Presently I could go no further. I stood on the apex of my high hill, a jubilation of spirit making my breast to heave in deeper breaths than my exertion had caused. Then, ere I knew what I was about I had flung my arms out and up, toward the vast deeps from which had come the still summons I had felt in the quiet peace of the Lodge. I felt unreal; I was trembling. I knew not what impended, but the air was charged with an electrical tenseness, and the pall of utter silence which hung over the world was pregnant with import. My arms dropped, and a sweet calm stole over me. Slowly I turned my gaze in every direction. That mammoth wall of blackness encircled the earth in an unbroken line, and was now quickly mounting to the zenith. How grand the sight! I bared my head before the majesty of it. How like battlements and ramparts the grim expanses appeared, crowned with their changing towers! And to make the comparison still more true, I now saw the flash of cannon through the jagged embrasures, and caught the distant thunder of their detonations. Quickly the conflict grew. North, south, east and west, and all between, the batteries of the sky unveiled. Not loud, as yet, but perpetual, and furious in the very absence of thunderous sound. There were constant growlings and incessant flashings, as back and forth over the aerial battleground the challenges were sent and answered. Now, a girdle of glory, the lightning zoned the middle sky, and ever upward, as though propelled by forces set in the earth beneath, the walls arose, blotting out stars by the thousands, and steadily converging toward a common meeting point directly overhead. Then, for the first time, I knew that the Harpist of the Wood had awakened.