“What-ever happened?” repeated a little yellow-haired girl, called Flavia because she was so fair. She was the daughter of Muraena the smith, and the youngest of the ten.

Ursula, the biggest girl, laughed. “If we were crossing a river and one of us got drowned, [pg 97]I suppose her fire would be lost,” she said teasingly. “But they wouldn’t excuse us for anything short of that.”

“But if it did go out—if all of the fires were put out?” persisted Flavia, walking a little closer to Marcia, whose word she felt that she could trust. She had visions of a dreadful anger of the gods,—another night of darkness and terror like the one they all remembered. “Should we never have a fire again, and have to eat things raw, and freeze to death, and let the wolves eat us up?”

“Certainly not,” answered Marcia reassuringly. “Father told me all about that when I was younger than you are. Don’t you remember how they kindled the fire in the new year?”

Flavia shook her yellow head. “I never noticed.” She had been so taken up with the chanting and the ceremonies that she had not seen how the fire actually blazed up on the altar.

“They do it with the terebra and the tabula. The tabula is a flat wooden block with a groove cut in it, and the terebra is a rubbing-stick that just fits the groove. They have some very fine chaff ready, and they move the stick very fast in the groove until it is quite hot. Don’t you know how warm your hands are after you rub them together? When there is a little spark it [pg 98]catches in the chaff, and then it is sheltered to keep it from going out, and fed with more chaff and dry splinters until the fire is kindled. They can always kindle a fire in that way.”

“What if the terebra and the tabula were lost?” asked Flavia.

“They would make others.”

“If I rubbed my hands together long enough, would they be on fire?” asked the child. She did not yet see how fire could be made just by rubbing bits of wood together. In fact, it was so much easier to keep the fire when it was once made that this was hardly ever done. It was only done regularly once a year, at the beginning of the month sacred to Mars. Then all the altar fires were put out and the priest kindled the sacred fire in this way afresh.

The girls all laughed, and Marcia answered,

“No, dear, it is only certain kinds of wood that will do that. I suppose the gods taught our people long ago which they were. The hearth god lives in the fire, you know. I always think it is like a living thing that will die without care. Father says that the fire keeps away the wicked fever spirits.”

“What’s fever?” asked Yaya, on the other side. “Did you ever have it?”

“No, never; but Father did once, when he was [pg 99]working on the road across the marsh, before I was born. It makes all your bones ache as if they were broken, and you cannot keep still because the spirits shake you all over. You grow hot and grow cold, and have bad dreams, and talk nonsense. Father woke up one day when he had the fever, and said that there were great rats coming to carry off my brother Marcs, who was a baby then, and he tried to get up and kill the rats, when there were none there. And when he was well he never remembered seeing the rats at all.”

Although the children did not know it, a blazing fire and wool clothing help to keep away the malarial fever of a wet wilderness. The people believed that their gods taught them to keep up a fire, to wear clean wool garments and to drink pure water, and it is certain that they were wise in doing all these things religiously, as they did. When they found a good spring on their journey they filled their water bottles and left a little gift there for the god of the waters. They kept near pure running water when they could, and away from standing water, even if they had to go a long way round to do it. In the sudden damps and chills of the lowlands through which they traveled the tunics and mantles of pure wool kept them from taking cold, and there [pg 100]was very little sickness on the journey. They kept to their own habits of eating, and the children were not allowed to experiment with strange and possibly unripe fruits.

It was a long time, however, before they came in sight of any place that could be thought of as a home. Most of the country they saw was not inhabited except by a stray hut dweller here and there, getting a miserable living as he could,—simply because the land was not fit to live in. They crossed a rolling plain, where the marshes were full of unpleasant looking water, and the air at night was full of singing, stinging insects that drove the cattle frantic. It was not quite so bad near the fires. The insects seemed to dislike the smoke, or perhaps their wings could not carry them through the strong currents of air that the flames made around them. As soon as possible they moved up toward the higher land, and here at last they came in sight of the river of the yellow waters, the great river that ran down to the sea. Beyond that they could not go without meeting strange people and the worship of strange and cruel gods.

Every night the beehive covers were taken off the baskets, and the fires were kindled, and in a round hut that was like a big basket lid, a bed of coals was made ready for the next day’s [pg 101]journey. It was the duty of the ten little girls, the guardians of the fire, to take care of this, and they spent a great deal of time around the miniature temple of the fire god. One or another was always there.

One night when they were carefully covering the coals with fine ashes, Marcia and Tullia and Flavia looked up and saw two strange men standing near and looking down at them. They were startled but not at all frightened. The strangers would not be there if they were not friends; the men would not allow it. The two youths did not say anything; they watched for a few minutes, smiling as if they liked what they saw; then they turned away. They looked very much alike, and walked alike, and their voices were alike; but one was a little taller and darker than the other and always seemed to take the lead. They were not like the rude, ignorant, pagan people who sometimes came to stare and beg and perhaps to pilfer when they found some one’s back turned. They looked like the people of Mars. But what could they be doing away out here?

The next day there was great news to tell. In the first place, the fathers of the colony had decided to stay here a few days, and let the cattle feed, and the women wash their clothing and rest for a little before going on. The water was [pg 102]good, and they had learned that it was a safe part of the country, though it was too rocky and barren to be a good place to live. But that was the smallest part of the news. The two youths were their own kinsmen, born of their own people, sons of a son of the old chief who had died in a far land many years ago.

This was wonder enough, to be sure, but there was more to come. The wicked uncle of the two brothers had killed their mother and father, and told one of his servants to take the twin boys down to the river and drown them. They were babies then. The servant did not like to do this. He may have been afraid he would get into trouble if he did it and any of their people found it out later. He may have hated to do the cruel work, for they were strong and handsome little fellows. At any rate he put them in a basket and gave the basket to a slave, telling him to throw it into the river.

The river was in flood just then, and its banks were overflowed for miles on each side. There was water everywhere, and the ground was soft so that it was hardly possible to get down to the real river, where the water was deep and the current strong. If the children had been thrown into that, they would have drowned at once. But the slave did not take time to go all the way [pg 103]around the plain to the bank itself. He put the basket down in the first deep pool he found and left it to be carried down to the river, for the flood was beginning to ebb. Instead of that the basket lodged on a knoll and stayed there, not very far from the banks.