When Bessie Ford parted from Lucy at the gate, she had still a long walk before reaching home.  Mill Bank Farm was a good mile and a half from the village if you went by the road, but Bessie shortened it very considerably by striking across the fields a little way beyond the village.  There were one or two fences to climb, but Bessie did not mind that any more than she minded the placid cows browsing in the pasture through which her way led.  The breezy meadows, white with ox-eye daisies, and in some places yellow with buttercups, with the blue river flowing rapidly past on one side, afforded a pleasant walk at any time, and the rest of the way was still prettier.  Just within the boundary of Mill Bank Farm the ground ascended slightly, and then descended into a narrow glen or ravine, with steep, rocky sides luxuriantly draped with velvet moss and waving ferns, while along the bottom of it a little stream flowed quietly enough towards the river, though a little higher up it came foaming and dashing down the rocks and turned a small saw-mill on the farm.  The sides of the ravine were shady with hemlocks, spreading their long, waving boughs over the rocks, with whose dark, solemn foliage maples and birches contrasted their fresh vivid green.  In spring, what a place it was for wild flowers!—­as Lucy Raymond and her brothers well knew, having often brought home thence great bunches of dielytras and convallarias and orchises; and at any time some bright blossoms were generally to be found gleaming through the shade.

Bessie, however, did not linger now to look for them, but picking her way across the stepping-stones which lay in the bed of the stream, she quickly climbed the opposite bank by a natural pathway which wound up among the rocks—­easily found by her accustomed feet—­and passing through the piece of woodland that lay on the other side, came out on the sunny expanse of meadows and corn-fields, in the midst of which stood the neat white farmhouse, with its little array of farm buildings, and the fine old butternut tree, under the shade of which Mrs. Ford sat milking her sleek, gentle cows, little Jenny and Jack sitting on the ground beside her.  The instant that they espied their sister coming through the fields, they dashed off at the top of their speed to see who should reach her first, and were soon trotting along by her side, confiding to her their afternoon’s adventures, and how Jack had found nine eggs in an unsuspected nest in the barn, but had broken three in carrying them in.

“But me wouldn’t have,” insisted Jack sturdily, “if Jenny hadn’t knocked up against me.”

“Oh, Jack!  Now you know I only touched you the least little bit,” retorted the aggrieved Jenny.

“Well, don’t jump up and down so, or I will let go your hand,” said Bessie.  “You almost pull my arm off!  I wish you could see how quietly little Mary Thomson sits in Sunday school, and she is no bigger than you.”

“Why can’t I go to Sunday school, then?” demanded Jenny; “I’d be quiet too.”