Of course the news of the affluence of that place went out everywhere by every caravan and by wing of every ship, until soon the streets of Jerusalem are crowded with curiosity seekers.  What is that long procession approaching Jerusalem?  I think from the pomp of it there must be royalty in the train.  I smell the breath of the spices which are brought as presents, and I hear the shout of the drivers, and I see the dust-covered caravan showing that they come from far away.  Cry the news up to the palace.  The Queen of Sheba advances.  Let all the people come out to see.  Let the mighty men of the land come out on the palace corridors.  Let Solomon come down the stairs of the palace before the queen has alighted.  Shake out the cinnamon, and the saffron, and the calamus, and the frankincense, and pass it into the treasure house.  Take up the diamonds until they glitter in the sun.

The Queen of Sheba alights.  She enters the palace.  She washes at the bath.  She sits down at the banquet.  The cup-bearers bow.  The meat smokes.  The music trembles in the dash of the waters from the molten sea.  Then she rises from the banquet, and walks through the conservatories, and gazes on the architecture, and she asks Solomon many strange questions, and she learns about the religion of the Hebrews, and she then and there becomes a servant of the Lord God.

She is overwhelmed.  She begins to think that all the spices she brought, and all the precious woods which are intended to be turned into harps and psalteries and into railings for the causeway between the temple and the palace, and the one hundred and eighty thousand dollars in money—­she begins to think that all these presents amount to nothing in such a place, and she is almost ashamed that she has brought them, and she says within herself:  “I heard a great deal about this place, and about this wonderful religion of the Hebrews, but I find it far beyond my highest anticipations.  I must add more than fifty per cent. to what has been related.  It exceeds everything that I could have expected.  The half—­the half was not told me.”

Learn from this subject what a beautiful thing it is when social position and wealth surrender themselves to God.  When religion comes to a neighborhood, the first to receive it are the women.  Some men say it is because they are weak-minded.  I say it is because they have quicker perception of what is right, more ardent affection and capacity for sublimer emotion.  After the women have received the Gospel then all the distressed and the poor of both sexes, those who have no friends, accept Jesus.  Last of all come the people of affluence and high social position.  Alas, that it is so!