Good Stories for Great Holidays: Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the Children's Own ReadingOlcott, Frances Jenkins
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Good Stories for Great Holidays: Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the Children's Own Reading
Olcott, Frances Jenkins
Children's literature; Holidays; Short stories; Storytelling
And you shall understand that these three kings had brought great gifts
from their own lands, rich ornaments and divers golden vessels, and many
jewels and precious stones, and both gold and silver,--these they had
brought to offer to the King of the Jews. But when they found the Lord
in a little-house, in poor clothes, and when they saw that the Star gave
so great and holy a light in all the place that it seemed as though they
stood in a furnace of fire, then were they so sore afraid, that of all
the rich jewels and ornaments they had brought with them, they chose
from their treasures what came first to their hands. For Melchior took
a round apple of gold in his hand, and thirty gilt pennies, and these he
offered unto our Lord; and Balthazar took out of his treasury incense;
and Jasper took out myrrh, and that he offered with weeping and tears.
And now after these three kings had worshiped the Lord, they abode in
Bethlehem for a little space, and as they abode, there came a command
to them, in their sleep, that they should not return to Herod; and so by
another way they went home to their kingdoms. But the Star that had gone
before appeared no more.
So these three kings, who had suddenly met together in the highway
before Jerusalem, went home together with great joy and honor. And when,
after many days' journey over perilous places, they had come to the Hill
of Vaws, they made there a fair chapel in worship of the Child they had
sought. Also they agreed to meet together at the same place once in the
year, and they ordained that the Hill of Vaws should be the place of
their burial.
So when the three worshipful kings had done what they would, they took
leave of each other, and each one with his people rode to his own land
rejoicing.
HOW THEY CAME TO COLOGNE
Now, after many years, a little before the feast of Christmas, there
appeared a wonderful Star above the cities where these three kings
dwelt, and they knew thereby that their time was come when they should
pass from earth. Then with one consent they built, at the Hill of
Vaws, a fair and large tomb, and there the three Holy Kings, Melchior,
Balthazar, and Jasper died, and were buried in the same tomb by their
sorrowing people.
Now after much time had passed away, Queen Helen, the mother of the
Emperor Constantine, began to think greatly of the bodies of these three
kings, and she arrayed herself, and, accompanied by many attendants,
went into the Land of Ind.
And you shall understand that after she had found the bodies of
Melchior, Balthazar, and Jasper, Queen Helen put them into one chest
and ornamented it with great riches, and she brought them into
Constantinople, with joy and reverence, and laid them in a church that
is called Saint Sophia; and this church the Emperor Constantine did
make,--he alone, with a little child, set up all the marble pillars
thereof.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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