ved with him
to a newer part of Connecticut, where she earned a living for them both
by weaving and spinning. A happy year or two slipped by and then--ah,
well, he remembered the dreary day when some neighbors had taken him to
see her whom he loved so well, buried beneath the elm trees, and he knew
he was left alone.

Memory of the bitter tears he shed came freshly to the boy as he recalled
it all--how, in but a few days, he was "bound out" to Henry Catesby with
the promise that he should have a home and want for nothing.

Had he been in want? Oh, he had been supplied with food and clothing and
a roof over his head. Could he ask more? Yes, a thousand times, yes! He
wanted friends, companionship, love. He remembered no one who had cared
for him in those early days, except--Mary Catesby, his hard master's
little daughter. And she was still but a child when she was told to have
no association with the "bound boy;" learning of which, he had steeled
his proud young heart and had spoken to her only when necessary.

So with work, day in and day out, save for a few winter weeks in school,
the years had passed, until he made the acquaintance of John Jerome, the
son of a distant neighbor. Too poverty-distressed to be proud, he had
known little happiness except a sort of sad pleasure he found in visiting
the church-yard, where in summer he placed great bunches of wild flowers
on the mound to him most sacred.

For two years he and John had been intimate friends. The latter being
sometimes employed by Mr. Catesby, gave the boys additional opportunities
of being with one another. Late at night after a long, hard day in the
harvest fields, they had gone swimming together. They had borrowed a gun,
and John's money bought the ammunition they used in learning to shoot, to
practice which they had risen before sunrise; for at Old Sol's first peep
the day's work must be begun. Many a time they had labored all day, then
tramped the woods all night, hunting 'coons, coming home in time only to
catch a wink of sleep before jumping into their clothes and away to work
again.

Sometimes in winter when, by reason of John helping him with his work,
Ree was able to secure a half-day off, the boys had sought other game,
and shared the profits arising from their hunting and trapping. What with
the knowledge they thus picked up themselves, and the instruction given
them by Peter Piper and others, there were no two boys in Connecticut
better versed