THE BOY AND THE BROOK 21 



cherries make five cherries, and wrestled more or 

 less successfully with the multiplication table. 

 The old meadow just above the orchard was a 

 famous place for strawberries, and many hours the 

 boy spent in gathering the luscious fruit while the 

 bobolinks, perched on swaying mullein stalks or 

 the old rail-fence, engaged in a vocal contest of 

 riotous and maudlin song. Then a robin had built 

 its nest on one of the big beams under the meeting- 

 house shed on the top of the hill, and the eggs must 

 needs be watched and the young birds looked after. 

 Sometimes the children strayed into the burial 

 ground adjoining the church and pushed aside the 

 myrtle to read on the little head-stone the name of 

 a child that had died long, long ago. 



If anything could make the boy forget the brook 

 it was his dog. Very likely the dog had a pedi- 

 gree, but it had not been recorded, and he was as 

 dear to the heart of the child as if his ancestors had 

 all been decorated with blue ribbons. Pedro and 

 the lad knew where the woodchucks lived on the 

 side of the hill above the pond, and it was a red- 

 letter day when one of them was cut off from his 

 hole by the two hunters and Pedro vanquished him 

 in a pitched battle. 



The brook has run through the years and its 

 laughter sounds now in the ears of the writer. 

 Somehow he hopes that the River of Life will be 

 like the brook, larger grown. And ever as its 

 murmur is heard a vision of the mother is seen. 



