AN OCTOBER ABROAD 211 



or more like a path, apart from the 

 main road, and the good dame brought me some 

 "home-brewed," which I drank sitting by a rude 

 table on a rude bench in a small, low room, with a 

 stone floor and an immense chimney. The coals 

 burned cheerily, and the crane and hooks in the 

 fireplace called up visions of my earliest childhood. 

 Apparently the house and the surroundings, and 

 the atmosphere of the place and the ways of the 

 people, were what they were three hundred years 

 ago. It was all sweet and good, and I enjoyed it 

 hugely, and was much refreshed. 



Crossing the fields in the gloaming, I came up 

 with some children, each with a tin bucket of milk, 

 threading their way toward Stratford. The little 

 girl, a child ten years old, having a larger bucket 

 than the rest, was obliged to set down her burden 

 every few rods and rest; so I lent her a helping 

 hand. I thought her prattle, in that broad but 

 musical patois, and along these old hedge-rows, the 

 most delicious I ever heard. She said they came 

 to Shottery for milk because it was much better 

 than they got at Stratford. In America they had 

 a cow of their own. Had she lived in America, 

 then ? " Oh, yes, four years, '^ and the stream of her 

 talk was fuller at once. But I hardly recognized 

 even the name of my own country in her innocent 

 prattle; it seemed like a land of fable, — all had a 

 remote mythological air, and I pressed my inquiries 

 as if I was hearing of this strange land for the first 

 time. She had an uncle still living in the " States 



