the strange fire; my mind ran in a tumult
of high resolves of which I understood neither the end nor the
present meaning, but only that the world had on a sudden become my
battlefield, that the fight was mine, and at all cost the victory
must be mine. It was, if I may say it without blasphemy, as if my
friend's blood had baptized me into his faith; and I saw life and
death with new eyes.

Yet, for the moment, in finding passion I had also found self; and
shame of this self dragged down my elation. I had sprung to my feet
in wild rage against Nat's murder; I had spoken words--fierce,
unpremeditated words--which, beginning in a boyish defiance, had
ended on a note which, though my own lips uttered it, I heard as from
a trumpet sounding close and yet calling afar. In a minute or so it
had happened, and behold! I that, sitting beside Nat, should have
been terribly alone, was not alone, for my new-found self sat between
us, intruding on my sorrow.

I declare now with shame, as it abased me then, that for hours, while
the darkness fell and the stars began their march over the tree-tops,
the ghostly intruder kept watch with me as a bodily presence mocking
us both, benumbing my efforts to sorrow. . . . Nor did it fade until
calm came to me, recalled by the murmur of unseen waters.
Listening to them I let my thoughts travel up to the ridges and forth
into that unconfined world of which Nat's spirit had been made free.
. . . I went to the hut for a pail, groped my way to the stream, and
fetched water to prepare his body for burial. When I returned the
hateful presence had vanished. My eyes went up to a star--love's
planet--poised over the dark boughs. Thither and beyond it Nat had
travelled. Through those windows he would henceforth look back and
down on me; never again through the eyes I had loved as a friend and
lived to close. I could weep now, and I wept; not passionately, not
selfishly, but in grief that seemed to rise about me like a tide and
bear me and all fate of man together upon its deep, strong
flood. . . .

At daybreak Marc'antonio and Stephanu came down the pass and found me
digging the grave. I thought at first that they intended me some
harm, for their faces were ill-humoured enough in all conscience; but
they carried each a spade, and after growling a salutation, set down
their guns and struck in to help me with my work.

We had been digging, maybe, for twenty minutes, and in silence, when
my ear