hat he might leave you."

The girl stood still.

Far out at sea the boat was lost to sight beyond the moonlight sheen.

The voice spoke softly, "Art thou contented?"

She said, "I am contented."

At her feet the waves broke in long ripples softly on the shore.

V. THREE DREAMS IN A DESERT.

Under a Mimosa-Tree.

As I travelled across an African plain the sun shone down hotly. Then I
drew my horse up under a mimosa-tree, and I took the saddle from him and
left him to feed among the parched bushes. And all to right and to left
stretched the brown earth. And I sat down under the tree, because the
heat beat fiercely, and all along the horizon the air throbbed. And
after a while a heavy drowsiness came over me, and I laid my head down
against my saddle, and I fell asleep there. And, in my sleep, I had a
curious dream.

I thought I stood on the border of a great desert, and the sand blew
about everywhere. And I thought I saw two great figures like beasts of
burden of the desert, and one lay upon the sand with its neck stretched
out, and one stood by it. And I looked curiously at the one that lay
upon the ground, for it had a great burden on its back, and the sand was
thick about it, so that it seemed to have piled over it for centuries.

And I looked very curiously at it. And there stood one beside me
watching. And I said to him, "What is this huge creature who lies here
on the sand?"

And he said, "This is woman; she that bears men in her body."

And I said, "Why does she lie here motionless with the sand piled round
her?"

And he answered, "Listen, I will tell you! Ages and ages long she has
lain here, and the wind has blown over her. The oldest, oldest, oldest
man living has never seen her move: the oldest, oldest book records that
she lay here then, as she lies here now, with the sand about her. But
listen! Older than the oldest book, older than the oldest recorded
memory of man, on the Rocks of Language, on the hard-baked clay of
Ancient Customs, now crumbling to decay, are found the marks of her
footsteps! Side by side with his who stands beside her you may trace
them; and you know that she who now lies there once wandered free over
the rocks with him."

And I said, "Why does she lie there now?"

And he said, "I take it, ages ago the Age-of-dominion-of-muscular-force
found her, and when she stooped low to give suck to her young, and her
back was broad, he put his burden of subjection on to it, a