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My boarders will be 'long and I got to freshen the house up a little." "You goin' to have the same folks you had last year, Em'line?" "Oh, yes. They're real nice -for city people. I tell Barzillai " "How is Barzillai?" "Middlin'. His leg ain't never been just right since he was helpin' ice the Tryout, come two summers ago.
Barzillai had seen enough of David to know that what the king said he meant, and that if he chose to go with him, honour and position awaited him at the court. But he would not be moved. His grey hairs, if nothing else, stood in the way. "How long have I to live," he answered, "that I should go up with the king unto Jerusalem?"
It may be said, perhaps, that it was easy for Barzillai to be cheerful. The sun had shone on him very brightly: the good things of life had fallen very freely to his share. But after all, is it the universal, or even the general, experience that wealth and power are associated with simple cheerfulness and happiness?
And it came to pass, when David was come to Mahanaim, that Shobi the son of Nahash of Rabbah of the children of Ammon, and Machir the son of Ammiel of Lodebar, and Barzillai the Gileadite of Rogelim, Brought beds, and basons, and earthen vessels, and wheat, and barley, and flour, and parched corn, and beans, and lentiles, and parched pulse,
But the abiding sentiments of his heart are gentleness and magnanimity. How affectionately his soul clung to Jonathan! What a power of self-denial, when he was faint and thirsty, in refusing the water which his brave companions brought him at the risk of their lives! How generously he spared the life of Saul! How patiently he bore the rebukes of Nathan! How nobly he treated the aged Barzillai!
And the king said unto him, Why speakest thou any more of thy matters? I have said, Thou and Ziba divide the land. And Mephibosheth said unto the king, Yea, let him take all, forasmuch as my lord the king is come again in peace unto his own house. And Barzillai the Gileadite came down from Rogelim, and went over Jordan with the king, to conduct him over Jordan.
You know, one o' them big cakes from the ice fact'ry fell on him. . . . I tell Barzillai the city folks are a godsend to us Cape Codders in summer time, now that sea-goin' don't seem so pop'lar with the men as it useter be." "I dunno. Some of these city folks don't seem to be sent by the Lord, but by the other feller!" was the grim rejoinder.
On the other hand, in point of classic style and the modern polish of his verses, he outdistances all who preceded him. Lebensohn the younger removed from the arena, Gordon attained the first place among Hebrew poets. In "David and Barzillai", the poet contrasts the tranquillity of the shepherd's life with that of the king.
Barzillai was evidently by nature a warm-hearted, sunshiny old man, himself happy and making others happy. David himself was such a man before the great sin which brought a trouble and a sorrow into his life that he was never again able wholly to surmount. And it may have been the sight of his own lost gaiety and lightness of spirit in the aged Gileadite that first drew out his heart to him.
But David desired Barzillai the Gileadite, that great and good man, and one that had made a plentiful provision for him at Mahanaim, and had conducted him as far as Jordan, to accompany him to Jerusalem, for he promised to treat him in his old age with all manner of respect to take care of him, and provide for him.
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