To his centurion turning, said, "some man Who knows, if nothing more, thus much at least, How to be adder-deaf and death-like dumb-- To dog him hence about and hither back!" "I wish thee pleasure of thy evening walk!" To Shimei, in mock courtesy, he said. With pleasantry as bitter as his own The mocker found himself a second time, And now to discomposure worse, dismissed. Of his own will he gladly would have gone From east to west as wide as was the world, To weave the meshes of his witness false About Paul's feet, or still to ambush him With instant bloody death at unawares; But thus to go, a lasso round his neck Held in the hand of Rome--it irked him sore. His heart misgave him heavily; he felt: 'And here perhaps is destiny for me, Perhaps, who knows? at last, at last, for me! On mine own head do I Paul's house pull down?' Strange, but, born with the boding sense thus born Of unguessed danger for himself, there crept Into that case-hard heart, long exercised To plot of mischief for his fellow-man, A softness, that was nigh become remorse, A kind of pity from self-pity sprung, Toward whoso was endangered, yea, even Paul! It was the slow beginning of an end-- Slow, liable to be quenched like smoking flax, Yet not so quenched to be--with Shimei. Meanwhile, from this to that there stretched much road, And Shimei still had demon's work to do. BOOK IV. BY NIGHT FOR CÆSAREA. The narrative returns to Paul riding with young Stephen, under escort of Roman soldiers, toward Cæsarea. The uncle and nephew (at sufficient remove from the cavalry before them and the infantry behind them) after an interval of silence, engage in conversation on a subject suggested by young Stephen's quoting against Shimei one of the imprecatory psalms. This conversation is prolonged till Antipatris is reached, from which point young Stephen comes back to Jerusalem with the returning foot-soldiers, while Paul goes on with the horse to Cæsarea. BY NIGHT FOR CÆSAREA. Clanging their armor and their arms alight In doubtful glimmer from the torches blown, Forward into the silence and the dark, Through the strait street, out from the city gate, Along the ringing highway stretched in stone To Cæsarea from Jerusalem, Rode vanguard in that order of array The turm of horse--in count three score and ten, But many fold to seeming multiplied Under the shadowy light that showed them half, Half hid them, and amid the numerous noise And movement of their massive martial tread. The centuries of foot the rear composed, While midst, between the horse and infantry, And double-guarded so from every fear-- Before, behind, commodious interval-- Those Hebrew kinsmen, Paul and Stephen, rode.