IN THE OLD PATHS 149 



wind. The wind is an anarchist ; it bloweth 

 where it listeth, with small regard for human 

 sovereignty. 



Your land, to my eye, is of a piece with all 

 the land round about ; or it would be, only 

 for its tall gray cliff. That is indeed a beauty, 

 a true distinction ; not so tall as it was forty 

 or fifty years ago, of course, but still a brave 

 and picturesque sight. I should like the illu- 

 sion of owning a thing like that myself. And 

 the brook just beyond, so narrow and so lively, 

 that, too, you may reasonably be proud of, 

 though it is nothing but a wet-weather stream, 

 coming from the hill and tumbling musically 

 downward into Dyer's Run, past one boul- 

 der and another, from late autumn till late 

 spring, and then going dry. You have only 

 pleasant memories of it, for you were oftenest 

 here in the wet season. It has always been 

 one of your singularities, I remember, to be 

 less in the woods in summer than at other 

 times. 



Now you have crossed your own boundary ; 

 but who would know it ? You yourself seem 

 not to feel the transition. The wood is one ; 

 and really it is all yours, as it is any man's 



