its course. Then he opened his letter. It was from his friend and former colleague on The Committee, who, as orator of the day, had met the Judge at the rally of the Old Guards.

The letter was written on the embossed stationery of the state-a rich state, lying to the eastward. It began affectionately: "Dear old Joe!" and indicated between the lines that the heart of the man who had spoken at the Old Guards' rally had been touched by the faded, broken figure who had edged about the crowd at the banquet. The letter closed with these words:

I

"And now, my dear Joe, here is something I can do for you: I have a contingent fund voted by the legislature to defend the various measures of popular government recently passed by our people at the polls from certain attacks in the courts. find I can appropriate five hundred dollars of this sum to you for associating with the attorneys of this state. See inclosed sheet for specific suits. I realise that you don't altogether agree with the spirit of these new measures; but a lawyer must take whatever business comes to his office." And then, after a few personal words, the letter closed.

Judge Joel Ladgett sat before the unopened ex

changes for a long time. His hands were clasped and his thin little body swayed as in a breeze. He rose and looked out of the window, and read and reread the letter. Then he moved unsteadily over to the desk of the editor and put the letter before him without a word. When he had read the letter the editor reached out and grasped the Judge's hand, crying:

"Fine, Judge! Fine!"

But when the editor looked up into the waxy old face he found it cast into a determined mould, which was half stare and half a self-deprecatory smile. The Judge stood in silent embarrassment a moment, then spoke in a cracked, overstrained voice:

"No

no - no!

I tell you, Archimedes don't you see I can't do it?"

The inner storm in his heart was playing in heat lightning twitches across the wrinkled face; but the high, overstrained voice answered its own question, while the self-deprecatory smile held its place through the storm:

"Why, man, can't you see? I can't surrender not now - not now, Archimedes." He was weaving slightly; and he grasped the desk with his

bony, veinous hands as he went on in the same tense, unnatural voice: "I'll not pull down my flag now, after — after "

He gathered strength from outside himself and found his natural voice, to say very slowly and cautiously, as one picking his way through flashes of light:

་

"I have begged for this cause, man! I have had to lie for this cause. I may yet - I may

– I

- well, I could steal for it if I had to; but, with the help of all the high gods, I'll not sell it outI'll not sell it out for money!

His voice broke in a little senile scream. The heat lightning on his face was a sheet of emotion and his trembling hands shook the desk. In a moment the storm subsided, for age does not long sustain its passions. An instant later he cried in triumph, as though to some invisible gallery:

"No-no! My head is bloody, but unbowed!'"

He was proud of his quotation, and his pride held back for a moment the reaction of grief in his soul. He may have felt it coming, for he turned quickly, sighed a spent sigh that was half a sob,

and fumbled his way out of the room, along the hall and into the street.

There, through a window, the man at the desk saw the Judge rubbing, with his bony fingers, the moisture from his burned-out eyes; but he was marching proudly through some exalted heaven to recite the story of his great refusal to the griffin, in her chains, and to the adoring mortal who watered his shrine.

"And I have seen," mused Archimedes, as he drummed on the desk with the little pine lever that moved his world, "the half gods go and the gods arrive!"

THE STRANGE BOY

THEY had just returned from their work in the Manual and were considering large matters concerning their coming hike. They were Twelve, Thirteen and Fourteen, and full of the joy that washes into life with the first full tides of youth. At the Manual they had been making things with their hands in wood and iron and stone. Creation seemed good to them. And they talked, making their to-morrow a kind of exalted yesterday, which is the way of youth. An old party of forty-five, sitting near them reading a musty book that had been off the list of best sellers for six long months, closed the book over his finger to mark the place while he listened to the chatter of the boys.

There was talk of a day's walk in the country; of a raft to be made at the river under the scoutmaster's direction; of fishing tackle to be had at the town's stores; where the best rods might be bought; what minnows were worth. Some consideration was given to the various grades of khaki

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