"The amulet-makers. There are a band of men in the White Town, and one of them in many of the villages, who profess to know something of the country from which the Black Ship comes, and who sends it. But they talk very mysteriously, in learned words; and I do not understand them. Your father said it was all a deception; because some of them profess to make amulets or charms which keep the Veiled Form away; and your little sister had one round her neck when she was taken from us. You have each one, but I cannot trust it; and I never could find out that the amulet-makers had anything but guesses as to where the ship came from; and your father said we could guess as well as they. "There is one thing," she added, with a faint smile, "which gives me more comfort than anything they ever said. When our baby was taken from my arms—when she felt that terrible touch—she did not seem to be at all afraid. She looked up in my face, and then at the Veiled Form, and stretched out her baby arms from me to it, and smiled. At first, I hated to think of that. It seemed as if some cruel charm was on her to win even her heart from me; but often in the night, in my dreams, that smile has come back to me, like a promise; and I have awaked, comforted—I hardly know why." "Perhaps they are in a happy place, mother," said little May. And Hope said—"Mother, I am going to question the amulet-makers in the White Town." And his mother suffered him to go. In two days, Hope came back. But his step was spiritless and slow, and his face very sad. "Mother," he said, "I think my father was right. I am afraid no one knows anything about the country from which the Black Ship comes. At first the amulet-makers promised to tell me a great deal. Some of them told me they believed it was a great king, an enemy of our race, who sent the ship; but that if we kept certain rules, and put on a certain dress they would sell us, or give them certain treasures to throw into the sea when the Ship appeared, they would watch for us, and make the powers beyond the sea favourable to us. But when I came to the question—how they knew this to be true, or if they had ever had any message from beyond the sea, or seen any one who came thence, they grew silent, and sometimes angry, and told me I was a presumptuous child. "There was one old man, however, who was kind to me; and he came and spoke to me alone, and said, 'My child, be happy to-day—to be good is to be happy. What is beyond to-day, or beyond the sea, no one knows, or ever can know. Go back to your mother, and live as before.' So I came," concluded Hope. "But it can never, never be with us again as before we knew." From that time the boy seemed to cease to be a child, or to take interest in any childish schemes. He was gentle and tender as his father could have been to his mother and to May, and seemed to take on himself to watch over and protect them. He never left them out of sight.