rocks to bear witness to this sad catastrophe?"

Again the stranger made a gesture of perplexity.

"Dear, dear! I forgot. Jasper, when you get home, read very
carefully that passage about the Tower of Babel. Whatever the cause
of that melancholy confusion, its reality is impressed upon us when
we stand face to face with one whom I may perhaps be allowed to call,
metaphorically, a dweller in Mesopotamia."

As no one answered, my uncle took silence for consent, and called him
so twice--to his own great satisfaction and the obvious awe of the
fishermen.

"It is evident," he continued, "that this gentleman (call him by what
name you will) is in immediate need of food and raiment. If such, as
I do not doubt, can be obtained at Polkimbra, our best course is to
accompany him thither. I trust my proposition meets with his
approval."

It met, at any rate, with the approval of the fishermen, who
translated Uncle Loveday's speech into gestures. Being answered with
a nod of the head and a few hasty foreign words, they began to lead
the stranger away in their midst. As he turned to go, he glanced for
the last time at me with a strange flickering smile, at which my
heart grew sick. Uncle Loveday lingered behind to adjure Joe to be
careful of me as we went up the cliff, and then, with a promise that
he would run in to see mother later in the day, trotted after the
rest. They passed out of sight through the archway of Dead Man's
Rock.