Upon this the stranger looked at her, and asked in a faltering voice, “Are you an angel?” still not knowing what he said.

“Oh, no, no; I am only a Pilgrim,” she replied.

“May I sit by you a little?” said the man.  He sat down, drawing long breaths, as though he had gone through great fatigue; and looked about with wondering eyes.  “You will wonder, but I do not know where I am,” he said.  “I feel as if I must he dreaming.  This is not where I expected to come.  I looked for something very different; do you think there can have been any—­mistake?”

“Oh, never that,” she said; “there are no mistakes here.”

Then he looked at her again, and said,—­

“I perceive that you belong to this country, though you say you are a pilgrim.  I should be grateful if you would tell me.  Does one live—­here?  And is this all?  Is there no—­no—­but I don’t know what word to use.  All is so strange, different from what I expected.”

“Do you know that you have died?”

“Yes—­yes, I am quite acquainted with that,” he said, hurriedly; as if it had been an idea he disliked to dwell upon.  “But then I expected—­Is there no one to tell you where to go, or what you are to be? or to take any notice of you?”

The little Pilgrim was startled by this tone.  She did not understand its meaning, and she had not any word to say to him.  She looked at him with as much bewilderment as he had shown when he approached her, and replied, faltering,—­

“There are a great many people here; but I have never heard if there is any one to tell you—­”

“What does it matter how many people there are if you know none of them?” he said.

“We all know each other,” she answered him but then paused and hesitated a little, because this was what had been said to her, and of herself she was not assured of it, neither did she know at all how to deal with this stranger, to whom she had not any commission.  It seemed that he had no one to care for him, and the little Pilgrim had a sense of compassion, yet of trouble in her heart; for what could she say?  And it was very strange to her to see one who was not content here.

“Ah, but there should be some one to point out the way, and tell us which is our circle, and where we ought to go,” he said.  And then he too was silent for a while, looking about him as all were fain to do on their first arrival, finding everything so strange.  There were people coming in at every moment, and some were met at the very threshold, and some went away alone with peaceful faces, and there were many groups about talking together in soft voices; but no one interrupted the other, and though so many were there, each voice was as clear as if it had spoken alone, and there was no tumult of sound as when many people assemble together in the lower world.