AND THE WILDERNESS BLOSSOMED 



island, who owned it, and whether it could be 

 bought. Now, there is no dearer fellow in the 

 world than Theodore Leaf, and he was not only 

 able to answer all my questions satisfactorily, but 

 actually offered to go and see the owners, who 

 lived in Massachusetts, and buy the property 

 in my behalf; and he did it too, and in a brief 

 time the island of Norinamentook was mine, or 

 rather it was the property of Hortense, and the 

 deeds, with careful folding, went into her stock- 

 ing the following Christmas eve. Deeds for real 

 estate in Maine are very small. 



Talking once with a Maine man about a wharf 

 that had lately been built in an exposed situation 

 on the lake, he remarked that it was " a terrible 

 hard chance over there," and I think it was " a 

 terrible hard chance " I had undertaken when 

 I proposed to build this comfortable house on 

 an island covered with primeval forest, nearly 

 twenty-five miles from a railroad, and which I 

 had only seen from a distance of two miles across 

 the water. Nevertheless, I resolved to take the 

 chance and see what would come of it. 



In a way, its very remoteness and wildness was 

 an attraction. I had nature to contend with, to 

 be sure, but I was quite free from the machina- 



2 



