“You all hear,” said the women, turning to the assembled crowd.  Then they pulled up their gowns high over their ankles, stepped into the river where it is shallow, and bared their brown necks, in order that the wild preacher might pour the water over them.  The men pressed closer, but the prophet tore a branch from the cedar and drove the hypocritical penitents back.  Some were glad that sin had no power over this holy man.

Then they sent an old man to him to ask who he really was.  “Are you the Messiah whom we are expecting?”

“I am not the Messiah,” answered the preacher.  “But he is coming after me.  I prepare the way for him like the morning breeze ere the sun rises.  As the heaven is above the earth, so is he greater than I. It is my prayer that I may be worthy to loosen his shoe latchets.  I sprinkle your heads with water; he will sprinkle them with fire.  He will separate you according as your hearts be good or evil.  He will lay up the wheat in the garner with his fan and burn the chaff.  Prepare yourselves—­the kingdom of God is nearer than ye think.”

The people were uneasy.  Clouds came up over the mountains of Galilee, and their edges shone like silver.  The air lay like a heavy weight over the valley of the Jordan, and not a twig stirred in the cedars.  The strangers from Samaria and Judaea did not know the man who climbed down over the stones and went towards the preacher.  He wore a blue woollen gown that came down over his knees, so that only his sandalled feet were seen.  He might have been taken for a working man had not his head, with its high, pale forehead and heavy waving locks, been so royal.  A soft beard sprang from his upper lip, and there was such a wonderful light in his dark blue eyes that some were almost frightened by it.  And they asked each other:  “Who is the man with the fiery eyes?”

He reached the prophet.  One hand hung down:  he held the other against his breast.  He said softly; “John, pour water over my head, too.”

The prophet looked at the young man and was terrified.  He went back two steps—­they knew not why.  Did he himself know?

“You!” he said, almost under his breath.  “You desire to receive the token of repentance from me?”

“I will do penance—­for them all.  I will begin with water what will be ended with blood.”  That is what they thought to hear.  In a man who speaks like this, there is something incredibly spiritual.

“He is a dreamer!  He is a madman!” the people whisper one to another.

“No, he’s not, he’s not!” others declare.

“Did he not speak of blood?”

“It seemed so.  Such young blood, and already repenting!”

“And as proud of it as a Roman.”

“With eyes glowing like an Arab’s.”

“Looking at his hair, you might take him for a German.”

“He is neither a Roman, nor an Arab, nor a German,” someone exclaimed, laughing; “he is the carpenter of Nazareth.”