s in, one is tempted to
say at impulsive first thought; but after all, as I mounted the last
hill before reaching the village, the houses took on a new look of
comfort and pleasantness; the fields that I knew so well were a
fresher green than before, the sun was down, and the provocations of
the day seemed very slight compared to the satisfaction. I believed
that with a little more time we should grow wiser about our fish and
other things beside.

It will be good to remember the white rose road and its quietness in
many a busy town day to come. As I think of these slight sketches, I
wonder if they will have to others a tinge of sadness; but I have
seldom spent an afternoon so full of pleasure and fresh and delighted
consciousness of the possibilities of rural life.

* * * * *

_The Town Poor_

Mrs. William Trimble and Miss Rebecca Wright were driving along
Hampden east road, one afternoon in early spring. Their progress was
slow. Mrs. Trimble's sorrel horse was old and stiff, and the wheels
were clogged by clay mud. The frost was not yet out of the ground,
although the snow was nearly gone, except in a few places on the north
side of the woods, or where it had drifted all winter against a length
of fence.

"There must be a good deal o' snow to the nor'ard of us yet," said
weather-wise Mrs. Trimble. "I feel it in the air; 'tis more than the
ground-damp. We ain't goin' to have real nice weather till the
up-country snow's all gone."

"I heard say yesterday that there was good sleddin' yet, all up
through Parsley," responded Miss Wright. "I shouldn't like to live in
them northern places. My cousin Ellen's husband was a Parsley man, an'
he was obliged, as you may have heard, to go up north to his father's
second wife's funeral; got back day before yesterday. 'T was about
twenty-one miles, an' they started on wheels; but when they'd gone
nine or ten miles, they found 't was no sort o' use, an' left their
wagon an' took a sleigh. The man that owned it charged 'em four an'
six, too. I shouldn't have thought he would; they told him they was
goin' to a funeral; an' they had their own buffaloes an' everything."

"Well, I expect it's a good deal harder scratchin', up that way; they
have to git money where they can; the farms is very poor as you go
north," suggested Mrs. Trimble kindly. "'T ain't none too rich a
country where we be, but I've always been grateful I wa'n't born up to
Pa