ears and plums will have to suffer again!" said I.

"Yes," said Ellen. "They stopped down at the foot of the hill, and
looked up at those two pear-trees in the old pound; then they glanced at
the house, to see if any one had noticed that they were passing."

"Those pears are just getting ripe," said Addison. "It wouldn't astonish
me if they disappeared to-night. There's no moon, is there?"

"No," said grandmother Ruth. "It's the dark of the moon. Joseph, you had
better look out for your pears to-night," she added, laughing.

The old Squire went on eating his supper for some minutes without
comment; but just as we finished, he said, "Boys, where did we put our
skunk fence last fall?"

"Rolled it up and put it in the wagon-house chamber," said I.

"About a hundred and fifty feet of it, isn't there?"

"A hundred and sixty," said Addison. "Enough, you know, to go round that
patch of sweet corn in the garden."

"That wire fence worked well with four-footed robbers," the old Squire
remarked, with a twinkle in his eye. "Perhaps it might serve for the
two-footed kind. You fetch that down, boys; I've an idea we may use it
to-night."

For several summers the garden had been ravaged by skunks. Although
carnivorous by nature, the little pests seem to have a great liking for
sweet corn when in the milk.

Wire fence, woven in meshes, such as is now used everywhere for poultry
yards, had then recently been advertised. We had sent for a roll of it,
two yards in width, and thereafter every summer we had put it up round
the corn patch. None of the pests ever scaled the wire fence; and
thereafter we had enjoyed our sweet corn in peace.

That night, just after dusk, we reared the skunk fence on top of the old
pound wall, and fastened it securely in an upright position all round
the inclosure. The wall was what Maine farmers call a "double wall"; it
was built of medium-sized stones, and was three or four feet wide at the
top. It was about six feet high, and when topped with the wire made a
fence fully twelve feet in height.

The old pound gate had long ago disappeared; in its place were two or
three little bars that could easily be let down. The trespassers would
naturally enter by that gap, and on a moonless night would not see the
wire fence on top of the wall. They would have more trouble in getting
out of the place than they had had in getting into it if the gap were to
be stopped.

At the farm that season were two hired