“I must go!” she said, rising. “I should like to see you again, Isla, and talk with you; your—your thoughts are strange to me, but I feel that your heart is good. I must go now back to the village.” She kissed the little boy, who cooed and smiled in return, and turned to find her way back to the village; but Isla was at her side. “Let me take you by a shorter way,” she said. “It is slow climbing over our rocks when folks are not used to them. I will take you through the Dead Valley, and you will get there quicker. But you will not tell people?” she said, stopping for a moment, and looking up into her companion’s face with searching eyes. “It is our own place, Jacob’s and mine; we don’t want other folks to know about it.” The preacher promised. “Shut your eyes, then!” cried the girl, her face lightening with pleasure. “Give me your hand, and I will lead you into our Dead Valley. Now! now open your eyes, and look!” The preacher obeyed, and gave a cry of surprise, so strange a place was this that met her eyes. A valley of rocks; yes! but not rocks like those she had seen elsewhere, not like any rocks that she had seen in her life. A place of desolation, full of the bones of forgotten ages. The girl, watching her companion’s face, laughed aloud for pleasure. “Do you see?” she cried. “Do you see why it is the Dead Valley? Look at them all, the great beasts, lying asleep! Giles told me all about them, when we first found this place; we came together, Giles and I. He said, ‘They are mammoths, like elephants, only bigger;’ and he had seen the bones of one, somewhere, in some place where they keep such things, so he knew their names and all. And see! They used to play here, and go down to the water to bathe, and just live as they liked. And one day,—we played they had done some dreadful thing, but we never knew just what,—they were all turned into gray stones, and here they have been ever since. There! that is one of the biggest; and he fell down on his side, you see, and just curled his great huge legs under him, and went to sleep so comfortable! And this one,—oh, I love this old fellow. He was kneeling, don’t you see, preacher? and he could not get up when the time came, so he went to sleep just that way. And down there by the beach, that one had gone down to drink and take his bath, and he tumbled in, and there he lies. Over the other side of him, that is where Jacob and I go to bathe ourselves. The rockweed grows all over his shoulders, and keeps him warm. And we run over his back, and sit on his great round head, and climb into a hollow place that we call his mouth; but he never stirs, just sleeps and sleeps; and there he will stay, Giles said, till the last call comes. What is the matter, preacher?”