to wonder, and still they went up.

"You're young, sir," said the butler, "and sound of wind and limb; so
you'll soon think nothing of it."

"I never was up so high before, except on a hill-side," returned Donal.
"The college-tower is nothing to this!"

"In a day or two you'll be shooting up and down it like a bird. I used
to do so myself. I got into the way of keeping a shoulder foremost,
and screwing up as if I was a blob of air! Old age does make fools of
us!"

"You don't like it then?"

"No, I do not: who does?"

"It's only that you get spent as you go up. The fresh air at the top
of the stair will soon revive you," said Donal.

But his conductor did not understand him.

"That's all very well so long as you're young; but when it has got you,
you'll pant and grumble like the rest of us."

In the distance Donal saw Age coming slowly after him, to claw him in
his clutch, as the old song says. "Please God," he thought, "by the
time he comes up, I'll be ready to try a fall with him! O Thou
eternally young, the years have no hold on thee; let them have none on
thy child. I too shall have life eternal."

Ere they reached the top of the stair, the man halted and opened a
door. Donal entering saw a small room, nearly round, a portion of the
circle taken off by the stair. On the opposite side was a window
projecting from the wall, whence he could look in three different
directions. The wide country lay at his feet. He saw the winding road
by which he had ascended, the gate by which he had entered, the meadow
with its white stripes through which he had come, and the river flowing
down. He followed it with his eyes:--lo, there was the sea, shining in
the sun like a diamond shield! It was but the little German Ocean, yet
one with the great world-ocean. He turned to his conductor.

"Yes," said the old man, answering his look, "it's a glorious sight!
When first I looked out there I thought I was in eternity."

The walls were bare even of plaster; he could have counted the stones
in them; but they were dry as a bone.

"You are wondering," said the old man, "how you are to keep warm in the
winter! Look here: you shut this door over the window! See how thick
and strong it is! There is your fireplace; and for fuel, there's
plenty below! It is a labour to carry it up, I grant; but if I was
you, I would set to o' nights when nobody was about, and carry till I
had a stock laid in!"

"But," said Donal,