ts, and dancing, met them like a mighty wave of the sea, and seemed
sure to drive them back: one of their old companions was dancing amongst
the rest; and as I looked hard at him, I saw that it was the same who had
given away his precious burden in order to go into the show. Now, as
soon as he saw these his former fellows, he called to them by their
names, and bid them join him and the townsmen round him. But he that was
leading the way shook his head, and said boldly: "No: we will not join
with you; we are going to the market-place to traffic for our lord." "It
is too late for that," said he; "you lost the morning, and now you cannot
trade." Then I saw that he who before had trembled exceedingly grew very
pale; but still he held on his way; and he said,--"Yes, we have lost the
morning, and a sore thing it is for us; but our good lord will help us
even yet; and we WILL serve him, 'redeeming the time, because the days
are evil.'" Then he turned to the other and said to him,--

"And will not you stop either? Do not be fooled by this madman: what use
is it to go to buy when the shops are all shut, and the market empty?"
Then he hung down his head, and looked as though he would have turned
back, and fallen into the throng; but his fellow seized him by the hand,
and bid him take courage, and think upon his kind master, and upon the
king's son, whose very blood had been shed for them; and with that he
seemed to gather a little confidence, and held for a while on in his way
with the other.

Then their old companion turned all his seeming love into hatred, and he
called upon the crowd round him to lay hands on them and stop them; and
this the rabble would fain have done, but that, as it seemed to me, a
power greater than their own was with those servants, and strengthened
them; until they pushed the rude people aside on the right and on the
left, and passed safely through them into another street.

Here there were fewer persons, and they had a breathing-time for a while;
and as they heard the sound of music and of the crowd passing by at some
little distance from them, they began to gather heart, and to talk to one
another. "I never thought," said the one, "that I could have held on
through that crowd; and I never could, if you had not stretched out your
hand to help me." "Say, rather, if our master's strength had not been
with us," said the other. "But do you think," said he that was fearful,
"that he will accept any