Little Thol, though he prayed earnestly enough that the dragon should stay at home by night, never prayed for him to leave the homeland. He prayed that he himself might grow up very quickly, and be very big and very strong and very clever and very brave. For the rest, the homelanders were all orthodox in their devotions. * * * * * The young moon had grown old, had dwindled, and disappeared. The sound of the clashed jaws ceased to be a novelty. The vesperal gatherings in the valley became smaller. The great column of smoke, by day and by night, was for the homelanders a grim reminder of what had happened, and of what would happen again if once they failed to fulfil the needs of their uninvited guest. They were resolved that they would not fail. In this resolution they had a sombre sense of security. But there came, before the leaves of the trees were yellow, an evening when the dragon left untasted the feast spread for him, and crawled down the hill. He was half-way down before any one noticed his coming. And on that night, a longer night than the other, he made a wider journey around the homeland, and took a heavier toll of lives. Thenceforth always, at sunset, guards were posted to watch the hill and to give, if need were, the alarm. Nor did even this measure suffice. In the dawn of a day in winter, when snow was lying thick on the homeland, a goat-herd observed with wonder a wide pathway through the snow from the dragon’s cave; and presently he saw afar on the level ground the dragon himself, with his head inside the mouth of a lonely hut that was the home of a young man recently wedded. From the hut’s mouth crept forth clouds of smoke, and, as the dragon withdrew his head, the goat-herd, finding voice, raised such a cry as instantly woke many sleepers. That day lived long in the memory of the homelanders. The dragon was very active. He did not plod through the snow. He walked at his full speed upon the ground, the snow melting before him at the approach of his fiery breath. It was the homelanders that plodded. Some of them stumbled head foremost into snowdrifts and did not escape their pursuer. There was nothing slothful in the dragon’s conduct that day. Hour after hour in the keen frosty air he went his way, and not before nightfall did he go home. Thus was inaugurated what we may call the Time of Greater Stress. No one could know at what hour of night or day the dragon might again raid the homeland. Relays of guards had to watch the hill always. No one, lying down to sleep, knew that the dragon might not forthcome before sunrise; no one, throughout the day, knew that the brute might not be forthcoming at any moment. True, he forthcame seldom. The daily offerings of slain beasts and birds sufficed him, mostly. But he was never to be depended on--never.