In contrast with the proud and cruel queen whose aim had been to slay Elijah and all who stood for Jehovah worship are certain obscure women who protected and comforted the prophet. "You will find a tulip of a woman," says Thackeray, "to be in fashion when a humble violet or daisy of creation is passed over without remark." We shall not fall under the implied condemnation by forgetting the nameless widow of Zarephath who, though found gathering a few sticks to make a meal of the last handful of flour and a little oil left in the cruse, yet when asked took the fleeing Tishbite into her frugal home and shared with him her poor repast. For fully a year did Elijah live under the widow's roof, and the meal in the barrel wasted not, nor did the oil in the cruse fail, till the famine was broken by the coming of the long delayed rains. A people's religion will register its mark quickly upon its women. A most suggestive Semitic conception is found in the use of the figure of marriage to describe the relationship between a people and their god, or perhaps more accurately, between a land and its governing divinity. This entire conception finds its best illustration in the term _Baal_, which means husband, or lord. The god was conceived of as father and the land as mother of the people and of all the products of the soil. The influence of the Baal cult upon Israelitish society, especially upon woman, cannot be understood without reference to the nature of that worship. Picture before your mind's eye the rustic prophet Amos, with wandering staff in hand, impelled by a divine impulse, making his way northward, and carrying a divine message to the people. He reaches Bethel in the southern part of the kingdom of Israel--a city that from time immemorial had been a sanctuary. He is shocked at the terrible orgies practised about the altars there in the name of religion; at the unbridled passion and lewdness in the name of the god and goddess of fertility, Baal and Ashtoreth; at the men and women revelling in shame, that the increase of the land might be celebrated and productiveness symbolized. It is while looking upon such a scene of bestialized worship and debauched womanhood that Amos cries out in prophetic grief: "The virgin of Israel is fallen, She shall no more rise. She is forsaken upon her land There is none to raise her up."