of physical discomfort now.

* * * * *

At the beginning of Miss Asenath's Romance those many years ago, her
father, Arethusa's great-grandfather Redfield, had set aside this strip
of woodland in which to build his daughter a house.

It was not nearly so heavily wooded then, and the lovers had wandered
over it and selected a spot for the little home, mute evidence of their
choice of site remaining in a half-dug foundation, overgrown with vines
and weeds and almost indistinguishable save for the few heavy stones
that marked one side of the depression. But the walls of the little
house had risen in fancy for her with such reality, that, when the sad
ending to her love-story came and the building was abandoned, at Miss
Asenath's request the woodland was fenced off. Hence, its name of "Miss
Asenath's Woods." She had never gone there since the day when with her
own hands she had spread a layer of mortar between two stones "for
luck," but she knew every inch of it as it was now, every tree and
bush, from Arethusa's vivid description. Arethusa's imagination could
for herself, from Miss Asenath's telling, place the little house on its
ghostly foundation in all the actuality it was once to have had.

Arethusa loved the woodland quite as much as Miss Asenath did, even
apart from the significance of its connections with her aunt's
love-story. It was the only spot on the place that Miss Eliza did not
keep straight; the only bit of the Farm that was not inspected, often,
by that keen glance which, even if a trifle near-sighted, so little
escaped. But she never went near the woodland on any pretext.

There was nothing "combed" or "fixed" about Miss Asenath's Woods; no
white-washed trees or clipped grass. Bees droned and birds sang and
wild-flowers bloomed there all uninterrupted; squirrels chattered in
the trees, friends of Arethusa's that were tame enough to perch on her
shoulder if she sat quite still; and funny little, Molly-cotton-tail
rabbits often scampered in front of her while she was reading, so close
she could have touched them. It was a bit of nature that no human hand
had ever spoiled, the never finished foundation was only an addition in
its suggestion; therefore, the girl's woodsy heart claimed it as her
very own, although by name it belonged to Miss Asenath.

But, since the time she was a wee scrap and, running away from Miss
Eliza's scolding, had stumbled on this enchanted