ikely to forget its name. The path dips at
once and runs steeply down, till it reaches the bottom of the dell,
along which a quick brook runs darkling. In summer, when the leaves are
out, it is twilight here at high noonday. Hardly a peep of sky to be
seen through the green arch of oak and elm; but now, through the
net-work of wintry twigs one looks up, and sees the faint, far blue, for
the loss of which no leafage can compensate. Winter brownness above, but
a more than summer green below--the heyday riot of the mosses. Mossed
tree-trunks, leaning over the bustling stream; emerald moss carpets
between the bronze dead leaves; all manner of mosses; mosses with little
nightcaps; mosses like doll's ferns; mosses like plump cushions; and
upon them here and there blazes the glowing red of the small
peziza-cups.

I am still singing; and, as no wind reaches this shadowed hollow, I have
taken off my hat, and walk slowly along, swinging it in my hand. It is a
so little-frequented place, that I give an involuntary start, and my
song suddenly dies, when, on turning a corner, I come face to face with
another occupant. In a moment I recover myself. It is only Frank,
sitting on a great lichened stone, staring at the brook and the trees.

"You seem very cheerful!" he says, rising, stretching out his hand, and
not (as I afterward recollect) expressing the slightest surprise at our
unlikely rencontre. "I never heard you lift up your voice before."

"I seem what I am," reply I, shortly. "I _am_ cheerful."

"You mostly are."

"That is all that _you_ know about it," reply I, brusquely, rather
resenting the accusation. "I have not been _at all_ in good spirits all
this--this autumn and winter, not, that is, compared to what I usually
am."

"Have not you?"

"I _am_ in good spirits to-day, I grant you," continue I, more affably;
"it would be very odd if I were not. I should jump out of my skin if I
were quite sure of getting back into it again; I have had _such_ good
news."

"Have you? I wish _I_ had" (sighing). "What is it?"

"I will give you three guesses," say I, trying to keep grave, but
breaking out everywhere, as I feel, into badly-suppressed smiles.

"Something about the boys, of course!"--(half fretfully)--"it is always
the boys."

"It is nothing about the boys--quite wrong. That is _one_."

"The fair Zephine is no more!--by-the-by, I suppose I should have heard
of that."

"It is nothing about the fair Zephine--wrong a