un by
his father's door. And it was a wonder then, and it has been a wonder
ever since, why, having resolved upon it, that prince did not abandon
the town, which would have changed all his fortune after. Much had been
made clear to me since I began to study, but not this: till the Lord
Himself came to me and told me. The prince looked at the child till he
loved him, and he reflected how many children there were like this that
would be murdered, or starved to death, and he could not give up the
little singing boy to the sword. So he remained; and the town was saved,
and he became a great king. It was so secret that even the angels did
not know it. But without that child the history would not have been
complete."

"And is he here?" the little Pilgrim said.

"Ah," said the historian, "that is more strange still; for that which
saved him was also to his harm. He is not here. He is--elsewhere."

The little Pilgrim's face grew sad; but then she remembered what she had
been told.

"But you know," she said, "that he is coming?"

"I know that our Father will never forsake him, and that everything
that is being accomplished in him is well."

"Is it well to suffer? Is it well to live in that dark stormy country?
Oh, that they were all here, and happy like you!"

He shook his head a little and said--

"It was a long time before I got here; and as for suffering that matters
little. You get experience by it. You are more accomplished and fit for
greater work in the end. It is not for nothing that we are permitted to
wander: and sometimes one goes to the edge of despair--"

She looked at him with such wondering eyes that he answered her without
a word.

"Yes," he said, "I have been there."

And then it seemed to her that there was something in his eyes which she
had not remarked before. Not only the great content that was everywhere,
but a deeper light, and the air of a judge who knew both good and evil,
and could see both sides, and understood all, both to love and to hate.

"Little sister," he said, "you have never wandered far--it is not
needful for such as you. Love teaches you, and you need no more; but
when we have to be trained for an office like this, to make the way of
the Lord clear through all the generations, reason is that we should see
everything, and learn all that man is and can be. These things are too
deep for us; we stumble on, and know not till after. But now to me it is
all clear."

She looked at