ther, she'd had a
fall, and couldn't get about very well. Hannah had good advantages.
She went off keeping school when she wasn't but seventeen, and she
saved up some money, and boarded over to the Port after a while, and
learned the tailoress trade. She was always called very smart,--you
see she's got ways different from me; and she was over to the Port
several winters. She never said a word about it, but there was a young
man over there that wanted to keep company with her. He was going out
first mate of a new ship that was building. But, when she got word
from me about father, she come right home, and that was the end of it.
It seemed to be a pity. I used to think perhaps he'd come and see her
some time, between voyages, and that he'd get to be cap'n, and they'd
go off and take me with 'em. I always wanted to see something of the
world. I never have been but dreadful little ways from home. I used to
wish I could keep school; and once my uncle was agent for his
district, and he said I could have a chance; but the folks laughed to
think o' me keeping school, and I never said any thing more about it.
But you see it might 'a' led to something. I always wished I could go
to Boston. I suppose you've been there? There! I couldn't live out o'
sight o' the woods, I don't believe."

"I can understand that," said I, and half with a wish to show her I
had some troubles, though I had so many pleasures that she did not, I
told her that the woods I loved best had all been cut down the winter
before. I had played under the great pines when I was a child, and I
had spent many a long afternoon under them since. There never will be
such trees for me any more in the world. I knew where the flowers grew
under them, and where the ferns were greenest, and it was as much home
to me as my own house. They grew on the side of a hill, and the sun
always shone through the tops of the trees as it went down, while
below it was all in shadow--and I had been there with so many dear
friends who have died, or who are very far away. I told Miss Cynthia,
what I never had told anybody else, that I loved those trees so much
that I went over the hill on the frozen snow to see them one sunny
winter afternoon, to say good-by, as if I were sure they could hear
me, and looked back again and again, as I came away, to be sure I
should remember how they looked. And it seemed as if they knew as well
as I that it was the last time, and they were going to be cut dow