Soon in the dusk they could no longer see each other's faces; and then it was still easier to break through reserve.
At last David found himself speaking.

What he said was at first almost inaudible, for he was kneeling between the wall and the pan which had been his childish joy, with his face and arms crushed against the stones.

But when he began the boys about pricked up their ears, and David was conscious suddenly of a deepened silence.
There were warm tears on his hidden cheeks; but it pleased him keenly they should listen so, and he prayed more audibly and freely.

Then, when his voice dropped at last, the prayer-leader gave out the familiar hymn, 'Come, O thou Traveller unknown:'-- Come, O thou Traveller unknown, Whom still I hold, but cannot see! My company before is gone, And I am left alone with Thee; With Thee all night I mean to stay, And wrestle till the break of day.
Wilt thou not yet to me reveal Thy new unutterable name?
Tell me, I still beseech thee, tell-- To know it now resolved I am.
Wrestling, I will not let thee go, Till I thy name, thy nature know.
* * * 'Tis Love! 'tis Love--thou lovest me! I hear thy whisper in my heart; The morning breaks, the shadows flee, Pure universal Love thou art; To me, to all, thy mercies move, Thy nature and thy name is Love.
Again and again the lines rose on the autumn air; each time the hymn came to an end it was started afresh, the sound of it spreading far and wide into the purple breast of Kinder Scout.

At last the painful sobbing of poor Tom Mullins almost drowned the singing.