Then Noah opened the wide door of the Ark, and all the world was green and fresh and shining in the sun. And there on the top of the mountain, which is called Ararat, Noah and his family thanked God for their deliverance, and all the beasts and birds, each in his own way, said Amen. And across the sky was a gleaming rainbow, from one hill to another over the glistening earth. And God said to Noah, “Behold the bow! It is the sign of my promise that I will never again destroy the earth. When the rain falls and men begin to be afraid, then shall the sun shine through the wet clouds, and the bow shall be painted in the sky.” Thus, with the prayers of Noah and with the promise of God, the life of man began anew.
III
THE ADVENTURES OF LOT
NCE upon a time, when the world was still young, there was a lad named Lot. His father and mother were dead, and he lived with his Uncle Abraham and his Aunt Sarah.
In the place where Lot lived, the people believed that the moon was God. They looked up into the sky at night, and saw the shining moon, and it seemed to them the most beautiful and most wonderful sight in the world, and they said their prayers to it. But Abraham knew better than that. He knew that God who made the earth made the moon also. Because Abraham would not go to the moon-church, his neighbors disliked him. So at last he made up his mind to move away. One night, in a dream, he heard the voice of God, and God told him to go. And, the next day, he took Sarah and Lot, and started out to find a better place to live in. Thus Lot got his first look at the wide world.
Abraham and Sarah and Lot rode on the backs of camels, but they had to go very slowly because they took with them all their sheep and cows. So they journeyed and they journeyed till by and by they came to a great river, called the Euphrates. And then they journeyed and they journeyed till by and by they came to another river, called the Jordan, in a deep valley. And there, between the Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea,—the place is on the map,—they found a pleasant land which they liked much. On account of their flocks and herds they could not settle down and stay long in one place, so they wandered here and there over the green country, stopping to rest now under a spreading oak, and now in the shadow of a great rock; and they slept in tents.
But, after a while, they had so many sheep and lambs, and cows and calves, that it was hard to find a pasture big enough to feed them all. When they came to a spring of water, and all wanted to drink at the same time, there was great confusion; and sometimes the herdsmen fought about it. So one day Abraham said to Lot, “There are now so many cattle that we had better divide them into two companies, and pasture them in different places. You take yours and go your way, and I will take mine and go my way. Here is a high hill, from which we may see all the land. Let us climb up and look, and you shall choose which part you will take.” So they climbed up the hill, and looked out over the land. To the north were rocky hills, to the south were wild deserts, to the west was the sea, but to the east was a green plain. In the plain were rich pastures, and groves of trees with the white houses of little towns among them, and a river flowing by, so that it looked like the Garden of Eden. This pleased Lot. He said to himself, “My Uncle Abraham has given me my choice, and I will choose the best there is.” So he chose the plain, leaving Abraham the stony hills.
Now, people who think only of themselves, and take the best without regard to others, sometimes get the worst. And this is very likely to be the case with those who choose that which is easy instead of that which is hard. So it was with Lot. The plain was not so pleasant as he thought. It had once been the bed of a salt sea, and in some places the salt lay upon the ground, and there were salt springs. And near by there was a dreadful swamp where the mud was mixed with oil. Before Lot had been long at Sodom,—for this was the name of the town in which he lived,—there came four kings with long names and fierce soldiers, and they drove the people out of their houses, and back into the swamp, and they captured them and carried them away. Abraham, when he heard of it, took all his herdsmen, and armed them with swords and clubs, and they attacked the four kings by night when they were asleep, and rescued Lot and his neighbors. But it was all very unpleasant for Lot.
The people of Sodom had never been good people, but after this they were worse than ever. It troubled Lot greatly. Sometimes he thought of moving away, but his wife liked the place, and so did their two daughters: so he stayed. He reproved his bad neighbors, but that did no good; he only made himself unpopular.
At last, one hot day, as Abraham sat in the door of his tent under the shade of the oaks, he saw three men coming. And he rose up and ran to meet them, for he was very kind to strangers. “Come,” he said, “and rest here in the cool shade, and my wife shall get you something to eat.” So the strangers stopped, and Sarah made a fire and baked some cakes and broiled some meat, and brought out curds and whey, and set the table. And after supper, the men looked towards Sodom, and one of them said, “What kind of a place is that? We hear sad things about it.” And Abraham said, “I have a nephew who lives there, and he tells me that it is a very wicked place indeed.” And the men said, “We are going to see with our own eyes and hear with our own ears.” So they went on down the road to Sodom.