so low.

"Peace and blessing be upon this house!" said the unknown in a voice
full of tender unction.

"Amen, amen!" the headsman hastened to reply.

"Heaven's blessing descend upon thy heart, my son!" said the youth to
the old man raising his hand in blessing.

"He is a pastor, a priest," said the headsman to himself, "he has all
the appearance of it."

Peter Zudar stooped down towards the youth's hand and kissed it. He
durst not touch it with his own hand but with his lips only.

"A priest in _my_ house, forsooth! My child! take the gentleman by the
hand and lead him to the arm-chair, make him sit down! Thy hands are
clean, they may touch him. Oh! a man of God in _my_ house! I never dared
to hope so much."

"I come from afar," said the unknown youth, sitting down in the
arm-chair provided for him, while the old executioner stood before him
bare-headed, with his large muscular arms folded across his bosom. The
little girl wound her hands round his arm and stood beside him.

"I come from afar, I say. I do not belong to your nation, though I
understand your language well enough to be able to converse in it
intelligibly. In olden times the Apostles of our Holy Faith received
direct from Heaven the gift of tongues, we, their unworthy successors,
must, with great labour and weariness, acquire the languages of those to
whom we have to preach the Gospel. I am the member of an English
religious society whose mission it is to seek out those who are
suffering, in whatever rank of life they may be, and endeavour to
administer to them, so far as we are able, those divine consolations
which God so freely distributes to the broken-hearted. We have our
special missionaries for every section of humanity, and we send them
forth continually to minister to their sufferings, and bring them peace
and healing. Some of us are sent to the palaces of the mighty, others to
the hovels of the poor. For everyone on earth has his own particular
sorrow, and everyone finds his own sorrow very hard to bear. Some of us
have chosen the dungeons and jails as our spheres of consolation, others
prefer to comfort the secret woes of family life, others again visit the
needy masses of the work-people. To me has been assigned the task of
ministering to those terrors of evil doers, the public executioners."

At these words the youth looked steadily at the face of the man, who was
standing there before him, with downcast eyes and quivering lips.

"Fo