CHAPTER XII.
ACHATES WRITES A BALLADE OF DOUBLE REFRAIN The golden geese of day had flown back to the Master's treasure house; and ah! the loneliness of that first night at sea!--the low whistling song of the icy winds among the shrouds; the cold repellent color tones which lay thinly across the west, pressing upon the ragged, heaving horizon; the splendor and intense brilliancy of the million stars; the vast imposing circle of untamed water, the purple of its flowing mountains and the velvet blackness of its sweeping valleys; the monotonous seething round the boring prow and the sad gurgle of the speeding wake; the weird canvas shadows rearing heavenward; and above all, that silence which engulfs all human noises simply by its immensity! More than one stout heart grew doubtful and troubled under the weight of this mystery.
Even the Iroquois Indian, born without fear, stoic, indifferent to physical pain, even he wrapped his blanket closer about his head, held his pipe pendent in nerveless fingers, and softly chanted an appeal to the Okies of his forebears, forgetting the God of the black-robed fathers in his fear of never again seeing the peaceful hills and valleys of Onondaga or tasting the sweet waters of familiar springs.
For here was evil water, of which no man might drink to quench his thirst; there were no firebrands to throw into the face of the North Wind; there was no trail, to follow or to retrace.

O for his mat by the fire in the Long House, with the young braves and old warriors sprawling around, recounting the victories of the hunt! Only the seamen and the priests went about unconcerned, untroubled, tranquil, the one knowing his sea and the other his God.

There was something reassuring in the serenity of the black cassocks as they went hither and thither, offering physical and spiritual assistance.

They inspired the timid and the fearful, many of whom still believed that the world had its falling-off place.

And seasickness overcame many.
With some incertitude the Vicomte d'Halluys watched the Jesuits.