GRM 28.4-5
The Gospel as revealed to me
Quotation
28.4 They go out and they follow the wall of the hotel. They turn into a little street that runs between the hotel and some poor houses. They then turn behind the hotel. They look for the stables. At last, here are some grottos, a kind of cellar, I would say, rather than stables, because they are so low and damp. The best have already been taken. Joseph is utterly disheartened.
«Ehi! Galilean!» an old man shouts. «Down there, at the end, under those ruins, there is a den. Perhaps there is nobody in it yet.»
They hurry to the «den». It is really a den. Among the ruins of an old building there is a hole, beyond which there is a grotto, an excavation in the mountain, rather than a grotto. It seems to consist of the foundations of the old building, with the roof formed by rubble supported by coarse tree trunks.
There is hardly any light, and to see better Joseph pulls out tinder and flint and he lights a little lamp that he takes out of the knapsack he is carrying across his shoulders. He goes in and is greeted by a bellow. «Come in, Mary. It is empty. There is only an ox.» Joseph smiles. «It’s better than nothing!…»
28.5 Mary dismounts from Her donkey and goes in.
Joseph has hung the little lamp on a nail of one of the supporting trunks. They see the vault covered with cobwebs, the soil
— stamped ramshackle earth, with holes, rubbish, excrement — the soil is strewn with straw. In the rear, an ox turns its head round and looks with its large quiet eyes while some hay is hanging from its lips. There is a rough seat and two big stones in a corner near a loop-hole. The black remains in that corner is a clear sign that a fire is normally lit there.
Mary goes near the ox. She is cold. She puts Her hands on its neck to feel its warmth. The ox bellows but does not stir. It seems to understand. Also when Joseph pushes it aside to take a large quantity of hay from the manger and make a bed for Mary, the ox remains calm and quiet. The manger is a double one: that is, there is one out of which the ox eats, and above it there is a kind of shelf, with some spare hay, which Joseph pulls down. The ox makes room also for the little donkey that, tired and hungry as it is, starts eating at once.
Joseph discovers also a battered bucket, turned upside down. He goes out, because he saw a little stream outside, and he comes back with some water for the little donkey. He then finds a bunch of twigs in a corner and he tries to sweep the floor with it. He next spreads the hay and makes a bed with it near the ox, in the most sheltered and dry corner. But he realizes that the poor hay is damp, and he sighs. He then lights a fire, and with the patience of job, he dries the hay, a handful at a time, holding it near the fire.
Mary is sitting on the stool, She is tired, She watches and smiles. The hay is now ready. Mary sits down more comfortably on the soft hay, with Her back leaning against one of the tree trunks. Joseph completes… the furnishings by hanging his mantle as a curtain on the hole that serves as a door. It is a makeshift protection. He then offers some bread and cheese to the Virgin, and he gives Her some water out of a flask.
«Sleep now,» he says. «I will sit up and watch that the fire does not go out. There is some wood, fortunately, let us hope that it will burn and last. Thus I will be able to save the oil of the lamp.»
Mary lies down obediently. Joseph covers Her with Her own mantle and with the blanket that She had around Her feet earlier.
«But you… you will be cold.»
«No, Mary. I’ll be near the fire. Try and rest now. Things will be better tomorrow.»
Mary closes Her eyes without insisting. Joseph creeps into his little corner, sits on the stool, with some dry twigs near him. They are very few. I do not think they will last long.
They are placed as follows: Mary is on the right hand side, with Her back to the… door, half hidden by the tree trunk and the ox which has lain down on the litter. Joseph is on the left side, towards the door, and since he is facing the fire, his back is turned towards Mary. But he turns round now and again to look at Her, and he sees She is lying quietly, as if She were sleeping. He breaks the little sticks as quietly as possible and throws them one at a time onto the little fire, so that it may not go out and may give some light and yet make the wood last longer. There is only the dim light of the fire: at times bright at times very faint. The lamp in fact has been put out and in the half light only the whiteness of the ox and of Joseph’s hands and face can be seen. All the rest is a confused mass in the dull dim light.