I.N.R.I Part 4

The western land seemed very strange to her and yet sweet, for it was her Joseph's childish home. How noisy it was in Jerusalem, and how peaceful it was here--almost as still and solemn as a Sabbath evening at Nazareth! Beloved Nazareth! How far away, how far away! Sometimes the sound of a shepherd's pipe was heard from the green hills. A youth leaned up against an olive tree and made a wreath of twigs and sang: "Behold, thou art fair, my love. Thine eyes are as doves in thy fragrant locks, thy lips are rosebuds, and thy two b.r.e.a.s.t.s are like roes which feed among the lilies. Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse." Then he was silent, and the leaves rustled softly in the evening breeze.

Mary looked out for Joseph, but he came not. And the singer continued: "Who art thou that shinest like the day-dawn, fair as the moon, and clear as the sun, divine daughter of Eve?" And Mary still waited under the palm-tree and listened, and she began to feel strange pangs. She drew her cloak more closely round her, and saw that the stars already stood in the sky. But still Joseph came not. And from the hill the singer: "And from the root of Jesse a twig shall spring." And a second voice: "And all nations shall rise up and sing her praises." So did the shepherds sing the songs of their old kings and prophets.

At last Joseph came slowly from the town. The enrolment was to take place to-morrow at nine o'clock; that was all right. But there was difficulty over the lodging for the night. He had spoken with rich relations; they would have been very glad, but unfortunately a wedding feast was going forward, and wanderers in homely garments might easily feel uncomfortable. He quite understood that. Then he went to his poorer relations, who would have been even more glad, but it was deplorable that their house was so small and their hearth so cramped.

All the inns were overcrowded with strangers. They did not seem to think much here of people from Galilee because all kinds of heathenish folk lived there--as if any one who was born in Bethlehem could be a heathen! And so he did not know what to do.

Mary leaned her head on her hand and said nothing.

"Your hands and feet are trembling, Mary," said Joseph.

She shook her head; it was nothing.

"Come, my wife, we will go in together," said Joseph. "We are not vagabonds to whom they can refuse a.s.sistance."

And then they both went into the town. Mine host of the inn was stern.

"I told you already, old man, that there's no place for the like of you in my house. Take your little daughter somewhere else."

"She's not my daughter, sir, but my true wife, trusted to me by G.o.d that I may protect her," returned Joseph, and he lifted up his carpenter's hand.

The door was slammed in their faces.

A fruit-seller, who had witnessed the scene, stretched forth his brown neck and asked for their pa.s.sport.

"If you show me your papers and three pieces of silver, I'll take you in for the love of G.o.d. For we are all wanderers on the earth."

"We've no pa.s.sport. We've come from Nazareth in Galilee for the enrolment, because I am of the house of David," replied Joseph.

"Of the house of David! Why, you don't seem to know whether you're on your head or your heels," and with a laugh the fruit-seller went his way.

"It is true," thought Joseph, "n.o.ble ancestors are useless to a man of no importance." For the future he would let David alone.

Mary now advised him to go outside the town again. Perhaps the very poor or entire strangers would have pity on them. And as they staggered along the stony road to the valley the woman sank down on the gra.s.s.

Joseph looked at her searchingly. "Mary, Mary, what is it?"

A shepherd came along, looked at them, and listened to their request for shelter.

"My wife is ill, and no one will take us in," complained Joseph.

"Then you must go to the beasts," said the shepherd cheerfully. "Come with me. I'll gladly share my house with you. The earth is my bed, the sky my roof, and a rocky cave my bedchamber."

And he led them to a hollow in the mossy rocks, and it had a roof woven out of rushes. Inside an ox was chewing the hay it had eaten out of the manger. A brown a.s.s stood near by and licked the ox's big head.

There was still some hay left in the manger and in the corner was a bed of dry leaves.

"Since you have nothing better, lie down here and rest as well as you can. I will seek a bed at my neighbour's."

So saying the shepherd went away. It had now grown dark.

The young woman lay down on the bed of leaves and heaved a sigh from her terrified heart. Joseph looked at her--and looked at her. Lightly the angel's wings touched his face.

"Joseph, be not afraid. Lift up your heart and pray. It is the secret of all eternities, and you are chosen to be the foster-father of Him who comes from heaven."

He looked round him, not knowing whence came these thoughts, these voices, this wondrous singing.

"You are tired, Joseph, you must sleep," said Mary. And when he slumbered peacefully she prayed in her heart: "I am a poor handmaiden of the Lord. The will of the Lord be done."

CHAPTER II

It is midnight and, wakeful shepherds see a bright star. A strange star, too; they had never seen its like before. It sparkled so brightly that the shepherds' shadows on the plain were long. And it is said that they saw other stars approach it, and at length surround it.

And then the new star threw off white sparks, which flew down earthwards and stopped in mid-air; and there were children with white wings and golden hair. And they sang beautiful words to the honour of G.o.d and the good-will of men.

In that selfsame hour a boy brought tidings that a tall, white-robed youth stood in front of the shepherd Ishmael's cave, and that within lay a young woman on the bed of leaves, an infant at her breast. And high up in the air they heard singing.

The story quickly spread through the mountains round Bethlehem. The shepherds who were awake roused those who slept. Everywhere a delicious tremor was felt, a sense of mighty wonder. A poor, strange woman and a naked child! What was the use of singing? Swaddling clothes and wraps and milk were what was needed. One brought the fleece of a slaughtered sheep. Another brought dried figs and grapes and a skin of red wine. Other shepherds brought milk and bread and a fat kid; every one brought something, just as they took t.i.thes to the officer. An old shepherd came with a patched bagpipe, and when the bystanders laughed, Ishmael said: "Do you expect our poor, good Isaac, to bring David's golden harp? He gives what he has, and that's often worth more than golden harps."

When they came down they no longer saw the star or the angels, but they found the cave, and the father and the mother and the child. He lay in the manger on the hay, and the beasts stood round and gazed at him with their big, melancholy, black eyes. The shepherd's pity for the poor people was so great that no one thought he was doing a good work for which people would praise him and G.o.d would bless him. No one looked slyly at his neighbour to see who gave more and who less. Their one feeling was pity.

People came from the town; and a wiry shepherd, placing himself before the entrance to the grotto, and using his staff as a spear, said: "Men of Bethlehem, ye cannot enter; the babe sleeps."

Near by stood an old man, who said dreamily: "The town cast him out. I always said there was no salvation yonder. That's to be found with the poor under the open sky. Miracles are happening here, men are pitiful.

What does it mean?"

Down below in a cleft of the rock cowered a poor sinner, and burrowed in the earth with his lean fingers as if he would dig himself a grave in its depths. He gazed at the cave where the child was with gla.s.sy, staring eyes. A prayer for mercy surged up in his heart like a stream of blood. Those who saw him turned from him shuddering. They took him for Cain, his brother's murderer.

CHAPTER III

A stranger was riding a lazy camel across the lonely Arabian desert.

All men are Moors in the dark, but this man was a Moor in the starlight. A newly discovered star brought the man from the banks of the Indus. He consulted all the calendars of the East, but none could tell him about the star. Balthasar, however, was not the man to let the strange, incomprehensible star escape him. Nothing can be concealed in G.o.d's bosom from an Eastern scholar, for not even G.o.d Himself has a pa.s.sport for the land of the all-wise. The world is through them alone and for them alone; man must grow of himself towards the light as the lotus grows out of the mud. So thought Balthasar, and felt that life was a failure.

In such wisdom the faith of Orientals lives and moves and has its being. If man honestly aspires to higher things and tortures his flesh, it may go better with him in another life. For he must be born again many times, and must torture his body until it shrivels up, is freed from sin, and is without desires. Then the soul is released and is not born again, for Nirvana, the last goal, is reached. Only bad men continue to live. The nations of India had been demoralised by that doctrine for centuries. But it did not satisfy wise men.

Balthasar thought: If a man starves through a few dozen lives, then something good must come out of it. Or is evil good enough to continue, and good evil enough to cease? Balthasar sought better counsel. He sought throughout the universe for a peg on which to hang a new, more beneficial philosophy of life. When, then, he saw the new star in the sky, he never ceased looking at it. And, lo! it too took the road from east to west which all men traversed. What was there yonder in the sunset that all went towards it, on earth as in heaven?

Could not one particular star swim against the stream? True, this new heavenly pilgrim took an unusual path; he leaned somewhat to the north of the barbarous folk. So the wise man of the east left the fragrant gardens of India and followed the star. On the road he was joined by two Oriental princes and their suites, who were also seeking they knew not what.

And one night the three wise men saw in the heavens an extraordinary constellation, a group of stars. .h.i.therto unknown to any of them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Diagram of constellation of stars, using asterisks for the stars, spelling out "INRI".]

They looked at the constellation for a long while, and Balthasar thought it was like writing. They brought all their wisdom to bear on it, but could not explain it, for all it shone so brightly. Did the G.o.ds mean to write some message? Who could understand it? An uncanny appearance, which no knowledge or faith could explain! The next night they did not see it, but the guiding star still went before them and yielded to no sun.

One morning, just as day began to dawn, they rode through the streets of Jericho. A man was lying on his face in the road, and the Moor asked him why he lay in the dust.

"I lie in the dust," answered the man of Judah, "because I must practise myself in humility in order not to become too proud. We have become great beyond measure these last days. The King of the Jews is born, the Messiah promised of G.o.d."