johan (3)

I saw him as just described... 

hastening across the country by the hand of his mother. 

Elizabeth was a tall, active, old woman, with a small, delicate face, and she was completely enveloped in a large mantle. John often ran on before her, hopping and jumping, perfectly unrestrained and childlike in action, though not distracted in soul. 

I saw them crossing a river. There was no bridge at that point, and so they crossed on a raft that was floating on the water. Elizabeth was a very resolute person, no difficulty daunted her. She herself rowed the raft across, using for that purpose the branch of a tree. 

They now turned eastward, and entered a ravine, rocky and desolate above, but lower down covered with bushes and overgrown with strawberries. John now and then ate one.

After going some distance into the ravine...

Elizabeth took leave of John. She blessed him, pressed him to her heart, kissed him on the cheeks and forehead, and turned away, looking back at him as she retraced her steps, weeping. 

But the boy appeared wholly unconcerned, and quietly walked on deeper into the ravine. I followed the child with a feeling of uneasiness at his going, so far from his mother, and fearing that he would not be able to find his way home again. But just then, a voice said to me, “Be not uneasy. The child knows well what he is about.” 

I went with him and, in several visions... 

saw his whole after life in the desert. He often told me himself how he denied himself in every way and mortified his senses, his understanding becoming clearer and clearer, learning in an unexplainable way something from everything around him. 

I saw him when a child playing with flowers and animals. The birds were particularly familiar with him. They lighted upon his head when he was walking or praying, and perched upon his staff when he laid it across the branches. There they sat in numbers, while he watched them and played with them. 

I saw him also going after other animals, following them into their dens, feeding them, playing with them, or earnestly watching them.

~bron~