dull monotony of the path in front of him with its heaps of brown leaves. A bird sat singing in the beech-tree above him; its song jarred on him just as much as the beauty of the sunset, it seemed to urge him to leave the place where he was not needed, to take himself out of a world which was meant for beauty and brightness and success, a world which had no sympathy for failure or misery. He longed for the song to cease, and he longed for the sunset glory to fade, he was impatient for the end; the mere waiting for that brief interval became to him almost intolerable; only the dread of being rescued held him back. Presently footsteps on the path made him look up; a shabbily dressed girl walked slowly by, she was absorbed in a newspaper story and did not notice him; neither did she notice her charge, a pale-faced, dark-eyed little girl of about six years old who followed her at some distance, chanting a pretty, monotonous little tune as she dragged a toy-cart along the gravel. Frithiof, with the preternatural powers of observation which seemed his that day, noticed in an instant every tiniest detail of the child’s face and dress and bearing, the curious anatomy of the wooden horse, the heap of golden leaves in the little cart. As the child drew nearer, the words of the song became perfectly audible to him. She sang very slowly, and in a sort of unconscious way, as if she couldn’t help it: “Comfort every sufferer, Watching late in pain—” She paused to put another handful of leaves into the cart, arranged them with great care, patted the wooden steed, and resumed her song as if there had been no interruption— “Those who plan some evil, From their sin restrain.” Frithiof felt as if a knife had been suddenly plunged into him; he tried to hear more, but the words died away, he could only follow the monotonous little tune in the clear voice, and the rattling of the toy cart on the pathway. And so the child passed on out of sight, and he saw her no more. He was alone again, and the twilight for which he had longed was fast closing in upon him; a sort of blue haze seemed gathering over the park; night was coming on. What was this horrible new struggle which was beginning within him? “Evil,” “sin”; could he not at least do what he would with his own life? Where was the harm in ending that which was hopelessly spoiled and ruined? Was not suicide a perfectly legitimate ending to a life? A voice within him answered his question plainly: “To the man with a diseased brain—the man who doesn’t know what he is about—it is no worse an end than to die in bed of a fever. But to you—you who are afraid of the suffering of life, you who know quite well what you are doing—to you it is sin.”