it into the cupboard, and was
able therefore to find it and get it out, looking at the thin, grief-
struck face of the tax-gatherer. He was rather older than my friend,
and very much more feeble and worn, and of a very different type. He
was not like him, a robust, successful man, but rather one of those
whose feet find no resting-place upon the earth. I recognized one of
the children of reverie, and said, "You are doubtless of the stock of
the old O'Donnells. I know well the hole in the river where their
treasure lies buried under the guard of a serpent with many heads."
"Yes, sur," he replied, "I am the last of a line of princes."

We then fell to talking of many commonplace things, and my friend did
not once toss up his beard, but was very friendly. At last the gaunt
old tax-gatherer got up to go, and my friend said, "I hope we will have
a glass together next year." "No, no," was the answer, "I shall be dead
next year." "I too have lost sons," said the other in quite a gentle
voice. "But your sons were not like my son." And then the two men
parted, with an angry flush and bitter hearts, and had I not cast
between them some common words or other, might not have parted, but
have fallen rather into an angry discussion of the value of their dead
sons. If I had not pity for all the children of reverie I should have
let them fight it out, and would now have many a wonderful oath to
record.

The knight of the sheep would have had the victory, for no soul that
wears this garment of blood and clay can surpass him. He was but once
beaten; and this is his tale of how it was. He and some farm hands were
playing at cards in a small cabin that stood against the end of a big
barn. A wicked woman had once lived in this cabin. Suddenly one of the
players threw down an ace and began to swear without any cause. His
swearing was so dreadful that the others stood up, and my friend said,
"All is not right here; there is a spirit in him." They ran to the door
that led into the barn to get away as quickly as possible. The wooden
bolt would not move, so the knight of the sheep took a saw which stood
against the wall near at hand, and sawed through the bolt, and at once
the door flew open with a bang, as though some one had been holding it,
and they fled through.

AN ENDURING HEART

One day a friend of mine was making a sketch of my Knight of the
Sheep. The old man's daughter was sitting by, and, when the
conversation drifted to