280 HILLS AND LAKES. 



great folly, Squire, and their pale faces and gray hairs, 

 that come before their time, ought to tell 'em so. 



11 And yet, it was a wonderful wisdom, Squire, 

 that made such a great difference in the likes, and dis- 

 likes of men. If everybody in the world was like 

 you and me, and loved the woods, and to be away off 

 in the deep forests, there wouldn't be much game left 

 in these parts, or a great many fishes, in these lakes 

 and streams. The hills and valleys, would swarm 

 with people, and there wouldn't be much elbow room, 

 for you and me. I, may be, meet a man who lives in 

 in a city, or great town, who hasn't got any likin' for 

 the back settlements, or no taste for the woods, who 

 never looks at land, unless to find out what it's worth 

 by the acre, whose estimation of a mountain stream, 

 is regulated by the amount of machinery it'll carry, 

 and whose regard for a lake, is measured by the pros- 

 pect of converting it into a millpond. Now, such a 

 man wouldn't leave nater, anywhere, one of the nateral 

 features of her old-fashioned face. He wouldn't leave 

 a deer in the forest, nor a trout in all the streams. 

 He'd convert the old trees into cordwood, and these 

 narrow valleys into sheep pastures. He'd lay up these 

 boulders into fences, or pile them up like hay-stacks. 



