"Now turn again—you are looking south. Here, almost at our feet, lies Jerusalem. Yet it was a long way to come, wasn't it?"
"Not when Jonathan carried me, and I was asleep," laughed Caleb.
"Yes," replied Deborah, "the white roads and the black stones in the fields, the gray of olive and the green of fig-trees between here and the city walls, look like a dream floating between two waking moments. And beyond the city is Bethlehem. And now turn this way—the way the sun is going. Down there we can see Lydda, as a pearl on a gray robe; and way off is Joppa, a dot on the shore of the Great Sea which looks like a blazing serpent with his back in the sky. Here is the plain of Sharon filled again with soldiers under the great generals Gorgias and Ptolemy and Nicanor. We can see the smoke, for they are making their camps. And we are on the side of Mount Mizpah, where once the Holy Tabernacle stood before Solomon built the Temple. And look, child; everywhere the brave men of Israel are coming—for Judas has bidden the people with him to spend the rest of the day in prayer. Listen! Quite near us is a company of soldiers. They have laid down their spears and bows and swords, and have covered their heads with dust. They are repeating together the Psalms of Penitence, and praying God not to visit the sins of Israel upon the land. Let us go nearer. They are now spreading on the ground the copy of the Books of the Law, that which Dion brought me one day, and which he found in the High Priest's house; the one in letters of silver and gold once encased in the beautiful ark with clasps of precious stone, but now with its holiest words cut out, and the margins covered over with pictures of heathen gods. Now the men are praying that the land may be restored to Israel; and they vow—every man—to keep all the precepts of the Law as our fathers did.
"Now what are they doing? They are holding up toward heaven some garments which belonged to the priests whom the Greeks have murdered."
"I can hear their words!" said the boy. "It is 'Lord, so perish the priests of the heathen!' How wild their cry is! Is any one coming to attack them?"
"No, my child. Their voices are harsh, being tuned for battle-cries on the morrow."
"But, listen, sister, some one is reading in a mocking voice."
"That," replied Deborah, "is a proclamation of the King which is posted on the gates of Antioch, a copy of which has found its way into our camp."
A soldier read: