, finding he could no longer hold out, agreed to surrender, on the condition that his men should deliver up their arms and be allowed to march away unharmed.

“The terms were accepted and ratified, but as soon as the Roman soldiers marched out and laid down their arms Eleazar and his followers fell upon them and slew them, Metilius himself being alone spared.

“After this terrible massacre a sadness fell on the city; all felt that there was no longer any hope of making condition with Rome. We had placed ourselves beyond the pale of forgiveness. It was war to death with Rome. Up to this time, as I have told you, I was one of those who had labored to maintain peace. I had fought in the palace by the side of Ananias, and had left it only when the troops, and we of their party, were permitted to march out when it surrendered; but from this time I took another part. All hope of peace, of concessions, or of conditions was at an end. There remained nothing now but to fight; and as the vengeance of Rome would fall on the whole Jewish people, it was for the whole Jewish People to unite in the struggle for existence.

“On the very day and hour in which the Romans were put to death retribution began to fall upon the nation, for the Greeks of Cæsarea rose suddenly and massacred the Jews. Twenty thousand were slain in a single day. The news of these two massacres drove the whole people to madness. They rose throughout the land, laid waste the country all round the cities of Syria—Philadelphia, Sebonitis, Gerasa, Pella, and Scythopolis—and burned and destroyed many places.

“The Syrians in turn fell upon the Jewish inhabitants of all their towns, and a frightful carnage everywhere took place. Then our people made an inroad into the domains of Scythopolis, but though the Jewish inhabitants there joined the Syrians in defending their territory, the Syrians doubted their fidelity, and falling upon them in the night, slew them all and seized their property. Thirteen thousand perished here. In many other cities the same things were done; in Ascalon twenty-five hundred were put to the sword; in Ptolemais two thousand were killed. The land was deluged with blood, and despair fell upon all.

“Even in Alexandria our countrymen suffered. Breaking out into a quarrel with the Greeks, a tumult arose, and Tiberias Alexander, the governor, by faith a Jew, tried to pacify matters, but the madness which had seized the people here had fallen also upon the Jews of Alexandria. They heaped abuse upon Alexander, who was forced to send the troops against them. The Jews fought, but vainly, and fifty thousand men, women, and children fell.

“While blood was flowing over the land, Cetius Gallus the prefect was preparing for invasion. He had with him the Twelfth Legion, forty-two hundred strong; two thousand picked men taken from the other legions; six cohorts of foot, about twenty-five hundred; and four troops of horse, twelve hundred. Of allies he had from Antonichus two thousand horse and three thousand foot; Sohemus joined him with four thousand men, a third of whom were horse, the rest archers. Thus he had ten thousand Roman troops and thirteen thousand allies, besides many volunteers who joined him from the Syrian cities. After burning and pillaging Zebulon, and wasting the district, Cestius returned to Ptolemais, and then advanced to Cæsarea.

“He sent forward a part of his army to Joppa. The city was open and no resistance was offered; nevertheless the Romans slew all to the number of eighty-five hundred. The cities of Galilee opened their gates without resistance, and Cetius advanced against Jerusalem. When he arrived within six miles of the town the Jews poured out and fell upon them with such fury that if the horse and light troops had not made a circuit and fallen upon us in the rear, I believe we should have destroyed the whole army. But we were forced to fall back, having killed over five hundred.

“As the Romans moved forward, Simon, son of Gioras, with a band pressed them closely in rear, and slew many and carried off numbers of their beasts of burden. Agrippa now tried once more to make peace, and sent a deputation to persuade us to surrender, offering in the name of Cestius pardon for all that had passed; but Eleazar’s party, fearing the people might listen to him, fell upon the deputation, slew some and drove the others back.

“Cestius advanced within a mile of Jerusalem, and after waiting three days in hopes that the Jews would surrender, and knowing that many of the chief persons were friendly to him, he advanced to the attack, took the suburb of Bezetha, and encamped opposite the palace in the upper city. The people discovered that Ananias and his friends had agreed to open the gates, and so slew them and threw the bodies over the wall. The Romans for five days attacked, and on the sixth Cestius with the flower of his army made an assault, but the people fought bravely, and disregarding the flights of arrows which the archers shot against them, held the walls and poured missiles of all kinds upon the enemy, until at last, just as it seemed to all that the Romans would succeed in mining the walls and firing the gates, Cestius called off his troops.

“Had he not done so he would speedily have taken the city, for the peace party were on the point of seizing one of the gates and opening it. I no longer belonged to this party, for it seemed to me that it was altogether too late now to make terms, nor could we expect that the Romans would keep to their conditions after we had set them the example of breaking faith. Cestius fell back to his camp, a mile distant, but he had no rest there. Exultant at seeing a retreat from their walls, all the people poured out and fell upon the Romans with fury.

“The next morning Cestius began to retreat, but we swarmed around him, pressing upon his rear and dashing down from the hills upon his flanks, giving him no rest. The heavy-armed Romans could do nothing against us, but marched steadily on, leaving numbers of dead behind them, till they reached their former camp at Gabao, six miles away.

“Here Cestius waited two days, but seeing how the hills around him swarmed with our people, who flocked in from all quarters, he gave word for a further retreat, killing all the beasts of burden and leaving all the baggage behind, and taking on only those animals which bore the arrows and engines of war. Then he marched down the valley toward Bethoron. The multitude felt now that their enemy was delivered into their hands. Was it not in Bethoron that Joshua had defeated the Canaanites while the sun stayed his course? Was it not here that Judas the Maccabean had routed the host of Nicanor? As soon as the Romans entered the defile the Jews rushed down upon them, sure of their prey.

“The Roman horse were powerless to act; the men of the legions could not climb the rocky sides, and from every point javelins, stones, and arrows were poured down upon them, and all would have been slain had not night come on and hidden them from us, and enabled them to reach Bethoron. What rejoicings were there not on the hills that night as we looked down on their camp there, and thought that in the morning they would be ours! Fires burned on every crest; hymns of praise and exulting cries arose everywhere in the darkness, but the watch was not kept strictly enough. Cestius left four hundred of his bravest men to mount guard and keep the fires alight, so that we might think that all his army was there, and then with the rest he stole away.

“In the morning we saw that the camp was well-nigh deserted; and furious at the escape of our foes, rushed down, slew the four hundred whom Cestius had left behind, and then set out in pursuit. But Cestius had many hours’ start, and though we followed as far as Antipatris, we could not overtake him, and so returned with such rich spoil and all the Roman engines of war to Jerusalem, having, with some scarcely any loss, defeated a great Roman army and slain fifty-three hundred foot and three hundred and eighty horse.

“Such is the history of events which have brought about the present state of things. As you see, there is no hope of pardon or mercy from Rome. We have offended beyond forgiveness. But the madness against which I fought so hard at first is still upon the people. They provoked the power of Rome, and then by breaking the terms and massacring the Roman garrison, they went far beyond the first offense of insurrection. By the destruction of the army of Cestius they struck a heavy blow against the pride of the Romans. For generations no such misfortune had fallen upon their arms.

“What, then, would a sane person have done since? Surely they would have spent every moment in preparing themselves for the struggle. Every man should have been called to arms; the passes should have been all fortified, for it is among the hills that we can best cope with the heavy Roman troops; the cities best calculated for defense should have been strongly walled; preparations made for places of refuge among the mountains for the women and children; large depots of provisions gathered up in readiness for the strife.

“That we could ever in the long run hope to resist successfully the might of Rome was out of the question; but we might so sternly and valiantly have resisted as to be able to obtain fair terms on our submission. Instead of this men go on as if Rome had no existence, and we only show an energy in quarreling among ourselves. At bottom it would seem that the people rely upon our God doing great things for us, as he did when he smote the Assyrian army of Sennacherib; and such is my hope also, seeing that so far a wonderful success has attended us. And yet how can one expect the divine assistance in a war so begun and so conducted; for a people who turn their swords against each other, who spend their strength in civil feuds, who neither humble themselves nor repent of the wickedness of their ways?

“Alas! My son, though I speak brave words to the people, my heart is very sad, and I fear that troubles like those which fell upon us when we were carried captive into Babylon await us now!”

There was a silence as the rabbi finished. John had of course heard something of the events which had been taking place, but as he now heard them in sequence, the gravity and danger of the situation came freshly upon him.

“What can be done?” he asked after a long pause.

“Nothing save to pray to the Lord,” the rabbi said sorrowfully. “Josephus is doing what he can toward building walls to the towns, but it is not walls, but soldiers that are wanted; and so long as the people remain blind and indifferent to the danger, thinking of naught save tilling their ground and laying up money, nothing can be done.”

“Then will destruction come upon all?” John asked, looking round in a bewildered and hopeless way.

“We may hope not,” the rabbi said. “Here in Galilee we have had no share in the events in Jerusalem, and many towns even now are faithful to the Romans; therefore it may be that in this province all will not be involved in the lot of Jerusalem. There can be, unless a mighty change takes place, no general resistance to the Romans, and it may be, therefore, that no general destruction will fall upon the people. As to this none can say.

“Vespasian, the Roman general who has been charged by Nero with the command of the army which is gathering against us, is said to be a merciful man as well as a great commander. The Roman mercies are not tender, but it may be that the very worst may not fall upon this province. The men of spirit and courage will doubtless proceed to Jerusalem to share in the defense of the Holy City. If we cannot fight with success here it is far better that the men should fight at Jerusalem, leaving their wives and families here, and doing naught to call down the vengeance of the Romans upon this province.

“In Galilee there have, as elsewhere, been risings against the Romans, but these will count for little in their eyes in comparison to the terrible deeds at Jerusalem; and I pray, for the sake of all my friends here, that the Romans may march through the land on their way to Jerusalem without burning and wasting the country. Here on the eastern shore of Galilee there is much more hope of escape than there is across the lake.

“Not only are we out of the line of the march of the army, but there are few important cities on this side, and the disposition of the people has not been so hostile to the Romans. My own opinion is that when the Romans advance it will be the duty of every Jew who can bear arms to go down to the defense of the Holy City. Its position is one of vast strength. We shall have numbers and courage, though neither order nor discipline; and it may be that at the last the Lord will defend his sanctuary and save it from destruction at the hands of the heathen. Should it not be so we can but die, and how could a Jew better die than in defense of God’s Temple?”

“It would have been better,” Simon said, “had we not by our evil doings have brought God’s Temple into danger.”

“He has suffered it,” the rabbi said, “and his ways are not the ways of man. It may be that he has suffered such madness to fall upon us in order that his name may at last be glorified.”

“May it be so!” Simon said piously; “and now let us to bed, for the hour is growing late.”

The following morning Simon, his wife, and the whole household accompanied John to the shore, as Simon had arranged with one of the boatmen to take the lad to Hippos. The distance was but short, but Simon, when his wife had expressed surprise at his sending John in a boat, said:

“It is not the distance, Martha. A half-hour’s walk is naught to the lad; but I had reasons altogether apart from the question of distance. John is going out to play a man’s part. He is young, but since my Lord Josephus has chosen to place him among those who form his bodyguard, he has a right to claim to be regarded as a man. That being so, I would not accompany him to Hippos, for it would seem like one leading a child, and it were best to let him go by himself. Again, it were better to have but one parting. Here he will receive my blessing, and say good-bye to us all. Doubtless he will often be with us, for Tiberias lies within sight, and so long as Josephus remains in Galilee he will never be more than a long day’s journey from home. The lad loves us, and will come as often as he can; but surrounded as Josephus is by dangers, the boy will not be able to get away on his own business. He must take the duties as well as the honor of the office, and we must not blind ourselves to the fact that in one of these popular tumults great danger and even death may come upon him.

“This seems to you terrible,” he went on in answer to an exclamation of alarm from Martha; “but it does not seem so terrible to me. We go on planning and gathering in as if no danger threatened us and the evil day were far off, but it is not so; the Roman hosts are gathering, and we are wasting our strength in party strife and are doing naught to prepare against the storm. We have gone to war without counting the cost; we have affronted and put to shame Rome, before whom all nations bow; and assuredly she will take a terrible vengeance. Another year, and who can say who will be alive and who dead—who will be wandering over the wasted fields of our people or who will be a slave in Rome!

“In the times that are at hand no man’s life will be worth anything; and therefore I say, wife, that though there is danger and peril about the lad, let us not trouble overmuch, for he is, like all of us, in God’s hands.”

Therefore the parting took place on the shore. Simon solemnly blessed John, and his mother cried over him. Mary was a little surprised at these demonstrations at what she regarded as a very temporary separation, but her merry spirits were subdued at the sight of her aunt’s tears, although she herself saw nothing to cry about. She brightened up, however when John whispered, as he said good-bye to her:

“I shall come across the lake as often as I can to see how you are getting on, Mary.”

Then he took his place in the stern of the boat, the fishermen dipped their oars in the water, and the boat drew away from the little group who stood watching it as it made its way across the sparkling waters to Hippos.

Upon landing John at once went to the house where Josephus was lodging. The latter gave him in charge to the leader of the little group of men who attached themselves to him as his body-guard.

“Joab,” he said, “this youth will henceforth make one of your party. He is brave and, I think, ready and quick witted. Give him arms and see that he has all that is needful. Being young, he will be able to mingle unsuspected among the crowds, and may obtain tidings of evil intended me, when men would not speak maybe before others whom they might judge my friends. He will be able to bear messages unsuspected, and may prove of great service to the cause.”

John found at once that there was nothing like discipline or regular duties among the little band who constituted the body-guard of Josephus. They were simply men who, from affection for the governor and a hatred for those who, by their plots and conspiracies, would un do the good work he was accomplishing, had left their farms and occupations to follow and guard him.

Every Jew boy received a certain training in the use of weapons in order to be prepared to fight in the national army when the day of deliverance should arrive, but beyond that the Jews had no military training whatever. Their army would be simply a gathering of the men capable of bearing arms throughout the land—each ready to give his life for his faith and his country, relying like their forefathers on the sword of the Lord and Israel, but without the slightest idea of military drill, discipline, or tactics. Such an army might fight bravely, might die nobly, but it could have little chance of victory over the well-trained legions of imperial Rome.

At noon Josephus embarked in a galley with his little band of followers, eight in number, and sailed across the lake to Tiberias. Here they landed and went up to the house in which Josephus always dwelt when in that city. His stay there was generally short, Tarichea being his general abode, for there he felt in safety, the inhabitants being devoted to him; while those of Tiberias were ever ready to follow the advice of the disaffected, and a section were eager for the return of the Romans and the renewal of the business and trade which had brought wealth to the city before the troubles began. That evening Josephus sent for John, and said:

“I purpose in two days to go to Tarichea, where I shall spend the Sabbath. I hear that there is a rumor that many of the citizens have privately sent to King Agrippa asking him to send hither Roman troops, and promising them a good reception. The men with me are known to many in the city and would be shunned by my enemies, and so would hear naught of what is going on; therefore I purpose to leave you here. In the morning go early to the house of Samuel, the son of Gideon. He dwells in the street called that of Tarichea, for it leadeth in the direction of that town. He is a tanner by trade, and you will have no difficulty in finding it. He has been here this evening, and I have spoken to him about you, and when you present yourself to him he will take you in. Thus no one will know that you are of my company. Pass your time in the streets, and when you see groups of people assemble join yourself to them and gather what they are saying. If it is aught that is important for me to know, come here and tell me; or if it be after I have departed for Tarichea, bring me the news there. It is but thirty furlongs distant.”

John followed up the instructions given him, and was hospitably received by Samuel the tanner.

In the course of the day a number of the citizens called upon Josephus and begged him at once to set about building walls for the town, as he had already built them for Tarichea. When he assured them that he had already made preparations for doing so, and that the builders should set to work forthwith, they appeared satisfied, and the city remained perfectly tranquil until Josephus left the next morning for Tarichea.

The galley which carried Josephus from Tiberias was scarcely out of sight when John, who was standing in the market-place watching the busy scene with amusement, heard the shout raised: “The Romans are coming!” At once people left their business and all ran to the outskirts of the city. John ran with them, and on arriving there saw a party of Roman horsemen riding along at no great distance. The people began to shout loudly to them to come into the town, calling out that all the citizens were loyal to King Agrippa and the Romans, and that they hated the traitor Josephus.

The Romans halted, but made no sign of entering the town, fearing that treachery was intended, and remembering the fate of their comrades who had trusted to Jewish faith when they surrendered the towers of Hippicus, Phasaelus, and Mariamne. The movement, however, spread through the city; the people assembled in crowds shouting “Death to Josephus!” and exclaimed for the Romans and King Agrippa.

Such as were loyal to Josephus did not venture to raise their voices, so numerous and furious were the multitude; and the whole city was soon in open revolt, the citizens arming themselves in readiness for war. As soon as he saw the course which affairs were taking, John made way out of the town and ran at the top of his speed to Tarichea, where he arrived in a little over half an hour. He was directed at once to the house of Josephus, who rose in surprise at the table at which he was seated writing at John’s entry.

“Scarcely had you left, my lord, than some Roman horsemen approached near the town, whereupon the whole city rose in revolt, shouting to them to enter and take possession in the name of the king, and breathing out threats against yourself. The Romans had not entered as I came away; but the populace were all in arms, and your friends did not venture to lift up a voice. Tiberias has wholly revolted to the Romans.”

“This is bad news, indeed,” Josephus said gravely. “I have but the seven armed men who accompanied me from Tiberias here. All those who were assembled in the city I bade disperse so soon as I arrived, in order that they might go to their towns or villages for the Sabbath. Were I to send round the country I could speedily get a great force together; but in a few hours the Sabbath will begin, even though the necessity be great. And yet if the people of Tiberias march hither we can hardly hope to resist successfully, for the men of the town are too few to man the full extent of the walls. It is most necessary to put down this rising before King Agrippa can send large numbers of troops into Tiberias; and yet we can do nothing until the Sabbath is past.

“Nor would I shed blood if it can be avoided. Hitherto I have put down every rising, and caused Sepphoris, Tiberias, and other cities to expel the evil-doers and return to obedience by tact and by the great force which I could bring against them, and without any need of bloodshed. But this time, I fear, great trouble will come of it, since I cannot take prompt measures, and the enemy will have time to organize their forces and to receive help from John of Gischala and other robbers, to say nothing of the Romans.”

Josephus walked up and down the room in agitation, and then stood looking out into the harbor.

“Ah!” he exclaimed suddenly, “we may yet frighten them into submission. Call in Joab.”

When Joab entered Josephus explained to him in a few words the condition of things in Tiberias and then proceeded:

“Send quickly to the principal men of the town and bid them put trusty men at each of the gates and let none pass out; order the fighting men to man the walls in case those of Tiberias should come hither at once; then let one or two able fellows embark on board each of the boats and vessels in the port, taking with them two or three of the infirm and aged men. Send a fast galley across to Hippos and bid the fishermen set out at once with all their boats and join us off Tiberias. We will not approach close enough to the city for the people to see how feebly we are manned, but when they perceive all these ships making toward them they will think that I have with me a great army with which I propose to destroy their city.”

The orders were quickly carried out. Josephus embarked with his eight companions in one ship, and followed by two hundred and thirty vessels of various sizes, sailed toward Tiberias. As they approached the town they saw a great movement among the population. Men and women were seen crowding down to the shore—the men holding up their hands to show that they were unarmed, the women wailing and uttering loud cries of lamentation.

Josephus waited for an hour until the ships from Hippos also came up and then caused them all to anchor off the town, but at such a distance that the number of those on board could not be seen. Then he advanced in his own ship to within speaking distance of the land. The people cried out to him to spare the city and their wives and children, saying that they had been misled by evil men and regretted bitterly what they had done.

Josephus told them that assuredly they deserved that city should be wholly destroyed, for that now when there was so much that had to be done to prepare for the war which Rome would make against the country they troubled the country with their seditions. The people set up a doleful cry for mercy, and Josephus then said that this time he would spare them, but that their principal men must be handed over to him.

To this the people joyfully agreed, and a boat with ten of their senate came out to the vessel. Josephus had them bound and sent them on board one of the other ships. Another and another boat-load came off, until all the members of the senate and many of the principal inhabitants were prisoners. Some of the men had been drawn from the other ships and put on board those with the prisoners, and these then sailed away to Tarichea.

The people of Tiberias, terrified at seeing so man taken away and not knowing how many more might be demanded, now denounced a young man named Clitus as being the leader of the revolt. Seven of the body-guard of Josephus had gone down the lake with the prisoners and one Levi alone remained. Josephus told him to go ashore and to cut off one of the hands of Clitus. Levi was, however, afraid to land alone among such a number of enemies, whereupon Josephus addressed Clitus, and told him that he was worthy of death, but that he would spare his life, if his two hands were sent on board a ship.

Clitus begged that he might be permitted to keep one hand, to which Josephus agreed. Clitus then drew his sword and struck off his left hand. Josephus now professed to be satisfied, and after warning the people against again listening to evil advisers sailed away with the whole fleet. Josephus that evening entertained the principal persons among the prisoners, and in the morning allowed all to return to Tiberias.

The people there had already learned that they had been duped, but with time had come reflection, and knowing that in a day or two Josephus could have assembled the whole population of Galilee against them and have destroyed them before any help could come, there were few who were not well content that their revolt had been so easily and bloodlessly repressed, and Josephus rose in their estimation by the quickness and boldness of the stratagem by which he had, without bloodshed, save in the punishment of Clitus, restored tranquillity.

Through the winter Josephus was incessantly active. He endeavored to organize an army, enrolled a hundred thousand men, appointed commanders and captains, and strove to establish something like military drill and order. But the people were averse to leaving their farms and occupations, and but little progress was made. Moreover, a great part of the time Josephus was occupied in suppressing the revolts which were continually breaking out in Sepporis Tiberias, and Galama, and in thwarting the attempts of John of Gischala and his other enemies, who strove by means of bribery at Jerusalem to have him recalled, and would have succeeded but had it not been that the Gilileans, save those of the great cities, were always ready to turn out in all their force to defend him, and by sending deputations to Jerusalem counteracted the efforts there of this enemies.

John was incessantly engaged as he accompanied Josephus in his rapid journeys through the province either to suppress the risings or to see to the work of organization; and only once or twice was he able to pay a short visit to his family.

“You look worn and fagged, John,” his cousin said on the occasion of his last visit, when spring was close at hand.

“I am well in health, Mary, but it does try one to see how all the efforts of Josephus are marred by the turbulence of the people of Tiberias and Sepphoris. All his thought sand time are occupied in keeping order, and the work of organizing the army makes but little progress. Vespasian is gathering a great force at Antioch. His son Titus will soon join him with another legion, and they will together advance against us.”

“But I hear that the walling of the cities is well-nigh finished.”

“That is so, Mary, and doubtless many of them will be able to make a long defense; but, after all, the taking of a city is a mere question of time. The Romans have great siege engines which nothing can withstand; but even if the walls were so strong that they could not be battered down, each city could in time be reduced by famine. It is not for me, who am but a boy, to judge the doings of my elders, but it seems to me that this walling of cities is altogether wrong. They can give no aid to each other, and one by one must fall and all within perish or be made slaves, for the Romans give no quarter when they capture a city by storm.

“It seems to me that it would be far better to hold Jerusalem only with a strong force of fighting men, and for all the rest of the men capable of carrying arms to gather among the hills and there to fight the Romans. When the legion of Cestius was destroyed we showed that among defiles and on rocky ground our active lightly armed men were a match for the Roman soldiers in their heavy armor, and in this way I think that we might check even the legions of Vespasian.

“Them women and the old men and children could gather in the cities and admit the Romans when they approached. In that case they would suffer no harm, for the Romans are clement when not opposed. As it is, it seems to me that in the end destruction will fall on all alike. Here in Galilee we have a leader, but he is hampered by dissensions and jealousies. Samaria stands neutral. Jerusalem, which ought to take the lead, is torn by faction. There is war in her streets; she thinks only of herself and naught of the country, although she must know that when the Romans have crushed down all opposition elsewhere she must sooner or later fall. The country seems possessed with madness, and I see no hope in the future.”

“Save in the God of Israel,” Mary said gently; “that is what Simon and Martha say.”

“Save in him,” John assented; “but, dear, he suffered us to be carried away to Babylon, and how are we to expect his aid now when the people do naught for themselves, when his city is divided in itself, when its streets are wet with blood, and its very altars defiled by conflict? When evil men are made high-priests and all rule and authority is at an end, what right have we to expect aid at the hands of Jehovah? My greatest comfort, Mary, is that we lie here on the east of the lake, and that we are within the jurisdiction of King Agrippa. On this side his authority has never been altogether thrown off, though some of the cities have made common cause with those of the other side. Still we may hope that on this side of Jordan we may escape the horrors of the war.”

“You are out of spirits, John, and take a gloomy view of things; but I know that Simon, too, thinks that everything will end badly, and I have heard him say that he too is glad that his farm lies on this side of the lake, and that he wishes Gamala had not thrown off the authority of the king, so that there might be naught to bring the Romans across Jordan. Our mother is more hopeful; she trusts in God, for, as she says, though the wealthy and powerful may have forsaken him, the people still cling to him, and he will not let us fall into the hands of our enemies.”

“I hope it will be so, Mary, and I own I am out of spirits and look at matters in the worse light; however, I will have a talk with father to-night.”

That evening John had a long conversation with Simon, and repeated the forebodings he had expressed to Mary.

“At any rate, father, I hope that when the Romans approach you will at least send away my mother, Mary and the women to a place of safety. We are but a few miles from Gamala, and if the Romans come there and besiege it they will spread through the country, and will pillage, even if they do not slay, in all the villages. If, as we trust, God will give victory to our arms, they can return peace; if not, let them at least be free from the dangers which are threatening us.”

“I have been thinking of it, John. A fortnight since I sent old Isaac to your mother’s brother, whose farm, as you know, lies upon the slopes of Mount Hermon, a few miles from Neve, and very near the boundary of Manasseh, to ask him if he will receive Martha, and Mary, and the women until the troubles are over. He will gladly do so, and I purpose sending them away as soon as I hear that the Romans have crossed the frontier.”

“I am indeed rejoiced to hear it, father; but do not let them tarry for that, let them go as soon as the snows have melted on Mount Hermon, for the Roman cavalry will spread quickly over the land. Let them go as soon as the roads are fit for travel. I shall feel a weight off my mind when I know that they are safe. And does my mother know what you have decided?”

“She knows, John, but in truth she is reluctant to go. She says at present that if I stay she also will stay.”

“I trust, father, that you will overrule my mother; and that you will either go with her, or if you stay you will insist upon her going; should you not overcome her opposition and finally suffer her with Miriam, and the older women, to remain with you, I hope that you will send Mary and the young ones to my uncle. The danger with them is vastly greater; the Romans, unless their blood is heated by opposition, may not interfere with the old people, who are valueless as slaves, but the young ones—“ and he stopped.

“I have thought it ever, my son, and even if your mother remains here with me I will assuredly send off Mary and the young maidens to the mountain. Make your mind easy on that score. We old people have taken root on the land which was our fathers’. I shall not leave, whatever may befall, and it may be that your mother will tarry here with me, but the young women shall assuredly be sent away until the danger is over. Not that I think the peril is as great as it seems to you. Our people have ever shown themselves courageous in great danger; they know the fate that awaits them after provoking the anger of Rome. They know they are fighting for faith, for country, and their families, and will fight desperately. They greatly outnumber the Romans, at least the army by which we shall first be attacked, and maybe if we can resist that we may make terms with Rome, for assuredly in the long run she must overpower us.”

“I should think with you, father,” John said, shaking his head, “if I saw anything like union among the people, but I lose all heart when I see how divided they are, how blind to the storm that is coming against us, how careless as to anything but trouble of the day, how intent upon the work of their farms and businesses, how disinclined to submit to discipline and to prepare themselves for the day of battle.”

“You are young, my son, and full of enthusiasm, but it is hard to stir men whose lives have traveled in one groove from their ordinary course. In all our history, although we have been ready to assemble and meet the foe, we have ever been ready to lay by the sword when the danger is past, and to return to our homes and families. We have been a nation of fighting men, but never a nation with an army.”

“Yes, father, because we trusted in God to give us victory on the day of battle. He is our army. When he fought with us we conquered, when he abstained we were beaten. He suffered us to fall into the hands of the Romans, and instead of repenting of our sins we have sinned more and more. The news from Jerusalem is worse and worse. There is civil war in its streets. Robbers are its masters. The worst of the people sit in high place.”

“That is so, my son. God’s anger burns fiercely, and the people perish; yet it may be that he will be merciful in the end.”

“I hope so, father, for assuredly our hope is only in him.”

Early in the spring Vespasian was joined by King Agrippa with all his forces, and they advanced to Ptolemais, and here Titus joined his father, having brought his troops from Alexandria by sea. The force of Vespasian now consisted of the Fifth, Tenth, and Fifteenth legions. Beside these he had twenty-three cohorts, ten of which numbered a thousand footmen, the rest each six hundred footmen and a hundred and fifty horse.

The allied force contributed by Agrippa and others consisted of two thousand archers and a thousand horse; while Malchus, King of Arabia, sent a thousand horse and five thousand archers. The total force amounted to sixty thousand regular troops, beside great numbers of camp-followers, who were all trained to military service and could fight in case of need. Vespasian had encountered no resistance on his march down to Ptolemais. The inhabitants of the country which he passed forsook the villages and farms, and retired, according to the orders they had received, to the fortified towns.

There was no army to meet the Romans in the field. The efforts at organization which Josephus had made bore no fruit whatever. No sooner had the invader entered the country than it lay at his mercy, save only the walled cities into which the people had crowded. In the range of the mountains stretching across Upper Galilee were three places of great strength, Gabara, Gischala, and Jotapata. The last named had been very strongly fortified by Josephus himself, and here he intended to take up his own position.

“It is a pitiful sight truly,” Joab remarked to John as they saw the long line of fugitives, men, women, and children, with such belongings as they could carry on their own backs and of their beasts of burden—“it is a pitiful sight, is it not?”

“It is a pitiful sight, Joab, and one that fills me with foreboding as well as with pity. What agonies may not these poor people be doomed to suffer when the Romans lay siege to Jotapata!”

“They can never take it,” Joab said scornfully.

“I wish I could think so, Joab. When did the Romans ever lay siege to a place and fail to capture it? Once, twice, three times they may fail, but in the end they assuredly will take it.”

“Look at its position. See how wild is the country through which they will have to march.”

“They have made roads over all the world, Joab; they will make very short work of the difficulties here. It may take the Romans weeks or months to besiege each of these strong places, but they will assuredly carry them in the end, and then better a thousand times that the men had in the first place slain the women and rushed to die on the Roman swords.”

“It seems to me, John,” Joab said stiffly, “that you are overbold in thus criticising the plans of our general.”

“It may be so,” John said recklessly, “but methinks when we are all risking our lives, each man may have a right to his opinions. I am ready, like the rest, to die when the time comes, but that does not prevent me having my opinions; besides, it seems to me that there is no heresy in questioning the plans of our general. I love Josephus, and would willingly give my life for him. He has shown himself a wise ruler, firm to carry out wht is right and to suppress all evil-doers; but, after all, he has not served in war. He is full of resources, and will, I doubt not, devise every means to check the Romans; but even so, he may not be able to cope in war with such generals as theirs, who have won their experience all over the world. Nor may the general’s plan of defense which he had adopted be the best suited for the occasion.”

“Would you have us fight the Romans in the open?” Joab said scornfully. “What has been done in the south? See how our people marched out from Jerusalem under John the Essene, Niger of Paræa, and Silas the Babylonian to attack Ascalon, held by but one cohort of Roman foot and one troop of horse. What happened? Antoninus, the Roman commander, charged the army without fear, rode through and through them, broke them up into fragments, and slew till night-time, when then thousand men, with John and Silas, lay dead. Not satisfied with this defeat, in a short time Niger advanced again against Ascalon, when Antoninus sallied out again and slew eight thousand of them. Thus eighteen thousand men were killed by one weak cohort of foot and a troop of horse, and yet you say we ought not to hide behind our walls, but to meet them in the open!”

“I would not meet them in the open where the Roman cavalry could charge, at any rate not until our people have learned discipline. I would harass them and attack them in defiles, as Cestius was attacked; harassing them night and day, giving them no peace or rest, never allowing them to meet us in the plains, but moving rapidly hither and thither among the mountains, leaving the women in the cities, which should offer no resistance so the Romans would have no point to strike at, until at length, when we have gained confidence and discipline and order, we should be able to take bolder measures gradually and fight them hand to hand.”

“Maybe you are right, lad,” Joab said thoughtfully. “I like not being cooped up in a stronghold myself, and methinks that a mountain warfare such as you speak of would suit the genius of the people; we are light-limbed and active, inured to fatigue, for we are a nation of cultivators, brave assuredly and ready to give our lives. They say that in the fight near Ascalon not a Jew fled. Fight they could not, they were powerless against the rush of the heavy Roman horse, but they died as they stood, destroyed but not defeated. Gabara and Gischala and Jotapata may fall; but, lad, it will be only after a defense so desperate that the haughty Roman may well hesitate; for if such be the resistance of these little mountain towns, what will not be the task of conquering Jerusalem garrisoned by the whole nation.”

“That is true,” John said, “and if our death here be for the safety of Jerusalem we shall not have died in vain. But I doubt whether such men as those who have power in Jerusalem will agree to any terms, however favorable, that may be offered. It may be that it is God’s will that it should be so. Two days ago, as I journeyed hither after going down to Sepphoris with a message from the general to some of the principal inhabitants there, I met an old man travelling with his wife and family. I asked him whether he was on his way hither, but he said ‘No’ he was going across Jordan and through Manasseh and ever Mount Hermon into Trachonitis. He said that he was a follower of that Christ who was put to death in Jerusalem some thirty-five years since, and whom many people still believe was the Messiah. He says that he foretold the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, and warned his followers not to stay in the walled cities, but to fly to the deserts when the time came.”

“The Messiah was to save Israel,” Jacob said scornfully. “Christ could not save even himself.”

“I know not,” John said simply, “I have heard of him from others, and my father heard him preach several times near the lake. He says that he is a man of wondrous power, and that he preached a new doctrine. He says that he did not talk about himself or claim to be the Messiah; but that he simply told the people to be kind and good to each other, and to love God and do his will. My father said that he thought he was a good and holy man, and full of the Spirit of God. He did works of great power too, but bore himself meekly, like any other man. My father always regarded him as a prophet, and said that he grieved when he heard that he had been put to death at Jerusalem. If he were a prophet, what he said about the destruction of Jerusalem should have weight with us.”

“All who head him agreed that he was a good man,” Jacob assented. “I have never known one of those who heard him say otherwise, and maybe he was a prophet. Certainly he called upon the people to repent and turn from their sins, and had they done as he taught them these evils might not have fallen upon us, and God would doubtless have been ready to aid his people as of old. However, it is too late to think about it now. We want all our thoughts for the matter we have in hand. We have done all that we can to put this town into a state of defense, and, methinks, if the Romans ever penetrate through these mountains and forests they will see that they have a task which will tax all their powers before they take Jotapata.”

The position of the town was indeed immensely strong. It stood on the summit of a lofty mass of rock, which, on three sides, fell abruptly down into the deep and almost impassable ravines which surrounded it. On the north side alone, where the ridges sloped more gradually down, it could be approached. The town extended part of the way down this declivity, and at its foot Josephus had built a strong wall. On all sides were lofty mountains covered with thick forests, and the town could not be seen by an enemy until they were close at hand.

As soon as Vespasian had arrived at Ptolemais (on the site of which city stands the modern Acre) he was met by a deputation from Sepphoris. That city had only been prevented from declaring for the Romans by the exertions of Josephus, and the knowledge that all Galilee would follow him to attack it should it revolt. But as soon as Vespasian arrived at Ptolemais, which was scarce twenty miles away, they sent deputies with their submission to him, begging that a force might be sent to defend them against any attack by the Jews.

Vespasian received them with courtesy, and sent Placidus with a thousand horse and six thousand foot to the city. The infantry took up their quarters in the town, but the horsemen made raids over the plains, burning the villages, slaying all the men capable of bearing arms, and carrying off the rest of the population as slaves.

The day after the conversation between Joab and John a man brought the news to Jotapata that Placidus was marching against it. Josephus at once ordered the fighting men to assemble, and, marching out, placed them in ambuscade in the mountains on the road by which the Romans would approach.

As soon as the latter had fairly entered the pass the Jews sprang to their feet and hurled their javelins and shot their arrows among them. The Romans in vain endeavored to reach their assailants, and numbers were wounded as they tried to climb the heights, but few were killed for they were so completely covered by their armor and shields that the Jewish missiles thrown from a distance seldom inflicted mortal wounds. They were, however, unable to make their way further, and Placidus was obligated to retire to Sepphoris, having failed signally in gaining the credit he had hoped for from the capture of the strongest of the Jewish strongholds in upper Galilee.

The Jews, on their part, were greatly inspirited by the success of their first encounter with the Romans, and returned rejoicing to their stronghold. All being ready at Jotapata, Josephus, with a considerable number of the fighting men, proceeded to Garis, not far from Sepphoris, where the army had assembled. But no sooner had the news arrived that the great army of Vespasian was in movement that they dispersed in all directions, and Josephus was left with a mere handful of followers, with who he fled to Tiberias.

Thence he wrote earnest letters to Jerusalem, saying that unless a strong army was fitted out and put in the field it was useless to attempt to fight the Romans, and that it would be wiser to come to terms with them than to maintain a useless resistance which would bring destruction upon the nation. He remained a short time only at Tiberias, and thence hurried up with his followers to Jotapata, which he reached on the 14th of May.

Vespasian marched first to Gadara, which was undefended, the fighting men having all gone to Jotapata; but although no resistance was offered, Vespasian put all the males to the sword and burned the town and all the villages in the neighborhood, and then advanced against Jotapata.

For four days the pioneers of the Roman army had labored incessantly cutting a road through the forests, filling up ravines, and clearing away obstacles, and on the fifth day the road was constructed close up to Jotapata.

On the 14th of May Placidus and Ebutius were sent forward by Vespasian with a thousand horse to surround the town and cut off all possibility of escape. On the following day Vespasian himself, with his whole army, arrived there. The defenders of Jotapata could scarcely believe their eyes when they saw the long heavy column, with all its baggage and siege engines, marching along a straight and level road, where they had believed that it would be next to impossible for even the infantry of the enemy to make their way. If this marvel had been accomplished in five days, what hope was there that the city would be able to withstand this force which had so readily triumphed over the defenses of nature!

“Well, Joab, what do you think now?” John said as he stood on the wall with his older companion watching the seemingly endless column of the enemy. “It seems to me that we are caught here like rats in a trap, and that we should have done better a thousand times in maintaining our freedom of movement among the mountains. It is one thing to cut a road, it would be another to clear off all the forests to shelter us the Romans could never have overtaken us. Here there is nothing to do but die.”

“That is so, John. I own that the counsel you urged would have been wiser than this. Here are all the best fighting men in Galilee shut up without hope of succor or of mercy. Well, lad, we can at least teach the Romans the lesson that the Jews know how to die, and the capture of this mountain town will cost them as much as they reckoned would suffice for the conquest of the whole country. Jotapata may save Jerusalem yet.”

John was no coward and was prepared to fight to the last; but he was young, and the love of life was strong within. He thought of his old father and mother, who had no children but him; of his pretty Mary, far away now, he hoped, on the slopes of Mount Hermon; and of the grief that his death would cause them; and he resolved that although he would do his duty he would strain every nerve to preserve the life so dear to them.

He had no other duties to perform other than those common to all able to bear arms. When the Romans attacked, his place would be near Josephus, or were a sally ordered he would issue out with the general, but until then his time was his own. There was no mission to be performed now, no fear of plots against the life of the general, therefore he was free to wander where he liked. Save the newly erected wall across the neck of rock below the town there were no defenses, for it was deemed impossible for man to climb the cliffs that fell sheer down at ever other point. John strolled quietly round the town, stopping now and then to look over the low wall that bordered the precipice, erected solely to prevent children from falling over. The depth was very great, and it seemed to him that there could be no escape anywhere save on that side which was now blocked by the wall, and which would, ere long, be trebly blocked by the Romans.

The town was crowded. At ordinary times it might contain three or four thousand inhabitants; now, over twenty-five thousand had gathered there. Of these more than half were men, but many had brought their wives and children with them. Every vacant foot of ground was taken up. The inhabitants shared their homes with the strangers, but the accommodation was altogether insufficient, and the greater part of the new-comers had erected little tents and shelters of cloths or blankets.

In the upper part of the town there were at present comparatively few people about, for the greater part had gone to the slope, whence they watched with terror and dismay the great Roman column as it poured down in an unbroken line hour after hour. The news of the destruction which had fallen on Gadara had been brought in by fugitives, and all knew that although no resistance had been offered there, every male had been put to death and the women taken captives.

There was naught then to be gained by surrender, even had any one dared to propose it. As for victory over such a host as that which was marching to the assault, none could hope for it. For hold out as they might, and repel every assault on the wall, there was an enemy within which would conquer them. For Jotapata possessed no wells. The water had daily to be fetched by the women from the stream in the ravine, and although stores of grain had been collected sufficient to last for many months, the supply of water stored up in cisterns would scarce suffice to supply the multitudes gathered on the rock for a fortnight.

Death, then, certain and inevitable, awaited them; and yet an occasional wail from some woman as she pressed her children to her breast alone told of the despair which reigned in every heart. The great portion looked out silent and as if stupefied. They had relied absolutely on the mountains and forests to block the progress of the invader. They had thought that at the worst they would have had to deal with a few companies of infantry only. Thus the sight of the sixty thousand by the camp swelled to nigh a hundred thousand by the camp-followers and artificers, complete with its cavalry and machines of war, seemed like some terrible nightmare.

After making the circuit of the rock, and wandering for some time among the impromptu camps in the streets, John returned to a group of boys whom he had noticed learning against the low wall with a carelessness as to the danger of a fall over the precipice which proved that they must be natives of the place.

“If there be any possible way of descending these precipices,” he said to himself, “it will be the boys who will know of it. Where a goat could climb these boys, born among the mountains, would try to follow, if only to excel each other in daring and to risk breaking their necks.” Thus thinking he walked up to the group, who were from twelve to fifteen years old.

“I suppose you belong to the town?” he began.

There was a general assent from the five boys, who looked with considerable respect at John, who, although but two years the senior of the eldest among them, wore a man’s garb and carried sword and buckler.

“I am one of the body-guard of the governor,” John went on, “and I dare say you can tell me all sorts of things about this country that may be useful for him to know. It is quite certain that no one could climb up these rocks from below, and that there is no fear of the Romans making a surprise in that way?”

The boys looked at each other, but no one volunteered to give information.

“Come!” John went on; “I have only just left off being a boy myself, and I was always climbing into all sorts of places when I got a chance, and I have no doubt it’s the same with you. When you have been down below there you have tried how far you can get up. Did you ever get up far, or did you ever hear of any one getting up far?”

“I expect I have been up as far as any one,” the eldest of the boys said. “I went up after a young kid that had strayed away from its mother. I got up a long way—halfway up, I should say; but I couldn’t get any further. I was barefooted too. I am sure no one with armor on could have got up anything like so far. I don’t believe he could get up fifty feet.”

“And have any of you ever tried to get down from above?”

They shook their heads.

“Jonas the son of James did once,” one of the smaller boys said. “He had a pet hawk he had tamed, and it flew away and perched a good way down, and he clambered down to fetch it. He had a rope tied round him, and some of the others held it in case he should slip. I know he went down a good way, and he got the hawk, and his father beat him for doing it, too.”

“Is he here now?” John asked.

“Yes, he is here,” the boy said. “That’s his father’s house, the one close to the edge of the rock. I don’t know whether you will find him there now. He ain’t indoors more than he can help. His own mother’s dead, and his father’s got another wife, and they don’t get on well together.”

“Well, I will have a chat with him one of these days. And you are all quite sure that there is no possible path up from below?”

“I won’t say there isn’t any possible path,” the eldest boy said; “but I feel quite sure there is not. I have looked hundreds of times when I have been down below, and I feel pretty sure that if there had been any place where a goat could have got up I should have noticed it. But you see the rock goes down almost straight in most places. Anyhow, I have never heard of any one who ever got up, and if any one had done it, it would have been talked about for years and years.”

“No doubt it would,” John agreed. “So I shall tell the governor that he need not be in the least uneasy about an attack except in front.”

So saying he nodded to the boys and walked away again.

In the evening the whole of the Roman army had arrived, and Vespasian drew up his troops on a hill less than a mile to the north of the city, and there encamped them.

The next morning a triple line of embankments was thrown up by the Romans around the foot of the hill, where alone escape or issue was possible, and this entirely cut off those within the town from any possibility of flight. The Jews looked on at these preparations as wild animals might regard a line of hunters surrounding them. But the dull despair of the previous day had now been succeeded by a fierce rage. Hope there was none. They must die, doubtless; but they would die fighting fiercely to the last. Disdaining to be pent up within the walls, many of the fighting men encamped outside, and boldly went forward to meet the enemy.

Vespasian called up his slingers and archers, and these poured their missiles upon the Jews, while he himself with his heavy infantry began to mount the slope toward the part of the wall which appeared the weakest. Josephus at once summoned the fighting men in the town, and sallying at their head through the gate rushed down and flung himself upon the Romans. Both sides fought bravely; the Romans strong in their discipline, their skill with their weapons, and their defensive armor; the Jews fighting with the valor of despair, heightened by the thought of their wives and children in the town above.

The Romans were pushed down the hill, and the fight continued at its foot until darkness came, when both parties drew off. The number of killed on either side was small, for the bucklers and helmets defended the vital points. The Romans had thirteen killed and very many wounded, the Jews seventeen killed and six hundred wounded.

John had fought bravely by the side of Josephus. Joab and two others of the little band were killed; all the others were wounded more or less severely, for Josephus was always in front, and his chosen followers kept close to him. In the heat of the fight John felt his spirits rise higher than they had done since the troubles had begun. He had fought at first so recklessly that Josephus had checked him with the words:

“Steady, my brave lad. He fights best who fights most coolly. The more you guard yourself the more you will kill.”

More than once when Josephus, whose commanding figure and evident leadership attracted the attention of the Roman soldiers, was surrounded and cut off, John with three or four others made their way through to him and brought him off. When it became dark both parties drew off; the Romans sullenly, for they felt it a disgrace to have been thus driven back by foes they despised; the Jews with shouts of triumph, for they had proved themselves a match for the first soldiers in the world, and the dread with which the glittering column had inspired them had passed away.

The following day the Jews again sallied out and attacked the Romans as they advanced, and for five days in succession the combat raged, the Jews fighting with desperate valor, the Romans with steady resolution. At the end of that time the Jews had been forced back behind their wall, and the Romans established themselves in front of it. Vespasian, seeing that the wall could not be carried by assault as he had expected, called a council of war, and it was determined to proceed by the regular process of siege, and to erect a bank against that part of the wall which offered the greatest facility for attack.

Accordingly the whole army, with the exception of the troops who guarded the banks of circumvallation, went into the mountains to get materials. Stone and timber in vast quantities were brought down, and when these were in readiness the work commenced. A sort of penthouse roofing, constructed of wattles covered with earth, was first raised to protect the workers from the missiles of the enemy upon the wall, and here the working parties labored securely, while the rest of the troops brought up earth, stone, and wood for their use.

The Jews did their best to interfere with the work, hurling down huge stones upon the penthouse, sometimes breaking down the supports of the roof and causing gaps, through which they poured a storm of arrows and javelins until the damage had been repaired. To protect his workmen Vespasian brought up his siege engines, of which he had a hundred and sixty, and from these vast quantities of missiles were discharged at the Jews upon the walls.

But they were not inactive. Sallying out in small parties, they fell with fury upon the working parties, who, having stripped off their heavy armor, were unable to resist their sudden onslaughts. Driving out and slaying all before them, the Jews so often applied fire to the wattles and timbers of the bank that Vespasian was obliged to make his work continuous along the whole extent of the wall, to keep out the assailants. But in spite of all the efforts of the Jews the embankment rose steadily, until it almost equaled the height of the wall, and the struggle now went on between the combatants on even terms, they being separated only by the short interval between the wall and bank. Josephus found that in such a conflict the Romans, with their crowd of archers and slingers and their formidable machines, had all the advantage, and that it was absolutely necessary to raise the walls still higher.

He called together a number of the principal men and pointed out the necessity for this. They agreed with him, but urged that it was impossible for men to work exposed to such a storm of missiles. Josephus replied that he had thought of that. A number of strong posts were prepared, and at night these were fixed securely standing on the wall. Along the top of these a strong rope was stretched, and on this were hung, touching each other, the hides of newly killed oxen. These formed a complete screen, hiding the workers from the sight of those on the embankment.

The hides, when struck with the stones from the balistæ, gave way and deadened the force of the missiles, while the arrows and javelins glanced off from the slippery surface. Behind this shelter the garrison worked night and day, raising the posts and screens as their work proceeded, until they had heightened the wall no less than thirty-five feet, with a number of towers on its summit and a strong battlement facing the Romans.

The besiegers were much discouraged at their want of success, and enraged at finding the efforts of so large an army completely baffled by a small town which they had expected to carry at the first assault, while the Jews proportionately rejoiced. Becoming more and more confident they continually sallied out in small parties through the gateway or by ladders from the walls, attacked the Romans upon their embankment, or set fire to it. And it was the desperation with which these men fought, even more than their success in defending the wall, that discouraged the Romans, for the Jews were utterly careless of their lives, and were well content to die when they saw that they had achieved their object of setting fire to the Roman works.

Vespasian at length determined to turn the siege into a blockade, and to starve out the town which he could not capture. He accordingly contented himself by posting a strong force to defend the embankment, and withdrew the main body of the army to their encampment. He had been informed of the shortness of supply of water, and had anticipated that in a very short time thirst would compel the inhabitants to yield.

John had taken his full share in the fighting, and had frequently earned the warm commendation of Josephus.

His spirits had risen with the conflict, but he could not shut his eyes to the fact that sooner or later the Romans must become masters of the place. One evening, therefore, when he had done his share of duty on the walls, he went up to the house which had been pointed out to him as that in which lived the boy who had descended the face of the rocks for some distance.

At a short distance from the door a lad of some fifteen years old, with no covering but a piece of ragged sackcloth round the loins, was crouched up in a corner seemingly asleep. At the sound of John’s footsteps he opened his eyes in a quick watchful way that showed that he had not been really asleep.

“Are you Jonas the son of James?” John asked.

“Yes I am,” the boy said, rising to his feet. “What do you want with me?”

“I want to have a talk with you,” John said. “I am one of the governor’s body-guard, and I think perhaps you may be able to give us some useful information.”

“Well, come away from here,” the boy said, “else we shall be having her,” and he nodded toward the house, “coming out with a stick.”

“You have rather a hard time of it from what I hear,” John began when they stopped at the wall a short distance away from the house.

“I have that,” the boy said. “I look like it, don’t I?”

“You do,” John agreed, looking at the boy’s thin half-starved figure; “and yet there is plenty to eat in the town.”

“There may be,” the boy said; “anyhow I don’t get my share. Father is away fighting on the wall, and so she’s worse than ever. She is always beating me, and I dare not go back now. I told her this morning the sooner the Romans came in the better I should be pleased. They could only kill me, and there would be an end of it; but they would send her to Rome for a slave, and then she would see how she liked being cuffed and beaten all day.”

“And you are hungry now?” John asked.

“I am pretty near always hungry,” the boy said.

“Well, come along with me then. I have got a little room to myself, and you shall have as much to eat as you like.”

The room John occupied had formerly been a loft over a stable in the rear of the house in which Josephus now lodged, and it was reached by a ladder from the outside. He had shared it at first with two of his comrades, but these had both fallen during the siege. After seeing the boy up into it, John went to the house and procured him an abundant meal, and took it with a small horn of water back to his quarters.

“Here’s plenty for you to eat, Jonas, but not much to drink. We are all on short allowance, same as the rest of the people, and I am afraid that won’t last long.”

There was a twinkle of amusement in the boy’s face, but without a word he set to work at the food, eating ravenously all that John had brought him. The latter was surprised to see that he did not touch the water, for he thought that if his stepmother deprived him of food, of which there was abundance, she would all the more deprive him of water, of which the ration to each person was so scanty.

“Now,” John said, “you had better throw away that bit of sackcloth and take this garment. It belonged to a comrade of mine who has been killed.”

“There’s not much of it,” the boy said. “If you don’t mind my tearing it in half, I will take it.”

“Do as you like with it,” John replied; and the boy tore the long strip of cotton in two and wrapped half of it round his loins.

“Now,” he said, “what do you want to ask me?”

“They tell me, Jonas, that you are a first-rate climber and can go anywhere?”

The boy nodded.

“I can get about, I can. I have been tending goats pretty well ever since I could walk, and where they can go I can.”

“I want to know, in the first place whether there is any possible way by which one can get up and down from this place, except by the road through the wall?”

The boy was silent.

“Now look here, Jonas,” John went on, feeling sure that the lad could tell something if he would; “if you could point out a way down the governor would be very pleased, and as long as the siege lasts you can live here with me and have as much food as you want, and not go near that stepmother of yours at all.”

“And nobody will beat me for telling you?” the boy asked.

“Certainly not, Jonas.”

“It wouldn’t take you beyond the Romans. They have got guards all round.”

“No, but it might enable us to get down to the water,” John urged, the sight of the unemptied horn causing the thought to flash through his mind that the boy had been in the habit of going down and getting water.

“Well, I will tell you,” the boy said. “I don’t like to tell, because I don’t think there’s any one here knows it but me. I found it out and I never said a word about it, because I was able to slip away when I liked, and no one knows anything about it. But it doesn’t make much difference now, because the Romans are going to kill us all. So I will tell you. At the end of the rock you have to climb down about fifty feet. It’s very steep there, and it’s as much as you can do to get down; but when you have got down that far, you get to the head of a sort of dried-up water-course, and it ain’t very difficult to go down there, and that way you can get right down to the stream. It doesn’t look from below as if you could do it, and the Romans haven’t put any guards on the stream just there. I know because I go down every morning as soon as it gets light. I never tried to get through the Roman sentries, but I expect one could if one tried. But I don’t see how you are to bring water up there, if that’s what you want. I tell you it is as much as you can do to get up and down, and you want both your hands and your feet; but I could go down and bring up a little water for you in a skin hanging round my neck, if you like.”

“I’m afraid that wouldn’t be much good, Jonas,” John said; “but it might be very useful to send messengers out that way.”

“Yes,” the boy said; “but you see I have always intended, when the Romans took the place, to make off that way. If other people go it’s pretty sure to be found out before long, and then the Romans will keep watch; but it don’t much matter. I know another place where you and I could lie hidden any time, if we had got enough to eat and drink. I will show you, but mind you must promise not to tell any one else. There’s no room for more than two, and I don’t mean to tell you unless you promise.”

“I will promise, Jonas. I promise you faithfully not to tell any one.”

“Well, the way down ain’t far from the other one. I will show it you one of these days. I went down there once to get a hawk I had taken from the nest and tamed. I went down first with a rope tied round me, but I found I could have done it without that; but I didn’t tell any of the others, as I wanted to keep the place to myself. You climb down about fifty feet, and then you get on a sort of ledge about three feet wide and six or seven feet long. You can’t see it from above, because it’s a hollow, as if a bit of rock has fallen out. Of course, if you stood up you might be seen by some one below, or on the hill opposite, but it’s so high it is not likely any one would notice you. Anyhow, if you lie down there no one would see you. I have been down there often and often since. When she gets too bad to bear I go down there and take a sleep, or lie there and laugh when I think how she is hunting about for me to carry down the pails to the stream for water.”

“I will say nothing about it, Jonas, you may be quite sure. That place may save both our lives, but the other path I will tell Josephus about. He may find it of great use.”

Josephus was indeed greatly pleased when he heard that a way existed by which he could send out messages. Two or three active men were chosen for the work, but they would not venture to descend the steep precipice by which Jonas made his way down to the top of the water-course, but were lowered by ropes to that point. Before starting they were sown up in skins, so that if a Roman sentry caught sight of them making their way down the water-course on their hands and feet he would take them for dogs or some other animals. Once at the bottom they lay still till night, and then crawled through the line of sentries.

In this way Josephus was able to send out dispatches to his friends outside and to Jerusalem, imploring them to send an army at once to harass the rear of the Romans, and to afford an opportunity for the garrison of Jotapata to cut their way out. Messages came back by return, and for three weeks communications were thus kept up, until one of the messengers slipped while descending the ravine, and as he rolled down attracted the attention of the Romans, who after that placed a strong guard at the foot of the water-course.

Until this discovery was made Jonas had gone down regularly every morning and drank his fill, and had brought up a small skin of water to John, who had divided it among the children who he saw most in want of it, for the pressure of thirst was now heavy. The Romans, from rising ground at a distance, had noticed the women going daily with jugs to the cistern, whence the water was doled out, and the besiegers directed their missiles to that point, and my were killed daily while fetching water.

A dull despair now seized the Jews. So long as they were fighting they had had little time to think of their situation; but now that they enemy no longer attacked, and there was nothing to do but to sit down and suffer, the hopelessness of their position stared them in the face; but there was no thought of surrender. They knew too well the fate that awaited them at the hands of the Romans. They were therefore seized with rage and indignation when they heard that Josephus and some principal men were thinking of making an endeavor to escape. John, who had hitherto regarded his leader with a passionate devotion, although he thought that he had been wrong in making to the fortified towns instead of fighting among the mountains, shared in the general indignation at the proposed desertion.

“It is he who has brought us all here,” he said to Jonas, who had attached himself to him with dog-like fidelity, “and now he proposes to go away and leave every one here to be massacred! I cannot believe it.”

The news was, however, well founded; for when the inhabitants crowded down to the house, the women weeping and wailing, the men sullen and fierce, to beg Josephus to abandon his intention, the governor attempted to argue that it was for the public good that he should leave them. He might, he said, hurry to Jerusalem and bring an army to the rescue. The people, however, were in no way convinced.

“If you go,” they said, “the Romans will speedily capture the city. We are ready to die all together, to share one common fate, but do not leave us.”

As Josephus saw that if he did not accede to the prayers of the women the men would interfere by force to prevent his carrying out his intentions, he told them he would remain with them, and tranquility was at once restored. The men, however, came again and again to him asking to be led out to attack the Romans.

“Let us die fighting,” was the cry; “let us die among our foes, and not with the agonies of thirst.”

“We must make them come up to attack us again,” Josephus said. “We shall fight to far greater advantage so, than if we sallied out to attack them in their own intrenchments, when we should be shot down by their archers and slingers before ever we should reach them.”

“But how are we to make them attack us? We want nothing better.”

“I will think it over,” Josephus said, “and tell you in the morning.”

In the morning, to the surprise of the men, they were ordered to dip large numbers of garments into the precious supply of water, and to hang them on the walls.

Loud were the outcries from the women as they saw the scanty store of water upon which their lives depended so wasted; but the orders were obeyed, and the Romans were astonished at seeing the long line of dripping garments on the wall.

The stratagem had its effect. Vespasian thought that the news he had received that the place was ill supplied with water must be erroneous, and ordered the troops again to take their station on the walls and renew the attack. Great was the exultation among the Jews when they saw movement among the troops, and Josephus, ordering the fighting men together, said that now was their opportunity. There was no hope of safety in passive resistance, therefore they had best sally out, and if they must die, leave at least a glorious example to posterity.

The proposal was joyfully received, and he placed himself at their head. The gates were suddenly opened, and they poured out to attack. So furious was their onslaught that the Romans were driven from the embankment. The Jews pursued them, crossed the lines of circumvallation, and attacked the Romans in their camp, tearing up the hides and penthouses behind which the Romans defended themselves, and setting fire to the lines in many places.

The fight raged all day; the Jews then retired to the city, only to sally out again the following morning. For three days the attacks were continued, the Jews driving in the Romans each day, and retiring when Vespasian brought up heavy columns who were unable, from the weight of their armor, to follow their lightly armed assailants.

Vespasian then ordered the regular troops to remain in camp, the assaults being repelled by the archers and slingers. Finding that the courage of the Jews was unabated, and that his troops were losing heavily in this irregular fighting, he determined to renew the siege at all hazards and bring the matter to a close. The heavy-armed troops were ordered to be in readiness, and to advance against the walls with the battering-ram.

This was pushed forward by a great number of men, being covered as it advanced with a great shield constructed of wattles and hides. As it was brought forward, the archers and slingers covered its advance by a shower of missiles against the defenders of the wall, while all the war machines poured in their terrible shower. The Jews, unable to show themselves above the battlements, or to oppose the advance of the terrible machine, crouched in shelter until the battering-ram was placed in position.

Then the ropes by which it swung from the framework overhead was seized by a number of soldiers, and the first blow was delivered at the wall. It quivered beneath the terrible shock, and a cry of dismay arose from the defenders. Again and again the heavy ram struck in the same place. The wall tottered beneath the blows, and would soon have fallen had not Josephus ordered a number of sacks to be filled with straw and let down by ropes from the walls, so as to deaden the blows of the ram.

For a time the Romans ceased work, and then fastening scythes to the ends of long poles cut the ropes. The Jews were unable to show themselves above the walls, or to interfere with the men at work. In a few minutes the sacks were cut down, and the ram recommenced its work of destruction.

Two Roman soldiers, seeing the wall of Jotapata tremble beneath the blows of the battering-ram, whose iron head pounded to powder the stones against which it struck, redoubled their efforts, when suddenly, from three sally ports which they had prepared, the Jews burst out, carrying their weapons in their right hands and blazing torches in their left. As on previous occasions, their onslaught was irresistible. They swept the Romans before them, and set fire to the engines, the wattles, and the palisades, and even to the woodwork of the embankment.

The timber had by this time dried, and as bitumen and pitch had been used as cement in the construction of the works, the flames spread with great rapidity, and the work of many days was destroyed in an hour. All the engines and breastworks of the Fifth and Tenth Legions were entirely consumed. Just as the attack began, Eleazar the son of Sameas, a Galilean, with an immense stone from the wall, struck the iron head of the battering-ram and knocked it off. He then leaped down from the wall, seized the iron head, and carried it back into the city.

He was pierced by five arrows; still he pressed on and regained the walls, and held up the iron head in the sight of all, and then fell down dead. Such was the spirit with which the Jews were animated; and the Roman soldiers, trained as they were to conflict among many peoples, were yet astounded by the valor displayed by the race that they had considered as unwarlike peasants. But the Romans were not discouraged; heavy masses of troops were brought up, the Jews were driven within their walls, and toward evening the ram was again in position.

While Vespasian was directing the attack he was struck by a javelin in the heel. The Romans ceased from the attack and crowded round their general; but as soon as they ascertained that his wound was not serious they returned to the attack with redoubled fury. All that night the contest raged unceasingly. The Roman engines swept the walls with missiles. The towers came crashing down under the blows of the huge stones, while the javelins, arrows, and the stones from the slings created terrible havoc among the defenders of the wall. But as fast as these fell fresh combatants took their places, and they continued hurling down stones and blazing brands upon the freshly erected wattles round the battering-ram.

The Romans had the advantage in this strife; for, while the fires on the walls, at which the Jews lighted their brands and boiled the pitch and sulphur in which these were dipped, enable them to aim accurately, they themselves worked in deep shadow at the foot of the wall. The night was a terrible one; the bolts, stones, and arrows which passed over the wall spread ruin and death over the town. The din was unceasing. The thundering noise of the great stones; the dull, deep sound as the ram struck the wall; the fierce shouts of the combatants as they fought hand to hand—for the corpses were in places piled so thick that the assailants could mount upon them to the top of the walls—the shrieks of the women and the screams of the children, combined in one terrible and confused noise which was echoed back and multiplied by the surrounding mountains.

Morning was just breaking when the shaken wall gave way and fell with a crash. Vespasian called off his weary troops and allowed them a short time for refreshment then he prepared to storm the breach. He brought up first a number of his lowest horsemen dismounted and clad in complete armor. They were provided with long pikes, and were to charge forward the instant the machines for mounting the breach were fixed. Behind these were the best of his infantry, while in their rear were the archers and slingers. Other parties with scaling ladders were to attack the uninjured part of the wall, and to drave off the attention of the besiegers. The rest of the horse extended all over the hills round the town so that none might make their escape.

Josephus prepared to receive the attack. He placed the old, infirm, and wounded to repel the attack on the uninjured parts of the walls. He then chose the five strongest and bravest men, and with them took his place to form the front line of the defenders of the breach. He told them to kneel down and cover their heads with their bucklers until the enemy’s archers had emptied their quivers, and when the Romans had fixed the machines for mounting, they were to leap down among the enemy and fight to the last, remembering that there was now no hope of safety, naught but to revenge the fate which was impending over them, their wives and children.

As the Romans mounted to the assault a terrible cry broke out from the women. They saw the Romans still manning the lines which cut off all escape, and they believed that the end was at hand. Josephus, fearing that their cries would dispirit the men, ordered them all to be locked up in their houses, and then calmly awaited the assault. The trumpet of the legion sounded, and the whole Roman host set up a terrible shout, while at the same moment the air was darkened by the arrows of their bowmen. Kneeling beneath their bucklers the Jews remained calm and immovable, and then, before the Romans had time to set foot upon the breach, with a yell of fury they rushed upon them and threw themselves into the midst of their assailants. For a time the Romans could make no way against the desperate courage of the Jews, but as fast as the leading files fell fresh troops took their places, while the Jews, who were vastly reduced by their losses, had no fresh men to take the place of those who died. At last the solid phalanx of the Romans drove back the defenders and entered the breach.

But as they did so, from the walls above and from the breach in front vessels filled with boiling oil were hurled down upon them. The Roman ranks were broken, and the men in agony rolled on the ground unable to escape the burning fluid which penetrated through the joints of their armor. Those who turned to fly were pierced by the javelins of the Jews, for the Romans carried no defensive armor on their back, which were never supposed to be turned toward an enemy.

Fresh troops poured up the breach to take the place of their agonized comrades; but the Jews threw down upon the planks vessels filled with a sort of vegetable slime. Unable to retain their footing upon the slippery surface the Romans fell upon each other in heaps. Those rolling down carried others with them, and a terrible confusion ensued, the Jews never ceasing to pour their missiles upon them. When evening came Vespasian called off his men. He saw that to overcome the desperate resistance of the defenders fresh steps must be taken before the assault was repeated, and he, accordingly, gave orders that the embankment should be raise much higher than before, and that upon it three towers, each fifty feet high and strongly girded with iron, should be built.

This great work was carried out in spite of the efforts of the besieged. In the towers Vespasian placed his javelin men, archers, and light machines, and as these now looked down upon the wall they were enabled to keep up such a fire upon it that the Jews could no longer maintain their footing, but contented themselves with lying behind it and making desperate sallies whenever they saw any parties of Romans approaching the breach.

In the meantime a terrible calamity had befallen the neighboring town of Japha. Emboldened by the vigorous defense of Jotapata it had closed its gate to the Romans. Vespasian sent Trajan with thousand foot and a thousand horse against it. The city was strongly situated and surrounded by a double wall. Instead of waiting to be attacked the people sallied out and fell upon the Romans. They were, however, beaten back, and the Romans, pressing on their heels, entered with them through the gates of the outside walls. The defenders of the gates through the inner walls, fearing that these too would be carried by the mob, closed them and all those who had sallied out were butchered by the Romans.

Trajan, seeing that the garrison must now be weak, sent to Vespasian and asked him to send his son to complete the victory. Titus soon arrived with a thousand foot and five hundred horse, and at once assaulted the inner walls. The defense was feeble. The Romans affected their entry, but inside the town a desperate conflict took place, the inhabitants defending every street with the energy of despair, while the women aided their efforts by hurling down stones and missiles from the roofs. The battle lasted six hours, when all who could bear arms were slain; the rest of the male population were put to death, and the women taken as slaves.

In all, fifteen thousand were killed, two thousand one hundred and thirty taken prisoners. In another direction a heavy blow had also been struck by the Romans. The Samaritans had not openly joined the revolt, but had gathered in great force on Mount Gerizim. Cerealis was sent by Vespasian with three thousand infantry and six hundred horse against them. He surrounded the foot of the mountain, and abstained from an assault until the Samaritans were weakened by thirst, many dying from want of water. Cerealis then mounted the hill, and sent to them to throw down their arms. On their refusal he charged them from all sides, and put every soul—in number eleven thousand six hundred—to the sword.

The situation of the defenders of Jotapata was now pitiable; indeed scarce a man but had received wounds, more or less severe, in the desperate combats. All were utterly worn out with fatigue, for they were under arms day and night in readiness to repel the expected attack. Numbers of the women and children had died of thirst and terror. Save the armed men lying in groups near the foot of the wall in readiness to repel an assault, scarce a soul was to be seen in the lately crowded streets. The houses were now ample to contain the vastly diminished number. Here the women and children crouched in utter prostration. The power of suffering was almost gone; few cared how soon the end came.

The siege had now continued for forty-seven days, and the Roman army, strong in numbers, in discipline, and in arms, and commanded by one of the best generals, had yet failed to capture the little town which they had expected to take within a few hours of their appearance before it, and so fierce was the valor of the besieged that Vespasian did not venture to order his legions forward to renew the assault. But now a deserter informed him that the garrison was greatly exhausted, that the men on guard could not keep awake, and that the breach could be carried at night by a sudden assault.

Vespasian prepared for the assault, which was to take place at daybreak. A thick mist enveloped the town, and the sleeping sentries were not aroused by the silent steps of the approaching Romans. Titus was the first to enter the breach, followed by a small number of troops. These killed the sleeping guards, and the main body of the Romans then poured in. before the Jews were conscious of their danger the whole Roman army was upon them.

Then the slaughter commenced. Many of the Jews killed each other rather than fall into the hands of the Romans, many threw themselves over the precipices, numbers took refuge in the deep caverns under the city. That day all in the streets or houses were killed; the next, the Romans searched the caverns and underground passages, slaughtering all the men and boys, and sparing none but infants and women.

During the siege and capture forty thousand men fell. Only twelve hundred women and children were spared. So complete was the surprise, and so unresistingly did the Jews submit to slaughter, that only one Roman was killed. This was Antoninus, a centurion. He came upon a Jew in a deep cavern, and told him he would spare his life if he would surrender. The Jew asked him to give him hand as a pledge of his faith, and to help him out of the cave. Antoninus did so, and the Jews at once ran him through with a spear.

John was asleep when the Romans entered. He was aroused by Jonas rushing into the room. The boy was at all times restless, and suffered less than most of those within the walls, for there was an abundance of grain up to the end of the siege, and until the Romans had discovered the way down to the water he had not suffered in any way from thirst. He was considered too young to take part in the actual fighting, but had labored with the rest in repairing the defenses, carrying food to the men on the walls, and carrying away the dead and wounded.

“Get up, John!” he exclaimed. “In the mist I have just run upon a mass of Roman soldiers ranged in order. The town is taken. Quick, before they scatter and begin to slay!”

John caught up his sword and ran out. Just as he did so a terrible shout was heard, followed by shrieks and cries. The work of butchery had begun.

John’s plans had been made for some time. At night Jonas had frequently descended to the ledge, taking with him food and jars of water he brought up from below, and once or twice John had descended, Jonas fastened a rope round his body and lowering it gradually, for, active as he was, John could not get down without such assistance. Indeed, to any one who looked casually over the top the descent appeared absolutely impossible.

At the top of their speed the lads ran to the spot at which the descent had to be made. The rope was hidden close at hand. John slipped the noose at the end over his shoulders, Jonas slipped the rope once around a stunted tree which grew close by, and allowed it to go out gradually. As soon as the strain upon it ceased, and he knew John was upon the ledge, he loosened the rope and dropped the end over, and then began himself to descend, his bare feet and hands clinging to every inequality, however ever slight, in the rock. He presently stood by the side of John. The latter had coiled up the rope and laid it by him, and had then thrown himself down and was sobbing bitterly. Jonas sat down quietly beside him till he had recovered his composure.

“It is no use fretting,” he said philosophically, “there’s no one you care about particularly up there, and I’m sure there’s no one I care about; only I should like to have peeped in and have seen her face when the Romans burst open that door. I don’t suppose she was very sorry, though, for it will be better to be a Roman slave than to be going through what they have been for the last month.”

“It was horrible!” John said, “horrible! However, Jonas, let us thank God for having thus preserved our lives when all besides are in such terrible danger of death.”

For a time the two lads sat silent. John was the first to speak.

“I am thankful,” he said, “that owing to our being down the face of the rock the sound is carried away above our heads and we can hear but little of what is going on there. It seems a confusion of sounds, and comes to us rather as an echo from the hills yonder than directly from above.”

Sometimes, indeed, thrilling screams and shouts were heard, but for the most part the sounds were so blended together that they could not be distinguished one from another. As soon as the mist cleared off the lads lay down as far back from the ledge as they could get.

“We must not lift up a head to-day,” John said; “the guards below and on the hills will have their eyes fixed on the rock on the lookout for fugitives, and until night-time we must not venture to sit up. Fortunately that outer edge of the shelf is a good deal higher than it is back here, and I don’t think that even those on the mountain opposite could see us as we lie.”

“I should think a good many may escape like us,” Jonas said presently; “there are numbers of caverns and passages from which they have dug the stone for the building of the houses. A lot of the people are sure to hide away there.”

“I dare say they will,” John agree; “but I fear the Romans will hunt them all out.”

“How long do you think we shall have to stay here, John?”

“Till the Romans go, whether it is one week or two; but I do not think they will stay here many days. The town is so full of dead that in this hot weather it will be unbearable before long. At any rate we shall be able to pass a good deal of time in sleep. We have not had much of it lately. Till last night I have not been in a house at night for over a fortnight. But I felt last night as if I must have a sleep whatever came of it. I suppose the guards at the breach must have felt the same, or the Romans could never have got in with the alarm being given.”

For a few minutes John lay thinking of the terrible scenes that must be passing on the rock above, then his drowsiness overcame him and he was soon fast asleep. It was dark when he woke; as he moved, Jonas spoke.

“Are you awake, John? Because if you are, let us have something to eat. I have been awake the last four hours, and I have been wishing you would stir.”

“There was no occasion to wait for my waking, Jonas; there is the grain and the water close at hand, and no cooking is required.”

“I wasn’t going to eat till you woke, if it had been all night,” Jonas said; “still I am glad you are awake; they are quiet now up above, and I have heard the Roman trumpets sounding. I expect that most of them have marched back to their camp.”

The next day passed like the first. Occasionally cries of agony were heard; sometimes bodies hurled from the top of the rock but a short distance from where they were lying.

The next two days passed more quietly, but upon that following, a murmur, as a multitude of men working, was heard. From time to time there were heavy crashes as masses of stones, hurled down the precipice, struck against its face as they fell, and then bounded far out beyond the stream at its foot. All these sounds were echoed back by the surrounding hills until it seemed as if a storm was raging far away in the heart of the mountains.

“They are destroying the town,” John said, in answer to his companion’s question as to the cause of the uproar. “That is the best thing possible for us. Had it remained standing they might have left a garrison here to prevent our people reoccupying it. If they destroy it, it’s a sign that they intend to march away altogether.”

Several times Jonas wished to climb up at night to ascertain what was going on, but John would not hear of it.

“There is nothing to find out, Jonas. We know what they did at Gadara, where they slew all the males and carried off all the women, although no resistance was offered. We may be sure that there will be no more mercy shown at Jotapata, which has affronted the Roman power by keeping their great army at bay for nearly seven weeks, and whose capture has cost them thousands of men. We know what has happened—they have slain every soul, save a few young women who were worth money as slaves. Now they are leveling the town to its foundations. The place that defied them will cease to exist. And yet they talk of Roman magnanimity! Would we had five thousand fighting men hidden here with us; we would climb then, Jonas, and fall upon them in the night and take mighty vengeance for the woes they have inflicted. But, being alone, we will remain here till we have reason to believe that the last Roman has left. Did one of them catch sight of you your fate would be sealed. They have no boys among them, and the slightest glimpse of your figure would be enough to tell them that you are a Jew who had been in hiding, and in their fear that one man should escape their vengeance they would hunt you down as a pack of wolves might hunt down a solitary lamb.”

“They could never get down here, John.”

“Not by the way you came; but they would lower a cage full of armed men from above, and slay us without pity.”

“But if I were found out, John, I would not lead them here. I would throw myself over the precipice rather than that risk should come to you!”

“But I don’t want you to throw yourself over the precipice, Jonas, I want to keep you with me; in the first place, because we are great friends now; in the second, because if you are killed I might as well throw myself over at once, for I do not think I could ever climb up this rock without your assistance.”

“It is much easier going up than coming down, John.”

“That may be and indeed I have no doubt it is so, but I would rather not put the matter to the test. No; we have provision and water here enough to last us for ten days, and until they are consumed it were best not to stir from here.”

Four days later, however, they heard the sound of the Roman trumpets, and on raising their head carefully a few inches saw that the guards on the opposite hills had all been withdrawn. Having now less fear of being seen, they raised their heads still further and looked up the valley to the great camp on the hillside, where at night they had seen the fires of Romans blazing high.

“They are going!” Jonas exclaimed joyously. “Look at the sun sparkling on the long lines of arms and armor. Not a sound is to be heard above—the work is done. They are about to march away.”

“Do not let us expose ourselves further,” John said; “it may be that they have left a few watchers to see if any who have eluded their search may show themselves believing that they have gone. I have no doubt they are going, and by to-morrow it may be safe for us to move.”

All day they heard the sound of trumpets, for the great host took a long time getting into motion, but gradually the sound grew fainter and fainter as the rear-guard of the army took the road which they had cut through the mountains eight weeks before.

That night when darkness fell, and the two lads sat up on their ledge and looked round, not a light was to be seen and not a sound broke the silence of the night.

“At daybreak to-morrow, Jonas, as soon as it becomes light enough for you to see your way, you shall go up and look round; they may have left a guard behind, but I should hardly think so. After the wholesale slaughter at Gadara and here the hatred of the Romans will be so intense that, confident as they are in their arms and discipline, they would hardly venture to leave a small body of men in the heart of these mountains.”

As soon as it was daylight Jonas prepared to climb up to the plateau above. He took with him the rope, arranging that if he found that the place was absolutely deserted he would lower one end to John and fasten the other to the tree above, and that he would then aid John as much as his strength would permit in making his way up the rock.

John watched his companion making his way up, and observed exactly where he placed his feet and hands until he was out of sight; then he waited. In about a quarter of an hour the end of the rope fell in front of him. He fastened it securely under his arms, and then, taking off his sandals, began the ascent. It was not so difficult as it had looked, and the steady strain which Jonas kept on the rope from above aided him and gave him confidence. In three or four minutes he gained the top of the rock.

“There is not a soul to be seen,” Jonas said; “the town has gone, and the people, and the Romans. All is desolation!”

The scene was indeed changed since John had last looked upon it. Not a wall in the so lately busy little town had been left standing. The whole area was covered three or four feet deep with a chaos of stones, mortar, and beams, forming a great grave, below which lay the bodies of forty thousand of the defenders of the place. The wall so bravely defended had disappeared, and the embankment whose erection had cost the Romans so much labor and bloodshed had been destroyed by fire. A dead silence hung over the place, and the air was tainted with a terrible odor of corruption.

The desolation and solitude of the scene overpowered John, and he sad down on a fragment of masonry and wept unrestrainedly for some time. He roused himself at last as Jonas touched him.

“I shall go down again and get what grain there is left,” the boy said. “There is no chance of finding any thing to eat within a day’s march of here. The Roman horse will have destroyed every village within a wide circuit.”

“But I cannot let you go down again, Jonas; the danger is too great.”

“But I have been up and down lots of times,” Jonas said.

“That may be, Jonas; but you might be dashed to pieces this time.”

“Well, if you like I will fasten the rope round me; then if I should slip I shall be safe.”

John consented with some reluctance, but he was so nervous and shaken that he walked some distance away, and did not turn round until he heard Jonas’ footsteps again approaching him.

“Now we can start,” the boy said. “We have got grain here enough for three days, and to-night we will crush it and cook it. I have had enough of eating raw grain for a long time to come.”

The boy’s cheerfulness restored the tone of John’s nerves, and making their way with some difficulty over the chaos of stone and timber until they arrived at the pile of charred timber which marked the spot where the Roman embankment had stood, they stepped out briskly, descended the hill, crossed the deserted lines of circumvallation, and then began to ascend the mountains, which had for some distance been stripped of their timber for the purposes of the siege. In another hour’s walking they reached the forest, and pressed on until the afternoon. Not that there was any need for speed now, but John felt a longing to place as wide a gap as possible between himself and the great charnel ground which alone marked the spot where Jotapata had stood.

At length Jonas urged the necessity for a halt for rest and food. They chose a spot at the foot of a great tree, and then set to work to collect a store of firewood. John took out the box of tinder, which in those days every one carried about with him and a fire was soon lighted. Jonas then looked for two large flat stones, and set to work to grind some grain.

The halting place had been chosen from the vicinity of a little spring which rose a few yards distant. With this the pounded grain was moistened, and after kneading it up Jonas rolled it in balls and placed them in the hot ashes of the fires. In half an hour they were cooked, and the meal was eaten with something like cheerfulness. Another day’s walking brought them to a little village nestled in the forest. Here they were kindly received, though the people scarce believed them when they said that they were survivors of the garrison of Jotapata. The news of the capture of the town and the destruction of its defenders had already spread through the country, and John now learned for the first time the fate which had befallen Japha and the Samaritans on Mount Gerizim, events which filled him with consternation.

The folly of the tactics which had been pursued of cooping all the fighting men up in the walled cities, to be destroyed one after the other by the Romans, was more than ever apparent. He had never from the first been very hopeful of the result of the struggle, but it seemed now as if it could end in nothing but the total destruction of the Jewish race of Palestine. John stayed for two days in the little mountain village, and then, with a store of provisions sufficient to last him some days, pursued his way, following the lines of the Anti-Libanus until that range of hills joined the range of Mount Hermon north of the sources of the Jordan.

He had stopped for a day at Dan, high up among the hills. Here the people had no fear of Roman vengeance, for the insurrection had not extended so far north, and the Roman garrison of Cæsarea Philippi overawed the plains near the upper waters of the Jordan. Determined, however, to run no unnecessary risks, John and his companion pursued their way on the lower slopes of the hills, until, after six days’ walking, they arrived at Neve.

Here they learned where the farm of John’s kinsman was situated, and made their way thither. As they came up to the house a woman came out, gazed intently at John and, with a scream of terror ran back into the house. It was one of Martha’s maids. John stood irresolute, fearing that his sudden appearance might startle the other inmates, when suddenly Mary appeared at the door, looking pale but resolute. She too gazed fixedly at John, and her lips moved, but no sound came from them.

“Don’t you know me, Mary?” John said.

The girl gave a scream of joy and threw herself into his arms. A moment later Martha, followed by Miriam and the other servants, came out.

“It is no spirit, mother, it is John himself,” Mary exclaimed, and the next moment John was clasped in his mother’s arms.

It was no surprising that the first who saw John had thought that he was a spirit. The news had already been received that the whole of the garrison of Jotapata had been put to the sword, and John’s appearance was changed so greatly within the last three months that he would scarcely have been known. Fatigue, anxiety, and the loss of blood from several wounds which he had received in the course of the siege had so pulled him down that he was but a shadow of his former self. His clothes were in rags. He had washed them at the village where he had first stopped, for before that they had been stiffened with blood, and even now, stained and ragged as they were, they gave him the appearance of a mendicant. Jonas had held back a little while the first joyful greeting was going on, but John soon turned to him.

“Mother,” he said, “this must be as another son to you, for, next to the protection of God, it is to him I owe my life.” Martha welcomed the young stranger affectionately.

“Before you tell us aught that has befallen you, John, go and change your garments and wash, while we prepare a meal for you, the clothes of your uncle’s son Silas, who is about your age, will fit you, and those of his younger brother will do for your friend.”

“Was the news of my father good?” John asked.

“Yes, the Lord be praised, he was well when we heard of him a week since.”

The travelers were at once conducted to a room and supplied with water and clean garments. By the time they had changed and returned to the general room John’s uncle and cousin had been fetched in from the farm, and he received another hearty welcome.

It almost seemed to him, as he sat down to a comfortable meal with Mary and his mother waiting upon him, that the events of the past two months had been a hideous dream, and that he had never left his comfortable home on the shore of the Lake of Galilee. As to Jonas, unaccustomed to kind treatment or to luxury of any kind, he was too confused to utter a word. When the meal was over John was asked to tell his news, and he related all the stirring incidents of the siege, and the manner in which he and his companion had effected his escape.

“We are, no doubt,” he concluded, “the sole male survivors of the siege.”

“Not so, my son,” Martha said. “There is a report that Josephus has survived the siege, and that he is a prisoner in the hands of the Romans.”

“It may be that they have spared him to grace Vespasian’s triumph at Rome,” John said. “It is their custom, I believe, to carry the generals they may take in war to Rome to be slain there.”

It was not until some time afterward that John learned the particulars of the capture of Josephus. When he saw that all was lost, Josephus had leaped down the shaft of a dry well, from the bottom of which a long cavern led off, entirely concealed from the sight of those above. Here he found forty of the leading citizens, who had laid in a store of food sufficient to last for many days. Josephus, at least, who gives his account of all these circumstances, says that he quite unexpectedly found these forty citizens in hiding there; but this is improbable in the extreme, and there can be little doubt that he had long before prepared this refuge with them when he found that the people would not allow them to attempt to make their escape from the city.

At night Josephus came up from the well and tried to make his escape, but finding the Romans everywhere vigilant, he returned to the place of concealment. On the third day a women, who was aware of the hiding-place, informed the Romans of it, probably in return for a promise of freedom, for the Romans were searching high and low for Josephus, who could not, they were convinced, have escaped through their lines. Vespasian immediately sent two tribunes, Paulinus and Gallicanus, to induce him to surrender by promise of his life.

Josephus refused to come out, and Vespasian sent another tribune, Nicanor, a personal friend of Josephus, to assure him of his safety if he would surrender. In the account Josephus gives of the transaction he says that at this moment he suddenly remembered a dream in which it was revealed to him that all these calamities should fall upon the Jews, that he himself should be saved, and that Vespasian should become emperor, and that therefore if he passed over to the Romans he would do so not as a renegade, but in obedience to the voice of God.

It was certainly a happy coincidence that the dream should have occurred to him at this moment. He at once announced his readiness to surrender, but his forty companions did not see the matter in the same light. The moment Josephus left them the Roman soldiers would throw combustibles down the well and suffocate them if they did not come out and submit to slaughter.

They urged upon Josephus that he was their leader; that they had all followed his orders and cast in their lot with his; and that it would be treacherous and base in the extreme for him now to save his life by going over to the Romans, when all the inferior people had slain themselves or had submitted to slaughter rather than beg their lives of the Romans. Josephus argued with them at length, but they were not convinced, and drawing their swords, threatened to kill him if he tried to leave them. They would all die together, they said. Josephus then proposed that, in order to avoid the sin of suicide, they should draw lots as to which should kill each other. To this they assented; and they continued to draw lots as to which should slay the other until only Josephus and one other remained alive.

This is the story Josephus tells. He was, of course, endeavoring to put his own case in the best light, and to endeavor to prove that he was not, as the Jews universally regarded him, a traitor to his country. It need hardly be said that the story is improbably in the extreme, and that had any one of the forty men survived and written the history he would probably have told a very different tale. The conduct of Josephus from the first outbreak of the trouble showed that he was entirely adverse to the rising against the Romans. He himself, having been to Rome, had seen her power and might, and had been received with great favor by Poppæa, the wife of Nero, and had made many friends there.

He has, therefore, at the outset opposed as far as he was able, without going so far as to throw suspicion on his patriotism, the rebellion against the Romans. During the events in Galilee he had shown himself anxious to keep in favor with the Romans. He had rebuked those who had attacked the soldiers traveling as an escort with a large amount of treasure belonging to King Agrippa, and would have sent back the spoils taken had not the people risen against it. He affected great indignation at the plunder of Agrippa’s palace at Tiberias, and, gathering all he could of the spoils, had handed them over to the care of the chief of Agrippa’s friends there.

He had protected the two officers of Agrippa whom Jews would have killed, had released and sent them back to the king; and when John of Gischala wished to carry off large quantities of grain stored by the Romans in Upper Galilee, Josephus refused to allow him to do so, saying that it should be kept for its owners. It is almost certain that Josephus must in some way have entered into communication with the Romans; for how otherwise could he, with the principal inhabitants, have proposed to make their escape when every avenue was closed? Josephus was a man of great talent and energy, full of resources, and of great personal bravery—at least if his own account of his conduct during the siege is to be believed. But no on can read his labored excuses for his own conduct without feeling sure that he had all along been in correspondence with the Romans, and that he had beforehand been assured that his life should be spared.

He had from the first despaired of successful resistance to the Romans; and his conduct in throwing himself, at the last moment, into a town about to be besieged, and, as he must have known, captured—for the want of water alone rendered its fall a mere question of time—when his presence and leadership were so urgently required among the people to whose command he had been appointed, seems to prove that he wished to fall into their hands. It would not be just to brand Josephus as a traitor. He had done his best to induce the Galileans to form themselves into an army and to defend the province; and it was only when that army dispersed at the approach of the Romans that he went to Jotapata. It was his leadership that enabled that city to continue its heroic defense. It cannot therefore be said that Josephus in any way betrayed the trust confided to him by the council at Jerusalem. But the conclusion can hardly be avoided, that from the first, foreseeing that utter ruin and destruction would fall upon the Jews, he had set himself to work to prepare a way of pardon and escape for himself, and that he thought a position of honor among the Romans vastly preferable to an unknown grave among the mountains of Galilee.

Upon being taken out of the well Josephus was taken to Vespasian, and in the presence only of the general, his son Titus, and two other officers, announced that he was endowed with prophetic powers, and that he was commissioned by God to tell Vespasian that he would become emperor, and that he would be succeeded by his son Titus. The prophecy was one that required no more penetration than for any person in the present day to predict that the most rising man in a great political party would one day become prime minister. The emperor was hated, and it was morally certain that his fall would not long be delayed; and in that case the most popular general in the Roman army would almost certainly be chosen to succeed him.

Vespasian himself was not greatly affected by the prophesy. But Josephus declared that he had all along predicted the success of the Romans, the fall of the town after forty-six days’ siege, and his own safety; and as some of the female captives were brought up, and, on Josephus appealing to them whether this was not so, naturally replied in the affirmative, Josephus says that Vespasian was then satisfied to his prisoner’s divine mission, and thenceforth treated him with great honor.

It is much more easy to believe that an agreement already existed between Vespasian and Josephus, and that the latter only got up this story to enable him to maintain that he was not a traitor to his country, but acting in accordance with the orders of God. Certain it is that no similar act of clemency was show by Vespasian to any other Jew, that no other thought of pity or mercy entered his mind during the campaign, that he spared no man who fell alive into his hands, and that no more ruthless and wholesale extermination than that which he inflicted upon the people of Palestine was ever carried out by the most barbarous of conquerors.

To this day the memory of Josephus is hated among the Jews.

John remained for three weeks at his uncle’s. A messenger with the news of his safe arrival there had been sent off to his father, who came up to see him three days later. The formal act of betrothal between John and his cousin took place. Simon and Martha would have been willing that the full ceremony of marriage should take place, and the latter even urged this upon her son.

“You are now more than seventeen, John, and have taken your place among men, and may well take to yourself a wife. Mary is night fifteen, and many maidens marry earlier. You love each other. Why, then, should you not be married? It would cheer the old age of your father and myself to see our grandchildren growing up around us.”

“Had the times been different, mother, I would gladly have had it so; but with the land torn by war, with our brethren being slaughtered everywhere, with Jerusalem and the Temple in danger, it is no time for marrying and giving in marriage. Besides, the law says that for a year after marriage a man shall not go to war or journey upon business, but shall remain at home quiet with his wife. I could not do that now. Did the news come to-morrow that the Romans were marching upon Jerusalem, assuredly I should do my duty and take up arms and go to the defense of the Holy City; and maybe Mary would be left a widow before the days of rejoicing for the marriage were over.

“No, mother; the life of no man who can yield a weapon is his own at present. The defense of the temple is the first and greatest of duties. If I fall there you will adopt Mary as your child and marry her to some one who will take my place and be a son to you. Mary will grieve for me, doubtless, for a time, but it will be the grief of a sister for a brother, not that of a wife for her husband; and in time she will marry the man to whom you shall give her and will be happy. Even for myself I would rather that it were so left. I shall feel more free from cares and responsibilities; and though, if you and my father lay your orders upon me, I shall of course obey them, I pray you that in this matter you will suffer me to have my way.”

Martha talked the matter over with her husband, and they agreed that John’s wishes should be carried out, and that the marriage should be postponed until the troubles were over. Neither of them believed that John would fall in the struggle. They regarded his escape from Jotapata as well-nigh miraculous, and felt assured that God, having specially protected him through such great danger, would continue to do so to the end.

Contrary to expectation, Vespasian had not followed up his success at Jotapata by a march against Jerusalem. His army had suffered very heavy losses in the siege, and the desperate valor which the defenders of the town had shown had doubtless impressed upon his mind the formidable nature of the task he had undertaken. If a little mountain town had cost him so dearly, what would not be the loss which would be entailed by the capture of a city like Jerusalem, with its position of vast natural strength—its solid and massive fortifications, and defended as it would be by the whole strength of the Jewish nation fighting with the fury of religious fanaticism and despair!

His army, strong as it was, would doubtless capture the city, but at such a cost that it might be crippled for further action, and Vespasian was keeping on eye upon Rome, and wished to have his army complete and in perfect order in readiness for anything that might occur there. Therefore, after the fall of Jotapata he marched first to Cæsarea, and after a short halt there passed north to Cæsarea Philippi, where the climate, cooled by the breezes from the mountains, was pleasant and healthful, and here he gave the army twenty days to rest and recover from their wounds and fatigues. He then marched south again to Scythopolis, or Behtsan, lying just within the borders of Samaria and not far from Jordan. Here Titus with a detached force joined him, and they prepared to reduce the cities near the lake.

Simon had by this time returned home accompanied by John and Jonas. Simon tried to persuade his son to remain with his mother, but John had entreated that he might accompany him.

“The war may last for a long time, father, and the land must be tilled, else why should you yourself return home? We are in the province of King Agrippa, and after what has befallen Jotapata and Japha it is not likely that the people of Hippos or of other towns will venture to show disaffection—therefore there is no reason why the Romans should carry fire and sword through Agrippa’s country east of Jordan. It is well that my mother and Mary should not return, for if evil days should come they could not save themselves by rapid flight; besides we risk but death, and death were a thousand times better than slavery among the Romans. If we find that they are approaching and are wasting the land, we can fly. The boats are close by, and we can take to the lake and land where we will and make our way back here.”

“And you will not seek, John, when the Romans approach to enter Tiberias or Gamala, or any other cities that may hold out against the Romans?

“No, father. I have had my share of defending a walled city, and save for Jerusalem I will fight no more in cities. All these places must fall sooner or later if the Romans sit down before them. I will not be cooped up again. If any leader arises and draws together a band in the mountains to harass and attack the Romans I will join him, for it has always seemed to me that in that way only can we fight successfully against them; but if not, I will aid you in the labors of the farm until the Romans march against Jerusalem.”

Simon yielded to his son’s wishes, for the events of the last year had aged him much and he felt the need of assistance on the farm. The men who had worked for him has, save Isaac and one or two of the older men, gone away to Jerusalem or to Gamala, or one or other of the fortified towns. The time for the harvest was at hand and there would be few to gather it in. Martha would fain have accompanied them, but Simon would not hear of this.

“You are in a safe refuge here, wife, and rather than that you should leave it, I would abandon our farm altogether. If you come, Mary and the women must come also, and even for us men the danger would be greater than were we alone.”

Mary so tried her power of persuasion, but Simon was not to be moved, and the three set off together, for Jonas as a matter of course accompanied John wherever he went. The three weeks’ kindness, rest, and good feeding had done wonders for him. The wild reckless expression which John had noticed when he had first met him had well-nigh disappeared, his bones had become better covered and his cheeks filled out, and comfortably clothed as he now was few would have recognized in him the wild goatherd of Jotapata.

Simon was mounted on a donkey, the others walked.

“It is well that I am off again,” Jonas said; “another month there and I should have got fat and lazy, and should have grown like the dwellers on the plains.”

“There will be plenty of work for you on the farm, Jonas,” Simon said; “you need not be afraid of growing fat and lazy there.”

“I don’t think I am fond of work,” Jonas said thoughtfully, “not of steady work, but I will work hard now, Simon; you have all been so good to me that I would work till I dropped for you. I wouldn’t have worked before, not if they had beaten me ever so much, because they were always unkind to me; and why should on work for those who do nothing for you but beat and ill-use you?”

“You should always do your duty, Jonas,” Simon said. “If others do not do their duty to you, so much the worse for them; but that is no excuse for your not doing your duty as far as you can.”

Jonas, being a little behind Simon, made a little face expressive of his disagreement with this option, but he said nothing. They followed the course of the river Hieromax down to Capitolias, where they slept that night in the house of some friends of Simon, and on the following evening arrived at the farm. John received a hearty greeting from Isaac and the other men, and several of the fishermen, when they heard of his return, came in to see him.

For the next fortnight, John and Jonas worked from daylight to dark, and by the end of that time the greater part of the corn was gathered in the granary; a portion was stored away in a deep pit, straw being laid over it when the hole was nearly full, and earth being thrown in level to the surface, so that should the Romans come and sack the granary there should still remain a store which would carry them on until the next harvest. Then the news came from across the lake that the Romans were breaking up their camp at Scythopolis and were moving toward Tiberias.

No resistance was expected to be offered there. The greater part of the inhabitants had all along been well affected to the Romans, and had only been compelled by a small faction in the city and by the fear of the country people of Galilee to join in the insurrection. It was, too, the richest city in the dominions of King Agrippa, for although these lay for the most part east of Jordan the towns of Tiberias and Tarichea were included in them. Tiberias was, in fact, his chief city.

Here he had his richest palace, and the city, which greatly benefited by being the seat of his government, was Roman rather than Jewish in its hopes and feelings. So confident was Vespasian that no resistance would be offered, that when he arrived within half a mile of the town he sent forward an officer with fifty horse to exhort the people to open their gates.

When he got near the town the officer dismounted and went forward to speak, when a party of the war faction, headed by Jesus the son of Shaphat, charged out upon him. The officer, having had no orders to fight the Jews, fled on foot with five of his men who had also dismounted. Their assailants seized the horses and carried them in triumph into the city. The senate of Tiberias at once issued out from the city and hurried to the camp of Vespasian, and implored him not to visit the crime of a small body of desperate men upon a whole city, whose inhabitants had always been favorably disposed toward Rome. Agrippa added his entreaties to theirs, and Vespasian, who had just given orders for the troops to advance to storm and sack the city, recalled them. The insurgents under Jesus fled to Tarichea, and the gates being opened the Romans entered Tiberias, Vespasian issuing strict orders against plundering and the ill-treatment of the inhabitants.

At Tarichea were assembled not only the insurgents from Tiberias, but fighting men from all the towns on the lake and from the country on the east. The city had been carefully fortified by Josephus, and as the inhabitants had a very large number of vessels in the port, they relied upon these for escape in case the town should be reduced to extremities. No sooner did the Romans appear before their walls and begin to lay out their siege works than the Tiberians and others under the command of Jesus sallied out and dispersed the workmen.

When the Roman troops advanced in regular order some of the Jews retired into the city; others made for their boats, which were ranged along on the shore, and in these putting out a little distance, they cast anchor and opened fire with their missiles upon the Romans.

In the mean time a large number of Jews had just arrived from the further side of Jordan. Vespasian sent Titus with six hundred chosen horse to disperse them. The number of Jews was so large that Titus sent for further succor, and was re-enforced by Trajan with four hundred horse, while Antonius Silo with two thousand archers was sent by Vespasian to the side of a hill opposite the city to open fire thence upon the defenders of the walls and thus prevent them from harassing the Roman horsemen as they advanced.

The Jews resisted the first charge of the cavalry, but they could not long withstand the long spears and the weight and impetus of the horses, and fled in disorder toward the town. The cavalry pursued and tried to cut them off from it, but although great numbers were slaughtered, the rest by pure weight of numbers broke through and reached the city. A great dissension arose within the walls. The inhabitants of the town, dismayed by the defeat inflicted by a small number of Romans upon the multitude in the field, were unwilling to draw upon themselves the terrible fate which had befallen the towns which had resisted the Romans, and therefore clamored for instant surrender. The strangers, great numbers of whom were mountaineers from Paræa, Ammonitis, and Hermon, who knew little of what had been passing in Galilee, where for resistance, and a fray arose in the town.

The noise of the tumult reached Titus, who called upon his men to seize the moment while the enemy were engaged in civil discord to attack. Then leading his men he dashed on horseback into the lake, passed round the end of the wall, and entered the city. Consternation seized the besieged; the inhabitants attempted no resistance, still hoping that their peaceful character would save them from ill-treatment, and many allowed themselves to be slaughtered unresistingly. Jesus and his followers, however, fought gallantly, striving, but in vain, to make their way down to the ships in the port. Jesus himself and many of his men were killed. Titus opened the gates and sent word to his father that the city was captured, and the Roman army at once entered.

Vespasian placed a number of his troops in the large vessels in the port, and sent them off to attack those who had first fled to the boats. These were for the most part fishermen from the various towns on the lake. The cavalry were sent all round the lake to cut off and slay those who sought to gain the land. The battle, or rather the slaughter, went on for some time. The fishermen in their light boats could do nothing against the soldiers in the large vessels. These slew them with arrows or javelins from a distance, or ran them down, and killed them as they struggled in the water. Many of the boats were run ashore, but the occupants were slain there by the soldiers on the lookout for them. Altogether six thousand perished in the slaughter.

In the meantime Vespasian had set up his tribunal in Tarichea. The inhabitants of the town were separated from the strangers. Vespasian himself was, as Josephus said, unwilling to shed more blood, as he had promised when he entered the city to spare the lives of all, but he yielded to the arguments of those who said that the strangers were mountain robbers, the foes of every man.

Accordingly they were ordered to leave the city by the road to Tiberias. As soon as they had left the town the troops surrounded them, headed by Vespasian in person. Twelve hundred of the aged and helpless he ordered to be slain at once; six thousand of the most able-bodied he went to Nero, to be employed on the canal he was digging across the isthmus of Corinth; thirty thousand four hundred were sold as slaves; and a large number were bestowed upon Agrippa, who also sold them as slaves. This act, after the formal promise of pardon, disgraces the memory of Vespasian even more than the wholesale massacres of the garrisons of the towns which resisted to the last.

The news of this act of wholesale vengeance spread such terror through the land that the whole of the cities of Galilee at once opened their gates, and sent deputations to Vespasian to offer their submission and ask for pardon. Gamala, Gischala, and Itabyrium, a town on Mount Tabor which had been strongly fortified by Josephus, alone held out. Itabyrium lay some ten miles to the west of Tiberias.

Standing back among the trees at a short distance from the lake, Simon, John, and the workers on the farm watched with horror the slaughter of the fishermen on the lake. None of their neighbors were among those who had gone out to aid in the defense of Tarichea, for Simon had gone among them to dissuade them from launching their boats and joining the flotilla as it proceeded down the lake in the morning. He urged upon them that if they took part in the affair they would only bring down vengeance upon themselves and their families.

“There is no lack of men,” he said, “in Tiberias and Tarichea. Such aid as you can give would be useless, and whether the cities fall at once, or whether they resist, the vengeance of the Romans will fall upon you. In a few hours their horsemen can ride round the shores of the lake and cut off all who are absent from returning to their homes, and give the villages to fire and sword. Those who can point to their boats drawn up at the side of the lake will be able to give proof to the Romans that they had not taken part against them. So far we have escaped the horrors of war on this side of Jordan. If the strong cities of Galilee cannot resist the Roman arms, what hope should we have on this side, where the population is comparatively scanty, and where there are few strong places? Do not let us provoke the Romans, my friends. If they go up against Jerusalem, let those who will go and die in defense of the Temple, but it would be worse than folly to provoke the wrath of the Romans by thrusting yourselves into the quarrel here.”

Warmly did the fishermen congratulate themselves when they saw the combat proceeding on the lake, and when a strong body of Roman horse rode along the shore, leaving parties at regular intervals to cut off those who might try and land. A body of twenty were posted down by the boats, and two came into the village and demanded food for the party. Simon, when he saw them coming, ordered all the able-bodied men to retire and remain in the olive groves on the slopes at a distance from the lake until the Romans had gone, while he and Isaac and some other old men went down and met the soldiers.

“Are any of the people of this place out there on the lake?” the officer in command of the twenty men asked, as Simon and his party, bringing bread, fruit, and wine, came down to the water-side.

“No, sir,” Simon replied; “we have but eight boats belonging to the village, and they are all there. We are peaceable people, who till the soil and fish the lake, and take no part in the doings of the great towns. We are subjects of King Agrippa, and have no cause for discontent with him.”

“A great many other people have no cause for discontent, old man,” the officer said, “but they have, nevertheless, risen in rebellion. However, as your boats are here, and your people seem to have taken no part in this matter, I have naught to say against you, especially as your wine is good, and you have brought down plenty of it.”

Simon and his companions withdrew, and, with aching hearts, watched from a distance the massacre upon the lake. The fury, however, pronounced among the men in the towns and villages on the shore at the sight of the numerous corpses washed ashore was so great that many of the young men left their avocations and started for Gamala, which, relying upon the strength of its position, which was even stronger than that of Jotapata, was resolved to resist to the last.

Several of the young men of the village, and many from the villages near, were determined to take this course, maddened by the slaughter of many friends and relations. John himself was as furious as any, especially when the news came of the violation of faith at Tarichea, and of the selling of nigh forty thousand men into slavery.

“Father,” he said that evening, “I had thought to stay quietly with you until the Romans advanced against Jerusalem, but I find I cannot do so. The massacre at Jotapata was bad enough, but the slaughter of defenseless men on the lake is worse. I pray you let me go.”

“Would you go into Gamala and die there, John?” Simon asked. “Better to die at the Temple than to throw away your life here.”

“I do not intend to go into Gamala, father, nor to throw away my life, though I care little for it, except for the sake of you and my mother and Mary; but I would do something, and I would save the sons of our neighbors and others from the fate that assuredly awaits them if they enter Gamala. They know not, as I do, how surely the walls will go down before the Roman engines; but even did they know it, so determined are they to fight these slayers of our countrymen that they will still go. What I propose to do is to carry out what I have always believed to be the true way of fighting the Romans. I will collect a band, and take to the mountains, and harass them whenever we may find opportunity. I know the young men from our village will follow me if I will lead them, and they will be able to get their friends along the shore to do the like. In that way the danger will not be so great, for in the mountains the Romans would have no chance of overtaking us, while, if we are successful, many will gather round us, and we may do good service.”

“I will not stay you, John, if you feel that the Lord has called upon you to go; and, indeed, you may save, as you say, the lives of many of our neighbors, by persuading them to take to the hills with you, instead of shutting themselves up in Gamala. Go down then to the village and talk to them, and see what they say to your plan.”

John had little doubt as to his proposal being accepted by the younger men of the village. The fact that he had been chosen as one of the bodyguard of Josephus had at once given him importance in the eyes of his neighbors, and that he should have passed through the siege of Jotapata, and had escaped, had caused them to regard him not only as a valiant fighter, but as one under the special protection of God. Since his return scarce an evening had passed without parties coming from one or other of the villages along the shore to hear from his lips the story of the siege. As soon, then, as he went down to the fishing village, and told the young men who had determined to leave for Gamala that he thought badly of such action, but that he intended to raise a band and take to the mountains and harass the Romans, they eagerly agreed to follow him, and to obey his orders. There were eight of them, and John at once made them take an oath of obedience and fellowship, swearing in all things to obey his orders, to be true to each other to death, to be ready to give their lives when called upon for the destruction of the Romans, and never, if they fell into the hands of the enemy, to betray the secrets of the band, whatever might be the tortures to which they were exposed.

John could have obtained more than eight men in the village, but he would only take quite young men.

“I want only men who can undergo fatigue and watching, who can climb mountains, and run as fast as the Roman horse can gallop; besides, for work like this it is necessary that there should be one leader, and that he should be promptly obeyed. If I take older men, they will naturally wish to have a voice in the ordering of things, I have seen enough of military matters to know that, for prompt decision and swift execution, one head, and one head only, is necessary. Besides, we may find difficulties in the way of getting food, and at first I wish for only a small band. If success attends us, we shall increase rapidly. Twenty will be quite enough to begin with.”

As soon as the eight young men, of whom all but two were under twenty years old, had taken the oath, they started at once to the villages round.

“Do each of you gather in two, but no more,” John said; “and let them be those whom you know to be strong and active. Do not bring more, and if four of you bring but one so much the better. If you find many more eager to join, you can tell them that we will send for them when the time comes to increase our numbers, and pray them to abide here and not to go into Gamala. Let each bring his arms and a bag of meal, and meet me to-morrow evening at sundown on the Hieromax River, three miles below Capitolias, that will be opposite to Abila, which lies on the mountain side. Let all travel singly, for the Roman horse may be about. However, as we shall be walking east, while Gamala lies to the west of south, they will not take us, should we come upon them, for men going thither to aid in the defense of the town.”

The young men started at once on their missions, full of confidence in John, and feeling certain that under his leadership they should soon come to blows with the Romans, being also in their hearts well satisfied that their warfare would be in the open country, and they should not be called upon to fight pent up in walls from which there was no escape. Having seen his followers off, John returned home and told Simon the progress he has made. The old man sighed.

“I do not seek to keep you, John, for your duty to your country stands now in the first rank of all, and it may be that the Lord preserved you at Jotapata because he intends you to do great deeds for him here. I do not say spare yourself or avoid danger for our sakes; I only say do no throw away your life by rashness. Remember that, young as you are, you are a leader, and be prudent as well as brave. After Gamala has fallen, as fall I fear it will, and the Romans have moved away from these parts, as they will then do, for there is no resistance to them on this side of Jordan save at that town. I shall bring your mother and Mary back again, and you will find us waiting here to welcome you if you return. If not, my son, I shall mourn for you as Jacob mourned for Joseph, and more, seeing that you are the only prop of my old age; but I shall have the consolation of knowing that you died for your country.”

“You will find in Mary a daughter, father; and you must find a husband for her who will take my place. But it may be that if the Romans march not direct upon Jerusalem—and they say that Vespasian has arranged that two of the legions shall winter on the seacoast at Cæsarea and the third at Scythopolis—it is probable that he will not move against Jerusalem till the spring. In that case I may be often here during the winter. For I will not go down to Jerusalem until the last thing, for there all is turmoil and disturbance, and until the time comes when they must lay aside their private feuds and unite to repel the invader, I will not go down.”

Father and son talked until later in the night. In the morning John made his preparations for departure. He had told Jonas of his intentions. The boy listened silently, only saying, “Where you go, John, I am ready to go with you; it makes no difference to me;” and afterward went down to the lake side, where he filled his pouch with smooth pebbles, each of which he selected with great care; for when herding his goats among the mountains, Jonas had been always practicing with a sling, and many a cony had fallen before his unerring aim. All the lads in the mountains were accustomed to the use of the sling, but none in Jotapata had approached Jonas in their skill with this weapon.

In the morning John prepared to start. He and Jonas each carried a small sack, supported by a strap passing over the shoulders, and containing some eight pounds of meal and a gourd of water. Jonas carried no weapon save a long knife hidden under his garment, and his sling and pouch of stones. John carried a sword and buckler and a horn. Before they started John knelt before his father and received his blessing, and Simon, as he bade him adieu, gave him a small bag of money.

“You will need to buy things in the mountains, lad, and I would not that you should be driven, like the robber bands, to take food by force. It is true that they who go not to war should support those who risk their lives for their country; but there are many aged men who, like myself, cannot fight, there are many women whose husbands are away in Gamala or Jerusalem, and these may not be able to afford to assist others. Therefore it is well that you should have means of paying for what you require, otherwise the curse of the widow and fatherless may fall upon you. And now, farewell, my son! May God have you in his keeping, and send you home safe to your mother and me!”