6 UPLAND AND MEADOW. 



but we met at a brook, where I batlied my smarting 

 flesh. 



"We walked home in silence; and to this day I feel 

 chagrined when my father talketh of bears ; nor is honey 

 a sweet morsel to me." 



Almost my last conversation with my venerable friend 

 was much the longest. He seemed far more disposed 

 to talk than walk, and, while sitting in the dense shade 

 of my three beeches, he remarked, " There was a spice 

 in livin' when the country was younger you don't get 

 now that all the big critters are about gone ;" and, point- 

 ing to a little woodpecker near by, asked, " Do you see 

 that sapsucker? I can remember when the big log- 

 cocks were about as plenty as those are nowadays. 

 Back towards the great Cattail Swamp, where there 

 was yaller-pine woods, the log-cocks used to run up and 

 down the trees like mad, and the way they sent the bark 

 flyin' was a caution. If tliey thought there was a bug 

 or grub under the bark, they'd lift it out, and, to get it, 

 sometimes ripped a bit of bark off big as a dinner-plate. 

 Now you see nothin' of all this, but have come down to 

 little sapsuckers." 



" Not quite," I replied ; " there are flickers and red- 

 heads left us." 



" That's so, but they're not much better, nor many of 

 'em, and who livin,' but me, ever heard a wolf growl or 

 a painter screech ?" 



" Did you ever see a panther about here ?" I asked. 



" Didn't I as much as say so just now ? See one, yes, 

 once, and that was enough." 



" Tell me the circumstance, please," I requested, with 

 much pleasurable anticipation. 



