my prayers which saved him from the teeth and the claws."

Good Father Anthony rose.

"You have described a young David. I am eager to see him. Let us go."

"Wait. Before you go you must know that he does not suspect that he
differs from other youths. Women have looked lewdly upon him and
written him letters with singing words, but Pierre being of a simple
nature, he answers them briefly and commends them to God. In fact, the
flattery of women he does not understand, and the flattery of men he
thinks is mere kindliness. Are you prepared to meet him, father?"

Father Anthony nodded, and the two went out together. The chill of the
open was hardly more than the bitter cold inside the building, but
there was a wind that drove the cold through the blood and bones of a
man.

They staggered along against it until they came to a small outhouse,
long and low. On the sheltered side of it they paused to take breath,
and Feather Victor explained: "This is his hour in the gymnasium. To
make the body strong required thought and care. Mere riding and
running and swinging of the ax will not develop every muscle. So I
made this gymnasium, and here Pierre works every day. His teachers of
boxing and wrestling have abandoned him."

There was almost a smile on the lean face.

"The last man left with a swollen jaw and limping on one leg."

Conscience-stricken, he stopped short, crossed himself, and then went
on: "So I give him for partners men who have committed small sins.
Their penance is to stand before Pierre and box each day for a few
minutes and then to wrestle against him. They are fierce men, these
woodsmen and trappers, and big of body; but little Pierre, they dread
him like a whip of fire. One and all, they come to me within a
fortnight and beg for an easier penance."

Here he opened the door, and they slipped inside. The air was warmed
by a big stove, and the room--for the afternoon was dark--lighted by
two swinging lanterns suspended from the low roof. By that
illumination Father Anthony saw two men stripped naked, save for a
loin-cloth, and circling each other slowly in the center of a ring
which was fenced in with ropes and floored with a padded mat.
Certainly Father Victor had spared nothing in expense to make the
fittings of the gymnasium perfect.

Of the two wrestlers, one was a veritable giant of a Canuck, swarthy of
skin, hairy-chested. His great hands were extended to grasp or to
parry--his h