172 LOCUSTS AND WILD HONEY 



We paused under a bridge at the mouth of Biscuit 

 Brook and ate our lunch, and I can recommend it 

 to be as good a wayside inn as the pedestrian need 

 look for. Better bread-and-milk than we had there 

 1 never expect to find. The milk was indeed so 

 good that Aaron went down to the little log house 

 under the hill a mile farther on and asked for more; 

 and being told they had no cow, he lingered five 

 minutes on the door-stone with his sooty pail in his 

 hand, putting idle questions about the way and dis- 

 tance, etc. , to the mother while he refreshed himself 

 with the sight of a well-dressed and comely-looking 

 young girl, her daughter. 



"I got no milk," said he, hurrying on after 

 me, "but I got something better, only I cannot 

 divide it." 



"I know what it is," replied I; "I heard her 

 voice." 



" Yes, and it was a good one, too. The sweetest 

 sound I ever heard," he went on, "was a girl's 

 voice after I had been four years in the army, and, 

 by Jove! if I didn't experience something of the 

 same pleasure in hearing this young girl speak after 

 a week in the woods. She had evidently been out 

 in the world and was home on a visit. It was a 

 difi'erent look she gave me from that of the natives. 

 This is better than fishing for trout, " said he. " You 

 drop in at the next house." 



But the next house looked too unpromising. 



"There is no milk there," said I, "unless they 

 keep a goat." 



