and, giving him the broad part of the spiral stair to walk on, led him

down a good way; then, opening another little door, led him out upon
a narrow gallery that ran all round the central part of the church,

on the ledges of the windows of the clerestory, and through openings
in the parts of the wall that divided the windows from each other.

It was very narrow, and except when they were passing through the wall,
Diamond saw nothing to keep him from falling into the church.

It lay below him like a great silent gulf hollowed in stone,
and he held his breath for fear as he looked down.

"What are you trembling for, little Diamond?" said the lady, as she
walked gently along, with her hand held out behind her leading him,

for there was not breadth enough for them to walk side by side.
"I am afraid of falling down there," answered Diamond. "It is

so deep down."
"Yes, rather," answered North Wind; "but you were a hundred times

higher a few minutes ago."
"Ah, yes, but somebody's arm was about me then," said Diamond,

putting his little mouth to the beautiful cold hand that had a hold
of his.

"What a dear little warm mouth you've got!" said North Wind.
"It is a pity you should talk nonsense with it. Don't you know I

have a hold of you?"
"Yes; but I'm walking on my own legs, and they might slip.

I can't trust myself so well as your arms."
"But I have a hold of you, I tell you, foolish child."

"Yes, but somehow I can't feel comfortable."
"If you were to fall, and my hold of you were to give way, I should

be down after you in a less moment than a lady's watch can tick,
and catch you long before you had reached the ground."

"I don't like it though," said Diamond.
"Oh! oh! oh!" he screamed the next moment, bent double with terror,

for North Wind had let go her hold of his hand, and had vanished,
leaving him standing as if rooted to the gallery.

She left the words, "Come after me," sounding in his ears.
But move he dared not. In a moment more he would from very terror

have fallen into the church, but suddenly there came a gentle
breath of cool wind upon his face, and it kept blowing upon him in

little puffs, and at every puff Diamond felt his faintness going away,
and his fear with it. Courage was reviving in his little heart,

and still the cool wafts of the soft wind breathed upon him,
and the soft wind was so mighty and strong within its gentleness,

that in a minute more Diamond was marching along the narrow ledge
as fearless for the time as North Wind herself.

He walked on and on, with the windows all in a row on one side of him,
and the great empty nave of the church echoing to every one of his

brave strides on the other, until at last he came to a little
open door, from which a broader stair led him down and down and down,

till at last all at once he found himself in the arms of North Wind,
who held him close to her, and kissed him on the forehead.

Diamond nestled to her, and murmured into her bosom,--"Why did you
leave me, dear North Wind?"

"Because I wanted you to walk alone," she answered.
"But it is so much nicer here!" said Diamond.

"I daresay; but I couldn't hold a little coward to my heart.
It would make me so cold!"

"But I wasn't brave of myself," said Diamond, whom my older readers
will have already discovered to be a true child in this, that he

was given to metaphysics. "It was the wind that blew in my face
that made me brave. Wasn't it now, North Wind?"

"Yes: I know that. You had to be taught what courage was.
And you couldn't know what it was without feeling it: therefore it

was given you. But don't you feel as if you would try to be brave
yourself next time?"

"Yes, I do. But trying is not much."
"Yes, it is--a very great deal, for it is a beginning. And a beginning

is the greatest thing of all. To try to be brave is to be brave.
The coward who tries to be brave is before the man who is brave

because he is made so, and never had to try."
"How kind you are, North Wind!"

"I am only just. All kindness is but justice. We owe it."
"I don't quite understand that."

"Never mind; you will some day. There is no hurry about understanding
it now."

"Who blew the wind on me that made me brave?"
"I did."

"I didn't see you."
"Therefore you can believe me."

"Yes, yes; of course. But how was it that such a little breath
could be so strong?"

"That I don't know."
"But you made it strong?"

"No: I only blew it. I knew it would make you strong, just as it
did the man in the boat, you remember. But how my breath has

that power I cannot tell. It was put into it when I was made.
That is all I know. But really I must be going about my work."

"Ah! the poor ship! I wish you would stop here, and let the poor
ship go."

"That I dare not do. Will you stop here till I come back?"
"Yes. You won't be long?"

"Not longer than I can help. Trust me, you shall get home before
the morning."

In a moment North Wind was gone, and the next Diamond heard
a moaning about the church, which grew and grew to a roaring.

The storm was up again, and he knew that North Wind's hair was flying.
The church was dark. Only a little light came through the windows,

which were almost all of that precious old stained glass which
is so much lovelier than the new. But Diamond could not see

how beautiful they were, for there was not enough of light
in the stars to show the colours of them. He could only just

distinguish them from the walls, He looked up, but could not see
the gallery along which he had passed. He could only tell where it

was far up by the faint glimmer of the windows of the clerestory,
whose sills made part of it. The church grew very lonely about him,

and he began to feel like a child whose mother has forsaken it.
Only he knew that to be left alone is not always to be forsaken.

He began to feel his way about the place, and for a while went
wandering up and down. His little footsteps waked little answering

echoes in the great house. It wasn't too big to mind him.
It was as if the church knew he was there, and meant to make itself

his house. So it went on giving back an answer to every step,
until at length Diamond thought he should like to say something out loud,

and see what the church would answer. But he found he was afraid
to speak. He could not utter a word for fear of the loneliness.

Perhaps it was as well that he did not, for the sound of a spoken
word would have made him feel the place yet more deserted and empty.

But he thought he could sing. He was fond of singing, and at home he
used to sing, to tunes of his own, all the nursery rhymes he knew.

So he began to try `Hey diddle diddle', but it wouldn't do.
Then he tried `Little Boy Blue', but it was no better. Neither would

`Sing a Song of Sixpence' sing itself at all. Then he tried `Poor
old Cockytoo', but he wouldn't do. They all sounded so silly!

and he had never thought them silly before. So he was quiet,
and listened to the echoes that came out of the dark corners in answer

to his footsteps.
At last he gave a great sigh, and said, "I'm so tired." But he did

not hear the gentle echo that answered from far away over his head,
for at the same moment he came against the lowest of a few steps

that stretched across the church, and fell down and hurt his arm.
He cried a little first, and then crawled up the steps on his

hands and knees. At the top he came to a little bit of carpet,
on which he lay down; and there he lay staring at the dull window

that rose nearly a hundred feet above his head.
Now this was the eastern window of the church, and the moon was at

that moment just on the edge of the horizon. The next, she was peeping
over it. And lo! with the moon, St. John and St. Paul, and the rest

of them, began to dawn in the window in their lovely garments.
Diamond did not know that the wonder-working moon was behind,

and he thought all the light was coming out of the window itself,
and that the good old men were appearing to help him, growing out

of the night and the darkness, because he had hurt his arm,
and was very tired and lonely, and North Wind was so long in coming.

So he lay and looked at them backwards over his head, wondering when
they would come down or what they would do next. They were very dim,

for the moonlight was not strong enough for the colours, and he
had enough to do with his eyes trying to make out their shapes.

So his eyes grew tired, and more and more tired, and his eyelids
grew so heavy that they would keep tumbling down over his eyes.

He kept lifting them and lifting them, but every time they were
heavier than the last. It was no use: they were too much for him.

Sometimes before he had got them half up, down they were again;
and at length he gave it up quite, and the moment he gave it up, he was

fast asleep.
CHAPTER VIII

THE EAST WINDOW
THAT Diamond had fallen fast asleep is very evident from the strange

things he now fancied as taking place. For he thought he heard
a sound as of whispering up in the great window. He tried to open

his eyes, but he could not. And the whispering went on and grew
louder and louder, until he could hear every word that was said.

He thought it was the Apostles talking about him. But he could not
open his eyes.

"And how comes he to be lying there, St. Peter?" said one.
"I think I saw him a while ago up in the gallery, under the

Nicodemus window. Perhaps he has fallen down.
"What do you think, St. Matthew?"

"I don't think he could have crept here after falling from such
a height. He must have been killed."

"What are we to do with him? We can't leave him lying there.
And we could not make him comfortable up here in the window:

it's rather crowded already. What do you say, St. Thomas?"
"Let's go down and look at him."

There came a rustling, and a chinking, for some time, and then
there was a silence, and Diamond felt somehow that all the Apostles

were standing round him and looking down on him. And still he
could not open his eyes.

"What is the matter with him, St. Luke?" asked one.
"There's nothing the matter with him," answered St. Luke, who must

have joined the company of the Apostles from the next window,
one would think. "He's in a sound sleep."

"I have it," cried another. "This is one of North Wind's tricks.
She has caught him up and dropped him at our door, like a withered

leaf or a foundling baby. I don't understand that woman's conduct,
I must say. As if we hadn't enough to do with our money,

without going taking care of other people's children! That's not
what our forefathers built cathedrals for."

Now Diamond could not bear to hear such things against North Wind,
who, he knew, never played anybody a trick. She was far too busy

with her own work for that. He struggled hard to open his eyes,
but without success.

"She should consider that a church is not a place for pranks,
not to mention that we live in it," said another.

"It certainly is disrespectful of her. But she always is disrespectful.
What right has she to bang at our windows as she has been doing

the whole of this night? I daresay there is glass broken somewhere.
I know my blue robe is in a dreadful mess with the rain first and

the dust after. It will cost me shillings to clean it."
Then Diamond knew that they could not be Apostles, talking like this.

They could only be the sextons and vergers and such-like, who got
up at night, and put on the robes of deans and bishops, and called

each other grand names, as the foolish servants he had heard his
father tell of call themselves lords and ladies, after their masters

• opening [´əupəniŋ] n.开放；开端 a.开始的 (初中英语单词)
• gallery [´gæləri] n.画廊；美术馆；长廊 (初中英语单词)
• breath [breθ] n.呼吸；气息 (初中英语单词)
• gently [´dʒentli] ad.温和地；静静地 (初中英语单词)
• standing [´stændiŋ] n.持续 a.直立的 (初中英语单词)
• coward [´kauəd] n.胆怯者 a.胆小的 (初中英语单词)
• therefore [´ðeəfɔ:] ad.&conj.因此；所以 (初中英语单词)
• beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
• lonely [´ləunli] a.孤独的；无人烟的 (初中英语单词)
• horizon [hə´raizən] n.地平线；范围；视野 (初中英语单词)
• moonlight [´mu:nlait] n.&a.月光(的) (初中英语单词)
• evident [´evidənt] a.明显的，明白的 (初中英语单词)
• height [hait] n.高度；顶点；卓越 (初中英语单词)
• dreadful [´dredful] a.可怕的；讨厌的 (初中英语单词)
• breadth [bredθ] n.宽度，幅面，广度 (高中英语单词)
• nonsense [´nɔnsəns] n.胡说 int.胡说!废话 (高中英语单词)
• mighty [´maiti] a.强有力的 ad.很 (高中英语单词)
• fearless [´fiələs] a.不怕的，无畏的 (高中英语单词)
• nursery [´nə:səri] n.托儿所；苗床；养鱼场 (高中英语单词)
• crowded [´kraudid] a.充(拥)满了的 (高中英语单词)
• spiral [´spaiərəl] a.螺纹的 n.螺旋(管) (英语四级单词)
• trying [´traiiŋ] a.难堪的；费劲的 (英语四级单词)
• glimmer [´glimə] n.&vi.闪光 (英语四级单词)
• forsaken [fə´seik] forsake的过去分词 (英语六级单词)
• backwards [´bækwədz] ad.向后 a.向后的 (英语六级单词)
• taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)