seem to pass over the face of the monarch. Was he sorry for poor Judaeacus? wondered little Eli.
Eli kept following Judaeacus in all his aimless meanderings until the latter finally led him into the poorer and less sanitary quarter of Rome. There Judaeacus suddenly spied a soiled, half-eaten gourd upon a dung-hill. This he seized and, seating himself upon the pile of rubbish, bit into it ravenously, casting mad, furtive glances about him.
But this was too much for Eli. Conquering his fears, he rushed upon Judaeacus and seizing his hands, cried "Come home with me, please, please, poor Judaeacus!"
Judaeacus paused and blinked at him.
V.
At this time the hands of the clock of history suddenly began to point to the elimination of the wanton Messalina from the stage of Roman politics. Discovered in a new intrigue of treasonable complexion with a young profligate by the name of Sirius, she was apprehended, together with her associates. At once the hunt for the constituents and near-constituents of Messalina's faction began thru the length and breadth of Rome.
The same afternoon when Josephus Barnabus returned rather hastily to his villa, his face had a sickly, yellowish hue. To his surprise he found Grandfather Ezra, Eli and the household slaves and attendants gathered about the great form of Judaeacus, who was lying on a couch, his breast heaving like the side of a stricken horse. The aged Ezra was carefuly scrutinizing the former gladiator’s shoulder while Eli, in a ferment of excitement was jumping about now on one side of Judaeacus and now on the other.
"Father! Father!" cried Eli, running to Barnabus as soon as he perceived him, "It is he! It is he!—my brother—your son—Judah!"
"What is this?" demanded Barnabus, uncomprehendingly.
"Whom the Lord hath taken away, He hath restored at last!" chanted old Ezra with upturned eyes.
"Is it really he?" asked Barnabus, dazed.
"See for yourself," said the old man, again putting aside the tunic of Judaeacus with his trembling, veined old hand," there is the red mole—there, near his armpit—which made him ineligible for the priesthood, just as I pointed it out to his sainted mother when he was a child!"
Josephus Barnabus stood stock still for a moment. Something suddenly welled up in him which was a mixture of pity for the suffering visited upon his simple-minded, great-limbed son stretched out before him and also for himself. He tried to speak but all he could utter was a queer inarticulate hali-sob. He stooped and pressed his trembling lips to the feverish brow of the former gladiator. Then he sat down beside him. He waved away the attendants, and all but the Egyptian eirl Neit disanneared.
"What a day! What a day!" muttered Barnabus, hopelessly.
"What is it, my son?" asked old Ben Ezra. "What is amiss?"
"What is it, father?" asked Eli, large-eyed.
"Have you not heard? Messalina Messalina and her supporters have been arrested on the charge of conspiring against the life of the Emperor. Some of the conspirators have already been scourged and executed. The informers Florus they are looking for her partisans everywhere! They will soon be here!"
Barnabus allowed his chin to sink into the palm of his hand. There was a somber glint in his eyes as of one already condemned.
The terror of Eli was pitiful to see. He threw his arms about his father's neck and would not release his hold. "Let us go—let us go, father—let us go back to Judaea—now—this minute," he cried. "We can take Judaeacus with us and cure him and we will all be saved."
"Child! They will follow after! I shall be seized. They will confiscate my estate.....All is ruin....."
"No! No!" persisted Eli, his eyes agleam, frantically seeking a way out, "Leave word—leave word with Neit. Let her say that we went to join the good King Aggrippa—that we are of his party which is leaving for Jerusalem to-day. Did I not see them this day? Tell her, father! The Emperor will not seek to harm the friends of King Aggrippa! Everybody in Rome says that Claudius loves our king beyond all men!"
N AT Fr u SAN Sn u EZ - Fe A Barnabus rose. A gleam of hope suddenly shot into his eyes. “Perhaps—perhaps you are right, my child!” he said with a hoarse, eager cry. Already, the insolent, harsh look of the Roman citizen which he had found necessary to assume, had disappeared to give way to the unassuming expression of the native of Judaea. He looked inquiringly at the old man Ezra.
"The child is right," said the aged Ezra. "We have already tarried too long in this Godless land. Let us return to Palestine ere we and our children with us are utterly lost!"
* * *
The glorious gilt dome of the temple glittered in the sunshine in plain view miles before they reached Jerusalem. And it was singular, but the nearer they approached the beautiful white walls of Jerusalem and the great majestic white temple which seemed to speak peace to all men, the clearer the mind of Judaeacus became....All thru their long journey, old Ezra and little Eli had tried in vain to inculcate the obdurate mind of Judaeacus with the old, forgotten prayers. It was useless. He did not seem to respond. Now, bit by bit, very simply and with but little effort, as the well-remembered soil of Palestine came into view in full bloom and the breath of the pomegranate and the acacia and the myrtle and the azalea entered his being, old, forgotten phrases came back to Judaeacus, and his mind seemed slowly to regain its sanity and to pick up one by one the threads of his former life in the Holy Land....When he beheld the Temple at last, he remarked in a low tone, “This is the Temple. I had forgotten it. How low I have fallen!” and great tears rolled slowlv down: his cheeks.
Eli rejoiced in the cräwds of people among whom he mingled and darted-ireely with an ineffable sense of intimacy and security. Even Barnabus and old Ezra smiled cheerfully ; for the faces about them were 10t the faces of callousness and insolence as in Rome— but the most intimate and human faces in the world— he faces of Tudaeans.
It was on the eve of the Sabbath and a holy day, and men, women and children were gravely but cheerfully flowing toward the Temple. They were informed on all hands that King Aggrippa himself was to read the Book of Deuteronomy before the people in accordance with the ancient custom.
Sure enough, when at last they reached the great congregation assembled in the Court of the Temple, there stood the King, the former profligate Jewish prince of Rome and prayed with the people Israel. When the King came to the passage, "From amongst