r ago now rose to
his lips. He threw himself from his horse, and kneeling in the
withered grass--a mere atom in the boundless plain--lifted his pale
face against the irresponsive blue and prayed.

He prayed that the unselfish dream of his bitter boyhood, his
disappointed youth, might come to pass. He prayed that he might in
higher hands become the humble instrument of good to his fellow-man. He
prayed that the deficiencies of his scant education, his self-taught
learning, his helpless isolation, and his inexperience might be
overlooked or reinforced by grace. He prayed that the Infinite
Compassion might enlighten his ignorance and solitude with a
manifestation of the Spirit; in his very weakness he prayed for some
special revelation, some sign or token, some visitation or gracious
unbending from that coldly lifting sky. The low sun burned the black
edge of the distant tules with dull eating fires as he prayed, lit the
dwarfed hills with a brief but ineffectual radiance, and then died out.
The lingering trade winds fired a few volleys over its grave and then
lapsed into a chilly silence. The young man staggered to his feet; it
was quite dark now, but the coming night had advanced a few starry
vedettes so near the plain they looked like human watch-fires. For an
instant he could not remember where he was. Then a light trembled far
down at the entrance of the valley. Brother Gideon recognized it. It
was in the lonely farmhouse of the widow of the last Circuit preacher.

II

The abode of the late Reverend Marvin Hiler remained in the
disorganized condition he had left it when removed from his sphere of
earthly uselessness and continuous accident. The straggling fence that
only half inclosed the house and barn had stopped at that point where
the two deacons who had each volunteered to do a day's work on it had
completed their allotted time. The building of the barn had been
arrested when the half load of timber contributed by Sugar Mill
brethren was exhausted, and three windows given by "Christian Seekers"
at Martinez painfully accented the boarded spaces for the other three
that "Unknown Friends" in Tasajara had promised but not yet supplied.
In the clearing some trees that had been felled but not taken away
added to the general incompleteness.

Something of this unfinished character clung to the Widow Hiler and
asserted itself in her three children, one of whom was consistently
posthumous. Prematurely