The eyes of the Jew were very bright. They could see he was hanging on the king’s every word. Cyrus had lifted his hand in an oath. “The man who saves Darius shall enter my treasure-house in Ecbatana, where are stored the jewels taken from the Assyrian by Cynaxares the Mede, and bear thence his own weight in precious stones, though he take rubies and diamonds only!” They who watched Isaiah saw him sweep his hand, as if in high disdain. “Keep the jewels, O Cyrus!” cried he, nigh passionately. “I have not come to sell my service like a huckster, to bargain for gems or gold. Yet would you truly see Darius free?” His voice had risen almost to a menace, but the king was not angry. “Good, Hebrew!” Cyrus was smiling. “I did not think riches would tempt such as you. You seek something nobler—and by Ahura’s great name, I declare that if you may save Darius, you may ask anything in reason, and it is yours.” Isaiah’s eyes glittered even brighter than before, but his voice grew calm. “King of the Aryans, the one God, whom you worship under the name of Ahura-Mazda, and we as Jehovah, has given my people now for fifty years into the power of the idol-worshipping Chaldeans. Fifty years long have we bowed beneath this yoke, and besought our God that he would forget our sins, would restore us to His mercy. Now at last the hour comes when it shall be proved before all nations which is the greater, Him whom we serve, or Nabu and Marduk and Samas, the demons of the Chaldees. For the rage of Avil-Marduk, the chief pontiff, and of Belshazzar is gone out against my people, and the oppression they suffer is more than most may bear. Either my people must bow the neck, must forsake their God, must teach their children to serve the idols of Babylon, or you, O Cyrus, must hear the summons of the Lord Most High, and make the oppressed go free!” “I? What are you saying, Jew?” The king had leaped from his seat. They faced one another, monarch and prophet for the instant equals.