impressed with a sense of the desertion, emptiness, and end of the
world, and finally his discovery of the little lonely and apparently
forsaken boy, thrown despairingly as it were against the closed
Cathedral, like a frail human wreck cast up from the gulf of the
devouring sea. Each incident, trivial in itself, yet seemed of
particular importance, though he could not explain or analyse why it
should be so. Meditatively he sat and watched the moon sink like a
silver bubble falling downward in the dark,--the stars vanished one
by one,--and a faint brown-gold line of suggestive light in the east
began the slow creation of a yet invisible dawn. Presently, yielding
to a vague impulse of inexplicable tenderness, he rose softly and
went to the threshold of the room where his foundling slept. Holding
his breath, he listened--but there was no sound. Very cautiously and
noiselessly he opened the door, and looked in,--a delicate half-
light came through the latticed window and seemed to concentrate
itself on the bed where the tired wanderer lay. His fine youthful
profile was distinctly outlined,--the soft bright hair clustered
like a halo round his broad brows,--and the two small hands were
crossed upon his breast, while in his sleep he smiled. Always
touched by the beauty, innocence and helplessness of childhood,
something in the aspect of this little lad moved the venerable
prelate's heart to an unwonted emotion,--and looking upon him, he
prayed for guidance as to what he should best do to rescue so gentle
and young a creature from the cruelties of the world.




V.