rs--Jerusalem Jewesses with blue shirts and head-veils,
Egyptian Jewesses with sweeping robes and black head-shawls, Jewesses
from Ashdod and Gaza, with white visors fringed with gold coins,
Polish Jewesses with glossy wigs, Syrian Jewesses with eyelashes black
as though lined with kohl, fat Jewesses from Tunis, with clinging
breeches interwoven with gold and silver.

Daily he held his court, receiving deputations, advices, messengers.
Young men and maidens offered him their lives to do with as he would;
the rich laid their fortunes at his feet, and fought for the honor of
belonging to his body-guard. That abstract deity of the Old
Testament--awful in His love and His hate, without form, without
humanity--had been replaced by a Man, visible, tangible, lovable; and
all the yearning of their souls, all that suppressed longing for a
visual object of worship which had found vent and satisfaction in the
worship of the Bible or the Talmud in its every letter and syllable,
now went out towards their bodily Redeemer. From the Ancient of Days
a new divine being had been given off--the Holy King, the Messiah, the
Primal Man, Androgynous, Perfect, who would harmonize the jarring
chords, restore the spiritual unity of the Universe. Before the love
in his eyes sin and sorrow would vanish as evil vapors; the frozen
streams of grace would flow again.

"I, the Lord your God, Sabbatai Zevi!"

Thus did Secretary Samuel Primo sign the Messianic decrees and
ordinances.

XVII

The month of Ab approached--the Messiah's birthday, the day of the
Black Fast, commemorating the fall of the Temples. But Melisselda
protested against its celebration by gloom and penance, and the word
went out to all the hosts of captivity--

"The only and just-begotten Son of God, Sabbatai Zevi, Messiah and
Redeemer of the people of Israel, to all the sons of Israel, Peace!
Since ye have been worthy to behold the great day, and the fulfilment
of God's word to the prophets, let your lament and sorrow be changed
into joy, and your fasts into festivals; for ye shall weep no more.
Rejoice with drums, organs, and music, making of every day a New Moon,
and change the day which was formerly dedicated to sadness and sorrow
into a day of jubilee, because I have appeared; and fear ye naught,
for ye shall have dominion not only over the nations, but over the
creatures also in the depths of the sea."

Thereat arose a new and stranger commotion throughout all the Ghet