e chanted, his serious eyes devoured the
blue leagues right away to the horizon.

The drovers at the far end of the compartment turned their faces inward
and grinned. The middle-aged man looked across at me behind the boy's
back with half a smile and resumed his reading. The mother laughed
apologetically--

"'Tis his way. He won't be so crazed for it in a few weeks' time, I
reckon. He's goin' up to Bristol to be bound apprentice to his uncle.
His uncle's master of a sailing ship."

But the boy did not hear. There are four or five tunnels in the red
sandstone between Teignmouth and Dawlish, and through these he sang on
in a low repressed voice, which broke out high and clear and strong as
we swept again into the large wind and sunshine. At Dawlish Station we
drew up for a minute, and a porter on the up platform nodded to one of
the drovers and asked, "What's the matter with 'ee, in there?"
"Nothin', nothin'; we've got a smokin'-concert on," said the drover.
Across the rails a group waiting for the down train stood and stared at
the boy, whispered, and smiled; and I can still recall the fascinated
gaze of a plump urchin of six as he gripped with one hand a wooden spade
and with the other his mother's skirt.

But the boy sang on heedless, and still sang on as we left Dawlish
behind. There was no jubilation in his chant, but through it all there
ran and rang out from time to time a note of high challenge. Perhaps I
read too much in it, for in the heart of a boy many thoughts sing
together before they come to birth,--and to the destinies we see so
distinctly he marches through a haze, drawn onward by incommunicable
yearnings. But as, unseen by him, I glanced up at his blown hair and
eager parted lips, the chant seemed to grow articulate--

"O Sea, I am coming! O fate, waiting and waited for, I salute you!
Friend or adversary, we meet to try each other: for your wonders I have
eyes, for your trials a heart. Use me, for I am ready!"

As we turned inland and ran beside the shore of the Exe, his song died
down and ceased. For a while he stood conning the river, the boats, the
red cliffs and whitewashed towns on the farther bank; and so, as we came
in sight of the cathedral towers, stepped back and dropped into his
seat.

"Well now," said his mother, "you _be_ a funny boy!"

For a moment he did not seem to hear; then started and came out of his
day-dream with a furious blush. I looked away.

II.

The