nd Cleopatra, who loved the great
proconsul; and Bathsheba, for whom David of the Psalms fell from grace?
And Balkis, queen of Sheba, with her apes, ivory, and peacocks? Dust
and ashes, dust and ashes! And Scheherazade was but a strange, sad
sound. Beauty increased and waned like the moon. A little shadow
around the eyes, a little crinkle in the neck, the backs of the hands
stiffening like parchment. Dust and ashes, dust and ashes!

But the little blue shadow would glow like an Easter morning.

Or it would be a poor, lonely, unlit shadow in the cold gloom of the
clanging worlds.

Poor Golden Bells! Poor little weeping Golden Bells! If he could only
tell her about the Bitter Tree!

And then what happens but his uncle Matthew claps him on the back,

"How would you like to go to China, Marco Markeen," says he, "and
preach religion to the benighted people!"

"How did you know, Uncle Matthew?"

"How did I know what?"

"That I wanted to go to China and preach religion to the--the people!"

"Well, if that doesn't beat Banagher," says Matthew Polo, "and Banagher
beats the devil! Tell me, did you ever hear an old tune called 'Bundle
and Go!'?"

And so the three of them leave upon their journey, but at Layas, where
the King of Armenia had his castle, they heard of the election of a new
pope, so they came back to Acre to get his instructions and blessing.

CHAPTER VII

The pope said a grand mass for them, and at the gospel he enters the
pulpit, a burly figure of a man with sad eyes.

"The blessing of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost be with you
and about you, Amen.

"It is not to you, Nicolo Polo, that I wish to speak, nor to you,
Matthew Polo, for neither of you are my ambassadors to the Great Khan.
Merchant and sportsmen, I honor you, and you have my blessing, but you
have no hopes of mine. The dirty diversions of the world are between
your eyes and glory," said he. "It's only myself, an old and sorrowful
man, and this child, a young and hopeful one, can understand; old men
having sight of visions, and young men dreaming dreams...

"Now in the matter of converting the Great Khan and his numerous
millions, first let wisdom speak. I have little hopes. He wants to be
argued into it, you see. Religion is not a matter of argument. It is a
wisdom that surpasses wisdom. It drifts in men's souls as the foggy
dew comes unbidden to the trees. It is born before our soul, as the
horned moon is b