long staffs; the sacks which some carried on their backs were wrinkled and empty.  A little way off was a tree-trunk, so big that three men could hardly have encompassed it; the bark was white and rough, so that it seemed as if spirits had carved mysterious signs thereon in pure silver.  Jesus, a little apart from His disciples, was resting under this tree.  He was, as usual, without a hat, and His abundant nut-brown hair fell over His shoulders.  His indescribably beautiful face was paler than formerly.  He leaned against the trunk of the tree and closed His eyes.

The disciples thought He slept, and in order not to wake Him they looked at one another and spoke in whispers.  Their hearts were full of the impressions of their late experiences.  They thought of the persecution in their native land, the attractiveness of the big world, and their ignorance of the future.  Many of them during this gloomy rest-time thought of their former lives.  Who is managing my boat?  Who tends my fruit-trees?  Who works in my workshop?  Who sits in the profitable toll-house?  Who is providing for my wife, my children?  There had been a triumphant progress through the land and then a flight.  Men had not recognised the Master.  If He would only say distinctly and clearly who He was!  Meanwhile the outlook was desperate.  As if they had run after a demagogue, a traitor, an anti-Jew!  How could an anti-Jew be King of the Jews?  If He would only say who He was!

Snow lay on the mountains.  The ice-wastes stretched down from the heights of Hermon.  If our travellers looked up to their summits they saw the wild ruggedness of their covering; if they looked downwards they saw abysses in which the water thundered.  An eagle flew through the solitude and vultures screamed in the storm-beaten cedars.  The men from the fertile plains of the Galilean Lake had never seen such wild nature.  Simon was so enchanted that he wanted to build huts there for himself, his comrades, and the Prophet.  The other disciples shuddered, and would gladly have persuaded the Master to return.  He pointed to the high mountains, and said:  “What frightens you, My children?  When the races of men are becoming satiated and stupid, such wildness will refresh them.”

Simon and John nodded in agreement, but the others, as often was the case, did not understand what He—­who spoke for all time—­said.

They wrapped themselves more closely in their cloaks, climbed up to where there was no path, and still went on their way.  The Master walked in front and they followed Him through briars, and over stones; it never came into their heads that He could miss the way.  At length, amid the bare rocks standing high above the cedar tops, they had to rest again.  Some of them, especially the young John, were almost exhausted.  Matthew dipped into his sack and drew forth a small crust of bread, showed it to his companions, and said softly, so that the Master, who was sitting on a stone higher up, might not hear:  “That is all; if we do not soon light upon some human dwelling we must perish.”