the rim of a
moon, like the paring of a giant's nail in the sky, glinted from behind
the dark cloud, and flung a silver radiance over the bog-pools around,
which glittered like patches of fairy silver upon a land of romance.

She was wet, but not cold. The fever in her blood raged and she
staggered forward again, slowly and tottering. A smile was playing about
her lips and eyes. Her lips were parted, and her breast rose and fell
like the heaving beat of an engine. But home beckoned and lured her
onward, and the hope of a long dream filled her soul. Again a sharp
scurry in front drove her heart to her mouth, as two hares battled and
tore at each other for the love of the female which sat close by,
watching the contest.

The sharp swish of the wings of lapwings, as they dived towards her,
filling the moors with their hard rasping double note, and also battling
for possession of a mate, stirred her frightened blood; and at every
step some new terror thrilled her, and kept her continually in a state
of fear.

Still she plodded on, and another squall of rain and hail followed,
giving place soon to the glory of the cold moon, and again obscuring it
in a quick succession of showers and calm moonshine. But there was home
in front, and she was always drawing nearer. Just a little while now, a
few hundred yards or so, and she would be there.

Weak and exhausted, stumbling and rising again, driven by that
unrelenting, irresistible desire, this poor waif of humanity, impelled
by sheer force of will, staggered and crawled towards its hope, forward
to its dream, and at last stood by the window of the home it had sought.

Panting and utterly worn out, she stood holding on to the window ledge,
her will now weakened, her strength of mind gone, and her desire
forsaking her now that she was there.

The wind fell to a mere whisper, and she stooped to look in at a chink
in the shutter, the tears running in hot, scalding streams from her eyes
and blinding her vision. The soft stirring of little limbs beneath her
heart brought back the old desire to hide herself from everyone she had
known.

Oh, God! It was terrible thus to be torn; for she had sung the song of
all motherhood in her own simple way--the song of the love that
recreates the world. The same song that enables motherhood to commune
with God. "I will walk in the pure air of the uplands, so that your life
shall be sweet and clean. I shall bathe my body in the sweet waters of