and the thoughts of our head were
clothed upon with acts and the words of men. But now are we broken in
sunder, and the bonds of our bones are loosed, and our thoughts lie in
the dust."

Then said the Poor Thing: "Charge them that they give you the virtue
they withheld."

And the man said: "Bones of my fathers, greeting! for I am sprung of
your loins. And now, behold, I break open the piled stones of your
cairn, and I let in the noon between your ribs. Count it well done, for
it was to be; and give me what I come seeking in the name of blood and
in the name of God."

And the spirits of the dead stirred in the cairn like ants; and they
spoke: "You have broken the roof of our cairn and let in the noon
between our ribs; and you have the strength of the still-living. But
what virtue have we? what power? or what jewel here in the dust with us,
that any living man should covet or receive it? for we are less than
nothing. But we tell you one thing, speaking with many voices like bees,
that the way is plain before all like the grooves of launching: So forth
into life and fear not, for so did we all in the ancient ages." And
their voices passed away like an eddy in a river.

"Now," said the Poor Thing, "they have told you a lesson, but make them
give you a gift. Stoop your hand among the bones without drawback, and
you shall find their treasure."

So the man stooped his hand, and the dead laid hold upon it many and
faint like ants; but he shook them off, and behold, what he brought up
in his hand was the shoe of a horse, and it was rusty.

"It is a thing of no price," quoth the man, "for it is rusty."

"We shall see that," said the Poor Thing; "for in my thought it is a
good thing to do what our fathers did, and to keep what they kept
without question. And in my thought one thing is as good as another in
this world; and a shoe of a horse will do."

Now they got into their boat with the horse-shoe, and when the dawn was
come they were aware of the smoke of the Earl's town and the bells of
the Kirk that beat. So they set foot to shore: and the man went up to
the market among the fishers over against the palace and the Kirk; and
he was bitter poor and bitter ugly, and he had never a fish to sell, but
only a shoe of a horse in his creel, and it rusty.

"Now," said the Poor Thing, "do so and so, and you shall find a wife and
I a mother."

It befell that the Earl's daughter came forth to go into the Kirk upon
her prayers