At her feet the roaring clamor of the waves seemed resolved into the solemn sobbing measure of some chant for the dead.

Slowly and by degrees the utter realization of her loss dawned upon the soul of Annadoah.  And to her in that magical spell the spirits of nature and the souls of the dead began to manifest themselves.

Out of the crimson-shot vapors mystical forms took shape.  Annadoah saw the beautiful face of Nerrvik, and in the mists saw her watery green and wondrous tresses of uncombed hair.  She saw the nebulous shadow of the dreaded Kokoyah, the pitiless god of the waters, to whose cold, compassionless bosom had been gathered Ootah and Little Blind Spring Bunting.

Along the horizon Annadoah saw the clouds moving to the south.  Higher up they moved to the west, and toward the zenith stray flecks moved to the north.  The spirits of the air were not at peace among themselves.  And dire things were brooding.  From the inland highlands of Greenland now came a series of swift explosions, and in the brief succeeding interval there was an unearthly silence.  Then a grinding crash rent the air.  The spirits of the mountains had engaged in combat.  And in the swift downward surge of the glacial avalanches Annadoah saw tribes wiped from existence and villages swept into the sun-litten sea.  But Annadoah knew that the sun-litten sea was a treacherous sea; she knew that Koyokah, whose face in the mist was wan, whose lips were golden, had no love for men, and she knew that the spirits of the air, who moved in the diversely soaring clouds, were engaged in some fell conspiracy against her helpless race.

A vague realization of the impotence of humanity against fate, against the forces that weave the loom of life within and without one’s heart, weighed crushingly upon her.

Radiant indeed was the sky and softly molten golden the glorious sea, but yet, grim and grisly, behind this smiling face of nature, Annadoah, primitive child of the human race, shudderingly felt the malevolent and evil eyes of Perdlugssuaq, the spirit of great evil, he who brings sickness and death.  Annadoah felt that instinctive fear which humanity has felt from the beginning—­the superstitious terror of tribes who confront extinction, in the face of famine; the quiet white tremor of the hard working hordes of modern cities in the face of poverty and starvation; the dread of savage and civilized races alike of the incomprehensible factor in the universe which wreaks destruction, that original and ultimate evil which all the world’s religions recognize, interpret, and offer to placate—­the force that is hostile to man and the happiness of man.

On the smooth tossing waters, reflecting the glory of the sky, there was no sign of those who had perished.

Then, after the first crushing sense of helplessness, an instinctive, insurgent hope that would not be defeated asserted itself.  Annadoah called upon Nerrvik, for surely Nerrvik was kind to men.  She pleaded with Kokoyah.  She importuned the spirits of the sea and air to return her beloved ones to her.