es that were their own monument, and told
their own story of struggle, agony, exhaustion, and despair.

None of these things had any depressing effect on Freeman's spirit.
His heart was singing with joy. To a mind logically disposed, there
was nothing but trouble in sight, whether he succeeded or failed in his
present mission. In the former case, he would find himself in a hostile
position as regarded the man he most desired to conciliate; in the
latter, he would remain the mere rolling stone that he was before, and
love itself would forbid him to ask the woman he loved to share his
uncertain existence. But Freeman was not logical: he was happy, and he
could not help it. He had kissed Miriam, and she loved him.

His course lay a few degrees north of east. Far across the plain,
dancing and turning somersaults in the fantastic atmosphere, were the
summits of a range of abrupt hills, the borders of a valley or ravine
which he wished to explore. Gradually, as he rode, his shadow lengthened
before him. It was his only companion; and yet he felt no sense of
loneliness. Miriam was in his heart, and kept it fresh and bold. Even
hunger and thirst he scarcely felt. Who can estimate the therapeutic and
hygienic effects of love?

The mustang could not share his rider's source of content, but he may
have been conscious, through animal instincts whereof we know nothing,
of an uplifting and encouraging spirit. At all events, he kept up his
steady lope without faltering or apparent effort, and seemed to require
nothing more than the occasional wetting which Freeman administered to
his nose. There would probably be some vegetation, and perhaps water, on
the hills; and that prospect may likewise have helped him along.

Nevertheless, man and beast may well have welcomed the hour when the
craggy acclivities of that lonely range became so near that they seemed
to loom above their heads. Freeman directed his steps towards the
southern extremity, where a huge, pallid mass, of almost regular
pyramidal form, reared itself aloft like a monument. He skirted the base
of the pyramid, and there opened on his view a narrow, winding valley,
scarcely half a mile in apparent breadth, and of a very wild and
savage aspect. Its general direction was nearly north and south, and it
declined downwards, as if seeking the interior of the earth. In fact, it
looked not unlike those imaginative pictures of the road to the infernal
regions described by the ancie