30 IN WINTER. 



tion was held in higher esteem. Then, certainly, 

 every neighborhood had its characters, and their 

 like has not been transmitted to the present gener- 

 ation. I saw the last of a native folk who had 

 occupied my neighborhood since 1680. Now a 

 new people, and as different as black from white, 

 occupy the land ; but during my early childhood, 

 my grandfather's help, like himself, had always 

 lived in the neighborhood. They had been boys 

 together, and little wonder that, when a day's 

 work was done, the evening should have been 

 spent in reminiscent talk. The farmer was not 

 off to his book at candle-light, and the " hands " 

 left to their thoughts. 



How glad, now, am I, that I caught, even in 

 early youth, a glimpse of simpler times ! In one 

 way, however, the world has not changed ; con- 

 versation continually turned upon the weather, 

 and there was one book to which reference was 

 often made and quite frequently consulted the 

 almanac. How plainly I can see my grandfather 

 adjust his heavy-rimmed spectacles and turn to 

 the record of the current month ! " Yes, thee is 

 right, Abijah; the moon changes in the fore- 

 noon." Then the thin pamphlet was hung again 

 in its place in the chimney corner. Hard-headed 

 and alertly observant as were the. farmers of fifty 

 years ago, they all deferred to the almanac's 

 dictum. Men might say, perhaps, what they 



