e up from the sea, and the hope that would not die kept
him from being of those who love not life for life's sake, be it in ease
or in sorrow. He was of those who find all worth the doing, even all
worth the suffering; and so, though he frowned and his lips drew
tight with anger when he looked down at the little city, he felt that
elsewhere in the world there was that which made it worth the saving.

If his daughter had been with him he would have laughed at that which
his own hands had founded, protected, and saved. But no word came from
her, and laughter was never on his lips--only an occasional smile when,
perhaps, he saw two sparrows fighting, or watched the fish chase each
other in the river, or a toad, too lazy to jump, walk stupidly like
a convict, dragging his long, green legs behind him. And when Felion
looked up towards Shaknon and Margath, a light came in his eyes, for
they were wise and quiet, and watched the world, and something of their
grandeur drew about him like a cloak. As age cut deep lines in his face
and gave angles to his figure, a strange, settled dignity grew upon
him, whether he swung his axe by the balsams or dressed the skins of
the animals he had killed, piling up the pelts in a long shed in the
stockade, a goodly heritage for his daughter, if she ever came back.
Every day at sunrise he walked to the door of his house and looked
eastward steadily, and sometimes there broke from his lips the words:
"My daughter-Carille!" Again, he would sit and brood with his chin in
his hand, and smile, as though remembering pleasant things.

One day at last, in the full tide of summer, a man, haggard and
troubled, came to Felion's house, and knocked, and, getting no reply,
waited; and whenever he looked down at the little city he wrung his
hands, and more than once he put them up to his face and shuddered, and
again looked for Felion. Just when the dusk was rolling down, Felion
came back, and, seeing the man, would have passed him without a word,
but that the man stopped with an eager, sorrowful gesture and said:
"The plague has come upon us again, and the people, remembering how you
healed them long ago, beg you to come."

At that Felion leaned his fishing-rod against the door and answered:

"What people?"

The other then replied: "The people of the little city below, Felion."

"I do not know your name," was the reply; "I know naught of you or of
your city."

"Are you mad?" cried the man. "Do you for