lled to his wife, and told her that they must leave
Bethlehem at once. God had sent the dream as a warning for them to get
out of the country. They did not dare to stay there any longer. So
Joseph and Mary packed up their belongings, and set out for the far
country of Egypt where they would be safe.

They left Bethlehem none too soon. For Herod was exceedingly angry
when the Wise Men did not come back. Now he was sure that the Messiah
really had been born! He was afraid that soon there would be a new
king in Palestine to take his throne away from him.

When Herod was afraid, he never wasted any time. Somewhere in
Bethlehem was a child whom he feared, and somehow that child must be
killed. But he did not know which child it was. How could he be sure
to find the right one? He thought of a simple plan.

He called his army officers together, and gave them their orders.

"Send your soldiers to Bethlehem," he told them, "and have them kill
every boy in the place who is two years old or younger."

The officers sent their men to Bethlehem, and all the little boys they
could find there were put to death. No matter who they were they had
to die. It did not take the soldiers very long.

In a few hours they were back in Jerusalem. Herod breathed more
easily.

_That's a good thing_, he thought. _If every little boy in Bethlehem
is dead, the Messiah must be dead along with the rest._

Herod did not know that the baby whom he feared was gone from
Bethlehem before the soldiers got there. While the fathers and mothers
of Bethlehem were crying because their little ones were dead, Joseph
and Mary and Jesus were safely on their way to Egypt.

Herod did not live long enough to find out his mistake. After he died,
the little family in Egypt learned that it was safe to go home again.

But this time they did not go back to Bethlehem. They went straight to
the town of Nazareth in Galilee, where Joseph had worked before Jesus
was born. There they settled down as though nothing unusual had
happened.

In Galilee nobody knew that anything strange had happened at all.
Nobody there had heard of the shepherds and the Wise Men, and nobody
knew what Simeon had said in the Temple. Nobody knew why it was that
so many babies in Bethlehem had been murdered. Nobody in Nazareth
thought that the Messiah had come.

[Illustration]

In Nazareth people only said, "I hear the carpenter has a son." When
Jesus began to walk perhaps they said, "Joseph'