At the period of which we are now speaking, Claudia was therefore in belief a Jew. Naomi had not ventured to confide to her the change which was worked in her own sentiments, for she feared that it might weaken Claudia's newly-acquired faith in the one true God of heaven and earth, if she knew that her young teacher paid divine worship to Jesus of Nazareth. Naomi waited until she could be satisfied that her pupil had a right understanding of the nature of Jehovah, as revealed by himself; and then she anticipated with delight the task of displaying to her mind the light of the Gospel, and showing her how the same God who reigns over the universe had manifested himself to the world in the person of his Son--and this for the salvation and redemption of guilty, fallen man! The conversation of Amaziah on the night of her return to her home, deprived her of the privilege of being the first to declare Jesus Christ to her friend as the Messiah, the Lord; but she saw with joy the evident impression that was made by her uncle's arguments both on her mother and Claudia, and earnestly she prayed that the good seed then sown, might, by the influence of the Holy Spirit, spring up and come to perfection, and bear good fruit; and that it might be her blessed privilege to help forward two beings so dear to her in the way of eternal salvation. [Illustration: Fountain of the Virgin] CHAPTER X. We have mentioned that Galba had succeeded to the throne of the Roman empire, in the room of the tyrant Nero; and that Vespasian prudently abstained from taking any active measures in Judea, lest he should weaken his forces, but kept them together in readiness for any enterprise that might seem calculated to promote his ambitious views, and hasten the accomplishment of the prophecy that had been pronounced by his Jewish captive, Josephus. Had all the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the neighbouring country improved this season of rest and respite from foreign war, their city might have been better prepared to receive the assaults of the Roman army when at length the siege was determined on; or, better still, they might, by a timely submission, have appeased the anger of the new emperor, whose attention was greatly occupied by the unsettled state of affairs in the regions nearer to the capital of the empire.