y wiser heads than mine, Uncle Terry, that have never been able to
answer your question," he replied, "and I doubt if they ever will. To my
mind the origin of life is an enigma, the wide variations in matters of
health and ability an injustice, and the end a blank wall that none who
scale ever recross with tidings of the beyond. As some one has expressed
it: 'Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two
eternities! We strive in vain to look beyond the heights; we cry aloud,
and the only answer is the echo of our wailing cry.'"

"An' right thar," put in Uncle Terry earnestly, "is whar I allus envy
the believers, as the widder calls 'em, for they are satisfied what is
beyond and have it all pict'rd out in thar minds, even to what the
streets are paved with, an' the kind o' music they're goin' ter have.
It's all guesswork in my way o' thinkin', but they are sure on't, an'
that feelin' is lots o' comfort to 'em when they are drawin' near the
end. I've been a sort er scoffer all my life," he added reflectively,
"an' can't help bein' a doubter, but there are times when I envy Aunt
Leach an' the rest on' em the delusion I b'lieve they're laborin'
under."

"But do you believe death ends all consciousness?" asked Albert
seriously. "Have you no hope, ever, of a life beyond this blank wall?"

"Sartin I have hopes," replied Uncle Terry at once, "same as all on us
has, but I wish I was more sure my hopes was goin' ter be realized. Once
in a while I git the feelin' thar ain't no use in hopin', an' then a
little suthin keeps sayin' 'Mebbe--mebbe--mebbe'--an' I feel more
cheerful again."

Albert looked at the roughly clad and withered old man who sat near, and
in whose words lurked an undertone of sadness mingled with a faint hope,
and in an instant back came a certain evening months before when the
Widow Leach had uttered a prayer that had stirred his feelings as no
such utterance ever had before. All the pathos of that simple petition,
all its abiding faith in God's goodness and wisdom, all its utter
self-abnegation and absolute confidence in a life beyond the grave, came
back, and all the consolation that feeling surely held for the old and
poverty-environed soul who uttered it impressed him in sharp contrast to
the doubting "mebbe--mebbe" of Uncle Terry.

Then again he thought of all the sneers against faith and religious
conviction he had found in the writings of Paine and Voltaire; all the
brilliant epigram