CHAPTER VII.
The bright sunshine of the clear mistless morning, after the
stormy night, flooded the main path of the settlement leading
from the low shore of the Pantai branch of the river to the gate
of Abdulla's compound. The path was deserted this morning; it
stretched its dark yellow surface, hard beaten by the tramp of
many bare feet, between the clusters of palm trees, whose tall
trunks barred it with strong black lines at irregular intervals,
while the newly risen sun threw the shadows of their leafy heads
far away over the roofs of the buildings lining the river, even
over the river itself as it flowed swiftly and silently past the
deserted houses. For the houses were deserted too. On the
narrow strip of trodden grass intervening between their open
doors and the road, the morning fires smouldered untended,
sending thin fluted columns of smoke into the cool air, and
spreading the thinnest veil of mysterious blue haze over the
sunlit solitude of the settlement. Almayer, just out of his
hammock, gazed sleepily at the unwonted appearance of Sambir,
wondering vaguely at the absence of life. His own house was very
quiet; he could not hear his wife's voice, nor the sound of
Nina's footsteps in the big room, opening on the verandah, which
he called his sitting-room, whenever, in the company of white
men, he wished to assert his claims to the commonplace decencies
of civilisation. Nobody ever sat there; there was nothing there
to sit upon, for Mrs. Almayer in her savage moods, when excited
by the reminiscences of the piratical period of her life, had
torn off the curtains to make sarongs for the slave-girls, and
had burnt the showy furniture piecemeal to cook the family rice.
But Almayer was not thinking of his furniture now. He was
thinking of Dain's return, of Dain's nocturnal interview with
Lakamba, of its possible influence on his long-matured plans, now
nearing the period of their execution. He was also uneasy at the
non-appearance of Dain who had promised him an early visit. "The
fellow had plenty of time to cross the river," he mused, "and
there was so much to be done to-day. The settling of details for
the early start on the morrow; the launching of the boats; the
thousand and one finishing touches. For the expedition must
start complete, nothing should be forgotten, nothing should--"
The sense of the unwonted solitude grew upon him suddenly, and in
the unusual silence he caught himself longing even for the
usually unwelcome sound of his wife's voice to break the
oppressive stillness which seemed, to his frightened fancy, to
portend the advent of some new misfortune. "What has happened?"
he muttered half aloud, as he shuffled in his imperfectly
adjusted slippers towards the balustrade of the verandah. "Is
everybody asleep or dead?"
The settlement was alive and very much awake. It was awake ever
since the early break of day, when Mahmat Banjer, in a fit of
unheard-of energy, arose and, taking up his hatchet, stepped over
the sleeping forms of his two wives and walked shivering to the
water's edge to make sure that the new house he was building had
not floated away during the night.
The house was being built by the enterprising Mahmat on a large
raft, and he had securely moored it just inside the muddy point
of land at the junction of the two branches of the Pantai so as
to be out of the way of drifting logs that would no doubt strand
on the point during the freshet. Mahmat walked through the wet
grass saying bourrouh, and cursing softly to himself the hard
necessities of active life that drove him from his warm couch
into the cold of the morning. A glance showed him that his house
was still there, and he congratulated himself on his foresight in
hauling it out of harm's way, for the increasing light showed him
a confused wrack of drift-logs, half-stranded on the muddy flat,
interlocked into a shapeless raft by their branches, tossing to
and fro and grinding together in the eddy caused by the meeting
currents of the two branches of the river. Mahmat walked down to
the water's edge to examine the rattan moorings of his house just
as the sun cleared the trees of the forest on the opposite shore.
As he bent over the fastenings he glanced again carelessly at the
unquiet jumble of logs and saw there something that caused him to
drop his hatchet and stand up, shading his eyes with his hand
from the rays of the rising sun. It was something red, and the
logs rolled over it, at times closing round it, sometimes hiding
it. It looked to him at first like a strip of red cloth. The
next moment Mahmat had made it out and raised a great shout.
"Ah ya! There!" yelled Mahmat. "There's a man amongst the logs."
He put the palms of his hand to his lips and shouted, enunciating
distinctly, his face turned towards the settlement: "There's a
body of a man in the river! Come and see! A dead--stranger!"
The women of the nearest house were already outside kindling the
fires and husking the morning rice. They took up the cry
shrilly, and it travelled so from house to house, dying away in
the distance. The men rushed out excited but silent, and ran
towards the muddy point where the unconscious logs tossed and
ground and bumped and rolled over the dead stranger with the
stupid persistency of inanimate things. The women followed,
neglecting their domestic duties and disregarding the
possibilities of domestic discontent, while groups of children
brought up the rear, warbling joyously, in the delight of
unexpected excitement.
Almayer called aloud for his wife and daughter, but receiving no
response, stood listening intently. The murmur of the crowd
reached him faintly, bringing with it the assurance of some
unusual event. He glanced at the river just as he was going to
leave the verandah and checked himself at the sight of a small
canoe crossing over from the Rajah's landing-place. The solitary
occupant (in whom Almayer soon recognised Babalatchi) effected
the crossing a little below the house and paddled up to the
Lingard jetty in the dead water under the bank. Babalatchi
clambered out slowly and went on fastening his canoe with
fastidious care, as if not in a hurry to meet Almayer, whom he
saw looking at him from the verandah. This delay gave Almayer
time to notice and greatly wonder at Babalatchi's official
get-up. The statesman of Sambir was clad in a costume befitting
his high rank. A loudly checkered sarong encircled his waist,
and from its many folds peeped out the silver hilt of the kriss
that saw the light only on great festivals or during official
receptions. Over the left shoulder and across the otherwise
unclad breast of the aged diplomatist glistened a patent leather
belt bearing a brass plate with the arms of Netherlands under the
inscription, "Sultan of Sambir." Babalatchi's head was covered
by a red turban, whose fringed ends falling over the left cheek
and shoulder gave to his aged face a ludicrous expression of
joyous recklessness. When the canoe was at last fastened to his
satisfaction he straightened himself up, shaking down the folds
of his sarong, and moved with long strides towards Almayer's
house, swinging regularly his long ebony staff, whose gold head
ornamented with precious stones flashed in the morning sun.
Almayer waved his hand to the right towards the point of land, to
him invisible, but in full view from the jetty.
"Oh, Babalatchi! oh!" he called out; "what is the matter there?
can you see?"
Babalatchi stopped and gazed intently at the crowd on the river
bank, and after a little while the astonished Almayer saw him
leave the path, gather up his sarong in one hand, and break into
a trot through the grass towards the muddy point. Almayer, now
greatly interested, ran down the steps of the verandah. The
murmur of men's voices and the shrill cries of women reached him
quite distinctly now, and as soon as he turned the corner of his
house he could see the crowd on the low promontory swaying and
pushing round some object of interest. He could indistinctly
hear Babalatchi's voice, then the crowd opened before the aged
statesman and closed after him with an excited hum, ending in a
loud shout.
As Almayer approached the throng a man ran out and rushed past
him towards the settlement, unheeding his call to stop and
explain the cause of this excitement. On the very outskirts of
the crowd Almayer found himself arrested by an unyielding mass of
humanity, regardless of his entreaties for a passage, insensible
to his gentle pushes as he tried to work his way through it
towards the riverside.
In the midst of his gentle and slow progress he fancied suddenly
he had heard his wife's voice in the thickest of the throng. He
could not mistake very well Mrs. Almayer's high-pitched tones,
yet the words were too indistinct for him to understand their
purport. He paused in his endeavours to make a passage for
himself, intending to get some intelligence from those around
him, when a long and piercing shriek rent the air, silencing the
murmurs of the crowd and the voices of his informants. For a
moment Almayer remained as if turned into stone with astonishment
and horror, for he was certain now that he had heard his wife
wailing for the dead. He remembered Nina's unusual absence, and
maddened by his apprehensions as to her safety, he pushed blindly
and violently forward, the crowd falling back with cries of
surprise and pain before his frantic advance.
On the point of land in a little clear space lay the body of the
stranger just hauled out from amongst the logs. On one side
stood Babalatchi, his chin resting on the head of his staff and
his one eye gazing steadily at the shapeless mass of broken
limbs, torn flesh, and bloodstained rags. As Almayer burst
through the ring of horrified spectators, Mrs. Almayer threw her
own head-veil over the upturned face of the drowned man, and,
squatting by it, with another mournful howl, sent a shiver
through the now silent crowd. Mahmat, dripping wet, turned to
Almayer, eager to tell his tale.
In the first moment of reaction from the anguish of his fear the
sunshine seemed to waver before Almayer's eyes, and he listened
to words spoken around him without comprehending their meaning.
When, by a strong effort of will, he regained the possession of
his senses, Mahmat was saying--
"That is the way, Tuan. His sarong was caught in the broken
branch, and he hung with his head under water. When I saw what
it was I did not want it here. I wanted it to get clear and
drift away. Why should we bury a stranger in the midst of our
houses for his ghost to frighten our women and children? Have we
not enough ghosts about this place?"
A murmur of approval interrupted him here. Mahmat looked
reproachfully at Babalatchi.
"But the Tuan Babalatchi ordered me to drag the body ashore"--he
went on looking round at his audience, but addressing himself
only to Almayer--"and I dragged him by the feet; in through the
mud I have dragged him, although my heart longed to see him float
down the river to strand perchance on Bulangi's clearing--may his
father's grave be defiled!"
There was subdued laughter at this, for the enmity of Mahmat and
Bulangi was a matter of common notoriety and of undying interest
to the inhabitants of Sambir. In the midst of that mirth Mrs.
Almayer wailed suddenly again.
"Allah! What ails the woman!" exclaimed Mahmat, angrily. "Here,
I have touched this carcass which came from nobody knows where,
and have most likely defiled myself before eating rice. By
orders of Tuan Babalatchi I did this thing to please the white
man. Are you pleased, O Tuan Almayer? And what will be my
recompense? Tuan Babalatchi said a recompense there will be, and
from you. Now consider. I have been defiled, and if not defiled
I may be under the spell. Look at his anklets! Who ever heard
of a corpse appearing during the night amongst the logs with gold
anklets on its legs? There is witchcraft there. However," added
Mahmat, after a reflective pause, "I will have the anklet if
there is permission, for I have a charm against the ghosts and am
not afraid. God is great!"
A fresh outburst of noisy grief from Mrs. Almayer checked the
flow of Mahmat's eloquence. Almayer, bewildered, looked in turn
at his wife, at Mahmat, at Babalatchi, and at last arrested his
fascinated gaze on the body lying on the mud with covered face in
a grotesquely unnatural contortion of mangled and broken limbs,
one twisted and lacerated arm, with white bones protruding in
many places through the torn flesh, stretched out; the hand with
outspread fingers nearly touching his foot.
"Do you know who this is?" he asked of Babalatchi, in a low
voice.
Babalatchi, staring straight before him, hardly moved his lips,
while Mrs. Almayer's persistent lamentations drowned the whisper
of his murmured reply intended only for Almayer's ear.
"It was fate. Look at your feet, white man. I can see a ring on
those torn fingers which I know well."
Saying this, Babalatchi stepped carelessly forward, putting his
foot as if accidentally on the hand of the corpse and pressing it
into the soft mud. He swung his staff menacingly towards the
crowd, which fell back a little.
"Go away," he said sternly, "and send your women to their cooking
fires, which they ought not to have left to run after a dead
stranger. This is men's work here. I take him now in the name
of the Rajah. Let no man remain here but Tuan Almayer's slaves.
Now go!"
The crowd reluctantly began to disperse. The women went first,
dragging away the children that hung back with all their weight
on the maternal hand. The men strolled slowly after them in ever
forming and changing groups that gradually dissolved as they
neared the settlement and every man regained his own house with
steps quickened by the hungry anticipation of the morning rice.
Only on the slight elevation where the land sloped down towards
the muddy point a few men, either friends or enemies of Mahmat,
remained gazing curiously for some time longer at the small group
standing around the body on the river bank.
"I do not understand what you mean, Babalatchi," said Almayer.
"What is the ring you are talking about? Whoever he is, you have
trodden the poor fellow's hand right into the mud. Uncover his
face," he went on, addressing Mrs. Almayer, who, squatting by the
head of the corpse, rocked herself to and fro, shaking from time
to time her dishevelled grey locks, and muttering mournfully.
"Hai!' exclaimed Mahmat, who had lingered close by. "Look, Tuan;
the logs came together so," and here he pressed the palms of his
hands together, "and his head must have been between them, and
now there is no face for you to look at. There are his flesh and
his bones, the nose, and the lips, and maybe his eyes, but nobody
could tell the one from the other. It was written the day he was
born that no man could look at him in death and be able to say,
'This is my friend's face.'"
"Silence, Mahmat; enough!" said Babalatchi, "and take thy eyes
off his anklet, thou eater of pigs flesh. Tuan Almayer," he went
on, lowering his voice, "have you seen Dain this morning?"
Almayer opened his eyes wide and looked alarmed. "No," he said
quickly; "haven't you seen him? Is he not with the Rajah? I am
waiting; why does he not come?"
Babalatchi nodded his head sadly.
"He is come, Tuan. He left last night when the storm was great
and the river spoke angrily. The night was very black, but he
had within him a light that showed the way to your house as
smooth as a narrow backwater, and the many logs no bigger than
wisps of dried grass. Therefore he went; and now he lies here."
And Babalatchi nodded his head towards the body.
"How can you tell?" said Almayer, excitedly, pushing his wife
aside. He snatched the cover off and looked at the formless mass
of flesh, hair, and drying mud, where the face of the drowned man
should have been. "Nobody can tell," he added, turning away with
a shudder.
Babalatchi was on his knees wiping the mud from the stiffened
fingers of the outstretched hand. He rose to his feet and
flashed before Almayer's eyes a gold ring set with a large green
stone.
"You know this well," he said. "This never left Dain's hand. I
had to tear the flesh now to get it off. Do you believe now?"
Almayer raised his hands to his head and let them fall listlessly
by his side in the utter abandonment of despair. Babalatchi,
looking at him curiously, was astonished to see him smile. A
strange fancy had taken possession of Almayer's brain, distracted
by this new misfortune. It seemed to him that for many years he
had been falling into a deep precipice. Day after day, month
after month, year after year, he had been falling, falling,
falling; it was a smooth, round, black thing, and the black walls
had been rushing upwards with wearisome rapidity. A great rush,
the noise of which he fancied he could hear yet; and now, with an
awful shock, he had reached the bottom, and behold! he was alive
and whole, and Dain was dead with all his bones broken. It
struck him as funny. A dead Malay; he had seen many dead Malays
without any emotion; and now he felt inclined to weep, but it was
over the fate of a white man he knew; a man that fell over a deep
precipice and did not die. He seemed somehow to himself to be
standing on one side, a little way off, looking at a certain
Almayer who was in great trouble. Poor, poor fellow! Why doesn't
he cut his throat? He wished to encourage him; he was very
anxious to see him lying dead over that other corpse. Why does
he not die and end this suffering? He groaned aloud unconsciously
and started with affright at the sound of his own voice. Was he
going mad? Terrified by the thought he turned away and ran
towards his house repeating to himself, I am not going mad; of
course not, no, no, no! He tried to keep a firm hold of the idea.
Not mad, not mad. He stumbled as he ran blindly up the steps
repeating fast and ever faster those words wherein seemed to lie
his salvation. He saw Nina standing there, and wished to say
something to her, but could not remember what, in his extreme
anxiety not to forget that he was not going mad, which he still
kept repeating mentally as he ran round the table, till he
stumbled against one of the arm-chairs and dropped into it
exhausted. He sat staring wildly at Nina, still assuring himself
mentally of his own sanity and wondering why the girl shrank from
him in open-eyed alarm. What was the matter with her? This was
foolish. He struck the table violently with his clenched fist
and shouted hoarsely, "Give me some gin! Run!" Then, while Nina
ran off, he remained in the chair, very still and quiet,
astonished at the noise he had made.
Nina returned with a tumbler half filled with gin, and found her
father staring absently before him. Almayer felt very tired now,
as if he had come from a long journey. He felt as if he had
walked miles and miles that morning and now wanted to rest very
much. He took the tumbler with a shaking hand, and as he drank
his teeth chattered against the glass which he drained and set
down heavily on the table. He turned his eyes slowly towards
Nina standing beside him, and said steadily--
"Now all is over, Nina. He is dead, and I may as well burn all
my boats."
He felt very proud of being able to speak so calmly. Decidedly
he was not going mad. This certitude was very comforting, and he
went on talking about the finding of the body, listening to his
own voice complacently. Nina stood quietly, her hand resting
lightly on her father's shoulder, her face unmoved, but every
line of her features, the attitude of her whole body expressing
the most keen and anxious attention.
"And so Dain is dead," she said coldly, when her father ceased
speaking.
Almayer's elaborately calm demeanour gave way in a moment to an
outburst of violent indignation.
"You stand there as if you were only half alive, and talk to me,"
he exclaimed angrily, "as if it was a matter of no importance.
Yes, he is dead! Do you understand? Dead! What do you care?
You never cared; you saw me struggle, and work, and strive,
unmoved; and my suffering you could never see. No, never. You
have no heart, and you have no mind, or you would have understood
that it was for you, for your happiness I was working. I wanted
to be rich; I wanted to get away from here. I wanted to see
white men bowing low before the power of your beauty and your
wealth. Old as I am I wished to seek a strange land, a
civilisation to which I am a stranger, so as to find a new life
in the contemplation of your high fortunes, of your triumphs, of
your happiness. For that I bore patiently the burden of work, of
disappointment, of humiliation amongst these savages here, and I
had it all nearly in my grasp."
He looked at his daughter's attentive face and jumped to his feet
upsetting the chair.
"Do you hear? I had it all there; so; within reach of my hand."
He paused, trying to keep down his rising anger, and failed.
"Have you no feeling?" he went on. "Have you lived without
hope?" Nina's silence exasperated him; his voice rose, although
he tried to master his feelings.
"Are you content to live in this misery and die in this wretched
hole? Say something, Nina; have you no sympathy? Have you no
word of comfort for me? I that loved you so."
He waited for a while for an answer, and receiving none shook his
fist in his daughter's face.
"I believe you are an idiot!" he yelled.
He looked round for the chair, picked it up and sat down stiffly.
His anger was dead within him, and he felt ashamed of his
outburst, yet relieved to think that now he had laid clear before
his daughter the inner meaning of his life. He thought so in
perfect good faith, deceived by the emotional estimate of his
motives, unable to see the crookedness of his ways, the unreality
of his aims, the futility of his regrets. And now his heart was
filled only with a great tenderness and love for his daughter.
He wanted to see her miserable, and to share with her his
despair; but he wanted it only as all weak natures long for a
companionship in misfortune with beings innocent of its cause.
If she suffered herself she would understand and pity him; but
now she would not, or could not, find one word of comfort or love
for him in his dire extremity. The sense of his absolute
loneliness came home to his heart with a force that made him
shudder. He swayed and fell forward with his face on the table,
his arms stretched straight out, extended and rigid. Nina made a
quick movement towards her father and stood looking at the grey
head, on the broad shoulders shaken convulsively by the violence
of feelings that found relief at last in sobs and tears.
Nina sighed deeply and moved away from the table. Her features
lost the appearance of stony indifference that had exasperated
her father into his outburst of anger and sorrow. The expression
of her face, now unseen by her father, underwent a rapid change.
She had listened to Almayer's appeal for sympathy, for one word
of comfort, apparently indifferent, yet with her breast torn by
conflicting impulses raised unexpectedly by events she had not
foreseen, or at least did not expect to happen so soon. With her
heart deeply moved by the sight of Almayer's misery, knowing it
in her power to end it with a word, longing to bring peace to
that troubled heart, she heard with terror the voice of her
overpowering love commanding her to be silent. And she submitted
after a short and fierce struggle of her old self against the new
principle of her life. She wrapped herself up in absolute
silence, the only safeguard against some fatal admission. She
could not trust herself to make a sign, to murmur a word for fear
of saying too much; and the very violence of the feelings that
stirred the innermost recesses of her soul seemed to turn her
person into a stone. The dilated nostrils and the flashing eyes
were the only signs of the storm raging within, and those signs
of his daughter's emotion Almayer did not see, for his sight was
dimmed by self-pity, by anger, and by despair.
Had Almayer looked at his daughter as she leant over the front
rail of the verandah he could have seen the expression of
indifference give way to a look of pain, and that again pass
away, leaving the glorious beauty of her face marred by
deep-drawn lines of watchful anxiety. The long grass in the
neglected courtyard stood very straight before her eyes in the
noonday heat. From the river-bank there were voices and a
shuffle of bare feet approaching the house; Babalatchi could be
heard giving directions to Almayer's men, and Mrs. Almayer's
subdued wailing became audible as the small procession bearing
the body of the drowned man and headed by that sorrowful matron
turned the corner of the house. Babalatchi had taken the broken
anklet off the man's leg, and now held it in his hand as he moved
by the side of the bearers, while Mahmat lingered behind timidly,
in the hopes of the promised reward.
"Lay him there," said Babalatchi to Almayer's men, pointing to a
pile of drying planks in front of the verandah. "Lay him there.
He was a Kaffir and the son of a dog, and he was the white man's
friend. He drank the white man's strong water," he added, with
affected horror. "That I have seen myself."
The men stretched out the broken limbs on two planks they had
laid level, while Mrs. Almayer covered the body with a piece of
white cotton cloth, and after whispering for some time with
Babalatchi departed to her domestic duties. Almayer's men, after
laying down their burden, dispersed themselves in quest of shady
spots wherein to idle the day away. Babalatchi was left alone by
the corpse that laid rigid under the white cloth in the bright
sunshine.
Nina came down the steps and joined Babalatchi, who put his hand
to his forehead, and squatted down with great deference.
"You have a bangle there," said Nina, looking down on
Babalatchi's upturned face and into his solitary eye.
"I have, Mem Putih," returned the polite statesman. Then turning
towards Mahmat he beckoned him closer, calling out, "Come here!"
Mahmat approached with some hesitation. He avoided looking at
Nina, but fixed his eyes on Babalatchi.
"Now, listen," said Babalatchi, sharply. "The ring and the
anklet you have seen, and you know they belonged to Dain the
trader, and to no other. Dain returned last night in a canoe.
He spoke with the Rajah, and in the middle of the night left to
cross over to the white man's house. There was a great flood,
and this morning you found him in the river."
"By his feet I dragged him out," muttered Mahmat under his
breath. "Tuan Babalatchi, there will be a recompense!" he
exclaimed aloud.
Babalatchi held up the gold bangle before Mahmat's eyes. "What I
have told you, Mahmat, is for all ears. What I give you now is
for your eyes only. Take."
Mahmat took the bangle eagerly and hid it in the folds of his
waist-cloth. "Am I a fool to show this thing in a house with
three women in it?" he growled. "But I shall tell them about
Dain the trader, and there will be talk enough."
He turned and went away, increasing his pace as soon as he was
outside Almayer's compound.
Babalatchi looked after him till he disappeared behind the
bushes. "Have I done well, Mem Putih?" he asked, humbly
addressing Nina.
"You have," answered Nina. "The ring you may keep yourself."
Babalatchi touched his lips and forehead, and scrambled to his
feet. He looked at Nina, as if expecting her to say something
more, but Nina turned towards the house and went up the steps,
motioning him away with her hand.
Babalatchi picked up his staff and prepared to go. It was very
warm, and he did not care for the long pull to the Rajah's house.
Yet he must go and tell the Rajah--tell of the event; of the
change in his plans; of all his suspicions. He walked to the
jetty and began casting off the rattan painter of his canoe.
The broad expanse of the lower reach, with its shimmering surface
dotted by the black specks of the fishing canoes, lay before his
eyes. The fishermen seemed to be racing. Babalatchi paused in
his work, and looked on with sudden interest. The man in the
foremost canoe, now within hail of the first houses of Sambir,
laid in his paddle and stood up shouting--
"The boats! the boats! The man-of-war's boats are coming! They
are here!"
In a moment the settlement was again alive with people rushing to
the riverside. The men began to unfasten their boats, the women
stood in groups looking towards the bend down the river. Above
the trees lining the reach a slight puff of smoke appeared like a
black stain on the brilliant blue of the cloudless sky.
Babalatchi stood perplexed, the painter in his hand. He looked
down the reach, then up towards Almayer's house, and back again
at the river as if undecided what to do. At last he made the
canoe fast again hastily, and ran towards the house and up the
steps of the verandah.
"Tuan! Tuan!" he called, eagerly. "The boats are coming. The
man-of-war's boats. You had better get ready. The officers will
come here, I know."
Almayer lifted his head slowly from the table, and looked at him
stupidly.
"Mem Putih!" exclaimed Babalatchi to Nina, "look at him. He does
not hear. You must take care," he added meaningly.
Nina nodded to him with an uncertain smile, and was going to
speak, when a sharp report from the gun mounted in the bow of the
steam launch that was just then coming into view arrested the
words on her parted lips. The smile died out, and was replaced
by the old look of anxious attention. From the hills far away
the echo came back like a long-drawn and mournful sigh, as if the
land had sent it in answer to the voice of its masters.
