Budge_Ethiopic_Alexander

A CHRISTIAN ROMANCE. 53 1
[did so] and they hung it about with spears and
with shields of gold and silver. Then he lifted
up his eyes and seeing it lit up and shining with
metal, he knew that the time of his death had
arrived according to the former words of the
Spirit of God, Who said unto him, "When the
"heavens appear to thee as brass above [p. 334]
"thy head, and when the stars appear to thee
"like gold and silver, then shall thy death be."'
And Alexander called one of his good friends
from the palace whom he was in the habit of
sending constantly to his mother,^ and he said His message
unto him, "Tell my mother that I have conquered ,her. ° "°
"in the war of the body, and behold, I have come
"to my rest. And now, make thou a feast that
"I may eat and make merry, and may not die,
"and do thou take the water for it from a house
"wherein no man hath ever died; if thou doest
"this thou^ wilt never die in this world." Now his
mother loved him very much and very dearly
and more than her own soul, and she rose up
quickly to seek for the water, even as her son
had bidden her to do, for she imagined that she
could find water in a house wherein no man had
died; and she went round about through the great oiympias
city of Macedonia for a whole
seeks
day seeking [for water
for
in a
the water] but she found [it] not.
ouse And when she|i|^
which
in
no
had rested somewhat, for she was weary with^° ^ad
going round about among the houses of the
died.
poor
' See above, p. 503. ^ See above, p. 375.
XXX 2