Kino and Hermes arrive in a country where everyone believes that the world will end the next day according to their Book of Prophecy as interpreted by the southern priest, but the northern priest declares that his interpretation predicts that the event will occur in thirty years. Kino then passes by a country where travelers rarely visit. After she leaves, the populace begin to think of different traditions to entice the next traveler to stay. When Kino arrives in the Sad Land, she learns from a boatman that a poet was commissioned by the king to write a sad poem, which he did so after his wife committed suicide...