unted fir and hemlock, and in sheltered nooks, adjacent
to these coverts, he could discern something which he judged to be stone
sheepfolds. Just below him, on the opposite side of the road and the
Rothel, which was crossed by a broad bridging of log and plank, stood a
long low stone house, to the north of which a double row of firs had
been planted for a windbreak. Behind him, on a rise of ground a few rods
from the highway, was a large double house of brick with deep granite
foundations and white granite window caps. Two shafts of the same stone
supported the ample white-painted entrance porch. Ancestral elms
over-leafed the roof on the southern side. One light shone from an upper
window. Beyond the elms, a rough road led still upwards to the heights
behind the house.

The priest retraced his steps; turned into this road, for which the
landlord of The Greenbush had given him minute instructions, and
followed its rough way for an eighth of a mile; then a sudden turn
around a shoulder of the hill--and the beginning of the famous Flamsted
granite quarries lay before him, gleaming, sparkling in the moonlight--a
snow-white, glistening patch on the barren hilltop. Near it were a few
huts of turf and stone for the accommodation of the quarrymen. This was
all. But it was the scene, self-chosen, of this priest's future labors;
and while he looked upon it, thoughts unutterable crowded fast, too fast
for the brain already stimulated by the time and environment. He turned
about; retraced his steps at the same rapid pace; passed again up the
highroad to the head of The Gore, then around it, across a barren
pasture, and climbed the cliff-like rock that was crowned by the ancient
pines. He stood there erect, his head thrown back, his forehead to the
radiant heavens, his eyes fixed on the pale twinklings of the seven
stars in the northernmost constellation of the Bear--rapt, caught away
in spirit by the intensity of feeling engendered by the hour, the place.
Then he knelt, bowing his head on a lichened rock, and unto his Maker,
and the Maker of that humanity he had elected to serve, he consecrated
himself anew.

Ten minutes afterwards, he was coming down The Gore on his way back to
The Greenbush. He heard the agitated ringing of a bell-wether; then the
soft huddling rush of a flock of sheep somewhere in the distance. A
sheep dog barked sharply; a hound bayed in answer till the hills north
of The Gore gave back a multiple echo; but t