Page:Ben-Hur a tale of the Christ.djvu/58

Rh and spoke positively—&quot;I tell you the khan is full. It is useless to ask at the gate.&quot;

Joseph's will was slow, like his mind; he hesitated, but at length replied, &quot;The offer is kind. Whether there be room for us or not in the house, we will go see your people. Let me speak to the gate-keeper myself. I will return quickly.&quot;

And, putting the leading-strap in the stranger's hand, he pushed into the stirring crowd.

The keeper sat on a great cedar block outside the gate. Against the wall behind him leaned a javelin. A dog squatted on the block by his side.

&quot;The peace of Jehovah be with you,&quot; said Joseph, at last confronting the keeper.

&quot;What you give, may you find again; and, when found, be it many times multiplied to you and yours,&quot; returned the watchman, gravely, though without moving.

&quot;I am a Bethlehemite,&quot; said Joseph, in his most deliberate way. &quot;Is there not room for—&quot;

&quot;There is not.&quot;

&quot;You may have heard of me—Joseph of Nazareth. This is the house of my fathers. I am of the line of David.&quot;

These words held the Nazarene's hope. If they failed him, further appeal was idle, even that of the offer of many shekels. To be a son of Judah was one thing—in the tribal opinion a great thing; to be of the house of David was yet another; on the tongue of a Hebrew there could be no higher boast. A thousand years and more had passed since the boyish shepherd became the successor of Saul and founded a royal family. Wars, calamities, other kings, and the countless obscuring processes of time had, as respects fortune, lowered his descendants to the common Jewish level; the bread they ate came to them of toil never more humble; yet they had the benefit of history sacredly kept, of which genealogy was the first chapter and the last; they could not become unknown; while, wherever they went in Israel, acquaintance drew after it a respect amounting to reverence.

If this were so in Jerusalem, and elsewhere, certainly one of the sacred line might reasonably rely upon it at the