first was the one with which the story is concerned; and Joseph, like the rest, went up from Galilee out of the city of Nazareth into Judæa, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David. From this passage, then, it appears that Luke’s conception of the procedure in the Roman empire was as follows: Augustus ordered a systematic numbering to be made in the empire. This system of numbering went on for a time, or more probably permanently, and hence