hurch, and the Pope had to apply to him,
ere he could celebrate weddings or baptisms--they offered to baptize
him free of tax, but he held firm to his faith; they impaled him on a
stake and lashed him--oh, my God! And the good sisters found me
weeping, a little girl, and they took me to the convent and were kind
to me, and spoke to me of Christ. But I would not believe, no, I could
not believe. The psalms and lessons of the synagogue came back to my
lips; in visions of the night I saw my father, blood-stained, but
haloed with light.

"'Be faithful,' he would say, 'be faithful to Judaism. A great destiny
awaits thee. For lo! our long persecution draws to an end, the days
of the Messiah are at hand, and thou shalt be the Messiah's bride,'
And the glory of a great hope came into my life, and I longed to
escape from my prison into the sunlit world. I, the bride of the
cloister!" she cried, and revolt flung roses into her white face.
"Nay, the bride of the Messiah am I, who shall restore joy to the
earth, who shall wipe the tears from off all faces. Last night my
father came to me again, and said, 'Be faithful to Judaism.' Then I
replied, 'If thou wert of a truth my father, thou wouldst cease thy
exhortations, thou wouldst know I would rather die than renounce my
faith, thou wouldst rescue me from these hated walls, and give me unto
my Bridegroom.' Thereupon he said, 'Stretch out thine hand,' and I
stretched out my hand, and I felt an invisible hand clasp it, and when
I awoke I found myself by his grave-side, where ye came upon me. Oh,
take me to the Woman's Bath forthwith, I pray ye, that I may wash off
the years of pollution."

They took her to the Woman's Bath, admiring her marvellous beauty.

"Where is the Messiah?" she asked.

"He is not come yet," they made answer, for the rising up of Sabbatai
was as yet known to but a few disciples.

"Then I will go find Him," she answered.

She wandered to Amsterdam--the capital of Jewry--and thence to
Frankfort-on-the-Main, and thence, southwards, in vain search to
Livorne.

And there in the glory of the Italian sunshine, her ardent, unbalanced
nature, starved in the chilly convent, yielded to passion, for there
were many to love her. But to none would she give herself in marriage.
"I am the Messiah's destined bride," she said, and her wild eyes had
always an air of waiting.

XII

And in the course of years the news of her and of her prophecy
travelled to Sabbatai Ze