In the nineteenth century, one similarly affected would think it meant a fevered, a disordered brain; but in the seventeenth, when statesmen like Cromwell believed in dreams and omens, and _roués_ like Monmouth carried charms in their pockets, these things were differently regarded. The Puritan ministry, whose minds were imbued with the gloomy supernaturalism of the Old Testament on which they fed, were especially men to whom anything resembling an apparition had a prophetic significance. And Cecil Grey, though liberal beyond most New England clergymen, was liable by the keenness of his susceptibilities and the extreme sensitiveness of his organization to be influenced by such delusions,--if delusions they be. So he stood awed and trembling, questioning within himself, like some seer to whom a dark and uncertain revelation has been made. Suddenly the answer came. "The Lord hath revealed his will unto me and shown me the path wherein I am to walk," he murmured in a hushed and stricken tone. "Ruth was taken from me that I might be free to go where he should send me. The vision of the Indians and the bridge which faded into the west, and the strange desire that was given me to follow it, show that the Lord has another work for me to do. And when I find the land of the bridge and of the wild people I saw upon it, then will I find the mission that God has given me to do. 'Lord God of Israel, I thank Thee. Thou hast shown me the way, and I will walk in it, though all its stones be fire and its end be death.'" He stood a moment with bowed head, communing with his God. Then he returned to his lonely home. The friends whose kindly sympathies had brought them to the house of mourning wondered at the erect carriage, the rapt, exalted manner of the man. His face was pale, almost as pale as that within the darkened room; but his eyes shone, and his lips were closely, resolutely set. A little while, and that determined face was all sorrowful and pitying again, as he bent over the still, cold body of his dead. CHAPTER IV. THE COUNCIL OF ORDINATION. Friends were assembled together; the Elder and Magistrate also Graced the scene with their presence, and stood like the Law and the Gospel.... After the Puritan way and the laudable custom of Holland. _The Courtship of Miles Standish._ A few days after the funeral, letters missive from the little society went out to all the neighboring churches, calling a council to ordain the Reverend Cecil Grey a missionary to the Indians. It was a novel thing, in spite of the noble example that Roger Williams had set not many years before; and the summons met with a general response.