254 BOYS OF THE BIBLE.

So passed they on,

O’er Judah's hills; and whereso’er the leaves

Of the broad sycamore made sounds at noon,
Like lulling rain-drops, or the olive-boughs,
With their cool dimness, crossed the sultry blue
Of Syria’s heaven, she paus’d, that he might rest;
Yet from her own meek eye-lids chas’d the sleep
That weigh’d their dark fringe down, to sit and watch
The crimson deepening o’er his cheek’s repose,
As at a red flower’s heart: and whence a fount
Lay, like a twilight star, midst palmy shades,
Making its banks green.gems along the wild,
‘There too she linger’d, from the diamond wave
Drawing clear water for his rosy lips,

And softly parting clusters of jet curls

To bathe his brow.
At last the Fane was reach’d,

The earth’s One Sanctuary; and rapture hush’d
Her bosom, as before her, through the day

It rose, a mountain of white marble, steep’d

In light like floating gold. But when that hour
Waned to the farewell moment, when the boy
Lifted, through rainbow-gleaming tears, his eye
Beseechingly to hers, and, half in fear,

Turn’d from the white-robed priest, and round her arm
Clung e’en as ivy clings; the deep spring-tide
Of nature then swell'd high; and o’er her child
Bending, her soul broke forth in mingled sounds
Of weeping and sad song.

The mother departs, and the child is left to wait on Eli,
the High Priest, to trim the temple lamps, and guard the fire
upon the sacred altar. How pleasant it must have been for
the venerable Eli to have had this gentle boy about him, and
with what sacred awe would Samuel discharge the duties with
which he was honored!

The picture of the venerable Eli, as presented in the book
of Samuel, is very pathetic. His sons were a shame and a
disgrace to him. They had broken his heart and crushed his
spirit. He had not the courage to rebuke and reprove them
for their shameless deeds. Everything was going wrong in