Meryt and the Eye of Horus

THE EGYPTIAN BUILDER

Early in the morning Meryt-Nefer was at work. When the sun rose over the desert and touched the sands with colors of rose and pearl and lighted up the river with flashes of gold, his slaves were already at work, obedient to his commands. And Meryt was working at the command of the great Pharaoh. Far up its course above the first cataract, he was widening the channel of the Nile so that the ships of the king might pass through to go to conquer the Nubians at the South. But the sun had scarcely risen, when running through the midst of the slaves there came a messenger, breathless, his tongue parched with thirst, and carrying in his hand a faded lotus flower. "A token, Lord Meryt," he said, holding it toward him, "a token and a true message. So it was said to me in these very words, 'Say to my Lord Meryt—The perfect flower of joy has budded.' "

EGYPT OLD AND NEW. BUILDING FOR THE AGES

To the others about them it was a strange message, but Meryt lifted his eyes on high to give thanks to the great Sun-god, Re. For by this he knew that there had been born to him a child who would sit in his chair when he was gone, a son who would cause his name to live. Happiness filled his heart. Yet even to see his son he might not leave the work of the Pharaoh. But he knew that his wife with the child in her arms would climb, each evening, to the roof of his house and looking far to the South would send him a message and a promise that she would take care of his son until he came.

Meryt, the boy, was named for his father. Childhood went swift and sweet for him, for his mother carried him tenderly on her neck, and as soon as he was old enough to enjoy them gave him wonderful dolls and toys, a good little man who would jump, and a crocodile with a movable jaw, and for a playmate a dwarf who watched over him. And at evening it was his great delight to go to the housetop and watch the cattle come home from their pastures in the marshes. It was a pretty sight in the sunset glow. From all over the land little processions of cattle could be seen winding across the desert—pure white cows and frisking calves, and here and there a little child at their head to lead them. Though he was scarcely more than a baby, Meryt begged to go and march at the head of his father's herd, each one of which he knew by name. And at last a day came when his mother gave him to the herdsman and let him go. Proudly he walked before the lowing cattle, listening to hear if perhaps his cows, like those in the stories he had heard, would talk to him and say: "Pleasant it is to follow behind thee."

THE FIRST CATARACT OF THE NILE

Proudly the little fellow marched in, and as he came to the steps of his house someone was waiting for him there,—a stranger. His mother ran to him, caught him and brought him in, for this was his father come at last to see his son. From about his neck his father took an amulet, a charm in the shape of an eye,—the familiar symbol of good luck, the eye of Horus,—and this he fastened about the little Meryt's neck, saying, "So like the good god Horus shalt thou cause thy father's name to live." For, like every Egyptian, the dearest desire of Meryt-Nefer's heart was to have a son who should carry on his name and care for his tomb when he was gone. From that time on the boy always wore his amulet as a charm against evil and a promise of devotion to his father.

AN EYE AMULET The Sacred Eye was one of the symbols of good luck. The story shows its connection with the god Horus. Here four eyes are grouped together

The months went on, and there came a day when his mother looked sad, but his father said to him: "Today is a lucky day, for this is the day that the good Horus made peace with the evil Set, so today shalt thou go to the house of books to begin thine instruction. For nothing is so precious as learning. Now shalt thou set to work to learn the profession of the scribe, for so shalt thou be a leader of men." He took the young Meryt to the school, even to the school at the court of the Pharaoh. There, with the young princes and sons of other nobles, he was taught good manners and to read the writings of his people and to learn to write. Early in the morning he began his work at the school, and his mother came daily, bringing bread for him from her house. Pens of reeds were given him, and a copy book of papyrus made from the pith of the reeds, and he applied himself diligently to learn the difficult letters, for he had heard often enough his schoolmaster's proverb: "The youth has a back, he attends when it is beaten." So he worked hard at his writing, copying the sayings of the wise men; and from them as well as from his masters he learned how a boy should behave—how to eat at table, how to rise in the presence of his elders, and how to guard his tongue lest he speak too much. But once lessons were over for the day, he and Khety and Bagt and the others went out with shouts of joy to play ball or to wrestle or to row up and down the Nile in their boats.

At length the time came when he could write well enough to be given his masterpiece of copying, a long exercise to be written down in a careful hand on a clean copy roll, fit to be put in his tomb with him when he died. The exercise the master gave him was one both familiar and dear to him. It was the old, old story of his people about the god Osiris. Though he had read it in the papyrus rolls and had once seen it acted by the priests in a wonderful drama at Abydos, he was glad now to learn it better still by copying it in his roll. This was the legend which he wrote:

The Earth-god and the Heaven-goddess had two sons, Set and Osiris, and Set married Nephthys and Osiris married Isis. Osiris was just and kind. But Set was evil and planned a trick against his brother. For he had a beautiful chest made, and though he knew that it had been made to the exact measure of Osiris, he pretended to offer it to whoever would fit it best when lying inside it. Many lay down in the chest, hoping to get it for themselves, but when Osiris stretched himself within it, of course it fitted him perfectly. Set was ready for him. Quickly he nailed down a cover upon the chest, sealed it with hot lead, and floated it out upon the river, and then the river carried it out to sea.

THE GODS OSIRIS AND HORUS Osiris is seated on the throne, and behind him is Horus, shown as the hawk-headed god. The king is making an offering before them, pouring out water from three vases

Isis went to the marshes mourning her husband, and there she stayed until her son Horus was born. But as soon as he was old enough she left him, and with the help of the god Anubis went near and far searching for the body of her husband. At last she found the chest, though it was in the midst of a great tree which had grown up around it. But she freed it and brought it home, where she wept and prayed over her husband’s body, though she kept the chest carefully hidden. But again the evil Set, while hunting by moonlight, came and stole it away; and Anubis once more had to help Isis, until together they recovered the body and cared for it. From that time on, Osiris’s spirit could rest in peace, since it had a sure dwelling place in the life after death.

Meantime Isis had brought up her son Horus to honor his father’s name and live for the day when he could avenge him on the evil Set. And that came at length. Horus, a, young man grown, pursued Set and fought with him, and though the struggle was long and hard, and though in the course of it Horus himself lost an eye, in the end he conquered Set and made glorious his father’s name. Then Osiris became King of the dead, while Horus was King on earth. And so from that day the eye of Horus had been to all the sign of good fortune and of devotion and of the protection of the god.

Meryt, even as he wrote the words, reached up to the amulet which always hung about his neck—the eye of Horus—and he heard again his father’s words, "So shalt thou too make thy father’s name to live."

On the very day when his copying was done and the last letters were scarcely dry on his papyrus, word came to him that he was to dress himself in a clean linen skirt and go to join his father in the court of the Pharaoh’s palace. That was a summons to fire his heart, for young Meryt had as yet never seen the Pharaoh, and it was long since he had seen his father. For his father had been at the North working on the great project of the Pharaoh to drain the marshes of the Fayum and turn them into a lake with fertile lands around it. So he had been long from home. Now Meryt, trembling with excitement, approached his father, who greeted him eagerly: "Is all well with thee, my son? Hast thou honored and obeyed thy mother? But now, come with me, for today great honor is ours, even to ascend to the Pharaoh."

A MAN WITH A WALKING STICK This is a woden status about 4000 years old. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

Then into the great hall of pillars, into the council room of the palace, Meryt was led with his father. The air was sweet with perfumes, the sound of softly trickling waters met their ears, and their eyes were dazzled at first by the splendor in this hall of pale gold. But as they looked longer they could see, besides the gold glistening from stools or couches, rich hangings of bright colors and glazed tiles of fine blue, and above on the ceiling a painted sky of blue set with golden stars. And at the far end of the hall they saw the Pharaoh beneath a gayly colored canopy, seated on a splendid throne of gold, his royal staff in his hand, the crown upon his head and around him fan-bearers and throngs of courtiers. The two Meryts bowed low before him with both hands on the ground in honor of the king, while Meryt the father greeted him with a hymn of praise. The Pharaoh spoke, addressing the father, "The lad is comely; good things the scribes say of him in the house of books"; and to young Meryt he said: "Be worthy of thy father. Make his name to live. So shall it be well with thee forever." Then the two went out.

That day was the beginning of much happiness for Meryt, for now for a time he was released from school to go with his father to learn to hunt with the throw stick in the marshes and to see the great work of irrigation that he was conducting at the Fayum. Never had he been so long with his father, and he learned from him many things. He saw how upright and true he was, so that he was honored of all, and Meryt too learned to love and reverence him more than ever before. His days went by in great contentment and all too fast.

For the time came when once again he must return to the school to go on with the education of a scribe,—to learn the sciences, the study of the stars and of the seasons and many sorts of magic. But his studies were not to go on for long. Something happened which overturned all plans. It was on the day when he and Bagt, his chief comrade at school, anxious for some excitement, were about to try out a kind of magic on their schoolfellow Khety. For Khety, they pretended, was in an evil mood and doubtless under the power of a demon. So according to a recipe they had heard, they had taken a scarab beetle, cut off his head and his wings, boiled these and laid them in oil, and the body of the beetle they had boiled and put in snake fat, and then they mixed the two together. That done, they were about to catch hold of Khety to pour the drink down his throat. But Khety never had to defend himself against their mischief. Before they had begun, a messenger appeared with his clothes torn and his face smeared with dust and sweat. Everything about him proclaimed bad news even before his words announced it: "Evil is the day. Now is the light of the sun darkened never to shine again." It was so that Meryt learned that his father was gone, had disappeared from his post in the Fayum, no one knew how. But foul play was suspected. For on the same day with his going an overseer and two Libyans who had been making trouble among the slaves in the camp had also disappeared, having gone presumably with a caravan bound for the North.

What should Meryt do? That the Pharaoh himself would send men to look for his father he felt sure, but he could not stay quietly at the school. He was now almost a man, who should himself do things, and, too, he wore about his neck the charm that was to him all but a promise to his father to care for his name. Useless though it might be, he must go to the Fayum, and if necessary follow in the steps of the caravan,—do something himself to learn his father’s fate. He went down the river by boat, but when he came to the Fayum no news was to be had. No one could tell him anything except that perhaps somewhere in the North the caravan might be overtaken, and that only from the men of the caravan, if at all, could he learn any news. So staff in hand he set out with a small party that were leaving the camp for the North. Though he knew it was foolish and though all tried to dissuade him, he had to go.

But, at best, journeying across the desert is painful work, and Meryt, with fear eating always at his heart, grew more and more discouraged the farther he went on. And at last an evening came when his companions had to return to their work, and he must bid them good-by. Though he did not know what to do, he could not bring himself to turn back. Left alone, he sat down under a palm tree near a little village in the desert, and, lonely and discouraged, he buried his head in his hands. At that moment he felt more like a boy than a man, and the tears began to trickle down between his fingers. A woman’s voice roused him, speaking kindly, "What bird of evil omen feeds upon thy heart, my son?"

"Alas!" Meryt groaned, without looking up, "if I could but find the one who would unriddle my secret!"

"Know you not Hordedef, whose dwelling is a tomb in the shadow of the great pyramids built by the kings of old? He knows all things."

Then Meryt started up and questioned her eagerly, and once more with hope in his heart set out to reach the pyramids and find Hordedef.

It was just at sunset that he came in view of the pyramids. Awe and wonder thrilled him at the sight. Those great works of the past of his people, of the mighty kings of old of whom he had so often heard, were before him. Tremendous and marvelously beautiful they seemed in this light. They towered above the desert, and the last rays of the sun still gleamed bright on their limestone sides, while, beneath, the purple and rose sands of the desert were fading into darkness. For a moment Meryt forgot himself and his errand in his wonder. But with the setting of the sun the wind changed, and even before he could reach the pyramids he was caught in whirls of sand that choked him. The desert in a sandstorm was no place for a man alone. He knew that. But where to find shelter was another matter, for, if there were houses or persons within reach, in that whirling darkness he could see nothing.

Putting his face in his hand, he turned his back to the wind and ran. He ran and stumbled, not knowing where he was going or what he ought to do. It was a desperate flight. Then he ran hard into something, and was at first almost unconscious from the blow. But he pulled himself together and found that he was close against a low stone wall. Feeling along with his hand he discovered an opening, and, though it was small, he got down on all fours and crawled in. Here at least was shelter from the storm. For he had blundered upon a partly buried tomb of a nobleman of earlier times which had been broken into and opened up by robbers seeking gold. Now for Meryt the open tomb meant safety and escape from death. Here he stayed. Coughing and choking he crouched down, but a vague fear of something on beyond kept him near the entrance.

It was not long before he heard sounds coming nearer, and his heart began to beat hard, caught between two fears—the fear of the unknown men and of the tomb beyond him. But he crawled back a little farther and kept still. Then, outlined against the sky at the entrance of the tomb, he saw three men, their faces buried in their hands, evidently driven like himself to seek shelter from the storm. In the dark Meryt could not be seen, and he made no sound. And in a few moments the men, who came and seated themselves within reach of his arm, began to talk. At first he had difficulty in understanding them, for two of them were evidently Libyans speaking the Egyptian tongue with difficulty. Soon he was holding back his breath in his body while he listened with all his might. For these men were outlining a plot against the Pharaoh. Before the king could hear of it, they said, there was to be an uprising among bands of discontented slaves in the North aided by Libyans. Meryt, in spite of himself, shuddered.

"Hush!" one of the men said instantly, "was it a sound? Speak softly."

Another laughed—"And what sound here, unless old Khufu or Men-Kaura turning in his tomb?"

"Aye," said the first, "yet when we talked by the watercourses at the Fayum, remember how Meryt-Nefer overheard us."

"Aye, aye," the second man made answer, "and remember how Meryt ended his days. Never will his Ka enjoy a secure dwelling place in Meryt’s body, nor will he build a tomb to prolong his name."

Then young Meryt had need of all his self-control, for anger and fear almost undid him. But some instinct saved him. He must keep still and listen and know all they had to say, until with the morning the chance would come to spread the alarm and work his own revenge. So all through the long night he held himself still, never stirring or sleeping. After some dispute as to what were the lucky days for starting such an enterprise, the men slept. But before it was really light they were out and moving off across the desert. Meryt, as soon as he dared, started to follow after them, but just at the opening of the tomb something bright caught his eye. It was a gold bracelet belonging to one of the men. Picking it up, he hurried on to make his way to Hordedef.

In a moment he stopped, held by a wonderful sight. Rising majestic from out of its bed of sand was the Great Sphinx, its face aglow as it looked toward the rising sun. To Meryt it seemed sublime. It seemed as if it were a god, and as if this great being were there in answer to his need, and he fell down on his face before it in worship. But only a moment was he there, when a sound startled him, and beside him, he saw an old, old man with shaved head and a long skirt like a priest’s. "What do you here, my son?" the old man asked.

"I seek one Hordedef, who knows all things."

"Aye, aye," another voice made answer before the old man could speak, and, as if rising out of the ground, three men came from the other side of the Sphinx. Meryt’s face turned white and his hand went to the dagger in his belt. They were his three men. But no one noticed him, for the old man was saying: "And Hordedef is here. I am he." One of the men quickly replied by asking him which were the lucky days, which one the best for beginning an affair of importance. But even as he spoke, another of the men noticed the bracelet in Meryt’s hand.

"Whence had you this?" he cried, and swooped upon the boy.

"Murders!" cried Meryt, reckless in his anger. "Slayers of my father! There in the tomb I had it, where you made your plot against the Pharaoh and told how you had killed my father."

A WOODEN BOAT This wooden boat in miniature is like the large boats used on the Nile 4000 years ago, which had both oars and sails. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

With one accord the three men, forgetting Hordedef, rushed upon Meryt, each with his dagger in hand, but Hordedef stepped between and by a gesture held them off. Deliberately raising his arms to the sky, he muttered strange words, words of magic, and the men, as if already spellbound, stopped in their tracks. So for a moment the old man stood with his hands to the sky, and then dropped them toward the men, as if actually placing upon their heads the curse he was calling down on them. "Go," he commanded in low, vibrant tones; "the curse of Set be on you. I see the boy speaks the truth. Go! and he that goes by the river, him shall the crocodile eat, and he that goes by the desert, the vulture shall feed upon his bones, and whoever escapes these two, him shall a worse fate overtake." Before he had finished, the men had fled, covering their heads with their hands, as if so they could keep off the magician’s curses.

A CLIFF TOMB OF AN EGYPTIAN NOBLE Such tombs as this, cut out of solid rock, were built in Egypt 4000 years ago. (From Breasted, "Ancient Times")

Then Meryt told Hordedef all, and together they went by boat up the river, warning the king’s officers on the way, until at last they came to the city of the Pharaoh. Hordedef, the magician, was always welcome at the court of the king, and he brought Meryt to the king to tell his own story. And though the Pharaoh wanted to give him a rich reward, the only thing Meryt would have was permission to go with the fighting men to punish the rebels and to avenge his father. So armed with bow and arrows he went with the others, and though he was no soldier, he took part in the fight and did bravely. Because he was no soldier, things went hard with him, and he was wounded in the leg. But he was brought back to the court, and the Pharaoh had him cared for by his own physicians so that Meryt recovered, though always after that he went lame. The king honored him, putting a beautiful necklace about his neck and giving him in marriage one of the princesses of the court. And he sent him to be under his chief builder, so that Meryt might learn to construct tombs and temples, until in time he became builder to the king. Yet before he gave himself over to the Pharaoh’s work, Meryt begged one favor—that the king would allow him to make first a tomb for his father and a statue to be placed in it. And not only did the Pharaoh give him permission but treasure too to aid him in the work. And Meryt hewed out a rock tomb and set up pillars before it, and inside he put a statue of granite made in his father’s likeness. So the spirit of his father had at last a tomb to rest in, and at the festivals Meryt brought him offerings of food. And through all his life he honored his father’s memory and caused his name to live.

Megacles and His Two Ambitions

THE GREEK SCULPTOR

The room was warm, the sunlight was very bright, and no sound except the drowsy humming of bees came from outside to interrupt the boys at their lessons. The cries from the agora had stopped, the unshaded streets were empty, and even the statues of the gods seemed to sleep. Megacles yawned. He was tired of tracing on his wax tablet the letters of the master's copy: Gnothi seauton, "Know thyself," while the wax ran together and filled up his efforts. Such soft wax was meant for better uses, and he scraped off a bit and began pinching it, though with an eye to the master, who, however, seemed busy listening to Lysicrates thumbing his lyre. He pinched and shaped; and first came a man's head, then a little pointed beard—unfortunately there was scarcely wax enough for shoulders, but he made eyes, ears, a nose and mouth. The task was absorbing, and everything else forgotten. "Megacles," the master's voice spoke sharply, "thine exercise! Come, fetch it here." Of course, standing before the master with his unfinished exercise, Megacles was scolded well and warned that if it were not done tomorrow he would bear the penalty. The penalty! Every boy's back knew the smart of that. Yet one more look Megacles gave to his little man and promised himself that tomorrow he would bring clay from his father's studio. For Simonides, Megacles' father, was a sculptor, and from babyhood it had been the boy's chief interest to sit and watch his father at work.

He was only nine years old now; only nine years ago it was that the olive branch had been tied to the door of Simonides' house as a sign of a boy's birth, and the nurse had run around the blazing fire on the family hearth carrying the baby in her arms, and friends and relatives had brought presents and come to eat a cake on the day when the boy's name was given him. A happy child he had been, with many toys and a nurse who told him Æsop's old, old stories of the fox and the raven and the lion and the mouse. But the happiest days had been those in the studio, and often he had kept still for hours, while in absorbed interest he watched the clay take shape under his father's hands until he could recognize his own face even as he had seen it in his mother's bronze mirror.

AN ATHENIAN SCHOOL IN THE AGE OF PERICLES These scenes are painted around the center of a shallow bowl, hence their peculiar shape. In A  we see at the left a music teacher seated at his lyre, giving a lesson to the lad seated before him. In the middle sits a teacher of reading and literature, holding an open roll from which the boy standing before him is learning a poem. Behind the boy sits a slave who brought him to school and carried his books. In B  we have at the left a singing lesson, aided by the flute to fix the tones. In the middle the master sits correcting an exercise handed him by the boy standing before him, while behind the boy sits the slave as before. (From Breasted, "Ancient Times")

But those days were over, and at nine he was a boy in school. Each morning at sunrise his pedagogue called him from bed and hurried him off to school, following behind him with his books and never leaving him all day. As they went through the city streets, all astir even at this hour, they caught the cries of the market people in the agora: "Buy fish!" "Buy oil!" "Buy charcoal!" They passed dignified citizens wrapped in cloaks and followed by slaves. Megacles saluted each one gravely. As they neared the Acropolis, they heard the din of hammer and chisel, the shouts of command and the straining of the men at work, for here before their eyes great temples were being built and statues of the gods rising in their places.

SMALL TERRA COTTA FIGURE OF A BARBER Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Regretfully Megacles left it all behind to enter the school, where only too surely a flogging awaited him, For he had brought the clay, and his writing was put aside while once again he began to work and pinch. This time the figure grew to a whole man seated, and then another bending above him: a barber at work with his shears—just such a scene as he had passed that morning. And so again the master's voice caught him; and again he had to produce his exercise untouched since yesterday. The master frowned with his shaggy brows and with his eyes searched him all through. "The thing with which thy hands have been busy,—go fetch it at once!" There it was: the little clay barber was held up for the whole school to laugh at, while Megacles hung his head as he stood waiting. Greek schoolmasters never spared the rod, and Megacles suffered all that day in his body. But he suffered too in mind, for the master had kept his toy,—his unfinished toy which like a good workman he wanted to complete and to take away from ridicule. And so all day while he tried to do the tiresome writing, he was comforting himself by repeating: "Laugh now, old thick-wits, but some day I will show you!" For Megacles intended to follow after his father and be a great sculptor some day. And he never guessed that that night the master showed his toy to Aristides, Megacles' uncle, saying, "Regard it! the very stoop of the shoulders, the way we all cringe under the shears, has he not caught it? Is he not already a worthy son of Simonides?"

A BOY PLAYING ON A CITHARA This is a marble figure of a boy on the side of a Greek altar of the fifth century B.C. The cithara had strings like a small harp and was played with a pick or plectrum. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

In spite of such beginnings Megacles learned to read and write; he also learned by heart long rolls of Homer's poems; by playing on the cithara, he trained his spirit in love of harmony and beauty, and in the wrestling schools he developed his body. He learned too to sing and dance. And one day at home he was dancing and chanting some verses of Homer, to the accompaniment of his sister's flutes, when Aristides, his uncle, came in. Aristides was a man of fortune and now doubly prominent in the life of Athens, for he had undertaken to train the chorus for a drama. For this was the season of the Dionysiac festival, when for three days dramas were played before the people of Athens to see which play the judges would declare was the best. And for each play there was a chorus, trained at the expense of one of the citizens. Aristides was full of interest in his new work. He caught sight of the dancing children as he was on his way to see Simonides, who was just beyond, in the studio, and he called out, "Good day. What, have we a dancer here? Come, let me borrow thy lad, Simonides. Why should he not go with me tomorrow to the play? Mark my words! It is worth his remembrance,—a chorus well-trained, even I must admit," he laughed good-naturedly, "and Sophocles' lines are not those doomed to perish with the day. If these make him not immortal, then am I no judge of tragedy."

THEATER OF DIONYSUS Here the great plays of Sophocles were given, while the people sat on the hillside, or in later times on seats placed like these in a circle. The seats for the chief men were at the front. (From Robinson and Breasted, "History of Europe, Ancient and Medieval")

So it came about that the next morning at sunrise, Megacles with his uncle was swept into the great stream of people that was setting toward the theater on the edge of the Acropolis hill. Men, women, and children were on their way there, many like Megacles and Aristides wreathed with ivy, many carrying baskets of eatables, for they had come to spend the day,—all in holiday dress and mood, pouring into the vast semicircle of benches that climbed the hillside. Near the front, in a seat of importance, sat Megacles with his uncle. The excitement was intense. There was the interest and wonder about what the play would be, but besides, since this play was one of three in the competition between the tragedies, there was also the great question of the prize at the end. To whom would the judges give the prize as the best writer of a tragedy? Which actor would they reward, which trainer of a chorus? The great throng was seated and ready, when only a moment after sunrise the chorus stepped into its place, an actor appeared on the wooden stage, and the play began. Would the audience listen to it gladly, or would they pelt the actor with figs and howl down the lines? It was the question of only a moment. In an instant all were held by the great lines of the drama, for this was Sophocles' tragedy of King Œdipus.

ŒDIPUS AND THE SPHINX This is a painting on a Greek amphora, or jar, made in the fifth century B.C. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

The story was well known: King Laius of Thebes was warned by an oracle that his own son would cause his death, and so when his boy, Œdipus, was born, he had him taken to the mountains and left there to die. Kind shepherds found the child and took him to the king of Corinth who brought him up as his son. But when Œdipus was a man grown, he heard the fate which the oracle had prophesied about him. Supposing that of course the king of Corinth was his father, he left Corinth lest somehow unknowingly he should kill the king, his father. With a few followers he journeyed away, until in a narrow path he met an old man whose attendants quarreled with his attendants over the right of way. In the struggle Œdipus by accident killed the old man. Going on to Thebes, he was, like everyone else, halted by the Sphinx with her riddle: What creature is it that in the morning goes on four legs, at noon on two and in the evening on three? "Man," Œdipus replied, "who as a baby crawls on all fours, in his strength walks erect on his two feet, and in old age must use a cane." So he solved the riddle of the Sphinx and in shame the monster put an end to herself; and the rejoicing citizens of Thebes asked Œdipus to become their king in the place of their king Laius who had just been killed, while away on a journey. So Œdipus was made king and married the queen, and all seemed happy until it became apparent that the gods were displeased with the city. The reason was that the city was sheltering the murderer of King Laius. Instantly Œdipus did everything in his power to find who the murderer was, swearing that, no matter who was guilty, he would not be spared the hardest punishment. At last proof was brought only too clearly that Œdipus himself was the wrongdoer, for the old man whom he had killed on his journey was Laius, King of Thebes and his own father. And so unsuspecting he had fulfilled the fate foretold by the oracle. Then, though he had acted innocently and without knowing what he did, Œdipus cruelly punished himself as he had said he would punish whoever was guilty. He put out both eyes, left the city and went into banishment for the rest of his days.

As the actors unfolded the story of the tragedy, deeper and deeper fell the hush upon the listening audience, except at moments when in response to the singing or the wailing of the chorus, the whole assembly swayed and sighed as if a wind was sweeping over the strings of a lyre. To Megacles it was the greatest moment of his life, and when at the end he walked quietly back from the theater beside his uncle, he seemed to himself not the same boy who had so lightly set out in the morning. For questions were repeating themselves over and over in his mind, one especially: Why must the king suffer for a wrong that was no fault of his? It was too big a question for a boy to answer, and he turned to his uncle. "Why did Œdipus do it?" he asked, "why punish himself for what he could not help?"

"Do you not remember the story of Heracles," Aristides answered, "how, when because of his great strength he unwittingly killed his music master, Linus, he was sent away to live in the mountains alone with the shepherds? So must it always be, for good intentions do not hold back the dire effects of evil done."

But Megacles was not satisfied. "It is not fair," he murmured. "Is  it fair for the gods to cause the evil and then to punish for it?"

"Tut, tut, 'for who can understand the will of the gods?' " his uncle quoted. "But no, it was not only because the gods willed it, but because Œdipus wanted to punish himself that he did it. For how could he face the light of the sun and live happily in the midst of his fellows when with his own hand he had killed his father? Only if he suffered too, could he find peace. It was the easier way for him. Such things thou canst not understand as yet, my lad."

A turning-point in Megacles' life had now come, for he left the school to take up with special masters the study of rhetoric and general culture, and to train his body on the gymnasium. And in stepping from childhood, as it were, over the threshold of youth, he began work again guided by the familiar legend (this time cut over the doorway of the gymnasium), "Know thyself." Earnestly Megacles set to work to train every part of himself to be as strong and perfect as possible, for in addition to the Greek's usual love of clean, vigorous manhood he had before him a growing hope, a hope only a little less dear to him than his other ambition of becoming a sculptor. For already while in the boys' wrestling schools he had twice, once when ten years old and again when he was fourteen, won the boys' boxing match in the great games at Olympia. These were the games in which the whole of Greece shared, and his opponents had been the best boy-boxers of Argos and Thebes. And if at the next festival, just before he became an ephebus  and left boyhood behind, he could win the boys' boxing match again, he would be victor of all Greece, his name would ring through the whole land, statues and poems would be made in his honor, and he could bring glory to his family and city. So he worked with a will.

AN ATHLETE AND HIS TRAINER This is a Greek painting on a large drinking-cup. The boy holds in his hands jumping weights. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

He was sixteen, and a boy of great beauty. "See him!" "There he goes!" "Ah! a new one!" "How beautiful!" so the older men cried, as they came daily to the gymnasium and watched him among the other boys at their training. And because to an unusual degree he was beautiful as well as strong, and because his fellows and the men of the city too began to look forward to the contest at Olympia, he became a great favorite. Men after their dinners, as they drank their wine mixed with water, raised their kylixes and toasted him. But Megacles was not spoiled, for his life was too much taken up by work and drill and routine, by the slow, hard building up of endurance and courage. And as he felt his chest broaden and saw his muscles strengthen and grow firm and supple, as he watched the swift, clean sweep of his arm when he hurled the discus, something of the reverence that he had felt as a child for his father's statues came to him now for his own body. And so, in shaping his body in all modesty to become as fit as possible, he tasted beforehand something of the joy of the sculptor who makes bodies of marble, and over and over he promised himself, "What I make now in my own body in flesh and sinew, I shall yet some day make come true in bronze and marble." So his two ambitions went hand in hand as he grew to manhood.

At last the midsummer came which brought the Olympic games, and Megacles with the other competitors went ahead to receive from the trainers at Olympia their last lessons. Then through all Greece went three heralds announcing the truce of Zeus, bidding the people everywhere drop their wars and quarrels and come to the sacred festival of the god. On every road the crowds came surging; hucksters with their wares, men and boys on foot, citizens of importance in chariots and officers from the different cities in gorgeous dress. But just before they reached Olympia, Megacles with the other athletes had left the town to go to the sacred fountain of Piera to offer a sacrifice and to purify themselves; at least all had gone who like Megacles could answer to the solemn charge of the trainers: "If you have exercised yourself in a manner worthy of the Olympic festival, if you have been guilty of no slothful or ignoble act, go on with a good courage. You who have not so practiced, go whither you will."

The great day came, the day that Megacles had been looking forward to for so long, the day of the boys' games. Though the sun was hot and there were no seats and though dust and thirst beset them, the spectators, eager and expectant, were ready and willing to stand for hours. Under the blue skies, surrounded by the temples and statues of the gods, the crowds gathered in the stadium. Then the procession entered: first came the trainers, splendid in their purple robes and with garlands on their heads, and then the athletes followed. The boys had already taken their oath to use no unfair means against each other to gain victory. Before each event a herald stepped out to proclaim the contestants.

BOXERS This is a Greek painting on a bowl. The boxers have wound around their hands heavy leather thongs. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

"Megacles," he announced, "son of Simonides, from the noble city of Athens, age, seventeen, contest, boxing; against him, Astylus, the son of Callippus, from the mighty city of Sparta, age, seventeen." The boys stepped into the ring, and each wound on his hands the leather thongs of the boxer—Megacles, lithe, straight and alert, Astylus, heavy and strong. The trumpet blew; the time was come. Astylus rushed forward, strong and sure, ready to strike with both his hands, but Megacles dodged and dealt him a quick blow on the chin; then, head down, Astylus drove into him, but again Megacles parried his thrust and hit him on the ear and cheek. Back and forth the blows fell; there was to be no easy victory. Now with his great strength Astylus seemed sure to crush Megacles; then Megacles, agile and unwearied, hit fast and clean, until the baffled Astylus caught Megacles' left hand in his and held him securely, while with his powerful right fist he swung upward, this time to give a final blow. A rush of anger blinded Megacles; this was against the rule, the unfair thing that each had sworn not to do. In a flash he struck out, hit Astylus on the head, snatched himself free, and saw Astylus drop. For a moment the Spartan lay still, while the crowd waited breathless; then his hand was held up in the signal of defeat. Megacles was victor.

The blare of the herald's trumpet told it, and the onlookers cheered and shouted, and Megacles decked his head with fillets of wool. But the unconscious Astylus had to be carried from the field. Then the chief trainer crowned Megacles with a wreath of sacred olive, and the crowds showered him with flowers as they cheered. For Megacles was now three times a winner. A statue would be raised in his honor in the street of the victors, and the great Pindar himself promised an ode to his name. But that evening at the banquet as the songs were being sung, whispers passed from mouth to mouth, and Megacles heard them too. Astylus was still lying unconscious, ill either from the blow which Megacles had given him or from overexerting himself, because he had been bound to win at any cost. With the crowd it did not matter, for it was one of the chances of the games; worse things than that had happened before and would doubtless happen again. But for Megacles the feast was done. He hurried from the room distressed to think that he might have injured another boy even in fair play; and though he knew that no blame rested upon him, the truth remained that Astylus was hurt and for the time being unable to take his part with the other boys, while he himself was well and free.

There was no time left him for thought, however, for in a few days he would be eighteen, and with other boys of his age he must go back to Athens to start upon his military training and to give himself for two years to the service of the state. As if in a dream he poured his libation at the temple to Heracles, put on his military dress, and took the oath not to disgrace his arms or to desert his comrades. Now for two years he was the servant of the state, one year serving at garrison duty in the city, and the next defending the frontiers. He did his duties like the others, but wherever he went a shadow seemed to have fallen upon his spirits. His companions noticed it and questioned what was the matter with Megacles, the pride of them all. While they joked, he sat silent. For he was seeing before him Astylus' white face, or he was hearing in his ears the wailing of the chorus in the Œdipus tragedy, and remembering again his uncle's words: "Only if Œdipus—suffered too . . ." Megacles was no longer light of heart like the other boys, but he was working on hard problems, problems too big for a boy of his age to settle, problems of right and wrong, of what was the will of the gods and what work was worthy of a man's devotion.

When the end of the two years came and the other ephebi  went back to Athens to taste their freedom and revel and feast, he could not, for a time, bring himself to go with them. But as Heracles and Œdipus had done, he took himself off to the mountains. He understood now why they had wanted to be by themselves. He too wanted to think over quietly what were the things he cared about and what he should do. Among the mountains he wandered with the shepherds and his lyre and his thoughts for company. And soon the animals were not afraid as he passed, and the trees and flowers seemed to speak to him. Sometimes as he played his lyre under a tree, it seemed as if a new music answered him,—a music, wild and strange, sad and sweet; and Megacles peered behind the tree, half expecting to see a goat's hoof or hear an elfish laugh, for surely such music could come only from the pipes of Pan. For living in the midst of superstitious shepherds, it was easy to see in the swaying trees and singing brooks fauns and dryads and the old woodland gods. Mystery was about him everywhere, too deep and too sweet to be questioned; until here mystery and the unknown ways of the gods began to seem a natural part of life, and as peace came to his mind, the love of beauty and of people filled his heart and brought back stronger than ever his old longing to carve a statue and become a sculptor. So he went to work on logs and blocks of wood, until at last he had succeeded in turning a fallen tree trunk into the likeness of man; and from that he went on making satyrs or shepherds out of tree trunks.

A HUNTER This painting on an oil-jug shows the wide hat, the cloak and high boots, worn by a man hunting or traveling. (Photograph furnished by the Musuem of Fine Arts, Boston)

One day, as he was at work modeling a shepherd boy, a hunter passed by and stood behind a tree watching him. Under Megacles' loving touch the wood was taking on form and beauty, and into the face of the figure which he was making he brought the look of the shepherd boy,—the look of one who lives face to face with the great mountains, who hears the woods whispering Nature's secrets and loves both the silence and the music of it all. It was not an ordinary piece of work, and the hunter, who happened to be an Athenian, recognized the rare quality of it. After talking with Megacles he was determined that Athens should not lose the promise of such a sculptor, and he went back to Pericles, the ruler of the state, to tell him what he had seen. So it was that Pericles sent a summons for Megacles to come to Athens, saying to him that there at home he must serve the state and the gods with his gift of sculpture.

THE ACROPOLIS IN ATHENS This is a restoration to show as nearly as possible how this famous hill looked after the age of Pericles

Just at the time of the Panathenaic festival, Megacles entered the city and came home. At once his old friends seized upon him and made him join the great procession that was even then forming in honor of Athena. Up the slopes of the Acropolis wound the procession: the cavalry in gay-colored coats, the victors in the Panathenaic games with wreaths on their heads, the city fathers, the stately maidens, and borne ahead of them all a ship on rollers, whose sail was the gorgeous embroidered yellow robe of the goddess. So in a scene of rejoicing and of honor to the gods, Megacles came back to his own, free now to set himself to making the sculpture which he loved.

Petronius and the Two-Faced Janus

THE ROMAN SOLDIER

The breeze blew fresh and sweet across the open stretches of the Campagna, the sky was blue, the sun was warm, and the whole earth seemed to dance with the joy of spring. It caught hold of little Petronius and sent him running as fast as his legs would carry him down the path from the villa to the little stream he loved, while after him went waddling his pet white goose. She was in great distress at having to hurry so, and her cackling complaints went traveling back on the breeze and warned the old nurse to come quickly after her baby. Petronius was scarcely six years old, but his delight when he was brought away from the city to the great, free places of his father's country place gave wings to his feet and filled his mind with a new idea for every minute. The slave women were kept busy.

Old Aspasia came stumbling after him, crying out frantically, for already she heard the sound of a little waterfall, and she knew that Petronius would not hesitate to plunge into the brook. Happily he waited a moment for his goose, and Aspasia caught him by the hand. "Naughty, what dost thou think to do?" He pointed to a little island in the stream, his favorite playground since he had discovered the slippery stepping-stones that led to it. So the old woman had to guide him across while the goose swam.

A ROMAN CHILD OF THE TIME OF AUGUSTUS Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The stream was the boundary on one side of his father's country place, and beyond was rough, unoccupied country. Until today the little island had always been a dull place to Aspasia and the goose, but today there was something new on the stones. Petronius made a dash toward it. It seemed like a bundle of clothes but as he pulled at it, suddenly a wee baby lay there before his eyes. Aspasia jumped and caught up the child in her arms.

"Alas, alas!" she cried, "poor baby, what is this? Thy father would not lift thee in his arms? Thou art cast out?" For Aspasia knew well what it meant when a baby was abandoned in such a place. Some cruel father had not wanted the little child, and so had not taken him in his arms when he was born, as Marcus Petronius had joyfully taken his little son; and according to the Roman law, if a father did not want his child, he might have him cast away in some lonely place to live or die as chance might be.

"A little boy, too," Aspasia was murmuring, "and nicely wrapped about with fine wool. Ah, Petronius, rejoice, rejoice indeed, that thou hast that about thy neck." She pointed to the gold bulla  shining in the sun, the little charm to guard him from all evil that his father had hung about his neck on the day when he was given his name.

Petronius was tremendously excited and began tugging at the slave's tunic to draw her to the house. But Aspasia shook her head. "I dare not,—who knows? Thy mother will not want to trouble with him, even to gain thereby another slave. No, we must leave the baby." Petronius did not care what she said; off he flew, up the path to the garden where his mother was reclining, fanned by two slaves while a third read to her from the poets. He clutched at his mother's stola, crying wildly, "Veni, veni"  (come, come), and his excitement was so great that she went with him. She had a tender heart and when she saw the tiny baby, sweet and clean and crying piteously, and heard her own little son's pleading for his new plaything, she could not resist them. She bade one of the slaves take the child and care for him. So he was kept and brought up in the slaves' quarters, and he was called Perditus, the lost one. From the beginning he belonged to Petronius, and Petronius was given the only thing found with the baby, a curious little bronze lamp of fine workmanship which had on it a picture of a two-faced god, Janus, the god of beginnings.

"But why two faces?" demanded Petronius.

"He sees both ways, does Janus, the beginning and the end, good and bad things, and mostly bad," Aspasia answered; and added, "Always war, war. Rome making war upon us all." For the old slave woman was a Greek made captive in one of the wars in the East. "And does Janus make the wars begin?" Petronius asked. "No," old Aspasia shook her head, "it is the wicked men who are always fighting, fighting, stealing and killing; they are the ones who make the wars and keep the gates of Janus open."

"What gates?" asked Petronius.

"In Rome," she answered, "and some day thou wilt see them. They say they never will be closed while men make war. Cruel, cruel race," she muttered, "I would I could see those gates shut and no more slaves brought to Rome."

Not understanding, but wondering what it all meant, little Petronius put these things away in his mind.

It was not long afterwards, when the family went back to Rome, that he had a chance to see what the old nurse meant. For his father took him to the Forum, once the market place and now the center of all that happened in Rome. There were the temples of the gods and the open meeting place of the people and the hall in which the senate sat. His father was in great good humor and pointed out men and buildings to his son, as if he were really old enough to care about them and remember. "There is the House of the Vestals," he said, "the Vestals who keep always burning the sacred fire of the state, and so they keep Rome safe. And there is the fountain where the Heavenly Twins, Castor and Pollux,—thou knowest them,—watered their horses after the battle. And yonder there is the temple of Janus, whose faces are on thy lamp."

At that Petronius remembered Aspasia's talk of the gates. "Janus? with the two faces? where?" he asked, and his father showed him a building like a big gateway with bronze doors wide open, and he told his little son again what the nurse had told him, that those doors were open and would stay open as long as wars went on. "I want to see them shut," the little fellow said. "Let's tell them to shut them so we can see." His father laughed and shook his head. "Octavius, who is our only hope, Octavius, whom thou art going to see, he alone can do that. And who knows?" he added. "Perhaps he may accomplish even that. We must wait. But come now, and thou shalt see."

THE ROMAN FORUM ABOUT THE TIME OF AUGUSTUS The Sacred Way passed the little circular temple of Vesta (A)  and reached the Forum at the Arch of Augustus (B), and the Temple of the Deified Julius Cæsar (C). Beyond this, across the old Forum Market Place (F), was the new Senate House (G)  planned by Julius Cæsar. The Temple of Janus was to the left nearer the river. (From Breasted, "Ancient Times")

They went to the curia, or senate house, and while Marcus Petronius, who was a senator, went inside, he left his son on the porch of the curia  with a slave, telling him to watch. No one but the senators might go inside, but through the open door Petronius saw many men dressed in pure white togas and seated on benches, and gathered together at one end trophies taken in the wars from conquered peoples. It seemed very solemn to the boy. Then there was a noise as all the senators rose in their places. He looked to see what it meant, and there, nearing the steps of the curia, was a young man with twelve men ahead of him, each carrying a bundle of rods with an ax head in the middle. "The new consul, Octavius, and the twelve lictors," the slave whispered to him. The young man was rather small and a little lame, and he seemed timid, yet he came on resolutely. Something about him pleased the little Petronius, and he called out, "Salve!"  (hail), but the slave bade him hush. Before the young man went inside he stopped to ask the augurs if all was well, for no public meeting was held in Rome without finding out whether the gods approved, and the augurs alone could tell this. They watched a piece of the sky, and when a bird flew across to the right, they assured him that it was a good sign and that the senate had the good will of the gods that day. Then the young man went in, and Petronius saw no more of him. But when his father came home that night he said eagerly, "Thou didst see him, carissime?  And didst mark him well? That was Octavius, the hope of Rome. Forget him not." Impressed by his father's excitement and his own memory of the young man's face, Petronius did not forget, though no one could have told him then that he had looked on the man who was to be Imperator Augustus, the greatest emperor of Rome.

THE EMPEROR AUGUSTUS Augustus is shown in his war dress,—the short tunic, the metal breastplate and the cloak thrown over his arm. Cupid is at his feet

That was a memorable day for a little boy, but after it he went back to Perditus and old Aspasia and to the learning of lessons with his mother, for it was from her that he learned to read and to speak his Latin carefully; and from her he came to know the stories of the gods and Rome, of Romulus and Remus, Vesta, Janus and the great Jove. But when he was seven, his mother gave him into his father's keeping, for now she had his baby sister to care for, and it was time that Petronius should learn a boy's lessons from his father. His father was a great man and had once been a friend of Cæsar's. He knew many people and was busy with many affairs; yet he liked to take his son with him of a morning when he walked to the Forum or to have him at his side in the atrium  of his house when clients came to do business or friends came to talk with him, and he taught Petronius to know them all by name.

But as he himself was so busy, he hired a learned Greek called Hieron to teach Petronius; and other boys, sons of his friends, took lessons with him. Hieron taught them to write on a wax tablet with a sharp-pointed stylus such letters as some day one of them might need to write if he became governor of a province; and he taught them to do sums by pushing beads on the abacus and to figure with the difficult Roman numerals. Also they learned by heart the Twelve Tables of the Law. Petronius was fond of school, and he was always ready when very early in the morning Perditus came to fetch his books and to go with him to the schoolroom.

A FINE OLD ROMAN Who this Roman is no one knows, but it is a true portrait of a man who lived about the time of Julius Cæsar or of Augustus. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

But when summer came he was even more ready to leave school and home to go to his father's villa. There the days were full of happy sights and sounds: the bees swarming in and out of their hives, the slaves cutting the yellow grain or gathering apricots, pears or figs, the doves strutting about or cooing softly to each other, the peacocks proud of their beauty. And when the hot rays of the sun beat fiercely upon their hilltop, he and Perditus would slip away while the rest of the household was taking its noontime siesta, and would go to the little brook where Perditus had been found. There they would dip and swim and play in and out of the water for hours together.

So the years went on until he was old enough to be sent to the school of the grammaticus, the school where he learned grammar, rhetoric and oratory, and to read Greek and the writings of his own countrymen, so that he might be fitted to become a great man like his father. Always, too, there was enough of gymnastics and exercise to make him strong against the time when he should become a soldier. For though his father had not yet decided on his career, Marcus Petronius expected that like most young Romans his son would join the army for a time. Great was his surprise to find that Petronius himself had definite ideas to the contrary.

It was on the day when all the family were gathered near the Palatine Hill for the ceremony of the casting of the lots to choose a Vestal Virgin. With his father and mother Petronius was there because his sister Julia was one of the little girls of noble family from whom the priest was to choose the new Vestal. It was a sad and solemn moment: a great crowd was there, filling the open spaces and crowding up the steps of the temple. All were looking toward the twenty little girls standing on one side, very young and very beautiful. Petronius, like his parents, felt proud that Julia was thought worthy to be one of them, but at the same time he was distressed and afraid that they were going to lose her. So he watched anxiously, when the Pontifex Maximus, the Chief Priest, with veiled head went to an urn in which were twenty slips of paper, each with the name of a girl upon it. He saw him put in his hand, take one out and when he had read the name walk straight toward Julia. "Amata," he said, "I take thee for a priestess for Vesta to fulfill the sacred rites." Then he put his hand on her head and drew her apart. Julia was chosen. She must go to the House of the Vestals, and there her hair would be cut and a white dress put on her in sign that she had been given to the service of the state to guard the sacred fire which made sure the safety of Rome. It was a great honor and she would have many privileges, but it meant that, little girl though she was, she must leave home. A sob caught in her mother's throat and little Julia gave a piteous glance at her family, but, even with the child, Roman pride came to her help, and she went quietly off. As Petronius, on his way home, passed through the Forum he paid little attention to the temples, for somehow he felt angry with the gods and with Rome itself. What right had they to steal his little sister? But his father was speaking to him. "Here is thy god Janus, son. Still another beginning he sees today." He sighed heavily. "And next time it will be thou. Aye, his doors as ever are wide open, and so soon thy mother and I must bid thee too, vale  [farewell], and send thee off to fight for Rome."

"No," said Petronius, quickly, "I do not wish to go and fight. Let them close the gates of Janus. In other ways will I serve the state." His mother, amazed, turned and looked at him, and she spoke with both relief and scorn, "What! A Roman! And he does not wish to fight!"

MARS This fine statue shows Mars, the war god, at his best. His thoughts are not now on war, for Cupid is playing at his feet

But his father smiled wisely. "It is Hieron and old Aspasia,—they put notions in his head. These Greeks, quite naturally, love not war. But now from the grammaticus  he will learn better things; all the more surely since his new master is a freedman of Octavius and a former teacher of our great triumvir. He will guide our son more wisely and teach him many things."

Petronius did learn many things in the school and gained many honors, and at the end of his schooldays when a debate was set by the master with a prize for the winner, he was chosen to be one of the debaters. It happened that the subject which the master gave was "War and Peace," but no one was willing to speak for Peace. At last Petronius said he would take the unpopular side, since how else could there be a debate! And the prize anyway was for the better argument, not for the better cause. His father felt sorry, but like the other parents he and Petronius' mother went to the school to hear the boys, and a big audience was gathered together.

Petronius was pitted against young Horatius, a fiery, energetic boy with a resounding voice and bold manner. Petronius himself, now nearly seventeen, was tall and slender, full of grace and vigor too, strong in voice and look and will. They argued back and forth, and both boys spoke well. It went better than the usual school debate, and parents and boys became eager and excited. Petronius had the closing speech. Horatius had ended by picturing the glory of Rome when war should have made her "mistress of the world, queen from sea to sea, the guardian of all lands beneath the sun and the darling of the gods." Then Petronius, with white face, rose and spoke, and when he came to his closing sentences his voice was low and earnest.

"Great Janus looks two ways," he said. "With one face he looks towards Mars, the war god, and with the other toward Pax, the goddess of peace. Many worship Mars, for he brings riches and fame; few follow Pax, and those who do are too often those who love idleness, ease, and are cowards at heart. These make peace hateful. And because of them as well as because of those who love to fight, the doors of Janus are kept open. And they will stay open until there comes a man strong and brave enough,"—he paused, and into his memory there flashed the face of the young Octavius. Then, as he went on, his voice was hushed, as if in prophecy. "Perhaps even now he is at hand, rising over the horizon of the state to light the world, a man brave and wise enough to love the state better than fame or plunder. He will know well the arts of war and how to wage it, but he will love better the arts of peace, sculpture, poetry and justice. He will seek not only to conquer lands but the minds of men. Then Rome will be not only mistress of the earth, but mistress of herself, secure in her people's hearts. Then at last two-faced Janus can shut his gates. Would that we might see it!"

Petronius sat down. The audience rustled and whispered; a few were pleased; the boys were openly disgusted. But the master whose business it was to give the prize sat still, thinking. At last he rose and, holding in his hand the roll or book which was the prize, said, "We are not here today to vote for war or peace, nor even to determine which we wish for. But we are here to decide who by the careful use of language, of rhetoric and eloquence has best put forth his case. Therefore to thee, Petronius, I award this book. Go forth from here and prove thyself worthy to follow, when that great sun of whom thou speakest shall indeed rise over our horizon."

"That was it; that was why he won, it was Octavius," the boys said to one another as they went out. "Peace! Great Jove, who wants peace? But Octavius!—say a good word for Octavius and you've fetched the master. Old toady! But what's Petronius thinking of to talk peace like that!"

The boys' feeling against him was plain, and Petronius was miserable. He could not know that the master was so pleased that he had at once sent a copy of his speech to Octavius, his old master; but even that would hardly have made up to him for losing the boys' good opinion. The hurt of it overshadowed everything; even the thought of the coming Liberalia  did not cheer him, though it was a most important festival for him, for then he was going to put on the toga virilis  and become a citizen. His father noticed his sadness and thought he understood it, and he was ready with his remedy when the great day came.

Early in the morning he and Petronius went to the altar of the Lares and Penates of the family. There Petronius took off his bulla, or charm against evil, that he had worn all these years and dedicated it to the household gods; then he exchanged the boy's toga with the purple stripe for the pure white toga such as men wore. That done, his father took him to the Forum, followed by a great crowd of friends and dependents, and there his name was written on the official list of the city. So he became a citizen of Rome. They went to the Capitoline Hill and offered a sacrifice before the temple of great Jove, and they made offerings of little honey-covered cakes to Bacchus, for in the streets old women crowned with ivy were selling them and calling to everybody to buy and honor the jolly Bacchus. The Liberalia  was his festival, and all the city made merry. At his father's house Petronius feasted with many friends. He tried to be gay, but his father saw his trouble.

THE PERISTYLE, OR COURT, OF A HOUSE AT POMPEII

When all the guests were gone, he called his son to him where he reclined on his couch. "My son," he said, "thou art sad, and why it is I understand. Thou dost not wish to go to join the army, and perhaps it is well. Thou art young yet, and thou art a good scholar. So for another year or two I have decided that thou shalt go to Athens to the University. Marcus Junius sends his son too. Thou shalt go with him." But Petronius shook his head. "I cannot go there," he said, "I wish to go to the wars."

His father sat up in amazement. "But I thought—Never—Always hast thou spoken against arms and fighting."

"It is for that reason that I must go to war. Would you have me marked for a coward? It is so men think of me now."

"Coward!" roared Marcus Petronius. "Who, thinkest thou, would dare call thee a coward? Art thou not my son? And in the games hast thou not over and over again shown thy strength and skill above others? Coward! Pfui!"

But as much as Petronius wanted to go to University, he would not be persuaded, though his father kept urging him to it. At last they agreed to drop the question for a time, hoping for something to settle it. Petronius was free to go about the city, to see and enjoy everything as all the young men did. He went to the Baths, but after his cold plunge and rubdown, when he walked about in the big hall, he felt the cold shoulder turned to him by the other boys. He went to the circus and saw the chariot races, and to the amphitheater, where like all Romans he became wild with excitement over the fights of the gladiators. Sometimes the gladiators fought each other in pairs, sometimes in groups as if it were a mimic battle, and Petronius loved the excitement of it. And yet he was often ashamed, fearing he was too soft-hearted. For when the moment came at the end of the fight when the people were asked to give the sign and turn down their thumbs if they wanted the defeated gladiator killed, he never could bring himself to turn down his thumb with the others. Was he a coward then? Was there no stern fighting stuff in him, no stuff to make a soldier of? The question went round and round in his head, until he felt that he could not stand it much longer.

CHARIOT AND HORSES

One day he went to the amphitheater and saw a gladiator die bravely without a quiver, and he found himself envying the man because at least in dying he had made good, and no man could call him a coward. He went out to the city gate and called to Perditus who was waiting with his chariot, and together they drove out upon the broad road leading to the Campagna. He drove so furiously that Perditus swayed on his feet, but Petronius was trying to beat the thoughts that were driving him still faster. What was he going to do? What was he going to do?

Suddenly ahead of him there was a great noise. A band of gladiators, broken loose from their training camp, were rushing riotously up the road. Nothing in their path was safe, and Petronius was just going to face about and make for the city gate and safety, when he saw coming toward him, between him and the rushing gladiators, a heavy carriage, hurrying as fast as the horses could go. It must be a woman in the carriage, and as Petronius looked again he saw a lictor ahead, and so knew it was a Vestal Virgin. At that he lashed his horses ahead and drove full speed. Passing the carriage he saw peering out the white face of the Vestal: it was not his sister, but he hurried on. It might be that by charging furiously into the band he could delay then and give her time to reach the gate. He pulled his dagger from his tunic, passed the whip to Perditus and shouted to him to lash the horses harder. So they charged the gladiators. The frenzied horses trampled or scattered some. Perditus answered for others with his whip, and Petronius, with one hand urging on the horses, with the other thrust before and behind with his dagger. The gladiators struck back with stones or bludgeons. But their ranks were broken up, some lay stunned, some dead, all were delayed, and as the chariot hewed its way through the last of them Petronius looked back and saw the carriage of the Vestal at the gate. She was safe. Petronius, however, was put to it to make his own escape, for the gladiators came after him, and one almost succeeded in jumping into the chariot, while the others dragged at the horses' heads or at him and Perditus. But the good beasts were savage now and, dashing off the gladiators, raced beyond them, and at last the chariot was clear of them all, safe and out of reach. It had been the work of a moment only, but both Petronius and Perditus were bruised, beaten, cut and almost lifeless. It was past nightfall when men and horses at last crawled back into the city.

The next day Rome was ringing with his praises, for the Vestal and lictor had recognized him and spread the story everywhere. Friends once cold came thronging to his house, magistrates and senators came to honor him, but Petronius was not there to see them. He had gone away at dawn. For that very night a summons had come from Octavius through his old teacher telling him to go and join the staff of one of the generals in the East. Petronius needed only to hear the message and he was off, for this was his chance. And he was no longer afraid of himself or of his courage. He knew at last that he could learn to become a good soldier, and that that for him now was the only way to earn peace for himself or for the state.

With his father's blessing he hurried away, but one last thing he did before he started. In the presence of his father and four of the household he declared Perditus a free man and in token of his freedom gave Perditus the only thing which could be said to belong to him,—the little bronze lamp with the two-faced Janus on it which had been wrapped up in his baby clothes. "For Perditus," he said, "thou makest now a new and better beginning." Perditus gladly put on his head the cap which was the sign of liberty, but he refused to part from Petronius and of his own accord went with him to the wars.

So, while the city hummed with their exploits Petronius and Perditus went on their way toward a life of danger and hardship, but both were happier than they had been since they played in the stream as children. Perditus was free in his body, and Petronius was free in his mind from all thoughts of fear and shame. For nearly three years he fought in the East, until Octavius won his great victory at Actium and went back to Rome to be made Imperator. Petronius rode behind him in his triumph, but for two years more he had to be away from Rome and still fight her battles.

But there came a day when everywhere throughout the Empire there was peace. With others of the generals, Petronius came home at the head of his legion. And then, because Rome was at last at peace and could turn to better and more useful things than war, Octavius ordered the gates of Janus to be closed. Petronius went to the Forum, and as with his own eyes he saw the great bronze doors shut he was happy. He was seeing the hope of his boyhood come true.

Yusuf and the Star of His Fate

The Saracen Scholar

"See that star! There yonder over the topmost of the Kara Dagh! Surely that is the star of his fate!"

"Hush! Let us watch it. Mark well its course. See what influences move it, which of the planets will draw it. Hush! Look well!"

Two old men were whispering to each other as they stood and gazed into the skies. All the rest of the world was asleep. And they, wrapped about in their long cloaks, were like two tiny black dots lost in the wide spaces of the night; their whispers only made the stillness greater. There was not even a breeze, the sheep lay fast asleep, the tents stood quiet, and the great mountains rose silent and black, with their high heads far away among the stars. The stars were clear and bright, sparkling to one another. As all night long they swung across the heavens, now alone, now side by side or in groups, it was as if they spoke together in the only voice or language there was in all the world. The two old men stood hour after hour watching them. At dawn, when the morning stars had sung together their last song, a little breeze crept up, the flowers waked, and the sheep shook themselves and Ayûb went to his tent door. But there was no one to be seen, for the old men had gone.

AN IMĀM A religious leader of the Mohammedans. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

As the sun rose over the mountains, Ayûb threw himself on the ground with his face toward Mecca, and he prayed to Allah with a new fervor: "Praise be to God, the Lord of creatures, the merciful and gracious. Thee we serve. . . . Lead us in the right way, the way of those to whom Thou hast shown mercy." Ayûb was happy. A new sound was rising from the earth that morning to greet the sun, a new baby's cry,—for in the night a son had been born to him. And it was because of the baby that old Ibrahim and Al-Kindi had been searching the face of the sky, trying to find out from the stars what his future was to be.

Ayûb was all impatience to know about it. And he wandered about restlessly until the old men should have cast the baby's horoscope with the help of the ancient writings, and should come to tell him what they had found. At last he saw them coming, their long camel's-hair cloaks wrapped about them and a kerchief, or Tailasân, over their turbans to protect their heads from the sun.

"Well come indeed are ye!" Ayûb greeted them and bowed low, and at the door of his tent placed rugs for them to sit upon. In spite of his impatience he ordered bowls of honeyed milk for their refreshment. Then at last he spoke, "Have pity, I pray. Forgive my haste, but tell me, will all be well with my son?"

Ibrahim of the long gray beard, the older of the two, answered, and slowly and carefully told him the meaning of the stars. At first the star of the child's life moved serenely on its way, he said, but then a stranger-influence crossed its path. It seemed without harm at first, but always it lurked close by, casting a threatening shadow. Sorrow or danger or both it meant, for alas! it was an evil influence; but what the end would be no man could tell.

Ayûb's face went white as the distant snow on the tops of the Kara Dagh, and when he tried to speak his tongue was dry as if he had come a long ride across the desert. "It is the will of Allah," he tried to say as usual, but he ended, "And there is then no escape?"

Al-Kindi answered him. "Evil is ever to be avoided, unless indeed it can be turned into good."

"But how avoid evil when one knows not even its name?"

"It is therefore that we speak to thee," Al-Kindi answered again.

"Ah, ye know it!" Ayûb exclaimed. "Tell me then its name!"

The two old men looked at each other, and each waited for the other. Finally Ibrahim spoke, "Know then, O Ayûb, that the star which crossed his path—alas, it is well known!—is the star that rose long since, the year when first the Franks defiled our land."

"The Franks!" Ayûb sprang to his feet. "The Franks! The cursed dogs! Tell me not that. Already my cup of hatred overflows."

The old men bowed their heads; they knew what good reason Ayûb had to hate the Franks. For the Franks had taken his father's flocks and herds and killed his brother and driven him to seek safety for his family in the East, far from the home of his people. For the Franks were the Crusaders who had come to win back from the Saracens the sacred places in the Holy Land. Seventy years before they had conquered Jerusalem and driven the infidel, as they called him, from the region, and still their king ruled over it and over many cities that had belonged to the Saracen caliph. And in these cities and along the coast they had destroyed many homes and killed many people.

Ayûb paced back and forth before his tent, his fingers clutching at the air, as he remembered these things and many more. "The Franks, the dogs of Franks!" he muttered. "Always because of them we are at war; because of them, prince Zangi was murdered in his sleep, and Nur-ud-din and the noble young Saladin risk their lives and the lives of all our youths in wars. But I swear it," he raised his hand to the sky, "my son shall not go to war. Since the stars have warned me, I shall keep him safe. He shall not fight the Frank. I will make him a wise man and a scholar. So shall we flee from fate."

The old men rose and held out their hands to him. "Wisdom is with thee. May Allah grant thee thy desire."

From that day on there was one idea in Ayûb's mind—to protect Yusuf, his little son, from the Franks. In these far-away mountains of the East he was at present safe, but Ayûb had already planned to leave these mountains and go back westward to settle again on his father's land. For now Nur-ud-din had retaken that country and driven the Franks farther off toward the coast. And Ayûb's soul longed for the house of his fathers. Yet, to be safe, he put off his going year by year until Yusuf was eight years old, and until noble Saladin, following after Nur-ud-din, had won still more victories.

Yusuf by that time had learned many things. He knew how to ride a horse as well as his father, and could help pitch a tent and pack a saddlebag. He could throw a spear and shoot an arrow, and already he loved to hunt the deer and even the wild panther with his father. One other lesson he was learning thoroughly,—to hate the Franks, or at least the Franks as he pictured them. For Ayûb kept talking to him about them. "Fear the Frank as thou wouldst fear Satan, the Evil One," he said over and over, "for he is a child of darkness and all his ways are black. Dread him like a panther in his fury, like a tiger whose claws drip blood. Allah's curse be on him and on his children after him! And thou, do thou beware! The very stars cry out to warn thee from him." So Ayûb painted the picture in the worst colors he could think of, until little Yusuf, without knowing it, was seeing a strange monster of a Frank. He saw him big and bony, with a broad panther-like face, cruel, and hung about with wild black hair. His hands had clawlike fingers red with blood, and he was black all over. He was black and fearsome-looking, like a strange man Yusuf had once seen when his father took him to town to one of the great fairs. He never told anyone of his picture of this demon-Frank of his; and all the time that he was half afraid of him he was half longing to see him, to find out what he would do.

HUNTING SCENE This is a Persian painting, or miniature, where things are not pictured realistically but yet give the fire of the chase and the charm of the landscape. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

For even at eight Yusuf was very brave; his life in the wild mountains and his riding and hunting had made him fearless beyond most boys of his age. On the day when they started on the long journey to the Lebanon Mountains his father gave him his own falcon to carry perched on his wrist to help him in the hunting. For on the way they had to stop constantly to hunt for deer and game to give themselves food. Yusuf was of course under orders never to go out of sight of his father or old Ismaîl, the herdsman, but one day when they were nearly at their journey's end he saw some creature and, forgetting orders and every thought of fear, he started after it up the mountainside, and before he knew it he was lost.

He stopped and looked about. He and his horse and falcon were alone in the strange mountains, and he did not know which way to turn. Suddenly his falcon gave a scream. There, bounding toward them, was a leopard. Yusuf tried all in a minute to unleash his falcon and reach for his bow. But his fingers shook. Already the leopard was close and about to spring at his horse's neck. Then an arrow whizzed through the air, and the leopard fell back, pierced through the head.

Yusuf looked up and saw a lone horseman. He was not one of their own band—he could tell that in an instant; and when the man came close to him, he saw that he was indeed some one very different. He had white skin like an angel and fair hair and blue eyes full of kindness. He wore a shirt of mail, as other men did, but over it was a long coat of silk covered with many golden crosses. Yusuf stared at him as if he had really dropped from heaven. But the man touched him to make sure he was unhurt and spoke to him in a deep pleasant voice, using his own language. "Hast thou any harm?" he said.

"No," Yusuf shook his head, and then stammered, "I—I did not see him. But for thy good arrow, my poor horse—I—I—it is a shame to me—My father—what would he say to me?"

The stranger smiled. "Are boys of thy race, then, expected to hunt alone even from their cradles?"

Yusuf shook his head. "It is my fault. I lost my way."

"As wiser heads than thine have done, as I am proof. Yet," the man looked at the dead leopard, "perchance God willed it so, or there might have been a brave boy the less. But come, shall we ride together and see if we can find thy father?"

A KING AND A KNIGHT This picture, made at the end of the twelfth century and taken from a manuscript in the British Museum, shows the dress of a Crusader, with the chain armor and the surcoat ornamented with crosses

They rode in what Yusuf thought the right direction, but for many long hours they saw nothing but the many wild flowers of the region, which delighted the stranger. Yusuf was growing tired and hungry when at last his companion stopped and took from his wallet some sort of biscuit, broke one and handed half to him. Also he gave him wine to drink from a flask. "So," he said with his pleasant smile, "having broken bread and drunk together we are no longer enemies, but friends. Christian and infidel, we are friends. Is it not so?"

For answer Yusuf ran off and gathered an armful of flowers,—cyclamen, anemones, daffodils growing wild in the mountains,—and thrust them into the man's hands. "For you," he said shyly, "for Yusuf's friend. And thank you for saving my horse."

"Surely a brave, fine lad," the man murmured in his own language. "I would I could take him to Arnaud."

A sound had caught Yusuf's quick ear, and off in the distance he pointed to horsemen. "Look," he cried, "my father. Come!"

The stranger hesitated, then shook his head. "Nay, it were wiser not. Thy people do not love a Christian. Ride on, and I'll watch thee to safety. But remember, Yusuf and Renaud part as friends. Farewell. Forget me not."

The boy lingered to look wistfully into his face. "Yusuf will not forget. Never."

When, flushed and excited, he told his story to his father his surprise was great, for first Ayûb shook like a dry leaf on a tree, then he raged like a mountain brook, then hugged his little son to his breast. "A Frank! A Frank! Yet art thou safe. Not this time then was thy fate come. Yet a Frank! My son, my son!"

"But no," Yusuf interrupted, "he was not a Frank. For he was as white as any angel; he was not black." He stopped short. The familiar picture of his demon-Frank was in his mind, and now for the first time he doubted it; perhaps it was not true. Yet he said nothing. And though his father would not let him out of his sight, and talked more than ever against the Franks, Renaud stayed warm and friendly in his memory.

COURTYARD AND FOUNTAIN OF A MOSQUE AT DAMASCUS

The new life in the old home of his fathers was a happy one to Yusuf, and he grew up slim and straight and tall, browned by suns and rains, and loving the life beneath the skies with the sheep and horses. But when he was twelve years old, his father told him that he was to go away to school. The great prince Saladin had come to rule as Sultan in Damascus and was building mosques and schools there, where Yusuf could safely go to study to become a wise man. For according to his early vow, Ayûb intended Yusuf for a scholar, and he meant that some day he should belong to the court of Saladin, who, though a soldier, loved learning and the arts. So Yusuf, the boy of the mountains and open spaces, went to Damascus to live in the medressa, the School of the Mosque. With many other boys he lived and ate and studied and made his five prayers daily, all under one roof. He studied the Koran, and he learned the beautiful writing of his people, and he began the study of grammar, arithmetic and geography, and of the sciences, especially botany and astronomy, for his people were wise and skilled in many kinds of learning.

For four years Yusuf worked hard and steadily, and after the first he was a good pupil. At first he had been terribly homesick for the mountains and his horse. But as he had been brave when his body was in danger, so now he was brave in conquering the miseries of his mind. He made himself control his homesickness, and learned to live the new life. For it was his father's will.

MECCA AND ITS MOSQUE The Kaaba lies in a vast court, into which the pilgrims are making their way to walk about the Kaaba seven times. (From Robinson and Breasted, "History of Europe, Ancient and Medieval")

He did so well that when he was sixteen his father came to him with his reward. It was in the month of Dhu'l Hijja, the pilgrimage month, when the great caravan was setting out from Damascus for Medina and Mecca. Every good Moslem, as Yusuf knew, tried once in his life to go to the Prophet's birthplace and to take part in the ceremonies of the pilgrimage, for it meant that then he would be washed clean of his sins. For a boy of sixteen to go was rare good fortune, and Yusuf was aglow with excitement. There was not only the religious reward, but all the adventures by the way. For the routes everywhere were full of people: Bedouins from the desert with their camels, soldiers on horseback, priests on asses, beggars on foot, and all were dressed as was Yusuf too, in the strange pilgrim dress of two pieces of white cotton cloth wrapped about the body, and all were bare of head and bare of feet. Once more Yusuf was on horseback, and so he delighted in the long journey.

Yet he was glad when they reached Mecca, and he saw the great mosque of the Prophet and the old, old Kaaba, the temple built, as some said, by Abraham or Ishmael, which has in it the Black Stone that fell direct to earth from heaven and so is very holy. On the first day he performed the rites at the Kaaba with the others. Seven times he went round and round it saying his prayers, "O Allah, make it an acceptable pilgrimage," "O Allah, verily I take refuge with thee," and when this was done he went to the Black Stone, touched it with his palms and kissed it. Then at evening he fed the mosque pigeons. The rites went on for many days. There was the journey to Arafat, the Holy Hill, where he listened for three hours to a sermon, and the day after at the village of Mina there was the stoning of the "Great Devil." The Great Devil was a large stone pillar at which all pilgrims threw stones. This was quite to Yusuf's mind: he took seven stones, nicely washed and, saying a prayer as he did it, he pelted the devil well. He did not stop until he had thrown seventy stones in all and so had thoroughly conquered the Evil One. His father made a sacrifice of a sheep, and at last, with all the rites performed, their clothes changed and their heads shaved, they were ready to start homeward with the others of their caravan.

They had been gone a long time from Damascus and had heard little of the rest of the world, but not far from Medina they met another caravan which gave them important news. The Franks, they said, had attacked a caravan of the Saracens, murdered the men, and stolen the goods. Ayûb and the other men felt for their swords or daggers. That meant an end to the truce which Saladin had made with the Christians: it meant war again. Ayûb blazed with anger; the desert sun was not hotter than he in his wrath. "Dogs! Swine! So a cur keeps faith!" he cried. "No place is safe from them. Thou shalt not return to Damascus, Yusuf. I will not risk thee so near them. I will go, but thou! The cursèd dogs! Would I had ten thousand swords in my one right hand!"

But Yusuf was no longer a child. He begged his father to let him go to the camp of Saladin to join the army. But his father was as unmoved as his own mountains.

"No, go thou home with Ali by the desert route. It is long, but safe. Thinkest thou I have forgotten what Ibrahim and Al-Kindi said to me on the night when thou wast born?"

"But it was only one false Christian who broke up the caravan. The men themselves have said so," Yusuf pleaded.

"All are the same, all false. I go to Damascus to arrange our affairs, but thou,—by another sunrise thou shalt be on thy way with Ali."

Yusuf had to obey, and though he started off with ten men as escort, his father's face was haggard with fear as he murmured over and over, "Allah preserve thee!" But any fear of the Franks soon fell from Yusuf's mind in the dreadful heat and thirst of the desert and the sand storms that came and choked him. Though they timed their day's marches so that they would reach a spring by nightfall, they suffered much, and one day it was long past dark when, fainting and blistered and parched, they finally reached the low hills and some water. The water and the cool night revived them, but it was with thankfulness for an escape from death that Yusuf made his sunrise prayer to Allah.

Then he heard two of his companions talking. They, in scouting about, had found just over the hill, not a bow-shot away, a band of Christians stretched out all but dead with thirst. "Far gone they were," said one of the men. "Though they were twenty and we only two, I had no fear."

"But why?" Yusuf came up to them, "why were they thirsty, with this spring so near?"

"Ah, they know not the country, nor have they intelligence enough to lead them to the places of water."

"But you told them!" exclaimed Yusuf, with a sharp memory of his own thirst and suffering.

"Told them!" the men looked at him and laughed. "Are we then babes in arms? Or who are we to oppose the will of Allah and give life to his enemies?"

"Oh, but to die of thirst! Surely the prophet would not wish even his enemies to die so cruelly."

The men laughed and walked away. "How they die, it matters not." But Yusuf was murmuring to himself, "Cowards. It is a coward's way. And did not Renaud save my life?"

So when they broke camp and started off he, with an excuse about a broken saddlebag, lingered behind, and as soon as the men were out of sight he dashed down to the place where he knew the Christians must be. He found them lying on the sand, weak and fainting, surrounded by their lifeless horses, and two were already dead. They paid no attention to his coming, except one boy who sat up and looked at him. To him Yusuf beckoned and pointed up the hill, making a gesture as if drinking. The boy crept to his side, his eyes questioning whether Yusuf were a ghost, a savior or a fiend. But Yusuf caught him up and put him on his horse and led him to the spring. He held the water to his lips, and the young Frank sipped slowly. Then, as the color came back to his face, he drank eagerly and stretched himself as if he were coming to life again. Yusuf filled his own gourd and some flasks which he had taken from the Christians, and with the water they revived the drooping men and afterwards the horses. Then Yusuf went to his own horse to mount and be off, while the boy followed him, eagerly trying to say his thanks with his large blue eyes, since they could not speak each other's language. But suddenly a rough hand seized Yusuf's bridle. The leader of the group towered above him. "Hold! Thou shalt not go!" he said, then in his own tongue to the young Frank, "Hold him! He shall be a hostage, else when his fellows return once more to find him, as they surely will, we are all dead men."

"Guy, what villainy is this!" the boy cried. "He has saved our lives."

"And what good is that if we lose them straight away again? We cannot rest here. He shall go with us and guide us, for we know not the way."

Others came up and with the boy argued hotly against Guy, as Yusuf knew, though he could not understand the words. But it was no use. What Guy said prevailed, and as soon as camp could be broken the band was off.

"To Jerusalem!" Guy said to Yusuf in his own language. "Guide us safely, or thou art as good as dead already."

It was useless for Yusuf to explain that he did not himself know the way; and he trusted to his own and his horse's instinct to lead them somehow until they could ask the road. It was a long and hard journey, but for Yusuf it was cheered by a new friend. For Arnaud, as the young Frank was called, was always beside him, and long before they made up a language in which they could speak to each other he had shown him his own loyalty and his disgust at Guy's treachery.

When at last they came to the walls of Jerusalem, the Christians found that they were none too soon. Saladin was close at hand with a great army ready to besiege the city. Yusuf was hurried in with his captors and, once in, they did not dare to let him go. For the garrison was reduced and the city in distress, and they feared that he would give information to their enemies. So he was kept in the city and was there when his own prince, the generous Saladin, sent in word: "I know that Jerusalem is a holy place. I do not wish to profane it. Abandon your ramparts, and I shall give you. . . as much land as you can cultivate." But the Christians were determined. They refused his good offer and resisted his siege. Food became short, and there was much suffering.

But Yusuf's suffering was not from lack of food. It was from longing, as he looked out through the loopholes in the towers and saw the camp of Saladin. He could see his people behind their intrenchments by day, the tents in rows like streets and the open squares where they held markets, and at night he could see their camp fires and imagine how they were sitting together in rings listening to stories of adventure or the poems and songs of their people told to the sound of a flute, until at last the setting of the stars sent them to bed. Arnaud understood his unhappiness and was constantly with him. One day as they stood on the ramparts together he said, "I would that thou couldst turn Christian, but I see it: thy heart is ever yonder with thy people. Daily I am begging the queen to let thee go, for I cannot bear it that we are guilty of such treachery."

"If all the Franks were like thee," said Yusuf, "then—but it would break my father's heart." And he told Arnaud of his father's bitterness and of the wise men's prophecy. But he himself was not frightened, he said, for he had once proved the goodness of a Frank; and he told Arnaud the story of Renaud and the leopard. Arnaud was much excited. "Thou—thou art that lad. But Renaud was my father, my dear father, long since dead, and I have often heard him tell the tale. God must have sent thee to me. Once more I will beg Queen Sybilla herself for thy release. My father would wish it."

Arnaud was granted his request, but on one condition: that Yusuf give his promise not to tell a word about the state of Jerusalem, and if he broke his promise, Arnaud's own life was to be forfeit. Yusuf promised, and Arnaud led him at night to the city gate and gave him the password.—"God wills it." The two boys threw their arms about each other's neck, and Yusuf went out—his word, the word of an infidel, the only guarantee that the enemy would not learn the wasted condition of the city. He was seized at once by sentries of the Saracen camp, who mistrusted him for a spy and, in Saladin's absence, brought him to one of the chiefs. When Yusuf had told his story, he and his counselors shook their heads. "How can we believe thee a true man and no spy," they said, "unless thou tell us the state of the enemy?"

"But I have promised not to," said Yusuf, "and my friend is surety for me."

A PAGE FROM A KORAN This title-page from an Arabic Koran, the Bible of the Mohammedans, is beautiful in color as well as in design. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

"Art thou a follower of the Prophet?" the men demanded. "Then the only wickedness is to withhold the truth and aid the enemy."

Still Yusuf refused. "I gave my word," he said.

"As thou wilt," the chief answered, "for it is thy life, the life of a spy, or the truth about Jerusalem."

His father was out of reach, and could not help him, and so Yusuf demanded the right of appeal to Saladin.

At the very moment Saladin himself rode into their midst, and Yusuf fell on his face before him and told him his story.

"He pretends to be a follower of the Prophet, yet is false to his own people," said the chief. "If he has this news, bid him give it to us and save our men."

But Yusuf lifted his eyes to Saladin and spoke only to him. "Then would I be false to my trust, since I have given my word."

A pleasant smile passed over the great Saladin's face. "I believe thee," he said. "Never have I seen a spy with a face like thine. And thou hast well done. Who holds his honor dearer than his life is indeed beloved of Allah." Then he turned to his generals and counselors. "By bravery, not by breaking faith, will we conquer this city." And to Yusuf he said, "Remain here with me till the city falls. It will be soon."

It was but a few days later that the city surrendered. Saladin, who had every reason to deal hardly with the Christians, treated them kindly and, instead of making them captives, allowed them four days in which to secure a ransom for every man, woman and child—ten dinars (or about thirty dollars) for every soldier, five for a woman, and one for a child. Yusuf sent to his father for money to ransom Arnaud, but Ayûb, overcome with a panic of fear, refused and ordered his son to come at once to Damascus. But Yusuf would not; he was determined to wait for the day of ransom. It came, and those whose ransoms were paid filed out of the city, taking their possessions with them, for such was Saladin's generosity. But many were unransomed. Then Saladin, the noble and chivalrous prince, himself paid the ransom for ten thousand of his enemies. He sent for Yusuf and with a smile gave him his orders. "Go, see to it thyself that thy young friend who trusted thee is among the ransomed."

So the boys met again and were happy, though it was a moment of parting. "Farewell, then," Arnaud spoke at last. "Do thou go back to thy father and tell him how by kindness thou hast overcome fate itself and hast made a friend out of thine enemies. And I,—I will return to my father's home, to France. The Holy Sepulcher is gone, and all the holy places are in the hands of the unbelievers. I have no heart to stay longer. But thanks to thee," and he put his hands on Yusuf's shoulders, "I will carry away one precious memory, the memory of a friend and of how one Saracen kept faith."

So the boys parted, Arnaud to his world and Yusuf to his. And Yusuf, since Saladin joined his father in advising it, went back to his studies in the medressa and fitted himself to become one of the learned men whom Saladin delighted to have at his court.

Christolphe and the Golden Fleece

The Flemish Weaver

The Place du Bourg in Bruges was crowded with people. From the walls of the houses hung gay-colored tapestries and bright banners, and from the windows ladies in their strange, horned headdresses looked down and over the heads of the crowd to an altar standing in front of the Town Hall. All the people of the city were on the streets,—nobles in their gorgeous velvet cloaks, members of the trade guilds, the weavers, butchers and metal-workers in high caps, friars in their rough robes, the sisterhood of the Béguines in their stiff white bonnets, poor peasants and work people in their tunics,—the poor and the rich all were eagerly straining to see.

The crowds jostled and frightened Jeanne and her little son, who were trying to reach a place where they could peep through. It was hard work, for Jeanne was frail and her little boy was lame. "Canst thou see here, little son?" she stopped and asked. "If I could but lift thee! For surely thou must see, when we have toiled so hard to come." She looked down longingly at the little fellow, who clung with one hand to her skirt while with the other he held tight to his crutch. "And thou shalt see," she hugged him close to her. "Thou shalt see. The holy relic has worked miracles before, they say, miracles harder than to cure thee. When the priest comes and lifts it, I will hold thee up, Christolphe. Somehow, somehow, my poor body, thou must be good for that!" The little boy smiled up at her, and patiently they waited for the great moment to come.

This was the day of the Procession of the Holy Blood in Bruges. On this day in May, as for a hundred years before, a procession had formed and was escorting through the streets of Bruges its chief treasure,—the drops of the Holy Blood. This was the Holy Blood of our Lord which Count Dierick and his chaplain had brought from Palestine three hundred years before. For in reward for his good services as a Crusader the Patriarch of Jerusalem had given him in a little tube some of the water with which Joseph of Arimathea had washed the body of our Lord and which had in it some of his blood, as all believed. It had been placed in the Chapel of the Holy Blood, and once a year it was brought out and carried in a beautiful shrine through the streets of the city to the Place du Bourg, where, at an altar, it was lifted up by the priest in the sight of all the people.

THE GIVING OF THE ROSES This tapestry woven in the middle of the fifteenth century shows some of the costumes of the time,—the high, horned headdresses of the ladies and the sausage-shaped hats of the men. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

Today, as so many times before, the people were waiting anxiously for that great moment. At last sounds of music were heard,—the solemn chanting of litanies and singing of hymns as the procession came in view. Priests were in front, nuns in their long veils and burghers in rich dressed followed, and behind them groups, or living pictures, from the holy time gone by. There were John and James and Peter and others of the Apostles, King Herod and his court, and, best of all, Mary and Joseph and the babe in the manger.

"Ah, if thou couldst but see the Christ Child," Jeanne whispered to her son, "and his blessed mother, too. Ah, but Mary is sweet this year, sweeter to look on than I ever saw her." Behind all this pageant came the bishops and priests, and acolytes with their incense pots sweetening the air, and in their midst the Sacred Shrine containing the Holy Blood. They came to the altar, and the priest stood above the crowd and raised high the tube with the sacred blood so that all might see. Then Jeanne with a great effort caught up her boy in her arms. "Look!" she said. "Look well and say thy prayer." Then as everyone bowed low she dropped him back in his place and knelt down beside him; and all kept solemn silence while the holy relic was returned to its place in the chapel close by.

But when all was over and the crowd began to move, Jeanne did not stir. Christolphe pulled at her skirt, but she stayed on her knees with her head sunk forward. Someone came up beside him, and he felt an arm about him; and the kind face of Sister Lisette framed in the wide bonnet of the Béguines looked into his. "Come with me," she said. "Thy mother is ill, and here comes Sister Margot to care for her. But thou and I will go to my house in the Béguinage, and soon there will be good hot soup for thee and me." Christolphe went with her and there he stayed. It was not for one night only but for many nights and years, for with the passing of the Holy Blood his tired mother had died and passed on to her place of rest.

THE BÉGUINAGE in BRUGES The buildings at the back of the picture are the church and houses of the Béguines, or Sisters

But Sister Lisette was glad to give him a home in her neat little whitewashed cottage in the quiet inclosure of the Béguinage, and he was happy, as far as a motherless boy can be. For Christolphe was not cured of his lameness, whether because he had not looked long enough on the relic or whether because for some reason it was not a day of miracle-working.

Yet he, with his one bad leg, could walk as fast as other boys with two good ones, and his hands were cleverer and his head was busier than most with inventions and dreams. The good sisters, sitting in the sun at their lace-making or walking to and from their church, found their lives less tranquil than they had been: some strange contrivance known only to a boy lay in their path, or across their green lawn echoed the shouts of children. But Sister Lisette was content. Her garden grew twice as well since Christolphe's fingers helped to pull at the weeds, and on cold winter nights when she came back from visiting her sick the fire on her hearth was burning brightly, and a little boy lay curled up before it building up the coals a city of dreams. This was Christolphe's favorite hour and place, especially when he came in cold and disappointed from watching the skaters. Skating was one of the things he could not do, though he greatly longed to glide and whirl like the others and make the beautiful, sweeping motions lovely as the flight of a bird.

He was always a little unhappy after such afternoons of watching by the Minnewater, but one day he heard something which sent him to the fire to think. One of the bigger girls had asked another why she did not try the Wishing Bridge. And she explained that beyond the Minnewater there was a little bridge and if you went there just at midnight and made a wish, alone, they said you wish came true. "Go try it tonight," she coaxed the other girl, "do, and see if Jan's heart won't come back and be true to thee." So Christolphe lay before the fire questioning whether it were only wishes about hearts, or whether wishes about legs would probably come true, too. It seemed worth the trying. He said nothing, but that night he did not go to sleep as usual, and when he heard the bells ring half past eleven, he slipped into his clothes and stole out. The night was dark and bitter cold and terrifyingly still. He almost hoped that the girl would be there, too, even though she spoiled his wish, for it was shivery work to be alone near the black water at such an hour. He crept along softly, as if the least sound might startle a hobgoblin or a demon. But no one was at the bridge, nothing was anywhere but blackness and cold and stillness. He waited. Suddenly there was a loud clangor, and he jumped in terror. But it was only the familiar deep, sweet tones from the Great Belfry, sounding at this hour strange and wild. Ten, eleven, twelve,—the Belfry chimes were telling him that his moment of midnight was come. Quickly he made his wish: "I want to run like other boys. Please give me a new leg." Then he ran back faster than most boys could hope to do, and he did not stop shaking until long after he was safely back in bed. Sister Lisette never knew about it, and he never told anyone, but waited, wondering how long it took the magic to work.

WINTER This is a tapestry woven in Flanders three hundred years ago and shows the people skating in the moat of a castle. (From a tapestry lent to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

But Sister Lisette did discover that he had a cold, and watching the skaters was therefore forbidden, so he had to find some other occupation. By good luck he found one much better. He was straying down the street when through an open door he saw a sight that held him open-mouthed and wide-eyed. On a huge sort of frame was stretched a picture, and even while he watched, the picture grew, as a man's hands went back and forth weaving with bright-colored threads. Already there were the tops of two trees and something gold hanging and a fearful creature's head,—a dragon with a long, red tongue. The old weaver looked up from his task and saw Christolphe's crutch and glowing face. "Come in an' thou wilt," he said. "I reckon thy life isn't overfull of pleasures, is it? Come in, lad, if thou wilt be still and not trouble us while we work." Christolphe went in and looked and looked. The room was full of looms with men at work, but it was the old weaver's tapestry that held him. Only after a long time did he dare to breathe aloud, "What is it?"

"What! Dost not know the Golden Fleece?" the old weaver exclaimed. "And thou a boy of Bruges! Not to know the Golden Fleece when he sees it! Why, it was here but round the corner that Duke Philip founded his Order of the Knights,—the Knights of the Golden Fleece. I well remember the day,—the day when he and Isabella of Portugal were married. Dost not know the Knights? Thou must have seen one."

Christolphe shook his head. "What does he look like?" he asked.

"He looks like a very splendid gentleman, to be sure," said the weaver, "and thou knowest him from all others by his long red coat and his cap with a long tail to it, and because around his neck he wears a collar,—a chain of steel links and firestones and hanging from it a lamb of gold."

"I did not know," said Christolphe. "Are there really golden lambs?"

"Tut, tut!" the old weaver shook his head. "He does not even know the story of Jason and the Golden Fleece. Why, lad, where dost thou live?"

"In the Béguinage with Sister Lisette."

"Ah, so, so. I see, I see. Well, dost see here," he pointed to his loom, "a fleece of gold and a dragon? And soon my fingers will weave Jason—Jason who came over land and over sea, and did all sorts of deeds thou shouldst hear about, until at last he carried off the Golden Fleece. But Medea helped him, she who was the enchantress and knew all the secret ways to protect him against the dragon."

"Oh, tell me please," begged Christolphe.

"Nay, I am no story-teller,—except with my fingers," the old man said, and he threaded on his bobbin a gleaming thread of gold. Yet he told, bit by bit, enough about Jason and the quest for the Golden Fleece so that Christolphe had the story. Then his mind was full of questions.

PHILIP, DUKE OF BURGUNDY The Duke is dressed in the costume of the Order of the Golden Fleece,—crimson gown, cloak, cap and collar with golden lamb

"And is it from Jason's Golden Fleece that Duke Philip has named his Knights?" he asked.

"So thinks the lord for whom I weave this tapestry," the weaver replied. "But some say it is from Gideon's fleece they got their name."

"Gideon's fleece! Tell me that! Who was Gideon?" begged Christolphe all in one breath, for he was hearing more stories today than he had even known existed outside of his own head.

But the old weaver had had enough stories enough for one afternoon. "Go ask the priest," he said. "Gideon is his story, for Gideon was a man of God. However, Jason suits me well enough, and I would I had his Golden Fleece."

"Where is it now?" Christolphe demanded eagerly.

"I said but now, I would I knew." The old man took his shears and cut off the knotted ends of his threads. "Perhaps some day some young hero like thee will find it." He winked slyly at Christolphe. "I'm old,—no more adventures for me."

"But Duke Philip's Knights,—do they not go to seek the Golden Fleece?"

"Nay, they get their gold an easier way,—by fleecing the burghers and the poor of Bruges," and at that, the weaver put back his head and laughed and laughed at his own joke. But after that, when Christolphe tried to question him about the fleece, he said, "I know not where it is, and there's an end to it." And he refused to talk any more.

Before the fire that night, Christolphe went over and over again in his mind the wonderful tapestry and the wonderful story. He thought about it until a new wish and a new plan formed in his mind. Again he stayed awake in the dark of his room, and again just before midnight he slipped out to the Wishing Bridge. This time it did not seem so black and awful, for he was fortified by the dreams of a would-be hero, and when the sweet chimes rang out the midnight hour, he spoke bravely. "Please, I want to change my wish. I want, instead, to go to find the Golden Fleece."

The next day, and the next, and all that followed found Christolphe in the weaver's shop watching his story grow. Sometimes the old weaver talked with him, and little by little told him about the making of the tapestry from its very beginning. He told him how it began with the sheep: the sheep was shorn of its fleece, and then the wool was cleaned and carded, and the thread was spun, fine and strong, and then it was dipped into the dyes, the wonderful dyes of blue and rose and emerald and pearl, until at last the bright skeins of wool came to the weaver's hand. He had a picture, made perhaps by some great painter, and when he had put that in place behind his loom he began to weave all the figures—everything just as it was in the picture. Christolphe saw how it was done: saw how the old weaver threaded his bobbin with a thread of red or blue or gold and then went in and out, in and out, of the long threads stretched between the rollers; saw how, when he had woven back and forth over and over again, he took a heavy wooden comb and pressed the rows tightly together so that they were firm and solid. It looked at once so easy and yet, as the perfect forms took shape, so hard! Christolphe watched until he had his lesson by heart.

Then he came home and made himself a miniature loom with two pieces of board at the top and bottom, like the big loom of the weaver; he begged threads from the Sisters and even scraps from the shop; he stretched the warp threads and traced on them in outline a pair of trees and a hanging fleece, and then he himself started in to weave. He worked day after day. No one could have guessed a little fellow would have such patience. He worked until one day it was done, and he went and thrust his work into his old friend's hands.

"What, what!" said the weaver. "Thou didst this? Why, this—for a little lad! Here's the tree, and here's the fleece, I swear. What, what! Keep on, my lad, keep on. Thou art on thy way to the Golden Fleece, the real Golden Fleece of Flanders, made of the finest wool and threads of gold and men's sure hands. Go on, my son, and some day when thou art old enough, come back or, better still, go to more-famed weavers than I am, and they will gladly take thee for an apprentice. But keep at it now, and some day, mark my words, thou wilt see that thou hast won the real Golden Fleece."

A CASTLE IN THE COUNTRY This charming scene is from a Book of Hours, made in the fifteenth century and pictures life in the country at that time

The old weaver was apt to speak in riddles and Christolphe often did not understand him. But this time he thought he understood: he seemed to be urging him to find the Golden Fleece, and then he could become a great weaver afterwards. It was just what he himself wanted. He wanted to adventure forth beyond the city walls and see what he might find. Out there someone might know where the fleece was and help him. He dreamt about it before the fire and laid his plans, and one day he was ready. He left word for Sister Lisette not to worry—the old weaver knew why he had gone, and he would be back soon. Then he set out, his crutch in hand, a bundle with his new woven tapestry slung on his back, and around his neck something new which he had made,—a collar made of bits of leather and wool and hanging from it a wooden lamb gilded to look as if it were gold. This was a Knight of the Golden Fleece going out on his quest.

Early in the morning as the market people were streaming into the city he slipped out between the big watchtowers of the Porte de Gand, and was on the open road when the birds began to sing. It was beautiful. He had never seen the open country like this: the peasants with their rude wooden plows, the windmills, the canals with bright-colored boats tied at anchor, the fresh green fields and grazing cattle, and the soft feathery trees. It was all a procession of delights. He did not mind going slowly because of his crutch. Someone overtook him, and a friar in a long gray dress and sandaled feet stopped and spoke. "Since we are traveling the same road," he said, "shall we not go on together?" It was pleasant to have such friendly company, and Christolphe soon told the friar his name, and the man was good enough not to ask his business, but he saw the strange chain about the boy's neck and began to guess its meaning. "Ah, the chain of the Order of the Golden Fleece! Thou art then a knight, a knight on a pilgrimage journey perhaps?" He spoke kindly and with a twinkle in his eyes, for though he was a friar and old, he had once been a boy himself and had not entirely forgotten. "Tell me, then, about it. Perhaps I can aid thee, for I myself have taken many a pilgrimage. Up and down this land I've wandered in the service of my Order."

Christolphe hesitated, but as he looked into the gentle, wise face of the friar he wondered if perhaps here was the very man he had hoped for,—the man who knew the way to the Golden Fleece. "Could you—could you—tell me what became of Jason's Golden Fleece and where to go to find it?" he quavered.

"Jason's Golden Fleece! Nay, it is not Jason's fleece thou seekest," the friar hastily contradicted him. "It was not from that the Order of the Golden Fleece took its name. God forbid," his tones were stern, "God forbid that Duke Philip should pattern his knights after an infidel and a man who broke his faith like Jason. Nay, it is from Gideon's fleece that thy Order is named."

"Gideon? Not Jason, but Gideon?" Christolphe was surprised. Yet he remembered that the weaver too had spoken of Gideon. "Tell me then, please, about him."

"Dost not know the story of Gideon? Listen, then, for this is a better tale than thine of Jason." The friar told a story well, better than the old weaver. "Gideon," he said, "was a mighty man of battle, a leader of his people, but before he went to fight his enemies he wished to know that God was with him and would prosper him. So he spoke to God, saying, 'I will put a fleece on the threshing-floor; if there be dew on the fleece and it be dry upon all the ground, then shall I know that thou art with me.' And so it was. In the morning he wrung much dew from the fleece while all the ground was dry. But even so Gideon asked yet one more sign: he asked that the Lord on the next night leave the fleece dry and let the dew fall upon the ground around it. And it fell so the second time, even as he asked. Then Gideon understood that he was the chosen of the Lord, and he did many mighty deeds. And it is in memory of him, be sure, that Duke Philip has set apart his Order of the Golden Fleece, his Knights who have pledged themselves to defend the faith and do valiant deeds."

Christolphe had listened eagerly, but plainly he was disappointed. After a moment he objected timidly. "Only you see that fleece was not gold, was it? And it is the Golden Fleece."

"Not golden? Who knows? Who knows?" the friar replied quickly. "In worth it was indeed more than gold, for it was the sign of the favor of God."

But again Christolphe had his question ready. "But what became of Gideon's fleece?" he asked. "Can anyone find it?" Then his face brightened. "Duke Dierick and the Crusaders in the Holy Land, did they see it? Did they bring it back like the Holy Blood? Where do you go to find it now?"

The good friar looked from the boy's glowing face to his crutch and twisted leg. "Nay, the way to win Gideon's fleece is not to go on a quest as Jason did. The fleece of Gideon comes to him who does some worthy deed."

Christolphe thought this over. The worthiest of worthy deeds did not seem as interesting to him just then as an adventure into the world, and he was determined not to turn tamely back. The friar, who was bound for Tournai and the monastery of St. Martin, knew it was a long walk, but he let Christolphe go on with him. However, he took pains to send word back to Sister Lisette, and when they reached the monastery, where he himself was to stay for only a few days, he told the monks Christolphe's whole story. The monks were very kind to Christolphe, but he was troubled, wondering what to do about his quest. Which was the true story? Was it Jason's Golden Fleece or Gideon's? Must he go on a long journey to find it, or must he do some worthy deed?

One day it happened that as he and Brother Norbert, his favorite of the brothers, were in the town together they passed the shop of Robert Dary and Jean de l'Ortye, two famous tapestry-weavers of the time, and Christolphe stopped like one entranced. Even he could recognize the wonder and beauty of their work, beyond anything he had ever seen in Bruges. He would not stir. "Why, look at the boy!" said Brother Norbert. "Art spellbound? What is this to thee?"

And Christolphe answered, "Some day I am to be a weaver, a master weaver, after I have—after—" he stopped, for he was thinking of the Golden Fleece.

Brother Norbert understood. "After thou hast shown thyself worthy?" he said. "Is that what thou art thinking? I know thy desire. The friar has told me. Stay then with us and let us teach thee. I swear thou art as likely to find the Golden Fleece here as anywhere. And all things are easier to him who is well taught. Then when thou art old enough thou canst decide the matter for thyself."

"I know that I must be a weaver," Christolphe answered, "that is sure. The old weaver said it. But the Golden Fleece—I wish I knew!"

"Thou wilt know when thou hast studied and canst read the books," said Brother Norbert gently. "Stay with us, then."

That evening Christolphe showed Brother Norbert his own little weaving which he had brought all the way strapped on his back. Norbert showed it to the other brothers,—and all nodded their heads in surprised approval. "But let Robert Dary and Jean de l'Ortye see that!" they exclaimed. And so it came about that these two master weavers not only saw his work but agreed willingly that when the boy was three or four years older he should enter their shop to become their apprentice and learn his trade. It was a great opportunity, as Christolphe realized even before the monks told him so; and when, after consulting with Sister Lisette, they arranged of their own accord that he was in the meantime to stay with them and have an education, he was very glad. It was not the quest of the Golden Fleece he had planned, but he trusted Brother Norbert and hoped and waited.

Life with the monks, in the gardens, in the refectory, in the chapel, in the scriptorium with the beautiful parchment books which he was learning to read,—all was delightful. And at every chance he slipped away and watched Robert Dary and Jean de l'Ortye at work. The years went fast, and he was soon fourteen and was duly apprenticed to work for three years in the famous shop. He had not forgotten the Golden Fleece, but as Brother Norbert had foretold, he now understood better about it. He knew that he could not find it by going on a pilgrimage, that he could no more hope to reach it than the beautiful cities he used to build in the coals at Sister Lisette's. But he did not give it up. Now it stood for his dream, the great thing he yet hoped to do or be some day.

FLOWER TAPESTRY OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY Evidently the tapestry weavers knew and loved their flowers, for each varierty is carefully pictured. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

The work at the shop went well: he learned fast and worked hard and loved it, and in spite of his lameness more than kept up with the other boys. Everything seemed to favor him, when one day the master called all the men of the shop together and told them that a catastrophe had taken place: a large supply of costly gold threads to be used in one of the tapestries had disappeared,—had been stolen, as they believed. Who was guilty? It was of immense value and must be found. All eyes were turned on the four apprentices and especially on Christolphe and another named Gherard, who were newcomers in the shop. "We give you all until tomorrow morning," said the masters. "Let the gold be returned then, and no questions will be asked. But if it come not back, then the innocent will be punished with the thief. For the guilt of one, all will suffer. Punishment will go alike to all unless the thief confess his sin."

It was an uncomfortable day. Christolphe felt cold, doubting eyes on him, and he heard Gherard whispering with the other apprentices, "His Golden Fleece! So, so! He has gotten it, then, at last." For these lads, like many in Tournai, had heard the story of the Golden Fleece. Christolphe could not work for very misery. He was wondering what the punishment would be and whether in the morning they would all be discharged from the shop, and so his great chance would be gone.

On his way home he stopped in the Cathedral and fell on his knees before an altar to pray. Everywhere it was dark except for a few flickering specks of light from the candles at the shrines. But as he passed out, he saw at the other side of the altar another boy praying, and in the light of a newly placed candle recognized Gherard. He half stopped, surprised to see Gherard there, and then something bright caught his eye. In the flicker of the candle it glittered,—a thread of gold winding its way from beneath Gherard's tunic to the floor. And Christolphe saw that even as he fingered his beads Gherard held his left arm pressed close to his side. As if aware of someone near him, Gherard turned, while Christolphe slipped off and was lost in the dark shadows. But he waited; and when Gherard came out of the church door, he was there watching for him. Quick as a flash, he struck Gherard a hard blow on his left elbow. Something fell,—a ball that glittered even in the bad light of the late twilight. Gherard understood, and with his right arm struck back and rained blow after blow on Christolphe. Christolphe defended himself as best he could, but he was trying all the time to hold fast with his crutch and foot to the gold threads that had fallen, and he, lame and alone, stood no chance against a fighter like Gherard. But the passers-by began to gather. Hands caught hold of Gherard and threw him back. "A great, strong boy against a lame one!" they cried. "For shame!"

Christolphe seized his chance, stooped and picked up the golden ball, tucked it under his smock, shook himself free of the friendly crowd and got away.

That night he slept little. His many bruises hurt too much, but still more he was worried about the morning. How to get the gold back? Would anyone see? Would they think it was he who had stolen it? Should he then tell on Gherard? Would Gherard come back and say that he, Christolphe, had been the thief? The word of one against the other, what would be the end of it? He got up before the sun was risen and went through the deserted streets to the shop. No one was there, but the door had been left open. He slipped the gold threads into the chest where they belonged, and came away. Only the boy whose business it was to sweep out the shop had seen him.

When all the others came to work, a few hours later, Gherard was not among them. Still Christolphe was anxious, not knowing what to expect. Then the master went to the chest, picked up the golden threads and called out, "See, the gold! Safe and in its place. Has anyone ought to say?" No one spoke, for Christolphe had made up his mind to tell nothing against Gherard, no matter what it cost, since he was not there to speak for himself. But his face grew whiter and whiter, and he kept his eyes on the floor. He heard the master's steps coming nearer, and he steadied himself, for he was shaking. Then he felt a hand on his shoulder, and the master was speaking: "News travels fast, my boy. We have heard of thy fight at the Cathedral door, and of how Gherard dealt thee blows until thou wast nearly overcome. Already we had suspected who was the thief, and now, since Gherard is gone and the gold is here, we understand what caused thy fight. Therefore, let us all give honor where honor is due. Men, to Christolphe we owe the good faith of the shop."

It is not often that a boy is as happy as Christolphe was that day. The favor of the masters and the good will of his fellows warmed him like sunshine after a cold night. He had done a brave thing and had saved the day for everyone.

And not long afterwards he had his reward in the best way possible. For Duke Philip had intrusted to Robert Dary and Jean de l'Ortye the making of one of the most important tapestries ever given to any shop to weave,—a tapestry to celebrate the founding of the Order of the Golden Fleece and to decorate its meetings. It was to be in fourteen scenes, made of finest threads of wool with threads of gold and silver, and the subject was Gideon and the Golden Fleece. When the pictures for it came from Bauduin de Bailleul, the famous designer of Arras, and the looms were set up and the work began, Christolphe alone of all the apprentices was chosen to work on the tapestries with the older weavers. "For the honesty of his heart and the skill of his hands is he chosen," the master had declared.

It took four years to weave the tapestries. Before they were done, Christolphe had finished his apprenticeship and had been acclaimed a master weaver, worthy of the famous shop. And before they were done he had made a great discovery and had unriddled the riddle of the old weaver of Bruges when he said, "the real Golden Fleece of Flanders, made from finest wool and threads of gold and men's sure hands." The real Golden Fleece of Flanders, what was it but the tapestries woven in her cities which went through all the world and brought her wealth and fame and honor? The Golden Fleece of ancient days was hardly more prized than were the wonderful weavings of Flanders in Christolphe's time. Kings and princes of all lands sent to Flanders for these precious pictures. And so, as Christolphe wove the story of Gideon for Duke Philip, he liked to call it his Golden Fleece; and as he recalled the words of the old friar, "The fleece of Gideon comes to him who does a worthy deed," again he liked to believe that in his own experience he had proved it true. He had done his best for the good faith of the shop, and he had been given a great chance. He was now, not perhaps the Knight of the Golden Fleece that he used to dream about, but something that satisfied him better still,—a master weaver of the Golden Fleece of Flanders.

Francesco and the Song of the Birds

The Italian Painter

Up the narrow stone street of his mountain village, little Francesco went dancing and capering and singing, burst into the room where his mother sat, and held out to her a bunch of anemones, colored like the rainbow.

"See what I bring thee," he shouted. "See the pretty darlings!"

"Francesco, meschinello, where hast thou been this long time?" his mother scolded him, but she pressed the lovely flowers to her face. "Ah, the dear springtime!" she murmured, "the blessed flowers! Thank thee, carissimo."

But she put them down in a moment to go back to her embroidery. Lucia's fingers were never quiet long, for their work meant bread for her little son. Her beautiful embroideries were all that stood between him and hunger. He had no father, and he himself was still so little and so full of joy that she could not bear to set him to work.

"Ah, mother, such a pretty day!" he was telling her, as he danced and hovered about her, though realizing even in his eagerness that he must not interrupt her work. "The hills are all flowers,—tulips and lilies and these bright ones everywhere on all the hills. Piero and Maria and Giovanni and I, we have picked our arms full. We climbed very high, right under the great bell of Santa Scholastica."

"And what hast thou done with the rest of thy flowers? Tell me not that thou hast left the poor things to die!"

"No, no, mother dear, no. I brought mine all the way back to the Cappucini and left them for my own San Francesco."

"That was a good boy," his mother kissed him. "Though thou art very idle, thou hast a good heart. The Brothers say I should set thee to work and not let thee waste thy time all day on the hills."

"But mother," Francesco jumped up and down as if so his words could be hurried faster, "mother, the flowers! Who would pick them? And my good saint, who would bring them to him? And you told me he loves flowers. And today, mother," for a moment he stood between her and her work, looking up into her face with big eyes, "I thought he smiled at me. I looked long, hoping he would do it. And the wolf, too; Brother Wolf did not look so fierce as usual. And I thought, perhaps does he like flowers brought him besides his food?"

It was a picture of St. Francis shaking hands with the wolf to which Francesco had taken his flowers. For as the old story told, St. Francis had made the wolf agree to stop eating sheep and cattle and men and had promised him that instead he should be given food each day, and then the two had shaken hands to seal their pledge.

Lucia kissed her boy again. "Thou art full of fancies, and as dear as thou art naughty. And who knows?—it may be thy flowers as well as my prayers that have pleased the good saint, for today I have an order for a cloth for the altar of il Sagro Speco. It will give me work for months, and the pay is good."

"O mother, why must thou work so late? If I could but show thee! Hark, dost thou hear the river tumbling and running faster than ever and with such a noise? And the flowers—each day I will bring them to thee and San Francesco." Already he was out and off again, to feel even in the village street the last of the soft spring day.

Lucia smiled. In this little mountain village she was alone and far from her early home and friends, and she was poor and ill, but from Francesco's sunny spirit she drank a sweet wine that gave her life. So she had struggled on, and the monks of the convent high up on the hills had given her work for her fingers, and, what was more, had promised that if anything happened to her they would care for her boy.

THE MONASTERY AT SUBIACO St. Francis is said to have visited this monastery about 1218, and according to the story changed the thorns in its garden into roses. There is still in the church a portrait of St. Francis, said to have been painted during his lifetime

When Francesco was ten years old the day came when they had to make good their word. For his mother died, and he was taken from the poor little room they had called home to live in the old monastery of St. Benedict, which high above the town clung to the mountain side like one of its own rocks, and there he was taught as a novice. At first he was very unhappy. To lose his dear mother, to give up the gay roaming of the fields, to do always as he was told, to leave behind his loved saint and wolf, in fact to belong now to St. Benedict and not to his own saint,—why, he wondered, if he must be shut up, might it not have been at Cappucini with them?—it was all very hard. Still there was food in plenty, such as he had never known, and there was the singing from the big books. He learned to read quickly so that he might sing from these big choir books, for until now he had had no schooling; and also he liked to read and look at the books with beautiful pictures which were a wonder to him. And then after the evening meal the prior often read to them, and sometimes besides the lesson of the day, he read stories of the saints.

One time, to Francesco's joy, it was the story of his own saint which the prior read: how St. Francis had changed from being a wild, gay boy, and had given his coat to a beggar and taken his rags in exchange; how he had left his father and great riches to go to live in a cell and build a chapel and choose our Lady of Poverty; how he had gone out to teach both at home and in distant lands, and had preached even to the birds, since they too were God's creatures. This story Francesco loved above all the others. "For as he came to Bevagna," so the prior read, "he saw a flock of birds and stopped and preached to them; 'Brother birds, you ought to praise and love your Creator very much. He has given you feathers for clothing, wings for flying, and all that is needful for you. He has made you the noblest of his creatures; he permits you to live in the pure air, you have neither to sow nor to reap, and yet he takes care of you, watches over you and guides you.' Then the birds began to arch their necks and spread their wings and open their beaks as if to thank him, while he went up and down stroking them with the border of his tunic."

This and other stories of St. Francis and the birds the prior read: how he quieted the swallows when their loud twittering disturbed his preaching, how he sang a duet with the nightingale in praise of God and had to acknowledge that the bird sang better than he did, how he built nests for the doves in his monastery. To little Francesco these stories suggested new delights. Each day he went out and tried to coax the doves to come to him and even to tame the three ravens which lived at the monastery. He talked to them gently and fed them until at last they came to him without fear.

And there was one other story which the prior read that made the monastery a very different place to him. For it seemed that his own good saint had once visited this very monastery, and his picture which had been painted then was still in the lower church, and the roses which had sprung up at his touch in place of the thorns of St. Benedict were still in the garden. After that, no one had to urge Francesco to work in the little terraced garden, and he was always ready to say his prayers, if he might slip away into the lower church to say them before his own saint. Looking up into the face of the kind young monk of the picture, he used to tell him his troubles and feel better.

In the chapels of the monastery there was not only St. Francis's picture, but there were many other paintings, beautiful and rich in color, like the pictures of the books. Francesco loved them. He studied them until he knew every line by heart, just how an arm was bent or a horse's neck arched, or the eyes of a saint looked out from a long, sweet face. Then he tried to copy them, and his lessons were neglected, and the monks were constantly scolding him. But he was too busy to care what they said. Wherever he could find a bit of charcoal and a pavement or a wall to draw on, he was making his own pictures. Even the margins of the beautiful books became only empty spaces to him where he could copy the lines of the pictures; and so over and over again he was punished. Nevertheless, his pictures were improving. Month by month and year by year he kept at it until the arms of his people, too, bent as they should, and the men even walked and the horses looked like those in the pictures. Then he was ready for something new. He watched the monks and began to draw their faces on the wall, better and better, until one day a brother recognized himself, and then there was trouble. Francesco was brought before the abbot, and after he had been found guilty of every sin of laziness and irreverence he was shut up by himself in a cell to live on bread and water and do penance. Picture-making was not a deadly sin, and Francesco did not think it fair to punish him so hard. And as he could not get hold of even a bit of charcoal, and the best he could do was to wet a finger in the water they brought him and make pictures that were faded as soon as they were done, he grew desperate and began to question whether it was not desirable to run away.

One evening he called to one of the younger brothers and persuaded him to let him into the chapel to make his prayers. The Brother, knowing his devotion to the picture of St. Francis, let him in. Somehow he was forgotten, and Francesco, thankful to be out of his bare cell, crept behind a pillar prepared to spend the night on the floor. It became very dark and cold and still, but he was just getting off to sleep when a little noise startled him, and in the candlelight from a shrine he saw a man's shape. One of the brothers must have come for him. But then he saw that the man was not dressed in the long robe of the monks but had on trunk hose and a pointed cap, and a second man was beside him with a sack flung over his shoulder. They were going from the altar to the wardrobe where the church furnishings were kept,—the embroideries and the gold and the silver dishes. Francesco could not understand what it meant, and, curiosity getting the better of him, he crept up toward them, trying to go quietly and yet to see.

The men heard and turned. One raised an arm to strike, but then saw that it was only a boy. "What doest thou here?" he said in a gruff, thick voice.

Francesco was frightened. "I—I am running away," he said, not knowing how else to account for his being there.

"Ho, indeed, a likely place this!" the man sneered; and the other one snorted, "Run away! Thou wouldst, wouldst thou? We'll see about that. Perhaps thou shalt run away in truth." And the two men laughed and whispered together, and Francesco tried to slip off into the darkness. But a heavy hand caught him, for these robbers of a church had decided to steal a boy too, since it was safer to leave nothing behind to tell tales. Also a boy would be useful to them.

So, by morning Francesco was out on the open road, farther from his little hill town than he had ever been in his life. He was of course terribly frightened at first, but the men were not cruel to him, gave him food and, except for a little work, left him to do pretty much as he pleased. He found that whatever their occupation by night might be (and he was never with them then), by day they were jugglers who went from village to village doing their tricks and entertaining the folk in return for food and a few pieces of silver. For the traveling jugglers and singers were the theater of Francesco's time, and brought the villages entertainment.

It was a happy-go-lucky, picturesque life: no rules, no hours, no lessons at the monastery; no confinement inside walls, but the whole wide world to roam in; new sights to see, everything to learn, and the old freedom and joy of the flowers of the field. Francesco was glad. And when the two jugglers found that he had a clear, ringing boy's voice, they were even kind to him. Since he knew only the psalms and hymns of the brothers, they taught him some boisterous, rousing songs, and he sang from village to village to the delight of the people. Then, too, he made his pictures for them, and the jugglers themselves were proud when they saw what this boy could do. On the stone walls of the houses, on the pavements, in the sand, he traced pictures for the crowd, now showing them a monk with his cowl, now a donkey with his load, then, best of all, pictures of themselves,—often a caricature of some man in the crowd, done while he watched amid the jeers and shouts of his neighbors. Every Italian loved a picture: that was something that high or low could understand. A man might not read or write, but he could tell a good picture when he saw it. And so Francesco was immensely popular and so his masters, who made much money through his skill, treated him well, unless they were very drunk indeed.

At any rate they left him free, and when he was not making his comic pictures in the village square, he could go where he pleased. And there was always one thing he wanted above everything,—to go where there were pictures. In every town he found church, cathedral or town hall,—wherever the best paintings were—and there he spent hours studying the ways of the different artists and storing his mind with things to help his own work. For though these were holy pictures and though he was only making coarse, clownish things, he wanted to know the better way.

MADONNA AND CHILD AND SAINTS, BY SANO DI PIETRO Such paintings of the Madonna with long face and sad eyes, the work of the painters of the earlier times, were in many of the churches of Italy

It was the best of chances for a would-be artist and the freest of lives for a convent-bred boy. Yet something was wrong. Francesco felt it. When he went into the churches, the eyes of the Virgin looked at him reprovingly. He had noticed it once, and then it happened again and again, until in each town he went to see how it would be, and always it was the same: the Virgin and the saints looked at him with disapproving eyes. At last he felt as if he could bear it no longer. What did it mean? Was it because the Virgin was displeased that he made such rude pictures of coarse, unholy things? Was it because he shouted out wild, boisterous songs and lived with men who talked foul language and had robbed a church? His convent training reminded him that all these things were wrong.

On their wanderings they came to Assisi, his own saint's home, and Francesco flew at his first free moment to the church where St. Francis was buried. There he felt again the rapture of devotion of his early boyhood as he knelt at the saint's tomb and saw the many pictures of his life. For a time he could do nothing but go over and over the story that they told and let their beauty sink into his soul, but after a little the pictures began to talk to him of other things: St. Francis in prayer, St. Francis marrying our Lady Poverty, St. Francis living in each picture his holy life; and what was he, little Francesco, doing? He was living riotously with evil men, and too, as his conscience of a would-be artist reminded him in the midst of these pure and lofty pictures, hurting his own mind and fingers by making low, coarse drawings until some day he would not be able to do anything better.

But what was he to do? He knew that his masters would never willingly let him go, for he was too valuable to them now. By chance he heard some men in the town talking of the many robberies in the churches,—embroideries, silver and gold dishes, even jewels from the shrines of the saints stolen,—and the midnight scene in the little chapel of his own monastery came back to him. He saw his two masters in the candlelight stuffing their sack with the precious things of the church! An idea came into his mind to solve his problem.

St. FRANCIS AND POVERTY, BY GIOTTO This is one of the paintings in the church of St. Francis at Assisi, and in an imaginary scene of the marriage of St. Francis to Poverty suggests his vow of poverty. The figure of Poverty is in the center beside that of Christ, who is performing the marriage

That afternoon when the crowd gathered in the village square and he, his charcoal in hand, must make his picture to amuse them, he drew on the pavement a new sort of scene,—the inside of a church, pillars, altar, candles, and two men catching up a chalice to stow it into a bag slung across their shoulders. And then he drew their heads. And their heads were portraits, exact likenesses of the two jugglers who were there in the crowd watching. As he drew feature after feature and made the whole face come true to life, the crowd began to understand. A gasp, a shout, hands reaching out to clutch the men whose evil deeds they saw pictured! But the two jugglers, or thieves as they were, had understood their danger and had slipped through the crowd and vanished no one knew where. Francesco was beset with eager questions, and the picture became so famous that all the countryside came to see it, and it was carefully preserved.

It chanced that the next day Messer Luigi, a nobleman of Florence, came riding by, and he saw the crowd and saw the picture and stopped to look. "Who did this?" he cried. "Why this has merit! See the sly movement of this fellow as he tucks his loot into his bag! And the faces,—I declare. Who did this?"

The crowd pushed forward Francesco, and he stood very bashfully before this great nobleman. He was only fourteen, and he was dressed in bizarre, jaunty fashion, as befitted a companion of jugglers, and Messer Luigi looked at him in astonishment. "Nay," he said, "not thou! A youngster like thee! Who art thou, then? And who hast taught thee?" No one had taught him, Francesco answered. He had just done it, and that was all. Messer Luigi talked with him and bade him draw other things for him, with the result that he was more and more pleased. "Come, then, with me," he said. "If this is what thou canst do untaught, come and we'll give thee to a master, and then we'll see what thou canst do. Wilt come with me to Florence?"

There was no one to cry stay, and Francesco was aglow at the mere thought of such a future. Learning to paint, as the real business of his days! It was a miracle. Messer Luigi put him behind him on his powerful horse, and together they rode through the gray-green olive groves and under the castle-crowned hills and beside the rich, growing fields until they came to the city of Florence. Never had Francesco seen anything like it: the stately Palace of the Signoria, or city government, the great domed Cathedral, the beautiful bell-tower, like a tall, pink lily of stone, the many shops, the open squares filled with people as handsome in their faces as in their dress—all the gay, merry life of the heart of Tuscany was to him a magic world. Messer Luigi took him to his home, a palace near the new one of the Great Duke, and here the fairy world of beauty was continued. Beautiful rooms, beautiful hangings, rugs and furniture, beautiful faces, for Messer Luigi's wife and daughters were like angels to him in their loveliness. That night when he went to sleep in a great bed covered with crimson damask, he told himself that he would surely wake to find it only a dream. But in the morning he was still there in the midst of all the splendor, and there he stayed.

A BEDROOM IN THE PALAZZO DAVANZATI, FLORENCE

For Messer Luigi, though he did not tell the boy, thought he had discovered a genius, and as with so many of his fellow citizens it was a matter of great pride with him to become patron to a rising artist. So he determined to have Francesco taught, believing that some day he as well as the boy would be famous through his paintings. He put Francesco to study under a master renowned for his studies in the new art of perspective, but Francesco also studied in every church and palace of Florence, which was already becoming a treasure house of art. Giotto, Orcagna, Donatello, della Robbia, he knew each work of theirs by heart.

The years went by, and the promise of his early work began to come true; yet work and play were both made too easy for him. People made much of him; he was feasted in the palaces of the rich, Duke Cosimo himself sent asking him to bring his sketches, and Messer Luigi was so pleased that he only added to what the others were doing to turn Francesco's head. It was the boy's sketches that especially pleased his friends, for, thanks to his early practice, he could make a rough, quick drawing that was full of life and fire, and to the people whose affections were turning away from the stiff, unreal saints or Madonnas of the early masters, these sketches were appealing. Often they were jokes or caricatures or scenes of trifling importance meant only to raise a laugh. But they were in such demand that Francesco had time for little else. Occasionally Messer Luigi would say to him, "Look out, young man, thou art spending all thy time on gewgaws. Where is that great painting of thine that shall make both thee and me famous?" But Francesco was being carried along dangerously fast on the stream of sudden popularity. Hard work and thought seemed scarcely necessary.

He still visited the churches, for he still loved the masters' work; especially he liked to go under the high arches of Santa Croce to see there again Giotto's story of St. Francis. Wherever St. Francis was, there he felt at home. Yet now he began to feel a sadness in the pictures of the saints, and once again wherever he went the eyes of the Virgin seemed to look at him reprovingly. He laughed now at the notion, for he was seventeen and beyond such childish fancies, but still he kept going back to see, and still it seemed that the Virgin reproached him with her look. "It is because I do not paint her picture as the other painters do," he said, and in order to gain her favor he started a hasty likeness of a Madonna. But he soon realized that that was not the spirit in which to paint a holy picture, and he stopped.

A struggle was going on within him. Like the times he lived in, he was two boys—one light-hearted, luxurious, pleasure-hunting, in love with every kind of outward beauty; and the other speaking the same message that the eyes of the Virgin were saying, "Was it to do such light, unholy work that thou hast loved beauty ever since as a child thou gatheredst flowers? Those thou used to bring in loving gift to San Francesco—now what doest thou?" Then he would look at the stiff, unnatural figures in the paintings of the early masters, and he would answer back rebelliously, "Must I, then, do such as these? These are not beautiful. These are not flesh and blood, as I see people. If I were to paint what I see, is that to serve the devil?"

He was more and more restless and went wandering around the city, doing little work. One day he passed the monastery of San Marco. He had heard of some great paintings that one of its monks had painted on the walls of the cells, but his boyhood memories had kept him away from monasteries. Now, a sudden impulse sent him in. He saw in their freshness the work of the blessed monk, Fra Angelico,—Brother Angel. Here were paintings of saints and Madonnas and of our Lord, full of devotion and purity and love, yet natural, lifelike and charming—real persons, only with an added beauty beyond that of this world. The colors were rich and glowing, the drawing fine and true, and the spirit was one of loving devotion. Francesco lingered for hours. It was as if new blood were being poured into his artist's heart.

MADONNA AND ANGEL, BY FRA ANGELICO This is one of the paintings in the monastery of San Marco, full of the spirit of devotion and of the love of beauty which is characteristic of the painter-monk, Fra Angelico

When he left, it was late in the afternoon and he wanted to get away from the city and across the river to the hillside opposite. But on the way, in crossing the Piazza of the Duomo, he saw the place crowded with pigeons. It was years since he had tried to talk to the birds, but now he stopped and fed them and called to them in the old way, and the birds flocked about him in friendly fashion. It sent him on in a happy mood. It was sunset. The last level rays of the sun sparkled in the river, sent out beacon fires from the many towers of the city, and turned its roofs to gold. Francesco stretched himself under a tree. The air was soft, the birds were singing their goodnight songs, the fragrance of flowers came home on the evening breeze. The world itself seemed such a paradise as the Blessed Angelico loved to paint. It was the world of St. Francis who loved every flower and blade of grass and every bird, beast and insect. Francesco closed his eyes the better to feel it all.

It was only a moment after, it seemed, that there was a flocking together of the birds and a great twittering all about him; and then a man appeared dressed in a long gray robe and monk's cowl, with dark brown eyes and an expression of wonderful sweetness. The birds were lighting about his feet, and stretching out their necks and opening their beaks to speak to him. It was St. Francis. He began to sing his hymn of love for the beautiful earth, and the birds took up the song and joined with him. "Praised be my Lord God of all his creatures, and especially for our brother the sun. Praised be my Lord for our sister the moon . . . for our brother the wind, and for air and clouds. Praised be my Lord for our mother the earth, the which bringeth forth divers fruits and flowers of many colors and grass." Then the saint seemed to stoop and bless the birds and bade them good-by. He disappeared as he had come, but the birds lingered, and led by one who had perched on the saint's hand, they sang on, and soon Francesco caught words and meaning in what they sang. "Our brother," they twittered, and came closer and closer to him, "our brother, we praise God with our voices; praise thou him with the work of thy hands. Praise him with beauty. Sweet is the earth and sky, and good and pleasant are all his creatures. Refresh the hearts of men with beauty through the works of thy hands. There was a whirring of wings and then a silence, and when Francesco opened his eyes, the night was about him and nothing was to be seen but the stars in the sky above and the little lights of the town. Then he knew that he had had a vision. His saint had sent word to tell him what to do. He leapt to his feet. "Refresh men with beauty!" He had his commission now. He would paint the world he saw,—the world that St. Francis loved—for the joy of men and the glory of God. He would paint the serene earth and blue sky, the circling hills and soft green woods, noble men and women with faces sweet and pure as a Madonna's.

St. FRANCIS AND THE BIRDS, BY GIOTTO This painting, made not very long after St. Francis' lifetime, seems to have much of the poetry and beauty of his character, which made him a friend of the birds

He left Florence, his gay life and his trifling sketches, went into the country, and set himself to work. And there, as long as he lived, he painted the goodness of earth and sky and all God's creatures, as a namesake of St. Francis should do.

Hugh and the Quest of the Unknown

The English Poet-Adventurer

In the quiet of twilight Lady Eleanor was walking in her park among the fast-darkening shadows of the great oaks and beeches. She loved the woods. At this hour they were full of mystery and story. And as she came upon a carpet of soft moss or saw a hollow formed by the gnarled roots of an old oak, she would say to herself,—even if her little boy Mortimer was not with her—"There's where the elves dance, there they keep house." Tonight as she came to a specially dark dell hidden away among the trees and bushes, she heard a little song. It was thin and faint and sweet, very like what an elf's song should be. But soon she caught words repeated over and over in singsong fashion.

O Fairie Queen, come dance for me, Thy secret fast I'll hold, Over hill, over dale, over park, over pale, Come on the moonbeam's gold.

Then suddenly there was a rude crashing through the branches, the song stopped, and the sound of blows was mingled with oaths spoken in the well-known voice of her head keeper. "Wicks!" she cried. "Stop! What is it? Come here!"

Wicks, a big, burly fellow, came out of the bushes holding by the neck of his smock a little boy, ten years old,—the age of her own Mortimer. The child blinked and swallowed hard, for he had had a bad beating, but he did not whimper nor shed a tear.

"What is the matter, Wicks?" Lady Eleanor demanded. "How came he here? Who is he?"

"Please, m'lady, 'tis yon lad from the tavern,—the little jackanapes. 'Tis the second time he'm come. I catched sight o' he once before."

"You mean Prettyman's boy,—Prettyman of the 'Golden Hind'?"

"No'm, he'm nobody's boy. But Martin leaves him bide there. And to think o' he coming here to steal."

Lady Eleanor interrupted, turning to the boy, "Tell me how you came here."

"Please, your ladyship," he answered soberly, and his eyes looked straight into hers, "through the iron rods of the gate. They sit so wide apart."

A smile peeped from Lady Eleanors's eyes. "You are a tiny bit of a lad, aren't you? My Mortimer's age, I take it, but much smaller. Tell me, why did you climb through?"

At that he lowered his eyes and was silent. Wicks answered for him.

THE PARK OF AN ENGLISH HOME

"They'm all the same, please, m'lady. 'Tis the rabbits."

Lady Eleanor shook her head. "No, Wicks. Go. Leave him with me."

Wicks reluctantly let go his hold, and she put a gentle hand on the boy's shoulder. Again he looked straight into her eyes. "What is your name?" she asked.

"Hugh, please, your lady, Hugh of the 'Golden Hind.' "

"Was it you whom I heard singing?" He flushed for answer, and she went on gently. "Now tell me why you came into my park?"

"It's the fairies, please, your lady."

"Oh, and so you find fairies in my park and sing to them?"

"Not—not yet. But this is their kind of place. I hoped they would be here. And so I made the song to call them."

"And that is all you came for?" He nodded. "Well, do you know," she admitted softly, "this is something I have always wondered about myself. And so you may come here as often as you like on one condition,—that is, if you ever do see fairies you will come and tell me. Will you?"

Hugh looked into her smiling eyes, and overcome with shyness and pleasure murmured his thanks.

He went back to the tavern, to his so-called home, with a big new happiness in his heart. He thought it was because he could go to find the fairies without any fear of the cruel Wicks, but it was also because he had found a friend who understood. His life at the tavern was always very interesting, but it was lonely. He was really nobody's child. No one knew who his father or mother was, though people supposed his father was a sailor gone away with Hawkins out across the seas to the New World, for it was just at that time that a basket with a baby boy in it, labeled Hugh, had been left on the tavern steps, and Goody Prettyman had taken him in, and had let him stay there ever since. He was useful, and no trouble to anyone. He sat for hours in the taproom listening to the sailor's talk. For the "Golden Hind" was near the wharves where ships came in at Plymouth. Wonderful times of excitement those were, when the little ships sailed out through the sunset into the Great Unknown, and more exciting still when they came back, each one with tales more marvelous than the last of the New World they had seen. They told of Spanish ships deep-laden with gold and silver, captured for the glory of England and good Queen Bess; of dark-skinned people with strange ways, who feasted on golden grain and roots taken from the earth; of shores piled up with pearls like pebbles, and with the very sands of gold.

Of course Hugh was going to sea himself as soon as he was old enough. Meanwhile, he climbed daily to the headland and watched the ships come and go on their voyages of mystery. The best of them all was naturally the Golden Hind, Captain Drake. No one had done such wonders as Drake of Plymouth. And now he was gone,—Hugh had seen him sail away,—out into a new ocean, the Pacific, where no Englishman had ever been. Word had come that he was lost, but Hugh and Plymouth knew better and waited for his return.

SHIPS This is a British warship of the time of Queen Elizabeth

So, thanks to the coming and going of the ships and the talk of the sailors, the days were never dull for Hugh. Though it was a coarse, rough life, somehow the coarseness left no mark upon him, for his mind was too much taken up with wondering about magic and mystery and high adventure. And it was while waiting for the day of his own big adventure when he should be old enough to put out to sea, that he had made a little adventure for himself by stealing through the dusk and dangers of the great park to watch for the fairies.

Now his hopes of success, quickened by Lady Eleanor's interest, were very strong, and he kept nightly watch. And one morning as Lady Eleanor and Mortimer came down the steps of the great house, they were met by an excited boy. "I've come to tell you," he cried,—then at the sight of Mortimer hesitated and stopped, but Lady Eleanor held out a welcoming hand. "It's Hugh, Mortimer," she said. "What is it, Hugh?"

"Please, please, your lady," he stammered, "I've seen them!"

"What, no! The fairies?"

"I came last night in the dark," he said, "and very soon they began to dance. Oh, but it was pretty, and I guess I must have watched all night, for now it's morning."

Lady Eleanor smiled, but Mortimer spoke in big-boy fashion. "Fairies! Pooh! Who believes in them? There's no such thing."

But his mother interposed, even before she saw Hugh's crestfallen look.

"How do you know there are not? Who would have believed there were oceans and lands and people in the West if Frobisher and our own Drake hadn't gone and found them and told us about them?"

"Yes," Hugh affirmed, "and stranger things than fairies happen there."

"What?" Mortimer challenged him.

"Why, why, seashores made of gold, and men who pour smoke out of their mouths but don't burn up, and a fountain where you drink and you'll be made young forever."

"Who told you?" demanded Mortimer.

"Why, all the sailors. Everyone tells about them."

Mortimer's only response was an indirect one. "I say, mother, why can't he stay and play with me?"

Lady Eleanor looked a moment into Hugh's honest face. "He may, whenever he will. Should you like to, Hugh?"

After that the boys were constantly together. The park was an enchanted place to Hugh, and Hugh's strange acquaintances and information were full of interest to Mortimer. One day he begged Hugh to take him to the wharves to hear the sailors talk, and Hugh gladly did so. They found Simms, and old friend of Hugh's, a veteran of many voyages and a former seaman of Drake's, now too stiff and too old to navigate.

"Tell him about it," begged Hugh, as master of ceremonies. "He's never properly heard about things, only what I tell him."

"Eh? Bless my soul!" said the old sea dog. "And what kind of story do you like best, young master?"

"Oh, about gold and catching the Spanish ships."

"Yes, but tell him, too, about the new ocean," Hugh interrupted, "and Drake's climbing up in the tree to see it, you know. Always there's something more out beyond, isn't there? New oceans and new worlds always on ahead?"

BOYHOOD OF RALEIGH, BY MILLAIS

"Sure, that's the spirit," said Simms. " 'Twon't be long before you'm at it, eh, Hugh? They'm as has things always beckoning 'em, they'm the ones who goes. But, if it's gold, you want, my master,"—he turned to Mortimer, "then listen"; and he told yarn after yarn of the Spanish Main, of Panama and its mule-trains loaded with gold, and of Drake capturing great shiploads all for the glory of England. "I want to go and do it with him," said Mortimer.

"Aye, marry, 'tis in the air, these days," the old salt said. "Every mother's son wants to be roving, each for his own good reason. Some for the sake of the gold, and Hugh here to find the place of the sunset and what's at the end of the world, eh, Hugh?"

AN ELIZABETHAN HOUSE The shape of the house is in the form of a letter E in honor of the queen

That was Mortimer's only visit to the wharves, for much to Hugh's surprise Lady Eleanor did not approve. She had plans of her own to keep the boys at home. Hugh was to come and share Mortimer's daily lessons. Here was great news for Hugh, who had never been taught a word, though he was ten years old. He worked hard now, and soon could read and write, and was rapidly catching up with Mortimer. They were happy days for him. He loved the big manor house, so different from the tavern. On the floors, instead of rushes strewn about, usually dirty, there were rugs of soft tints, and on the walls bright-colored pictures woven of wool,—"wall-clothing," Lady Eleanor called them, and instead of the thick mica panes of the tavern the windows were of glass, through which one could see to the beautiful park outside. And sometimes Lady Eleanor sat at the clavichord making music and singing. This was home,—an English home in the days of Queen Bess, with beauty and comfort and clean, sweet living.

A PANELED ROOM Such beautifully carved walls might have been found in a room of a house of Elizabeth's time. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

The best place of all was a richly paneled room where they sat while Lady Eleanor read to them. The wood of the walls was carved in pictures; the faces of gnomes and fairies and knights looked at them while Lady Eleanor read and reread the old stories of Arthur and his Round Table. These were the boys' favorites, and after she had read to them about King Arthur rowing across the lake to catch the fateful sword Excalibur from the waves, or of Arthur receiving the vows of his knights who rose pale and dazed with awe when they had taken their oath

Of utter hardihood, utter gentleness, And, loving, utter faithfulness in love, And uttermost obedience to the King,

they went out to play them, just as Hugh had seen the companies of actors who came to the tavern play their old stories. Mortimer was always King Arthur: that somehow seemed natural to both boys. And Hugh, now as Sir Launcelot, now as Sir Bors, now as Sir Gareth, who won his knighthood by serving as a kitchen-boy (and Hugh liked that story well), knelt and was knighted and started out on his quest to honor his fair lady. His fair lady was always like Lady Eleanor with thick golden hair and gentle eyes.

The best story of all, and the one he asked Lady Eleanor to read over and over again, was the story of Sir Galahad and the Holy Grail,—the quest of the Holy Cup from which our Lord drank at his last supper, and which, before it vanished from the earth, was seen only by those whose lives were pure. He used to curl up in one of the big wooden chairs in the paneled room and picture every scene as Lady Eleanor read the story.

Sir Galahad came to Arthur's court, the youngest of the Knights, dressed in white armor, though where he came from or who he was no one knew; yet he was so fair that when King Arthur knighted him, he said, "God make thee good as thou art beautiful." At the Round Table there was a seat called the Siege Perilous, for the magician Merlin had said that on it "no man could sit but he should lose himself." So it had been left vacant, but when Galahad came he sat in it, saying "If I lose myself, I save myself." Then there had followed thunder and a beam of light, and in the midst of the beam shone the Holy Grail, and Galahad heard a voice calling, "O Galahad, and O Galahad, follow me." At once Sir Galahad and Sir Percival and others of the knights took the oath to go to find the Holy Grail; but of all those who set out, only Sir Galahad and Sir Percival really saw it. Sir Percival, because he was not always true to his vows and because, lacking real modesty, he prided himself on the deeds he did, saw it only in the distance and then only with the help of Sir Galahad. But to Sir Galahad it was given to complete the quest of the Grail. For he went out and fought and overcame evil men and did great deeds, never thinking of his own worth and bravery, and when he met Sir Percival, he bade him follow him. Together they came to a steep and perilous hill; this they climbed, only to reach on the other side a black swamp, and there Sir Percival stayed; but Galahad crossed over it on bridge after bridge, each one of which burned behind him, until he came to a shore and took a boat and sailed away far out on an unknown sea. Percival saw him go, but could not follow. And soon the Holy Grail, red as any rose, floated over his head in a bright cloud, while far away, like a pearl in its beauty, shone a heavenly city with all its spires and gateways. This was the goal, and to this Sir Galahad sailed away never to come back. But Percival returned to Arthur's court and told what he had seen. Then all knew that Sir Galahad, because he best of all had kept his vow to "Live pure, speak true, right wrong, follow the King," had alone of them all accomplished his quest of the Holy Grail.

When Mortimer and Hugh began to act out this story, as they had the others, both wanted to play Sir Galahad, Hugh because he too was a knight from no one knew where, and Mortimer, because he always took the leading part. It was Hugh who yielded, remembering that for lack of humility Sir Percival had lost the Holy Grail. Yet he was always a little jealous, when Mortimer, acting his part, stepped into his imaginary boat and sailed away to the dream-city. For to take boat and go away was what he was always longing to do. And so, when Lady Eleanor asked, "Why do you both like this story so much?" Mortimer answered, "Because Sir Galahad won his prize," but Hugh said, "Because he sails away in his boat out into the unknown sea and finds it all come true. And I'm sure it was just the same way I have seen it when I climb up onto the headland and watch the boats when they go out at sunset into the gold. Do you suppose the real gold they find is half as nice as sailing into that?" And he and Lady Eleanor both doubted it.

One day Hugh was on "the Hoe," his favorite headland, when he saw far out a sail, and the longer he looked the more surely he made up his mind that it was the Golden Hind. It must be Drake home again after all the long years. He ran into the village, crying to the people to come and see. And true it was; the Golden Hind was limping into port after its three years' journey around the world. There was excitement enough in Plymouth then. Not only was the ship loaded with gold and pearls and diamonds and emeralds, but their own Drake was back, having beaten the Spanish ships in every port and having carried the name of England upon every sea. Drake had "plowed a furrow round the world," they said, and all kinds of revelry were planned in Plymouth to honor her favorite son.

Hugh took a share in the celebration, according to his own fashion. When, in the midst of shouting throngs, Drake passed up the street, a boy darted out from the crowd, put a paper into his hand and disappeared. It was a verse in his honor, proclaiming him a knight like the knights of old, who had gone out on adventures for his queen, and it closed with a prayer that some day great Drake of the Golden Hind  would let Hugh of the "Golden Hind" go with him as his squire. The verse pleased and amused Drake, and he made inquiries about the boy, but before he could see Hugh he had to sail away to London to the queen. And there he was really made a knight, for Queen Bess touched him with her royal staff and called him "Sir Francis." Drake, well pleased, declared that Hugh was a prophet and did not forget the boy. But he was seldom on land, and Hugh went on his quiet way growing up and learning his lessons until he and Mortimer were seventeen.

SIR FRANCIS DRAKE Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The time was come then when Hugh might carry out his ambition and go to sea. Of course, more than ever, he wanted to go with Drake, for no one else could rival him for daring and adventure or in service of the queen. But Hugh, who was nobody's boy, knew that he would have to be content to ship on some little trading boat until he had proved himself. Mortimer was not going with him. Though he begged hard for the chance, his mother insisted that he should go to Eton to continue the education of a gentleman. Both boys were unhappy at the parting; Hugh was sorry to give up his books, though he longed for the sea, and Mortimer was openly rebellious.

May Day came. Hugh with the other villagers had been watching a band of Morris dancers and had himself been dancing around the Maypole when a sudden summons sent him hurrying to Lady Eleanor. He found her in distress. Mortimer had disappeared and had left no word for his mother. Hugh went at once and searched the wharves and all the departing ships, but without result, for no mariner was foolish enough to carry off the son of the manor house. Mortimer was not to be found. The only clue Hugh could get was that someone thought he had seen him among the company of the Morris dancers, who had started to dance their way to London.

"I will go after them," Hugh promised Lady Eleanor. "Never fear! I shall find him. I will do nothing else until I find him."

"Bless you, dear Hugh," Lady Eleanor thanked him with affection. "I have no one whom I can trust like you. Take anything you need, and God reward you for what you are doing."

Hugh traveled from village to village, now finding that the Morris dancers had been there and gone, now finding no clue to their whereabouts. He rode his horse as fast as possible, refreshed by the beauty of the green meadows and blossoming hedgerows, and occasionally another traveler joined him at some village, but Hugh outrode them all. One day his road was blocked. There was no passing. Crowds were everywhere,—hucksters with carts, companies of actors, wagonloads of goods, great lords in splendid dress on prancing horses, heralds and outriders shouting orders. Everywhere was confusion. Hugh could not get right of way to pass. He could not combat Queen Bess herself. For all this tumult and gay life meant that the queen was at hand. She was coming to visit one of her lords in his castle close by, and great fêtes and pageants were already beginning in her honor. The crowds were everywhere lined up by the roads hoping to catch a sight of it all, and though horsemen shouted and pushed them back, the people pressed in ever closer. For the queen was coming! The word went flashing down the lines, as men in plumes and gorgeous armor came by, reining in their prancing, spirited horses. Then, from the midst of the crowd, a little hunchback boy leaned far out to see, lost his balance and fell, pushed out into the highway. A horseman was almost on him. He shouted out oaths but never even slackened his speed. The hunchback was almost caught under the horse's hoofs. Women screamed, but Hugh, who was close by, sprang out, caught back the little fellow and saved him. But he himself was kicked in the head.

QUEEN ELIZABETH Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

He knew nothing more until he found himself in a beautiful room, and whether he was alive or dead, he could not say. A young man entered, as handsome as any knight of his early dreams, but his greeting was not dreamlike. "Ho, the lad's awake!" he cried. "I told them it was not easy killing such as you! Art well again?" This, he learned was his rescuer, Sir Hubert, who had brought him to where he was lying now, in the very castle of the lord who was entertaining the queen. The queen! The thought sent Hugh jumping from his bed. The queen! If he could see her! But then he remembered his promise to Lady Eleanor. "Alas, I cannot wait. Show me the road," he said sadly, "for I must not stay even to pay my thanks."

"Tut, tut!" said Sir Hubert. "Business of more importance than the queen's? And how can you go? Your horse is strayed, lost in the crowd, and you but off a sick bed!"

When he heard Hugh's errand, however, he was ready to help him. He promised that in two days' time he would mount him on one of his own horses and take him by the most direct route to London.

So Hugh stayed, and saw the queen, more resplendent in her pride and all her gold and pearls,—the very jewels Drake had brought her—than any earthly being he had ever imagined. He understood why all the poets made verses in her honor, and why at every gate or doorway that she passed some one sang her praises. His own mind was rhyming her with sun and moon and all the stars of heaven. There were sights, too, to see as wonderful as those he used to dream of: banquets and plays, pageants of gods and goddesses in stately companies, a mock tournament between knights in armor, and even fairies dancing on the green. Those, however, were not half as lovely as the memories of his childhood.

Yet he was glad when at last he was on his way to London. London itself took his breath away. It was so big, so crowded with people, so splendid with fine houses, finer even than the manor house. And there was so much noise, with carts jolting over the newly paved roads, and street venders crying their wares. How could he ever expect to find Mortimer in such a place? Sir Hubert gave him a home for as long as he would stay and helped him in every way possible, but it was the wharves that drew Hugh. He felt sure that Mortimer meant to go to sea, here where no skipper would know him; so he spent all his days at the docks. He boarded every outgoing ship, for fear that Mortimer might be in hiding somewhere. But the days and weeks went slipping by without result. It was dreary, disappointing work. To fight for one's lady is much more interesting than to suffer loneliness and to do nothing but wait, yet the thought of Lady Eleanor held him fast.

One evening he stayed later than usual. Something seemed to hold him. It was cold, the fog was thick, and it was difficult to see two yards before one's face,—a night for some bad thing to happen. Soon he heard scuffling and swearing, common enough sounds at the docks, where the ruffians of the city were apt to gather. But he stepped nearer, and saw that the victim this time was a young fellow better dressed than most haunters of the wharves. Something about him made Hugh start. His hat was pulled low over his face and he was muffled in his cape, but it was Mortimer. There could be no doubt of it. Hugh sprang forward, and with the advantage of surprise, struck down one and then another of the ruffians. Mortimer, too, seeing help at hand, recovered his fighting spirit, and thrust at them. But they were two against four, and it was likely to go hard with Hugh and Mortimer. At that moment, however, a broad, commanding figure swung into their midst, ordered the bandits off, and told the boys to follow him. They followed into a ship lying close by, and into a cabin, and there by the light of a candle Hugh recognized their preserver. It was as he suspected—Sir Francis Drake. "Now what is this to-do?" he demanded. "And who are you two, loitering at this hour about the docks?"

"My name is Mortimer," Mortimer spoke boldly, "and I am waiting for Sir Francis Drake."

"Humph!" the captain grunted, and turned to Hugh. "And you?"

"I am Hugh,—Hugh of the 'Golden Hind,' men call me,—and I was seeking my friend for whose safety I feared."

"Hugh of the 'Golden Hind'! Where have I heard that name before?" Sir Francis spoke half to himself. "Ah, Plymouth,—the day we came into port. You're the boy, are you, who sprang out of the road?"

"Yes, Sir Francis," Hugh spoke the name softly.

"Humph!" the great man grunted again, but this time with good humor. "And you write verse, don't you? I remember."

"Sometimes, sir."

"Pretty good one, too. Still wanting to go to sea? Want to go and write verses to the mermaids, eh?"

"Indeed, sir, yes, I want to go."

"And no one to say you no, if I recollect aright. Eh?"

"No one, sir,—oh, except, sir, I have first a promise to keep, and then,—then, oh, I want to go, sir."

"Meet me at Plymouth, then, in a month and a day. And mind you be ready. We set sail from there, God willing, for the Indies in a month and a day."

"Oh, sir!" Hugh could not express himself for amazement and for joy.

But Mortimer, who had been completely mystified, was just coming to understand. "Oh, Sir Francis," he put in, "take me, too!"

The captain shook his head. "You're another sort of waterfowl, young sir, I take it. A friend of yours?" he turned to Hugh. "From Plymouth, too?" Hugh nodded. "Mortimer, son of the late Sir Mortimer of Kestor Park, I'll wager. So?" he questioned Hugh again, and again Hugh nodded, though Mortimer looked black.

"Humph." Sir Francis grunted. "Sent me letters about you, they did. Afraid I'd kidnap you, were they? Marry, I still can see the nose before my face and know a runaway when I see him. Go home, young sir, and when your mother says the word, there's time enough for you to think about the sea."

MAP OF THE NEW WORLD This map of the early sixteenth century, from a book called the "Strasburg Ptolemy." shows the West Indies, the point of Florida, and a little of the coast of North America, as well as a good deal of Brazil, marked "Terra Incognita," the Unknown Land. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

That was enough to send Mortimer straight to Plymouth with Hugh, to beg Lady Eleanor to change her will. But it was of no use; she insisted that he go to college first, and then, when he was twenty-one, he could choose for himself. But Hugh was ready. He had brought Mortimer safely home and kept his word. And at the end of a month and a day, followed by Mortimer's envy and Lady Eleanor's blessing, he took ship with Drake, outward bound in the service of England and the queen. The New World would soon lie before him,—the New World, still the Unknown and Mysterious, a land of fabulous treasure, ready to reward each newcomer, whether he sought riches for pocket or mind. Out to the Unknown Hugh sailed, a poet-adventurer launched on his Sea of Gold. In childhood he had dared everything to find the fairies and sing to them, and as a boy he had in dreams followed after Sir Galahad and the Holy Grail, and now in the same spirit and with the same hopes he was going out to seek the New World. One more knight was embarking on his quest,—on the Great Adventure of the Unknown.

Pierre and a Daughter of France

THE FRENCH LOVER OF THE BEAUTIFUL

Pierre's mother, the Countess Clothilde, was very gay and very pretty and very charming. That was to be expected, for she was a lady-in-waiting to a princess at the court of King Louis. There everyone, it seemed, was charming and light-hearted and merry. The great palace of Versailles where they lived was gorgeous with paintings and gilded panels on its walls and with gilded chairs and tables about the rooms. And around the place were terraces crowned with statues and groves of oranges and chestnuts, and gardens where the play of fountains filled the air with music. It was a world of poetry and delight that would satisfy any lover of the beautiful. The painters painted it over and over again, and if they did make pictures of others than the elegant gentlemen and ladies of the court, they dressed them up too,—in pretty clothes and in all the colors of their own fancy until them made work seem like fun and to be poor like a play. So for the court the care and hard work of the world were all hidden behind laughter and veiled with beauty.

THE PALACE OF VERSAILLES AND THE GARDENS

Yet underneath all her gayety an occasional care did come to trouble the Countess of Clothilde. There was her need of money; for if one lives at the court of a king where all is gold and glitter, one must have fine clothes and glitter too. She had to keep sending word to her place in the country, which she never even visited herself, to tell her peasants that they must work harder and send her more money. And, too she had Pierre to bring up without help from his father, since his father had died when the baby was a few days old. Of course she had an old nurse who really took all the care of him, and now that he was no longer a baby, she had had him brought from the château in the country to the palace, and with other children of the court he had lessons under an old tutor. He was a dear though mischievous little fellow who did not always do what was expected of him.

One afternoon the Countess Clothilde was called from her merrymaking in the garden with the other lords and ladies by the old nurse, who was wringing her hands and sobbing. Pierre was lost. All day old Nanna and the grooms had been searching for him, but he was nowhere to be found. That was bad news. The Countess Clothilde was alarmed. Yet she could do little to help, for she had to go to be dressed in her brocade and jewels ready for the court ball that night. The king was just back from his hunting and everyone was summoned. She went to the ball and to hide her trouble put on her best mask of gayety, but soon she did not need to pretend. Her little Pierre was the talk of the evening. Monsieur le Marquis de Vernous, who had been with the king on his hunt, came up to her, a fine figure with his powdered hair and satin clothes. "Look out, Madame la Comtesse," he said, "that baby of yours, gare, but he has spirit! He is an enfant terrible. Some day you will really lose him."

"My boy! Pierre? You've seen him! Tell me, is he safe?"

"Safe and deserves a medal for gallantry, Madame. Seldom in battle have I seen more fearless conduct." He went on to tell her that when they were riding home from the hunt, in a field far from the palace he saw something moving and supposed it to be a fawn. The hunting had been poor, and on the chance he let loose his dogs, but happily spurred on his horse after them. "And there, Madame, if you please," he said, "there in the midst of the pack, jumping and barking around him, I found your Pierre. He was holding them off, a dauntless chevalier indeed, but I, I confess it, Madame, I was frightened. Yet he is safe, without harm. I brought him back myself in front of me on my horse."

THE HUNTS OF LOUIS XV This is one of a series of tapestries of the Hunts of the King

When the Countess herself took the time to question and scold her small son, she found him happy and unrepentant. "I had to go to see the pretty horses all together," he cried. "In the stables they stand too still, but out there, oh, how they danced and pranced! It was so pretty, mother. I want to go to hunt."

After that, Pierre was a great favorite. The gentlemen talked of his courage, and the ladies all spoiled him; so that whenever he dared he ran away from nurse and lessons into the gardens where the lovely ladies were. He was a real child of the court, in love with every gay and pretty thing. At last, though he was barely ten years old, the Countess Clothilde had to send him away to school. He went up to Paris to the very school which the young Marquis de Lafayette had just left. There he lived in a dreary little room not much better than a cell, with no window and only an opening in the door to let in the air. He learned some Latin and mathematics, but the things he really liked were the lessons in fencing and horsemanship, in manners and all the etiquette of the court,—how to make his bow, how to pick up a lady's fan, how to be a perfect courtier. As the years went by and a new Louis and his queen, Marie Antoinette, came to reign at Versailles, he had mastered these things so well that all the ladies declared he would be a great favorite with her majesty, who more than ever loved everything elegant and pretty.

So when the boys at school talked together of what they would do when they were men, Pierre naturally said, "I shall be a gentleman-in-waiting at the court." But Guillaume, one of the older boys, shook his head. "When we are men, it well may be that there will be neither court nor king." Neither court nor king! The boys howled him down and threatened to mob him. But Guillaume went on, "Can't any of you, even you spoiled darlings here, feel what is in the air? Did you suppose all the world was a picnic like Versailles? Have you never heard of the peasants who slave and starve in the country while the court blows soap-bubbles? How long do you think they'll keep it up? A month's work and it buys my lady a pretty fan! A fan for her and no food for them!"

"What nonsense you talk, Guillaume," said Pierre, "I haven't been in the country, to be sure, since I was a baby, but I've seen Boucher's pictures, and the peasants are as jolly as anybody."

"Pictures! He's seen Boucher's pictures!" jeered Guillaume. "And he thinks they're the real thing! Get along down to the country, you fellows; it's time you did, though your dainty souls will have a shock. Magic words are running around here—liberté et egalité."

"Liberty and equality! And what might they mean?" Pierre and the other boys asked in chorus as they shrugged their shoulders scornfully.

"Mean? They mean fewer joujous for my lady and more bread for the farmer. We'll all be saying them soon, unless we want to hang for it."

"Not I," sang out Pierre. "No ugly old world like that for me! Coarse black bread instead of my lady's pretty little fan! Bah!"

"Look out, then!" Guillaume retorted. "Liberté et egalité!  You're likely to hear them any minute."

"Liberty and equality!" The very next day Pierre heard them. He had stolen away from school to buy oranges of his favorite vender on the street. She kept her golden fruit well piled and wore bright colors herself and her voice rang out in jolly fashion as she cried her wares: "Oranges, oranges! Come buy!" So Pierre always went to her, and she like everyone else was usually ready to pet him. But today she was full of new talk. The king was making one of his rare visits to Paris and the streets were decorated with fine lords on horseback and bright ladies peering out daintily from their sedan chairs, as strong porters carried them clear of the dirt and tumult.

GOING TO MARKET, BY BOUCHER Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

"Aye," said the orange-woman, with a toss of her head, "my lady rides today. But tomorrow,—liberté et egalité. Do you hear that, my boy? Learn quickly to say it, too,—for soon things will change. For by what right has she her fine clothes and jeweled chains, and I—nothing? Tell me, then," she defied Pierre.

It was Guillaume's talk over again, and Pierre though only fourteen was angry. A boy brought up at court could not put up with such talk. "By what right?" he cried. "Because they belong to her, of course,—like sunshine to a flower, like their gold skins to these oranges of yours. She is herself sweet and pretty! Eh bien, she shall have sweet and pretty things."

"Ah, shall she?" scoffed the orange-vender, and Pierre lost his temper. "Would you, then," he cried "have all the world ugly like yourself?"

Then something happened. Whether it was accident or whether the orange-woman did it, Pierre never knew. A sedan chair came close beside them, and at the moment a pretty lady in her high-feathered headdress and gleaming jewels leaned out of her window to wave her fan toward a gentleman behind her. Suddenly her fan fell into the street. Quick as a thought Pierre darted out to pick it up. But a workman standing by was in his way and in his hurry Pierre ran head on into him. It made the man angry, and he gave Pierre a fierce blow on the head, but Pierre somehow rallied, flung himself upon the fan, picked it up and handed it to the lady with his most courtly bow. A brillian smile rewarded him, and he was well content.

But the blow on his head had been a hard one, and Pierre fell ill with fever and delirium. He knew nothing until weeks later he opened his eyes in a strange room, once fine but now faded and dull compared with the bright rooms of Versailles. Everything was still. There were no rumblings of carts and no shrill street cries as in Paris. He was in the country at the old family château, where with old Nanna his mother had sent him to get well. He got well slowly, and it was the dreariest life he had ever known. There was nothing to do; he was not allowed to hunt; there was no good horse to ride, and there were no people to talk to. On all sides of the château stretched fields and woods and pastures with only the peasants at work in them. Such people he had never seen. They certainly were not like Boucher's pictures. They were coarse, clumsy, stupid creatures, bent over as they walked, dressed almost in rags, with legs and feet bare, and their faces were heavy, without expression. "Who are these?" he asked old Nanna.

"Your people," she answered. "It is they who work the ground for Madame la Comtesse and for you. They are made to do your will."

"But why are they like this?" Pierre cried.

"Ah, they know nothing. They are but beasts," old Nanna said, with the contempt of a city woman for the country, and for the moment Pierre let it go at that.

When he was well enough he walked about in the fields for the sake of having something to do. Close at hand the people disgusted him even more, for they were so dirty and rough, and they seemed to like him as little as he them. It was a rude contrast to his dainty past. Yet to roam the country was all he had to do. He could not appreciate its beauty, for a boy brought up in the artificial splendor of Versailles had not eyes to see the loveliness of this smiling land of Touraine, with its gleaming rivers and green fields, its wooded hills and little hamlets nestled into the landscape.

He was dreadfully bored and longing for any kind of change, when one day he crossed a narrow footbridge, so narrow that two could hardly pass, and coming toward him he saw a little boy, hair matted like thatch on a cottage roof, hands and feet caked with dirt, clothes few and foul. Must he, Pierre, rub against such a creature? All the dreariness of the past days seemed to turn into disgust. Before he knew what he was doing, he shouted, "Get out of the way!" and started to kick the boy. But he felt a hand pull him and before he turned to look he somehow guessed whose it was. There stood a girl whom he had often seen and wondered about, though he had never spoken to her. She was older than himself, a peasant, like the others, yet different. For she held her head high, and there was a light in her eyes. Though she had a short skirt and bare feet, she walked with a natural grace, and as she walked she often sang a little tune. She always courtesied to him respectfully, not avoiding him as the others did. Now it was she who challenged him.

SHEPHERDESS KNITTING, BY MILLET Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

"What—what,—by what right?" Pierre stammered, though in spite of himself he was admiring her courage.

"By what right?" she echoed in low, sweet tones. "Liberté et egalité!  Is he not, like you, a son of France?"

Liberty and equality,—there was the watchword turning up again! Pierre, surprised, stepped aside and the girl and the little boy passed on. He went home, and as he thought it over, he became less surprised at what she had done than at his own feeling toward her. She interested him. There was something of authority about her as well as charm, and he wanted to see more of her. Her name was Michelle, he learned; her father was an old tenant on the place, and—what was strange—people said she knew how to read, a thing almost unheard of among the peasants. He fell into the habit of passing near where she tended the sheep. Always she bowed politely, without a word.

One day she had a book in her hand, and Pierre went up to her. "What do you read?" he asked.

"The story of France," she answered quietly. "Always I read of France, poor France, which is always on my heart."

"Poor? Why call France poor?"

She looked at him for a moment with wide eyes, then answered simply, "Because the people have not enough to eat. They work and suffer, and the queen spends all they have. It is not just. She must stop."

"But would you have all the world like them?" asked Pierre with a shrug, waving his hand toward the reapers in a neighboring field.

"No, not like us," Michelle corrected him, "for we are dull through working all the time to give the queen her pretty chains and toys. That is why I say it is not just. And it shall change."

"But," said Pierre, "you do not understand. If you had ever seen! If you could know something about the beautiful world, as well as about just bread!"

"The beautiful world!" she caught her breath. "Do I tend my sheep here all day and not know what beauty is! The lovely earth, our river in the sun, the great white clouds like flocks of my own sheep, the sower as he swings across the fields! Ah, monsieur, are not these beautiful, too? Do I not know? It may be there are many kinds of beauty."

Pierre looked at her surprised. Then for the first time he opened his eyes to look about him and really see the lovely landscape. A peasant with a bundle of fagots strapped on his back moved somberly across the fields, almost picturesque in the distance. Michelle pointed to him. "Now we may seem ugly to you, for we are sad and tired. But when we are free, when liberty comes, even the common man will have some time for what is pleasant and lovely. Ah, why is that day so long in coming?" she cried. "If Jeanne d'Arc would but come again and help us!" Her eyes traveled out along a brown thread of road in the distance.

"Patience, I know! Patienve, I tell myself. I tend my sheep and read her story," she went on quietly, "and then I go far along on the road to Chinon, where the stone Madonna is. She is very, very old and even in Jeanne's time they say she stood there,—perhaps Jeanne prayed to her herself when she rode to the king—and I go to her and pray that soon, soon she will send someone to save France."

"Jeanne d'Arc? Who was she?" Pierre asked. "I know I've heard her name. Was she a queen or saint?"

JEANNE D'ARC, BY CHAPU

"She was only a peasant girl like me. She worked hard as we all must, but she prayed often too, and one day when she was in the field with her sheep there came a light. Ah, sometimes when I am here alone with my sheep, I can see just how it looked to her. And there was a voice too which often spoke to her: 'Be good and wise and go often to church.' Jeanne heeded it, and after that, when the other children went to dance at Lady Tree or took their suppers to the fountain where the fairies were, she was thinking of the voices. Three times the light came, and then St. Michael himself stood before her. 'I come to tell you of the great pity of France,' he said to her. For you know, monsieur," Michelle interrupted her story, "that was in the days when France suffered worse than now. An enemy king had conquered all the north of France, almost down to our great river Loire, and Paris was gone, and the young Dauphin was not even crowned true king, and he did nothing to save his people, but idled (close by us here) in his castle of Chinon.

"And so St. Michael came to Jeanne and said, 'It is thou, daughter of God; thou must go to save France.' Think of it, monsieur. She was ignorant, even more ignorant than I, for, as she told the angel, she did not know her A or B, she could not ride a horse or fight, and how could she save France? But St. Michael sent her St. Margaret and St. Catherine to teach her. Often they came and talked with her and directed her in all things. She had two lives then,—one when she worked for her mother, one when she saw her visions and heard her voices. And she believed all that the voices taught her; though it was so hard, she believed. That is the great thing, monsieur, to believe; then one must do. And so Jeanne made her uncle believe in her visions, too, until at last he was ready to take her to the king's officer, Robert de Baudricourt. Robert of course did not understand, and he said to Jeanne, 'I will send you back to your father with your ears well beaten.' But Jeanne only answered him, 'By mid-Lent I must be with the king even if I have to walk my legs off to the knees.'

"And she meant it, monsieur, she would have done it, and so the king's officer had to believe in her, too, and he gave her a sword and a few men to guide her to the king. All the long, hard journey through the wild lands where the enemy lay, she rode with only those few men, until at last they came to Chinon, where the king was. He did not believe in her, and he thought to trick her by hiding himself among his nobles and putting another man on his throne. But Jeanne went straight to the real king. She knew him, for her voices told her. Then the king had to listen to her. He gave her armor and let her go to join the army, and she went riding on her white horse to Orléans, where the enemy was camped against us. And because she was so pure and wise and good, even the soldiers believed her, and they did what she said, and she saved the city. Then she made the Dauphin go with her to Reims, to the cathedral where the sacred oil is kept for crowning our kings. There at last he was made true king over all France, and the people turned to him and did their best to serve him and serve France.

"Jeanne died, monsieur, a dreadful death, but not until she had given us our country, our lovely France to love and care for." Michelle stopped, and her eyes traveled far away across the beautiful fields.

Pierre got up and stretched himself, as if waking from a dream. "I've heard some of that story," he said, "but I supposed it was a fairy tale. How could a girl do such things? Lead an army! It isn't possible!"

"Impossible? Yes, impossible, yet true." Michelle answered quietly. "It was because she loved France so much, and because she believed. So it must be again today. There must be someone to save France, someone to believe and love enough. Why will you not be the one, monsieur?"

She spoke always quietly, but Pierre noticed the glow in her face, the light in her eyes, the strength of her feeling, which shook her body as the wind sways a lily on its stalk. She was not pretty like the exquisite ladies of the court, but she had a power unknown to them. Pierre, scarcely realizing what he did, turned to her and said, "What would you have me do?"

STATUE OF THE MADONNA This statue was made in France before the days of Joan of Arc. (Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

After that they were continually together. She had lighted a little spark in his spirit, and day by day she fanned it, to kindle it into a real fire. He was only a boy, only fourteen he told her, and what could he do? But she told him he must learn, and he must love. He must learn to love the real France, not the little world of the court. She talked to him about his peasants, and made him know them, until Martin was no longer like a clod of the earth to him, but a father working day and night to save his sick baby, and old André became a sort of hero, because through giving his daughter a real marriage feast he had robbed himself of any hope of meat to eat, for the tax collector had seen the feathers of the chicken he had killed and told him that a man so rich must pay bigger taxes, and now as the result André was very poor. So, under Michelle's teaching, Pierre grew interested in the people and began to understand them and to find them less dull and to want to help them. She took him on a pilgrimage to Chinon, where Jeanne d'Arc had gone to find the king, and on the way back, at the shrine of her stone Madonna, she stopped to pray for him. No longer did he find the days dreary, for he had so much to learn. But he was well again now, and his mother sent for him. He must go back to school.

For farewell, Michelle climbed with him to some uplands above the river, covered with purple heather and yellow gorse. She picked a flower of each and gave them to him. "That you may not forget!" she said. "The wild heather, that's for liberty, and the golden gorse, for equality! See the two together; are they not beautiful? They are the fair France that is to be. You will not forget?" she begged, looking at him eagerly.

Pierre took the flowers. "I shall not forget," he promised.

He went back to school, this time to the Military School at Versailles. He was glad to be back, but somehow it was all changed. Was it really the same place? Had the pretty ladies always been like dolls, each one like the other one? Had it always been such a made-up sort of world?

Yet even here he found a new stir in the air. Even here the magic words had crept into the talk,—liberté et egalité. For far across the seas in America some peasants or farmers, as the nobles called them, had risen up against their king and had declared that all men alike had a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and they were even then fighting to get what they believed in. The Marquis de Lafayette, who might have been the darling of the court, had braved the king's anger and was fitting up a ship at his own expense to go over and help them in their fight. "For," he said, "I believe that the liberties of the whole world are bound up in this fight in America." Pierre longed to go, too, and wished that he were old enough. But he did the next best thing; he worked hard at his business of learning to be a good soldier, and talked with Madame de Lafayette whenever he could about all that was happening in America. Then three years later, when Lafayette came home and persuaded King Louis at last to send troops and money to help the great American, General Washington, Pierre was fitted and ready to go, too. Just before sailing, he wrote to Michelle. "Tomorrow I start for America, following Monsieur de Lafayette. Liberté et egalité!  I say the words after you who first taught me to think about them. You gave me the flowers, the purple heather and the yellow gorse, to make me remember them, and now to show you how I have remembered I go to fight to make them come true. It is not yet for France. But after America is saved, it will be the turn of France. We shall come back and win them too for France—liberty and equality! And then we will make her the fair and beautiful land you dream of. Till then, farewell."

LAFAYETTE, BY LA PERCHE Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Pierre made good his word. With Lafayette he fought for freedom in both worlds. After liberty was won for America, he came home to find France in tumult. The court was rocking, and the people clamoring for the right to work for themselves and live as men, not as slaves of the king. Dreadful years of revolution followed, when, seeing all in the light of Michelle's words, Pierre, like Lafayette, took his stand with the people and fought for their freedom. Though it took long, dark years, France at last, like America, became a land of liberty. And Pierre, through fighting to save it, learned more than ever how dear to him were its beautiful fields, farms and rivers, just as Michelle had seen that it would be. Patriot or lover of the beautiful,—either way,—France filled his heart.

Nathaniel and the Handicraft of a Patriot

THE AMERICAN SILVERSMITH

Dark and tall and unbroken the pine forests stretched to the North. There were no roads through them, and no clearings for miles and miles. No white person lived in their midst, and only the easily lost Indian trails guided the traveler. To journey through them was to wander in a wilderness of silence and mystery. Yet into this forest a group of people from a little Connecticut village was pushing its way. They were of stout pioneer stuff, going out to take up new lands, plant new farms and homes and schools and churches,—to carry far into the North the white man's way of life. They were leaving behind them hot discussions and many disturbances, for it was in 1768, when feeling ran high in the colonies against their king, George III, and many of them were glad to escape from the bitterness of the struggle. Still, just as long before in the wilderness of Sinai the Children of Israel had sighed for the fleshpots of Egypt, there were a few who looked back with longing eyes as they lost sight of the last chimneys which told of settled homes and friends and cheerful hearths.

But not so Nathaniel, who was eleven years old. He did not need any preaching from his father the minister, "Fear not, but go forward." He delighted in it all,—the pitching of camp each night, the suppers cooked over glowing coals, the lullaby of the soughing of the pines and the murmuring of the river. And though the journey was slow, it was pleasantly varied. Sometimes he rode behind his father on the pillion with his mother, sometimes he walked sturdily with the men, riding and tying, as they called it, each having his turn at the few horses. And on Sundays they stopped for worship and rest, for these were good Puritan people. Nathaniel had no regrets, and no fears for the future. He knew that they were going to a new clearing, where they should have to make their own log houses before they could have a place to live in, and that there would be no church for his father to preach in, and at first no school. But there was the great out of doors to live and learn in, and he was not afraid of work. He had been brought up on Bible texts and the one he knew best was, "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might."

Even the hardships of the first winter did not take away his spirit. The winds came in cold through the oiled paper which served for window panes, the snow lay deep, and food was often scarce. But he learned to walk on snowshoes such as the Indians had, he worked hard to do his share of woodcutting and, best of all, one of the men taught him to handle a gun. Everyone who could hunt for deer or rabbits or kill the wild pigeons as they flew over was just so much help to keep them all alive. And a gun stood for safety, for once the little settlement had heard far away the terrifying sound of an Indian war whoop, as a band of braves followed the river north; and often in the cold winter nights the wolves and wildcats and lynxes came almost to their doors, as hungry for food as the settlers were themselves.

Once, before his father trusted Nathaniel with a gun, he had gone with his little sister only a stone's throw into the forest, when he saw two gleaming specks of fire blazing from behind a rock. He knew what it meant. A hungry wolf had scented them. "Run," he cried to little Patience, and pushed her away while he put himself between her and the wolf. He had not even a stick to beat the creature off, but he had his wits, sharpened already by experience to think quickly. He ran behind a tree, and as the wolf snapped closer and closer to him, he darted back and forth, always keeping the tree between them. It would have been a losing game for Nathaniel, but suddenly he heard a shot ring out and a bullet went whistling by him. The wolf fell dead. A friendly Indian from a neighboring tribe was passing, and saw, and saved his life. After that, even his mother knew that he was safer with a gun.

His father gave him and the other children daily lessons, but it was the work with his hands that filled most of his days. "Come, Nathaniel," his mother would call, "come, dip the wicks for me in the tallow; it is hot and ready, and we sorely need candles. Mind you waste none, and hang the wicks carefully from the rods to dry."

Or it was, "Nathaniel, go fetch a bit of wood and whittle me a spoon. My big one broke last night right in the midst of my hasty pudding." Or, "Canst build a little stool for thy sister, Nathaniel? The child should have a seat of her own, though it may not be so fine as the high chair with twisted legs I had at home in dear old England. That had on it a carved crown, and how proud I was of it!"

"Indeed, then," said Nathaniel, "Patience shall have one, and with carving on it, too,—even a carved crown, if she likes."

"Ah, yes," said the mother, "do it, Nathaniel, with a crown. That stands for loyalty to our king, though he is so far away."

Nathaniel made a stool of pine wood and carved it with pine branches and a crown,—loyalty in the heart of the forest.

In the spring there was planting of corn and pumpkins, fishing, berrying, building a new schoolhouse, and making canoes. There was no idle moment even for a boy. "But," as people on the frontier said to one another, "a hard day's work makes a soft bed." Nathaniel grew up strong and diligent and skillful with his hands.

KITCHEN OF THE PAUL REVERE HOME

Late one winter, strange tales came drifting down from the friendly Indians farther up the river. The wild tribes in the Canada forests, they said, were on the war path, driven far out of their usual trails by hunger, though some said, too, that they were driven by the French to harass the people of the border. Everyone in the settlement was warned to take no risk, but time went on, and nothing was seen or heard of even one stranger-Indian. It was impossible to keep always within bounds, and Nathaniel went to the river one afternoon with his stick and line and hook, bent on getting some trout to vary their continual supper of hasty pudding. Everything was very still; only an occasional jumping fish and himself seemed to be alive in all the black stretches of the forest or on the silver thread of the river.

Then, suddenly, as if he had sprung from the earth, an Indian boy was crouching beside him. He made no sound but sat and looked at Nathaniel, his face as unmoved as the silent, mysterious forest behind them, telling nothing of what he felt. But Nathaniel started forward. From the boy's foot blood was streaming. He had cut it badly, yet he gave it no attention. But Nathaniel dipped his handkerchief in water and bound it up well. The boy neither thanked nor stopped him, but continued his silent gaze while Nathaniel, now as stolid as he was, went back to his fishing.

Suddenly the Indian boy sat erect. A sound! A full minute ahead of Nathaniel he heard it,—the soft beat of feet in the forest. And soon close upon them came thirty Indian braves, crowned with feathers and in their war paint. At sight of Nathaniel they stopped short, questioned the Indian boy sharply, and then took counsel together. Still Nathaniel felt no real fear,—he liked the boy and he had seen many Indians,—not until one of them beckoned, and the boy pulled him to his feet and hurried him on to where, close by, their canoes were lying under the bank.

Then his heart began to beat hard. They were carrying him away, perhaps for the sake of demanding a ransom from the white men, perhaps to add another warrior to the tribe. His wits did not desert him, but what was he to do? The Indian boy was watching him, and as they paddled silently up the river, his eyes never seemed to leave him. To be brave and stolid like him, and show no fear,—what else was there to do? It was many miles from home, far on into the great forest, when they finally lay down in their blankets under the night. Even then there was no chance for escape, for the ears of an Indian never sleep, and the black forest with its wild creatures would have proved but a huge trap meaning sure death. So Nathaniel, tired out, slept.

A touch on his arm awakened him. The first dim light of morning was barely entering the woods, but the Indian boy was beckoning him. The others still slept, or if some looked up, the boy quieted them with a word. He took Nathaniel to the river, jumped in and by a gesture bade him follow, as he swam fast downstream. Happily Nathaniel too was a good swimmer, and with the help of the current they traveled swiftly. At last the Indian climbed out, shook himself like a dog and waited. When Nathaniel came up with him, he pointed on down the river, would not let him land, pointed to his foot, pointed back to the camp, and then shook his head and threw a stone into the river. Plainly he was telling Nathaniel to go. As plain as signs could make it, he was saying "Go! You are safe. I will see to it. Go with an Indian boy's thanks for his foot. I will tell them that like that stone, you are gone, drowned in the river. Go!"

"Oh, bless you!" Nathaniel cried. "Your Great Spirit reward you!" and he swept on downstream like a leaf on the current.

When exhausted with swimming, he got out and ran until his breath was gone; then again he took to the river and floated. All day he traveled so, until at nightfall, spent and hungry, he pushed open the door of his father's house and was welcomed home. "The Lord heareth when I call upon Him," his father gave thanks with one of his favorite texts, and everyone rejoiced with him. Everyone who heard his story told Nathaniel that he had his own courage, too, to thank for his escape, for if he had been a bit less unflinching the Indian boy would not have set him free. "I shall always think a lot of Indians now," Nathaniel said, "for twice I have seen how good they are."

For days a watch was set, and the men of the town patrolled the woods with muskets ready, but no more Indians were to be seen, and life took up its usual busy course again. Nathaniel, however, was never quite the same. It was as if he had suddenly become a man, ready now to think and plan and act for himself.

For two years, until he was sixteen, he worked with all his might, sometimes as a carpenter building new houses and a new church, sometimes as a blacksmith beating out the white-hot iron or copper. For Nathaniel's father was always poor, since his salary as minister and schoolmaster was paid him mostly in food or lumber or merchandise; and so Nathaniel had to do his share to help the family along. The settlement was growing fast. Whenever he could, he talked with the new settlers to learn the ways of the world beyond the clearing, and he heard many things that interested him. At last plans began to take shape in his mind.

"Father," he said on his sixteenth birthday, "I want to talk to you." He had gone to meet his father at the log cabin which still served as schoolhouse, though there was now a church of matched boards. The two walked home by the edge of the village, the long way round, where few men would pass them, but where the birds, singing a riotous evensong, had the world to themselves. "Father," Nathaniel went on, "I've been thinking. My brother can help you here now, and we need money. Let me go to Boston to learn a trade. Send me to my uncle's; he will surely give me bed and board at first, if you but write him, and I will become an apprentice to a silversmith. Mistress Morrison has been showing me her teapot and telling me of the rare things made, and always—Boston is so rich, she says—the trade is so good. Soon I should be able to help you and could send you what you ought to have. For I know I could learn easily. To work with my hands,—it all comes so easy to me, and why should I do this coarse work here all my life? I want to go and be a master craftsman. Let me go and try it."

His father listened, but shook his head. "Ah, my lad, my lad," he said, "leave your mother and me! How could we let you go? Yet I know it must be so. I see it." He waved his hands toward the trees. "Everywhere the young birds are leaving the nests. But to go to Boston,—I like it not. Boston, we hear, is a hotbed of trouble, an unruly town, which is defying his Majesty, the king. I do not like their spirit. You would be tainted with this new heresy of independence."

"No, father," Nathaniel answered, "it is not to take part in disputes with the king that I want to go, but to learn to make some fine and beautiful thing. When I see Mistress Morrison's silverware, my fingers itch for hammer and metal to try it. Let me go."

His mother too was troubled when they told her. "To Boston!" she cried. "I am afraid." For this was in 1773, and even in the wilderness people knew of the Boston massacre, of the hatred in Boston for the British troops, of the refusal to pay the king's taxes and of the defiance of the General Assembly until the king had had it dissolved. "We are loyalists," his mother said. "Here we can see clearly that England is our dear mother, and that we owe our duty to whoever is king. But in Boston Samuel Adams and James Otis have turned men's heads."

BOSTON HARBOR, BY PAUL REVERE

"But, mother," Nathaniel answered, "has not father taught me that wherever I am I should follow my conscience and not other men's words? Why should I listen to these men?"

"Aye, that is so," his father answered, and as usual added a text. " 'Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.' It is time the boy learned to go by himself. We must let him go. But do not be carried along by the fever of the times. If you will remember that, we must let you go. It is best."

So Nathaniel went. Part of the long way he walked, and part of the way he went by a stagecoach that now ran between Portsmouth and Boston. His uncle welcomed him warmly and he was soon apprenticed to Mr. Hurd, the silversmith. He went to work with all his might, partly because it was his habit, and partly because in that way he kept off homesickness for the great forest and the old free life. For though Boston then was only a small town with the Common in its midst for games and the sea at its doors for space, Nathaniel felt cramped. The city life, without risk or danger, seemed tame to his active spirits, especially as he scarcely dared make friends beyond his uncle's house, for fear of being "tainted." So he was lonely, and his work was his one comfort.

For he loved his work as much as he had expected to love it. He liked to roll the rich metal into sheets and hammer it into shape, or to pour it into molds to make handles for a pot or a flagon, and gradually he learned to shape a spoon, a beaker and a basin. The pure silver delighted him, soft almost as velvet to his touch, yet firm and strong beneath his strokes, and he liked the shapes, so simple yet so beautiful. While he worked, he liked to see how the surface of the silver reflected all the colors about him. He looked forward to the time when he could engrave or chase the decorations, or even make the letters of the inscriptions, using the skill in penmanship that he had learned at school from his father, for many of the pieces in those days had long inscriptions. The most famous of all was a punch bowl made by Paul Revere for the Sons of Liberty in honor of the "Glorious Ninety-Two" of the General Assembly, who had defied King George. Nathaniel, though he might not like the sentiment, could not help but admire its beauty.

PUNCH BOWL, BY PAUL REVERE On it, on one side, are engraved the names of the fifteen Sons of Liberty who ordered the bowl together with the inscription: "To the memory of the Glorious NINETY-TWO Members of the Honbl. House of Representatives of the Massachusetts Bay, who undaunted by the insolent Menaces of Villains in Power, from a strict Regard to Conscience and the LIBERTIES of their Constituents, on the 30th of June, 1768, voted NOT TO RESCIND." On the other side is "Wilkes [the English Patriot] and Liberty"

Paul Revere, he knew, was the chief of the silversmiths, and he studied his work. One day he was very proud, for Revere coming into his master's shop stopped and praised him for his work. "The lad has a good eye and a right sense," he turned and spoke to Hurd, "for he makes shapes clean and true, and one can see he likes work well done, eh, lad?"

Nathaniel worked all the harder, but in Hurd's shop it was impossible to keep his mind only on his work. Not only Revere but other patriots were constantly dropping in and talking together. The air in Boston was charged with fiery matter, and whether he would or no, Nathaniel was caught up in the blaze of feeling.

"Taxation without representation,—that is tyranny," was the constant cry he heard. As the men sat about the shop, one would throw down the challenge, "What Englishman ever yielded to such tyranny without a struggle?" So the talk would run on.

"Since the days of King John," one would say, "our fathers have fought for liberty to rule themselves according to their own consciences, and shall we be less brave?"

"Aye," another patriot would answer, "and even now in England the best men are fighting with us. Wilkes and Burke and Pitt,—they're with us. It's their liberty as well as ours at stake. They say we are no longer good Englishmen here in Boston! I say it's Englishmen everywhere against the king!"

"Yes, the king, the king," a third called out, "he's the one. Let him take one cent of our money, and we are lost. It's the principle. One farthing yielded, and he can take our lives, our liberties, everything!"

Often as they talked, they looked at Nathaniel, for his uncle was known to be a Tory, a king's man, but Nathaniel never showed his mind. One day when the group had left, Hurd turned to him. "What say you, Nathaniel? Are you patriot or against us all?"

Nathaniel remembered his mother's and father's words. "I am a subject of the king," he answered.

"So, so. So are we all of us subjects of the king. But is that good reason why he should have the right to steal from us everything we have?"

Nathaniel thought he was speaking of the new tax on tea which the king was trying to make the colonies pay, and he said a bit disdainfully, "Is Boston then so greedy that she will not pay even a farthing? The tax gives her her tea cheaper than they have it in England, I hear."

Hurd blazed up then. "Greedy! By the Lord Harry, greedy, no! Can't you understand? 'Taxation without representation is tyranny.' Free man or slave, which? That's the only question. And you,—"

But Hurd did not finish. He flung himself from the shop, and went straight to the Green Dragon Tavern, where the Sons of Liberty were in the habit of gathering together. "Have a care!" he cried. "I give you all warning. My boy Nathaniel's a Tory, a rank Tory. What shall I do? He may be—"

PAUL REVERE, BY ST. MEMIN

But Revere interrupted him. "Do?" he said. "Why, turn him into a patriot of course. What else would you do with a fine lad like that? Leave him to me. I'll show him."

The next day he dropped in at Hurd's shop when Nathaniel was alone. Nathaniel had been feeling troubled and restless. Somehow he seemed a misfit in this town. His body seemed to be in prison and his mind to be continually upset. Only his work satisfied him, and he kept hard at that. On this dark, dreary day of November, 1773, though a fire was burning brightly on the hearth, he had to blow on his fingers to warm them. He was for the first time shaping a caudle cup, with its undulating curves and beautiful symmetry. Under his steady strokes the surface became smooth and mirrorlike, until the firelight was caught and glistened in its sides and it seemed like a gold and silver flame. Hurd had left him free to work it out for himself, and he took great pride in it. Revere, as he came into the shop, big and warm-hearted, noticed it at once.

"What is this? A caudle cup, and a well-shaped one too. You have the knack, my lad. The work's to your taste, eh? You understand it."

Nathaniel assented silently.

" 'Tis a good trade, a good trade," Revere went on. "It is not accident, I say, that makes us silversmiths a good straight lot of fellows,—and good patriots too. It's the craft. To see things true, and shape them so; to make fit for use in a score of shapes a shapeless mass" (he touched a lump of the crude metal lying beside him); "to put our own thought into it, and make it a hundred times more beautiful than when we began; 'tis work, this, for an honest patriot, eh, Nathaniel?"

"You—you know, sir," Nathaniel stammered, "I'm not what you call a patriot."

"So?" said Revere. "And what's wrong with being a patriot?"

"He's against the king, sir."

"Humph! So? Let's take a look at it together. You here in this shop, Nathaniel, call Hurd your master. You are subject to him, and when he says 'Make a caudle cup as best you can,' you go at it. Right and good. But suppose he were a false craftsman, not holding his work in honor but trying to do our trade harm, and suppose then he were to say, 'Do as I tell you. Use bad silver. Make the shape untrue. Put on the handles weakly. Leave the work rough!' Would you still obey him?"

Revere looked into his face and answered for him. "No, to be sure, you wouldn't. And why not? Because indeed you are an honest craftsman. To make bad forms, use impure stuff, spoil a beautiful thing,—'twon't do. It hurts. You can't. The conscience of a craftsman tells you no. So, then,—do you follow me, lad?"

Nathaniel nodded his head. "So far, sir, I know it's true."

"Even more true is it then of our country. To take our liberties, abuse them and spoil them, fling away a God-given right—what man of right heart will do it, even at the bidding of our king? No, I tell you, there is not only the conscience of a craftsman, but there's the conscience of a patriot. Eh, what say you to that, Nathaniel? Think it over."

He left the room abruptly, but after that almost every day the busy man found time to come and talk for a moment of their work and of their country. He insisted too that Nathaniel go with him to the Green Dragon to hear Warren and Hancock and Adams talk. But at that Nathaniel blushed in confusion. He felt that Mr. Hurd distrusted him and would not like it. "Already I fear he looks at me awry, as if I were a telltale," he said. But Revere would hear nothing of the kind, and took him with him. So Nathaniel was taught to see the patriots' side, but he remained troubled and uncertain in mind.

SAMUEL ADAMS, BY COPLEY Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

"Unhappy, are you not, lad?" Revere said one day. "What is it? Too much Revere?—dogging you at your heels—" and the great man gave him a good-natured slap on the shoulder and laughed heartily.

"Oh, no, sir," Nathaniel answered quickly, "but I presume that perhaps I am homesick for the great free places of the North."

"Tut, tut!" Revere spoke out, "where our bodies are doesn't matter. It's the free mind,—the free conscience. Give your mind over to freedom and the true cause, and then see! You'll feel free as the whole of God's green earth can't make you."

After that he often talked with Nathaniel of the wilderness,—of the log-cabin home, of the making of the settlement, the wolf, and the escape from the Indians. "You'll soon be one of us, Nathaniel," he declared. "I see it. All your boyhood points the way to freedom."

"How can I, sir? My mother and my father wish me to be loyal to the king."

Revere shook his head. "They too may change. Anyway, after we are grown up, mothers and fathers aren't our jailers to keep our consciences. Your heart's your own to keep." And in Nathaniel's ears there sounded again his father's text, "Keep thy heart with all diligence." Perhaps his father had meant it that way too; he must decide for himself.

It was now the sixteenth of December, and in the harbor three ships loaded with tea still rode at anchor. The citizens would not let the tea be landed for fear that someone would pay the king's tax, the governor would not let the ships sail away, and by the rules of the port of Boston the last day was come when a vessel not yet unloaded might stay in the harbor. There was then no place on ship or land or sea where the tea could rest. What was to be done? Great crowds of people, Nathaniel among them, went to a meeting in the Old South Meeting House to discuss it. One last appeal was made to the governor that the ships might go, and all sat in perfect order while they waited his answer. But the governor would not change his mind. What should be done?

THE BOSTON TEA PARTY

In the glimmer of dim candlelight in the dark of the old church, it was voted unanimously not to land the tea. "How will tea mix with salt water?" someone called out, and there was great applause. Samuel Adams adjourned the meeting. What would happen? The answer came on the instant—the war whoop of Indians. Nathaniel shivered, for that sound awakened memories. Then he saw fifty Indians in full war dress pass quickly by the church and down the street, and with the others he followed to the wharf and in the cold, clear moonlight saw a strange sight.

The Indians quietly boarded the three ships, cut open the tea chests one after the other, and threw every bit of tea overboard. Scarcely a leaf of tea escaped them. But nothing else was harmed and no one was molested. By nine o'clock all the tea was well brewed with salt water. Swiftly, silently and in order everything had been done. "Was ever anything like it?" people said. But Nathaniel was seeing the great dark forest again, the wolf, the swift river, and the silent Indian boy. "It's a way they have," he said. "Do it, and be done with it."

As he stood on the street corner, the Indians swept by, and one of them, strangely familiar beneath his feathers and paint, turned suddenly and whispered, "What if the Indians once again should steal you? I am minded to have them."

"No, need, sir," Nathaniel spoke impetuously. "I'm with you already." He had no idea he was going to say it, but, once said, he knew it was true. Once again a band of Indians had swept him from his place, this time not on to a silent river of the North but on to the great stream of patriotism which was flooding the country.

"Bravo, lad," his Indian called back. "I knew you'd come to it. It's the only way for an honest craftsman." And Nathaniel went off feeling strangely free and light-hearted.

WASHINGTON AT DORCHESTER HEIGHTS, BY STUART Photograph furnished by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

No longer did he feel cramped or in prison in Boston. His spirits were free. For whether he was working at his craft or in the cause of liberty with the patriots, he was trying to make things come straight and true. And when he wrote home to his parents of how he had changed, he was made happier still by hearing in reply that they were not distressed, but that—partly because of what he had written to them—they too were slowly turning from the king to believe in the right of the patriots' cause.

When two years later Washington came and took command of the army, Nathaniel was already in its ranks. And until the war was over, his craft had to give place to his work as a patriot, but whether as craftsman or patriot, he was working with all his might at what he believed was good, and he was content.