THE FRIENDLY ROCKS 



tiers used them to line the open fireplaces in their 

 stone chimneys. Along the Hudson they used slate, 

 which is also nearly fireproof. 



I know a huge iron-stone rock lying at the foot of a 

 hill, from beneath which issues one of the coldest 

 and sweetest springs in the neighborhood. How the 

 haymakers love to go there to drink, and the grazing 

 cattle also ! Of course, the relation of the rock to the 

 spring is accidental. The rocks help make the his- 

 tory of the fields, especially the natural history. 

 The woodchucks burrow beneath them, and trees 

 and plants take root beside them. The delightful 

 pools they often form in a trout-stream every angler 

 remembers. Their immobility makes the mobile 

 water dissolve and excavate the soil around and be- 

 neath them, and afford lairs for the big trout. I 

 know of a large one that stood on the edge of the 

 road where it snubbed the wagon-wheels as they 

 came along. For generations it had defied the road- 

 menders, till one June day a farmer of more pluck 

 and endurance than usual tackled it with a heavy 

 crowbar, and, after a prolonged effort, split off a 

 huge slab from its top, making it, as the path-master 

 said, "haul in its horns." When a boy I saw my 

 elder brother drill a hole in one with a churn drill, 

 and with a charge of powder blast it into four pieces, 

 which were used in the foundation of a wall by the 

 roadside. As I pass along that road now, after sixty- 

 five years, I see the square faces of that rock with a 

 57 



