196 Hills and Lakes* 



me ; and the last three or four nights we stayed in the 

 woods, I didn't close an eye till I saw he was fast 

 asleep. He could out-talk me, and outreason me ; 

 but he didn't shake my faith. I mind one day he was 

 sittin' on the bank of a little stream that came lafiin 

 along down from the hills, and he was tellin' how 

 everything came by chance, and I asked him what 

 made that little stream run down into the valley, and 

 he said, it's gravity. Well, we passed along, and 

 came to another small stream, and I put him the same 

 question as to that, and he made the same answer. 

 ' Well, Squire,' said I, ' ain't there some place in the 

 world where the streams run up hill ?' ' No,' said he, 

 ' it's a law of nater, all over the world, that water shall 

 always run down hill.' We came, after a little, to a great 

 oak tree ; I looked around, and after a good while I 

 found an acorn that had sprouted up in the spring, and 

 had sent out a little tree twice as long as my finger. 

 ^ISToW)' said I, ' Squire, did that great oak always 

 stand there?' 'No,' said he, 'it grew up from an 

 acorn.' ' What,' said I, ' was that oak ever a little 

 thing, like this I hold in my hand?' and I showed 

 him the acorn, and the sprout I had found. ' Exactly,' 

 he replied. 'Well,' said I, *do all great oaks sprinsf 



