er as neighbors will in a new country, though they do not
so well in cities, and when they reached the creek one of them, the
father, cut a forked twig and lifted the black-snake to its full
length. Its head, raised even with his, allowed its tail to barely
touch the ground. Evidently the men were interested, and evidently one
of them was rather proud of something. But he said nothing to his son
about it. That would, in its full consideration, have involved a
licking of somebody for disobedience of orders. It was a good thing
for the bereaved song-sparrows, though. Older heads than that of the
boy were now considerate of their welfare. Lucky sparrows were they!

As for the youth, he had, that night, queer dreams, which he remembered
all his life. He was battling with the snakes again, and the fortunes
of war shifted, and there was much trouble until daylight. Then, with
the sun breaking in a blaze upon the clearing, with the ground and
trees flashing forth illuminated dew-drops, with a clangor of thousands
of melodious bird-voices--even the bereaved father song-sparrow was
singing--he was his own large self again, and went forth conquering and
to conquer. He found the murdered nestling stranded down the creek,
and buried it with ceremony. He found both dead invaders, and punched
their foul bodies with a long stick. And he wished a bear would come
and try to take a pig!

This was the boy. This was the field he grew in, the nature of his
emergence into active entity, and this may illustrate somewhat his
unconscious bent as influenced by early surroundings, while showing
some of the fixed features of heredity, for he came of a battling race.

CHAPTER IV.

GROWING UP WITH THE COUNTRY.

Have you ever seen a buckwheat field in bloom? Have you stood at its
margin and gazed over those acres of soft eider-down? Have your
nostrils inhaled the perfume of it all, the heavy sweetness toned
keenly with the whiff of pine from the adjacent wood? Have you noted
the wild bees in countless myriads working upon its surface and
gathering from each tiny flower's heart that which makes the clearest
and purest and most wine-like of all honey? Have you stood at the
forest's edge, perched high upon a fence, maybe of trees felled into a
huge windrow when first the field was cleared, or else of rails of oak
or ash, both black and white--the black ash lasts the longer, for worms
invade the white--and looked upon a field