could be sold at a better price in Jerusalem. He asked for permission
to go there and his mother, desiring more that her son should see the
capital than that he should get higher prices for the bread, said:

"Go, my son, and God be with thee."

That trip to Jerusalem and the several trips that followed, made a
great impression upon the young man and gave a remarkable turn to his
whole life.

He saw Jerusalem, of whose beauty and glory his father had often told
him, a fallen city. It had not yet recovered from the terrible results
of the war with Amaziah of Israel; King Uzziah had not yet restored
the treasures and vessels of which the temples had been looted; and,
in the quarter of the city where Amos sold his bread, oh! such
poverty, such wretchedness, such desolation!

His heart was filled with grief. He went to the trenches where he knew
his father lay in an unmarked grave, and wept bitterly. There, at his
father's grave, a wonderful thought came to him. A new light entered
into his life and a great determination for his future career. His
mind once made up, he soon outlined a plan for himself, and having the
determination to carry the plan through, he made rapid progress.

With the additional profits that resulted from his business trips to
Jerusalem, Amos bought sheep and goats and became a shepherd, as well
as a gatherer of sycamore fruit.

The great rocky wilderness that slopes from the limestone hills of
Tekoah down to the Dead Sea was just the place where sheep and goats