oss Portland and
the Chesil bank, and gained the mainland.

He found in the snow a footprint, and set out to follow it. Presently he
heard a groan, and came to the end of the footprints. The woman, a
beggar-woman who had lost her way, had uttered the groan. She had sunk
down in the snow, and was dead when the boy found her. He heard a cry,
and discovered a baby, wretched with cold, but still alive, clinging to
its dead mother's breast.

The boy took the baby in his arms. Forsaken himself, he had heard the
cry of distress, and wrapping the infant in his coat, he pursued his
journey in the teeth of the freezing wind. Four hours had passed since
the boat had sailed away; this baby was the first living person the boy
had met.

Struggling along with his burden, the boy reached Weymouth, then a
hamlet, and a suburb of the town and port of Melcombe Regis. He knocked
at doors and windows; no one stirred. For one thing, everybody was
asleep, and those who were awakened by the knock were afraid of opening
a window, for fear of some sick vagabond being outside.

Suddenly the boy heard in the darkness a grinding of teeth and a growl.
The silence was so dreadful that he was glad of the noise, and moved in
the direction whence it came. He saw a carriage on wheels, with smoke
coming out of the roof through a funnel, and a light within.

Something perceived his approach and growled furiously and tugged at its
chain. At the same time a head was put out of a window in the van.

"Be quiet there!" said the head, and the noise ceased. "Is anyone
there?" said the head again.

"Yes, I," said the child.

"You? Who are you?"

"I am very tired and cold and hungry," said the child.

"We can't all be as happy as a lord. Go away!" said the head, and the
window was shut down.

The child turned away in despair. But no sooner was the window shut than
the door at the top of the steps opened, and the same voice called out
from within the van, "Well, why don't you come in? What sort of a fellow
is this who is cold and hungry, and who stays outside?"

The boy climbed up the three steps with difficulty, carrying the baby,
and hesitated for a moment at the door. On the ceiling was written in
large letters:

URSUS, PHILOSOPHER

It was the house of Ursus the child had come to. Homo had been growling,
Ursus speaking.

The child made out near the stove an elderly man, who, as he stood,
reached the roof of the caravan.

"Come in! Put do