OCTOBER. 243 



as any tree of the forest after the first touch of frost. 

 Never a blossom was found nestling in her hair, so far as 

 we are told, but they clung to her dress — accidentally, of 

 course. Mild reproof proved irksome at last, and her 

 troubles ended by marrying out of meeting. 



Let this suffice of her, this Quaker fairy, as she was 

 called, save casual reference ; and what now of the rem- 

 nant of her father's garden ? Perhaps not a tree or vine 

 that I found was one of those planted one hundred and 

 ninety years ago; but the pear may have been. That 

 pear tree is beyond description. Once it was a stately 

 growth, perhaps nearly two feet in diameter ; now a mere 

 fragment of a hollow trunk is left, from which projects a 

 single stunted branch, and from this I gathered a single, 

 rotting pear. The little that remained of jt at all edible 

 was evidence that in its day the Bishops had excellent 

 fruit. I ate that morsel with closed eyes, and sat by the 

 fireside of the Bishops in early colonial days. Is this not 

 happiness enough for a hazy, dreamy October day ? 



Three grapes! Small, seedy, and sour, yet what of 

 that ? Whether or no John Bishop planted the vine — for 

 it was not a native grape — some one had, and I saw the 

 Quaker fairy gathering fruit as I plucked the three wrink- 

 led berries. Their bitterness brought tears to my eyes, 

 but with what juice they had I drank a deep draught ef 

 that cunning wine which Jane Bishop well knew how to 

 make. For home-made wine was then as much a neces- 

 sity as vinegar, and far more wholesome. And while I 

 struggled with the mat of weeds, hoping to trace out the 

 narrow path edged with the white stones " dear cousin 

 William gave me," as she has left on record, I found the 

 neck of a small glass decanter. It was well buried in the 

 soil that here has certainly never been disturbed since the 

 old garden was abandoned. How vividly the old side- 

 board, a remnant of which I cherish, floated into space, 



