The years went by and the time came when, in obedience to the first
decree, Miriam must be educated. Long were the discussions which ensued
among the curators of the Essenes. At length three of the most learned
of their body were appointed to this task, and the teaching began. As
it chanced, Miriam proved an apt pupil, for her memory was good, and
she had a great desire to learn many things, more especially history and
languages, and all that has to do with nature. One of her tutors was an
Egyptian, who, brought up in the priests' college at Thebes, when on
a journey to Judaea had fallen sick near Jericho, been nursed by the
Essenes and converted to their doctrine. From him Miriam learnt much
of their ancient civilisation, and even of the inner mysteries of the
Egyptian religion, and of its high and secret interpretations which were
known only to the priests. The second, Theophilus by name, was a Greek
who had visited Rome, and he taught her the tongues and literature of
those countries. The third, all his life long had studied beasts and
birds and insects, and the workings of nature, and the stars and their
movements, in which things he instructed her day by day, taking her
abroad with him that examples of each of them might be before her eyes.
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