e sun
had gone. He touched the gold of the cross, then his own hair.

"Dorthe," grunted the old man, regarding his bare drumstick regretfully.

"Who is she? Where did she get such a name? Why has she that hair?"

Out of another set of expletives Father Carillo gathered that Dorthe was
the granddaughter of a man who had been washed ashore after a storm, and
who had dwelt on the island until he died. He had married a woman of
the tribe, and to his daughter had given the name of Dorthe--or so the
Indians had interpreted it--and his hair, which was like the yellow
fire. This girl had inherited both. He had been very brave and much
beloved, but had died while still young. Their ways were not his ways,
Father Carillo inferred, and barbarism had killed him.

The priest did not see Dorthe again that day. When night came, he was
given a cave to himself. He hung up his robes on a jutting point of
rock, and slept the sleep of the weary. At the first shaft of dawn he
rose, intending to stroll down to the beach in search of a bay where he
could bathe; but as he stepped across the prostrate Californians, asleep
at the entrance of his cave, he paused abruptly, and changed his plans.

On the far edge of the ocean the rising diadem of the sun sent great
bubbles of colour up through a low bank of pale green cloud to the gray
night sky and the sulky stars. And, under the shadow of the cacti and
palms, in rapt mute worship, knelt the men and women the priest had come
to save, their faces and clasped hands uplifted to the waking sun.

Father Carillo awoke his Indians summarily.

"Gather a dozen large stones and build an altar--quick!" he commanded.

The sleepy Indians stumbled to their feet, obeyed orders, and in a few
moments a rude altar was erected. The priest propped the cross on the
apex, and, kneeling with his Indians, slowly chanted a mass. The savages
gathered about curiously; then, impressed by the solemnity of the
priest's voice and manner, sank to their knees once more, although
directing to the sun an occasional glance of anxiety. When the priest
rose, he gave them to understand that he was deeply gratified by their
response to the religion of civilization, and pointed to the sun, now
full-orbed, amiably swimming in a jewelled mist. Again they prostrated
themselves, first to him, then to their deity, and he knew that the
conquest was begun.

After breakfast they were ready to follow him. They had cast their
feathered ro