In the same unconsciousness of Zarah's imminent peril, another, to whom she was dearer than the sight of the eyes or the breath of life, lay extended on the ground in sleep, many miles from Jerusalem, with no pillow but that stalwart arm, around which was still twined a slight flaxen strand. A monarch might have envied the dream which made the features of the sleeper relax into an expression of happiness which, when waking, they seldom indeed wore. Maccabeus, lying on the parched dry earth, was in thought seated in an Eden of flowers, with Zarah at his side, her small hand clasped in his own. She was listening with bashful smile and downcast eyes to words such as the warrior had never breathed to her, save in his dreams. All was peace within and without, peace deepening into rapture, even as the sky above appeared almost dark from the intensity of its blue! Such was the Hebrew's dream of Zarah! How different the dream from the actual reality! Had Maccabeus known the actual position of the helpless girl, to guard whom from the slightest wrong he would so willingly have shed his life's blood, even that heart which had never yet quelled in the face of peril would have known for once keenest anguish of fear! CHAPTER XX. THE COURT OF ANTIOCHUS. Fierce had been the rage and disappointment of Antiochus Epiphanes on hearing of the result of the night attack on his forces at Emmaus, and the subsequent retreat of Giorgias without striking a blow. In vain the troops of that too cautious leader endeavoured, by exaggerating the account of the numbers of their enemies, to cover their own shame. Antiochus was furious alike at what he termed the insolence of a handful of outlaws, and the cowardice of his picked troops, who had flaunted their banners and gone forth as if to assured victory, and had then fled like some gay-plumed bird before the swoop of the eagle. Not only the oppressed inhabitants of Jerusalem and its environs had cause to tremble at the rage of the tyrant, but his own Syrian officers and the obsequious courtiers who stood in his presence. And none more so than Pollux, once the chosen companion and special favourite of the Syrian king. Pollux had been so loaded with wealth and honours by his capricious master, as to have become an object of envy to his fellow-courtiers, and especially so to Lysimachus, a Syrian of high birth, who had seen himself passed in the race for royal favour by a rival whom he despised. But there was little cause for envying Pollux, the wretched parasite of a tyrant. Alas, for him who has bartered conscience and self-respect to win a monarch's smile! He has left the firm though narrow path of duty, to find himself on a treacherous quicksand, where the ground on which he places his foot soon begins to give way beneath him!