A BED OF BOUGHS 169 



have ached; then struck an attitude upon the chim- 

 ney, and fairly squealed with mirth and ridicule. 

 In fact he grew so obstreperous, and so disturbed 

 our repose, that we had to "shoo" him away with 

 one of our boots. He declared most plainly that he 

 had never before seen so preposterous a figure as 

 we cut lying there in the corner of that old shanty. 



The morning boded rain, the week to which we 

 had limited ourselves drew near its close, and we 

 concluded to finish our holiday worthily by a good 

 square tramp to the railroad station, twenty-three 

 miles distant, as it proved. Two miles brought us 

 to stumpy fields, and to the house of the upper in- 

 habitant. They told us there was a short cut across 

 the mountain, but my soldier shook his head. 



"Better twenty miles of Europe," said he, getting 

 Tennyson a little mixed, "than one of Cathay, or 

 Slide Mountain either." 



Drops of the much-needed rain began to come 

 down, and I hesitated in front of the woodshed. 



"Sprinkling weather always comes to some bad 

 end," said Aaron, with a reminiscence of an old 

 couplet in his mind, and so it proved, for it did not 

 get beyond a sprinkle, and the sun shone out before 

 noon. 



In the next woods I picked up from the middle 

 of the road the tail and one hind leg of one of our 

 native rats, the first I had ever seen except in a 

 museum. An owl or fox had doubtless left it the 

 night before. It was evident the fragments had 

 once formed part of a very elegant and slender crea- 



