The hut when Gutenberg awoke was in profound darkness. In a faint voice he asked for a light. Beildech went out and lighted a resinous torch, which he placed in an iron ring in the wall, fastened there for the purpose, and close to Gutenberg’s bed. The latter hearing the door creak on its hinges lifted himself up. “A light--light!” said he; then again, after a short pause, he added in an impatient tone, “Is there then no one here who will condescend to grant the favour of a light to an old man, to while away the tedious hours of darkness?” Beildech, trembling from head to foot, drew the young Frenchman quickly to the other side of the bed. “Beloved Master,” he said, “be so good as to turn and to open your eyes, the torch is in its usual place.” “I tell thee thou liest,” said Gutenberg angrily, “is not everything here as dark as in a tomb? Claude, my son, answer me--where art thou?” He whom he called was close to his master’s head, he shuddered as he bent down towards him. “Here I am,” he said, in a low voice, taking hold affectionately of his master’s hand; but the latter pushed him away, and stretching out his arm towards the torch he laid hold of it, and brought it close to his eyes. He could no longer see it! With a cry of despair, and burying in his hands those eyes from which the light was for ever shut out, Gutenberg threw himself back on his pallet. “I understand you,” he said to his two companions, who were sobbing aloud, “but I cannot see you. I smell the odour of the resin, but its flame no longer penetrates the darkness which envelopes me. O miserable man that I am! Alas, I am afflicted like Tobias, but Tobias without a son!” After the first burst of despair, silence once more reigned in the hut. The shepherd, who, in this respect, much resembled the doctors of our own days, when he was at a loss what more to do, slunk noiselessly away. The young Frenchman, quite overcome with grief, was on his knees by the side of the bed, while Beildech, the torch in his hand, held it close to the eyes of the old man, as if he sought by this means to restore the light which was quenched for ever. Such was the picture presented by the interior of the hut, when the sound of an approaching horse came suddenly to relieve the solitude of our poor sufferers. Beildech was just opening the window to listen, when the fisherman ushered in a horseman wet to the skin, and covered with mud. “Here,” said the boatman, “behold him of whom you are in search.” The horseman bent his tall figure as he entered the low door of the dwelling. “He whom I seek,” said he to Beildech, who advanced gloomily, “is called John Gutenberg, and he is from Maïence.”