which he discovered the seeds in his own heart. They lived without a law, sunk in heathen vice and immorality. He now perceived that nothing but the most faithful obedience to the law could make him truly happy, that in this way only he became a partaker in the promises of God to the upright, and that the passion for allegories had corrupted his mind instead of enlightening it. These reflections determined him to return to the faith of his fathers.

He now felt himself once more at home under his paternal roof; his former filial reverence for his mother returned; his father's spirit seemed to smile on his conversion; and the experienced counsels of his uncle proved much more than an equivalent to him for all the wisdom of the Museum. All the joys and the longings of his childhood returned upon him; the feelings of the present moment seemed to be linked immediately to the remembrances of his boyish days, and all that had intervened appeared like a period of delusion. His desire to behold Jerusalem came over him again, in all its original

vividness it had been the strongest of his early feelings, and the very names of Canaan, Zion, and Jerusalem, had held a mysterious sway over his imagination. His mother, as he sat upon her knees, had told him of the place, towards which he was taught to lisp his prayer; of the thousands who went up to the feast; of Moses, David, and Solomon; and had represented Egypt as a land of exile, another Babel, in comparison with the land of his fathers. He often saw her weep when she spoke of Jericho and her native city, and related how she, when a maiden, had gone up in the choir of singers to the festival, but must now remain in a strange land. As the severest punishment for his childish offences, he used to be told, that it would be a long time before he would be fit to accompany his father on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land; and the reward of his proficiency and his obedience was the promise of a sight of Jerusalem. When Jews from the holy city visited Alexandria, and, as their custom was, came to see his father, it was a festival for Helon; he regarded these strangers with

scarcely less veneration than his fathers had done Jeremiah, and tried all the insinuating arts of which he was possessed, to induce the most courteous among them to tell him something about the land of his ancestors. It was the land of promise, the theme of sacred song, the theatre of sacred history. When his father was in a cheerful mood, he used to relate anecdotes of his pilgrimages, beginning and ending every narrative with the words of the children of Korah:

The Lord loveth the gates of Zion,

Whose foundation is in the holy mountains,
More than all the dwellings of Jacob.
Glorious is it to speak of thee,

O city of God!-Ps. lxxxvii

The journey from which his father never returned, was to have been the last which he made alone on the next, Helon was to have accompanied him. His grief at being obliged to remain at home, his mother's tears, his father's solemn farewell, as it were prophetic of the fatal event; his mother's daily remarks, "Now they are in Hebron, to-day they will reach Jerusalem; to-day the passover begins,

to-day it will be over;" their joyful expectations of his return, and the overwhelming intelligence of his death, had all combined to leave an impression on his mind, which he had with difficulty mastered for a time, and which now revived with uncontroulable force. Since his return to the law of his fathers, a pilgrimage to Jerusalem had been his dream by night and his thought by day. Leontopolis, the character and proceedings of the Hellenists, and even the conversation at this evening's entertainment, all conspired to convince him, that Egypt was no place for the fulfilment of the law. It was now the predominant wish of his soul to become a true Israelite, a faithful follower of the law, and a worthy member of the people of the Lord, and he felt that only in the Holy Land could he become so.

All these reflections and retrospects of his past life filled the mind of Helon, as he laid down his harp upon the parapet of the roof, and paced up and down in strong emotion. At times he stopped, and fixing his eyes on the north-east, almost persuaded himself that the

clouds which he saw there were the hills of Judah. In the mean time Sallu, who, like his master, had been unable to sleep, had silently placed a lamp in the alija. Helen was attracted

A roll lay unfolded ;

by the light and went in. he looked into it, and opened at the splendid description which an exile at Nineveh, of the tribe of Naphthali, makes of the holy city. (Tob. x.) "O Jerusalem, the holy city! Many nations shall come from far to the name of the Lord God, with gifts in their hands. Blessed are they that love thee, and rejoice in thy peace. Let my soul bless God, the great King: for the Lord our God will deliver Jerusalem from all her afflictions. The gates of Jerusalem shall be built of sapphires and emeralds and precious stones; thy towers and battlements of pure gold: and the streets of Jerusalem shall be paved with white marble, and in all her streets shall they say, Hallelujah! Praised be God who hath exalted her, and may his kingdom endure for ever. Amen."

"Hallelujah," he exclaimed, "that before me an Egyptian Jew could put such words into