, and his face, uplifted to the jewelled sky of the
moonless night, was beatific in its peacefulness, as he continued in an
altered tone, gentle and low:

"I think all questions are answered there. The stars tell it all. When
you look at them you know! They have put them on our flag. There are
times when this seems but a poor nation: boastful, corrupt, violent, and
preparing, as it is now, to steal another country by fraud and war; yet
the stars on the flag always make me happy and confident. Do you see
the constellations swinging above us, such unimaginable vastnesses, not
roving or crashing through the illimitable at haphazard, but moving in
more excellent measure, and to a finer rhythm, than the most delicate
clockwork man ever made? The great ocean-lines mark our seas with their
paths through the water; the fine brains of the earth are behind the
ships that sail from port to port, yet how awry the system goes! When
does a ship come to her harbor at an hour determined when she sailed?
What is a ship beside the smallest moon of the smallest world? But,
there above us, moons, worlds, suns, all the infinite cluster of
colossi, move into place to the exactness of a hair at the precise
instant. That instant has been planned, you see; it is part of a
system--and can a system exist that no mind made? Think of the Mind that
made this one! Do you believe so inconceivably majestic an Intelligence
as that could be anything but good? Ah, when you wonder, look above you;
look above you in the night, I say," he cried, his hand upraised like
his transfigured face. "Look above you and you will never fear that a
sparrow's fall could go unmarked!"

It was not to the stars that she looked, but to the orator, as long as
he held that pose, which lasted until a hard-ridden horse came galloping
down the street. As it dashed by, though the rider looked neither to
right nor left, Miss Betty unconsciously made a feverish clutch at her
companion's sleeve, drawing him closer to the hedge.

"It is my father," she said hurriedly in a low voice. "He must not
see you. You must never come here. Perhaps--" She paused, then quickly
whispered: "You have been very kind to me. Good-night."

He looked at her keenly, and through the dimness saw that her face was
shining with excitement. He did not speak again, but, taking a step
back-ward, smiled faintly, bent his head in humble acquiescence, and
made a slight gesture of his hand for her to leave him. S