ll incredulous as he lent himself to a new posture,
and leaned forward to look with the languid indulgence of one who will
not again entertain doubt.

"Nare A, nor B, nor C, nor none o' the fambly," he declared. "These hyar
rocks ain't no Moses' tables sure enough; Moses never war in Tennessee.
They be jes like enny other rock, an' thar ain't a word o' writin' on
'em."

He looked up with a curious questioning at Pur-dee's face--a strange
face for a man detected in a falsehood, a trick. The deep-set eyes were
wide as if straining for perception denied them. Despite the chill,
rare air, great drops had started on his brow, and were falling upon
his beard, and upon his hands. These strong hands were quivering; they
hovered above the signs on the rocks. The mystic letters, the inspired
words, where were they? Grope as he might, he could not find them. Alas!
doubt and denial had climbed the mountain--the awful limitations of
the more finite human creature--and his inspiration and the finer
enthusiasms of the truth were dead.

Dead with a throe that was almost like a literal death. This--on this he
had lived; the ether of ecstasy was the breath of his life. He clutched
at the stained red handkerchief knotted about his throat as if he were
suffocating; he tore it open as he swayed backward on his knees. He did
not hear--or he did not heed--the laugh among the little crowd on the
bald--satirical, rallying, zestful. He was deaf to the strains of the
violin, jeeringly and jerkingly playing a foolish tune. It was growing
fainter, for they had all turned about to betake themselves once more to
the world below. He could have seen, had he cared to see, their bearded
grinning faces peering through the stunted trees, as descending they
came near the spot where he had lavished the spiritual graces of
his feeling, his enthusiasm, his devotion, his earnest reaching for
something higher, for something holy, which had refreshed his famished
soul; had given to its dumbness words; had erased the values of the
years, of the nations; had made him friends with Moses on the "bald";
had revealed to him the finger of the Lord on the stone.

He took no heed of his gestures, of which, indeed, he was unconscious.
They were fine dramatically, and of great power, as he alternately rose
to his full height, beating his breast in despair, and again sank upon
his knees, with a pondering brow and a searching eye, and a hovering,
trembling hand, striving