hem, and most intent on the pretty game, was
a boy like a sunbeam, slender and quick, with blithe brown eyes and
laughing lips. The priest's hand was laid upon his shoulder. The boy
turned and looked up in his face.

"Here," said the old man, with his voice vibrating as when a thick rope
is strained by a ship swinging from her moorings, "here is the chosen
one, the eldest son of the Chief, the darling of the people. Hearken,
Bernhard, wilt thou go to Valhalla, where the heroes dwell with the
gods, to bear a message to Thor?"

The boy answered, swift and clear:

"Yes, priest, I will go if my father bids me. Is it far away? Shall I
run quickly? Must I take my bow and arrows for the wolves?"

The boy's father, the Chieftain Gundhar, standing among his bearded
warriors, drew his breath deep, and leaned so heavily on the handle of
his spear that the wood cracked. And his wife, Irma, bending forward
from the ranks of women, pushed the golden hair from her forehead with
one hand. The other dragged at the silver chain about her neck until the
rough links pierced her flesh, and the red drops fell unheeded on her
breast.

A sigh passed through the crowd, like the murmur of the forest before
the storm breaks. Yet no one spoke save Hunrad:

"Yes, my Prince, both bow and spear shalt thou have, for the way is
long, and thou art a brave huntsman. But in darkness thou must journey
for a little space, and with eyes blindfolded. Fearest thou?"

"Naught fear I," said the boy, "neither darkness, nor the great bear,
nor the were-wolf. For I am Gundhar's son, and the defender of my folk."

Then the priest led the child in his raiment of lamb's-wool to a broad
stone in front of the fire. He gave him his little bow tipped with
silver, and his spear with shining head of steel. He bound the child's
eyes with a white cloth, and bade him kneel beside the stone with his
face to the cast. Unconsciously the wide arc of spectators drew inward
toward the centre, as the ends of the bow draw together when the cord
is stretched. Winfried moved noiselessly until he stood close behind the
priest.

The old man stooped to lift a black hammer of stone from the
ground,--the sacred hammer of the god Thor. Summoning all the strength
of his withered arms, he swung it high in the air. It poised for an
instant above the child's fair head--then turned to fall.

One keen cry shrilled out from where the women stood: "Me! take me! not
Bernhard!"

The fligh