its crown was wavering with flames. The grass itself caught here and
there, and in whatever direction the eye turned, new fires as
instantaneously sprang out to meet it.

Stumps blazed up like lighted altars, or like huge gas-jets suddenly
turned on. Adam saw one log lying endwise downhill, one side of which
was crumbling into coals of fierce and tremulous heat, while from the
other side still sprung unsinged a delicate tuft of ferns.

The smoke was driving straight upward in a quivering current, and in
Lake Magog's depths another island seemed to be on fire.

Sublime as the sight was, all these details impressed themselves on the
man in an instant, and he turned his face directly up toward the woman.

"Darling, your face looks blistered," said Adam.

"It feels blistered," replied Eva. "I'll put some water on it, now that
you've caught your breath again. I thought I could not get you out from
those burning trees."

"But you dragged me down the hill?"

"Yes, and then dipped you in the lake and pushed off with you in the
boat. I don't know how I did it. But here we are together."

Adam bathed her face carefully himself, and held her tight in his arms.
The unspeakable love of which he had dreamed, and the heat of the
burning island, seemed welding them together without other sign than the
fact.