pathy into
her face, but spake no word, and again the withering hours passed on,
and the elder prayed in a husky and broken whisper, and his hearers
muttered an Amen, hollow and mournful as the echo from an open tomb.

Three o'clock, and Hobomok scrambled down from the roof, and stood in
the open doorway. His master saw and went out to him. In a moment he
came again, and passing between the banks of rude benches stood before
the elder, who, pausing suddenly, fixed upon him a gaze of piteous
inquiry, while a little movement among the hundred starving souls
watching and praying heralded his news.

"The answer has come, Elder," announced the soldier briefly. "A full
rigged ship has just cleared Manomet headland, and a cloud black with
rain is rolling up out of the Southwest."

"Let us pray!" said the elder softly; and Standish bowed his head with
the rest as the holy man, his voice strong and fervent once more, poured
out for himself and his people such gratitude as perhaps is only
possible from those "appointed to die," and suddenly rescued by the hand
of a merciful Father.

A few moments later, as the procession wound down the hill, somewhat
less formally than it had gone up, the southern and western sky were
black with clouds already veiling the sun, and within an hour a soft and
tender rain began to fall, soaking quietly into the earth gaping all
over with the wounds of drought, and reviving, as Bradford quaintly
phrased it, both their drooping affections and their withered corn.

"The white man's God is better than the red man's," remarked Hobomok
privately to Wanalancet, who was visiting Plymouth. "When our powahs
pray for rain, and cut themselves, and offer sacrifice, it comes
sometimes, but in noisy floods that tear up the earth, and beat down the
maize, and do more harm than good. Wanalancet better turn praying Indian
like Hobomok."

CHAPTER XXXV.

THE BRIDES' SHIP.

The rain proved as persistent as it was gentle, and under its influence
the wind sighed itself asleep, leaving at sunset the ship espied by
Hobomok becalmed outside Beach Point. Some of the Pilgrims would have
rowed out to her, but Bradford knew from his own feelings how unfit they
were for such heavy labor.

"A little patience should not be hard for men who have patiently waited
so long," said he smiling. "Let us all break our fast with
thanksgiving."

"One more cup of broth and a bit of the hare," said Priscilla gayly, as
she s