I had finished, Jonathan was grinning delightedly. "Suppose we
shake these city ways," he said. He deliberately got up, raised the
shades, pushed back a curtain, and moved a jug of goldenrod. "There! Can
you see better now?" he asked.

And I said cheerfully, "Yes, quite a good deal better. And after this,
Jonathan, when you hear a team coming, why don't you stop carving till
it goes by?"

"I will," said Jonathan.

It was our final capitulation, and since then we have been much more
comfortable. We run to the window whenever we feel inclined, and we
leave our shades up at dusk without apology or circumlocution. We are
coming to know our neighbors' teams by their sound, and we are proud of
it. Why, indeed, should we be ashamed of this human interest? Why should
we be elated that we can recognize a bluebird by his flight, and ashamed
of knowing our neighbor's old bay by his gait? Why should we boast of
our power to recognize the least murmur of the deceptive grosbeak, and
not take pride in being able to "spot" Bill Smith's team by the
peculiar rattle of its board bottom as it crosses the bridge by the
mill? Is he not of more value than many grosbeaks? But how can we love
our neighbor if we do not pay some attention to him--him and his horse
and his cart and all that is his? And how shall we pay attention to him
if we neglect the opportunities of the Road, since for the rest he is
busy and we are busy, and we belong each to our own farm?

I stopped at a friendly door one day to ask, "Have Phil and Jimmy gone
by? I wanted to see them."

"No, I haven't seen them." The bright-faced little lady stood in the
doorway glancing over my shoulder out toward the sunny road. "Have you
seem them to-day, Nellie?" she called into the dusky sitting-room. "No,"
she turned back to me, "we haven't seen them. And," she added, with gay
directness, "nobody could get by the house _without_ our seeing them;
I'm sure of that!"

Her remark pleased me immensely. I like this frank interest in the Road
very much. When I am at home, I have it myself, and I have stopped being
ashamed of it. When I am on the Road, I like to know that I am an
object of interest to the dwellers in the houses I pass. I look up at
the windows, whose tiny panes reflect the brightness of outdoors and
tell me nothing of the life within, and I like to think that some one
behind them knows that I am going by. Often there is some sign of
recognition--a motion of the hand thr