direction. "The Gate of Wanderers is before us, at the end of the
road."

The party urged their animals forward down the hill-side, and pressed on
until noon, when they halted for rest and refreshment in a wood beside
the road. There they sat at their ease on the grass, and the Third
Vice-President looked from one to another, and spoke as follows:

"My friends, I must tell you the story of the Towers. Our King, you must
know, is a handsome and amiable man, in appearance about thirty years of
age. When I tell you that he has been our king for more than forty
years, you will be surprised. His wife was a princess of some few years
less than his own, and of a beauty unequalled in the kingdom. Her
wedding ring, the gift of her husband, was a single ruby in a plain gold
band, and this ring she was never known to remove from her
wedding-finger for a single moment. She was blessed with three beautiful
children, two boys and a girl, the oldest of whom was nearly nine years
of age.

"When the prince, our present King, was thirty years old, his father the
King, who was then alive, gave a great ball at the palace, and at this
ball the old King declared to the assembled court that he desired to
build a tower; a mighty tower, higher than any other in the world, where
he might seek repose from time to time; a tower so tall that it would
reach the cloud that hangs perpetually on the mountain. To him who
should build such a tower in the shortest time the King would give any
reward which the fortunate bidder might ask. The old King laughed as he
made his offer, and it was plain that he was only half serious; but many
of the richest of his nobility desired the prize, and contended for it
earnestly. One proposed to erect the tower in ten years, another in
eight, and one was found who was willing to promise it in six years and
a half; but these terms were all too long. The King was old, and he
would not wait so long.

"'Is there no one,' said the old King at last, 'who will build me my
tower in less than six years and a half?'

"'I will build it in one night,' said a voice from the rear of the
ball-room.

"An old man came forward and stood before the King; an old man, dressed
in a short gown tied in with a cord about the middle, with sandals on
his feet, a lantern with a lighted candle in one hand, and a staff in
the other. No one in that place had ever seen him before, and no one
knew how he had gotten in amongst that glittering com