May-Day out of Town. 105 



with P when the boundary of Penn's first purchase 

 was marked, from the spruce upon the bank of the 

 Delaware westward to the Neshaminy. Armed 

 with his note-book and compass, my companion 

 studied the tree as an ancient deed-mark, and left 

 me to drift wheresoever fancy might determine. 

 I scarcely moved and had no desire to wander. 

 It was my most happy fate to be held by the mute 

 eloquence of the imperious oak, and I long rested 

 upon a grassy bed, looked upward at the tree's 

 strange gestures, and marked the continuous 

 stream of life that, as if to consult an oracle, sud- 

 denly appeared and as speedily departed. I was 

 the only slave, perhaps, but ready to kiss my 

 chains. There was little to commend and much 

 to deplore when my companion reappeared and 

 snapped them. Probably nowhere, in the same 

 space, could life in such varied forms be found as 

 in, on, and about such an oak as this. It was 

 alike the home or resting-place of the extremes 

 of bird-life, the eagle and the humming-bird. The 

 raccoon, squirrel, and mice of two kinds made it 

 a home or temporary refuge ; snakes were among 

 its branches and about its roots ; the lizard and 



