The little elderly man’s face was tickled by a cedar twig for so long that at length he awoke.  He saw a young woman sitting on a rock.  She was just going to hurry off with her round basket when the fisherman called loudly to her; “Well, Beka, daughter of Manasseh, whither are you taking your ivory white feet?”

“My feet are as brown as yours,” replied Beka.  “Stop mocking at me, Simon.”

“How can I be mocking at you?  You’re a fisherman’s child, like me.  But your basket is too heavy for you.”

“I am taking my father his dinner.”

“Manasseh has had a good catch.  Look, smoke is rising yonder behind the palms of Hium.  He is cooking the fish.  But I have eaten nothing since yesterday at the sixth hour.”

“I can well believe that, Simon.  The fish of the Lake of Gennesaret do not swim ready-cooked into the mouth.  He who lies like a child in the cradle, and lets the gods provide——!”

Simon, with his legs apart in order to preserve the balance, stood up in the boat.  “Beka,” he said, “let the gods alone, they won’t feed us; they eat the best that men have.”

“Then hold to the one God who feeds the birds.”

“And who delivers the Jews to the Romans.  No; Jehovah won’t help me either.  So I’m forsaken and stand alone, a tottering reed.”

“How can I help it if you stand alone?” asked the daughter of Manasseh.  “Are there not daughters in Galilee who also stand alone?”

“Beka, I am glad that you speak so,” replied the fisherman.  “Why, how can Simon come to an understanding with anybody so long as he can’t come to an understanding with himself?  And fishing delights me not.  Everything is a burden.  Often when I lie here and look up into the blue sky, I think:  If only a storm would come and drive me out on the open sea—­into the wild, dark terror, then, Simon, you would lie there and extend your arms and say:  Gods or God, do with me what you will.”

“Don’t talk like that, Simon.  You must not jest with the Lord.  There, take it.”

And so saying, Beka took a magnificent bunch of grapes out of her basket, and handed it to him.

He took it, and by way of thanks said:  “Beka, a year hence there’ll be some one who will find in you that sweet experience which I vainly seek in the Prophets.”

Whereupon she swiftly went her way towards the blue smoke that rose up behind the palms of Hium.

It was no wonder that the fisherman gazed after her for a long time.  Although he cared little for the society of his fellow-creatures, because they were too shallow to sympathise with what occupied his thoughts, he felt a cheerless void when he was alone.  He was misunderstood on earth, and forsaken by Heaven.  He feared the elements, and the Scriptures did not satisfy him.  Then the little man threw himself on his face, put his hand into the water of the lake, and sprinkled his brow with it.  He seated himself on the bench of the boat in order to enjoy Beka’s gift.