guarding the Rose Tree Mine, which Falding the Englishman and his
companions had prospected and declared to be their Ophir.

But St. Jean was far from the ways of settlement, and there was little
food and only one hut, and many things must be done for the Rose Tree
Mine in the places where men sell their souls for money; and Antoine and
Angelique, French peasants from the parish of Ste. Irene in Quebec, were
left to guard the place of treasure, until, to the sound of the laughing
spring, there should come many men and much machinery, and the sinking of
shafts in the earth, and the making, of riches.

But when Antoine and Angelique were left alone in the waste, and God
began to draw the pale coverlet of frost slowly across land and water,
and to surround St. Jean with a stubborn moat of ice, the heart of the
woman felt some coming danger, and at last broke forth in words of timid
warning. When she once had spoken she said no more, but stayed and
builded the heaps of earth about the house, and filled every crevice
against the inhospitable Spirit of Winds, and drew her world closer and
closer within those two rooms where they should live through many months.

The winter was harsh, but the hearts of the two were strong. They loved;
and Love is the parent of endurance, the begetter of courage. And every
day, because it seemed his duty, Antoine inspected the Rose Tree Mine;
and every day also, because it seemed her duty, Angelique said many aves.
And one prayer was much with her--for spring to come early that the child
should not suffer: the child which the good God was to give to her and
Antoine.

In the first hours of each evening Antoine smoked, and Angelique sang the
old songs which their ancestors learned in Normandy. One night Antoine's