for generations. Nevertheless, there is some reason why the calling of
the shepherds should be despised. Many of them are rude and fierce
men. Living out of doors so constantly makes their manners rough and
their temper harsh. They are often quarrelsome. Such bloody fights as
I used to see among them, at the wells in the south country, where
they brought their flocks to water and each one wanted the first
chance at the well, I hope you will never look upon."

"But all shepherds are not so," protested Joseph.

"No, indeed. Brave men they must be; fleet of foot and strong of limb
and stout of heart; but brave men are not always quarrelsome. Many a
shepherd whom I have known had a heart as pure and gentle as a
child's. And the godliest men that I have known have been among them.
If the shepherd has but learned to think, to commune with his own
soul, he has time for thought and time for prayer. More than one with
whom I have watched upon these hills knew all the Psalms of David by
heart and many of the books of the prophets. The doctors in the
synagogues teach only the law; the shepherds love best the Psalms and
the prophets. They do not forget that King David was himself a
shepherd's lad. It was upon these very hills that he kept his father's
sheep. It was in that ravine over yonder, on that hillside, that he, a
mere stripling, caught by the beard and killed the lion and the bear
that attacked the sheep. It was on that slope, just a little to the
south, that the messenger found him with his flocks when he was called
home to be anointed by Samuel the prophet. When the doctors talk so
contemptuously about the shepherds, I wonder if they do not remember
that the great king wrote: 'The Lord is my Shepherd.' How can our
calling be so mean as they say, when David, who was called from the
sheepfolds, praises the Eternal One himself as his Shepherd? But hark!