le of it would go rolling
and echoing apparently in a dozen regions all at once, so that it would
be impossible to tell from what direction the original sound proceeded.
Two voices of the solitude were ceaseless--the reverberating roar of the
river and the chatter of the mountain brook which ran to meet it; but
in ears long accustomed to them they seemed to weave a silence of their
own. Twice a day, at least, his sole reminders of the living, pulsing
outer world went by. Sometimes as the panting train rushed east or west,
its reminder of the world from which he had parted brought a bitter pang
with it.

He found but little occupation for his hands, and, apart from his
memories, little for his mind. He read and reread his father's dying
words until he knew them by rote, and could read them with shut eyes as
he lay in his blanket in the wakeful hours of night. He would not admit
to himself that he had a real belief in their message, and yet it was
always with him in a fainter or a stronger fashion, and it made a part
of life.

It was not merely that he had little to do and little to think about
apart from his memories, that he dwelt so constantly upon them. He
thought often that there was something within himself which led him
gently yet inexorably to these contemplations, and it happened more than
once that while he was in the very act of thinking thus his dream came
upon him as if a spell had been cast upon his mind Forgotten emotions
lived again; facial expressions of people he had known; tones of
voices not remarkable, and not much remarked, came back. It was like
a curiously vivid dream; but it had all happened, and he was living it
over again.

Bring what intellectual denial he would to the problem his father's
letter had set before his mind, his nerves at least accepted it, and
he had a settled consciousness that he was not alone. He fought against
this as a mere superstitious folly. He was often angry with himself for
ever stooping to discuss it in his own mind. He had long ago resolved
that the man dies as the beast dies, and that there is no more a bourne
of new life for the one than for the other. And now all manner of doubts
began to pester him. No more for the one than for the other? Why not for
all? Why not one unending cycle of experience? Why not the passing of
one growing intelligence through every form of life? The Eastern sages
dreamed so.

He would sit there at his tent door buried deep in his tho