t it does not know
why. It is conscious of a something wrong, but the little brain is often
unable to tell whether that something be weariness or hunger. If the
wandering spirit be upon it, it wanders to the last limit of physical
power, and it is surprising indeed to find how long it is before that
limit is reached. A healthy, muscular infant of this age has been known
to walk nearly eight or ten miles before becoming utterly exhausted. And
when exhaustion comes, and the tiny form falls in its tracks, how small
an object it is to detect in the great world of outdoors! A little
bundle of dusty garments in a ditch, in a wayside hollow, in tall grass,
or among the tufts and hummocks of a marsh--how easy it is for so
inconspicuous an object to escape the eye of the most zealous searcher!
A young animal lost cries incessantly; the lost child cries out his
pitiful little cry, finds itself lifted to no tender bosom, soothed by
no gentle voice, and in the end wanders and suffers in helpless,
hopeless silence.

As the morning wore on Dirck and Halford beat the swampy lands of the
riverside with a thoroughness that showed their understanding of the
difficulty of their work, and their conviction that the child had taken
that direction. This conviction deepened with every hour, for the rest
of the countryside was fairly open and well populated, and there the
search should have been, for such a search, comparatively easy. Yet the
sun climbed higher and higher in the sky, and no sound of guns fired in
glad signal reached their ears. Hither and thither they went through the
hot lowlands, meeting and parting again, with appointments to come
together in spots known to them both, or separating without a word, each
knowing well where their courses would bring them together. From time to
time they caught glimpses of their companions on the hills above, who,
from their height, could see the place of meeting on the still higher
hill, and each time they signalled the news and got back the despairing
sign that meant "None yet!"

News enough there was, but not _the_ news. Mrs. Penrhyn still stayed,
for her own house was so situated that the child could not possibly
return to it, if he had taken the direction that now seemed certain,
without passing through the crowd of searchers, and intelligence of his
discovery must reach her soonest at that point. Perhaps there was
another reason, too. Perhaps she could not bear to return to that
silent h