author - "Algernon Blackwood"

craft ofbirch bark like a thing of life, answering cheerfully all hiscompanion's questions. Both were gay and light-hearted. On suchoccasions men lose the superficial, worldly distinctions; they becomehuman beings working together for a common end. Simpson, the employer,and Défago the employed, among these primitive forces, were simply--twomen, the "guider" and the "guided." Superior knowledge, of course,assumed control, and the younger man fell without a second thought

on of their vast numbers, and contriving in some way or other to represent to the imagination a new and mighty power, a power, moreover, not altogether friendly to us.Great revelations of nature, of course, never fail to impress in one way or another, and I was no stranger to moods of the kind. Mountains overawe and oceans terrify, while the mystery of great forests exercises a spell peculiarly its own. But all these, at one point or another, somewhere link on intimately with human life and

their own business; every moment the strain on the nerves increased.Out of the gloomy dining-room they passed through large folding doors into a sort of library or smoking-room, wrapt equally in silence, darkness, and dust; and from this they regained the hall near the top of the back stairs. Here a pitch black tunnel opened before them into the lower regions, and--it must be confessed--they hesitated. But only for a minute. With the worst of the night still to come it was essential to turn