A DAY IN FRANCONIA 



IT is the most delightful of autumn days, 

 too delightful, it seemed to me this morning, 

 to have been designed for anything like 

 work. Even a walking vacationer, on pe- 

 destrian pleasures bent, would accept the 

 weather's suggestion, if he were wise. Long 

 hours and short distances would be his pro- 

 gramme ; a sparing use of the legs, with a 

 frequent resort to convenient fence-rails and 

 other seasonable invitations. There are 

 times, said I, when idleness itself should be 

 taken on its softer side ; and to-day is one of 

 them. 



Thus minded, I turned into the Landaff 

 Valley shortly after breakfast, and at the 

 old grist-mill crossed the river and took my 

 favorite road along the hillside. As I passed 

 the sugar grove I remembered that it was 

 almost exactly four months since I had spent 

 a delicious Sunday forenoon there, seated 



