u and we have
come nearly ten since then. These hosses are travelers. Oh, I reckon
we've got about three more miles to go yet."

The country was old, with here and there a worn-out and neglected field.
A creek wound its way among the hills, deep and dark in places, but
babbling out into a broad and shiny ford where we crossed. One moment
the scene was desolate, with gullied hill-sides, but further on and off
to the right I could see poetic strips of meadow land, and further yet,
upon a hill-top, stood a grim old house of brick and stone. We turned
off to the right before coming abreast of this place, and pursued a
winding course along a deep-shaded ravine, not rough with broken ground,
but graceful with grassy slopes and with here and there a rock. My
companion pointed out his house, what is known as a double log building,
with a broad passage way between the two sections. A path, so hard and
smooth that it shone in the sun, ran down obliquely into the ravine, and
at the end of it I saw a large iron kettle overturned, and I knew that
this marked the spring. I liked the place, the forest back of it, the
steep hills far away, the fields lying near and the meadow down the
ravine. I hate a new house, a new field, a wood that looks new; to me
there must be the impress of fond association, and here I found it, the
spring-house with moss on its roof, the path, a great oak upon which
death had placed its beautiful mark--a bough of misletoe.

"You hop right out and go in and make yourself at home, while I take
care of the horses," said the old man. "Go right on," he added, for he
saw that I was hesitating. "You don't need an introduction. Jest say
that you are Whut'sname and that you are the new school teacher."

"But I don't know yet that I am to be the teacher."

"Well, then, tell 'em that you are Whut'sname and that you don't know
whether you are to be the teacher or not."

"But won't you stop long enough to introduce me?"

"Oh, I reckon I mout. Come on. There is wife in the door, now."

He did not go as far as the door; he simply shouted: "Here's a man,
Susan. He can tell you his name, for blamed if I ain't dun forgot."

CHAPTER III.

Into this household I was received with open-handed graciousness.
Nothing can be more charming than the unconscious generosity of simple
folk. To this family I applied the word simple and cut myself with a
cool smile at my own vanity. Was I not a countryman and as rustic-minded