'Almost at its dawning; the last days are passing.'
'How do you know this?'
'The spirits tell me. Abide here, and perhaps they will speak to you also,' replied Waiting Samuel.
We made no answer. Twilight had darkened into night, and the Flats had sunk into silence below us. After some moments I turned to speak to our host; but, noiselessly as one of his own spirits, he had departed.
'A strange mixture of Jacob Bœhmen, chiliastic dreams, Christianity, sun-worship, and modern spiritualism,' I said. 'Much learning hath made the Maine farmer mad.'
'Is he mad?' said Raymond. 'Sometimes I think we are all mad.'
'We should certainly become so if we spent our time in speculations upon subjects clearly beyond our reach. The whole race of philosophers from Plato down are all the time going round in a circle. As long as we are in the world, I for one propose to keep my feet on solid ground; especially as we have no wings. 'Abide here, and perhaps the spirits will speak to you,' did he say? I think very likely they will, and to such good purpose that you won't have any mind left.'
'After all, why should not spirits speak to us?' said Raymond, in a musing tone.
As he uttered these words the mocking laugh of a loon came across the dark waste.
'The very loons are laughing at you,' I said, rising. 'Come down; there is a chill in the air, composed in equal parts of the Flats, the night, and Waiting Samuel. Come down, man; come down to the warm kitchen and common-sense.'