oud moving now, and a few large
drops splashed in the grass about him, and one fell upon his brow.

And now a great fear fell upon Henry of he knew not what. He seemed
to himself to be in the presence of some vast and fearful thing, that
was passing swiftly by; and yet seemed, for all its haste, to have
espied him, and to have been, as it were, stayed by him; there came
into his mind a recollection of how he had once, on a summer's day,
joined the mowers in one of the fields, and had mowed a few swathes
with them for the pleasure of seeing the rich seeded grass fall before
the gleaming scythe. At one of his strokes, he remembered, he had
uncovered a little field-mouse, that sate in the naked field, its high
covert having been swept bare from above it, and watched him with
bright eyes of fear, while he debated whether he should crush it; he
had done so, he remembered, carelessly, with his foot, and now he
wished that he had spared it, for it was even so that he himself felt.

So to strengthen himself in his purpose, he made a prayer aloud,
though it was a thing that in his idle life he had much foregone; and
he said:

"Lord God, if Thou indeed hearest and seest me, make me strong to do
what I have a mind to do; I have lived foolishly and for myself, and I
have little to give. I have despised life, and it is as an empty husk
to me. I have put love away from me, and my heart is dry; I have had
friends and I have wearied of them. I have profited nothing; I have
wasted my strength in foolish dreams of pleasure, and I have not found
it. I am as a weed that cumbers the fair earth."

Then he stayed for a moment, for he was afraid; for it seemed to him
as though somewhat stood near to listen. Then he said again:--

"But, Lord, I do indeed love my fellow-men a little; and I would have
the waste of life stayed. It is a pitiful thing that I have to offer,
but it is all that I have left--an empty life, which yet I love. I
will not promise, Lord, to yield my life to the service of men, for I
love my ease too well, and I should not keep my word--so I offer my
life freely into Thy hand, and let it avail that which it may avail."

Then the blackness seemed to gather all about him, and he felt with
his hand in the turf and found the sword; then he drew the scabbard
off, and flung it down beside him, and he raised the sword in his
hands.

Then it seemed as though the heavens opened above him, but he saw not
the fire, nor heard the