Yet hard as he strove to catch their purport, he did not succeed, and when he asked the child to explain them the sound of his own voice roused him and he returned to the camp, disappointed and thoughtful.
Afterwards he often tried to remember these words, but always in vain.
All his great powers, both mental and physical, he continued to devote to the people; but his nephew Ephraim, as a powerful prince of his tribe, who well deserved the high honors he enjoyed in after years, founded a home of his own, where old Nun watched the growth of great-grand-children, who promised a long perpetuation of his noble race.
Everyone is familiar with Joshua's later life, so rich in action, and how he won in battle a new home for his people.
There in the Promised Land many centuries later was born, in Bethlehem, another Jehoshua who bestowed on all mankind what the son of Nun had vainly sought for the Hebrew nation.
The three words uttered by the child's lips which the chief had been unable to comprehend were: "Love, Mercy, Redemption!" ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: A school where people learned modesty Asenath, the wife of Joseph, had been an Egyptian Brief "eternity" of national covenants But what do you men care for the suffering you inflict on others Childhood already lies behind me, and youth will soon follow Choose between too great or too small a recompense Good advice is more frequently unheeded than followed Hate, though never sated, can yet be gratified I do not like to enquire about our fate beyond the grave Most ready to be angry with those to whom we have been unjust Omnipotent God, who had preferred his race above all others Pleasant sensation of being a woman, like any other woman Precepts and lessons which only a mother can give Regard the utterances and mandates of age as wisdom Should I be a man, if I forgot vengeance?
Then hate came; but it did not last long There is no 'never,' no surely To the mines meant to be doomed to a slow, torturing death Voice of the senses, which drew them together, will soon be mute What had formerly afforded me pleasure now seemed shallow When hate and revenge speak, gratitude shrinks timidly Who can prop another's house when his own is falling Woman's disapproving words were blown away by the wind.