Elisama and Helon had been so much occupied with the splendour which they beheld around them, that they had allowed the slaves with their silver ewers to wait, without performing their office. Selumiel re-entered, and said, smiling, to Elisama, observing how he was occupied, “Doubtless you are used to see more splendid edifices in Alexandria.” “Nay,” said Elisama, laughing, “I recall what I said on the way. An elder of Israel who dwells so sumptuously and tastefully is assuredly no Essene.” Selumiel led his guests into one of the bowers, and after they had rested here a short time, to the richly spread table. When the dishes were taken away, and the dessert set on, the mother and her daughter appeared, to bid a solemn welcome to the guests from Egypt—a condescension which showed the esteem in which Selumiel held them. The mother, though advanced in years, was active and still handsome; but Sulamith her daughter, who stood by her side, was glowing in all the freshness of youthful beauty, and united in herself every charm by which a daughter in Israel could fix the attention of the beholder. From beneath the large eyebrows, coloured of a brilliant black, dark eyes, like those of the gazel, sent forth their quiet brilliancy, through the transparent veil which descended from the turban. Her tall and stately form was clad in a robe of fine cotton, which flowed down in folds like a wide mantle; the sleeves hung loose, except where they were fastened with costly bracelets; the ears and the nose were adorned with rings of gold, in which rubies, emeralds, and topazes were set. Helon, dazzled by so much beauty, on which he hardly dared to gaze, and agitated by an emotion which he had never felt before, thought he read in the looks with which the old men regarded his surprise, the interpretation of some words which had occasionally escaped Elisama and Selumiel, and which till now he had not understood. When the females had retired, and the men continued their conversation, Selumiel’s son addressed himself to Helon, and proposed to him that in the coolness of the early morning on the following day he would be his guide through the region round Jericho, and as far as to the Dead Sea. Helon, lost in feelings to which he had hitherto been a stranger, had scarcely heard the conversation of the elders; but he was roused from his reverie by this offer, which it was the more difficult to decline without discourtesy, as an oriental seldom imposes on himself the fatigue of a walk. Yet it seemed to him as if he were forcibly torn from that world of delightful illusions, to which he had been just transported.