ore questions. She said I must have asked her a thousand
already. I suppose I had, too, but how you going to find out about
things if you don't ask questions? And what DOES make the roads red?"

"Well now, I dunno," said Matthew.

"Well, that is one of the things to find out sometime. Isn't it splendid
to think of all the things there are to find out about? It just makes
me feel glad to be alive--it's such an interesting world. It wouldn't be
half so interesting if we know all about everything, would it? There'd
be no scope for imagination then, would there? But am I talking too
much? People are always telling me I do. Would you rather I didn't
talk? If you say so I'll stop. I can STOP when I make up my mind to it,
although it's difficult."

Matthew, much to his own surprise, was enjoying himself. Like most quiet
folks he liked talkative people when they were willing to do the talking
themselves and did not expect him to keep up his end of it. But he had
never expected to enjoy the society of a little girl. Women were bad
enough in all conscience, but little girls were worse. He detested the
way they had of sidling past him timidly, with sidewise glances, as if
they expected him to gobble them up at a mouthful if they ventured to
say a word. That was the Avonlea type of well-bred little girl. But
this freckled witch was very different, and although he found it rather
difficult for his slower intelligence to keep up with her brisk mental
processes he thought that he "kind of liked her chatter." So he said as
shyly as usual:

"Oh, you can talk as much as you like. I don't mind."

"Oh, I'm so glad. I know you and I are going to get along together
fine. It's such a relief to talk when one wants to and not be told
that children should be seen and not heard. I've had that said to me a
million times if I have once. And people laugh at me because I use big
words. But if you have big ideas you have to use big words to express
them, haven't you?"

"Well now, that seems reasonable," said Matthew.

"Mrs. Spencer said that my tongue must be hung in the middle. But it
isn't--it's firmly fastened at one end. Mrs. Spencer said your place was
named Green Gables. I asked her all about it. And she said there were
trees all around it. I was gladder than ever. I just love trees. And
there weren't any at all about the asylum, only a few poor weeny-teeny
things out in front with little whitewashed cagey things about them.
They just lo