mingling with touching fervor with the tones of the girl, whose harsh
notes thrilled with the loftiest enthusiasm.

Hosea felt that it would be criminal to interrupt the outpouring of these
earnest hearts, but Eliab soon stopped them and gazed with evident
anxiety into the stern face of his lord's first-born son.

Had Hosea understood him?

Did this warrior, who served under Pharaoh's banner, realize how entirely
the Lord God Himself had ruled the souls of his people at their
departure.

Had the life among the Egyptians so estranged him from his people and his
God, rendered him so degenerate, that he would bid defiance to the wishes
and commands of his own father?

Was the man on whom the Hebrews' highest hopes were fixed a renegade,
forever lost to his people?

He received no verbal answer to these mute questions, but when Hosea
grasped his callous right hand in both his own and pressed it as he would
have clasped a friend's, when he bade him farewell with tearful eyes,
murmuring: "You shall hear from me!" he felt that he knew enough and,
overwhelmed with passionate delight, he pressed kiss after kiss upon the
warrior's arms and clothing.