"I am dying," said she, "but my bitterest sorrow is in leaving my poor little babe, who must perish thus alone in the desert."
The poor mother for one moment thought of asking the kind old man to take her child, but she saw that one of his water-bottles had been broken by some accident, and that he had hardly enough water to cross the desert.
Ben-Ha-Zelah had had the same thought, but he calculated the quantity of water remaining to him, and and to himself that it was impossible.
The woman was dying.
There, in the presence of the mother's despair, with the wail of the infant so soon to be an orphan, in his ears, he thought of his own child.
"Woman," said he, "I will take your babe, and will care for him as for my own. I will save his life, even at the cost of my own."
The mother died, invoking blessings on his head.
Ben-Ha-Zelah resumed his journey across the desert, placing before him on the saddle, the infant, who at first wept, then laughed in infantile glee, then amused himself by teasing the patient nurse, pulling his beard, or tangling the reins of the camel. The old man who had become as gentle as a mother, sought every means which affection could suggest to amuse the helpless little creature, so strangely given to his charge--sometimes with the gold tassels of his bridle, sometimes with his bright fire-arms, sometimes by rattling in his ears the gold sequins in his purse. Again he would sing to him a lullaby, long-forgotten. [{701}] The child was pleased with each new amusement devised by the old savant, but it was only for a few moments, and was again looking about for something he had not yet seen.
How much we all resemble children!
Poor old Ben-Ha-Zelah knew not what to do to satisfy this restless craving for amusement. Suddenly he thought of the beautiful little box, which the child had not seen, and drew it out from the folds of his robe.