a look of great importance, and we drove away. He was very
talkative; the unusual excitement of the day was not without its
effect. He had a good deal to tell me about the people I had seen,
though I had to ask a good many questions.

"Who was the thin old fellow, with the black coat, faded yellow-green
on the shoulders, who was talking to Skipper Downs about the
dog-fish?"

"That's old Cap'n Abiah Lane," said Georgie; "lives over toward Little
Beach,--him that was cast away in the fog in a dory down to the Banks
once; like to have starved to death before he got picked up. I've
heard him tell all about it. Don't look as if he'd ever had enough to
eat since!" said the boy grimly. "He used to come over a good deal
last winter, and go out after cod 'long o' father and me. His boats
all went adrift in the big storm in November, and he never heard
nothing about 'em; guess they got stove against the rocks."

We had still more than three miles to drive over a lonely part of the
road, where there was scarcely a house, and where the woods had been
cut off more or less, so there was nothing to be seen but the uneven
ground, which was not fit for even a pasture yet. But it was not
without a beauty of its own; for the little hills and hollows were
covered thick with brakes and ferns and bushes, and in the swamps the
cat-tails and all the rushes were growing in stiff and stately ranks,
so green and tall; while the birds flew up, or skimmed across them as
we went by. It was like a town of birds, there were so many. It is
strange how one is always coming upon families and neighborhoods of
wild creatures in the unsettled country places; it is so much like
one's going on longer journeys about the world, and finding town after
town with its own interests, each so sufficient for itself.

We struck the edge of the farming-land again, after a while, and I saw
three great pines that had been born to good luck in this world, since
they had sprouted in good soil, and had been left to grow as fast as
they pleased. They lifted their heads proudly against the blue sky,
these rich trees, and I admired them as much as they could have
expected. They must have been a landmark for many miles to the
westward, for they grew on high land, and they could pity, from a
distance, any number of their poor relations who were just able to
keep body and soul together, and had grown up thin and hungry in
crowded woods. But, though their lower branches might s