Ben Hur

The Jebel es Zubleh is a mountain fifty miles and more in length, and so narrow that its tracery on the map gives it a likeness to a caterpillar crawling from the south to the north. Standing on its red-and-white cliffs, and looking off under the path of the rising sun, one sees only the Desert of Arabia, where the east winds, so hateful to vinegrowers of Jericho, have kept their playgrounds since the beginning. Its feet are well covered by sands tossed from the Euphrates, there to lie, for the mountain is a wall to the pasture-lands of Moab and Ammon on the west⁠—lands which else had been of the desert a part.

The Arab has impressed his language upon everything south and east of Judea, so, in his tongue, the old Jebel is the parent of numberless wadies which, intersecting the Roman road⁠—now a dim suggestion of what once it was, a dusty path for Syrian pilgrims to and from Mecca⁠—run their furrows, deepening as they go, to pass the torrents of the rainy season into the Jordan, or their last receptacle, the Dead Sea. Out of one of these wadies⁠—or, more particularly, out of that one which rises at the extreme end of the Jebel, and, extending east of north, becomes at length the bed of the Jabbok River⁠—a traveller passed, going to the tablelands of the desert. To this person the attention of the reader is first besought.

Judged by his appearance, he was quite forty-five years old. His beard, once of the deepest black, flowing broadly over his breast, was streaked with white.

By the gate, hugging his mantle close, the watchman walked; at times he stopped, attracted by a stir among the sleeping herds, or by a jackal’s cry off on the mountainside. The midnight was slow coming to him; but at last it came. His task was done; now for the dreamless sleep with which labor blesses its wearied children! He moved towards the fire, but paused; a light was breaking around him, soft and white, like the moon’s. He waited breathlessly. The light deepened; things before invisible came to view; he saw the whole field, and all it sheltered. A chill sharper than that of the frosty air⁠—a chill of fear⁠—smote him. He looked up; the stars were gone; the light was dropping as from a window in the sky; as he looked, it became a splendor; then, in terror, he cried,

“Awake, awake!”

Up sprang the dogs, and, howling, ran away.

The herds rushed together bewildered.

The men clambered to their feet, weapons in hand.

“What is it?” they asked, in one voice.

“See!” cried the watchman, “the sky is on fire!”

Suddenly the light became intolerably bright, and they covered their eyes, and dropped upon their knees; then, as their souls shrank with fear, they fell upon their faces blind and fainting, and would have died had not a voice said to them,

“Fear not!”

And they listened.

“Fear not: for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.”

The voice, in sweetness and soothing more than human, and low and clear, penetrated all their being, and filled them with assurance.

“Seat yourselves,” said the monarch, graciously.

“From the North Gate,” he continued, when they were at rest, “I had this afternoon report of the arrival of three strangers, curiously mounted, and appearing as if from far countries. Are you the men?”

The Egyptian took the sign from the Greek and the Hindu, and answered, with the profoundest salaam, “Were we other than we are, the mighty Herod, whose fame is as incense to the whole world, would not have sent for us. We may not doubt that we are the strangers.”

Herod acknowledged the speech with a wave of the hand.

“Who are you? Whence do you come?” he asked, adding significantly, “Let each speak for himself.”

In turn they gave him account, referring simply to the cities and lands of their birth, and the routes by which they came to Jerusalem. Somewhat disappointed, Herod plied them more directly.

“What was the question you put to the officer at the gate?”

“We asked him, Where is he that is born King of the Jews.”

“I see now why the people were so curious. You excite me no less. Is there another King of the Jews?”

The Egyptian did not blanch.

“There is one newly born.”

An expression of pain knit the dark face of the monarch, as if his mind were swept by a harrowing recollection.

“Not to me, not to me!” he exclaimed.

Possibly the accusing images of his murdered children flitted before him; recovering from the emotion, whatever it was, he asked, steadily, “Where is the new king?”

“That, O king, is what we would ask.”

I am to be a soldier; and you, O my Judah, I pity you; what can you be?”

The Jew moved nearer the pool; Messala’s drawl deepened.

“Yes, I pity you, my fine Judah. From the college to the synagogue; then to the Temple; then⁠—oh, a crowning glory!⁠—the seat in the Sanhedrim. A life without opportunities; the gods help you! But I⁠—”

Judah looked at him in time to see the flush of pride that kindled in his haughty face as he went on.

“But I⁠—ah, the world is not all conquered. The sea has islands unseen. In the north there are nations yet unvisited. The glory of completing Alexander’s march to the Far East remains to someone. See what possibilities lie before a Roman.”

Next instant he resumed his drawl.

“A campaign into Africa; another after the Scythian; then⁠—a legion! Most careers end there; but not mine. I⁠—by Jupiter! what a conception!⁠—I will give up my legion for a prefecture. Think of life in Rome with money⁠—money, wine, women, games⁠—poets at the banquet, intrigues in the court, dice all the year round. Such a rounding of life may be⁠—a fat prefecture, and it is mine. O my Judah, here is Syria! Judea is rich; Antioch a capital for the gods. I will succeed Cyrenius, and you⁠—shall share my fortune.”

Now the lad had heard of the custom, borrowed from a habit of the first Caesar, by which chief commanders, to indicate their rank, appeared in public with only a laurel vine upon their heads. By that sign he knew this officer⁠—Valerius Gratus, the New Procurator of Judea!

To say truth now, the Roman under the unprovoked storm had the young Jew’s sympathy; so that when he reached the corner of the house, the latter leaned yet farther over the parapet to see him go by, and in the act rested a hand upon a tile which had been a long time cracked and allowed to go unnoticed. The pressure was strong enough to displace the outer piece, which started to fall. A thrill of horror shot through the youth. He reached out to catch the missile. In appearance the motion was exactly that of one pitching something from him. The effort failed⁠—nay, it served to push the descending fragment farther out over the wall. He shouted with all his might. The soldiers of the guard looked up; so did the great man, and that moment the missile struck him, and he fell from his seat as dead.