nted my prayer. And I
am as little and as free in this house which I built as in His own
forests, or under His own stars; for it is His only, as they are His.
And I am nothing but His own little child, as thou art. And He has my
hand and thine in His, and will not let us go."

The child looked up, nearly certain now that it must be an angel. To
have lived longer than the cathedral seemed like living when the
morning stars were made, and all the angels shouted for joy.

"Then God will let me sing here next Easter!" he said, looking
confidingly in the old man's face.

"Thou shalt sing, and I shall see, and I shall hear thee, but thou wilt
not hear or see me!" said the old man, taking both the dimpled hands in
one of his. "And the blessed Lord will listen, as to the little
children in Jerusalem of old. And we shall be His dear, happy children
for evermore."

Gottlieb went home and told his mother. And they both agreed, that if
not an angel, the old man was as good as an angel, and was certainly a
messenger of God.

To have been the master-builder of the cathedral of which it was
Magdalis's glory and pride that her husband had carved a few of the
stones!

The master-builder of the cathedral, yet finding his joy and glory in
being a little child of God!

CHAPTER VI.

The "silent week" that followed was a solemn time to the mother and the
boy.

Every day, whatever time could be spared from the practice with the
choir, and from helping in the little house and with his mother's
wood-carving, or from playing with Lenichen in the fields, Gottlieb
spent in the silent cathedral, draped as it was in funereal black for
the sacred life given up to God for man.

"How glad," he thought again and again, "the little children of
Jerusalem must have been that they sang when they could to the blessed
Jesus! They little knew how soon the kind hands that blessed them would
be stretched on the cross, and the kind voice that would not let their
singing be stopped would be moaning 'I thirst.'"

But he felt that he, Gottlieb, ought to have known; and if ever he was
allowed to sing his hosannas in the choir again, it would feel like the
face of the blessed Lord himself smiling on him, and His voice saying,
"Suffer this little one to come unto me. I have forgiven him."

He hoped also to see the master-builder again; but nevermore did the
slight, aged form appear in the sunshine of the stained windows, or in
the shadows of the