ment which must be as the pivot upon which his whole future
life would turn. Pollux left Zarah still on her knees, nor did she
rise when he had torn himself from her clinging arms and left the
apartment. When the daughter could no longer plead with, she pleaded
for, her father--she implored that grace and wisdom might be given to
him at this momentous crisis. There was no more sleep for Zarah on
that eventful night.

CHAPTER XXIV.

DECISION.

Tossed backwards and forwards on a wild sea of doubt--a vessel without
ballast, compass, or rudder--was the mind of the miserable Pollux. The
courtier paced for hours up and down a verandah where the cool breeze
of heaven could fan him, and where he would be secure from
interruption. Ever and anon Pollux tore his beard, or smote his
breast; unconsciously giving expression by outward gesture to the
inward torture which he felt. Was he to give up all at once--all for
which he had bartered his soul, rank, wealth, position--to begin life
again on the lowest round of the ladder, with the brand of disgrace,
the burden of shame upon him? Could he endure to appear in the
presence of Maccabeus, to sue from him the place of hewer of wood and
drawer of water; to exchange the pride of power and pomp of wealth for
hardship and want, poverty and peril? Pollux felt that he could not
bring his pride to submit to the degradation, or his worldliness to the
loss. The leap to be taken was from such a height, and into such an
abyss, that it seemed as if he must be dashed in pieces by the fall.

But what was the alternative, if the dreaded leap were not taken? If
Zarah remained firm in the faith, she must die;--could the father
endure to witness the martyrdom of his beautiful child? And his own
life--was it not in danger? Was not instant flight from court the only
means of affording a chance of safety either to parent or daughter? was
it not the only means of delivering an apostate from the execrations of
his countrymen, the curse of his mother, the impending vengeance of the
Most High! Conscience would no longer be silenced--Zarah had aroused
the sleeper; beside the faith and purity of his own child, Pollux had
regarded himself almost as a demon!

And Zarah had awakened not only conscience, but hope. She had clung to
the apostate with tenderness, not shrunk back from him with horror.
She had not, then, been taught to regard her parent as one who had
forfeited all claim to her