es; down into their shadowy depths;
up again; now breaking through the bramble out into the open on the
edge of the bluff that skirts the lake; then bounding back again, like
a rabbit running to covert. He inhaled with delight the dampness that
rose from the ground and from the vegetation about him. In the spring,
and in the early summer there is something so hopeful, so suggestive
of awakening life in that fragrant moisture, that it seems to call
forth an answering energy. Steve felt its significance in full force,
and fairly thrilled with delight as it permeated his being.

Now he was out again, following the sweep of the bluff and looking
eastward over the big waters. Some days the sun appeared there in
regal splendor, but on this particular morning there was a delicacy
about the picture suggestive of the careful work on one of Turner's
loveliest. There was no gorgeous red, no blazing gold, but tints as
exquisite as those seen in the heart of an abalone shell--still lakes
of sea-green feathered about by a fleecy white just touched with the
yellow of the daisy; lambent wings of gray, kissed into a roseate hue
as they spread outward and upward toward the zenith; and the expectant
waters on the lake trembling 'neath their answering pink.

Steve stood and faced it all, hat in hand. His locks were stirred by
the slight fresh breeze that came over the lake, and something else
was stirred within him. There was a fine look on his face. The
physical had disappeared. He no longer felt that strong animal
buoyancy akin to the strength of the wild horse as he courses the
prairies, but his soul was answering "Here" to the call from the
skies.

He turned by-and-by and walked onward in a still mood--the receptive
mood into which God sows rare seed. He was walking away from the
sunrise now out toward the Skokie, that great bog, but he could see
the west flushing with delight--could see the windows of a cottage far
ahead blazing with reflected glory.

He reached the cottage ere long. There were no signs of life about it
as yet.

"I'm the first man up," Steve thought, smiling as he went on.

The little home put the finishing touch to the picture, and Steve
looked at it so long and so intently that he might have been accused
of rudeness had the occupants seen him. His thoughts, however, were
anything but rude, for a home had always been sacred to him. Had he
acted at the bidding of his fine instinct, he would have raised his
hat