there any place on earth that can mean as much to us as
this island? Suppose Asia, or Africa, or Europe are still in
existence, we should not regain our friends and relatives, and life
would be harder with strange people, under a strange government, far
more so than we have found it here, even without so many of its
luxuries."

Robin shook her head sadly. "At first, Adam. We should learn their
language and their customs. New friends are speedily acquired, and as
for relatives,--well, in the scheme of life relatives don't count for
much. There always comes a time when they step out of our lives,
anyway."

"But as to happiness?"

Her face paled a little. "Have you been happy here?" she asked,
without raising her eyes to his, and then went on, not waiting for a
reply, "If you have been, it has been in the care of our little family
of dependents, who do not need you half so much as the great family of
human dependents. Rest assured if there is a continent over there
across the darkness, it is peopled with beings who need the devoted
and unselfish labors of such a man as you. You would find your work
easily enough,--the work you have been saved for, the work you must
do."

"But if there is no continent left?" he queried.

"In that case there must be islands; there were many mountains higher
than these, and they are peopled, no doubt. Shall we not go to these
other orphans, deserted by Mother Earth, our brothers and sisters,
through our common calamity?"

Both were silent, engrossed in their own thoughts. A return to the
world meant going back to the uncivilized rush of civilization. It
meant the eternal question of what shall we eat, and what shall we
drink, and where-withal shall we be clothed? It meant the old
competition, the stern old law of the survival of the brawniest. Above
all, to Robin, it meant separation from Adam, for once more in Rome,
the customs of Rome must be followed. To do Adam justice, this was a
contingency which did not enter his mind. As he had said before,
whatever had put them in this dream together would keep them there, so
that when he thought of relinquishing all the comfort and ease and
quiet of his present life, all the loving animals, the cosy little
house, the tiny fields, the blooming garden, it never occurred to him
that he must relinquish more than all these things, more than the
peace and harmony, that which, unconsciously, had come to be the very
guiding star of his life.

"I