towns where food might have been found. As well as providing the starting-point for the long discussion of ‘the bread from heaven’ which will occupy most of the chapter, this passage is full of deft little touches which invite us to enter into the scene imaginatively and, perhaps, identify with one or other of the characters. The exchange between Jesus, Philip and Andrew—and the unnamed boy with the bread and fish—is told far more intimately than in the other gospels. Indeed, Philip and Andrew are