the treetops.

Back of the house, and sweeping around between it and the public road,
was a far-reaching extent of woodland; and through this, for the
distance of half a mile, wound the shaded lane which led from the
highway to the Squirrel Inn.

At the point at which this lane was entered from the highroad was the
sign of the inn. This was a tall post with a small square frame hanging
from a transverse beam, and seated on the lower strip of the frame was a
large stuffed gray squirrel. Every spring Stephen Petter took down this
squirrel and put up a new one. The old squirrels were fastened up side
by side on a ledge in the taproom, and by counting them one could find
out how many years the inn had been kept.

[Illustration: THE SIGN.]

Directly below the bluff on which the house stood were Stephen Petter's
grassy meadows and his fields of grain and corn, and in the rich
pastures, or in the shade of the trees standing by the bank of the rapid
little stream that ran down from the woodlands, might be seen his flocks
and his herds. By nature he was a very good farmer, and his agricultural
method he had not derived from his books. There were people who
said--and among these Calthea Rose expressed herself rather better than
the others--that Mr. Petter's farm kept him, while he kept the Squirrel
Inn.

When it had become known that the Squirrel Inn was ready to receive
guests, people came from here and there; not very many of them, but
among them were the Rockmores of Germantown. This large family, so it
appeared to Stephen Petter, was composed of the kind of fellow-beings
with whom he wished to associate. Their manners and ways seemed to him
the manners and ways of the people he liked to read about, and he
regarded them with admiration and respect. He soon discovered from their
conversation that they were connected or acquainted with leading
families in our principal Eastern cities, and it became his hope that he
and his Squirrel Inn might become connected with these leading families
by means of the Rockmores of Germantown.

As this high-classed family liked variety in their summer outings, they
did not come again to the Squirrel Inn, but the effect of their
influence remained strong upon its landlord. He made up his mind that
those persons who did not know the Rockmores of Germantown did not move
in those circles of society from which he wished to obtain his guests,
and therefore he drew a line which excluded all perso