"The head of our
village quarrelled with the tax-gatherers, and refused to pay his dues
to Caesar. So the soldiers came a week ago and slaughtered nearly all
of us, and took such sheep and cattle as they could find, and with them
many of the young folk, to be sold as slaves, so that the rest are left
empty and desolate. Such are the things that chance in this unhappy
land. But, woman, who are you?"
"I am one shipwrecked!" answered Nehushta, "and I bear with me a
new-born babe--nay, the story is too long to tell you; but if in this
place there is any one who can nurse the babe, I will pay her well."
"Give it me!" said the woman, in an eager whisper; "my child perished in
the slaughter; I ask no reward."
Nehushta looked at her. Her eyes were wild, but she was still young and
healthy, a Syrian peasant.
"Have you a house?" she asked.
"Yes, it still stands, and my husband lives; we hid in a cave, but alas!
they slew the infant that was out with the child of a neighbour. Quick,
give me the babe."
So Nehushta gave it to her, and thus Miriam was nurtured at the breast
of one whose offspring had been murdered because the head of the village
had quarrelled with a Roman tax-collector. Such was the world in the
days when Christ came to save it.
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