expedition, this, my son, _if thou discover
thyself_--and in time!" Still the Boy said nothing. The other resumed
more lightly: "In America we combine our travels with business. But it
is no new idea in the world that a young man should have his Wanderjahr
before he finds what he wants, or even finds acquiescence. It did not
need Wilhelm Meister to set the feet of youth on that trail; it did not
need the Crusades. It's as old as the idea of a Golden Fleece or a
Promised Land. It was the first man's first inkling of heaven."

The Boy pricked his ears. Wasn't this heresy?

"The old idea of the strenuous, to leave home and comfort and security,
and go out to search for wisdom, or holiness, or happiness--whether it
is gold or the San Grael, the instinct of Search is deep planted in the
race. It is this that the handful of men who live in what they call
'the world'--it is this they forget. Every hour in the greater world
outside, someone, somewhere, is starting out upon this journey. He may
go only as far as Germany to study philosophy, or to the nearest
mountain-top, and find there the thing he seeks; or he may go to the
ends of the earth, and still not find it. He may travel in a Hindu gown
or a Mongolian tunic, or he comes, like Father Brachet, out of his
vineyards in 'the pleasant land of France,' or, like you, out of a
country where all problems are to be solved by machinery. But my point
is, _they come_! When all the other armies of the world are disbanded,
that army, my son, will be still upon the march."

They were silent awhile, and still the young face gave no sign.

"To many," the Travelling Priest went on, "the impulse is a blind one
or a shy one, shrinking from calling itself by the old names. But none
the less this instinct for the Quest is still the gallant way of youth,
confronted by a sense of the homelessness they cannot think will last."

"That's it, Father! That's it!" the Boy burst out. "Homelessness! To
feel that is to feel something urging you----" He stopped, frowning.

"----urging you to take up your staff," said the priest.

They were silent a moment, and then the same musical voice tolled out
the words like a low bell: "But with all your journeying, my son, you
will come to no Continuing City."

"It's no use to say this to me. You see, I am----"

"I'll tell you why I say it." The priest laid a hand on his arm. "I see
men going up and down all their lives upon this Quest. Once in a great
w