  The aged Gamaliel has his wish and enjoys a prolonged interview with the prisoner Paul in the castle where the latter is confined—young Stephen being present. The result is Gamaliel's conversion to Christianity; but this is followed by the old man's peaceful death on the couch where he had been resting while he talked. So peaceful is the death that, in the darkness of the late evening, Paul and young Stephen are not aware that it has occurred. PAUL AND GAMALIEL. n eyes,Which, downward bent a moment on the boy, Gave him his gift with usury again. "Behold," said Paul, "my parable made plain A sea of bitterness was yesterday Poured round me in that madding multitude That tossed me on the shoulders of its waves; But here is this my loving nephew, Stephen, A fountain of sweet water in the sea— Art thou not, Stephen?—whence to drink my fill. But this is parable of parable; No more—for what I mean is still to speak. Know, then, there is no earthly accident Of evil that has happened me, or can Happen, nay, and no swelling flood of such, Of any power at all to touch with harm The peace that passeth understanding, fixed By Jesus in my inward firmament; The sea less vainly might assail the stars." "If this thou meanest," Gamaliel, groping, said, "That when the angry people yesterday Bore thee headlong and menaced death to thee, Then thou wert calm at heart, feeling no fear— What else were that than boasting, 'I am brave,' Which but such vaunt of it could bring in doubt?" "Nay, master," Paul said, "braggart am I not, Man can be; and the peace whereof I speak Is not the calmness that the brave man drinks Out of the cup of danger at his lips. That also I perhaps have sometimes known; But this is other, and a mystery Even to myself, who only have, and not The secret of the having understand— Save that I know it no virtue, but a gift Renewed forever from the grace of Christ." Gamaliel listened deeply, with shut eyes; He listened, and kept silence, and then sighed, A long, considerate sigh, and unresolved. His struggling reason could not right itself; It staggered like a vessel in the sea That cuff and buffet of the storm has left A hulk, dismasted, rudderless, forlorn, Wedged between waves rocking her to and fro, And threatening to engulf her in the deep; So there Gamaliel swayed, with surge on surge Of thought and passion sweeping over him, Till now he trembled on the point to sink. Paul saw the old man's state, and, pitying him, With a low voice, daughter of silence, he Slowly intoned a soft, melodious psalm: "'Not haughty is my heart, O God the Lord, Nor do mine eyes ambitiously aspire; In great affairs I exercise me not, And not in things too wonderful for me. Yea, I have stilled and quieted my soul; As with its mother a new-weanÉd child, So is my soul a weanÉd child with me. O Israel, hope thou, in Jehovah hope, From this time forth and even forevermore!'" The mood, all melting, of that monody— Less monody, than sound of sobbing ceased— Its cradling gentle lullaby to pride, Went, subtly permeant, through Gamaliel's soul, And mastered it to sympathy of calm. Paul saw with pleasure this effect, and wished The too much shaken old man venerable Might taste the soothing medicine of sleep. Not pausing, he, with ever softer tone Verging toward silence, over and over again Crooned like a cradle melody that psalm; Once yielded to young David's harping, so Now even the fluttering of the aged flesh Owned a strange power reverse to cancel it, Hid in the vibrant pulsing of Paul's voice, Its flexures and its cadences, that matched The meaning with the music; lulled to rest, Gamaliel lightly, like an infant, slept. "Hist! Haste!" So Paul to Stephen signed and said; "Hence, and bring hither quickly bread and wine, Wherewith to cheer Gamaliel when he wakes; He sleeps now, weary with unwonted thought." Shimei saw Stephen from the fort come out And bear purveyance back of bread and wine; So, earlier, he had seen Gamaliel pass, Led by the hand of Stephen, through the gate, Presumably to visit Paul within. For he, as ever when some crime he teemed, Uneasy till the full-accomplished birth, Was like the hungry hunting hound denied Access to his wished prey, known to be near— And only by the teasÉd nostril snuffed— Who cannot cease from patient jealous watch, On haunches sitting, or on belly prone, Lest somehow yet he miss his taste of blood— So that ill spirit all day had scented Paul, Shut up within the castle out of reach, And sedulously studied, at remove, Whatever might be token of attempt, Other's or his, the morrow's doom to cheat. The very thought, 'Should he slip through our hands!' Was anguish, like a goad, to Shimei, Who now was sure he had the hope divined That Paul was harboring—an escape by night! 'Paul, in the darkness, stealing out disguised As old Gamaliel, would, with meat and drink Supplied him, safety seek in distant flight.' Filled with such thought, the tireless crafty Jew, Colluding with the sentry at the gate, There sat him down the sentry's watch to share; Paul should by no such stratagem avoid The vengeance that next morrow waited him. |
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