28 PASTORAL DAYS. 



cow-bell breaks the spell, and recalls my wandering thoughts, and as 

 I again take up my way along the moonlit road, the glimmering win- 

 dows on right and left betray the hiding-places of a score of humble 

 homes. Not far beyond I see the swinging motion of a flickering lan- 

 tern, as some tardy farmer's boy, whistling about his work, clears up his 

 nightly chores. Now he enters the old barn-door. I see the light glint- 

 ing through the open cracks, and hear the lowing of the cows, the bleating 

 of the baby-calf, and rattling chains of oxen in the stanchion rows. Now 

 again I catch the gleam at the open door; the swinging light flits across 

 the yard, and the old corn-crib starts from its obscurity. I see the boyish 

 figure relieved against the glow within as a basketful of yellow ears are 

 gathered for the impatient mouths in the noisy manger stalls. Sing on, 

 my boy, enjoy it while you may ! That venerable barn will yield a fra- 

 grance to you in after-life that will conjure up in your heart a throng of 

 memories as countless as the shining grains that glimmer in the light 

 you hold, and as golden, too, as they. I wonder if those soft-winged bats 

 squeak among the clapboards, or make their fluttering zigzag swoops 

 about your lantern as they were wont to do in olden times. 



Then there was that big-eyed owl, too, that perched upon the maple- 

 tree outside my window, and cried as if its heart would break at the dole- 

 ful tidings it foretold. What a world of kind solicitude that dolorous bird 

 awakened in our superstitious neighbor across the road ! How she over- 

 whelmed us with her sympathy, aroused by that sepulchral omen ! But I 

 still live, and so does the owl, for aught I know ; and I sometimes think 

 that this aged, stooping dame over the way has never fully recovered 

 from her disappointment, for she always greets me with a sigh and an 

 injured expression, as she says, in her high and tremulous voice, " Well ! 

 well ! back agin ez hale 'n hearty 's ever ; an' arter the way thet ar witch 

 bird yewst teu call ye, too, night arter night. Jest teu think on't ! an' 

 we'd all a' gi'n ye up fer sartin. Well ! well ! I never see the beat on't. 

 Yeu cleu seem teu hang on paowerful" and, after a moment's hesitation, 

 seemingly in which to swallow the bitter pill, she usually adds, with sad 

 solicitude, " Feelin' perty toFblc teu, I spose ?" But the "witch bird" 

 never roused my serious apprehensions. I remember its plaintive cry 

 only as a tender bit of pathos in the pages of my early history. 



I recall, too, the pleasant sound upon the shingles overhead as the 

 dark-clouded sky let fall its tell-tale drops to warn us of the coming rain. 

 How many times have I glided into dream-land under the drowsy influ- 



