e shade of trees, discussing turkeys, when my
companion of the road arrived upon the truant horse. He was a member
of the Orthodox Greek Church.

What was my amazement when, having tied up the horse, he came with
reverent haste and knelt at my companion's feet, kissing his hand with
pious and devoted fervour. The grey-bearded priest, with full brown
eyes, and hair that curled below the tall black head-dress like a
trimming of grey astrakhan, with whom I had been talking so
familiarly, was no other than the successor of St. James, the Orthodox
Patriarch of Jerusalem. I had supposed him some sub-prior or domestic
chaplain. His Beatitude acknowledged my surprise by an ironic grin.

The new arrival, still upon his knees, embarked on a long story, told
in lamentable tones, about a man who was in love, and like to die of
it, with a young girl who was the sister of his brother's wife. It is
forbidden by the canons of the Eastern Church for two brothers to
marry two sisters.

'Is there no way by which he may obtain her lawfully?' the suppliant
asked.

The Patriarch assumed an air of weariness, and shook his head.

'If he were a Catholic or a Protestant he could obtain her lawfully.'

The Patriarch assumed an air of pitying scorn.

'The case is very hard,' the suppliant moaned, as he rose up from the
ground at last and cleaned his knees.

The Patriarch, with a shrug, remarked that it was so. The young man
should not have cast eyes upon a maid unlawful to him.

'The only way,' he said, 'is to obtain annulment of the brother's
marriage by proving it to be illegal in some way.' With that he left
the subject and resumed his talk concerning poultry. My companion of
the road was plucking at my sleeve.

I took leave of the Patriarch respectfully, with many thanks. He
clapped me on the shoulder, saying: 'Come again! And never seek to wed
the sister of thy brother's wife. Your Church does not forbid such
marriage--does it?--being still tainted with the Latin heresy. Why
does the Orthodox Church forbid it? Because it brings confusion into
families, and is indecent.'

He seemed to jest, but the look he gave to my companion as we rode
away was stern, I thought, and more than half-contemptuous.

Excepting that my head was bandaged, I felt well again; so we rode on,
as we had first intended, towards Bethlehem. Over a rocky land with
patches of pink cyclamen, black crows were wheeling in a sky of vivid
blue.

We came into the