ostess stood in the doorway, watching in amused
tolerance as we filled and refilled our goblets. They were wonderful
goblets, be it said--the best the house afforded. Jonathan's was of
fancy green glass, all covered with little knobs; mine was yellow, with
a head of Washington stamped on one side, and "God Bless our Country" on
the other. Finally the good woman broke the silence-- "Guess your
mothers ain't never weaned ye." Which we were not in a position to
refute.

On our return train we found the same conductor who had taken us out in
the morning. As he folded back the green cover of our mileage book he
could not forbear remarking, quizzically, "Know how far you're goin'
to-night?"

"Jonathan," I said, as we settled to toast and tea before our home
fireplace that evening, "I like running away. I don't blame horses."

II

An Unprogressive Farm

Most of our friends, Jonathan's and mine, are occupying their summers in
"reclaiming" old farms. We have an old farm, too, but we, I fear, are
not reclaiming it, at least not very fast. We have made neither formal
gardens nor water gardens nor rose arches; we have not built marble
swimming-tanks, nor even cement ones; we have not naturalized
forget-me-nots in the brook or narcissus in the meadows; we have not
erected tea-houses on choice knolls, and after six years of occupancy
there is still not a pergola or a sundial on the place! And yet we are
happy.

To be happy on a farm like ours one must, I fancy, be either very old or
very unprogressive. While we are waiting to grow comfortably old, we are
willing to be considered unprogressive.

Very old and very, very unprogressive is the farm itself. There is
nothing on it but old apple trees, old lilac bushes, old rocks, and old
associations--and, to be sure, the old red house. But the old rocks,
piled on the hillsides, are unfailingly picturesque, whether dark and
dripping in the summer rains or silver gray in the summer suns. The
lilacs are delightful, too. In June they send wave upon wave of
fragrance in through the little windows, penetrating even to the
remotest corners of the dim old attic, while all day long about their
pale lavender sprays the great yellow and black butterflies hang
flutteringly. Best of all is the orchard; the old apple trees blossom
prodigally for a brief season in May, blossom in rosy-white, in
cream-white, in pure white, in green-white, transforming the lane and
the hill-slopes into a