ld not
guess.

Of what happened to them in the course of their seeking, even of that
the telling must be brief, flitting from one event to another, even as
the small Peter-bird flits from the top of one wave to the top of
another, nor wets foot or feather in the marbled sea between; else
would the story of the seeking linger out the full seven years of the
seeking.

The first trial that befell them was dense wintry fog, in the dusk of
which they lay with lowered sail on a sullen sea for a day and a night.
When the change came, it brought with it the blowing of a fierce gale
with a plague of sleet and hail-stones, and they were chased out of the
fog, and driven far into the south.

Great billows followed them as they ran, and broke about the stern of
the ship in fountains of freezing spray which drenched them to the
skin. Little ease had they in their sea-faring in that long race with
the north wind, for every moment they looked to have the mast torn up
by the root and the frame-work of the ship broken asunder. The salt
surf quenched their fire and mingled their bread with bitterness.

Aching they were and weary, and sorrowful enough to sleep, when the
tempest abated, and the sun returned, and the sea rolled in long glassy
swells.

As the sun blazed out, and the sea glittered over all his trackless
ways, Serapion said to the chorister: "Ha, little brother, 'tis good,
is it not? to see the bright sun once more. His face is as the face of
an Angel to us."

The lad looked at him curiously, but made no answer.

"Art thou ailing, or sad, or home-sick, little one, that thou hast
nought to say?" asked Serapion.

"Nay, father, I was but thinking of thy words, that the face of the sun
is as the face of an Angel."

"Ay! And is it not so?"

"Nay, father. When I have seen the sun at sunrise and at sunset I have
ever seen a ring of splendid Angels, and in the midst of the ring the
snow-white Lamb with his red cross, and the Angels were moving
constantly around the Lamb, joyfully glittering; and that was the sun.
But as it rose into the heavens the Angels dazzled mine eyes so that I
could see them no more, nor yet the Lamb, for very brightness. Is the
sun then otherwise than what I see?"

Then was it Serapion's turn to muse, and he answered:

"To thy young eyes which be clear and strong--yet try them not
overmuch--it is doubtless as thou sayest; but we who are older have
lost the piercing sight, and to us the