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Indeed, if any

alive--the joi de vivre as the French have it--let hi, and look about hiolden song of a blackbird in ry, yet, nevertheless,

content

Long before I reached the sh the village was not yet astir, and it was

with some trepidation as to my reception that I approached the

open doorway

There he stood, busy at his anvil, goodly to look upon in his

bare-ar in his yellow hair, a

veritable son of Anak He od

cohters of

e blacksh he lanced up or gave the slightest sign of welcome, or the reverse

Now, as I watched, I noticed a certain slowness--a heaviness in

all his ether with a listless, slipshod air which,

I judged, was very foreign to hi his head lower than was quite necessary