gnal after which the roasting and the eating and
the singing might go on, but not the preparation more.

Through the great northern gate the rider rode, and lo! Jerusalem
before the fall, in ripeness of glory, illuminated for the Lord.

CHAPTER VI

Ben-Hur alighted at the gate of the khan from which the three
Wise Men more than thirty years before departed, going down
to Bethlehem. There, in keeping of his Arab followers, he left
the horse, and shortly after was at the wicket of his father's
house, and in a yet briefer space in the great chamber. He called
for Malluch first; that worthy being out, he sent a salutation to
his friends the merchant and the Egyptian. They were being carried
abroad to see the celebration. The latter, he was informed, was very
feeble, and in a state of deep dejection.

Young people of that time who were supposed hardly to know their
own hearts indulged the habit of politic indirection quite as much
as young people in the same condition indulge it in this time;
so when Ben-Hur inquired for the good Balthasar, and with grave
courtesy desired to know if he would be pleased to see him, he really
addressed the daughter a notice of his arrival. While the servant was
answering for the elder, the curtain of the doorway was drawn aside,
and the younger Egyptian came in, and walked--or floated, upborne in
a white cloud of the gauzy raiment she so loved and lived in--to
the centre of the chamber, where the light cast by lamps from the
seven-armed brazen stick planted upon the floor was the strongest.
With her there was no fear of light.

The servant left the two alone.

In the excitement occasioned by the events of the few days past
Ben-Hur had scarcely given a thought to the fair Egyptian. If she
came to his mind at all, it was merely as a briefest pleasure, a
suggestion of a delight which could wait for him, and was waiting.

But now the influence of the woman revived with all its force the
instant Ben-Hur beheld her. He advanced to her eagerly, but stopped
and gazed. Such a change he had never seen!

Theretofore she had been a lover studious to win him--in manner
all warmth, each glance an admission, each action an avowal. She
had showered him with incense of flattery. While he was present,
she had impressed him with her admiration; going away, he carried
the impression with him to remain a delicious expectancy hastening
his return. It was for him the painted eyelids drooped lowest