"Why do you hasten away from these sunny slopes?" I said. "There seems nothing so pleasant in all the land besides." "Perhaps not," the travellers replied, with a slight sigh; but it ended in a snatch of song as they danced gaily on. "Perhaps not, but we are a race of Wanderers! We cannot stay; and perhaps better things await us in the plain." "Whither are you going?" I asked. "We know not," was the answer; "only onward, onward!" In the plain were buildings of more solid construction, houses and cities. And here I observed many of the travellers would have gladly lingered, but it could not be. Homesteads, and corn-fields, and vineyards, all had to be left; and still the tide of life streamed on and on. "Why?" I asked. "It is the doom of our race," they said, sorrowfully; "we are a people of Wanderers." "Whither?" I inquired. "We do not know," was the reply; "only onwards and onwards to the dark mountains!" Slower and slower grew the footsteps of the Wanderers, more and more regretful the glances they cast behind. Slower, yet with fewer pauses. The strange restless impulse drove them steadily on, until, wearied and tottering, they began the ascent of the dark mountains. "What is on the other side?" I asked. "The sea," they said, "the Great Sea." "How will you cross it, and what is beyond?" "We know not," they said, with bitter tears. "But we are a doomed race of Wanderers—onwards, onwards; we may not stay!" Then first I perceived that, among these multitudes of aimless Wanderers, there was one band who kept close together, and moved with a freedom and a purpose, as if they journeyed on not from a blind, irresistible impulse, but from choice. Their looks were seldom turned regretfully behind them, or only on the dark mountains. They looked to something higher. I asked them—"Why are you thus hasting on?" "We are Pilgrims," they replied; "we would not linger here." "Whither are you going?" I inquired. "Home!" they answered, joyfully. "To a Holy City which is our Home." "But how do you know the way?" I asked, for no barriers seemed to limit their path, so that any of the Wanderers might join it at any point. "We know it by two marks," they answered—"by the footsteps of One who trod it once, and left indelible footprints wherever He stepped. And we know it also by the goal to which it tends!" Then looking up, I saw resting on the mountains where this path ended, a bridge like a rainbow, and beyond it, in the sky, a range of towers and walls, pearl and opal, ruby and golden, such as in a summer evening is sometimes faintly pictured on the clouds, when the setting sun shines through them. And the little band chanted as they went, "The doom of our race is reversed for us. We are not Wanderers; we are Pilgrims. We would not linger here; this is not our rest. Onwards, upwards, to the City!—To the Home!" The Ark and the Fortress. —————