With the
greatness of his sacrifice in mind, she filled with the determination
that his work should not have been in vain.
She rose and flung back the cumbrous striped mantle on her shoulders
and put out her hands to the Maccabee.
"Hast seen these pilgrims going to the Passover?" she exclaimed, with
color rising as her emotion grew. "All day they have passed; army
after army of Jews, not only strong, but filled with the spirit that
makes men die for a cause! Hast seen Judea, which was once the land of
milk and honey? Wasted! a sight to make Jews gnash their teeth and die
of hate and rage! What hast thou said of Jerusalem? 'The perfection of
beauty and the joy of the whole earth!' threatened with this same
blight that hath made a wilderness of Canaan! If the hour and the
circumstance and the cause will but unite us, this unweaponed host
will stretch away at once in majestic orders of tens of
thousands--legions upon legions that would shame Xerxes for numbers
and that first Caesar for strength. Then--oh, I can see that calm
battle-line pass like the ocean tide over the stony Roman front, and
forget as the sea forgets the pebbles that opposed it!"
She halted suddenly on the edge of tears. The Maccabee, astonished and
moved, looked at her in silence. This, then, was what even the women
of the shut chambers of Palestine expected of him--if he freed Judea!
If such spirit prevailed over the armies of men assembling in the Holy
City, what might he not achieve with their help! The Maccabee felt
confidence and enthusiasm fill his heart to the full.
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