"How, O my master," said Simonides, "may we without trial tell what
a man is? I knew you; I saw your father in you; but the kind of
man you were I did not know. There are people to whom fortune is
a curse in disguise. Were you of them? I sent Malluch to find out
for me, and in the service he was my eyes and ears. Do not blame
him. He brought me report of you which was all good."

"I do not," said Ben-Hur, heartily. "There was wisdom in your
goodness."

"The words are very pleasant to me," said the merchant, with feeling,
"very pleasant. My fear of misunderstanding is laid. Let the rivers
run on now as God may give them direction."

After an interval he continued:

"I am compelled now by truth. The weaver sits weaving, and, as the
shuttle flies, the cloth increases, and the figures grow, and he
dreams dreams meanwhile; so to my hands the fortune grew, and I
wondered at the increase, and asked myself about it many times.
I could see a care not my own went with the enterprises I set going.
The simooms which smote others on the desert jumped over the things
which were mine. The storms which heaped the seashore with wrecks
did but blow my ships the sooner into port. Strangest of all, I,
so dependent upon others, fixed to a place like a dead thing, had
never a loss by an agent--never. The elements stooped to serve me,
and all my servants, in fact, were faithful."

"It is very strange," said Ben-Hur.

"So I said, and kept saying. Finally, O my master, finally I came to
be of your opinion--God was in it--and, like you, I asked, What can
his purpose be? Intelligence is never wasted; intelligence like
God's never stirs except with design. I have held the question
in heart, lo! these many years, watching for an answer. I felt
sure, if God were in it, some day, in his own good time, in his
own way, he would show me his purpose, making it clear as a whited
house upon a hill. And I believe he has done so."

Ben-Hur listened with every faculty intent.

"Many years ago, with my people--thy mother was with me, Esther,
beautiful as morning over old Olivet--I sat by the wayside out
north of Jerusalem, near the Tombs of the Kings, when three men
passed by riding great white camels, such as had never been seen
in the Holy City. The men were strangers, and from far countries.
The first one stopped and asked me a question. 'Where is he that
is born King of the Jews?' As if to allay my wonder, he went on to
say, 'We have seen his s