ence,--I feel its vibrations like those of a great organ."

She walked up and down, her hands back of her head, and the moonlight
shining on her upturned, troubled face.

"There is another scientific fact you forget," he said.

She stopped to listen, and he went on.

"When a race has run its course, nature cries 'habet,' and nothing can
alter its fate. It was not alone the merciless onslaughts of the white
man that exterminated the buffalo. They died, and none came to take
their places. They vanished, less on account of man's cruelty than by
reason of their own sterility. Degenerates or regenerates, can't we
leave the decision with a power that forever builds or destroys, in
accordance with a law we do not understand, a higher law that comes
from the source of all law, whatever that source may be? Don't think
any more, but play for me. In spite of my lecture, I will quote too;
my mother used to sing a hymn that went like this,--

'I'd soar and touch the heavenly strings,
And vie with Gabriel while he sings,'--

Do you know it?"

She began the old tune, "Ariel," and then wandered on, playing many
airs that brought back forgotten days. Adam threw himself down on the
grass to listen, half jealously, for she seemed to forget everything.
She had seated herself on a great boulder, and, leaning back against
it, her eyes looking into the blue depths above her, she played on and
on. The old tunes were merged in new ones, and the high sustained
notes of the Cavalleria, the subtle minor of Wagner, the exquisite
sweetness of Beethoven and Schubert filled the moonlit canon, and
still she played on, melodies new to Adam, intoxicating, full of a
wild ecstasy, that filled his very soul, and thrilled through him till
he felt all power of resistance swept away. Every other desire in the
world was lost in the supreme and overwhelming longing to gather her
to his heart and hold her there forever. The very air was steeped in
melody. The full majestic chords rose and melted in unison with the
high, exquisitely sweet notes, and throbbed their life away. She held
the bow suspended a moment, then very softly, half unconsciously,
played a dreamy lullaby, and laid the violin down in her lap.

Adam took her and it into his arms.

"Be careful, put it down gently," she said faintly; "it is your soul
and mine. Do you not know the secret of Antonio Stradivari, of all the
great makers of violins? Ah, they solved our riddle, Love, ages