young girls appeared to look over his
collection.

"Am I mistaken," said he, at length, "in thinking I heard singing, as
I came over the meadow?"

"Well, I reckon not," said the old lady, "come, 'Sula, child, go on
with your song--maybe the young man would like to hear you; it was Old
Robin Gray she was singing."

Ursula was at length prevailed on to repeat the ballad, which she did
in a style so simple and unaffected, that, ere she had finished, the
young artist had made up his mind, that listening to a sweet voice by
moonlight, beneath a wide-spreading elm, with the stars peeping down
between the dancing leaves, and the soft evening breeze fanning his
temples, was far more delightful, than to recline in his
soft-cushioned box at the Opera, listening even to the delicious notes
of a Pico, with bright jewels, and still brighter eyes flashing around
him, and his cheek kissed by the inconstant air wafted from the
coquettish fan in the hands of smiling beauty. And, moreover, that the
book of human nature, to be studied in the country, certainly opened
very beautifully.

The evening passed off pleasantly. Leland confided to the old man his
poverty, and desire to obtain scholars in his art sufficient to
enable him to pay his board while in the village; that he had been
employed by several gentlemen to sketch scenes from nature, and that
having heard much of the beautiful views in the neighborhood, he had
been induced to visit the village.

But the old man thought he had much better turn farmer, and offered to
hire him for eight dollars a month, as he needed a hand in haying
time. This offer, however, the young man could not accept, being, as
he said, already engaged to complete the drawings. Then the old man
told how his fathers had lived there before him, and how by hard labor
he had been able to keep the old homestead his own; and that his
daughter, Hetty, had been living with a great heiress, who was very
fond of her, and who had given her leave to spend the summer at home;
and how she had come, and brought a poor girl with her, who made caps,
and such gim-cracks, and that (in a whisper) his old woman thought she
had never had any bringing-up, poor thing!"

When Leland returned to his lodgings, in the village, he thought over
his evening adventure with great pleasure. The simplicity of the old
people charmed him; Hetty he thought a modest, pretty girl; but it was
the little cap-maker who somehow or other dwelt mo