ho broke them
here in his wrath. He knew that the step of the musician slackened as he
followed. What holy mysteries were they not rushing in upon? He spoke in
a bated voice.

"Roger," he said, "we'uns hearn ye tell 'bout the scriptures graven on
these hyar tables ez Moses flung down, an' we'uns 'lowed we'uns would
kem an' read some fur ourselves."

[Illustration: Tables of the Law 347]

Purdee did not speak nor hesitate; he moved aside that the blacksmith
might stand where he had been--as it were at the foot of the page.

But what transcendent glories thronged the heavens--what august
splendors of dawn! Had the sun ever before risen like this, with the sky
an emblazonment of red, of gold, of darting gleams of light; with the
mountains most royally purple or most radiantly blue; with the prismatic
mists in flight; with the slow climax of the dazzling sphere ascending
to dominate it all?

The blacksmith knelt down to read. The musician, his silent violin under
his chin, leaned over his comrade's shoulder. The hunter stood still,
expectant.

Alas! the corrugations of time; the fissile results of the frost; the
wavering line of ripple-marks of Seas that shall ebb no more; growth of
lichen; an army of ants in full march; a passion-flower trailing from
a crevice, its purple blooms lying upon the gray stone near where it
is stamped with the fossil imprint of a sea-weed, faded long ago and
forgotten. Or is it, alas! for the eyes that can see only this?

The blacksmith looked up with a twinkling leer; the violinist recovered
his full height, and drew the bow dashingly across the strings; then let
his arm fall.

"Roger," the blacksmith said, "dad-burned ef I kin read ennything hyar."

The young musician looked over his brawny shoulder in silence.

"Whar d'ye make out enny letters, Roger?" persisted Spears.

Purdee leaned over and eagerly pointed with his ramrod to a curious
corrugation of the surface of the rock. Again the blacksmith bent down;
the musician craned forward, his yellow hair hanging about his bronzed
face.

"I hev been toler'ble well acquainted with the alphabit," said Spears,
"fur goin' on thirty year an' better, an' I'll swar ter Heaven thar
ain't nare sign of a letter thar."

Purdee stared at him in wild-eyed amazement for a moment. Then he flung
himself upon his knees beside the great rock, and guiding his ramrod
over the surface, he exclaimed, "Hyar, Spears; right hyar!"

The blacksmith was a