as young as the morning. For man grows old only by what he suffers, and
what he forgives, and what he sins. What have you to say for Henri
Rouget, my Francois?"

And Francois read:

"I was a fool; nothing had I to know
Of men, and naught to men had I to give.
God gave me nothing; now to God I go,
Now ask for pain, for bread,
Life for my brain: dead,
By God's love I shall then begin to live."

The priest rose to his feet and put a hand on the young man's shoulder.

"Do you know, Francois," he said, half sadly, "do you know, you have the
true thing in you. Come often to me, my son, and bring all these things
--all you write."

While the Cure troubled himself about his future, Francois began to work
upon a monument for the grave of a dozen soldiers of Pontiac who were
killed in the War of the Patriots. They had died for a mistaken cause,
and had been buried on the field of battle. Long ago something would
have been done to commemorate them but that three of them were
Protestants, and difficulties had been raised by the bigoted. But
Francois thought only of the young men in their common grave at St.
Eustache. He remembered when they went away one bright morning, full of
the joy of an erring patriotism, of the ardour of a weak but fascinating
cause: race against race, the conquered against the conquerors, the
usurped against the usurpers.