THE SEARCH AND FINDING 



I venture to inquire after his crops. 



"Crops-yah." 



The conversation was not satisfactory: we 

 were driving along a dusty highway, and had 

 entered upon a sombre valley, where there was 

 no sign of cultivation, and where the only 

 dwelling to be seen, was one of those exces- 

 sively new houses of matched boards, perched 

 immediately upon the side of the high-road, 

 and with its pert and rectangular "joinery" 

 offending every rural sentiment that might 

 have grown out of the blithe atmosphere and 

 the morning drive. 



"Dish is de place," said my friend of the red 

 beard and porcelain pipe; and I could not 

 doubt it; there was a poetic agreement be- 

 tween man and house ; but the mill remained — 

 where was the mill ? 



Van Heine was only too happy: across the 

 way — only at a distance of a few rods, not 

 removed from the dust of the high-road, was 

 the mill, and the "body of water." The new 

 scars in the hillsides, from which the earth 

 had been taken to dam the brook, were 

 odiously apparent: but the investment had 

 clearly not proven a profitable one : the capacity 

 of the brook had been measured at its winter 

 stage; even now, the millpond at its upper 



27 



