sod;
cleared off the surface layer; quarried the rock, using the hand drill
entirely. Towards morning the thick granite slab, that lay nearest to
the crimsoning sky among the Flamsted Hills, was hoisted from its
primeval bed and lowered to its place on the car.

It was then that four men, Champney Googe, Antoine, Jim McCann, and
Luigi Poggi asserted their right, by reason of what the dead had been to
them, to cut and chisel the rock into sarcophagus shape. Luigi and
Antoine asked to cut the cover of the stone coffin.

All Saturday afternoon, the four men in Shed Number Two worked at their
work of love, of unspeakable gratitude, of passionate devotion to a
sacrificed manhood. They wrought in silence. All that afternoon, they
could see, by glancing up from their work and looking out through the
shed doors across the field, the silent procession entering and leaving
the chapel. Sometimes Jim McCann would strike wild in his feverish haste
to ease, by mere physical exertion, his great over-charged heart of its
load of grief; a muttered curse on his clumsiness followed. Now and
then Champney caught his eye turned upon him half-appealingly; but they
spoke no word; _chip-chip-chipping_, they worked on.

The sun set; electricity illumined the shed. Antoine worked with
desperation; Luigi wrought steadily, carefully, beautifully--his heart
seeking expression in every stroke. When the dawn paled the electric
lights, he laid aside his tools, took off his canvas apron, and stepped
back to view the cover as a whole. The others, also, brought their stone
to completion. As with one accord they went over to look at the
Italian's finished work, and saw--no carving of archbishop's mitre, no
sculpture of cardinal's hat (O mother, where were the day-dreams for
your boy!), but a rough slab, in the centre of which was a raised heart
of polished granite, and, beneath it, cut deep into the rock--which,
although lying yesterday nearest the skies above The Gore, was in past
aeons the foundation stone of our present world--the words:

THE HEART OF THE QUARRY.

The lights went out. The dawn was reddening the whole east; it touched
the faces of the men. They looked at one another. Suddenly McCann
grasped Champney's hand, and reaching over the slab caught in his the
hands of the other two; he gripped them hard, drew a long shuddering
breath, and spoke, but unwittingly on account of his habitual profanity,
the last word:

"By Jesus Christ,