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PRO TOOLS

FUNDAMENTALS I

For Pro Tools 2020.3 Software

Frank D. Cook

Avid Learning Partner Program

PRO TOOLS 2020

Copyright

Copyright © 2020 NextPoint Training, Inc. and its licensors. All rights
reserved. Printed in USA.

No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any

form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including
photocopying, photographing, and recording, for any purpose, without
the express written permission of NextPoint Training, Inc.

The media provided with this book, and any accompanying course
material, is to be used only to complete the exercises and projects
contained herein. No rights are granted to use the footage/sound
materials in any commercial or non-commercial production or video.

All product features and specifications are subject to change without

notice.

Trademarks
Avid, Digidesign, Pro Tools, VENUE, Media Composer, Sibelius, and
all related product names and logos are registered trademarks of
Avid Technology, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. All
other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Acknowledgements

Avid Global Learning Services would like to thank all Avid Certified
Instructors for their ongoing suggestions and comments, based on
their experience in the classroom and their professional expertise,
which have resulted in the continued improvement of Avid
courseware.

PT101, Version 2020

PN: 9320-70086-00 (Printed Book)

PN: 9511-66151-00 (eBook – ALP)

PN: 9321-00010-00 (eBook – Webstore)

ISBN-13: 978-1-943446-83-4 (Printed Book)

ISBN-13: 978-1-943446-89-6 (eBook – ALP)

ISBN-13: 978-1-943446-84-1 (eBook – Webstore)

pd 5.8.20

PT101v2020r7.doc

The sale or distribution of this book without its cover is unauthorized.

If you purchase this book without a cover, you should be aware that it
was reported to the publisher as “unsold and destroyed.” Neither the
author nor the publisher has received payment for the sale of this
“stripped” book.

Acknowledgments
The author would like to extend special thanks to the following
individuals who have provided ongoing support, feedback, technical
information, time, communication, and persistence to make this
version of the book happen.

Avid Staff. Jason Plews, Mary Torgersen, Bryan Castle, Andy

Hagerman, Tim Mynett, Michael Flores, Francois Quereuil, and Kent
Blodgett

Others. Eric Kuehnl, Andy Cook, and John Cerullo

About the Author

This book and associated coursework has been developed by Frank

D. Cook (twitter: @FDCAudio; linkedin.com/in/fdcook) as the first in a
series of courses designed to prepare students for Pro Tools
Certification under the Avid Learning Partner program.

Frank is a musician, educator, and longtime Pro Tools user. The

owner and President of NextPoint Training, Inc.
(nextpointtraining.com), Frank has worked in the technical
publications and education industries for almost 25 years. As a writer,
editor, publications manager, and business owner, Frank has
authored, edited, and contributed to hundreds of publications in a
wide variety of industries. He has also authored several Pro Tools
video training courses on LinkedIn Learning.

Frank has been a consultant for Avid for over fifteen years. During
this time he has worked closely with Avid to develop extensive
curricula related to Pro Tools training and certification. Frank has
taught Pro Tools in the Commercial Music programs at Sacramento
City College and American River College in Sacramento, California,
and is an Avid Master Instructor.

Other books by Frank D. Cook in the Avid Learning Series include

! Pro Tools 110: Pro Tools Fundamentals II

! Pro Tools 201: Pro Tools Production I

! Pro Tools 210M: Pro Tools Production II (Music Production)

! Pro Tools 310M: Advanced Music Production Techniques

Contents

Introduction
...............................................................................................................
........... xiii About This Book
...............................................................................................................
............................... xiii Course Prerequisites
...............................................................................................................
....................... xiv Course Organization and Sequence
........................................................................................................ xiv
Conventions and Symbols Used in This Book
....................................................................................... xv The Avid
Learning Partner Program
......................................................................................................... xv
How Can I Learn More?
...............................................................................................................
................. xvii SECTION I. Lessons and Exercises
........................................................................................ 1

Lesson 1. Pro Tools Background

.......................................................................................... 3

The Pro Tools Digital Audio Workstation

................................................................................................. 4

Audio Processing
...............................................................................................................
......................... 4

MIDI Production
...............................................................................................................
............................ 4

Notation and Scores

...............................................................................................................
................... 4

Mixing and Automation

...............................................................................................................
............. 4

Audio for Video and Post Production

................................................................................................ 5

Pro Tools History and Evolution

...............................................................................................................
.... 5

Roots in Digidrums
...............................................................................................................
...................... 5

Digidrums Becomes Digidesign

............................................................................................................ 6

Digidesign Merges with Avid Technology

........................................................................................ 7

Pro Tools in the 2010s

...............................................................................................................
................ 8

Recent Pro Tools Features

...............................................................................................................
....... 9

Related Product Releases

...............................................................................................................
....... 10

Audio Characteristics: Waveform, Frequency, and Amplitude

....................................................... 12
Waveform: The Shape of a Sound
...................................................................................................... 12

Frequency: The Pitch of a Sound

........................................................................................................ 12

Amplitude: The Intensity of a Sound

.................................................................................................. 13

Recording and Playing Back Analog Audio

.................................................................................... 13

Converting Audio to Digital Format

.......................................................................................................... 13

The Importance of Sample Rate

.......................................................................................................... 13

The Importance of Bit Depth

...............................................................................................................
. 14

Sample Rate, Bit Depth, and File Size

............................................................................................... 15

Recording in Digital Format

...............................................................................................................
... 15

Pro Tools System Configurations

...............................................................................................................
16

Software Options
...............................................................................................................
........................ 16

Host-Based Systems Versus DSP-Accelerated Systems

............................................................ 16
Audio Interface Options
...............................................................................................................
........... 16

Cross-Platform Issues
...............................................................................................................
....................... 18

Keyboard Commands
...............................................................................................................
............... 18

File-Naming Conventions
...............................................................................................................
........ 18

Review/Discussion Questions
...............................................................................................................
..... 20

Exercise 1. Audio Interface Options

.................................................................................. 21

vi

Pro Tools Fundamentals I

Lesson 2. Getting Started with Pro Tools

........................................................................ 23

Target Systems
...............................................................................................................
................................. 24

Software Installation and Operation

........................................................................................................ 24

Installing Pro Tools

...............................................................................................................
................... 24

Using Avid Link for Plug-In Installations

.......................................................................................... 25

Included Plug-Ins and Extras

...............................................................................................................
. 27

Pro Tools Software Features

...............................................................................................................
28

Pro Tools File Structure

...............................................................................................................
................. 28

File Organization
...............................................................................................................
....................... 29

Session Components
...............................................................................................................
............... 29

Starting Pro Tools

...............................................................................................................
.............................. 31

Powering Up Your Hardware

...............................................................................................................
.. 31

Using the PACE iLok System

...............................................................................................................
. 32

Launching Pro Tools

...............................................................................................................
................ 33

Accessing Connected Audio Devices

.............................................................................................. 33

Optimizing Host-Based Pro Tools Performance

.......................................................................... 34

The Pro Tools Menu Structure

...............................................................................................................
..... 35

File Menu
...............................................................................................................
...................................... 35

Edit Menu
...............................................................................................................
..................................... 35

View Menu
...............................................................................................................
................................... 35

Track Menu
...............................................................................................................
.................................. 35

Clip Menu
...............................................................................................................
...................................... 35

Event Menu
...............................................................................................................
.................................. 36

AudioSuite Menu
...............................................................................................................
....................... 36
Options Menu
...............................................................................................................
............................. 36

Setup Menu
...............................................................................................................
.................................. 36

Window Menu
...............................................................................................................
............................. 36

Avid Link Menu

...............................................................................................................
.......................... 36

Help Menu
...............................................................................................................
.................................... 36

Main Pro Tools Windows

...............................................................................................................
................ 37

Edit Window
...............................................................................................................
................................ 37

Mix Window
...............................................................................................................
.................................. 41

Transport Window
...............................................................................................................
.................... 43

Additional Editor Windows

...............................................................................................................
... 44
Review/Discussion Questions
...............................................................................................................
..... 46

Exercise 2. Pro Tools Main Windows

................................................................................ 47

Lesson 3. Pro Tools Basic Controls

.................................................................................... 51

Edit Tool Functions

...............................................................................................................
........................... 52

Zoomer Tool
...............................................................................................................
................................ 52

Trim Tool
...............................................................................................................
...................................... 53

Selector Tool
...............................................................................................................
............................... 53

Grabber Tool
...............................................................................................................
............................... 54

Scrubber Tool
...............................................................................................................
............................. 54

Pencil Tool
...............................................................................................................
................................... 55
Smart Tool
...............................................................................................................
................................... 55

Introduction

vii

Edit Modes
...............................................................................................................
........................................... 56

Shuffle Mode
...............................................................................................................
................................ 56

Slip Mode
...............................................................................................................
....................................... 56

Spot Mode
...............................................................................................................
.................................... 57

Grid Mode
...............................................................................................................
..................................... 57

Time Scales and Rulers

...............................................................................................................
................... 58

Main Time Scale

...............................................................................................................
.......................... 59

Sub Time Scale

...............................................................................................................
.......................... 60
Ruler Display Options
...............................................................................................................
.............. 60

MIDI Control Features

...............................................................................................................
..................... 62

Wait for Note

...............................................................................................................
............................... 62

Metronome
...............................................................................................................
................................... 62

Countoff Controls
...............................................................................................................
...................... 63

MIDI Merge Mode

...............................................................................................................
....................... 63

Tempo Ruler Enable

...............................................................................................................
................. 63

Meter Display
...............................................................................................................
............................... 63

Tempo Field
...............................................................................................................
................................ 64

Tool Tips
...............................................................................................................
.............................................. 64
Other documents randomly have
different content
 “Now, while we propose that the whole tone of ‘The Courier’ shall
show the spirit of the seer in a measure, we shall endeavour to make
the particular column to which we are now alluding essentially new.
In it we shall deal with every class of subject likely to prove mentally
arrestive to our readers, and shall make it prophetic up to the limits
of our capacities as man, citizen and editor. How far the possession
of the quality of the seer will be found in us we must leave the future
—and our readers—to decide. But we certainly anticipate that ‘The
Prophet’s Chamber’ column will be one of the most popular features
of what we shall aim to make the most popular paper of the day.”
Tom Hammond was no believer in luck. He had left nothing to
chance in the production of his paper. There was not a department
left to subordinates which he did not personally assure himself was
being carried out on the best, the safest, lines. For weeks he literally
lived on the spot where his great paper was to be produced, taking
his meals and sleeping at an hotel close by the huge building that
housed “The Courier.”
He saw very little of Sir Archibald Carlyon during these weeks, and
nothing at all of George, or the fair American, Madge Finisterre.
George was in Scotland; Madge on the Continent.
His thoughts often turned to the American girl, and his eye
brightened and his pulse quickened whenever he heard of her from
Sir Archibald.
Once he had been permitted by Sir Archibald to read a gossipy
letter sent by her to the old baronet. He laughed over a quotation in
that letter.
“I am not like the Chicago girl,” she wrote, “of whom our Will
Carleton writes, who, telling all about her tour in ‘Urop,’ says,

“Old Scotland? Yes, all in our power,

We did there to be through;
We stopped in Glasgow one whole hour,
Then straight to ‘Edinborough.’
At Abbotsford we made a stay
Of half-an-hour precisely.
 (The ruins all along the way
Were ruined very nicely.)

“We ‘did’ a mountain in the rain,

And left the others undone,
Then took the ‘Flying Scotchman’ train,
And came by night to London.
Long tunnels somewhere on the line
Made sound and darkness deeper;
No; English scenery is not fine
Viewed from a Pullman sleeper.

“Oh, Paris! Paris! Paris! ’Tis

No wonder, dear, that you go
So far into ecstasies
About that Victor Hugo!
He paints the city, high and low,
With faithful pen and ready.
(I think, my dear, I ought to know,
We drove there two hours steady.”)

“I feel,” Madge had written, “that one wants a life-time to ‘do’ the
Continent.”
Tom Hammond’s thoughts often flew to the gay girl. This morning,
having seen a review of Carleton’s latest book of ballads, he had
been reminded of her, and he laid down his pen a moment, as he
gave himself up to a little reverie about her. An announcement
aroused him.
“Miss Finisterre and Mr. Carlyon, sir.”
He smiled to himself. “Talk of angels, etc.,” he mused.
The next moment he was greeting his callers. Madge Finisterre
looked, in Tom Hammond’s eyes, more radiant now than ever.
“Fancy, Mr. Hammond,” she laughed, when the greetings were
over, “George and I met at Dover! He had come south to see a friend
off from Dover, and was on the pier when I landed from the Calais
boat. We’ve been down to that dear old country house, but I wanted
to do some shopping, and to see how you looked as editor-in-chief
and general boss of the biggest daily paper in the world.”
Tom Hammond’s eyes flashed with a pleased light at her
confession, which implied that she had thought of him, even as he
had thought of her. He noted, too, how an extra shade of colour
warmed the clear skin of her cheeks as she made her confession.
“Because,” she went on, “all the world declares that ‘The Courier’
is the premier paper of the world, and everyone who is anyone—in
the know of things, I mean—knows that Mr. Tom Hammond is ‘The
Courier.’”
The talk, for a few minutes, was “shop.”
“You don’t go in for a column of comic,” Madge presently said. “If
you did, I could give you an item, we, George and I, heard in the
train as we ran up to town. There were two of your English parsons
in our carriage, talking in that high-faluting note that always reminds
me of your high-pitched church service,—‘dearly-beloved-brethren’
note.
“Well, the two parsons were telling yarns one against the other—
chestnuts were cheap, I assure you,—and one of them told a story
he tacked on to General Booth—the last time I heard it, it was told of
Spurgeon. He said that the General was going down Whitechapel,
and, seeing the people pouring into a show, and wondering what
there was so powerfully attractive to the masses in these shows, he
determined to go into this particular one. It was advertised as a
‘Museum of Biblical Curiosities.’ Just as he got in, the showman was
exhibiting a very rusty old sword, and saying,
“‘Now, yere’s a werry hinterestin’ hobject. This is the sword wot
Balaam ’it ’is hass wiv, ’cos ’ee wouldn’t go.’ Booth speaks up, and
says,
“‘Hold hard there, my friend; you’re getting a little mixed. Balaam
hadn’t got a sword. He said, “Would that I had a sword.”’
“‘That’s all right, guv’nor,’ cried the showman; ‘this is the sword ’ee
wished ’ee ’ad.’”
 The girl’s mimicry of the coster-showman’s speech was inimitable,
and the two men laughed as much at her telling as at the tale itself.
George Carlyon got up from his seat, saying, “But I say, you two,
do you mind if I leave you to amuse each other for an hour? I want,
very much, to run down to the club. I’ll come back for you, Madge, or
meet you somewhere.”
“Bless the boy!” she laughed. “Do you think I was reared in an
incubator, or in your Mayfair? Haven’t you learned that, given a
Yankee girl’s got dollars under her boots to wheel on, it ain’t much
fuss for her to skate through this old country of yours, nor yet
through Europe, come to that, even though she has no more
languages under her tongue than good plain Duchess county
American. I told the ‘boys’ that before I left home.”
George Carlyon laughed, as, accepting his release, he nodded to
the pair and left the room.
It was a strangely new experience to Tom Hammond, to be left
alone with a beautiful and charming woman like Madge Finisterre.
The picture she made, as she moved round the room looking at
the framed paintings, all gifts from his artist friends, came to him as a
kind of revelation. When he had met her that day in the Embankment
hotel, he had been charmed with her beauty and her frank, open,
unconventionality of manner. He had thought of her many times
since—only that very day, a moment before her arrival,—thought of
her as men think of a picture or a poem which has given them
delight. But now he found her appealing to him.
She was a woman, a beautiful, attractive woman. She suggested
sudden thoughts of how a woman, loved, and returning that love,
might affect his life, his happiness.
Her physical grace and beauty, the exquisite fit of her costume, the
perfect harmony of it—all this struck him now. But the woman in her
appealed strongest to him.
“Awfully good, this sketch of street arabs!” she turned to say, as
she stood before a clever bit of black-and-white drawing.
 An end of a lace scarf she was wearing caught in a nail in the wall.
He sprang forward to release the scarf. It was not readily done, for
his fingers became infected with a strange nervousness. Once their
hands met, their fingers almost interlocked. A curious little thrill went
through him. He lifted his eyes involuntarily, and met her glance. A
warm colour shot swiftly into her face. And he was conscious at the
same moment that his own cheeks burned.
“I guess I’ll sit down before I do any more mischief,” she laughed.
Woman-like, she was quicker to get at ease than he was.
“Do you know, Mr. Hammond,” she went on, as she seated herself
in a revolving armchair, “I just wanted very much to see how you
were fixed up here, and how you looked now that you are a big
man.”
He made a deprecatory little gesture.
“Oh, but you are a really great man,” she went on. “I have heard
some big people talk of you, and say——”
She leaned back, and smiled merrily at him, as she went on,
“Well, I guess if there’s only a shadow of truth in the old saying,
then your ears must often have burned.”
Madge Finisterre gave the chair in which she was sitting a half
twist.
“Why don’t you British people go in for rockers?” she asked. “I
simply can’t enjoy your English homes to the full, for want of a good
rocker, wherever I go.”
An indiarubber bulb lay close to his hand. He pressed it without
her noting the movement. A clerk suddenly appeared. Hammond
looked across at Madge, with an “Excuse me, Miss Finisterre, one
moment.”
He drew a sheet of notepaper towards him. The paper was
headed with “The Courier” title and address.
“Send me, at once, unpacked and ready for immediate use, the
best American drawing-room rocking-chair you have in stock. Send
invoice, cash will follow,” etc.
That was what he wrote. He enclosed it in an envelope, then on a
separate slip of paper he wrote:—
“Take a cab, there and back, to Wallis’s, Holborn Circus. See how
smart you can be; bring the chair, ordered, back with you.”
From his purse he took a four-shilling piece, and gave the young
fellow the note, the slip of instructions, and the coin.
As the attendant left the room, he turned again to Madge, who,
utterly unsuspicious of the errand on which he had sent his
employee, was amusing herself with a copy of “Punch.” She looked
up from the paper as the door closed.
“I like ‘The Courier’ immensely, Mr. Hammond,” she cried. There
was a rare warmth of admiration in her tone.
“Thank you, Miss Finisterre!” His eyes said more than his words,
“what do you specially like in it?” he asked; “or is your liking of a
more general character?”
“I do like it from a general standpoint,” she replied; “I think it the
best paper in the world. But especially do I like your own particular
column, ‘From a Prophet’s Chamber.’ But, Mr. Hammond, about the
Jew—you are going in strong for him, aren’t you?”
“From the ordinary newspaper point, yes,” he said. “I cannot quite
recall how my mind was first switched on to the subject, but I do
know this—that the more I study the past history of the race, and the
future predictions concerning it, the more amazed I am, how, past,
present, and future, the Jews, as a nation, are interwoven with
everything political, musical, artistic—everything, in fact. And I
wonder, equally, that we journalists, as a whole—I speak, of course,
as far as I know my kinsmen in letters—should have thought and
written so little about them.
“Take their ubiquitousness, Miss Finisterre,” went on Hammond.
“There does not appear to have been an empire in the past that has
not had its colony of Jews. By which I do not mean a Ghetto, simply,
a herding of sordid-living, illiterate Hebrews, but a study colony of
men and women, who, by sheer force of intellect, of brain power,
have obtained and maintained the highest positions, the greatest
influence.
“Why, in China, even, isolated, conservative China, before Christ
was born in Bethlehem, the Jews were a prosperous, ubiquitous
people, worshipping the one God, Jehovah, amidst all the foulness
of Chinese idolatries.”
Madge Finisterre listened with rapt interest. The man before her,
fired with his subject, talked marvellously. A good listener helps to
make a good talker, and Tom Hammond talked well.
“It is not simply that they practically hold the wealth of the world in
their hands, that they are the world’s bankers, but they are
dominating our press, our politics.”
With glowing picture of words he poured out a flood of wondrous
fact and illustration, winding up presently with:
“Then you cannot kill the Jew, you cannot wipe him out.
Persecution has had the effect of stunting his growth, so that the
average Britisher is several inches taller than the average Jew. But
the life of the Hebrew is indestructible. Sometimes of late I have
asked myself this question, as I have reviewed the history of the
dealings of so-called Christianity with the Semitic race—Has
Christianity been afraid of the Jews, or why has she sought to stamp
them out?”
The pair had been so engrossed with their talk that they had lost
all count of time. A half-hour had slipped by since Tom Hammond
had sent his messenger to Wallis’s. The young fellow suddenly
appeared at the door.
“Got it, Charlie?”
Without waiting for a reply to his question, the editor bounded from
his seat and passed outside. Thirty seconds later the door opened
again, and he appeared, bearing a splendid rocker in his arms.
Before she fully realized the wonder of the whole thing, Madge
found herself seated in the rocking-chair. Swaying backwards and
forwards, and blushing and smiling, she cried:
“You are a wonderful man, Mr. Hammond!”
“You said you could never fully enjoy our English houses for want
of a rocker. Now, however ‘angelic’ your visits to this room may be,
you shall have one inducement to slip in—a rocker.”
She was beginning her thanks again, when he interrupted with:
“But, excuse me, Miss Finisterre, what about some tea? Shall we
go out and get some, or would you prefer that I should order it in
here?”
“Oh, here, by all means! I can have tea at a restaurant every day
of my life, but with a real London lion—a real live editor—and in his
own special den. Why, it may never fall to my lot again. Oh, here, by
all means!” she cried, excitedly.
He squeezed that rubber bulb again. To the lad Charlie, who
appeared, he gave a written order to a neighbouring restaurant.
Twenty minutes later the tea was in the room.
Madge officiated with the teapot. Hammond watched her every
movement. A truly pretty, graceful girl never looks handsomer to a
man than when presiding at a tea-table. Tom Hammond thought
Madge had never looked more charming. The meal was a very
enjoyable one, and as she poured out his second cup he paid her a
pretty compliment, adding:
“To see you thus, Miss Finisterre, makes one think what fools men
are not to——”
He paused abruptly. She flashed a quick glance of enquiry at him.
“Not to what, Mr. Hammond?”
“I wonder,” he replied, “if I ought to say what I left unsaid?”
“Why not?” she asked.
“I don’t know why I should not,” he laughed. “I was going to say
that, to have a bright, beautiful, graceful woman like Madge
Finisterre pouring out tea for him, makes a man think what a fool he
is not to marry.”
His tone and glance were alike full of meaning. She could not
mistake him. Her colour heightened visibly. Her eyes drooped before
his ardent gaze. The situation became tense and full of portent.
The opening of the door at that instant changed everything.
George Carlyon had returned. At the same moment a wire was
brought to Hammond, together with a sheaf of letters—the afternoon
mail.
 CHAPTER VII.
“COMING.”

George Carlyon’s entrance, the arrival of the afternoon mail, and

the telegram gave Madge Finisterre an opportunity to escape.
George Carlyon was anxious to leave, and Madge rose at once to
accompany him.
Tom Hammond did not press them to stay, for he, too, felt
awkward. The friends shook hands. The eyes of Madge and
Hammond met for one instant. Each face flushed under the power of
the other’s glance.
When the door had closed upon them, Tom went back to his old
place by the table, his eyes involuntarily sweeping the whole
apartment. He smiled as he suddenly realized how empty the room
now seemed. His glance rested upon the tea-tray, and he rang for
the lad Charlie.
“Clear all this away, Charlie, please,” he began. Then with a smile
he said, “You will find a capital cup of tea in that pot.”
The boy grinned. At his first glance at the tray he had mentally
decided that he would be able to have a rare feast. A couple of
minutes, and the boy had gone.
Tom Hammond gathered up his mail, and was about to drop into
his ordinary seat, when he remembered the rocker. With a smile at
Madge’s occupancy of the chair, he dropped into it.
For fully five minutes he sat still thinking, reviewing all the
circumstances of the peculiar situation upon which the unexpected
coming of George Carlyon had broken. He asked himself whether he
was really in love with the fair Madge, and whether he would have
proposed to her if her cousin had not so unexpectedly turned up? He
made no definite reply to his own questioning, but turned to his mail.
 The telegram he had opened at once on its receipt. He turned now
to the letters. He had opened all but two. The last one was
addressed in a woman’s hand-writing. Breaking the envelope, he
took out the letter, and turned first to the signature on the fourth
page.
“Millicent Joyce,” he read. “Millicent Joyce?” he repeated.
Unconsciously he had laid his emphasis on the “Millicent,” and he
forgot the “Joyce.”
But suddenly it came to him that the letter was from Mrs. Joyce,
the woman whom he had helped to save from drowning on the night
of that memorable day when the great chance of his life had come to
him.
“Poor soul!” he muttered. “I wonder what she has written about?”
The next instant he was reading the letter.
Tom Hammond cast his eyes over the letter which Mrs. Joyce had
sent him, and which ran thus:

“Dear Sir,
“I gave you my word that if ever I was in
special trouble or need I would write, or come to you
for help.
“I did not promise you, however, that if any great joy
or blessing should come to me, that I would let you
know. I don’t think I believed any joy could ever
possibly come into my life again. But joy and wondrous
gladness have come into my life, and in an altogether
unexpected way.
“You will remember how I said to you in parting, that
morning, that your strong, cheery words had given me
a clearer view of God than any sermon I had ever
listened to. That impression deepened rather than
diminished when I got home. My husband, I heard, had
been sent to Wandsworth Prison for a month, for
assaulting the police when drunk.
 “And in this month of quiet from his brutalities, the
great joy of my life came to me. I began to attend
religious services from the very first night after my
return home. I went to church, chapel, mission hall,
and Salvation Army.
“One night I went to the hall of the Mission for
Railway Men. A lady was speaking that night, and God
found me, and saved me. All that I had ever heard
from my dear father’s lips, when he preached about
conversion, came back to me, and that night I passed
from death to life.
“The subject of the address was ‘The Coming of the
Lord.’ I listened in amazement as the lady speaker
declared that, for this age, God evidently meant that
this truth of the near coming of Christ should have
almost, if not quite, the most prominent place in all
public preaching.
“I was startled to hear her say that there were nearly
three hundred direct references to the second coming
of Christ in the Gospels and Epistles, and that there
were thus more than double the number of references
to that subject than even to that of salvation through
the blood of the Atonement.
“With her Bible in her hand, she turned readily to a
score of passages as illustrations of her statement,
and all through her address she never made a
statement without backing it up by Scripture. One thing
she said laid a tremendous grip upon me, and led me
to an immediate decision for Christ: she said, ‘How
often is the possibility of sudden death advanced by a
preacher as an incentive to unsaved souls to yield to
God!
“‘But how poor an argument is that compared with
the near approach of Christ! Sudden death might come
to one person in a congregation before twenty-four
 hours, but in a sense, that would touch that one person
only. But if Christ came to take up His people from the
earth—the dead in Christ from their graves, the living
from their occupations, etc.,—this would affect every
unsaved soul in every part of the country, of the world,
even.’”

Tom Hammond paused in his reading.

“What on earth can she mean?” he murmured, under his breath.
Then he went on from the letter:

“I gave myself up to God there and then, Mr.

Hammond, and am seeking now to live so that, should
Christ come, even before I finish this letter, I may be
ready to be caught up to meet Him in the air.”

Hammond paused again.

“What can the woman mean?” he murmured again. With the letter
held in his hand, his eyes became fixed upon space, his mind was
searching for something that he had recently heard or read bearing
on this strange topic. The clue seemed almost within grasp, yet for
awhile he could not recall it.
Suddenly it came to him. A volume of poems had been sent to him
for review, amid the excitement of the second day’s issue of “The
Courier.” He had glanced rapidly through the book, had written a
brief line for his paper, acknowledging the receipt of the book, and
promising to refer to it fully at some later date.
“That book,” he mused, “had something in it about—about——”
He got up from the rocker, took his place at his table, then
wheeled about slowly in his revolving chair, and began searching his
book-case. In an instant his keen eye picked out the volume he
sought. He wheeled round again to his table, the book in his hand.
He turned a moment to the title-page. “Ezekiel and Other Poems,”
he read. “By B. M.”
 “B. M.,” he mused, “Whom have I heard writes under those
initials? Ah! I remember! Mrs. Miller.—Barbara Miller.”
He ran the gilt-edged leaves rapidly through his practised fingers,
his quick eye catching enough of the running pages to satisfy him.
Suddenly he paused in his search. His eye had lit upon what he
sought, and he began to read:

“COMING.”
“At even, or at midnight, or at the cock-crowing, or in
the morning.”

“It may be in the evening,

When the work of the day is done,
And you have time to sit in the twilight
And watch the sinking sun,
While the long, bright day dies slowly
Over the sea,
And the hour grows quiet and holy
With thoughts of Me;
While you hear the village children
Passing along the street,
Among those thronging footsteps
May come the sound of My feet.

“Therefore I tell you, ‘Watch,’

By the light of the evening star,
When the room is growing dusky
As the clouds afar;
Let the door be on the latch
In your home,
For it may be through the gloaming
I will come.”

He paused in his reading for a moment, for, like a voice near by,
the drone of that blind beggar’s reading came to him, as he had
heard it that day on the embankment.
 “This same Jesus shall so come in like manner as ye have seen
Him go.”
“I remember,” he mused, “how that sentence arrested me. My
mind was utterly pre-occupied a moment before, but that wondrous
sentence pierced my pre-occupation.”
His eyes dropped to the poem again, and he read on:—

“It may be when midnight

Is heavy on the land,
And the black waves lying dumbly
Along the sand;
When the moonless night draws close,
And the lights are out in the house;
When the fires burn low and red,
And the watch is ticking loudly
Beside the bed.
Though you sleep, tired out, on your couch,
Still your heart must wake and watch
In the dark room;
For it may be that at midnight
I will come.”

He read rapidly, but more eagerly interested each moment. The

next section he scarcely paused upon, but the fourth he lingered
over, and then read it the second time:

“It may be in the morning,

When the sun is bright and strong,
And the dew is glittering sharply
Over the little lawn;
When the waves are laughing loudly
Along the shore,
And the little birds sing sweetly
About the door;
With the long day’s work before you,
You rise up with the sun,
And the neighbours come in to talk a little
 Of all that must be done:
But remember that I may be the next
To come in at the door,
To call you from your busy work
For evermore.
As you work, your heart must watch,
For the door is on the latch
In your room,
And it may be in the morning
I will come.”

He read on with a strange, breathless interest the next two pages

of poem, then, with a sudden sense of hush upon him, he went
carefully over the concluding lines:

“So I am watching quietly

Every day.
Whenever the sun shines brightly,
I rise and say,
‘Surely it is the shining of His face!’
And look unto the gates of His high place
Beyond the sea,
For I know He is coming shortly
To summon me.
And when a shadow falls across the window
Of my room,
Where I am working my appointed task,
I lift my head to watch the door, and ask
If He is come;
And the angel answers sweetly
In my home:
‘Only a few more shadows,
And He will come.’”

The face of Tom Hammond, as he laid down the book, was full of a
strange, new perplexity. “Strange, very!” he muttered. “Do you know
Joyce, Mr. Simpson?” Hammond asked a reporter. “He used to be on
the staff of the——”
“‘Daily Tatler,’” cried the man. “Knew him well years ago, sir. Old
school-fellows, in fact. Got wrong with the drink, sir. Gone to the
dogs, and——”
“Have you seen or heard anything of him this last month, Mr.
Simpson?”
“Yes, sir. He’s grown worse than ever. Magistrate at Bow Street,
committing him for three days, said fellow ought to be put in
Broadmoor. Pity his poor wife, sir. Perfect lady, sir.”
“You know Mrs. Joyce, then?” Hammond queried.
The reporter sighed, “Rather, sir! Wished a thousand times I could
have had her for a wife, and he’d had mine. I should have had a
happier life. And he——”
The man laughed grimly. “Well, he’d have had a tartar!”
Hammond had heard something about the shrewish wife Simpson
had unfortunately married. But he had learned all he wanted to know,
so dismissed the poor, ill-married fellow.
“I think I must call upon Mrs. Joyce, and learn more about this
strange matter of the coming Christ,” he told himself.
He copied the address from the head of the letter into his pocket-
book, then turned to the last letter of his mail.
This proved to be a comparatively short letter, but, to Hammond, a
deeply-interesting one. It was signed “Abraham Cohen,” and the
writer explained that he was a Jew, who had taken the “Courier” from
the very first number, and had not only become profoundly interested
in the recent utterances of the editor in the “Prophet’s Chamber”
column, but he had, for some days, been impressed with the desire
to write to the “Prophet.”

“Will you pardon me, sir,” the letter went on, “if I say
that it would be to your immense advantage, now that
 your mind has become aroused to the facts and history
of our race, if you would get in touch with some really
well-read, intelligent Jew who knows our people well,
knows their history, past, present, and future, as far as
the latter can be known from our Scriptures and sacred
books. Should you care to fall in with my suggestion, I
should be pleased to supply you with the names and
addresses of several good and clever men of our
people.
“Yours obediently,
“Abraham Cohen.”

As he folded the letter slowly, Hammond told himself that there

was something in the letter that drew him towards the writer.
“I will hunt him up, for it is evident that he is as enthusiastic over
his people’s history as he is intelligent. I will see what to-morrow
brings. Now to work.”
He put Cohen’s letter in his pocket, and turned to the hundred and
one editorial claims upon his time.
 CHAPTER VIII.
REVERIE.

In spite of the time of the year, the evening was almost as warm as
one in June. Madge Finisterre was on one of the wide hotel
balconies overlooking the Embankment. She had dined with her
cousin, George Carlyon, but instead of going out of town that
evening with him—he had pressed her strongly to go,—she had
elected to spend a quiet evening alone.
London’s roar, subdued a little, it is true, at that hour, rose all
around her where she sat. The cup of coffee she had brought to her,
cooled where it stood upon the little table at her elbow. She had
forgotten it.
Her mind was engrossed with the memory of the latter part—the
interrupted part—of that interview with Tom Hammond that
afternoon.
“What would have happened if George Carlyon had not turned up
at that moment?” she mused,—“if we had been left alone and
undisturbed another five minutes?”
Her cheeks burned as she whispered softly to herself:
“I believe Tom Hammond would have proposed to me. If he had,
what should I have replied?”
A far-away look crept into her eyes. She was back again in the
little town where she had been “reared,” as she herself would have
said. We have many villages in England larger, more populous, more
busy, than her “town,” but, then, the people of her land talk “big.”
Before her mind’s eye there rose the picture of her father’s store, a
huge, rambling concern built of wood, with a frontage of a hundred
feet, and a colonnade of turned wooden pillars that supported a
verandah that ran the whole length.
 Every item of the interior of the store came vividly before her mind,
the very odour of the place—a curious blend of groceries, drapery,
rope, oils and colours, tobacco,—seemed suddenly to fill her nostrils.
And in that instant, though she scarcely realized it, the first real touch
of nostalgia came to her.
She saw the postal section of the store littered with men, all
smoking, most of them yarning. One after another dropped in, and,
with a “Howdy, all?” dropped upon a coil of white cotton rope, or
lounged against a counter or cask. “Dollars” and “cents” floated in
speech all around, while the men waited for the mail. It was late that
night.
A week before she had sailed for England, she had gone down to
the store, as she had gone every evening about mail-time, and,
entering at the end nearest her home, she had come upon the scene
that had now so suddenly risen before her mind’s eye. She had
traversed all the narrow alley-way between the stored-up supplies,
from which the various departments were stocked, singing as she
went:

“The world is circumbendibus,

We’re all going round;
We have a try to fly the sky,
But still we’re on the ground.
We every one go round the sun,
We’re moving night and day;
And milkmen all go round the run
Upon their Milky Way.”

“We’re all circumbendibus,

Wherever we may be.
We’re all circumbendibus,
On land or on sea.
Rich or poor or middling,
Wherever we are found,
We’re all circumbendibus,
We’re all going round.”