"Have you been at Adrianople?"

"My oppressors were not the Paynim," replied the Eremite, "but they
were enemies far more dire, my own evil passions. Time was when my eye
sparkled like thine, gentle pilgrim, and my heart was not as pure."

"God is merciful," said Iduna, "and without His aid, the strongest are
but shadows."

"Ever think so," replied the Eremite, "and you will deserve rather His
love than His mercy. Thirty long years have I spent in this solitude,
meditating upon the past, and it is a theme yet fertile in instruction.
My hours are never heavy, and memory is to me what action is to other
men."

"You have seen much, holy father?"

"And felt more. Yet you will perhaps think the result of all my
experience very slight, for I can only say unto thee, trust not in
thyself."

"It is a great truth," remarked Iduna, "and leads to a higher one."

"Even so," replied the Eremite. "We are full of wisdom in old age, as
in winter this river is full of water, but the fire of youth, like the
summer sun, dries up the stream."

Iduna did not reply. The Eremite attracted her attention to a patch of
cresses on the opposite bank of the stream. "Every morn I rise only to