COMMUTER'S THANKSGIVING 221 



lot had shuffled into its greatcoat, its muffler 

 and muffetees, and settled comfortably down for 

 the winter. 



The old farmhouse was an invitation to winter. 

 It looked its joy at the prospect of the coming cold. 

 Low, weather-worn, mossy-shingled, secluded in 

 its wayward garden of box and bleeding-hearts, 

 sheltered by its tall pines, grape-vined, hop-vined, 

 clung to by creeper and honeysuckle, it stood 

 where the roads divided, halfway between every- 

 where, unpainted, unpretentious, as much a part 

 of the landscape as the muskrat-lodge; and, like 

 the lodge, roomy, warm, and hospitable. 



Round at the back, under the wide, open shed, 

 a door led into the kitchen, another led into the 

 living-room, another into the storeroom, and two 

 big, slanting double-doors, scoured and slippery 

 with four generations of sliders, covered the cav- 

 ernous way into the cellar. But they let the smell 

 of apples up, as the garret door let the smell of 

 sage and thyme come down; while from the 

 door of the storeroom, mingling with the odor of 

 apples and herbs, filling the whole house and 

 all my early memories, came the smell of broom- 

 corn, came the sound of grandfather's loom. 



