he trap. The Master was careful to extinguish the light
about two hours before daybreak, in order that no vessel should make
towards his stronghold in broad daylight. Of his victims not one man
was ever left alive.

They had, indeed, leagued themselves with all the fiends of Darkness
and the Storm, in defiance of both Heaven and Earth.

This, then, was the sorcery by which they drew bread, meat, wine and
fruit from the rocks and the sea. It was the stranded vessels that
filled the chambers and vaults of the Tower of Dago with everything
dear to the heart of man, and covered the rocky shore beneath the
tower with that which was now dearest of all to its inmates'
hearts--the fleshless bones of their brother men.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER V

The Famine

It came to pass as the Master of the Tower of Dago had foretold. A
year of famine visited the island.

There in his loneliness he had taken continual counsel of that great
vital principle which he chose to associate with the Prince of Evil,
but to which the learned give the name of "Gaea"--Earth.

And the Earth-demon has, in truth, diabolical humours. Between Earth
and her minions, and the favourites of Heaven, there is eternal
strife. It pleases Earth to let the ill weeds grow. The poppy and the
corn-flower are her darlings. And yet, that child of Heaven, man's
finer nature, forces her to bring forth white wheat for him! The
Earth-spirit favours the savage and grosser instincts, while man does
her violence by pressing upon her his nobler fruits and virtues. Man,
doubtless, has a right to ask, "Why has the Creator brought forth
these myriads of caterpillars and cockchafers that devastate my
fruit-trees?" But surely the caterpillar and the cockchafer have an
equal right to demand, "To what purpose has Earth given birth to that
misshapen, two-legged creature that delights to sweep me down from my
tree, and trample me under foot?" But, after all, the Earth-spirit is
not the gardener's friend, but rather the caterpillar's.

The hermit in the Tower of Dago included in his studies that centre of
the other infernos, the sun. He had observed that the spots and
eruptions on the sun's disc exercise an influence upon the weather of
our planet. He had, moreover, imbibed the wisdom of the wind and
waves. He had carefully noted the migrations of whales and
kingfishers, as well as the displays of the aurora borealis and the
shooting stars. All these had told him that th