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Chapter 1

I. Of Our Spiritual Strivings

O water, voice of my lieart, cryuig in the sand,

Ali night long crying with a moumful ery,

As I lie and listen, and cannot imderstand

The voice of my lieart in my side or die voice of the sea,

O water, crying for rest, is it I, is it I?

Ali night long the water is crying to me.

Unresting water, diere shall never be rest Till the last moon droop and the last tide fail,

And die fire of the end begin to bum in the west;

And die lieart shall be weary and wonder and ery like the sea, Ali life long crying without avail,

As die water all nigjit long is cryuig to me.

ARTHUR SYMONS.

[musiał notation jrom "Nobodj Knoirs the Trouble Yit Scen⁹]

Between me and die odier wodd diere is ever an imasked question: unasked by soine througli feelings of delicacy; by otliers dirough die difficulty of nghtly framing it. All, neverdieless, flutter roimd it. Tliey approach me in a half-hesitant sort of way, eye me curiously or compassionately, and dien, instead of saying directly, How does it feel to be a problem? tliey say, I know an excellent colored man in my town; or, I fouglit at Mechanicsville; or, Do not diese Soudiem outrages make your blood boil? At diese I sirule, or am interested, or reduce die boiling to a simmer, as die occasion may reąuire. To the real question, How does it feel to be a problem? I answer seldom a word.

And yet, being a problem is a strange experience, - peculiar even for one who has never been anydiing else, save pediaps in babyhood and in Europę. It is in die early days of rollickmg boyhood tliat die revelation first bursts upon one, all in a day, as it were. I remember well wlien die sliadow swept across me. I was a litde tliing, away up in die liills of New England, wliere the dark Housatonic winds between Hoosac and Taghkanic to die sea. In a wee wooden schoolhouse, something put it into die boys' and girls' lieads to buy gorgeous visiting-cards -- ten cents a package -- and exchange. Tlie exchange was

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