rom a small
house farther down the road, and we stopped for a word with him. We
spoke of the funeral, and were told something of the man who had died.
"Yes, and there's a man layin' very sick here," said our friend in an
excited whisper. "He won't last but a day or two. There's another man
buried yesterday that was struck by lightnin', comin' acrost a field
when that great shower begun. The lightnin' stove through his hat and
run down all over him, and ploughed a spot in the ground." There was a
knot of people about the door; the minister of that scattered parish
stood among them, and they all looked at us eagerly, as if we too
might be carrying news of a fresh disaster through the countryside.

Somehow the melancholy tales did not touch our sympathies as they
ought, and we could not see the pathetic side of them as at another
time, the day was so full of cheer and the sky and earth so glorious.
The very fields looked busy with their early summer growth, the horses
began to think of the clack of the oat-bin cover, and we were hurried
along between the silvery willows and the rustling alders, taking time
to gather a handful of stray-away conserve roses by the roadside; and
where the highway made a long bend eastward among the farms, two of us
left the carriage, and followed a footpath along the green river bank
and through the pastures, coming out to the road again only a minute
later than the horses. I believe that it is an old Indian trail
followed from the salmon falls farther down the river, where the
up-country Indians came to dry the plentiful fish for their winter
supplies. I have traced the greater part of this deep-worn footpath,
which goes straight as an arrow across the country, the first day's
trail being from the falls (where Mason's settlers came in 1627, and
built their Great Works of a saw-mill with a gang of saws, and
presently a grist mill beside) to Emery's Bridge. I should like to
follow the old footpath still farther. I found part of it by accident
a long time ago. Once, as you came close to the river, you were sure
to find fishermen scattered along,--sometimes I myself have been
discovered; but it is not much use to go fishing any more. If some
public-spirited person would kindly be the Frank Buckland of New
England, and try to have the laws enforced that protect the inland
fisheries, he would do his country great service. Years ago, there
were so many salmon that, as an enthusiastic old friend once