ty shell of its ear, and the ear was round and
full as a shell on the shore, and nothing told her that the voice of the
sea was not heard in it, and that all within was silence.

So Ruth cherished her hope in secret, and whispered her heart and said,
"It is well, all is well with the child. She will look upon my face and
see it, and listen to my voice and hear it, and her own little tongue
will yet speak to me, and make me very glad." And then an ineffable
serenity would spread over her face and transfigure it.

But when the time was come that a child's eyes, having grown familiar
with the light, should look on its little hands, and stare at its
little fingers, and clutch at its cradle, and gaze about in a peaceful
perplexity at everything, still the eyes of Ruth's child did not open
in seeing, but lay idle and empty. And when the time was ripe that
a child's ears should hear from hour to hour the sweet babble of a
mother's love, and its tongue begin to give back the words in lisping
sounds, the ear of Ruth's child heard nothing, and its tongue was mute.

Then Ruth's spirit sank, but still the angel out of heaven seemed to
come to her, and find her a thousand excuses, and say, "Wait, Ruth; only
wait, only a little longer."

So Ruth held back her tears, and bent above her babe again, and watched
for its smile that should answer to her smile, and listened for the
prattle of its little lips. But never a sound as of speech seemed to
break the silence between the words that trembled from her own tongue,
and never once across her baby's face passed the light of her tearful
smile. It was a pitiful thing to see her wasted pains, and most pitiful
of all for the pains she was at to conceal them. Thus, every day at
midday she would carry her little one into the patio, and watch if its
eyes should blink in the sunshine; but if Israel chanced to come upon
her then, she would drop her head and say, "How sweet the air is to-day,
and how pleasant to sit in the sun!"

"So it is," he would answer, "so it is."

Thus, too, when a bird was singing from the fig-tree that grew in the
court, she would catch up her child and carry it close, and watch if
its ears should hear; but if Israel saw her, she would laugh--a little
shrill laugh like a cry--and cover her face in confusion.

"How merry you are, sweetheart," he would say, and then pass into the
house.

For a time Israel tried to humour her, seeming not to see what he saw,
and pret