us go with him to Spain, for on the road to Damascus he had a vision, and nearly lost his sight in it.  And ever since he has been preaching that the doors are open to all.  He is the greatest traveller the world has ever known.  Christ is a Greek word, Manahem said, for it seemed to him that Saddoc was speaking too much, and that he could give Jesus a better account of Paul’s journeyings, his conversions of the Gentiles and the persecutions that followed these conversions:  for the Jews, Manahem said, have been on his track always, and his last quarrel with them was yester even by the Jordan, where he was preaching with Timothy.  They lost each other in the hills.  Of Timothy I have news, Jesus answered.  He met a shepherd in the valley who pointed out the way to Caesarea to him, and it may be that he is not far from that city now.  Then I will go to Caesarea at once, Paul cried.  I have promised to put thee on the direct road, Jesus said, but it is for thee to choose another guide, he added, for Paul’s face told him the thoughts that were passing in Paul’s mind:  that he would sooner that any other of the brethren should guide him out of the wilderness.  After looking at Paul for some time he said:  I’ve heard from Manahem and Saddoc that thou wast a persecutor of Christians, but without understanding, so hurried was the story.  And they tell me, Paul said, that thou’rt from Nazareth and suffered under Pilate.  More than that they do not seem to know; but from what they tell me thy story resembles that of our Lord Jesus Christ who was betrayed in a garden and was raised from the dead.  At the words, who was betrayed in a garden, a light seemed to break in Jesus’ face and he said:  some two years of my life are unknown to anybody here, even Hazael does not know them, and last night I was about to tell them to him on the balcony.

You all remember how he was carried out of the lecture-room on to this balcony by Saddoc and Manahem, who left him with me.  I had just returned from the mountain, having left my flock with Jacob, our new shepherd, and Hazael, who recovered his senses quickly in the evening air, begged me to tell him of Jacob’s knowledge of the flock, and I spoke to him highly of Jacob....  Hazael, have I thy permission to tell the brethren here assembled the story I began to tell thee last night, but which was interrupted?  The old man raised his head and said:  Jesus, I hearken, go on with thy story.

Brethren, yester evening I returned from the hills after having left our flock in charge of Jacob.  You know, brethren, why I confided the flock to him.  After fifty (I am fifty-five) our steps are no longer as alert as they were:  an old man cannot sleep in a cavern like a young man nor defend himself against robbers like a young man, and yesternight was the first night I spent under a roof for many a year, and under that roof I am to live henceforth with you here, tending on our president, who needs attention now in his great age.  These things were in his mind