Philip, and of those who are with him, is natural and necessary; and I blame Philip, therefore, not for his principles, but for his policy. He surrenders himself wholly to his passions, which bear him apparently with more despatch toward the attainment of his object, but deceive him, and end in leading him farther and farther from that at which he aims. He, who obeys his passions rather than his reason, is like one who, on the ocean, should hope to reach the port, trusting to the winds alone. They may drive him swiftly; but if there be no rudder and no helmsman, the faster he shall go, the farther it may be from the haven he seeks.

After a stormy day, I now willingly seek repose. To-morrow the games of Herod commence, and it will not be strange if disturbances should again break out. When it shall have passed, I will record its events.

I

The day has come and gone in peace. will not, my mother describe the scenes I have witnessed at the Amphitheatre, resembling as they have, even to the minutest ceremonial, those of the same kind in Rome, of which you have often heard, though you never witnessed them. To thine apostate son was left that office; and faithfully were its duties fulfilled.

Never, as I think, was I absent after my tenth year, from any game or show within the walls of Rome or never, except when my old master Plancus used to interpose, out of regard, as he averred, to my progress in my studies, and obtain from you, or from my father, an interdict to be laid upon my movements. With my father, I believe, he rarely succeeded, he being ever ambitious, that, by mingling, at all times and in every place, with the Roman youth, especially at their national sports and public games, I should grow up in their likeness, and lose my own. It was to you I owe it, that occasionally I was withheld from such scenes, and kept, instead, to my Greek. But my relish for them I find not to be quite dead within me; even on the humbler scale in which they were to-day exhibited in this provincial city. And truly I was not the only son of Abraham then and there present, but beside me, as it were, the whole Jewish population of Cæsarea so successful have been the means resorted to, to tempt our people to adopt the customs and manners of their conquerors and masters. The more strict, indeed, were not there, such as Anna, Philip, Simon, and their friends; but they are few in comparison with the whole. On the third day of the games occurs the Sabbath, when many more will be added to the

numbers of the absent; but so fatal is the power of bad example, great numbers will also be found in the seats of the Theatre whom, alas, thy son may be.

amongst

On the evening of the first day as I was but now about to say - we sat together in the Portico, looking both over the garden, and the waters of the sea, as they then sparkled under the light of the half-grown moon. Our talk was of the games, and of what had been witnessed there. I related all I had either seen or heard. Simon also was of our company; who asked me whether any difference was to be noted in the demeanor of Pilate toward the Greeks and Jews. I told him I had noticed none; or if any, that his manner was even more gracious towards those of the Jews who were near him than to any others, and what was more perhaps, that at the side of Procla sat the wife of Sylleus. There is no good designed,” said Simon, "in any quarter, when Pilate smiles; least of all, to us. Would that his wife reigned here in Judea, instead of him. Her smiles, and they are many, are of the heart. Were her counsels followed, there were no uncertain prospect of days of peace in Judea. She is full of humanity, as he of cruelty. Toward our people she has ever shown herself

prompt to do them favors, and atone, as she might, for the slights and affronts of her husband and other lordly Romans. The Lord be nigh unto her in the hour of her necessity."

"Often has she been known," said Anna, "to interpose between the judgment of Pilate and his victim, believed by her to be unjustly condemned, and snatch him from the death that threatened; and sometimes has she herself in the silence of night set open the prison door, and unlocked the chain, and set the prisoner free, trusting to Pilate's love of her,which all Cæsarea knows how fond it is, -to overlook the offence. Her heart is full of pity, and even the Jew is not shut out."

"He is not," said Simon; "to day at the Synagogue and in the Market it passed from mouth to mouth, that Procla was on our part, and that to the wife of Sylleus she had declared as much, and had said moreover, that whatever it lay within her power to do, that would she do gladly for the furtherance of our desires. The peace with which this day has passed gives hope that justice and milder counsels will prevail."

"It is," said Philip, "the treacherous calm that precedes the tempest; the smoothness of the stream before it shoots the precipice; the stillness that comes before the lightning; the

quiet speech of Joab when he smote Abner under the fifth rib. Look not for peace till the yoke of slavery shall have been fastened upon the neck of every man, who dares to stand up and call himself a Jew. Procla's intercession may buy the life of a malefactor, or save a thief from the stocks, but at a time like this her smiles would scarce avail to change the mind of Pilate. His love of money and his dread of Cæsar are stronger both, than his love of Procla. "T is rumored, that the Greeks more than make good the bribe of Sylleus."

"Still," said Simon, "I will hope the best. If to-morrow shall also go over, and our temple still keep its place, I will believe that the Lord hath turned the heart of our enemy. For it is Pilate's wont not to delay what he purposes."

I could not help saying here, what I did not doubt was the truth, that it was not to be questioned that Pilate would carry into effect his purpose sooner or later; he might not do it to-morrow or the day after, but as there was no power to prevent him, and there was a strong motive for him to do the Greeks this favor, he would neither pause nor hesitate in the work before him. This was, as I learned at the Amphitheatre, the opinion of all who were most capable of judging, who knew Pilate well, and