here the old black walls of Fort Mowbray gazed out upon the
groaning and booming glacial bed, burying the dead earth beyond the
eyes of man. The fount of life was renewing itself in man, in beast,
even in the matter we choose to regard as dead.

Jessie Mowbray was watching the broken ice as it swept on down the
flooding river. She was clad in an oilskin which had only utility for
its purpose. Her soft gray eyes were gazing out through the gently
falling rain with an awe which the display of winter's break up never
failed to inspire in her.

The tremendous power of Nature held her spellbound. It was all so
vast, so sure. She had witnessed these season's changes since her
childhood and never in her mind had they sunk to the level of routine.
They were magical transformations wrought by the all-powerful fairy,
Nature. They were performed with a wave of the wand. The iron of
winter was swept away with a rush, and the stage was instantly set for
summer.

But the deepest mystery to her was the glacier beyond the river. Every
spring she listened to its groaning lamentation with the same feelings
stirring. Her gentle spirit saw in it a monster, a living, moving,
heaving monster, whose voice awoke the echoes of the hills in protest,
and whose enveloping folds clung with cruel tenacity to a conquered
territory laboring to free itself from a bondage of sterility which it
had borne for thousands of years. To her it was like the powers of
Good battling with influences of Evil. It was as though each year,
when the sun rose higher and higher in the sky, these powers of Good
were seeking vainly to overthrow an evil which threatened the tiny
human seed planted in the world for the furthering of an All-wise
Creator's great hidden purpose.

The landing was almost awash with the swollen waters. The booming
ice-floes swept on. They were moving northwards, towards the eternal
ice-fields, to melt or jamb on their way, but surely to melt in the
end. And when they had all gone it would be summer. And life--life
would be renewed at the post.

Renewal of the life at the post meant only one thing for Jessie. It
meant the early return of John Kars. The thought of it thrilled her.
But the thrill passed. For she knew his coming only heralded his
passing on.

She sighed and her soft eyes grew misty. Nor had the mist to do with
the rain which was saturating the world about her. Oh, if there were
to be no passing on! But she