il
after the fashion of the country. While, yet more wonder-struck,
he was thinking what could bring such a company at such an hour
to a quarter so lonesome, they were all brought to a standstill.
Voices called out excitedly in front; a chill sensation ran from
man to man; there was a rapid falling-back, and a blind stumbling
over each other. The soldiers alone kept their order.

It took Ben-Hur but a moment to disengage himself from the mob and
run forward. There he found a gateway without a gate admitting to
the orchard, and he halted to take in the scene.

A man in white clothes, and bareheaded, was standing outside the
entrance, his hands crossed before him--a slender, stooping figure,
with long hair and thin face--in an attitude of resignation and
waiting.

It was the Nazarene!

Behind him, next the gateway, were the disciples in a group; they
were excited, but no man was ever calmer than he. The torchlight
beat redly upon him, giving his hair a tint ruddier than was
natural to it; yet the expression of the countenance was as
usual all gentleness and pity.

Opposite this most unmartial figure stood the rabble, gaping,
silent, awed, cowering--ready at a sign of anger from him to break
and run. And from him to them--then at Judas, conspicuous in their
midst--Ben-Hur looked--one quick glance, and the object of the visit
lay open to his understanding. Here was the betrayer, there the
betrayed; and these with clubs and staves, and the legionaries,
were brought to take him.

A man may not always tell what he will do until the trial is
upon him. This was the emergency for which Ben-Hur had been
for years preparing. The man to whose security he had devoted
himself, and upon whose life he had been building so largely,
was in personal peril; yet he stood still. Such contradictions are
there in human nature! To say truth, O reader, he was not entirely
recovered from the picture of the Christ before the Gate Beautiful
as it had been given by the Egyptian; and, besides that, the very
calmness with which the mysterious person confronted the mob held
him in restraint by suggesting the possession of a power in reserve
more than sufficient for the peril. Peace and good-will, and love
and non-resistance, had been the burden of the Nazarene's teaching;
would he put his preaching into practice? He was master of life; he
could restore it when lost; he could take it at pleasure. What use
would he make of the power now? Defend