We shall be surprised here by the daylight if we delay any longer, he said, returning to Jesus, and, mounting their asses, they rode down the hillside into a long, shallow valley out of which the track rose upwards and upwards penetrating into the hills above Jericho.

CHAP.  XXIV.

Now it is here we leave the track, Jesus said, and he turned his ass into a little path leading down a steeply shelving hillside.  We shall find the brethren coming back from the hills, if they aren’t back already.  It is daylight on the hills though it is night still in this valley; and looking up they saw a greenish moon in the middle of a mottled sky of pink and grey.  Over the face of the moon wisps of vapour curled and went out:  and the asses, Joseph said, are loath to descend the hillside for fear of this strange moon, or it may be they are frightened by the babble of this brook; it seems to rise out of the very centre of the earth.  How deep is the gorge?  Very deep, Jesus answered; many hundred feet.  But the asses don’t fear precipices, and if ours are unwilling to descend the hillside it is because the paths do not seem likely to lead to a stable; so would I account for their obstinacy.  I’ll not ride down so steep a descent, and Joseph slipped from his ass’s back; and, rid of his load, the ass tried to escape, but Jesus managed to turn him back to Joseph, who seized the bridle.  Dismount, Jesus, he cried, for the path is narrow, and to please him Jesus dismounted, and, driving their animals in front of them, they ventured on to a sort of ledge.

It passed under rocks and between rocks to the very brink of the precipice as it descended towards the bridge that spanned the brook some hundreds of feet lower down.  Already our asses scent a stable, Jesus said; he called after them to stop, and the obedient animals stopped and began to seek among the stones for a tuft of grass or a bramble.  I see no place here for a hermitage, Joseph said, only roosts for choughs and crows.  There have been hermits here always, Jesus answered.  We shall pass the ruins of ancient hermitages farther down on this side above the bridge.  The bridge was built by hermits who came from India, Jesus said.  And was destroyed, Joseph interjected, by the Romans, so that they might capture the robbers that infested the caves.  But the Essenes must have repaired the bridge lately, Jesus replied, and he asked Joseph how long the Essenes had been at the Brook Kerith.  My camel-driver did not say, Joseph answered, and Jesus pointed to the ledge that the Essenes must have chosen for a dwelling:  it cannot be else, he said; there is no other ledge large enough to build upon in the ravine; and behind the ledge thou seest up yonder is the large cave whither the ravens came to feed Elijah.  If the brethren are anywhere they are on that ledge, in that cave, and he asked Joseph if his eyes could not follow the building of a balcony:  thine eyes