In another instant the Bishop was no longer the same man. Conviction of Dan's guilt had taken hold of him. Thus far he had borne up against all evil shown by the strength of his great faith in his Maker to bring out all things well. But at length that faith was shattered. When the Deemster and the archdeacon went away together, leaving him in the midst of the people, he stood there, while all eyes were upon him, with the stupid bewildered look of one who has been dealt an unexpected and dreadful blow. The world itself was crumbling under him. At that first instant there was something like a ghastly smile playing over his pale face. Then the truth came rolling over him. The sight was terrible to look upon. He tottered backward with a low moan. When his faith went down his manhood went down with it. "Oh, my son, my son!" he cried again, "how have you shortened my days! How have you clothed me with shame! Oh, my son, my son!" But love was uppermost even in that bitter hour, and the good God sent the stricken man the gift of tears. "He is dead, he is dead!" he cried; "now is my heart smitten and withered like grass. Ewan is dead. My son is dead. Can it be true? Yes, dead, and worse than dead. Lord, Lord, now let me eat ashes for bread and mingle my drink with weeping." And so he poured out his broken spirit in a torrent of wild laments. The disgrace that had bent his head heretofore was but a dream to this deadly reality. "Oh, my son, my son! Would God I had died before I saw this day!" The people stood by while the unassuageable grief shook the Bishop to the soul. Then one of them--it was Thormod Mylechreest, the bastard son of the rich man who had left his offspring to public charity--took the old man by the hand, and the crowd parted for them. Together they passed out of the churchyard, and out of the hard glare of the torchlight, and set off for Bishop's Court. It was a pitiful thing to see. How the old father, stricken into age by sorrow rather than years, tottered feebly on the way. How low his white head was bent, as if the darkness itself had eyes to peer into his darkened soul. And yet more pitiful was it to see how the old man's broken spirit, reft of its great bulwark, which lay beneath it like an idol that was broken, did yet struggle with a vain effort to glean comfort from its fallen faith. But every stray text that rose to his heart seemed to wound it afresh. "As arrows in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth.... They shall not be ashamed.... Oh, Absalom, my son, my son!... For thy sake I have borne reproach; shame hath covered my face.... I am poor and needy; make haste unto me, O God.... Hide not thy face from thy servant, for I am in trouble.... O God, thou knowest my foolishness.... And Eli said, It is the Lord, let him do as seemeth him good.... The waters have overwhelmed me, the streams have gone over my soul; the proud waters have gone over my soul."