16 LITERARY PILGRIMAGES 



brought under its blanket shades of all the moun- 

 tain legends that had in times past trooped to the 

 mind of the poet as he sat there with sensitive soul 

 a-quiver to their touch, photographing them in 

 black and white for the minds of all men forever. 

 From the fireplace stalked Mogg Megone and the 

 powwows of his tribe, bringing with them all the 

 dusky people of the weird stories of his day. 

 The wind wailed their lone songs outside, and in 

 its deep throat the aged chimney mumbled to 

 itself old, old tales of night and darkness. 



Then a slender flame slipped upward from the 

 hearth, showing the form of the caretaker faintly 

 shadowed and edged with light against the black 

 background, and if I saw not her but the outline 

 of Whittier's mother bending to light the fire and 

 drive from the minds of the children the fancies 

 of the dusk it must have been because the witches' 

 twilight still held the room under its spell. Be- 

 tween the fore and back logs the brush of hem- 

 lock and of pine crackled and sent incense across 

 the gloom to me, and with the leap of the flame all 

 the weird shadows wavered into the corner and 

 vanished. In their stead trooped up river the 



