ANOTHER OF "THE MISTAKES OF MOSES."
"And it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown, that he went out unto his brethren and looked on their burdens, and he spied an Egyptian smiting an Hebrew, one of his brethren.
"And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no man, he slew the Egyptian, and hid him in the sand."
Yet we are told a little farther on "Now the man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth." But we haven't anything to do with his meekness, and only mention the murder because thereby hangs the tale of Moses' first love affair.
"Murder will out," and so in due course of time the King heard about it and "sought to slay Moses." "But Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land of Midian, and he sat down by a well."
Now when we read about the young men of the Bible hanging around a "well" we know what is going to happen. There is romance in the air and a love affair soon develops, for that seems to have been love's trysting place. And I suppose he neglected no artifice of the toilet that might enchance his personal charms, that he donned the most costly and elegant of his Egyptian costumes, flung himself in courtly indolence upon the sand, and waited and watched eagerly for the rich girls to come down to the well to water their father's flocks, just as one watches in the twilight for the first star to sparkle in the azure overhead, for the first sunbeam of the morning or the first rose of June.
"Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father's flock. And the shepherds came and drove them away, but Moses stood up and helped them, and watered their flock."
And who can blame Moses if he happened to wear his best raiment? Everything and everybody knows, and always has known, that love loves the beautiful; and each one according to his light takes advantage of the fact. So the wild maiden, when love with magic finger touches her quivering heart, stains her teeth a blacker black, hangs more beads and shells about her dirty neck and ankles, and practices all her rude arts of coquetry. And her savage lover, charmed with her charms, sticks the gayest feathers in his hair, rubs a more liberal supply of grease upon his polished, shiny skin, and makes himself brave with all his weapons of war. So the birds only seek love's trysting place in the springtime when their plumage is the most brilliant and their songs the sweetest, and the fishes when their colors are the brightest. And the woman of our day and generation, when love's arrow "tipped with a jewel and shot from a golden string" pierces her vital organ, wears her dress a little more décolleté, bangs her hair more bangy, clasps more diamonds round her throat, dispenses with sleeves altogether, smiles her sweetest smile and laughs her gayest laugh. And he, the modern man, caught in the snare, buys the shiniest stovepipe hat and nobbiest cane, dons his gaudiest neck-tie and widest trousers—and after all, beasts and birds and fishes, savage and civilized, we are all alike and ruled by the same instinct and passion, and "why should the spirit of mortal be proud?"