254 MISCELLANEOUS. 



must soon yield to the ravages of time. The old barn is 

 gone, the granary is gone, the shop is gone, the spring-house 

 is no more, and I learn on inquiry they all rotted down long 

 ago. But the spring, that clear, bubbling fountain, is still 

 there. It looks just as it did, I lift a cup of its pure liquid 

 to my lips, and it is as cooling, as refreshing, as welcome to 

 my taste as of yore. Never did the oldest Maraschino, or 

 the rarest Cognac taste half so good as does this sparkling 

 fluid. 



I approach the house, and am met at the door by a strange 

 lady. I announce myself. She receives me politely; says 

 she has heard my name, has heard her grandmother speak of 

 my mother, but she herself was but a child when we left the 

 country, and never saw any of us. The interior of the house 

 shows as great a change as the exterior. True, it is neat and 

 clean the mistress is a tidy housekeeper but the windows 

 and doors have been changed, and, worst of all, the old fire- 

 place, the dearest relic of all, is no more. It has been bricked 

 up, and near its place stands a modern heating-stove. 



What a train of memories cluster around that dear old fire- 

 place ! Here, during the long winter evenings, we gathered 

 around it, and by its cheerful light and genial warmth, 

 conned our lessons for the morrow, or perused an interesting 

 book, or the weekly newspaper. Here I first read Irving's 

 " Life of Washington," the " History of the American Revo- 

 lution," the "Life of Daniel Boone," and many other works 

 that made deep and lasting impressions on my mind, and 

 whose teachings I shall never forget. Here, when some of 

 the neighbors came in to spend the evening, we used to sit and 

 crack nuts, and listen to great hunting yarns and Indian 

 stories, which my father and some of our neighbors were fond 

 of spinning. I have sat and listened to these harrowing 

 tales until my hair would stand on end, and then it invariably 



