ming of

new-washed, freshly attired, with all the delicious and incommunicable flavor of the years irretrievably lost! Doubtless there are many such st

, unkempt, unshorn, out at the elbows. In spite of itself, in

hings, it has all been done with the best possible intentions, per

at barn and settled comfortably among the bare faces of rock in the barnyard, as if they had always been there, as, indeed, they had been there longer than any one now living can remember. Neither they nor the barn had ever been painted, and they had all weathered to a silver-gray-not the gray of any paint or stain ever made, but the gray that comes only to certain kinds of wood when it has lived out in the rain and the s

rs," and it thus gained the title of "Durance Vile." The rest were nameless, the abode of cobwebs and rats and old grain-bags and stolen nests and surprise broods of chickens, who dropped through cracks between loose boar

d. "We need that. Where s

to treat setters, anyway. They s

e of those agricultural experi

d to one or another of these little pamphlets, and when a new

ads and regarding me with their red-rimmed eyes as if they were cluckfully conjuring up old associations. Did they remember Durance Vile? Perhaps, but probably not. For

pot. But Jonathan's mind is prac

or a carriage-hou

ndigested in all its uncompromising newness of line and color. Its ridgepole, its roof edges, its corners, look as if they had been drawn with a

the old-fashioned red to make it mor

cans. And the farm remained implacable: it refused to digest the

and feed the hens and watch the "critters" come into the yard at milking-time. I like "critters," but when there are more than two or three in the yard, including some irresponsible calves, I li

itzerland, would one occur. But in our part of New England they occur so thickly that they are hard to dodge, even in

ed around. But this gave me no anxiety, because I felt sure that it had survived much stronger language than his. I did

as one might break up a chunk of maple sugar with a pair of scissors

rch of the North, but the girlish little gray birch with its veil of twinkling leaves and its glimmer of slender stems. There were rugged ledges, deep-shadowed with oak and chestnut; there were hot, open hillsides thick-set with cat-brier a

f twinkling birches-no longer twinkling-prone! Cut, dragged, and piled up in masses of white stems and limp green leafage and tangled red-brown twigs! It was a sorry sight. I walked about it much

up near the lon

re

an! Those

about

l c

eed that piece

ll not have a farm if we

arm if we don't cut them down.

if they would run an

t way about them. We'll let that

I li

rry, wild cherry, sweet-fern, bitter-sweet-all cut, hacked, torn away. It looked like a collie dog in the summer when his long yellow fur has been sheared off. And, another day, it

id: "I'm sorry. I suppose Hiram wa

this farm shipshape than you could make a woodchuck lo

a woodchuck, eith

ideals-the ideal of a happy home, since in attaining a happy home berry pies are demonstrably helpful. And one is also having a beautiful time. On my way I turned down the side lane to see how the blackberries were coming on. There lay my blackberry canes-lay, not stood-their long stems thick-set with fruit just turning from light red to dark. I do not love blackberries as I do birches; it was rather the practical than the contemplative pa

after the first shock I explored the edges to see what was left, but wit

that night, "I thou

e said ex

do you lik

s, pref

ps you preferred cin

oke. "Oh, you mean those blackberry bushes. Did

ht," I said

obo I gave work to last week. I told him to cut the brush

rd Jonathan a little. Then I stiffened again. "How a

lty, but held himse

to plough up next year, and that's as good a piece as there is-n

there were more of them! If it weren't f

hed, then we

that would be a mi

imply unendura

not a proper subordination of values. I h

o was he?" said Jon

at the huckleberry questio

y say that there was a certain field that was full

aid he. "Wh

t, just in its glory when the grass was read

" said

lf, and when he came to a clump of butt

id Jonathan, in a

hat I call having a proper

e," s

u will tell me where to find a huckleberry patch that is not already

here were still plenty of berry bus

for you. Only I don't know which things you like. If you'll just tell

here's the lane-you know, that mustn't be touched; and the le

uldn't tackle them,"

he cedar knoll where the high-bush blueberries grow, and then-oh, yes-that lovely hillside beyond the long

all the farm. There isn't a spot as big as your hat wh

better," I sa

tell about did a little mowing. He mowed around the butterfly-weed, but he mowed.

eadow, and the hill orchard, and then there's the ten-acre lot

matter wit

ith potato-bug powder, and then they wither up and lie all around, and then they are d

see myself expressing these ide

n to the simple question, W

what Hiram would th

eep, haven't you yourself a sneaking desire for-oh, for crops, and

n, as though we were tal

k at a man when he goes to a party, or to have his picture taken! He always dashes to the barber's first-that is, unless there's a woman around to interfere. Do

otice," sai

hop off his tail, of course! And they are only beginning to learn better. When a man builds a house, what does he do? Cuts down every tree,

an. "You wouldn't like it, you know, if a man never

ks. Still, of course, there's a medium. Possi

k of the orchard, looking out over the little swamp, all a-twinkle with fireflies. Jonathan had been up the lane, prowling about, as he often does at nightfall, "to take a look at the farm." I heard his step in the lane, and he jumped over the

ed out, "What'

over. "Matter! Come and s

hing besides that a m

er I called him, h

d there in the half light I saw a

uince bushe

her unprintable phrases descriptive of the city-bred l

know how I have felt about those huckleberry bushes and bir

uage enough,"

do not habitually batten on the sorrow of others, but this was a special case. For how could I be blind to the fact that chance had thrust a weapon into my hand? I knew that hereafter,

se standing here. Come back to

chirruped steadily in the orchard behind us. From a distant meadow the purring whistle of the whip-poor-will sounded in continuous cadence, like a monotonous and gentle lullaby. The woods beyond the open swamp, a shadow

last, "the farm is rat

t b

not make it too shipshape. After all

chuck, I hope,"

ent not to pre