She, too, was kindly disposed toward the Egyptians, among whom her pride and joy, our Moses, had attained such high honors.
"So in happy intercourse with the others I reached my fifteenth year.
In the evening, when the shepherds returned home, I sat with the young people around the fire, and was pleased when the sons of the shepherd princes preferred me to my companions and sought my love; but I refused them all, even the Egyptian captain who commanded the garrison of the storehouse; for I remembered you, the companion of my youth.

My best possession would not have seemed too dear a price to pay for some magic spell that would have brought you to us when, at the festal games, I danced and sang to the tambourine while the loudest shouts of applause greeted me.

Whenever many were listening I thought of you--then I poured forth like the lark the feelings that filled my heart, then my song was inspired by you and not by the fame of the Most High, to whom it was consecrated." Here passion, with renewed power, seized the man, to whom the woman he loved was confessing so many blissful memories.

Suddenly starting up, he extended his arms toward her; but she sternly repulsed him, that she might control the yearning which threatened to overpower her also.
Yet her deep voice had gained a new, strange tone as, at first rapidly and softly, then in louder and firmer accents, she continued: "So I attained my eighteenth year and was no longer satisfied to dwell in Succoth.

An indescribable longing, and not for you only, had taken possession of my soul.