Near the house a trout brook comes plashing over the ledges.  At one place there is a most exquisite waterfall, to which neither painter’s brush nor writer’s pen can do justice.  The sunlight falls through flickering leaves into the deep glen, and makes the foam whiter and the brook more golden-brown.  You can hear the merry noise of it all night, all day, in the house.  A little way above the farmstead it comes through marshy ground, which I fear has been the cause of much illness and sorrow to the poor, troubled family.  I had a thrill of pain, as it seemed to me that the brook was mocking at all that trouble with all its wild carelessness and loud laughter, as it hurried away down the glen.

When we had said good-by and were turning the horses away, there suddenly appeared in a footpath that led down from one of the green hills the young grandchild, just coming home from school.  She was as quick as a bird, and as shy in her little pink gown, and balanced herself on one foot, like a flower.  The brother was the elder of the two orphans; he was the old man’s delight and dependence by day, while his hired man was afield.  The sober country boy had learned to wait and tend, and the young people were indeed a joy in that lonely household.  There was no sign that they ever played like other children,—­no truckle-cart in the yard, no doll, no bits of broken crockery in order on a rock.  They had learned a fashion of life from their elders, and already could lift and carry their share of the burdens of life.

It was a country of wild flowers; the last of the columbines were clinging to the hillsides; down in the small, fenced meadows belonging to the farm were meadow rue just coming in flower, and red and white clover; the golden buttercups were thicker than the grass, while many mulleins were standing straight and slender among the pine stumps, with their first blossoms atop.  Rudbeckias had found their way in, and appeared more than ever like bold foreigners.  Their names should be translated into country speech, and the children ought to call them “rude-beckies,” by way of relating them to bouncing-bets and sweet-williams.  The pasture grass was green and thick after the plentiful rains, and the busy cattle took little notice of us as they browsed steadily and tinkled their pleasant bells.  Looking off, the smooth, round back of Great Hill caught the sunlight with its fields of young grain, and all the long, wooded slopes and valleys were fresh and fair in the June weather, away toward the blue New Hampshire hills on the northern horizon.  Seaward stood Agamenticus, dark with its pitch pines, and the far sea itself, blue and calm, ruled the uneven country with its unchangeable line.