getting rid of it, which darkened the sun for him. Day after day, night after night, this one thing was before him. It was as if he were bound to a corpse, and ever dragged it after him. Higher than any of the people from his shoulders and upwards, like a lion for courage, and yet he would have fled even to Death from this thing, for he could not face it. What a mockery is the strength of the strongest! A word from the Lord can cause the greatest to grovel in the dust! It was thought that music would help him, and they brought to him David, who was skilled with the harp, and had moreover a ruddy, cheerful countenance. Gay and light of heart was he, and as he sang and played the Terror would sometimes loosen its hold, and Saul was himself again, but it never left him for long. Much has been made by Saul's enemies of his hatred of David. It came in this way. Saul loved David, and made him a captain, and they went out together to war against the Philistines. When they returned, the women, smitten with his pretty face--they were always ready to go after him, and he after them--sang aloud in the streets that Saul had slain his thousands and David his ten thousands. The Terror was on Saul; he believed David was Samuel's friend, and David and the Terror became one. He eyed David from that day. He was not blameworthy. It was the Evil Spirit from God, and the Evil Spirit put a fixed thought in his mind, that if he could but remove David, the Terror would depart. Although I hated the son of Jesse from the beginning, I made light of my lord's dread of him, but who can reason against an Evil Spirit from God; and while David was playing the second time, my lord cast a javelin at him to kill him. When the Evil Spirit departed, the desire to destroy David departed with it. After Saul had cast the javelin, Jonathan pleaded with his father for David, and Saul listened, and swore that no harm should befall him; but when David soon afterwards returned from another battle with the Philistines, the Spirit came again and turned David's music into an instrument of torture, and again put the javelin in Saul's hand, and strove through Saul to strike David with it. Hard ridden was Saul by the Spirit at that time, and he went to Ramah to see Samuel; and when he saw him, he, the king, my beloved, was so beset that he tore off his clothes, and lay down naked all night. When he came back at the feast of the new moon, he sat down to meat with his princes, and with Abner and Jonathan; but David was not there. He asked the reason of his absence, and Jonathan explained that David had leave to go to Bethlehem to visit his father. Jonathan said nothing more, but the Evil Spirit descended even at the feast, in the company of all the lords, and Saul imagined that Jonathan was plotting against him; and in his fury, possessed by the Lord, he cast his spear against Jonathan also, his own best beloved son. That was the misery