My Dear Father:

In my last letter I told you that Lazarus was dead. I write this to say that he who was dead is alive! Lazarus lives! He whom I saw dead and buried, and sealed up within the rocky cave of the tomb, is alive again from the dead; and at this moment, while I am penning this extraordinary account, I hear his voice from the porch.

How, my dear father, how shall I find adequate language to tell you all that has happened here within the last twenty-four hours!

The funeral procession was so very long that strangers, pausing, asked what great master in Israel, or person of note, was being taken to the sepulchre.

Some answered, "Lazarus, the industrious scribe;" others said, "A young man who has devoted his life to honor his mother." Others answered, as Lazarus himself, were he alive, would have had them:

"It is Lazarus, the friend of Jesus."

The place where they were to lay him was the cave in which his father and mother were entombed. It was in a deep, shady vale, thickly shaded by cypress, palm and pomegranate trees, and a large tamarind grew, with its stately branches, overclasping the summit of the secluded place of sepulchre. The remote swell of a Roman bugle from the head of a cohort, which was just issuing from a defile, came softly and musically to our ears, as we stood in silence about the grove wherein we were to place the dead. Æmilius, my betrothed, was also present, wearing a white scarf above his silver cuirass, in token of grief, for he also loved Lazarus. Of him, dear father, I have not of late spoken, for should I begin to write of him I should have no room in my letters for any other theme.

The sacred observances at the grove being over, they raised the body of the dead young man from the bier, and four youths, aided by Æmilius at the head to support it, conveyed it into the yawning cavern. A moment they lingered on the threshold, that Mary and Martha might take one more look, imprint upon its icy cold lips one last kiss, press once more his unconscious head to their loving and bursting hearts.

The young men moved slowly forward into the gloom of the cave. Mary rushed in, and with disheveled hair, cried:

"Oh, take him not away forever from the sight of my eyes! Oh, my brother, my brother, would that I had died for thee! for I am willing to lie down with the worm and call it my sister, and sleep in the arms of death, as on the breast of my mother, so thou couldst live! Oh, brother, brother, let them not take thee forever from the sight of my eyes! Without thee, how shall life be life!"

As they were retiring with heavy hearts from performing this last duty to the beloved dead, the sun sank beyond the blue hills of Ajalon in the west in a lake of gold. To enjoy the sunset, and to relieve our emotions of sadness, I walked apart with Mary to the top of the hill, from which I beheld the sun gilding the pinnacle of the Temple, and making it appear like a gigantic spear elevated into the sky. From the Levites at evening sacrifice came, mellowed by distance, the deep chant of the Temple service, uttered by a thousand voices. The cloud from the altar sacrifice ascended slowly into the still air, and catching the splendor of the sun's last beams, shone as if the pillar of cloud and of fire which stood above the tabernacle in the wilderness. The laborers in the harvest were hastening towards the gates, ere they should be shut out for the night by the Roman guards, and dwellers in the village were hurrying forth, lest they should be held in the city over night.

There was a sacred hush in the sleepy atmosphere that seemed in sympathy and touching harmony with the scene in which we had just borne a part. With Mary leaning sobbing upon my shoulder, I sat upon a rock giving my heart up to the sweet influences of the hour. We were alone, save Æmilius, who had ridden after us, anxious for our safety, and who sat upon his horse near by, gazing upon the beauty of the evening scene.

"I am calmer now," said Mary, after a while, raising her head and looking into my face, her splendid eyes glittering brimful with tears. "The peace of the sweet, holy skies seems to have descended and entered my heart. The spirit of Lazarus pervades all and hallows all I see. I will weep no more. He is happy now, very happy, and let us try to be holy and go to him, for he cannot come back to us."

At this moment we heard the tramp of horses' hoofs. Æmilius, startled thereby from his reverie, recovered his seat and laid his hand upon his sword. The next moment, around a rock projecting from the shoulder of Olivet, appeared a horseman in the wild, warlike costume of an Ishmaelite of the desert, brandishing a long spear in the air; then another and another similarly clad and armed, and mounted on superb horses of the desert, dashed in sight. These were immediately followed by a tall, daring-looking young man, in a rich costume, half Grecian, half Arabic, though his dark, handsome features were decidedly Israelitish. He rode a superb Abyssinian charger, and sat upon his back like the heathen centaur I have read of in the Latin books which Æmilius has given me to read. Upon seeing us he drew rein and smiled, and waved his jewelled hand with splendid courtesy; but at the sight of Æmilius his dark eyes flashed, and leaping to his feet in his stirrups he shook his glittering falchion towards him, and rode with a trumpet-like cry full upon him.

The brave Roman soldier received the charge by turning his horse slightly, and catching the point of the weapon upon the blade of his short sword.

"We meet at last, O Roman!" cried this wild, dashing chief, as he wheeled his horse like lightning, and once more rode upon the iron-armed Roman knight.

"Ay, Barabbas, and with joy I hail thee!" responded Æmilius, placing a bugle to his lips.

At hearing the clear voice of the bugle awaking the echoes of Olivet, the dread robber chief said haughtily and with a glance of contempt:

"Thou, a knight of the tribune, and commander of a legion, call for aid, when I offer thee equal battle, hand to hand, and ask not for aid of my own men's spears?"

"I know no equal battle with a robber. I would hunt thee as I would do the wolf and the wild beasts of thy deserts," answered Æmilius, pressing him closely. At a signal from the robber chief his four men, who had reined up a short distance off, near the tomb of Lazarus, sent up a shrill, eaglelike scream, that made my blood stand still, and then rode down like the wind to overcome Æmilius.

Hitherto I had remained as one stupefied at being an involuntary spectator of a sudden battle, but on seeing his danger, I was at his side, scarce knowing how I reached the place.

"Retire, dear Adina," he said authoritatively. "I shall have to defend both thee and myself, and these barbarians will give both my hands enough to do."

As he spoke he turned his horse's head to meet the forefold shock, and I escaped, I know not how, with the impulse to hasten to Bethany for succor. But heaven interposed its aid. A detachment of the body-guard of Pilate, hearing the recall of their chief's bugle, came now cantering up the hill. At the sight Barabbas and his party fled, like wild pigeons pursued by a cloud of Iturean hawks. Barabbas, however, turned more than once to fling back defiance to his foes. Æmilius soon reached his side, seized the crimson sash which encircled his waist, and held him thus, both fighting as they rode. The Roman troop came up, and after a desperate battle the celebrated chief was taken alive, though bleeding with many wounds, and bound with his own sash to the column of one of the tombs.

Æmilius says that Barabbas will assuredly be crucified for his numerous crimes. Dreadful punishment! and for one so young as this desert robber to come to such an ignominious and agonizing death; doomed to hang for hours under the sunbeams by his lacerated hands and feet, till death at last comes from slow exhaustion of all the powers of nature. I am amazed that so polite and humane a nation as the Roman can inflict such a cruel and agonizing death, even upon their malefactors. Ignominious, indeed, must the life of a man have been, for him to be doomed justly to suffer such a death.

In this letter, dearest father, I intended to relate to you how Lazarus has been restored to life, but it is already taken up with so much, that I defer it to my next. Suffice it for me to tell you at the close of this letter that it was Jesus who raised him from the dead. And will you say that he is an impostor? That he has done this wonderful thing is alone evidence enough to me that he is indeed the Messias of the Prophets, the Son of God.

Your affectionate daughter,

Adina.