Deborah: A tale of the times of Judas Maccabaeus. James M. Ludlow

magnificently enthroned, his head canopied by a device in which a golden sun and silvery planets were made to float through fleecy azure. At his feet on a lower platform were priests representing every religion in his wide domain—those of the Phœnician Baal in white robes with fluted skirts slashed diagonally with violet scarfs, their heads covered with close-fitting caps of knitted hair-work, as if of a piece with their black beards; Greek priests with gloomy brows inspecting the entrails of the sacrifice; and naked Bacchantes, crowned with the leaves of the vine.

      Among these sacred officials was Menelaos, the High Priest of the Jews, clad in the beauty of the ancient pontificate; his white tunic partly covered with the blue robe; his head surmounted with the flower-shaped turban. Menelaos was not the rightful High Priest of his people. His brother, the sainted Onias, had held that office, until, after long captivity in the prison of Daphne, he was murdered by Menelaos' order, not far from the spot the fratricide was now passing.

      As on the previous days, Dion, the Macedonian, had his station as a spectator on the raised platform by the splendid gate of Daphne. By his side was a young man. He was of decided Jewish countenance, of slight form, head uncovered except for the silver band which held his artificially curled hair close down upon his forehead—the fashion of Antiochian fops of the time; from his shoulders a yellow himation buckled with an enormous jewel and cornered with purple devices.

      "I take it, Glaucon," said Dion, "that you are in feather with the High Priest of your people. If I mistook it not, you gave him a knowing nod, which he would have returned had not his pose at the feet of the King prevented."

      "Yes," replied the Jew, "Menelaos and I are good friends. And well we may be, for, next to his own, my family is the noblest in Jerusalem. Menelaos has great influence with the King, and has brought me into much favor in Antioch."

      "Such favor you will doubtless need, if reports be true," replied Dion. "They say that General Apollonius has made your city of Jerusalem a butcher's pen. That surely might have been avoided, since Menelaos, and your house—the house of——"

      "The house of Elkiah, the Nasi," quickly interjected Glaucon.

      The Greek continued: "Since such great families as yours have been induced to accept the lordship of Antioch, why not all others? I fear that Apollonius is given to the wearing of the bones on the outside of his hand."

      "Well he may be," replied Glaucon, "for my people are obdurate—stupidly so. Many of them are crazed with their religious bigotry. For the precept of some dead Rabbi they would live in the tombs. They would cut off their flesh rather than part with a traditional hem of the garment. They are so proud that one of them would not marry Astarte herself. But a few of us are wiser. We are going to introduce the Greek customs which are so beautiful and joyous; learn your philosophy; adorn our Temple with your art. Young Jewry hears the call of the Greek civilization, as does all the rest of the world. Old Jewry is soured with its traditions, as milk is from too long standing."

      "I am glad that I am not a Jew," replied Dion. "I fear that my love of fight would make me a rebel."

      "Not you, Captain Dion," said the Jew, looking with admiration into the Greek's handsome face and his blue eyes, that were as full of frolic as of fire. "You, Dion, could fight for a woman, if she were beautiful; but not for a gray-walled temple, and a lot of psalm-snoring priests."

      "Well," replied Dion, "I shall soon have a chance to study your strange people; for I am ordered by the King to join Apollonius. I sail to-morrow on the Eros, from the harbor of Seleucia to Joppa."

      "Then I am in high luck," replied the Jew enthusiastically, "since I will have you for a fellow-passenger. One night more in Daphne! I assure you that I shall play the true Greek, and fill myself with the best that is left in Antioch, since to-morrow I pay tribute to Neptune. You will join me at sunset, Captain? Celanus' wines are excellent."

      "Impossible," replied Dion. "I must keep my legs steady under me, and my brain-pan level, for to-morrow I shall have to take charge of a hundred of the most villainous wretches that the King ever got together. And he calls them 'Greek soldiers,' though there isn't a man of them that can tell his race two generations back. A lot of pirates, robbers, mine-slaves, and old wine-skins on legs! Greek soldiers! When Mars turns chambermaid to a stable we Greeks will be such soldiers. But they may be good enough for the work that Apollonius has for them in Jerusalem. Farewell! To-morrow at noon on deck!"

      Even a king must sometimes work. So Antiochus, the Glorious, laid aside the trappings of divinity and attended to business. A vast empire, such as he had inherited through several generations from Alexander the Great, needed care. So far as possible the King farmed out the government of the provinces to those who would return the largest revenue, and trouble him least about the method of their gathering it. Yet something was left for even the King to do.

      First in the royal interest, after he had returned to his palace, was the report of the chief of the city spies—old Briareus, he fondly called him, since he was as one that had a hundred arms, and a thousand fingers on them, which were in all the private affairs of the inhabitants of the capital. Having satisfied himself with his chief's account, and feeling confident that the royal throat was in no immediate danger of being cut by any of the multitude he was daily outraging, the King turned to less interesting matters, such as the whereabouts of his many armies, their victories and defeats.

      "Your tablets, Timon."

      The scribe read:

      "Apollonius reports all quiet at Jerusalem. Executed two hundred yesterday."

      "Good!" said the King. "Bid him leave not so much as a ghost of a Jew above Hades; and then let him hasten the work in the country to the north. The Jewish peasants are unsubdued. It is not safe for a single company of our troops to go over land to Judea. I have had to send the detachment tomorrow by water down the coast."

      "There is the matter of Glaucon, son of the Nasi. You recall your Majesty's promise to spare his property. It was a part of the bargain with Menelaos, the Priest."

      "To Hades with the Priest!" cried the King.

      "Would it be wise to break with Menelaos?" timidly suggested the scribe.

      "You are right, Timon. The High Priest will be convenient in Jerusalem—like the handle to a blade. Has Menelaos paid up all he promised?"

      "Yes; the nine hundred talents are safe."

      "Nine hundred talents! That rascal must have robbed the Temple."

      "Well, if he did, it will save your Majesty the trouble of finding the hidden coffers. They say that the old King Solomon put his gold into wells as deep as the earth, and that only the High Priest knows where they are."

      "A good thought!" said the Glorious, thumping the bald head of the scribe with the royal seal. "Your skull, Timon, is as full of wisdom as a beggar's is of fleas. When Menelaos has gobbled down all the gold there is in Jerusalem, we will open his crop and let out the shekels, as they do corn grains from a turkey's gullet. A good thought! But enough of these things. They tire me. Business is for slaves, not for kings. Did you note to-day how the people looked as I appeared in the procession?"

      "Your Majesty's glory can but grow upon the multitude. It is like that of a mountain—of a sunset—of—of the Great Sea when the glowing orb of day with rays like the dishevelled hair——"

      "Stop, good Timon; no flattery. You know I never could abide flattery."

      "No words could flatter your Majesty." The scribe bowed upon the marble floor, and kissed the feet of his master.

      "Now begone," said the King. "Let everything be ready for to-night. Clarissa, the Queen of the Grove, comes with a troop of her dancers."

      With a wave of the royal hand the scribe vanished, and instead came the King's costumers and physician; for the body of the Glorious must be re-apparelled, and his stomach put in order for feasting.

      II

       THE CITY OF DESOLATION