SPASS JAMES HOWIESON]

Sometime, I thought, this old farm will be owned by a man who is also
capable of possessing it. More than one such place I know already has
been taken by those who value the beauty of the hills and the old walls,
and the boulder-strewn fields. One I know is really possessed by a man
who long ago had a vision of sheep feeding on fields too infertile to
produce profitable crops, and many others have been taken by men who saw
forests growing where forests ought to grow. For real possession is not
a thing of inheritance or of documents, but of the spirit; and passes by
vision and imagination. Sometimes, indeed, the trespass signs stand
long--so long that we grow impatient--but nature is in no hurry. Nature
waits, and presently the trespass signs rot away, one arm falls off, and
lo! where the adventurer found only denial before he is now invited
to--"pass." The old walls are conquered by the wild cherries and purple
ivy and blackberry bushes, and the old Howiesons sleep in calm
forgetfulness of their rights upon the hills they thought they
possessed, and all that is left is a touch of beauty--lilac clump and
wild-rose tangle.

CHAPTER VII

LOOK AT THE WORLD!

"Give me to struggle with weather and wind;
Give me to stride through the snow;
Give me the feel of the chill on my cheeks,
And the glow and the glory within!"

_March 17th._

The joy of winter: the downright joy of winter! I tramped to-day through
miles of open, snow-clad country. I slipped in the ruts of the roads or
ploughed through the drifts in the fields with such a sense of adventure
as I cannot describe.

Day before yesterday we had a heavy north wind with stinging gusts of
snow. Yesterday fell bright and cold with snow lying fine and crumbly
like sugar. To the east of the house where I shovelled a path the heaps
are nearly as high as my shoulder....

This perfect morning a faint purplish haze is upon all the hills, with
bright sunshine and still, cold air through which the chimney smoke
rises straight upward. Hungry crows flap across the fields, or with
unaccustomed daring settle close in upon the manure heaps around the
barns. All the hillsides glisten and sparkle like cloth of gold, each
glass knob on the telephone poles is like a resplendent jewel, and the
long morning shadows of the trees lie blue upon the snow. Horses' feet
crunch upon the road as the early farmers go by with milk for the
creamery--the frosty br