ed what I know on just such
visitings! Mothers of Sorrow are we all, dear friend, and if we hold
ourselves too far from sorrow, we are no true mothers of the world we
make. If all did a little, there would be no need of a few who should do
all--or so it seems to us on the Dunes."

"But we think--in my city--that these unhappy ones, the poor, the sick,
the ignorant, gain more from the few who should do all," she argued.

"Maybe. But you gain the less who fail to do them," said the Countess.

"Child," said the woman, sternly, "the poor were not created for our
discipline."

"I do not know how you know that," said the Countess.

At this the woman's eyes grew wide, and she stared at the embroidery
frames and the stags' heads and the arras, and all the quiet maidens in
their looped skirts, with eyes that saw them not. At last she sighed and
rose from her carved chair humbly.

"Thank God, I am not too old to learn!" she said; "I see I have not
earned my rest, while so many of the world lack theirs. Perhaps in
heaven, if I win there, I may take it. But it is hard. Once in my life,
yes, and twice, I was all for urging on and doing, and two women, in
strange places, one very old and one of middle age, taught me sharply
that it might not be, and bridled and haltered my young strength. Now
that I am content to be nothing, you, a young woman, urge me on. Are you
the third, then? How many more must there be?"

Then the Countess rose and threw herself on her knees before her and
kissed her trembling hand.

"No more, no more, O mother of six!" she cried, sobbing, "and be sure
that only the fine gold must needs be so harried by the great Smithy!
But it could not be that such as thou shouldst end at a sunset window.
Rather die fighting as did my good lord, and leave the quiet for them
that mourn!"

"I will do so," said the woman, "but how have you learned such wisdom,
being so young?"

"When my lord died," said the Countess, "I was as one mad, and set
myself toward the convent, to end there, praying for him. But a very
holy hermit that lives beneath Merlin Oak, in the very midst and heart
of the Dunes, to whom I brought a relic from Jerusalem as a pious
offering, set me right and told me I was not made for a religious. 'It
may be, my daughter, that in too much thought on your religion you will
lose it,' he said, 'and end in tears and kissings of the Feet, for which
not many of the saints have power, for long. Make of thy dee