Esther 5:13 Yet all this avails me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate. Some time ago, as a gentleman was passing over one of the extensive downs in the West of England, about mid-day, where a large flock of sheep was feeding, and observing the shepherd sitting by the roadside preparing to eat his dinner, he stopped his horse, and entered rote" conversation with him to this effect: Well, shepherd, you look cheerful and contented, and I daresay you have few cares to vex you. I, who am a man of pretty large property, cannot but look at such men as you with a kind of envy." "Why, sir," replied the shepherd, "'tis true I have no troubles like yours; and I could do well enough was it not for that black owe that you see yonder amongst my flock. I have often begged my master to kill or sell her; but he won't, though she is the plague of my life, for no sooner do I sit down to look at my book, or take up my wallet to get my dinner, but away she sets off over the down, and the rest follow her, so that I have many a weary step after them. There, you see, she's off, and they are all after her." "Ah, friend," said the gentleman, "I see every man has a black ewe in his flock to plague him as well as I." Parallel Verses KJV: Yet all this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate.WEB: Yet all this avails me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate." |
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