232 OLD PLYMOUTH TRAILS 



mists by the incantations of the Druid pines. 



Neighborly and simple as are all the pasture 

 people when we sit quiet long enough to see them 

 and gain their confidence by making them feel 

 that we are an integral portion of the place, as 

 they are, they all have something of the mys- 

 tical about them. There are four chipmunks, 

 sleek and beautiful striped children of a this 

 year's late litter. These frolic about on the 

 stones and among the bushes at my very feet. 

 They eat crusts almost from my hand. Yet they 

 might as well be mahatmas, for in their going and 

 coming they are as mysterious. I hear a scratch- 

 ing on a stone, and there sits a chipmunk. With 

 a swish he is gone, and unless I hear the skitter- 

 ing of tiny feet a rod away I may not tell in what 

 direction or how. Then, too, the skittering may 

 be that of some entirely different creature. I 

 prefer to think of them thus, as furry bogles that 

 bob up out of fairy tales and bob back again to 

 the making of a mythology that sniffs of sweet 

 fern and bayberry and has the flavor of bar- 

 berry sauce. 



The tender glow of still October days seems 

 to fill the pasture with such mysteries as this. 

 Commonplace things are touched with the soften- 



