hich all the Judges, Lawmakers, Captains and Leaders knew to be
"our" portion;
Notes of the flowers, the wine, the lights, the music, the splendor,
Notes of the Leaders' oratory, notes of the Bishop's deep-voiced
unctiousness,
Notes he made; and as I looked at the notes he was carefully
writing,
The words ran red like wine and blood, they blazed like the blazing
lights!
Words they were of blood and fire, that spread, that filled the
banquet-hall.
Words of old, I read them--"MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSHIN!--
Weighed in the Balance you are, ye Leaders respected of men,
You Statesmen, Lawmakers, Judges, Captains, Bishops, vice-regents of
God!
Weighed and tried and found wanting. Give way, now, to what shall
come after!
Make ye way for the Men who shall do what ye have but neglected and
shirked!
Make ye way for a Time which hath more than Power and Greed for its
watchwords!
Soon your day shall decline forever, your sun shall sink and shall
vanish.
Then from the Cellars of Life the darkness-dwellers shall issue,
Greeting another daunt which shall have more than pain for its
portion.
Then no more shall the humble, the lowly, the friends of the
Nazarene Carpenter
Be starved, be mangled for gold, be crucified, slaughtered, bled.
Make ye way!...Make ye way!..."

Such was the message I read, the words of that fire-writ warning.
Then peace came back to my spirit, calm peace, and hope and
patience:
Then, through my anger and heat, I thought of the Retribution.
But even more clearly I saw the New Birth of this weary world,
This world now groaning in chains, with the bloody sweat of
oppression.
These things and many more, such as were hard to write of,
I read in the words of the Socialist, patient, peaceful and sober,
Full of prophetic vision, above all things hopeful and patient,
Written in living flame at the Feast of the Leaders of Men....

CHAPTER XXIX.

"APRES NOUS LE DELUGE!"

As Gabriel's voice fell to silence, after the last words, a stillness
came upon the lamp-lit room, a hush broken only by the snapping of the
pine-root fire on the hearth and by the busy ticking of the clock upon
the chimneypiece. Then, after a minute's pause, Craig reached over and
took Gabriel by the hand.

"I salute you