man she has the tongue of a woman, and
a woman's tongue is unfavourable to meditation. How should I be told?

OZIAS. I am the governor of this great city of Bethulia.

CHABRIS. You are responsible for this city?

OZIAS. I am.

CHABRIS. Now I understand my misfortune. And the truth was in me when I
said to your mother as she lay dying: Better it is to die without
children than to have them that are ungodly.

OZIAS. Oh! How comely a thing is the judgment of grey hairs!

CHABRIS. You ask me what has brought me at last out of my house. I will
tell you. Thirst! Thirst has brought me out of my house. Every morning
and every evening my great-grandchild serves me with pulse and water.
For five days she has furnished less and less water, and this day--not a
drop! Can one eat pulse without water to drink? Half an hour ago I went
to her to reason with her, and she lay on her bed cracked, and raved
that she herself had not drunk for three days and that there was no
water left in all Bethulia. So I came at last out of my house into the
streets of this city famous for its cool fountains which never fail. And
lo! I meet the governor of this city, and he is Ozias! Ozias! Seven days
do men mourn for him that is dead, but for an ungodly man all the days
of his life! Why is there no water in Bethulia, sprig?

OZIAS. Old man, meditation is good and solitude is good, but think not
because you sit staring all day at your own belly that the sun and stars
have ceased to revolve round the earth and the kings of this world to
make war. Is it possible that you do not know what has happened?

CHABRIS. I only know that I cannot eat pulse without water to drink.

OZIAS. Bethulia is besieged.

CHABRIS. Who is besieging Bethulia?

OZIAS. Holofernes.

CHABRIS. I have never heard his name. Who is he?

OZIAS. Never heard the name of the chief captain of Nebuchadnezzar? Have
you heard the name of Nebuchadnezzar, by chance?

CHABRIS. I seem to remember it.

OZIAS. Come up here. (_They go up the steps to the vantage-point_.)
Look! A hundred and twenty thousand foot-soldiers. Twelve thousand
archers on horseback. Oxen and sheep for their provisions. Twenty
thousand asses for their carriages. Camels without number. Infinite
victuals; and very much gold and silver. The like was never seen before.

CHABRIS (_stepping down_.) Why has Nebuchadnezzar set about this thing?
What harm has Bethulia done to him?

OZIAS. Much harm. Nebuchadnezzar has