The steady straining of the donkey's muscles seemed to say that,
to whatever station in life it pleased Providence to call him, he
would think only of duty.

Then Daphne alighted and sat on a stone, with the donkey's face
to hers, taking counsel of those long ears which were always
eloquent, whether pricked forward in expectation or laid back in
wrath.

"San Pietro, if I should give it up, and stay here and live,--for
I never knew before what living is,--if I should just try to keep
this sunshine and these great spaces of color, what would you
think of me?"

Eyes, ears, and the tragic corners of the mouth revealed the
thought of this descendant of the burden bearers for all the
earth's thousands of years.

"Little beast, little beast," said Daphne, burying her face in
the brownish fuzz of his neck, and drying her eyes there, "you
are the one thing in this land of beauty that links me with home.
You are the Pilgrim Fathers and the Catechism in one! You are
the Puritan Conscience made visible! I will do it; I promise."

San Pietro Martire looked round with mild inquiry on his face as
to the meaning and the purpose of caresses in a hard world like
this.


CHAPTER XI