at
dawn the next day upon his mission. They pressed his hand, some with
warm words of sympathy, some silently and with wet eyes. Many
affectionate words were said, for they had never known before how much
they loved their pastor; and now he seemed no longer a pastor, but a
martyr and a saint. More than one mother brought him her child to
bless;--others strangers from a distance--lifted their children up,
so that they could see him above the press, while they whispered to
them that they must always remember that they had seen the good Mr.
Grey, who was going far off into the west to tell the Indians about
God.

Long afterward, when nearly all that generation had passed away and
the storm of the Revolution was beginning to gather over the colonies,
there were a few aged men still living who sometimes told how, when
they were children, they had seen Cecil Grey bidding the people
farewell at the old meeting-house; and through all the lapse of years
they remembered what a wonderful brightness was on his face, and how
sweet and kind were his words to each as he bade them good-by
forever.

CHAPTER V.

INTO TRACKLESS WILDS.

"I will depart," he said, "the hour is come,
And in the silence of yon sky I read
My fated message flashing."

EDWIN ARNOLD.

The next morning Cecil rose early after a sleepless night. On that day
he was to go out from all that was sweet and precious in life and take
the path into the wilderness. At first his heart sank within him; then
his strength of purpose revived, and he was resolute again.

He must go, and soon. The briefer the parting the briefer the pang. He
had already bidden his friends good-by; his parents were long since
dead; it only remained to part from the old Indian woman, his nurse in
childhood, now his faithful housekeeper and the only inmate of his
home.

He went to the kitchen,--for usually at this hour she was up and
preparing breakfast. She was not there, and the room looked cold and
cheerless in the gray dawn. He went to her door and knocked; there was
no response. He called her; the room was as still as death. Alarmed,
he opened the door; no one was within; she was gone,--had evidently
been gone all night, for the bed was untouched.

He was pained and bewildered at this desertion, for only the day
before he had given her a paper legally drawn up, securing to her the
little prop