Down North and Up Along 
pelled her to work for his satisfaction. So 
she found it convenient to become bedridden, 
thus shifting the responsibiUty of work to 
younger shoulders, and was only able to walk 
at night, when undetected she would steal 
forth and seat herself in the devil's chair for 
the comfort of a pipe. Her discoverer prom- 
ised not to betray her, gave her a new pipe 
and a supply of tobacco, and it is to be hoped 
her hard son will never read these lines, at 
least not until the poor old soul has gone 
where she cannot be called forth to work at 
the bidding of any man. 
We floundered slowly along through the 
Melancholy Way of the Alders, cheering each 
other with ghost stories, and about noon came 
out of it, and crossed the bridge over Black 
Brook ; of all the streams we had seen the most 
forbidding, fascinating, and rock-bound. It was 
far, far below us and made its way between mas- 
sive and broken walls of rock. Trees closely 
bordered the rocks above and clung in the 
crevices, overleaning and shadowing the chasm 
below. Altogether, it was a sinister-looking 
brook and as black as night. 
But we had a sudden inner vision of trout 
258 
