every one with a crisp, tingling hilarity.

Before the sun first touched Castle Rock on the morning of the feast they
were up and in high feather over at the bunk-house. They raced across to
see what Sam was cooking; they begged and joyfully swallowed lumps of his
raw plum-pudding. "Merry Christmas!" they wished him, and "Melly
Clismas!" said he to them. They played leap-frog over by the stable, they
put snow down each other's backs. Their shouts rang round corners; it was
like boys let out of school. When Drake gathered them for the
shooting-match, they cheered him; when he told them there were no prizes,
what did they care for prizes? When he beat them all the first round,
they cheered him again. Pity he hadn't offered prizes! He wasn't a good
business man, after all!

The rounds at the target proceeded through the forenoon, Drake the
acclaimed leader; and the Christmas sun drew to mid-sky. But as its
splendor in the heavens increased, the happy shoutings on earth began to
wane. The body was all that the buccaroos knew; well, the flesh comes
pretty natural to all of us--and who had ever taught these men about the
spirit? The further they were from breakfast the nearer they were to
dinner; yet the happy shootings waned! The spirit is a strange thing.
Often it dwells dumb in human clay, then unexpectedly speaks out of the
clay's darkness.

It was no longer a crowd Drake had at the target. He became aware that
quietness had been gradually coming over the buccaroos. He looked, and
saw a man wandering by himself in the lane. Another leaned by the stable
corner, with a vacant face. Through the windows of the bunk-house he
could see two or three on their beds. The children were tired of
shouting. Drake went in-doors and threw a great log on the fire. It