e air was vibrant of voiceless voices, of
pixy tambourines beating the silence. There was a hush, the sibilant
hush of waters rushing down from the far snows of the Holy Cross; and a
flutter--the flutter of all the little leaves clapping their hands; and
a big voiceless voice of solemn undertone--the diapason of the pines
harping the age-old melodies to the touch of the wind's invisible
hands, melodies of the soul of the sea in the heart of the tree, of
strength and power and eternity. As she listened, she could fancy some
vast oratorio voicing the themes of humanity and the universe and God.

Then all the little people of the woods came peeping through the
greenery surveying her, weighing her, examining her, testing her spirit
of good or ill. A little squirrel went scampering up one huge tree
trunk and down another, just a pace ahead, scouting for the other
pixies of the woods, till with a scurr-r-r and chitter--chipper--ee, he
whisked back in his tracks. "She's all right, people," he said. Then
a whisky jack flitted from branch to branch of the under brush--always
just a step ahead, not saying as much as was his custom, but peeking a
deal with head cocked from side to side. "No," said Eleanor, "I have
no camp crumbs: you go back." The little red crested cross bill
twittered in front of her from spray to spray of the purple fire weed
and fern fronds; then, concluded that she was only a part of this out
door world, anyway, and went back about his business on the trail
behind. Two or three times, there was a vague rustle in the leaves
that she couldn't localize--water ouzel in moss covert, or hawk babies
in hiding, or--or what? She couldn't descry. Then, suddenly, with a
hiss--ss and swear plain as a bird could swear, a little male grouse
came sprinting down the trail to stop her, ruff up, tail spread to a
fan, wings down, screaming at her in bad words "to stop! to stop! or
he'd pick her eyes out!" Eleanor naturally stopped. There was a
rustle and a flump; and a mother grouse whirred up with her brood--a
dozen of them Eleanor counted, was it a second family? babies just in
feather, clumsy and heavy of wing; and the little man ducked to hiding
among the dead leaves. Eleanor peered everywhere. There was not the
glint of an eye to betray hiding. She laughed and looked back for
Matthews and his little pupil. A turn of the lane shut off all view;
and again, she had that curious sensation of a vague movement bac