The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-03-27
(Continued.N

| 50 Rachel ate, and afterwards, feel | ing drownsy, even slept a while per- | maps because she was still weary with | her Journeying, and her new-found | mind needed repose. or perhaps be- ! cause some drug had been mingled with her drink. When she awoke Nya led her to the mouth of the cave. i There they stood awhile studying the stars. No breath of air stirred, and the silence was intense. only from time 10 time the sound of trees falling in | the forest reached their ears. Some 1 times 1t was quite soft as though fleece of wool had been dropped to the earth; that was when the tree that dled had grown miles and miles away from them: and sometimes the crash was as that of sudden thunder: that was when the tree which died had grown near to them.
 A sense of the mystery and wonder of the place and hour sank in Rachers
 heart. The stars above. the mighty entombing forest. in which the trees fell unceasingly after their long cen tur1es of life, the encircling wall, built perhaps by hands that had ceased from | their Iabours hundreds of thousands of years before those trees began to grow; the huge moss-clad cedar upon the mound beneath the shadow of whose branches day by day it's wor- shippers gave up their breath. that inn morial cedar whereof. as they believed. the life was the life of the nation: the wizened little witch-woman at her side with the seal of doom already set upon her brow and the stare of farewell in her eyes; the sad, spiritual face of Noie who held her hand, the loving, faithful Noie, who in that light seem ed half a thing of air; the grey little dwarf-mutes who sQuatted on their mats staring at the ground, or now the Fence of Death above. bearing be- tween them a body to it's burial: all were mysterious, all were wonderful. AS she looked and listened, a new | tc-f-- l,OIB-
 first she had felt afraid, but now cour age flowed into her, and it seemed to come from the old. old woman at her side, the mistress of mysteries. the mother of magic, in whom was gather ed the wisdom of a hundred genera tions of this half human race.
 Look at the stars and the night" she was saying in her soft voice. flor soon thou shalt be beyond them a l. and perchance thou shalt never see
 them more. Art thou fearful? If so, speak and we will not try this journey
 in search of ore whom we may not
 find"
 t'No," answered Rachel: 'fbut, Moth CT, whither go we?"
 we go to the Land of Death. Come.
 then. the moment is at hand. It is
 stands above the holy Tree" and she
 pointed to a bright orb that hung al-
 most over the topmost bough of the
 cedar. ''it marks thy road, and if thou
 wouldst pass it, now is the hour.
 Mother asked Noie. may come
 with her? I also have my dead, and
 where my Sister goes I follow"
 Aye, if thou wilt, daughter of Seya-
 pi, the path is wide enough for three
 and if I stay on high, perchance thou
 that art of my blood mayest find
 strength to guide her earthwards
 through the wandering worlds
 Then Nya walked up the cave and
 sat herself down within the circle of
 the lamps with her back to the stalac-
 tite that was shaped like a tree, bid
 ding Rachel and Noie be seated in
 front of her. Two of the dwarf-mutes
 appeared, women both of them. and
 squatted to right and left, each gazing
 into a bowl of Impid dew. Nya made a sign. and still gazing into their bowls
 these dwarfs began to beat upon little
 drums that gave out a curious, rolling noise. while Nya sang to the sound or
 the drums, a wild. low song With her thin little hands she grasped the right hand of Rachel and of Noie and gazed into their eyes.
 Things changed to Rachel. The dwarfs to right and left vanished away. but the low murmuring of their drums grew to a mighty music. and the stars danced to it. The song Of Nya swelled till it filled all the space between earth and heaven; it was the rush of the gale among. the forests, 1t was the beating of the sea upon an illimitable coast, it was the shout Of | all the armies of the world. 1t was the weeping of all the women of the world | It lessened again, she seemed to be | passing away from it, she heard it far | beneath her. it grew tiny in it's volume tiny as if it were an infinite speck or point of sound which she could still | discern for millions and millions or miles. till at length distance and vast | ness overcame it, and it ceased It ceased, this song of the earth. but new song began, the song Of the rush ing words. Far away she could hear | it, that ineffable music, far in the utter depths of space. Nearer 1t would | come and nearer, a ringing, glorious sound, a sound and yet voice, one mighty voice that sang and was an- | swered by other voices as sun crossed | the path of sun, and caught up and re-echoed by the innumerable choir or the cancellations.
 They were falling past her, those vast, glowing suns. those rounded planets that we've now vivid with light and now steeped in gloom, those in finite showers of distant stars. They were gone, they and their music to- she was far beyond them in a region where all life was forgotten, beyond the rush of the. uttermost com ct, beyond the last glimmer of the spies and outposts of the universe. One shape of light she sped into the black bosom of fathomless space, and it's solitude shrivelled up her soul. She could not endure, she longed for some shore on which to set her mental feet.
 Beholdi far away a shore appeared, towering cliff-bound shore, upon whose iron coasts all the black waves of space beat vain1y and were eternaliy rolled back. Here there was light. but no such light as she had ever known; 1t did not fall from sun or star, but changeful and radiant, welled upward from that land in a thousand hues. as light might well from world of opal Tn it's dazzling. beautiful rays she saw fantastic palaces and pyramids. she saw seas and pure white mountains. she saw plains and new-hued flowers, she saw gulfs and precipices and pale lakes pregnant with wavering flame All that she had ever conceived Of as lovely or as fearful, she beheld, far ovelier or a thousandfold more fear ,u1.
 Like a great rose of glory that world oloomed and changed beneath her. Petal by petal it's splendours fell away {; and were swallowed in the sea of space, whilst from the deep heart of he immortal rose new splendours took
 II, fr,e,I r,r1rl r.