And it seemed as if the brother had guessed rightly, for though Jesus’ face showed no interest in the brethren, nor in the cenoby, he seemed to enjoy the sympathy of the dumb animal.  He liked to call to Caesar and to lay his hand upon Caesar’s head, and to look into his eyes, and in those moments of sympathy the brethren said:  he forgets his grief.  But Caesar is coming into ramhood, Saddoc answered, and will have to go away with the flock.  There were brethren who cried out against this:  let the flock perish rather than Jesus should be deprived of Caesar.  Wouldst have him remain when he is a great ram?  Manahem asked, and the others answered:  yes, for Jesus takes no thought for anything but Caesar, and the brethren conferred together, and spent much thought in trying to discover a remedy other than Caesar for Jesus’ grief.

But one day Jesus said to the brethren:  Caesar is coming into ramhood, and I must take him away to the hills, he must come with me and join the ewes.  Art thou going to be our shepherd again? said they.  If ye will entrust the flock to me.  My thoughts will never wander from it again.  Jesus spoke the words significantly, and many of the brethren believed that he would prove himself to be the great shepherd that he was of yore, but others said:  his grief will break out upon him on the hills; but these counsels were overruled by Manahem and Saddoc.  Jesus, Saddoc said, never smiles and his words are few, but he is himself again, and the best shepherd that ever walked these hills is worse than he, so it is said.  He lost a few sheep, Manahem said, in the first days of his great grief, but his mind is altogether now on the encouragement of the flock and Amos is wearied of it and would return to the reading of the Scriptures.  Thou speakest well, Manahem, Saddoc returned, for it was in his mind as it was in Manahem’s that the sight of men and the sound of men’s voices were a torture to Jesus, and that he longed for solitude and silence and the occupation of the flock.

The cenoby will never be the same again without our pet, some of the brethren cried, but others said:  it must be so.  We’ll go to see Caesar’s lambs, they cried, as he was being led away.  There will be no lambs by Caesar this spring, Jesus answered.  He’ll run with the ewes and that’s about all; for a ram is not fit for service till he is two years old.  Whereupon the distraction of Jesus’ grief being removed from the cenoby, the Essenes fell to talking again of the great schism and what came of it.  Are our brothers happier in wedlock than we are in celibacy? was the question they often put to each other on the balcony; and a sudden meeting of thoughts set them comparing the wives beyond Jordan with the ewes of the hills.  Which are the most fruitful? they asked themselves; and it was averred that though twin lambs were of equal worth, it might fall out in the strange destinies that beset human life that one of human twins might be a robber and the other a devout Essene.